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Esper3k
02-16-2012, 06:32 PM
I think we've beat the horse enough for now.

Let's talk about sideboarding. What strategies have you guys employed for the major archetypes (and taking out/bringing in - details!)?

Since my SB these days is still in flux (I like playing around with different options to see what works for me), I'll detail what I take out more than bring in.

I'm playing pFires (as if anyone who has been reading this thread recently at all doesn't know), so that's also a consideration here.

RUG Delver (w/ and w/o Stifle)
-2 Qasali Pridemage
-3 Stoneforge Mystic
+2 Path to Exile
+1 Maze of Ith
+2 Red Elemental Blast

Burn & UR Delver
-Not currently playing any particular tech for Burn since it hasn't been showing up in my meta, but probably take out stuff like Qasali's and add more removal / REBs

UW/x Stoneblade
-4 Swords to Plowshares
+3 REB
+any Chokes

Reanimator
-3 SFM
-3 Equipment
-3 Punishing Fires
+2 PtE
+1 Maze of Ith
+3 REB
+2 Tormod's Crypt
+1 Bojuka Bog

Dredge
-4 Swords to Plowshares
-1 Punishing Fires
-1 Thrun, the Last Troll
+2 Tormod's Crypt
+1 Bojuka Bog
+3 REB

Storm combo
-3 SFM
-4 StP
-1 Thrun
-1 Qasali
+3 REB
+2 Tormod's Crypt
+1 Bojuka Bog
+2 Canonist

BUG Control / Hymn+Blue decks
-Qasali / StP
+REB / Choke

Deadguy / Junk
-Depends on builds. PFires is better against Deadguy than against Junk. Qasali stays in against the builds running SFM.
+Graveyard hate, PtE/Maze package

Zoo / 2-3 color Sligh
-1 Qasali Pridemage
-1 Gaddock Teeg
-1 SFM
+2 PtE
+1 Maze

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-16-2012, 06:56 PM
Mother of runes is the best card in this deck, if you untap with it, you'll win 90% of those games, you dont give a crap if they stp your KotR.

This is absolutely not true.

The best card in the deck, and in fact the entire reason to play the deck, is Knight of the Reliquary. Let's just get that out of the way right now. Like the deck's reason for being is that a lot of decks just lose to Knight; anything RUG for instance.

The best argument for Mother of Runes in the deck, and in fact the only argument for it, is to protect your Knights from StP. It is only because of that unfavorable two card interaction that there is a reason for running the card at all. If you removed Knight, the deck would not exist; if you removed StP, Mom would be awful.

Without understanding this there's no way to advance a discussion of the deck intelligently. Equipment and other tricks exist as a backup to Knight, but she's route to victory #1.


I'm actualy thinking about going up to 4 stoenforge, adding a second jitte, the sylhana eldgewalker and a couple of those faith's shelds. That would give the deck a new dimension and an edge in the mirror imo.

I would encourage this as it's an interesting and potentially powerful card that I've been curious about since its printing. Probably won't pan out but no reason not to see.


I'm not a fan of pushing up our mana curve especially with things we can't tutor up unless it's absolutely busted.

An active defensive Mom stops Thrun + Jitte...

If they have to use Mother of Runes as a Drudge Skeletons then it's not exactly a threat, even if you don't have an Elspeth or StP or Wave or some other way of getting past that line of defense. A lone Mother of Runes is a pretty weak defense, ultimately, which was the reason I cut the card (besides it being a weak standalone card and even before the format had adapted to it; I think it was borderline before and obviously incorrect now.)

@Ruckus:

My current SB Plan is as follows:

2x Path to Exile
2x Eternal Witness
4x Tormod's Crypt
1x Gaddock Teeg
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
3x Nevermore

Still paired with this maindeck;

4x Noble Hierarch
4x Green Sun's Zenith
2x Scavening Ooze
2x Qasali Pridemage
2x Tarmogoyf
4x Knight of the Reliquary
2x Eternal Witness
2x Thrun, the Last Troll

4x Swords to Plowshares
2x Sensei's Divining Top
2x Sylvan Library
3x Umezawa's Jitte
2x Elspeth, Knight Errant
2x Parallax Wave

1x Maze of Ith
2x Wasteland
3x Horizon Canopy
1x Stirring Wildwood
1x Karakas
2x Dryad Arbor
4x Windswept Heath
2x Misty Rainforest
2x Forest
1x Plains
4x Savannah

Against RUG you go:

-2 Elspeth
-2 Pridemage
+2 Witness
+2 Path

Against Blade Control:

-4 StP
- Some other stuff I haven't decided yet, likely incuding Hierarchs
+2 Witness
+3 Nevermore
+3 Thalia

The idea here is that both Thalia and Nevermore are effective answers to their strategy of StPing infinite of your guys with Snapcaster (although I haven't actually tested Thalia in this match yet.)

Mirror is going to depend somewhat on how they're built, but bringing in +2 Path, +2 Witness is going to be your general go-to strategy against midrange creature-based decks.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-16-2012, 07:04 PM
Also, can I go into a side-rant here about how fucking ridiculous all the 1x Elspeth lists are? Like, what the fuck are you people living in terror of, the scenario where you have active Elspeth and then you lose because you have the second one in hand and gee it could've been a Scryb Ranger or whatever else you would run in that slot? Because surprise, that doesn't fucking happen.

Koby
02-16-2012, 07:07 PM
FWIW, I think IBA's Jitte numbers are probably the right way to go going forward. Jitte still performs all the junctions that the other equipment do, except provide stand alone protection. Just like it was during Kamigawa block, whoever maintains Jitte active (and isn't afraid to Legend-nuke their opponent's copy) will eventually take control and win.

Adding a 2nd Jitte in the SB is definitely right, and the third is probably right too.

majikal
02-16-2012, 07:16 PM
Also, can I go into a side-rant here about how fucking ridiculous all the 1x Elspeth lists are? Like, what the fuck are you people living in terror of, the scenario where you have active Elspeth and then you lose because you have the second one in hand and gee it could've been a Scryb Ranger or whatever else you would run in that slot? Because surprise, that doesn't fucking happen.
It's more like, "Gee, that could have been a Thrun". See, with so many Wastelands, Stifles, and Spell Pierces roaming around, running six maindeck 4-drops only seems like a good idea if you're Jack Elgin.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-16-2012, 07:39 PM
At least the way I built the deck RUG Tempo is a ludicriously favored matchup, so that argument is pretty irrelevant. With eight 1cc mana rampers you really want to be able to play enough powerful cards that you can overwhelm other attrition based decks like Blade Control and the mirror.

And unlike Thrun you can't tutor for an Elspeth. The Waves are questionable, but a minimum of 2x Elspeth should be mandatory in these lists. And that's assuming at least 2 Libraries.

Barbed Blightning
02-16-2012, 10:15 PM
My current SB Plan is as follows:

2x Path to Exile
2x Eternal Witness
4x Tormod's Crypt
1x Gaddock Teeg
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
3x Nevermore

Still paired with this maindeck;

4x Noble Hierarch
4x Green Sun's Zenith
2x Scavening Ooze
2x Qasali Pridemage
2x Tarmogoyf
4x Knight of the Reliquary
2x Eternal Witness
2x Thrun, the Last Troll

4x Swords to Plowshares
2x Sensei's Divining Top
2x Sylvan Library
3x Umezawa's Jitte
2x Elspeth, Knight Errant
2x Parallax Wave

1x Maze of Ith
2x Wasteland
3x Horizon Canopy
1x Stirring Wildwood
1x Karakas
2x Dryad Arbor
4x Windswept Heath
2x Misty Rainforest
2x Forest
1x Plains
4x Savannah



What's you justification for only 2 wastes, given the RUG/BUG/nonbasics running around currently? They were an auto 4-of for me. Also, Parallax Wave seems a weird choice imo, esp. given the dudes you could be running (aven mindcensor, for example, straight-up wins you games). Also, jitte's good an all, but Sword of Fire and Ice/Feast and Famine/Batterskull give you more to work with. Maybe I'm missing something here.

Matt
02-16-2012, 10:32 PM
TheInfamousBearAssassin,

I like your sideboard. I think you're running a little heavy on the Crypts, but besides that, pretty solid.

-Matthew

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-17-2012, 12:18 AM
I know that Parallax Wave seems like an odd choice, but, while I hate to fall back on this, I really think that it's important that anyone who's never played with the card do so. It's actually a very powerful card. These are the things it does;

- Nuke an opponent's defense and allow you to easily kill them for the turn or two they're without blockers (even with a Mom active.)
- Protect your own team from mass removal or even pinpoint removal.
- Combo with Pridemage to permanently exile a bevy of guys.
- Combo with Witness to get it back and keep their team exiled unless they break the loop.

It's actually a very powerful and flexible card.

As for cutting SFM and the associated package, I really find that, more so even now than in previous metas, there's little incentive to grab an equipment that's not Jitte, so the extra mana you pay for SFM gets you little. Jitte is much better to draw than the average of whatever other equipment you're running (meaning that yes, sometimes you rawdraw a SoFI where it's amazing, but on average a drawn SoFI is worse than a drawn Jitte,) and it's the most common tutor target, so there's no real reason to run another equipment that I can see, at least in the current meta.

Part of the plan of my build is also to get Thrun active with a Jitte against control, and on Thrun Jitte is much better than any given Sword of Herpaderp as it deals with the chump blocking problem. Trollstick is a plan few decks in the metagame can beat.

I'm not sure I even understand the Wasteland question. Against what matchup is it important enough to have more than double Wasteland that the manabase should be distorted further? I don't mind skipping one turn of attacking with Knight to try and nuke a key land, but anything past that and I'd rather be attacking. It's mainly there to take out Maze and Riptide Lab and other utility lands, not to try and craft a mana denial strategy.

@Matt: Thanks. I just find 4x Crypt to be a really reliable way to give yourself favorable matchups that would otherwise be nightmares, and I'm not sure what else is compelling enough to go to 3. Although I've wondered if a 2/2 Crypt/Faerie Marcabre split would be better.

Barbed Blightning
02-17-2012, 01:16 AM
All I see with Jitte off the draw is spell snare fodder, and while Stoneforge is too, if it sticks you get the card advantage. Also, stoneforge can't be touched by spell pierce.

Further, against the mirror, or a deck with big dudes (Reanimator) and Sword of Cool & Awesome keeps your Thrun alive, whereas Jitte just gets a few counters. A batterskull spells GG in certain matchups. Also, the diversity is just nice to have--3x jitte is consistent, sure, but I like to know that I have more answers than just that.

The wasteland question pertains to the greedier decks of legacy. RUG, for example, or Zoo. A T1/2 wasteland can be back-breaking against certain decks, and I don't want to rely on KotR to fetch it out. Also, I'm not seeing the level of destabilization your talking about (at least in my manabase).

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-17-2012, 01:29 AM
All I see with Jitte off the draw is spell snare fodder, and while Stoneforge is too, if it sticks you get the card advantage. Also, stoneforge can't be touched by spell pierce.

So Witness it back. Or just draw another Jitte which you have because you run multiples. Yes, Jitte can be dealt with. And it has to be. Or you'll just win.


Further, against the mirror, or a deck with big dudes (Reanimator) and Sword of Cool & Awesome keeps your Thrun alive, whereas Jitte just gets a few counters.

Thrun, as it turns out, has regeneration.


A batterskull spells GG in certain matchups.

Please name one where Jitte doesn't. Without costing five to re-equip.

Go on. I'll be over here, waiting.


Also, the diversity is just nice to have--3x jitte is consistent, sure, but I like to know that I have more answers than just that.

See I disagree. I think diversity feels nice to certain people because they feel like they can always draw the optimal card in any given situation. But take that to its logical outcome and you wind up with the list zulander posted in parody.

Diversity for its own sake is useless. Running four ofs isn't boring, it's good deckbuilding. I mean a toolbox can be worthwhile, I certainly don't advocate cutting Knight or GSZ, but it has to earn its keep.

I don't really think SFM is doing that in the meta, not when Jitte already does so much. Like, SFM isn't free. SFM into Jitte into equip is six mana, a full half again as much as you'd have spent just raw-drawing the Jitte.


The wasteland question pertains to the greedier decks of legacy. RUG, for example, or Zoo. A T1/2 wasteland can be back-breaking against certain decks, and I don't want to rely on KotR to fetch it out. Also, I'm not seeing the level of destabilization your talking about (at least in my manabase).

Well I have a lot of gg and ww spells; you may have less.

I find mana denial to be a really shaky and unreliable strategy and don't want to build the deck to pursue it. A strategy that starts sucking if they draw a couple lands, and might even bite you on the ass, isn't really important enough to run the third Wasteland to me, although I don't think there's anything intrinsically wrong with it.

Barbed Blightning
02-17-2012, 02:08 AM
When thrun regenerates, he deals no damage. Thus no jitte counters. With a sword, the combo of protection and +2/+2 allows him to actually kill things. Further, you can equip a Sword to a mindcensor/scryb/dweeb and block all day.

Batterskull ends games against Fish--which does run jitte.

The way I see SFM is this: It's a 1/2 creature that fetches you a sword. The vialing ability circumvents larger costs (Skull, Swords, etc.) Nigh-pointless with Jitte, I understand, but it gets around counterspells. Either way, it's still a decent Squire that replaces itself in your hand.

I get the point of playsets--that's why I run 4 KotRs & GSZs. Consistency is key in making a good deck. However, being too consistent makes you predictable. Matches are won not in the first game but in the 2nd and 3rd. I like the ability to avoid something like Pithing Needle G2/G3. Even if they name my Mystic I still get the tutoring.

A final note: do you always respond to comments and critique with snarky dogmatism? I mean, this is a forum dedicated to improving a deck archetype and those who play it--not to prove you can come up with witty comebacks or put-downs. It's ultimately uninviting to new ideas and development. Just food for thought. ;)

Koby
02-17-2012, 02:16 AM
You should read the game rules on regeneration before posting like a fool.

sdematt
02-17-2012, 03:47 AM
I'm just going to do a big IIRC, since I haven't regenerated basically anything since pre-6th:

You form a "regeneration bubble" so the next time it would be destroyed, it instead isn't. Isn't that the basic gist? You still deal and receive damage normally, just instead of dying, you don't. Correct?

-Matt

arcannys
02-17-2012, 03:51 AM
A lone Mother of Runes is a pretty weak defense, ultimately, which was the reason I cut the card

I was actualy giving you credit until i read this. You're so wrong, so, so wrong.
And btw, i won't argue over this, you can try to justify yourself as much as you want.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-17-2012, 04:02 AM
@sdematt: Yes, your creature still deals damage.

@arcannys: Okay, whatever. Nice Drudge Skeleton.

arcannys
02-17-2012, 04:12 AM
http://www.thecouncil.es/tcdecks/tipo.php?archetype=Maverick&format=Legacy

Just the first page, tell me how many lists are not running moms?
If its more than 5% i wont say anything. If its less than 5% you should concider if you're doing something wrong.

And btw, if you're using your moms as blokers you might want to reconsider how you play the deck.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-17-2012, 04:20 AM
http://www.thecouncil.es/tcdecks/tipo.php?archetype=Maverick&format=Legacy

Just the first page, tell me how many lists are not running moms?
If its more than 5% i wont say anything. If its less than 5% you should concider if you're doing something wrong.

Efficient market theory and therefore irrelevant.


And btw, if you're using your moms as blokers you might want to reconsider how you play the deck.

Well hi welcome to the conversation, that was my point. If your opponent is using Mom to fog a dude you're in pretty good shape, the only time it's really scary is when it's paired with Knight.

Also,


And btw, i won't argue over this, you can try to justify yourself as much as you want.

You not only did you then basically conceded my point.

Do people think shit like this is a figure of speech or what.

arcannys
02-17-2012, 04:31 AM
I cant believe you're discussing if mom is not good in this deck. This is absurd.
Still waiting for you to show me a list without mom, beside yours...

makochman
02-17-2012, 04:38 AM
Mother of runes is the best card in this deck

QFT. It's a lot like Goblin Lackey in Goblins.

arcannys
02-17-2012, 04:43 AM
QFT. It's a lot like Goblin Lackey in Goblins.

Thank you, finally some sanity around here.
It's a fact that i've never lost more than 15% of my games where i untapped with mom against non-combo decks.

menace13
02-17-2012, 06:55 AM
QFT. It's a lot like Goblin Lackey in Goblins.
NO.



Thank you, finally some sanity around here.
It's a fact that i've never lost more than 15% of my games where i untapped with mom against non-combo decks.
So now we are just going to throw out random numbers backed and evidenced by your word?

lyracian
02-17-2012, 08:01 AM
Okay, whatever. Nice Drudge SkeletonI see Mom more as a Maze than a Drudge. Most of the time she stops things attacking, occasionally counters a kill spell or lets a Knight get through.

One of the main things Mom does for me is keep Mystic alive so that I can get Equipment past countermagic. Now you have dropped Mystics and are running multiple can-not-be-countered-creatures who are also immune to spot removal so I can see why you have taken Mom out. It does not stop her being a great creature though.


I don't really think SFM is doing that in the meta, not when Jitte already does so much. Like, SFM isn't free. SFM into Jitte into equip is six mana, a full half again as much as you'd have spent just raw-drawing the Jitte.Without Swords and BSkull Mystic is doing very little more than being a squire with 'draw a card'. Your deck has dropped the white creatures in favour of more library manipulation and being able to Zenith for what you want. I am certainly going to try out Parallax Wave (since I have not used it for years).

How often do you actually find yourself using Top to draw cards? I was thinking of adding a Mirri's Guile to my deck since it does not require mana to use.


I'm not sure I even understand the Wasteland question. Against what matchup is it important enough to have more than double Wasteland that the manabase should be distorted further?I find it helpful to stop control decks getting to four mana for Wrath, and it can be a way to get around Daze but I have also suffered muligan due to double wasteland. Mana denial is an extra strategy but perhaps man-lands like Stirring Wildwood are a better use of that slot. How often have you found the Wildwood attacks, or even blocks, or is is mostly a comes-into-play-tapped-dual?

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-17-2012, 09:38 AM
I see Mom more as a Maze than a Drudge. Most of the time she stops things attacking, occasionally counters a kill spell or lets a Knight get through.

One of the main things Mom does for me is keep Mystic alive so that I can get Equipment past countermagic. Now you have dropped Mystics and are running multiple can-not-be-countered-creatures who are also immune to spot removal so I can see why you have taken Mom out. It does not stop her being a great creature though.

To expound a bit, my problem with the original decklists were that fundamentally they relied too much on team-building, and lacked both enough individually strong cards and manipulation to put a gameplan together.

And there's a lot of decks and cards that prey on such a configuration, from Counterbalance to Jitte, Lavamancer and Cursed Scroll to just plain Sweepers. It also makes it much harder to mulligan successfully.


How often do you actually find yourself using Top to draw cards? I was thinking of adding a Mirri's Guile to my deck since it does not require mana to use.

After a certain point in mana development, pretty much always. At that point it smooths out your draws without costing a card which is pretty important in grinding situations, although I can't say Guile would be terrible, although my guess is worse than either Top or Library.


I find it helpful to stop control decks getting to four mana for Wrath, and it can be a way to get around Daze but I have also suffered muligan due to double wasteland. Mana denial is an extra strategy but perhaps man-lands like Stirring Wildwood are a better use of that slot. How often have you found the Wildwood attacks, or even blocks, or is is mostly a comes-into-play-tapped-dual?

I've found blocking Delvers with it to be pretty important, and have been pondering squeezing in a second. It's also a nice answer to Jace.

Barbed Blightning
02-17-2012, 02:59 PM
I'm just going to do a big IIRC, since I haven't regenerated basically anything since pre-6th:

You form a "regeneration bubble" so the next time it would be destroyed, it instead isn't. Isn't that the basic gist? You still deal and receive damage normally, just instead of dying, you don't. Correct?

-Matt

Regeneration explicitly states that the creature is tapped and removed from combat.

For those who think I'm a fool:


"614.8. Regeneration is a destruction-replacement effect. The word “instead” doesn’t appear on the card
but is implicit in the definition of regeneration. “Regenerate [permanent]” means “The next time
[permanent] would be destroyed this turn, instead remove all damage marked on it and tap it. If it’s
an attacking or blocking creature, remove it from combat.” Abilities that trigger from damage being
dealt still trigger even if the permanent regenerates"

majikal
02-17-2012, 03:15 PM
Regeneration explicitly states that the creature is tapped and removed from combat.

For those who think I'm a fool:


"614.8. Regeneration is a destruction-replacement effect. The word “instead” doesn’t appear on the card
but is implicit in the definition of regeneration. “Regenerate [permanent]” means “The next time
[permanent] would be destroyed this turn, instead remove all damage marked on it and tap it. If it’s
an attacking or blocking creature, remove it from combat.” Abilities that trigger from damage being
dealt still trigger even if the permanent regenerates"
Are you implying that creatures die in combat before they deal damage?

I'm just asking your expert opinion, since you are obviously no fool.

Koby
02-17-2012, 03:18 PM
Regeneration explicitly states that the creature is tapped and removed from combat.

For those who think I'm a fool:


"614.8. Regeneration is a destruction-replacement effect. The word “instead” doesn’t appear on the card
but is implicit in the definition of regeneration. “Regenerate [permanent]” means “The next time permanent] would be destroyed this turn, instead remove all damage marked on it and tap it. If it’s an attacking or blocking creature, remove it from combat.” Abilities that trigger from damage being dealt still trigger even if the permanent regenerates"

"614.1. Some continuous effects are replacement effects. Like prevention effects (see rule 615), replacement effects apply continuously as events happen--they aren't locked in ahead of time. Such effects watch for a particular event that would happen and completely or partially replace that event with a different event. They act like "shields" around whatever they're affecting."

arcannys
02-17-2012, 03:19 PM
Just to close the regenaration thing up.
Regenration is a replacement oeffect of being destroyed.
Creatures in combat deal damage to each other, then if there lethal damage on those creatures they die. If a creature has regeneration up, it will be tapped and removed from combat instead of being destroyed. All that after dealing combat damage.

rxavage
02-17-2012, 05:59 PM
This may also be a ridiculously stupid question, but I have to ask. Do you have to pay for the regeneration before combat damage or can you just leave the mana open and IF the creature (thrun) receives leathal you pay for it?

Koby
02-17-2012, 06:10 PM
This may also be a ridiculously stupid question, but I have to ask. Do you have to pay for the regeneration before combat damage or can you just leave the mana open and IF the creature (thrun) receives leathal you pay for it?

Regeneration "shields" must be up before lethal damage is dealt or a destroy effect resolves.

fallenphoenix
02-17-2012, 06:12 PM
That used to work pre-tenth-edition. Nowadays, if Your opponent askes "Damage?" and you say "Okay", Thrun dies and there isn't much you can do about it.
Last opportunity would be at the end of 'declare blockers'-step.

rxavage
02-18-2012, 08:54 AM
That used to work pre-tenth-edition. Nowadays, if Your opponent askes "Damage?" and you say "Okay", Thrun dies and there isn't much you can do about it.
Last opportunity would be at the end of 'declare blockers'-step.

SO, you can wait until blockers have been declared but must cast before before combat damage? I really have to read the comprehensive rules and commit them to memory. I know it would improve my game so much.

fallenphoenix
02-18-2012, 09:25 AM
SO, you can wait until blockers have been declared but must cast before before combat damage?

Exactly. By resolving the "Regenerate ~this"-ability, you create a regeneration-shield around the creature. A creature can have as many of those, as you can pay for.

The creature will then still deal it's damage, unless it is destroyed/dealt leathal damage before the 'combat damage'-step or before it would deal damage (by a creature with first strike).

If it is assigned lethal damage or destroyed, it will be regenerated, which means that all damage will be removed from it (no matter how much it has been dealt) and it will be removed from combat. Also, one of it's regeneration-shields is now used up and gone.

Effects that trigger on combat damage, like Jitte, still apply, as long as the creature has not been regenerated before it's damage assignment.

Koby
02-18-2012, 12:38 PM
I'm not sure what to make of this list... (4-0 in MTGO Legacy Daily Event this past week)

61 cards:
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Flooded Strand
2 Forest
1 Gaea's Cradle
1 Karakas
1 Maze of Ith
1 Misty Rainforest
2 Plains
4 Savannah
4 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath
23 lands

1 Aven Mindcensor
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
2 Eternal Witness
3 Fauna Shaman
4 Knight of the Reliquary
1 Loyal Retainers
3 Mother of Runes
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Reveillark
2 Scavenging Ooze
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
26 creatures

2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Sylvan Library
12 other spells

Sideboard
2 Choke
2 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Gaddock Teeg
1 Krosan Grip
2 Life from the Loam
2 Path to Exile
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Tormod's Crypt

Maëlig
02-18-2012, 02:26 PM
Interesting, I remember playing a similar list a while back after survival got banned. Unfortunately I think the combo just isn't viable anymore with everyone and their mother playing surgical.

sdematt
02-18-2012, 03:59 PM
Looks like someone wants to justify having spent $120 on Loyal Retainers two years ago.

-Matt

pryite199
02-18-2012, 04:01 PM
Try closer to $0.11 since its from MTGO.

menace13
02-18-2012, 05:27 PM
The Lark looks good as it gets back every creature in the deck aside Thrun or Elesh.

arcannys
02-18-2012, 05:40 PM
Remeber when i said i wanted to try adding the 4th SFM, the 2nd jitte, silhana ledgewalker and 2 faith's Shield?
Well, today i put the deck together and they didn't give me any other choice but to win the tournament..

This is the list i played:

// Lands
1 [JGC] Maze of Ith
1 [FUT] Dryad Arbor
2 [FUT] Horizon Canopy
1 [US] Gaea's Cradle
1 [LG] Karakas
4 [R] Savannah
4 [TE] Wasteland
4 [JGC] Windswept Heath
1 [CHK] Plains (4)
2 [SOM] Forest (3)

// Creatures
4 [FNM] Mother of Runes
3 [CFX] Noble Hierarch
1 [RAV] Birds of Paradise
2 [FNM] Qasali Pridemage
4 [CFX] Knight of the Reliquary
4 [WWK] Stoneforge Mystic
2 [TSP] Scryb Ranger
1 [CMD] Scavenging Ooze
1 [MBS] Gaddock Teeg
1 [GP] Silhana Ledgewalker

// Spells
4 [MBS] Green Sun's Zenith
4 [FNM] Swords to Plowshares
2 [4E] Sylvan Library
1 [V10] Sword of Fire and Ice
2 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
1 [DS] Sword of Feast and Famine
2 [DKA] Faith's Shield

// Sideboard
SB: 2 [GTW] Path to Exile
SB: 1 [WWK] Bojuka Bog
SB: 3 [ALA] Ethersworn Canonist
SB: 2 [FBP] Surgical Extraction
SB: 1 [ALA] Elspeth, Knight-Errant
SB: 2 [WWK] Nature's Claim
SB: 1 [ISD] Garruk Relentless/Garruk, the Veil-Cursed
SB: 1 [ALA] Rhox War Monk
SB: 2 [FNM] Kitchen Finks

We were somewhat around 50 players, 6 rounds + top8.
Here's a mini report:

R1: Reanimator
G1: He plays an animate dead on a gin gitaxias turn 2. Somehow he doesnt draw a counterspell for my qasali and looses his giaxias. I draw my karakas naturaly on the folowing turns and he cant race me with an inkwell leviathan that he was forced to reanimate.
G2: He has elesh norm and iona turn 4.
G3: I curve out noble into reliquary that resolves. Thats prety much GG since i can keep bojuka bog up the whole game.
2-1 3 Points
SB:
+3 canonist (it's annoying and lets me resolve STP without fear)
+2 Surgical
+2 Path
+1 Bojuka Bog
-4 SFM
-4 Equipment

R2: GW Zenith mirror match. This is a very good player and i end up splitting the finals with him.
G1:I keep a land light hand on the draw and i miss 1 landrop that's enough to put me too far behind.
G2:I play noble into x2 mother of runes.
G3:We both have good starts but my opponent get a little bit flooded and cant deal with my jitte. I SFM for my second Jitte (to ensure the win) the turn before he scoops.
2-1 6 Points
SB:
+2 path
+1 elspeth
+1garruk
+1 bojuka
-1 SOFI
-1 Gaddock Teeg
-2 KOTR
-1 Karakas
R3:NO Bant
G1: He casts NO on turn 4 and while I look at the gaddock in my hand. Who the fuck plays NO nowadays?
G2: I STP his nobles and wasteland his lands so that he never has 4 mana. Jitte closes the deal.
G3:I zenith for gaddock Teeg on turn 2 that gets answered by 3 KOTR. The game goes very long but i cant never deal witha a pair of KOTR + goyf, and a karakas for my gaeddock wins him the game. Disapointing round. I messed up a couple times and i lost.
1-2 6 Points.
SB:
+2 Path
+1 Bojuka
-1 SOFI
-1 KotR
-1 Karakas
R4:Canadian Threshold
G1: I curve out prefectly and he cant answer all my threads.
G2: Normal Tempo game, with stifles, wastelands and dazes.
G3 t1 Noble, t2 x mom, and susprisingly he cant kill them.
3-1 9 Points.
SB:
+2 path
+2 Finks
+1 Rhox war monk
-2 Qasali
-1 SOFAF
-2 faith's shield (We dont have time to play a thread + leave 1 mana up for shield most of the times, and is not very good against lavamancer and grudge).

R5: Punishing Zoo
G1: Silhana jitte
G2: Silhana jitte = grudge :(
G3: Silhana jitte.
2-1 12 Points
SB:
+2 path
+2 finks
+1 Rhox war monk
+1 Elspeth
-1 Gaddock
-2 Qasali
-2 Scryb ranger
-1 something.

R6: ID

Top8: Bant Maverick
My opponent tried to bounce my Jitte with karakas. That prety much sumes up the whole match.
Best play of the tournament: Nature's claim your SOLAS, block your KOTR with my deathtouch garruk token.

Top4: RUG aggro (similar to canadin threshold but with kird appes and no stifles)
G1: I STP his first 2 threads and i play Sylvan library at 20 life.
G2: he plays a grudge for my 2 equipment an about 2-3 bolt 2-3 submerge. At some point he flips a delver with a Back to nature, and the crowd goes wild because i had no hand and only my sylvan library in play.
G3: this math was very close i have a jitte with some counters and i am at 2 life for about 2 turns that he can topdeck 2 bolts to kill me, or even a krosan grip that he showed me G1. In the end he doesnt draw it and a 10/10 Kotr + jitte finished the job.

SB:
+2 Finks
+2 Path
+1 Rhox war monk
-2 Qasali
-1 Gaddock
-2 something....

Finals I split the price.

Faith's shield was awesome the whole day, it took a lot of ppl off guard.
Silhana ledgewalker is a complete garbage. It's only good against zoo (out only out punishing + swords+path+bolts+chains lighitnigs). Everytime i GSZ for it i ended up facing 2 enormous KotR or an ancient grudge. Everyone sides in artifact removal against us so Silhana is not very good w/o equipment.

The garruk in the sideboars was insane. It won one of the games in the top8 by himself. Letting me tutor up for w/e card i needed and providing an stream of deathough tokens that made an unpenetrable wall and axcelent equipment holders...
The 2 planeswalkers are an excelent answer to Deed decks or Perish/virtue's ruin.

I was also trying that single Rhox war monk in my SB. It was very good against zoo and Canadian threshold. It can be cast off a noble hierarch or you can GSZ it.

I'll be playing around with faith's shield some more, this card is just the nuts. I won't play with Silhana anymore, it's garbage.

Koby
02-18-2012, 06:07 PM
I wouldn't recommend Ledgewalker if you don't anticipate much UW StoneBlade. It was selected specifically for Snapcaster Mage + StP/PtE matchups. Thrun's better in that respect too, but they typically have blockers for Thrun.

arcannys
02-18-2012, 06:16 PM
I wanted to go up to 4 stoneforge, 2 jittes and silhana, and kind of go allin on the qeuipment plan with faith's shield. But silhana is garbage.

Koby
02-18-2012, 06:23 PM
I wanted to go up to 4 stoneforge, 2 jittes and silhana, and kind of go allin on the qeuipment plan with faith's shield. But silhana is garbage.

Great, it doesn't work in a metagame with a ton of Mavericks. I could have told you that in the onset.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-18-2012, 07:10 PM
I'm confused by your conclusion, since based on the tournament report you wrote, Silhana won you at least one round, and you don't even mention using Faith's Shield in any of your games.

arcannys
02-18-2012, 07:28 PM
Silhana only won me the Zoo Match. He had Pfires, STP, path, bolt and chain ligthinigns and grudge post board. She was awful in the other MUs.
Well, whats to be told about shield? It countered a lot of STP, qasalis, etc.. I killed a jace giving pro green to my KotR so it couldnt be blocked. It did what it was meant to do. That was a fast report, im not gonna write every single situation in which i cast shield and i dont have the time either.

Koby
02-18-2012, 07:31 PM
Silhana only won me the Zoo Match. He had Pfires, STP, path, bolt and chain ligthinigns.
Well, whats to be told about shield? It countered a lot of STP, qasalis, etc.. I killed a jace giving pro green to my KotR to so it couldnt be blocked. It did what it was meant to do. That was a fast report, im not gonna write every single situation in which i cast shield and i dont have the time either.

And that's all it is supposed to do - ignore spot removal. It's not a very strong beater, but it has the important abilities. You already ran the necessary equipment, so this is what makes Ledgewalker good. It should be considered part of the SFM package.

arcannys
02-18-2012, 07:43 PM
And that's all it is supposed to do - ignore spot removal. It's not a very strong beater, but it has the important abilities. You already ran the necessary equipment, so this is what makes Ledgewalker good. It should be considered part of the SFM package.

I ..know...thanks..

Richard Cheese
02-18-2012, 07:53 PM
Is the Fateful Hour on Faith's Shield really worth playing it over Emerge Unscathed, which nobody plays anyway?

arcannys
02-18-2012, 07:59 PM
Is the Fateful Hour on Faith's Shield really worth playing it over Emerge Unscathed, which nobody plays anyway?

Emerge Unscathed only protects cratures.
Shield protects permanents (equipments sylvan library). Emerge is WAY more narrow than shield.
Shield can even counter Tendrils of agony :)

sdematt
02-19-2012, 02:36 AM
Well, it'll make the last few lethal copies go to crap.

-Matt

trilobite_hives
02-19-2012, 03:48 AM
After seeing some people running Maverick with Blue for Jace and Geist of St. Traft, I took the GW shell and added black for Dark Confidant and Pernicious Deed. So I guess it's kinda like Junk without any discard plus Mom, and it's been performing pretty well in limited testing. Here's what I've been running:

4x GSZ
4x Knight of the Reliquary
4x Noble Hierarch
4x Mom
3x Stoneforge Mystic
1x Jitte
1x SoFaF
2x Top
1x Scryb Ranger
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Eternal Witness
1x Pridemage
4x Dark Confidant
3x Pernicious Deed
4x StP
1x Maze of Ith
3x Wasteland
1x Karakas
1x Dryad Arbor
4x Windswept Heath
3x Verdant Catacombs
3x Savannah
2x Bayou
2x Scrubland
1x Plains
1x Forest
1x Swamp

Maybe this list needs to be posted in the Junk forum. Maybe I'm a dummy for playing 61 cards. Maybe more people are doing this and I'm just not noticing it, but Pernicious Deed absolutely devastates the mirror. Dark Confidant keeps me running on gas with extra draws that always seem to be able to keep me ahead. Granted, I've only really tested the mirror, against U/W Stoneblade and Reanimator, but it seems really solid for something I just kind of threw together.

I know there's improvements that can be made, and I'm willing to listen to any constructive criticism. After a bit of testing the Witness seems a little slow, and I feel like I could maybe cut it and go down to 2 Deed and play like 2 Vindicates? I have a well documented irrational love for that card, but it seems like there are so many situations where it would be great to have around. I realize nothing close to this has done well at any events, and Maverick has kinda disappeared in the past couple weeks, but I really feel like this deck is pretty powerful. I know I straight up lose to combo, but don't all versions of this deck do that?

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-19-2012, 05:39 AM
Deed seems like a really powerful tool right now for hosing all the decks running equipment and a lot of cheap dudes.

On that note...

SlopeeJ
02-19-2012, 06:41 AM
I would love to play against maverick and have them deeds their whole board away.


devastates the mirror
I find this really interesting and my first thought was really dude? Seriously

randomly.anonymous
02-19-2012, 09:13 AM
I think a black splash for Confidant is alright. Deed seems a bit counterproductive. Vindicate is far better in its slot.

There's a section about the black splash in the primer.

arcannys
02-19-2012, 09:14 AM
deck with Deed != mirror match.
That deck looks to me like a very bad junk deck. How do u play Deed in a deck with noble hierarchs, moms, and confidant? I think you're trying to mix 2 different decks by taking the best spells of each of those, but there's a reason why noone has done that before...

Esper3k
02-19-2012, 12:01 PM
On a positive note, I want to say how awesome this deck is regardless of the different variations we're playing.

I took a break from it this week for our weekly tournament and definitely regretted it!

trilobite_hives
02-19-2012, 01:09 PM
deck with Deed != mirror match.
That deck looks to me like a very bad junk deck. How do u play Deed in a deck with noble hierarchs, moms, and confidant? I think you're trying to mix 2 different decks by taking the best spells of each of those, but there's a reason why noone has done that before...

That's the type of response I was expecting, and you know as well as I do that boardstates in the mirror can get wildly out of hand extremely fast. When I say mirror I mean just Maverick in general, I should have been more specific. The mirror comes down, usually, to whoever drops the first Mom (or two) and after playing Junk for so long, I'm used to losing a couple Mox Diamonds or something along the way if it means I can save myself from a game that would have otherwise gotten out of hand.

I agree it seems counterproductive, but if I can follow up a Deed board wipe with almost anything, especially a Confidant, stock Maverick decks just can't ever seem to get back into the game. I'm just looking for something to break the mirror and trying different shit. Is NO/Prog really the best we can do? Now that everyone will see that coming, should I just play stock GW and assume I'm better with the deck than my opponent? This deck is really popular around here.

arcannys
02-19-2012, 01:29 PM
check my list from couple posts ago, it has an edge in the mirror.
loosing a couple moxes when you already have 4+lands in play isn's as big of a deal as loosing your own noble hierarchs, your confidants etc...
Plus any sane player will never overextend to a Deed deck, so it's no that devastating as you think. If you check my list you'll see i have 2 planes walkers in my board against deed and perish/virtue's ruin decks.

angel882
02-19-2012, 01:30 PM
Hi, I played today in a local tournament first time with my GWr Maverick. I ended up first with 5-0 result.

GWr Maverick:

1 Birds of Paradise
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Mother of Runes
3 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
1 Scryb Ranger
3 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Tarmogoyf
1 Gaddock Teeg

3 Punishing Fire
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
4 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Life from the Loam
1 Sylvan Library

1 Forest
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Plateau
4 Savannah
2 Taiga
3 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Karakas

SB:
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Choke
3 Enlightened Tutor
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Batterskull
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Garruk Relentless
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Stony Silence

I played against
R1: Reanimator (2-0): g1: I don't know what my opp is playing and I have opening hand Noble, Ranger, GSZ and 4 Lands (one of them is Karakas). I decide to keep and my opp flips when I play second turn Karakas. Lucky me :) g2: Opp has Blazing Archon and I have Mom and Ranger. It takes long but finally I lock the game and draw StoP to Archon.
R2: Dragon Stompy (2-1): g1: I know I'm playing against Dragon Stompy so I just fetch basic forest and just race with Noble and Jitte g2: I mull to 4 and opp plays t1 chalice@1 g3: I start hand with 3 GSZ, KotR, 1??, 2 Lands. Fetch basic forest and just win the game with two KotR and Garruk.
R3: UB Aggro (2-1)
R4: Affinity (2-0): g1: I stabilize with Ranger and Jitte g2: ETutor to Stony Silence -> opp skuups :)
R5: The Gate (2-0): g1: I just race my opp because he doesn't get third land g2: I stabilize at 3 life. My opp has Bitterblossom (4 fearies), powder keg and I have Mystic, Batterskull and Library.

I did use my whole sideboard except Canonist.

+ Sylvan Library, Great!!!
+ Scryb Ranger (Maybe add second)
+ Garruk Relentless
+ Batterskull
+ Thrun, the Last Troll

I Think there is no negative to say about this list. I love it.

Fade
02-19-2012, 01:42 PM
Hi, I played today in a local tournament first time with my GWr Maverick. I ended up first with 5-0 result.

GWr Maverick:

1 Birds of Paradise
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Mother of Runes
3 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
1 Scryb Ranger
3 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Tarmogoyf
1 Gaddock Teeg

3 Punishing Fire
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
4 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Life from the Loam
1 Sylvan Library

1 Forest
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Plateau
4 Savannah
2 Taiga
3 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Karakas

SB:
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Choke
3 Enlightened Tutor
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Batterskull
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Garruk Relentless
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Stony Silence

I played against
R1: Reanimator (2-0): g1: I don't know what my opp is playing and I have opening hand Noble, Ranger, GSZ and 4 Lands (one of them is Karakas). I decide to keep and my opp flips when I play second turn Karakas. Lucky me :) g2: Opp has Blazing Archon and I have Mom and Ranger. It takes long but finally I lock the game and draw StoP to Archon.
R2: Dragon Stompy (2-1): g1: I know I'm playing against Dragon Stompy so I just fetch basic forest and just race with Noble and Jitte g2: I mull to 4 and opp plays t1 chalice@1 g3: I start hand with 3 GSZ, KotR, 1??, 2 Lands. Fetch basic forest and just win the game with two KotR and Garruk.
R3: UB Aggro (2-1)
R4: Affinity (2-0): g1: I stabilize with Ranger and Jitte g2: ETutor to Stony Silence -> opp skuups :)
R5: The Gate (2-0): g1: I just race my opp because he doesn't get third land g2: I stabilize at 3 life. My opp has Bitterblossom (4 fearies), powder keg and I have Mystic, Batterskull and Library.

I did use my whole sideboard except Canonist.

+ Sylvan Library, Great!!!
+ Scryb Ranger (Maybe add second)
+ Garruk Relentless
+ Batterskull
+ Thrun, the Last Troll

I Think there is no negative to say about this list. I love it.

How do you feel about the cage in your board? Do you find it to be a hinderance with your GSZ?

trilobite_hives
02-19-2012, 02:13 PM
check my list from couple posts ago, it has an edge in the mirror.
loosing a couple moxes when you already have 4+lands in play isn's as big of a deal as loosing your own noble hierarchs, your confidants etc...
Plus any sane player will never overextend to a Deed deck, so it's no that devastating as you think. If you check my list you'll see i have 2 planes walkers in my board against deed and perish/virtue's ruin decks.

If I have Hierarchs, Confidants, Moms, etc. then I'm probably ahead due to Confidant. But you're probably right, most of the time I completely caught my opponents off guard because they weren't expecting the Deed, and while it was a competent player was still new to the deck. I guess the most I could hope for would be to steal a few game 1's or something with it. I may give your list a try, it looks pretty interesting. Love the Ledgewalker. Now to try to find my foil....

arcannys
02-19-2012, 02:22 PM
:/ ledgewalker is awful you didnt read my post :(
Well i only played it on that tornament and it didn't impress me, i might give it another try... but my first impression was that it's not very good in a metagame full of mirror matches... Never played against caw blade and it destroyed Zoo tho... Apart from that it was either outclassed or too slow. I had a game were i had turn 2 zenith for silhana, turn 3 SFM for jitter, turn 4 jitte equip and he grudged my jitte, so the only think i did until turn 4 was to play 2 1/1's...And he even had the grudge flashback if i drew another equipment..

arcannys
02-19-2012, 02:23 PM
:/ ledgewalker is awful you didnt read my post :(
Well i only played it on that tornament and it didn't impress me, i might give it another try... but my first impression was that it's not very good in a metagame full of mirror matches... Never played against caw blade and it destroyed Zoo tho... Apart from that it was either outclassed or too slow. I had a game were i had turn 2 zenith for silhana, turn 3 SFM for jitter, turn 4 jitte equip and he grudged my jitte, so the only think i did until turn 4 was to play 2 1/1's...And he even had the grudge flashback if i drew another equipment..
PD: sry for double post, my internet freezed for a sec..

angel882
02-19-2012, 02:32 PM
How do you feel about the cage in your board? Do you find it to be a hinderance with your GSZ?

Today it wasn't relevant but I haven't tested it so much. This was the first time because I was expecting a lot of Dredge.

arcannys
02-19-2012, 02:34 PM
cage doesn't beat dredge.

Koby
02-19-2012, 03:14 PM
majikal vs Gearhart in SCG feature match right now.

@majikal:
What was your reasoning for casting Surgical on Tundra in Game 2?

angel882
02-19-2012, 03:52 PM
cage doesn't beat dredge.

Cage shuts
- Narco
- Ichorid
- Flashbacks

So almoust evrything. Only way Dredge can survive is to cast artifact removal from hand.

arcannys
02-19-2012, 04:00 PM
im fully aware of what cage does againt dredge, but they're playin 8 looting effects,cards still go to the graveyad unil they find a way to kill the cage and they just explode on your face.
I saw a match were 1 player cast 3 cage on turn 1 and 2, his dredge opponent played his 3rd land and cast shattering sptree for 3.

angel882
02-19-2012, 04:42 PM
im fully aware of what cage does againt dredge, but they're playin 8 looting effects,cards still go to the graveyad unil they find a way to kill the cage and they just explode on your face.
I saw a match were 1 player cast 3 cage on turn 1 and 2, his dredge opponent played his 3rd land and cast shattering sptree for 3.

Ok, I understand. I haven't seen people playing shattering spree in Dredge, in my meta they are usually playing Ancient Grudge so that's why it's harder to get rid of Cage. I know that it won't shut any deck immediately but it will buy us time to find a real answer and win the game :)

arcannys
02-19-2012, 04:46 PM
they shouldnt be playing that many grudges. I think nature's claims and shattering spree will be the most popular cards in dredge sideboards.

conboy31
02-19-2012, 07:30 PM
majikal vs Gearhart in SCG feature match right now.

@majikal:
What was your reasoning for casting Surgical on Tundra in Game 2?

I was curious about that also. I had seen Gearharts deck during the previous weeks (or two) coverage which gave me the knowledge to know its clearly wrong.

Also, does Geartharts deck have a thread here at the source? I noticed at least once, maybe twice, he missed out on a card. Specifically, he'd upkeep put ebridge on top of his deck, drew it, then bricked with tezz. As opposed to drawing, put ebridge on top and guarantee a hit.

majikal
02-19-2012, 10:58 PM
majikal vs Gearhart in SCG feature match right now.

@majikal:
What was your reasoning for casting Surgical on Tundra in Game 2?

A couple of reasons. 1 - I didn't know wtf he was playing. 2 - I didn't see basic plains or Scrubland g1 and had him on WoG or Humility.

Now that I've seen the deck though I'm sure I hold extraction for Bridge.

Some quick thoughts - Worship was awesome against Burn. Ledgewalker was marginal all day and probably not needed with Thrun and SoLaS in the deck. Thrun was amazing though.

I took some notes and will write a report later if I remember.

Philipp2293
02-20-2012, 10:36 AM
@Majikal:

That's a pretty sweet list you've got there. If I would have to play straight GW today I would play almost the same list. I gotta ask though: No love for the second Scryb Ranger? In straight GW it has always been such a house, especially when coupled with SoLaS.

majikal
02-20-2012, 11:02 AM
@Majikal:

That's a pretty sweet list we've got there. If I would have to play straight GW today I would play almost the same list. I gotta ask though: No love for the second Scryb Ranger? In straight GW it has always been such a house, especially when coupled with SoLaS.

I had a Ledgewalker in that slot, but I ended up wanting the second Ranger all day. I'll probably switch back if I play GW again, but keep the rest of the 60 the same.

Report incoming later tonight.

TehGems
02-20-2012, 04:55 PM
A few pages ago someone proposed to remove Mother of Runes from the deck, because of the high amount of mass removal around (Deed, Wrath, etc.) at least where I'm from, but the subject has been dropped.

Is it so crazy an idea? You would gain 4 slots (plus maybe 1: if you play two Scryb Ranger, you could drop one), and you could play more creatures that have a huge impact on the board by themselves, such as Thrun, Geist of Saint Traft or even Mirran Crusader.

I was thinking about something like this:

// Lands
1 Dryad Arbor
2 Forest
1 Gaea's Cradle
1 Karakas
1 Maze of Ith
2 Plains
4 Savannah
1 Tropical Island
1 Tundra
3 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills

// Creatures
1 Gaddock Teeg
2 Geist of Saint Traft
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Silhana Ledgewalker
4 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Thrun, the Last Troll

// Spells
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
4 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Sylvan Library
2 Umezawa's Jitte


This version, compared to other "more classic" GW lists plays two Geists, one additional Thrun and Silhana (which is a power house with so many equipments and Elspeth) and I chose to include a Sylvan Safekeeper as a tutorable Mom. I like it, even if it's not as versatile as Mom, because you can activate it the same turn you play it.
Sure, it doesn't give evasion, but Silhana and the Geists (at least the Angels) already have it. Also, hexproof helps a lot against those Punishing Mavericks.
The sheer number of equips, planeswalkers and Mystics should be enough to make every of those unblockable/untargetable creatures a huge menace, allowing us to keep our resources without risking an X/1 against Wrath of God of Pernicious Deed.

What do you guys think?

majikal
02-20-2012, 05:02 PM
A few pages ago someone proposed to remove Mother of Runes from the deck, because of the high amount of mass removal around (Deed, Wrath, etc.) at least where I'm from, but the subject has been dropped.

Is it so crazy an idea? You would gain 4 slots (plus maybe 1: if you play two Scryb Ranger, you could drop one), and you could play more creatures that have a huge impact on the board by themselves, such as Thrun, Geist of Saint Traft or even Mirran Crusader.

I was thinking about something like this:

// Lands
1 Dryad Arbor
2 Forest
1 Gaea's Cradle
1 Karakas
1 Maze of Ith
2 Plains
4 Savannah
1 Tropical Island
1 Tundra
3 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills

// Creatures
1 Gaddock Teeg
2 Geist of Saint Traft
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Silhana Ledgewalker
4 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Thrun, the Last Troll

// Spells
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
4 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Sylvan Library
2 Umezawa's Jitte


This version, compared to other "more classic" GW lists plays two Geists, one additional Thrun and Silhana (which is a power house with so many equipments and Elspeth) and I chose to include a Sylvan Safekeeper as a tutorable Mom. I like it, even if it's not as versatile as Mom, because you can activate it the same turn you play it.
Sure, it doesn't give evasion, but Silhana and the Geists (at least the Angels) already have it. Also, hexproof helps a lot against those Punishing Mavericks.
The sheer number of equips, planeswalkers and Mystics should be enough to make every of those unblockable/untargetable creatures a huge menace, allowing us to keep our resources without risking an X/1 against Wrath of God of Pernicious Deed.

What do you guys think?
IBA, is that you?

TehGems
02-20-2012, 05:09 PM
IBA, is that you?

Nope, I'm sorry! :)

Lt. Quattro
02-20-2012, 10:31 PM
IBA, is that you?

I didn't like his adding parallax wave or lowering the wastelands, but I came around on dumping mother of runes and scryb ranger for better creatures. Mom is pretty good turn 1 where you get to untap it, but I found the later I played it, the less useful it is and it competes with playing a mana dork turn 1. I added a couple eternal witness since extra swords are good, recurring wasteland to punish my opponent when he stumbles with his mana base, or just getting an extra land since there is always something useful to do with the mana like using punishing fires, equipping a guy and activating scavenging ooze.

sdematt
02-20-2012, 11:32 PM
Congrats, Majikal! I'd like a report to read instead of doing homework, plox.

-Matt

majikal
02-21-2012, 01:05 AM
Report time!

I rolled up to Charlotte with the following list:

Maindeck:

Artifacts
1 Batterskull
1 Sword of Light and Shadow

Creatures
1 Eternal Witness
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Mother of Runes
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Silhana Ledgewalker
3 Stoneforge Mystic

Enchantments
1 Sylvan Library

Instants
4 Swords to Plowshares

Legendary Artifacts
1 Umezawa's Jitte

Legendary Creatures
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Thrun, the Last Troll

Planeswalkers
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Sorceries
4 Green Sun's Zenith

Basic Lands
2 Forest
1 Plains

Lands
2 Horizon Canopy
2 Misty Rainforest
4 Savannah
4 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath

Land Creatures
1 Dryad Arbor

Legendary Lands
1 Gaea's Cradle
1 Karakas

Sideboard:
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Choke
1 Stony Silence
1 Worship
2 Enlightened Tutor
2 Path to Exile
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Maze of Ith

Round 1: Stephen G. with Merfolk.

The first game was just bad. He mulliganed once, had all colorless lands, and I killed him with a Voltron of 4x Noble Hierarch.

Game 2 was more interesting. He gets Kira, Great Glass-Spinner, a Coralhelm, and a Reejery and takes me down to six before I Stoneforge in a Jitte, equip it to a Scryb Ranger with Mom's approval and start fucking his team with it. Batterskull comes down a few turns later to seal the deal and he scoops it up.

1-0

Round 2: Vincent L with Punishing Maverick

Judging from all the scribbles on my paper, it looks like we go back and forth killing each other's men until he runs out of gas. His Punishing Fire holds my dorks at bay until I waste his Grove, and then I land a Knight, followed by an Elspeth, and leap over his team for 9 to the face. He manages to kill my planeswalker, we spend a few turns durdling around, and I draw the other one. One swing and he's at 4. He fetches EOT, looks at his card, and scoops.

Game 2 was a little stronger for him, opening with Sylvan Library. We durdle around for a few turns with the board clogged up, getting a hit in here or there before something dies, and eventually he starts gaining the advantage with his superior card selection power, thanks to Library. He brings me down to 11 before I drop Thrun followed by Elspeth. Fortunately, he paid life with Sylvan Library once after a couple of fetches, and one swing takes him to 3. At some point he got a Sword of Feast and Famine and a Jitte, but Path to Exile kept them from being relevant until this very turn. He suits up his Stoneforge Mystic and thinks for a while. He looks at the board, then down at his hand, and then at his library, and realizes it's over. He told me he drew the wrong card and it cost him the game, but little does he know that the lone card in my hand is another copy of Elspeth. I flop it down and he tells me I shouldn't have won because I'm not playing Punishing Fire. Obviously.

2-0

Round 3: Eric C playing Burn.

Game 1 He burns my face and I die.

Game 2 I put men in the way of his men, drop Thrun, and then Enlightened Tutor for Worship. He calls a judge to get an oracle wording on my sweet Japanese USaga Worship, tries to play it out, and Thrun eats him.
http://whatculture.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/ski-free-monster-360x300.jpg

Game 3 I do the exact same thing only this time he gets a Sulfuric Vortex and helps me kill him faster.

3-0

Round 4: ?? with RUG Tempo. I forgot my notpad this round and had to scribble on a napkin. In the confusion, I neglected to write down my opponent's name.

Game 1 I get Double Knight and just go kill him.

Game 2 he gets turn 1 Delver, flips it, and counters my removal. A few Goyfs and Mongeese later and I'm dead.

Game 3 I get a Scryb Ranger with Mom's permission to block his Delver all day long, and then Thrun comes along and does what trolls do best.
http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/096/044/trollface.jpg?1296494117

4-0

Round 5 - MIDBOSS!!! David Gearhart playing that thing he plays.

For the record, David Gearhart is one of the most entertaining human beings alive, and even though I lost this match like a little bitch, it was the most fun I had all day.

Game 1 - He leads with Vault of Whispers, and I put him on Affinity, since I've never seen his deck before. Then he plays a Tundra and I die a little on the inside. He plays a bunch of useless artifacts and then drops a Tezz. I have options, or so I think. I go over the plays in my head, and then check my life total. Oh. I look back at Tezz, and then at the pile of artifacts, and specifically at the Thopter foundry on the top of the pile. Fuck. Next game.

Game 2 - I have a strong opener in this game. I lead with Noble Hierarch, and David plays another artifact land. I Enlightened Tutor for Stony Silence during my upkeep, draw it, drop a land and cast it. It sticks. But then we both durdle around for a while, both drawing brick after brick. Gearhart is a honey badger.
http://smalltownrevelations.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/honey_badger1.jpg
He just keeps piling up his useless artifacts while I peck away at his life. I Waste a Tundra, and he just keeps going. As he plays his fourth land, a Flooded Strand, I start getting nervous about Wrath of God or Humility. I didn't see a basic Plains or Scrubland in game 1, so in response to him fetching, I Surgical Extraction his Tundra. Bad play. It and the other one in play are the only ones. I didn't realize it at the time, but that cost me the game. I get his life total extremely low before he drops the first Ensnaring Bridge. I have the Pridemage, but he has another Bridge and then an Oblivion Ring on my Stony Silence. Fuck. Now his Thopter Combo is active. I blow up his Academy ruins and get another Pridemage to blow the O-Ring, but by now it's pointless. He nonchalantly finds his other Academy Ruins and continues on his merry way.
http://honey-badger-t-shirt.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/honey_badger_just_takes_what_it_wants_tshirt-d2357624040368849767b0j_325-300x300.jpg

If I had saved my Surgical Extraction I would have been able to remove his Bridges and thus win the game. Instead I get Tezz'd to death. Sad Panda.

4-1

Round 6: UR Delver, aka Life Tilt
Game one - "Delver Delver herf derf blind flips 6 you 6 you bolt fireblast"
Game two - "lololol I left in Force of Will, so Delver Delver blind flip FoW your StP, 6 you 6 you bolt bolt lol"

I almost drop here, but I realize that I had just hit the nut low and it can't get any worse.

4-2

Round 7: Guy with awesome Pirate Hat, playing some kind of Deadguy Ale
Game 1 - Mom, Stoneforge, Sword of Light and Shadow, ruin him. I end the game at 32 life and having used the same Pridemage to blow up every artifact he played.
Game 2 - More of the same.

5-2. Back in the game!

Standings go up, and I'm in the top of my bracket on tiebreakers. The top seeds are such that the only people who can safely draw in are the top 2. If the stars aligned just right and everyone else played it out instead of gambling on a draw, I would make top 8 if I 2-0 my next round. FINGERS CROSSED!

Round 8: Jeremy, playing Bant Maverick
Game one - This wasn't a game. I Waste him out and get in with dorks, and he scoops.

Game two - I get Mother of Runes, Scryb Ranger, and Stoneforge Mystic. It resolves and I go get Sword of Light and Shadow. He allows it, and goes for Batterskull.
http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lj1ikc4MVA1qcqc2u.jpg
I equip SoLaS to my Noble Hierarch and swing in with it and Scryb Ranger. He Mazes my Hierarch, and I use it to repeatedly block his Germ token. He eventually gets a Knight of the Reliquary and tries attacking with it, just in case I forgot. But I block it too. Pro White AND Pro Black is pretty sexy right now. I get my own Knight and blow up his Maze, and I start getting in. He manages to kill my Sword, but I GSZ for 3 and grab Eternal Witness, bringing it back the very next turn, SFM-vialing it back into play, and suiting up again. I hear infinite Pridemages are pretty good.
http://i.qkme.me/4qgh.jpg
At any rate, Knight carried the sword to victory, and an outside chance at top 8.

6-2

Standings go up aaaaaaaaaaaaand....

http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lwq8wmVQMS1qib2im.png
2nd THRU 10th --- Y U NO PLAY IT OUT

At least 4 of them drew, knocking one guy to 9th who I'm sure thought he was in, and landing me square at 10th. Sad face. But happy face.

But sad face.

I take my $100 and drown my sorrows in delicious Fuel Pizza (http://www.fuelpizza.com/).


EDUCATION TIME, KIDS!
I was extremely happy with the maindeck with the lone exception of Silhana ledgewalker. By the time I needed a shroudy guy for whatever reason, I could have just gone to get Thrun, and I feel this slot is better served as either another Scryb, another Jitte, or another Library.

The sideboard needs a Pithing Needle, and possibly some number of Krosan Grip.

Also, Worship is awesome against Mono-R Burn, but not so much against Delver.

Koby
02-21-2012, 02:29 AM
" he tells me I shouldn't have won because I'm not playing Punishing Fire. "

No respect from PFires sheeple. He deserved to get Elspeth-smashed. :D

For the record, I too recently cut the Ledgewalker. I was clouded by a sore loss to Infinite-StP.dec and wanted another Hexproofer. Going forward, I'd rather just splash for Geist than play Ledgewalker. Thrun has taken up the lead for Trolling Blue.

majikal
02-21-2012, 02:41 AM
" he tells me I shouldn't have won because I'm not playing Punishing Fire. "

No respect from PFires sheeple. He deserved to get Elspeth-smashed. :D

For the record, I too recently cut the Ledgewalker. I was clouded by a sore loss to Infinite-StP.dec and wanted another Hexproofer. Going forward, I'd rather just splash for Geist than play Ledgewalker. Thrun has taken up the lead for Trolling Blue.

I tested the Geist version all last week too and didn't like it. I'd honestly rather just have Vendilion Clique in that slot if I'm going for blue. At least it can surprise block a Delver.

Koby
02-21-2012, 02:55 AM
I tested the Geist version all last week too and didn't like it. I'd honestly rather just have Vendilion Clique in that slot if I'm going for blue. At least it can surprise block a Delver.

Ya, but :1::u::u: means fucking up the manabase too much to get it to work consistently in the face of Wasteland. Stock GW it is.

majikal
02-21-2012, 03:07 AM
Ya, but :1::u::u: means fucking up the manabase too much to get it to work consistently in the face of Wasteland. Stock GW it is.
Not necessarily. I played a GWU Maverick list to a Top8 finish in Nashville and the mana was never an issue.

I think I played this shell:

3x Misty Rainforest
4x Windswept Heath
3x Tropical Island
2x Tundra
1x Savannah
1x Horizon Canopy
2x Forest
1x Plains
1x Karakas
1x Dryad Arbor
3x Wasteland

Bobboviking
02-21-2012, 08:30 AM
@majikal Grats on your finish! You say you tested geist and dident like it, im abit curious what it was that you dident like about it? Do you feel its a bad card in general or is it just not worth it? (swapping some cards in the manabase of the deck)

Esper3k
02-21-2012, 09:59 AM
Congrats on your finish, dude!

Did you ever miss having a second Jitte / regret Batterskull? I'm glad the Worship tech panned out for you, it seems awesome & hilarious against Burn.

Rafa
02-21-2012, 01:30 PM
Just want to share the list I'm currently testing with my friends on MWS. It's being great against every deck!

// Lands
1 [UNH] Forest
1 [FUT] Dryad Arbor
3 [R] Savannah
4 [ON] Windswept Heath
1 [CMD] Bojuka Bog
2 [R] Taiga
2 [ON] Wooded Foothills
1 [R] Plateau
3 [FUT] Grove of the Burnwillows
3 [TE] Wasteland
1 [FUT] Horizon Canopy
1 [UNH] Plains
1 [LG] Karakas

// Creatures
4 [CFX] Knight of the Reliquary
1 [MBS] Thrun, the Last Troll
1 [TSP] Scryb Ranger
1 [M12] Birds of Paradise
1 [FUT] Tarmogoyf
2 [ARB] Qasali Pridemage
2 [CMD] Mother of Runes
3 [CFX] Noble Hierarch
3 [WWK] Stoneforge Mystic
1 [CMD] Scavenging Ooze
3 [DKA] Huntmaster of the Fells/Ravager of the Fells

// Spells
1 [DS] Sword of Light and Shadow
1 [DS] Sword of Fire and Ice
4 [CST] Swords to Plowshares
1 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
4 [MBS] Green Sun's Zenith
3 [DDG] Punishing Fire

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [ALA] Ethersworn Canonist
SB: 1 [NPH] Phyrexian Metamorph
SB: 1 [LRW] Gaddock Teeg
SB: 2 [FNM] Tormod's Crypt
SB: 1 [ISD] Stony Silence
SB: 1 [US] Worship
SB: 2 [TSP] Ancient Grudge
SB: 2 [TE] Choke
SB: 2 [IA] Pyroblast
SB: 2 [MI] Enlightened Tutor

In my opinion Huntmaster will be the deal in Legacy, too.

zulander
02-21-2012, 02:32 PM
Why do you keep saying Scryb Ranger with moms approval against merfolk and delver? It has Pro-Blue, it doesn't moms approval...

Koby
02-21-2012, 02:41 PM
Why do you keep saying Scryb Ranger with moms approval against merfolk and delver? It has Pro-Blue, it doesn't moms approval...

All the latest Merfolk lists run maindeck Dismember.

zulander
02-21-2012, 03:02 PM
All the latest Merfolk lists run maindeck Dismember.

Doesn't fully answer the question, and when he mentioned it it sounded like he was trying to give it evasion, not protection from dismember.

majikal
02-21-2012, 03:48 PM
Why do you keep saying Scryb Ranger with moms approval against merfolk and delver? It has Pro-Blue, it doesn't moms approval...
Just to make you ask that question.

But for reals, those decks play non-blue things that kill your stuff. As a rule of thumb, it's a good idea not to run your best answer to an entire deck into off-color removal, because that tends to make you lose.

arcannys
02-21-2012, 04:42 PM
Mom is the best creature in the deck.
Scryb is the second best creature in the deck (yes rlly... And if you say the opposite you havent played this deck correctly...), i've allways played 2 and ill never play less..

KobeBryan
02-21-2012, 04:47 PM
Mom is the best creature in the deck.
Scryb is the second best creature in the deck (yes rlly... And if you say the opposite you havent played this deck correctly...), i've allways played 2 and ill never play less..

yea. if you don't use scryb ranger in the deck, you are doing something wrong.

majikal
02-21-2012, 04:49 PM
Mom is the best creature in the deck.
Scryb is the second best creature in the deck (yes rlly... And if you say the opposite you havent played this deck correctly...), i've allways played 2 and ill never play less..
I disagree. Knight of the Reliquary is objectively the best creature in the deck.

However, Mom and Scryb Ranger are the best support creatures in most situations.

Machahiko
02-21-2012, 04:50 PM
I've been thinking about my sideboard. Expecting to play against decks like Reanimator, RUG Delver, UW, Burn, Dredge and Maverick I presume? At the moment my sideboard is something like this:


3 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Path to Exile
1 Qasali Pridemage (1 MD.)
3 Choke
4 Tormod's Crypt
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Garruk Relentless


Canonists for combo, I don't like these so much. There's always a few combo decks which I need these for and I hate having these on my sideboard, feels like wasted space.

Path to Exile for the delver decks and possibly for reanimator, Zoo or Merfolk. You never know when these might come handy. Mainly for the delver decks.

Feeling a bit uncertain about the lone Qasali Pridemage. I have SoLaS MD to recur the one pridemage that I have, but it can get exiled. Feels like a good insurance.

Chokes don't need explaining, right? Tormods' and Wheel for graveyard based decks, I have a feeling that dredge and reanimator might be popular.

I feel like Garruk would be good for UW matchup, but.. I'm not sure. Generates a lot of tokens for sure which might be awesome, flipping Garruk will be hard though. On the other hand, I might just be biased because I want to try him out since I haven't had the chance.

I thought about two Life from the Loams, but I don't see that much use for them. Usually I have played E. Tutor sideboards so I've dropped COP: Red and Phyrexian Metamorph.


I understand that it's hard to give any advice when you don't know the maindeck, but I'll try to keep it as a secret until the tournament, will write a report Saturday or Sunday. :-)


EDIT: Also, if you post a decklist, use the proper tags, it makes watching decklists that much more fun!

Koby
02-21-2012, 04:57 PM
I've been thinking about my sideboard. Expecting to play against decks like Reanimator, RUG Delver, UW, Burn, Dredge and Maverick I presume? At the moment my sideboard is something like this:


3 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Path to Exile
1 Qasali Pridemage (1 MD.)
3 Choke
4 Tormod's Crypt
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Garruk Relentless



You can easily cut one of the Chokes and 1 of the Crypts, which would free up 2 slots for a 2nd planeswalker and Oblivion Ring as a catch-all. Alternatively, you could also run Surgical Extraction, but I feel the card is wasted SB space. Maybe a 2nd or even 3rd Jitte to beat on creature decks.

arcannys
02-21-2012, 05:09 PM
I disagree. Knight of the Reliquary is objectively the best creature in the deck.

However, Mom and Scryb Ranger are the best support creatures in most situations.

Ofcourse KotR is the best creature in a vacum, but scryb give this deck a whole new dimension. I top8d the las Catalan league of legacy (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?23035-LCL-2012-January-119-people-Decklists-Video-feature-matches-More!) without GSZing for KotR a single time but searching for scryb almost every game. Scryb is also a skill tester for both you and your opponent and if you can take full advantatge of its power you will increase drasticly your winratio with this deck.

majikal
02-21-2012, 05:19 PM
Ofcourse KotR is the best creature in a vacum, but scryb give this deck a whole new dimension. I top8d the las Catalan league of legacy (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?23035-LCL-2012-January-119-people-Decklists-Video-feature-matches-More!) without GSZing for KotR a single time but searching for scryb almost every game. Scryb is also a skill tester for both you and your opponent and if you can take full advantatge of its power you will increase drasticly your winratio with this deck.
I can definitely agree with that. Most of my blowout victories were directly caused by Scryb Ranger allowing me to both attack and block while keeping Mother of Runes available to blank multiple pieces of removal.

Koby
02-21-2012, 05:25 PM
I can definitely agree with that. Most of my blowout victories were directly caused by Scryb Ranger allowing me to both attack and block while keeping Mother of Runes available to blank multiple pieces of removal.

I agree with this too; many people forget several things about Scryb Ranger - Pro:blue, flying, untaps someone every single turn. Even after they read the card.

Deep6er
02-21-2012, 05:31 PM
Congratulations, Joel. Your match report is the only reason why I've visited the Source in multiple months. HIGH-larious. I approve.

Aside: GearHART.

Double Aside: That match was probably the most fun I'd had that day, too. Don't get me wrong, beating the guy in Top 8 was the fucking best. But he wasn't very much fun to play against. I do remember being COMPLETELY boggled by the Extraction on Tundra. Looking at your reasoning, I suppose I can understand why, but man, if you'd saved that Extraction, we totall would have gone to a game three, and I would have had even more fun! Protip: make better plays. It's a good call. I'm trying to follow it myself. Hell, look at my goddamn top four match. I wouldn't have won, but I absolutely should have made my shit 5/5's because that would have at least made it look to me like I was winning. And I'm CLEARLY the important one in that matchup since I sure as shit wasn't winning.

arcannys
02-21-2012, 05:38 PM
I agree with this too; many people forget several things about Scryb Ranger - Pro:blue, flying, untaps someone every single turn. Even after they read the card.

And not only that, it can keep you safe from wastelands, it can blank a jitte with a dryad arbour. Out of all its abilities the FLASH one is the most important. Thats why you always wanna see one scryb in your hand rather than having to zenith for it :)

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-22-2012, 06:09 AM
Mom is the best creature in the deck.
Scryb is the second best creature in the deck (yes rlly... And if you say the opposite you havent played this deck correctly...), i've allways played 2 and ill never play less..


I have to say that this mindset makes no sense to me.

If you want to play a bunch of guys that work well in a team and are hard to kill when you get your Voltron assembled, you can always just go play Slivers. Seriously. I'm not even kidding. They'll be bigger too, and they'll all fly and be untargetable and shit. You can even throw in some counters.

The reason that this approach falls apart is that people in Legacy play cards that are designed to disrupt your strategy- besides just the inevitability of having to mulligan to 5 or lower some games- and the individual pieces suck. Just like Mother of Runes and Scryb Ranger, which are fucking terrible cards if you don't have other things to support them.

Now, I mean, I'm all for synergy in deckbuilding, but let's not lose track of the core strengths of the deck in that effort. Even if Mother of Runes and (ugh) Scryb Ranger, or you know the card that does the same thing but costs half as much, should be played in the deck (which again, I don't agree with and others apparently have come to the same conclusion), they're not the strongest cards in the deck and not the reason for the deck's existence. Knight is the strongest creature in the deck, and Hierarch and Zenith providing versatile mana ramping are the other most important elements in making the deck function, along with just a bevy of good options and cards in this color combination, especially StP and good equipment.

The problem with Mom is that while she's great in the scenario where she's active and protecting a Knight and your opponent doesn't have a way to deal with this anarchy, there's lots of other scenarios where they counter the Knight and you have a 1/1, or wipe the board, or just flashback the StP with Snapcaster and you wish your Moms were now relevant cards. And the problem with Scryb Ranger is the same only much worse because primarily the only time it's really useful is when you have Mom (the synergy with Knight is of relatively low marginal value because games where you are active with Knight should pretty much be over unless you're running up against combo or something, in which case Scryb Ranger is dead. Also there's a card that does the same fucking thing and costs half as much am I on crazy pills or something.)

On an unrelated note, however, I'm thinking of going back to SFM, probably still with 2 Jitte main. While it's still far and away the most powerful maindeckable equipment and there's not much added utility to running SFM game 1, I really want a Manriki-Gusari and SoLS in the board for the mirror and Blade Control.

@Majikal: Congrats on the finish.


Since we're posting pictures, I feel like this is relevant:

http://i.imgur.com/ES6zA.gif

arcannys
02-22-2012, 06:22 AM
Just like Mother of Runes and Scryb Ranger, which are fucking terrible cards if you don't have other things to support them.
LOL.
I stopped reading right here. You dude have no clue about whats going on here. Period. End of story.
I already told you why are wrong on this, you didnt want to listen and change your mind, its fine, i dont care. But stop posting nonsense.
I'm still waiting on this btw:


http://www.thecouncil.es/tcdecks/tipo.php?archetype=Maverick&format=Legacy

Just the first page, tell me how many lists are not running moms?
If its more than 5% i wont say anything. If its less than 5% you should concider if you're doing something wrong.

And btw, if you're using your moms as blokers you might want to reconsider how you play the deck.

bakofried
02-22-2012, 06:48 AM
Arcannys, can you please post an argument, and not just spam "I stopped reading after I saw 0 Moms lolol."

I mean, at least IBA is explaining his position, and the reasoning is sound. Mother of Runes is not the best if it's alone. Neither is Scryb Ranger. Maybe we should develop this line of thought a bit before dropping it?

arcannys
02-22-2012, 07:21 AM
Well, im confidant enough that my previous 30M posts on the matter are a good enough argument.
Noone is stopping him from playing his own brews and if he thinks moms and scryb ranger are not good enough.. so be it, aparently nothing will change his mind. I don't want to fight over this anymore feel free to discuss the posibilities of removing moms and rangres, maybe you'll figure out why its wrong.

zulander
02-22-2012, 07:22 AM
LOL.
I stopped reading right here. You dude have no clue about whats going on here. Period. End of story.
I already told you why are wrong on this, you didnt want to listen and change your mind, its fine, i dont care. But stop posting nonsense.
I'm still waiting on this btw:

I don't get it, how did this quote make you LOL and stop reading?


Just like Mother of Runes and Scryb Ranger, which are fucking terrible cards if you don't have other things to support them.

Do you not agree that Mother of Runes is terrible by herself? Like if your opponent has creatures on the board and the only creature you have access to is Mother of Runes then you would think she isn't so great in that scenario right?

This scenario actually matters often as control decks run sweepers, and making a deck with cards that are good by themselves is better than making a deck with cards reliant on other ones (especially creature based decks). Now with an active Knight both Mother of Runes and Scryb Ranger have great synergy, but each independently then they are not so good.

And really who cares about that 5% quote, of course 95% of maverick decks are running mom, otherwise they wouldn't be mom decks... that's like saying RUG decks run Delver.

dsck
02-22-2012, 07:41 AM
Do you not agree that Mother of Runes is terrible by herself? Like if your opponent has creatures on the board and the only creature you have access to is Mother of Runes then you would think she isn't so great in that scenario right?

If your opponent has somehow outnumbered you with creatures and you only have mom, she can block the biggest creature they have until you get zenith/knight/equipment. She is NEVER bad.



This scenario actually matters often as control decks run sweepers, and making a deck with cards that are good by themselves is better than making a deck with cards reliant on other ones (especially creature based decks). Now with an active Knight both Mother of Runes and Scryb Ranger have great synergy, but each independently then they are not so good.

Any of those small creatures is a threat with equipment, maverick also can attack aggressively against manabase so you dont really have that easy time getting to sweeper mana.



And really who cares about that 5% quote, of course 95% of maverick decks are running mom, otherwise they wouldn't be mom decks... that's like saying RUG decks run Delver.

Yeah, and this is maverick thread discussing maverick deck which runs mother of runes.

arcannys
02-22-2012, 08:06 AM
Thanks dsck finally some sane comment.
I agree if you ran a deck with 56 lands and 4 mother of runes, then yeah... mom wouldnt be that great. You definetly convinced me.

OK, enough sarcasm, mom is great in every situation, either if you have creature or not, It makes any thread you draw a HUGE one. Beside, do you realy think you're winning if the only thing you have on board is a KotR and 6 lands?
I'd rather have a mom in play and 0 other creatures than a KotR. I'll draw my KotR later..

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-22-2012, 08:59 AM
If your opponent has somehow outnumbered you with creatures and you only have mom, she can block the biggest creature they have until you get zenith/knight/equipment. She is NEVER bad.

Drudge Skeletons are pretty fucking bad, dude.


Any of those small creatures is a threat with equipment, maverick also can attack aggressively against manabase so you dont really have that easy time getting to sweeper mana.

You may not be aware of this but lots of decks in Legacy run 4 Wasteland.

But if Blade Control ran nothing but Wrath that might be sufficient. The problem is that they run 6 StPs post-board, which they can find with Brainstorm and multiply with Snapcasters and God forbid Riptide Lab. It's when you try to build up a defensive board against this including Moms etc.. that Wrath becomes an issue. By that point they can have easily recovered from a Wasteland.


Yeah, and this is maverick thread discussing maverick deck which runs mother of runes.

Mother of Runes is not core to the deck's strategies. I mean Blade Control ran Mental Misstep when it could, but we didn't stop calling it Mental Misstep when it took it out.

Or alternately, Maverick used to run Aether Vial. And for a long time people were pushing it. But people eventually dropped it because it wasn't worth the slot. And lots of people argued about how good Aether Vial was. And they're not objectively wrong. Aether Vial is a potentially really powerful card. Hell, it's been banned in enough formats. I'm sure lots of people flipped out when they saw people cutting Aether Vials because the deck couldn't do as many cute tricks as it could before.

Argument to the status quo is not a logically sufficient argument, is what it comes down to. Yes, we know most lists run Mother of Runes. But there is no perfectly efficient market, much less in the Legacy metagame. And the one or two extra points you add or subtract from your win percentages by running the right or the wrong card add up.

At the very least the deck's fucking name should stop people from using, "Well that's how everyone's doing it" as an argument.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-22-2012, 08:59 AM
LOL.
I stopped reading right here. You dude have no clue about whats going on here. Period. End of story.
I already told you why are wrong on this, you didnt want to listen and change your mind, its fine, i dont care. But stop posting nonsense.
I'm still waiting on this btw:

Yes, you attempted to summon up an argument, going at least somewhat beyond "LOL," and I rebutted it. This all happened a while ago. Try to keep up, I'm not going to endlessly repeat myself to humor laggards.


Well, im confidant enough that my previous 30M posts on the matter are a good enough argument.
Noone is stopping him from playing his own brews and if he thinks moms and scryb ranger are not good enough.. so be it, aparently nothing will change his mind. I don't want to fight over this anymore feel free to discuss the posibilities of removing moms and rangres, maybe you'll figure out why its wrong.

Then you should stop posting. Either contribute to the discussion or don't.


OK, enough sarcasm, mom is great in every situation, either if you have creature or not, It makes any thread you draw a HUGE one. Beside, do you realy think you're winning if the only thing you have on board is a KotR and 6 lands?
I'd rather have a mom in play and 0 other creatures than a KotR. I'll draw my KotR later..

I notice that you're not running Lightning Greaves in your list. Can you explain that one to me?

For that matter, others have advocated Sylvan Safekeeper as a one of since it's a Green Sun's Zenith target that fulfills a similar function to Mom. Yet you're not running that.

That's to leave aside the question of why you're not running Quirion Ranger. If the effect of Scryb Ranger is so good, surely at least one should be a Ranger so you can get that power online a turn faster.

But these are rhetorical questions because you are obviously just in love with specific cards and not interested in optimization.

Sims
02-22-2012, 09:04 AM
Yeah, and this is maverick thread discussing maverick deck which runs mother of runes.

Where is there a law decreeing that this thread shall only contain discussion of GW and GWx Maverick decks containing Mother of Runes? I'll wait.

...

On a serious note: Welcome to innovation, people. Just because all of your lists run Mother doesn't mean it's necessarily the correct call. If no one is willing to push the envelope and say "In certain situations during testing I've found situation X to arise more often than I'd like, so lets try replacing card Y with a less situational card and see what happens.."

That's what Jack is doing, innovating and testing. He might be proven wrong in the end, or you guys in a few months might be playing decks sans Mother or Ranger... but if the person asking the question doesn't actually test and share their results, innovation can't occur and the entire point of this thread (and forum) becomes moot.

Machahiko
02-22-2012, 09:31 AM
I would be more than pleased to hear what you want to add to the deck in place of Mother of Runes. Comparing MoR to Drudge skeletons is pretty low. Mother of Runes is a really good 1-drop for all what it does, it either takes a removal spell really early or later on forces your opponent to either sweep the board or use a few cards to get rid of your knight, and even then you can fight back with a scryb ranger if you're blessed enough to have it in your hand.

I don't mind removing mother of runes from the deck, but I'd really like to hear some good alternatives. I think a set of 4x Mother of Runes, 4x Noble Hierarch and 4x GSZ for dryad arbor is pretty damn good for always having a solid turn 1 play.

ImpinAintEasy
02-22-2012, 09:46 AM
Where is there a law decreeing that this thread shall only contain discussion of GW and GWx Maverick decks containing Mother of Runes? I'll wait.

...

On a serious note: Welcome to innovation, people. Just because all of your lists run Mother doesn't mean it's necessarily the correct call. If no one is willing to push the envelope and say "In certain situations during testing I've found situation X to arise more often than I'd like, so lets try replacing card Y with a less situational card and see what happens.."

That's what Jack is doing, innovating and testing. He might be proven wrong in the end, or you guys in a few months might be playing decks sans Mother or Ranger... but if the person asking the question doesn't actually test and share their results, innovation can't occur and the entire point of this thread (and forum) becomes moot.


Agreed completely, over in the RUG thread people are saying it is insane to chose pierce vs. stifle because it changes to tempo of the deck. If you aren't willing to make changes and adjust to the flow of the metagame then why even post here. Why not simply copy last weeks winning list and run that for the next 6 months.

Players not willing to think outside the box and consider change are the same players who post unproven comments here all the time, the same players who wonder why they can't ever win the big one and the same players who beat up the locals over and over again to boost their ego in an attempt to hide the fact that they are to lazy to actually make innovations and change.

I'm curious, can someone name a deck where Mom and/or Ranger were relevant consistently prior to Maverick becoming a hit?

Koby
02-22-2012, 09:53 AM
Mom is good in certain situations but in no way is she the best objective card in the deck. That still goes to Knight and Ooze is coming a close second. There were meta games in the past that running less than four Moms was also correct (Mental Misstep era, which the card replaced Mom's role in protecting Knight). I correctly reason in he wake after that increasing Mom to four to combat RUG Delver and UW Stone blade due to their removal in order to continue the protection suite.

Jack is correct in that the non-ramp 1/1's are pretty miserable when the deck is trying to go aggro. If there is a good way to protect them repeatedly other than Mom then I would like to know. Very rarely when I cast Mom did she resolve or stay alive. In those situations in which she did I usually won because my future Knights went unopposed.

Scrub ranger was good when Merfolk was around everywhere. Now Delver is everywhere, which still makes scrub ranger useful but not a trump.

@impin
Mother of runes is used extensively in Death and Taxes. It's used there for the same purpose: protect bombs.

Asthereal
02-22-2012, 10:00 AM
To keep the mana curve of the deck intact, I tried Thoughtseize as a replacement for Mother of Runes (also a turn-1-play). It messes up the mana base a bit, but it does increase your chances against combo, and in most cases it's just a very strong card.
Black also allows us to include Dark Confidant, who can play the Sylvan Library-part but also carry swords, and Vindicate in the sideboard. I really liked the list I got out of that, but I haven't yet thoroughly tested it or tried it in a tournament.

The list I came out on (without Ranger, bacuse it loses a lot of value when Mom is gone):

1 Dryad Arbor
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Birds of Paradise
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Dark Confidant
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Tarmogoyf
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Gaddock Teeg
4 Knight of the Reliquary
1 Thrun, the Last Troll /24

4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Thoughtseize
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Body and Mind
1 Sword of Light and Shadow /15

3 Bayou
3 Savannah
1 Scrubland
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Swamp
3 Windswept Heath
3 Verdant Catacombs
1 Marsh Flats
1 Karakas
3 Wasteland /21

Side:
3 Vindicate
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2 Path to Exile
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Kitchen Finks
2 Entlightened Tutor
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 CoP: Red
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Phyrexian Metamorph /15

Not fully developed yet, as I said, but it gives an idea.

ImpinAintEasy
02-22-2012, 10:04 AM
@impin
Mother of runes is used extensively in Death and Taxes. It's used there for the same purpose: protect bombs.

Yea, DNT was the only deck I could think of, but it wasn't exactly putting up stellar winning percentages either, or at least that I can recall and certaintly not putting up the performances that maverick is.

Machahiko
02-22-2012, 10:06 AM
I'm curious, can someone name a deck where Mom and/or Ranger were relevant consistently prior to Maverick becoming a hit?

I'm curious, does this matter? Can you name a deck where Sword of the Meek was good before Thopter Foundry was printed? Can you name a deck where Grindstone was good before Painter's Servant was printed?

Stupid question which has nothing to do with this discussion.



Agreed completely, over in the RUG thread people are saying it is insane to chose pierce vs. stifle because it changes to tempo of the deck. If you aren't willing to make changes and adjust to the flow of the metagame then why even post here. Why not simply copy last weeks winning list and run that for the next 6 months.

Players not willing to think outside the box and consider change are the same players who post unproven comments here all the time, the same players who wonder why they can't ever win the big one and the same players who beat up the locals over and over again to boost their ego in an attempt to hide the fact that they are to lazy to actually make innovations and change.


I find it funny from time to time that people from all around the world come here and find out what to change in their deck in order to adjust to a certain metagame. There isn't such a thing as "mtgthesource.com-metagame". It might work for some people who attend SCG Opens, but most of the people, they have to make their own deck/sideboard in the end to gain an advantage against the known "metagame".

Mother of Runes is a good and steady choice because she supplements the other creatures in the deck in such a great way. I think that there isn't a card (or the card has not been found) that helps Maverick as much as Mother of Runes.

If Mother of Runes is just a drudge skeletons for you, you might want to try Kavu Predator or Tarmogoyf, they usually hit more than a mother of runes does.

BlackStarDeceiver
02-22-2012, 10:11 AM
Another approach would be a Terrageddon-like deck, with Mox Diamonds, effectively jumping the 1 mana slot or MAYBE adding Veteran Explorer, but NicFit does this better.

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/legacy/22119_Terrageddon.html (Mike Eisenhauer article on SCG June 2011)

Just as an idea, i liked that list a lot when i tested it last year, still there is a lot of room for improvement/innovation.

wcm8
02-22-2012, 10:14 AM
Decks adapt to deal with the metagame. Decks running Black have already discovered how to defeat Mother of Runes via playing non-damage based sweepers like Massacre, Virtue's Ruin, and Pernicious Deed. MoR can certainly be a trump against decks that use Red or White as their removal colors, but eventually those decks will also figure out ways to get around the card (Engineered Explosives and/or Wrath of God are already seeing play). While MoR is certainly a great card in certain matchups, I'm sure there will be a point in the not-too-distant future where its not worth the slot in Maverick.

ImpinAintEasy
02-22-2012, 10:19 AM
I'm curious, does this matter? Can you name a deck where Sword of the Meek was good before Thopter Foundry was printed? Can you name a deck where Grindstone was good before Painter's Servant was printed?

Stupid question which has nothing to do with this discussion.



I find it funny from time to time that people from all around the world come here and find out what to change in their deck in order to adjust to a certain metagame. There isn't such a thing as "mtgthesource.com-metagame". It might work for some people who attend SCG Opens, but most of the people, they have to make their own deck/sideboard in the end to gain an advantage against the known "metagame".

Mother of Runes is a good and steady choice because she supplements the other creatures in the deck in such a great way. I think that there isn't a card (or the card has not been found) that helps Maverick as much as Mother of Runes.

If Mother of Runes is just a drudge skeletons for you, you might want to try Kavu Predator or Tarmogoyf, they usually hit more than a mother of runes does.


I like stupid questions, they lead to stupid responses. The question is valid in the fact that previously Mom was used in DNT to protect its' more important creatures, just like Mom is used in Maverick to protect its' most important creature. She is a utility creature here just like she was in DNT and to call her more important than Knight seems silly. Does she serve a role in the deck, sure, but she isn't the glue the holds the deck together like Knight is.

"Meta-games" are vastly different from place to place, agree completely, but often times threads try to portray the ultimate listing of 75 or the listing most reference too. If you are just copying 75 from the internet without taking into consideration your locals play 3-4 storm decks then you are in for a rude awakening. This is exactly my point, people need to think outside the box sometimes.

@ the Skeleton comment, I wasn't the one who made that reference, but I think comparing Mom to drudge is a little harsh as she is much better than that.

All I'm saying is people need to open up their minds a little and try to be innovative and stop being stuck on the same ole same ole. Just because Mom has been a great utility card for the past year or so, doesn't mean she will be the best selection going forward.

If you think Mom is a great card, I'm not mad at you. I think she is a great card too, but I think being dead set on specific ideas only furthers the boredom and lack of innovation of deck ideas that seems to wander around these forums.

arcannys
02-22-2012, 10:44 AM
Ok since you like multiquote replies, here's one for you:


Yes, you attempted to summon up an argument, going at least somewhat beyond "LOL," and I rebutted it.
Where exactly did you rebut it? All you kept saying was that mom wasn't good because it's a drudge skeleton.

I notice that you're not running Lightning Greaves in your list. Can you explain that one to me?
I'm not sure if you're just trying to troll us or what, but i'll respond anyway. Greaves rlly? greaves is fucking terrible it makes you unable to equip your own equipment (insert smart comment about how to move greaves around, sure...), it doesnt advance your board state (this will horrify you since apparently you dont like moms that act like drudge skeletons and do nothing on the board), and it disables you own mom (oh right you dont run moms, ye greaves are great).

For that matter, others have advocated Sylvan Safekeeper as a one of since it's a Green Sun's Zenith target that fulfills a similar function to Mom. Yet you're not running that.
Sylvan safekeeper is certainly not a bad card but it's not nearly close to mom's power, It doesnt provide evasion to your other creature and its drawback is pretty huge.


That's to leave aside the question of why you're not running Quirion Ranger. If the effect of Scryb Ranger is so good, surely at least one should be a Ranger so you can get that power online a turn faster.
This is certainly makes me believe you're just throwing questions to the air just to dismiss my points of view.
Quirion ranger is MUCH worse than scryb. First of all scryb has flying which makes him a better equipment holder. The pro-blue and flash, tho, is what pushes it over the top.
The pro blue ability is insane, it makes it the best creature against jace, and the flash part is even more insane since you can set up good 2x1 situations with mother of runes and KotR. Quirion is just a 1/1 that doesnt fit the curve.


Or alternately, Maverick used to run Aether Vial. And for a long time people were pushing it. But people eventually dropped it because it wasn't worth the slot. And lots of people argued about how good Aether Vial was. And they're not objectively wrong. Aether Vial is a potentially really powerful card. Hell, it's been banned in enough formats. I'm sure lots of people flipped out when they saw people cutting Aether Vials because the deck couldn't do as many cute tricks as it could before.

Thats wrong.
Maverick still does play aether vial and wayfarer. Thats the reason why this thread is incorrecly named. Maverick is a different deck than GW zenith.
If you're gonna be a smartass, at least try to inform yourself before embarrassing yourself.

Now can you at least put the guns down for a sec, and try to agree with at least ONE of my points, instead of multiquoting my comments and inserting random nonsense to dismiss it?
I'd appreciate that.

dsck
02-22-2012, 11:18 AM
Drudge Skeletons are pretty fucking bad, dude.

I dont understand this comparison. Drudge Skeleton doesnt protect your other creatures or let them through when theres stall on board. Moms ability doesnt use up any mana and it costs 1 to play.



You may not be aware of this but lots of decks in Legacy run 4 Wasteland.


By attacking manabase aggressively I meant Knight sitting on board growing while wastelocking your opponent (with Scryb Ranger the job is done fairly fast). If you have played with Maverick you have surely done this yourself multiple times and know what I mean. Provoking me with that response is silly and dodging the point.



But if Blade Control ran nothing but Wrath that might be sufficient. The problem is that they run 6 StPs post-board, which they can find with Brainstorm and multiply with Snapcasters and God forbid Riptide Lab. It's when you try to build up a defensive board against this including Moms etc.. that Wrath becomes an issue. By that point they can have easily recovered from a Wasteland.


Postboard Blade Control sides out counter magic for removal and Choke becomes a problem. Thrun and Scavenging Ooze are also fairly effective against Snapcaster Mage. There are just so many must answer creatures and Maverick doesnt have to overextend and play all of them into board. Once theres equipment on battlefield a fetch for Dryad Arbor does the job.



Mother of Runes is not core to the deck's strategies. I mean Blade Control ran Mental Misstep when it could, but we didn't stop calling it Mental Misstep when it took it out.

Or alternately, Maverick used to run Aether Vial. And for a long time people were pushing it. But people eventually dropped it because it wasn't worth the slot. And lots of people argued about how good Aether Vial was. And they're not objectively wrong. Aether Vial is a potentially really powerful card. Hell, it's been banned in enough formats. I'm sure lots of people flipped out when they saw people cutting Aether Vials because the deck couldn't do as many cute tricks as it could before.

I dont get your mental misstep point. Aether Vial was dropped because Zenith was printed (late game threat density is better than what Vial offers). I can foresee people running mom as long as spot removal is being played.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-22-2012, 01:15 PM
I mean I think it's a mistake to approach the deck with the mindset that you need 4 strictly protective spells, although if you're going to run anything in that slot Thoughtseize does sound pretty good since it protects your Knights from Deed, Wrath, countermagic and other discard, which Mom doesn't, as well as giving you an outside shot against combo. It might even provide sufficient reason to convince people to run Goyf again and thus up their win percentages. I mean if I had to do choose between Thoughtseize and Goyf in a deck or Mother of Runes and Scryb Ranger it wouldn't seem like much of a dilemma to me.

I had liked Mental Misstep in the deck for some of the same reasons, although it was just a much more powerful card all around.

If you want something to make Knight even more ridiculous I had much more positive results testing Lightning Greaves in the deck than I did Mom. It's also a lot less slot intensive with SFM.

Or you could just play more threats and card manipulation. Like my list runs 2x Elspeth and 2x Thrun and 2x Goyf and 4 library manipulation spells so that I can just go get another threat if they StP a Knight, I'm not stuck around trying to assemble a Voltron.

Also Jesus Christ would people stop being dishonest. I never said Mom was just a Drudge Skeleton; I said by herself she's just a Drudge Skeleton. Because people were making the laughable claim that she was useful by herself. To recap the fucking conversation:

Me: I mean the problem with Mom is it's really only good protecting your Knight from spot removal, and the power of disruption in Legacy makes relying on Voltron teams a bad idea.
People that won't be named: Mom is good by itself, because you can chump block stuff indefinitely.
Me: Yeah, Drudge Skeleton is fucking terrible.
People that won't be named: Mom isn't Drudge Skeleton, when you have other stuff on board she's really good*.


*Note: By other stuff we mean Knight

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-22-2012, 01:26 PM
By attacking manabase aggressively I meant Knight sitting on board growing while wastelocking your opponent (with Scryb Ranger the job is done fairly fast). If you have played with Maverick you have surely done this yourself multiple times and know what I mean. Provoking me with that response is silly and dodging the point.

No, I haven't done this multiple times. I've never felt the need to Wasteland someone in a game more than twice, which is why I only run two. Instead of sitting around masturbating with Knight I would generally just rather go kill them.

And it's not dodging the point because if you have Knight active, you shouldn't be "aggressively attacking their mana base," you should be aggressively attacking them. Like the utility on Knight is awesome but it's primarily there to be a giant beat stick. Certainly by the time it's a 7/7 or bigger you should be swinging in, not derping around with multiple Wastelands.


Postboard Blade Control sides out counter magic for removal and Choke becomes a problem. Thrun and Scavenging Ooze are also fairly effective against Snapcaster Mage. There are just so many must answer creatures and Maverick doesnt have to overextend and play all of them into board. Once theres equipment on battlefield a fetch for Dryad Arbor does the job.

You know that they also run equipment and creatures and stuff like Jace right? I mean yes, you have a lot of things they have to deal with; the problem is that in the general configuration your gas, excluding land, is about half your deck, and in their configuration half their deck is also gas and the other half is shit that fuck I don't know does something to make gas less gassy, I didn't think this metaphor through.

On a card for card basis, in this matchup, Blade Control just generally has more relevant and quality and card advantage cards. It's a real problem.


I dont get your mental misstep point. Aether Vial was dropped because Zenith was printed (late game threat density is better than what Vial offers). I can foresee people running mom as long as spot removal is being played.

The deck didn't exist before GSZ as far as I'm aware, so that's not why it was dropped.

Spot removal is not the deck's only weakness, and running a card that tries to stop spot removal plans and does nothing else seems of questionable worth over the bevy of other good cards that could be run in the deck, even without going to a third color.

Especially given the meta. Mom isn't a particularly effective answer to Blade Control, especially post-board, and is ironically pointless against decks like Rug where your Knights are already undealable and really you'd just be better off running a couple Goyfs or something to have more big-assed creatures.

Anusien
02-22-2012, 01:33 PM
If all Mother of Runes does is blank a single removal spell or block a single creature, if you just replace it with something that trades with a single removal spell or a single creature but also attacks, you're making an upgrade.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-22-2012, 01:36 PM
Where exactly did you rebut it? All you kept saying was that mom wasn't good because it's a drudge skeleton.

Previously. I'm not digging the post up for you, go look for it.


I'm not sure if you're just trying to troll us or what, but i'll respond anyway. Greaves rlly? greaves is fucking terrible

lulz


it makes you unable to equip your own equipment (insert smart comment about how to move greaves around, sure...), it doesnt advance your board state (this will horrify you since apparently you dont like moms that act like drudge skeletons and do nothing on the board), and it disables you own mom (oh right you dont run moms, ye greaves are great).

You don't need to use Mom because you have Lightning Greaves. Also wow, your arguments are that Lightning Greaves is bad if you don't have anything else in play. I'm staggered.


Sylvan safekeeper is certainly not a bad card

No, see, that's the joke, it is.


This is certainly makes me believe you're just throwing questions to the air just to dismiss my points of view.

No, I have already dismissed your point of view, I am throwing out rhetorical questions to show that your point of view is dismissable.


Quirion ranger is MUCH worse than scryb. First of all scryb has flying which makes him a better equipment holder.

This is why I run Birds over Noble Hierarch, personally.

I mean I'm kidding but that would actually make infinitely more sense than running a card whose disadvantage is costing twice as much instead of not having exalted.


The pro-blue and flash, tho, is what pushes it over the top.
The pro blue ability is insane, it makes it the best creature against jace

Man because can you imagine how annoying it would be if your opponent was using his Jace to bounce your Quirion Ranger every turn.


and the flash part is even more insane since you can set up good 2x1 situations with mother of runes and KotR. Quirion is just a 1/1 that doesnt fit the curve.

Flash is really important on a three mana sorcery-speed creature I heard. Slightly better than the synergy with GSZ and Bloodbraid Elf at least.


Thats wrong.
Maverick still does play aether vial and wayfarer. Thats the reason why this thread is incorrecly named. Maverick is a different deck than GW zenith.
If you're gonna be a smartass, at least try to inform yourself before embarrassing yourself.

I'm sorry, what was that argument you stated so eloquently before? Lots of laughs or something I dunno

There is no "GW Zenith" deck except possible in SCG archives before they called it Maverick along with everyone fucking else.


Now can you at least put the guns down for a sec, and try to agree with at least ONE of my points, instead of multiquoting my comments and inserting random nonsense to dismiss it?
I'd appreciate that.

Try being right about something and I'll see what I can do for you.

kingtk3
02-22-2012, 02:31 PM
Hi to all,
I'm testing a GW build and I'm looking for some advices and explanations. I've attended a couple of small tournaments with the following list:

4 noble hierarch
3 mother of runes
3 stoneforge mystic
2 qasali pridemage
4 knight of the reliquary
1 gaddock teeg
1 scavenging ooze
1 scryb ranger
1 thrun, the last troll
1 terravore
1 eternal witness
2 aven mindcensor

1 sword of feast and famine
1 umezawa's jitte
1 batterskull

4 green sun's zenith

4 swords to plowshares

2 sylvan library

1 elspeth, knight-errant

1 marsh flat
2 misty rainforest
4 windswept heath
1 plains
1 forest
1 gaea's cradle
1 karakas
1 tower of the magistrate
1 horizon canopy
1 dryad arbor
4 savannah
4 wasteland

SIDE
2 enlightened tutor
1 bojuka bog
1 tormod's crypt
1 wheel of sun and moon
1 sword of light and shadow
3 ethersworn canonist
2 choke
1 life from the loam
1 edric, spymaster of trest
2 path to exile

The deck was strong but I felt that it lacked of important treats, as I found myself quite often with a board of small utility creatures unable to deal reasonable damage if stripped of the equipments (which is not uncommon).

I decided to take a more aggressive route and I wanted more beaters to complement the Knights:

-2 aven mindcensor (they are annoyng versus almost any deck, and are the second best creature MD against combo, but they are not stellar)
-1 eternal witness
-1 sword of feast and famine
2 mirran crusader
1 birds of paradise
1 sword of fire and ice

Mirran crusader is an important presence on the board that can grow rapidily with exalted or equipments. Because of the crusader inherent protections and double strike, I switched to sword of fire and ice, and I added the birds to speed up the curve.
I playtested a bit and I found the crusader very good, but they easily die against any burn. Also, I found that sometimes the witness would have been useful for recurring a StP or a broken equipment.
If I were to take out the Crusader (as I'm planning to), what do you recommend me to play? I was thinking to add the second Thrun and the second Elspeth, adding Worship (as Majikal) to the side. Maybe terravore will leave too to avoid being too graveyard dependant.

@IBA: I'm curious about your Mother-less build, would you mind to share?

Thanks in advance for your comments.

arcannys
02-22-2012, 02:37 PM
Bah, i give up. You see??
Of the last 3 comments you did multiquoting every pharagraph of 3 different people, you didn't agree with ANY of those quotes!! Thats statisticaly impossible...
This is just unbelieveable, your only job is to sistematicaly disagree with everything..
I only follow a couple of threads in this forum but seeing how many comments you have done with your account i feel terribly sorry for all the other users that have to deal with you...
Like, whats the matter with you? you sit all day infront of your computer activly dismissing ppls points with your idiotic points of view or what?
Im done with this crap, if someone wants to discuss serious matters i'll be glad to do so.

bakofried
02-22-2012, 03:30 PM
If someone feels the points being made are wrong, then its fine to dispute them. Everyone on the Mother of Runes/Scryb Ranger side of the argument is using the same argument -> they're awesome when together or with other dudes. IBA's argument, roughly, is that in a metagame with a substantially higher amount of spot removal due to Snapcaster, along with the rebirth of mass removal ala Wrath of God or Pernicious Deed, that one's draws should be independently strong; which Mother of Runes, and Scryb Ranger, really aren't. Thus, he uses that space for Goyfs (strong independent threat) Libraries, Tops, Elspeths, very, very bomby cards.

arcannys
02-22-2012, 03:56 PM
GW Zenith is not every deck that runs 4 KotR and 4 savannah.
GW zenith runs mother of runes, zeniths, scryb ranger, 4 wastelands and a very long etcetera that is the core of the deck. If you want to play a deck that doesnt fit this criteria, this forum is kind enough to provide a sub-forum for you, which is called "New and Developmental Decks".
And yes, its GW zenith, not GW maverick. Maverick is a diferent deck. I happen to know the creator of GW maverick and he would gladly tell you that this is not the deck he created.

dsck
02-22-2012, 04:04 PM
The deck didn't exist before GSZ as far as I'm aware, so that's not why it was dropped.

The deck evolved from GW version of death and taxes, I believe.

http://thecouncil.es/tcdecks/deck.php?id=5384&iddeck=38958

Koby
02-22-2012, 04:21 PM
If someone feels the points being made are wrong, then its fine to dispute them. Everyone on the Mother of Runes/Scryb Ranger side of the argument is using the same argument -> they're awesome when together or with other dudes. IBA's argument, roughly, is that in a metagame with a substantially higher amount of spot removal due to Snapcaster, along with the rebirth of mass removal ala Wrath of God or Pernicious Deed, that one's draws should be independently strong; which Mother of Runes, and Scryb Ranger, really aren't. Thus, he uses that space for Goyfs (strong independent threat) Libraries, Tops, Elspeths, very, very bomby cards.

I contend that Goyfs are not independently strong in this archetype. We don't have a variety of card types to boost Tarmogoyf to actually be better than Watchwolf. All the removal is exiling type; we don't willingly sacrifice creatures (since they are all strong independently).

Is a 2/3 Goyf the best use for a deck that's trying to essentially out-muscle the metagame with Knights?



The deck evolved from GW version of death and taxes, I believe.

http://thecouncil.es/tcdecks/deck.php?id=5384&iddeck=38958

Semantics. The deck wasn't particularly strong between the time Survival got banned, and GSZ became printed. At that point Vial was put on the back burner due to game-play issues that made those versions fundamentally weaker compared to GSZ.

majikal
02-22-2012, 04:45 PM
I started with Goyf in my build, and after much deliberation and testing, I cut it for another Ooze and haven't looked back.

As for Mother of Runes, she has so far been more amazing than bad, and when that changes I will cut her.

sdematt
02-22-2012, 07:36 PM
Holy tits, I don't read the thread for a day and you all spawn three pages. Bah! You're worse than the death camp I run for fruitflies. Leave it for a day, prepare to cull infinite offspring.

I think Mother is decent, but whoever's saying it competes for the Turn 1 drop slot and could be other cards has a completely sound argument. I've played with the Moms and like them very much, and in my meta, they've been fine. Could it be better? Perhaps, but I don't think I'll switch them out quite yet.



-Matt

Tao
02-22-2012, 08:11 PM
We already had the same discussion about Mother of Runes on page 3 of this thread and I am still convinced that MoR is a 4-off and that playing any other number is wrong.

sdematt
02-22-2012, 08:19 PM
Personally, I don't think 5 is wrong.

-Matt

Vandalize
02-22-2012, 09:14 PM
Personally, I don't think 5 is wrong.

-Matt

If you play against me, and I see 5 Mother of Runes, I'll call the judge! You little CHEATER! STOP THAT.

How good has Parallax Wave been for you misters? Couldn't cast it in a century.

sdematt
02-22-2012, 09:43 PM
Then I'll just use Mother of Runes #6 to protect me from the judge call. Take that! :tongue:

-Matt

Vandalize
02-22-2012, 09:57 PM
Then I'll just use Mother of Runes #6 to protect me from the judge call. Take that! :tongue:

-Matt

What if the Judge is an artifact? TAKE THAT.

randomly.anonymous
02-22-2012, 10:46 PM
Using StP + Snapcaster -> StP to remove just one Mother of Runes is fine with me. A 1UWW solution to a W to cast 1/1 is alright. It certainly is better than losing KotR to StP and then a second KotR to Snapcaster -> StP.


Spot removal is not the deck's only weakness, and running a card that tries to stop spot removal plans and does nothing else seems of questionable worth over the bevy of other good cards that could be run in the deck, even without going to a third color.

The deck definitely fears sweepers more. For the time being though, sweepers are showing up postboard in UW and as 1-or-2-ofs in the form of Deed and/or Perish in BG/x decks. I think the total number of StP/PtE/Maelstrom Pulse/GftT being run is high enough to warrant running some numbers of MoR mainboard.

MoR definitely does a lot more than stop spot removal plans (which is by no means insignificant). I think saying that MoR "does nothing else of questionable worth" is underrating its performance.

If you expect the opponent to be bringing in sweepers postboard, it would be fine to just side out some number of Heirarchs/MoR for whatever equipment/PW/Libraries you have in the SB.

KobeBryan
02-23-2012, 02:53 AM
I was watching IBA's match on cockatrice against MUC.

It seems like this deck has a hard time fighting through the counters and the other constant annoyance.

Besides thrun, is there anything you can do to fight this matchup.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-23-2012, 03:06 AM
I don't think counters are particularly a problem for the deck, most of the decks in Legacy run relatively few hard counters, and a lot of them are soft or narrow and weak against Maverick, like Spell Snare or Counterbalance. Generally in Blade Control the much bigger problem is the white cards, not the blue ones.

I mean it's important not to get thrown off tilt by random shit. Sometimes you'll have no mana dudes and lose to a random Back to Basics or Blood Moon, or get murdered by Raffinity pumping out an army on turn 1. But one can't lose track of the averages. Just be threat dense and you'll tend to win those matchups.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-23-2012, 03:17 AM
@IBA: I'm curious about your Mother-less build, would you mind to share?

Thanks in advance for your comments.

Sure.

4 Savannah
2 Forest
1 Plains
4 Windswept Heath
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Dryad Arbor
3 Horizon Canopy
2 Wasteland
1 Karakas
1 Stirring Wildwood
1 Maze of Ith

4 Noble Hieararch
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Sylvan Library
3 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Tarmogoyf
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Knight of the Reliquary
2 Eternal Witness
2 Thrun, the Last Troll
2 Elspeth, Knight Errant
2 Parallax Wave

SB Pending.

lemariont
02-23-2012, 07:11 AM
Hi guys.

What do you think about the new Thalia in a maverick deck????

I think is best against combo than aven mindcensor, but perhaps worse than the aven against stoneblade.

Could be included without problems in a Punishing Maverick?? or better included in a version without punishing??

Thanks

Asthereal
02-23-2012, 08:58 AM
I know things are going rediculously fast here, but around 10 pages earlier you can see the discussion about Thalia.

In short:
Thalia is awesome against Tempo Thresh and clones, (Storm) Combo.
Thalia is okay against Stoneblade, BUG Still/Controllish, Burn (still buys you a turn, which is nice)
Thalia works perfectly well with Karakas.

On the downside: Thalia is 2/1 first strike for 2, which is not that great, and legendary has its natural drawback of only being able to play one.

In GW Mav I fitted in 2/3 main deck. They get boarded out a lot, but in general I am pleased with them.
In GWr Punishing Mav I have NO space whatsoever to get them in the main deck. There, I play 3 side, with which I am also pleased.

Since Thalia became legal I personally haven't played the Mindcensors anymore. Thalia is quicker, dodges Daze better, the Karakas tricks are nice and for flying we have Scryb Ranger. Seems pretty clear to me.

rayray
02-23-2012, 10:16 AM
hey guys, what do you side in and take out against a U/R delver MU?

arcannys
02-23-2012, 10:25 AM
hey guys, what do you side in and take out against a U/R delver MU?

It's actualy a pretty bad MU, since they're starting to run gutshot MD. And equipment is pretty bad since they also have smite to smitherins in the board. I have 2 finks and a rhox war monk in my sideboard which can help along with a little bit of praying. Now this kind of situation is why i like rhox more than batterskull, since there's no way you live to cast a batterskull against this type of deck.

rayray
02-23-2012, 10:37 AM
thanks! i board in COP:red against them, but even if it resolves, the main problem is the multiple delvers. i seem to have no answer to them. StP often gets countered and does not resolve

arcannys
02-23-2012, 10:50 AM
well, against delver we have maze of ith, 6 STP post board and scryb rangers, those dekcs only run 4 Force of wil so you have to play very bad or they to draw very good in order to not be able to kill the delver. Also, KotR is the best card against them as long as you dont play it as a 3/3.

maktus
02-23-2012, 01:14 PM
What do you think about use skinshifter or mentor of the meek?

skinshifter is very versatile and mentor allows more purchases against nic fit or other attritions

majikal
02-23-2012, 02:30 PM
It's actualy a pretty bad MU, since they're starting to run gutshot MD. And equipment is pretty bad since they also have smite to smitherins in the board. I have 2 finks and a rhox war monk in my sideboard which can help along with a little bit of praying. Now this kind of situation is why i like rhox more than batterskull, since there's no way you live to cast a batterskull against this type of deck.

The now have Combust for Rhox War Monk. I mean... WHAT A FUCK?!!!

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-23-2012, 03:02 PM
From my testing, Tempo RUG is the deck's best matchup and an absolute slaughter. Anything RUG really. They can't deal with your big guys. Of course I'm not running Scryb Ranger over Tarmogoyf.

My tentative sideboard plan is -2 Elspeth, - 2 Qasali Pridemage, +2 Path to Exile, +1 Eternal Witness, +1 Bojuka Bog against them. You really just want more early removal, bring in an extra land or two if you have them in the board, and lower the curve a bit. The only real ways to lose are to get mana fucked or have a flying Delver kill you before you can find an answer, and that plan solves both of those issues.

majikal
02-23-2012, 03:38 PM
From my testing, Tempo RUG is the deck's best matchup and an absolute slaughter. Anything RUG really. They can't deal with your big guys. Of course I'm not running Scryb Ranger over Tarmogoyf.

My tentative sideboard plan is -2 Elspeth, - 2 Qasali Pridemage, +2 Path to Exile, +1 Eternal Witness, +1 Bojuka Bog against them. You really just want more early removal, bring in an extra land or two if you have them in the board, and lower the curve a bit. The only real ways to lose are to get mana fucked or have a flying Delver kill you before you can find an answer, and that plan solves both of those issues.
Scryb Ranger is excellent against RUG. It blocks their Delvers all day and lets you both attack and block with Knight.

Vandalize
02-23-2012, 04:25 PM
From my testing, Tempo RUG is the deck's best matchup and an absolute slaughter. Anything RUG really. They can't deal with your big guys. Of course I'm not running Scryb Ranger over Tarmogoyf.

Good Luck on beating Natural Order RUG.

Koby
02-23-2012, 04:52 PM
Good Luck on beating Natural Order RUG.

To be fair, having an active Knight if your only chance of beating Natural Order -> Progenitus. Batterskull comes in a close second, but that's very unlikely considering the turn after NO resolves Progenitus acts as a Moat, preventing any profitable attack.

arcannys
02-23-2012, 05:33 PM
Good Luck on beating Natural Order RUG.

So.. you've been playing lately it seems..
NO RUG is not a deck anymore without misstep.


The now have Combust for Rhox War Monk. I mean... WHAT A FUCK?!!!

what?

majikal
02-23-2012, 06:51 PM
what?
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?23124-Burn-wins-second-consecutive-SCG-Open&p=620809&viewfull=1#post620809

sdematt
02-23-2012, 08:28 PM
Don't make me laugh when I'm sick, it hurts too much :tongue:

In all seriousness, I was thinking about playing Combust when SFM.deck was the nut-high, but then I remembered that I hadn't had a stroke, so I didn't.

-Matt

VITASOY
02-23-2012, 09:58 PM
Hey guys, I've been getting into legacy and I have been wondering about the pros and cons of punishing maverick, compared to GW Maverick.

majikal
02-23-2012, 10:46 PM
Pros: you get a bit of late-game reach and can deal with irritating creatures like Delver, Stoneforge Mystic and Mother of Runes a little better than other decks.

Cons: Your manabase becomes extremely vulnerable and unstable, you have more dead cards against a lot of decks, and you can't cram as many threats into your deck.

Esper3k
02-23-2012, 11:49 PM
Pros: you get a bit of late-game reach and can deal with irritating creatures like Delver, Stoneforge Mystic and Mother of Runes a little better than other decks.

Cons: Your manabase becomes extremely vulnerable and unstable, you have more dead cards against a lot of decks, and you can't cram as many threats into your deck.

You also get some slightly better sideboard options (Ancient Grudge, REB's).

You do lose consistency though, which is what I really miss about the straight GW list. That mana base is so solid.

In my experience, the pFires builds are also more controlling and less Aggro than the GW builds.

Koby
02-24-2012, 02:06 AM
The GWr lists also miss out on Elspeth. That's a big minus if you're looking to lock away easy wins.

arcannys
02-24-2012, 08:45 AM
@Majikal
Are you saying that if you're playing against burn and you have a rhox in your sideboard you dont bring it in, in fear of a combust?
Im not playing rhox to beat burn, im playing rhox to beat zoo. That doesnt mean i wont bring it in against burn.

rayray
02-24-2012, 09:17 AM
This is the list I'm playing. Welcomes feedbacks. :)

4 windswept heath
4 savannah
4 wasteland
2 horizon canopy
2 misty rainforest
2 forest
1 plains
1 dryad arbor
1 karakas
1 gaea's cradle
1 maze of ith

4 mother of runes
4 noble hierarch
4 stoneforge mystic
4 knoght of the reliquary
2 qasali pridemage
2 scavenging ooze
1 scryb ranger
1 silhana ledgawalker
1 eternal witness
1 terravore
1 gaddock teeg
1 thrun the last troll

4 swords to plowshares
4 green sun's zenith
1 umezawa's jitte
1 batterskull
1 sword of feast and famine

SB:
2 enlightened tutor
2 choke
2 ethersworn canonist
2 surgical extraction
1 chalice of the void
1 dueling grounds
1 stony silence
1 pithing needle
1 phyrexian metamorph
1 life from the loam
1 circle of protection:red

>ledgewalker has been the best sword-holder for me, gets past through maze of ith
>sofaf and maze interaction is great
>meta in my place: delver decks, UW stoneblade, mirror

majikal
02-24-2012, 11:43 AM
@Majikal
Are you saying that if you're playing against burn and you have a rhox in your sideboard you dont bring it in, in fear of a combust?
Im not playing rhox to beat burn, im playing rhox to beat zoo. That doesnt mean i wont bring it in against burn.

/facepalm

menace13
02-24-2012, 12:06 PM
@Majikal
Are you saying that if you're playing against burn and you have a rhox in your sideboard you dont bring it in, in fear of a combust?
Im not playing rhox to beat burn, im playing rhox to beat zoo. That doesnt mean i wont bring it in against burn.


/facepalm

Contrary to conventional thought, Telling if I am being trolled seems to get harder the more exposed to it that I become.

maktus
02-24-2012, 12:42 PM
This is the list I'm playing. Welcomes feedbacks. :)
4 windswept heath
4 savannah
4 wasteland
2 horizon canopy
2 misty rainforest
2 forest
1 plains
1 dryad arbor
1 karakas
1 gaea's cradle
1 maze of ith
4 mother of runes
4 noble hierarch
4 stoneforge mystic
4 knoght of the reliquary
2 qasali pridemage
2 scavenging ooze
1 scryb ranger
1 silhana ledgawalker
1 eternal witness
1 terravore
1 gaddock teeg
1 thrun the last troll
4 swords to plowshares
4 green sun's zenith
1 umezawa's jitte
1 batterskull
1 sword of feast and famine
SB:
2 enlightened tutor
2 choke
2 ethersworn canonist
2 surgical extraction
1 chalice of the void
1 dueling grounds
1 stony silence
1 pithing needle
1 phyrexian metamorph
1 life from the loam
1 circle of protection:red
>ledgewalker has been the best sword-holder for me, gets past through maze of ith
>sofaf and maze interaction is great
>meta in my place: delver decks, UW stoneblade, mirror

maybe -1 circle of protection:red
+1 rule of law (delver)
+1 scryb (delver, uw)

Machahiko
02-25-2012, 01:17 PM
Played today in a really small tournament, got into top4, deck crapped out on me unfortunately. In swiss I faced enchantress (2-0), hivemind combo (2-1), dredge (2-0), BW tempo (1-0, time) and WBU control (2-1).

In the top 4 I played again against the WBU control and it didn't work as planned, had to mulligan in both games and draws after the opening hand of 6 were a bit awkward unfortunately.

I left the tournament with a new windswept heath which I came to look for because I had only 3. :-)

Parallax Wave was good when I got to play it, didn't happen too much though. People were really scared of it and when possible, it was always taken away with thoughtseize even if it was the wrong play. 2 Jitte's MD is awesome. Not really anything special about the deck, it worked very well and I liked everything about my MD setup with Quirion Ranger and Scryb Ranger.

My sideboard for the event was:


1 Garruk Relentless
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2 Choke
3 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Path to Exile
3 Tormod's Crypt
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon
2 Krosan Grip


Garruk did good when he showed up, Elspeth was shy all day long and for the first time ever, Ethersworn Canonist did her job and won me a game against hivemind. This deck still keeps on amazing me with everything it can do and after every tournament I play I like the deck more than I did yesterday.

Only thing that could make the deck more cool would be few blue lands and sideboard with 4 meddling mages.

Water_Wizard
02-25-2012, 03:41 PM
Only thing that could make the deck more cool would be few blue lands and sideboard with 4 meddling mages.

Just out of curiosity, what you would bring meddling mage in against? It seems like Hive Mind (naming Show & Tell) is the only solid match to bring it in against (out of the matches you listed - enchantress, hive mind, dredge, bw tempo and wbu control). I guess you could name STP against BW or WBU, but they are likely to have PTE and Mom already does a good job of protecting your guys from STP/PTE (not to mention you could run Thrun/Ledgewalker/SoLaS).
I thought Meddling Mage was dis-favored due to the fact that most decks have an alternative kill condition or a way to kill meddling mage.
Back in Sept. when the NO Bant lists were hot, they were running meddling mage, but it seemed like most players found it underwhelming and replaced it with other teck, like spell pierce or flusterstorm.

Machahiko
02-25-2012, 03:56 PM
Just out of curiosity, what you would bring meddling mage in against? It seems like Hive Mind (naming Show & Tell) is the only solid match to bring it in against (out of the matches you listed - enchantress, hive mind, dredge, bw tempo and wbu control). I guess you could name STP against BW or WBU, but they are likely to have PTE and Mom already does a good job of protecting your guys from STP/PTE (not to mention you could run Thrun/Ledgewalker/SoLaS).
I thought Meddling Mage was dis-favored due to the fact that most decks have an alternative kill condition or a way to kill meddling mage.
Back in Sept. when the NO Bant lists were hot, they were running meddling mage, but it seemed like most players found it underwhelming and replaced it with other teck, like spell pierce or flusterstorm.

And here you have given an answer to yourself, Meddling Mage isn't good enough, but I like it as a card to fight combo. Naming Tendrils, Empty the Warrens, Show & Tell or something like that. But it still doesn't make the card good. :cry: You're absolutely right, combo decks have multiple ways to win and many ways to get rid of Meddling Mage. They can just bounce Mage and combo out. Or start going off and bounce him, then proceed to win. Ethersworn Canonist is there to lock them out until she leaves the table and because of that, she's the superior hatebear. I think that Meddling Mage is a pet card of mine just like Quirion Ranger.

http://magiccards.info/scans/en/jr/26.jpg
Now look at that handsome devil. To me, the mage in the art portraits what Planeswalker/ass-kickin'-wizard/Gandalf should look like.

Water_Wizard
02-25-2012, 04:01 PM
http://magiccards.info/scans/en/jr/26.jpg
Now look at that handsome devil. To me, the mage in the art portraits what Planeswalker/ass-kickin'-wizard/Gandalf should look like.
And with art like that, I could see why you would want to run it. He does look badass.

angel882
02-26-2012, 02:45 AM
Hi, what do you board out against Reanimator? I'm playing this GWr-list

1 Birds of Paradise
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Mother of Runes
3 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
1 Scryb Ranger
3 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Tarmogoyf
1 Gaddock Teeg

3 Punishing Fire
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
4 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Life from the Loam
1 Sylvan Library

1 Forest
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Plateau
4 Savannah
2 Taiga
3 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Karakas

and I'm bringing in 8 cards

1 Phyrexian Metamorph
3 Enlightened Tutor
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Maze of Ith
1 Worship

I have also Thrun, the Last Troll in my SB. Do we need to board Thrun in? Last tournament I sided out all my PFires, but missed those because the game stalled a long time because opp had Archon and I had Scryp Ranger feat Mom.

CookedChestnuts
02-26-2012, 03:04 AM
I would board out a Birds, Life from the Loam, a Noble Hierarch, 3 Punishing Fires, 1 Pridemage, and potentially a fetchland and/or a Taiga.

angel882
02-26-2012, 06:15 AM
I would board out a Birds, Life from the Loam, a Noble Hierarch, 3 Punishing Fires, 1 Pridemage, and potentially a fetchland and/or a Taiga.

Why Loam? It's good cause if they destroy Karakas or Maze of Ith you can Loam those back. Is it better to take out PFires than Mystic package?

Philipp2293
02-26-2012, 06:42 AM
Loam is slow. Also Reanimator doesn't have that many means to destroy your lands anyway. (Angel of Despair afaik) Punishing Fire should be taken out, and IMO parts of the Mystic Package, probably 2 Mystic and SoFaF, leaving 1 Mystic and Jitte in, which could be important in close races or on rare occasions as removal with enough tokens.

angel882
02-26-2012, 07:33 AM
Ok, thanks for your advices :) how about UW blade or UB decks like UB Tempo. What do you board out against them?

Philipp2293
02-26-2012, 09:56 AM
Against UW: Depends on what you board in ;) If you're running a Fires build I think it's ok to take out some numbers of StP if you have REBs to bring in. Also the Goyf (all he'll do is going to eat a sword/path most of the times) and maybe the third Mystic.

As far as UB tempo is concerned, it depends on the build as I'm not exactly sure what you have in mind ;)

angel882
02-26-2012, 12:21 PM
Against UW: Depends on what you board in ;) If you're running a Fires build I think it's ok to take out some numbers of StP if you have REBs to bring in. Also the Goyf (all he'll do is going to eat a sword/path most of the times) and maybe the third Mystic.

As far as UB tempo is concerned, it depends on the build as I'm not exactly sure what you have in mind ;)

Oh, I didn't post my list cause it was there few post ago :) but yeah I'm playing PFires Maverick and my SB looks like this

1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Choke
3 Enlightened Tutor
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Batterskull
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Stony Silence
1 Garruk 3.0/Elspeth
1 Worship
1 Maze of Ith

Hanni
02-26-2012, 01:58 PM
Needs more Lionheart Maverick.

Philipp2293
02-26-2012, 04:21 PM
In: 2 Choke, Thrun, Walker
Out: 1 StP, Goyf, 1 Mystic. I somehow hesistate to recommend cutting the 2nd StP since you have no REBs as backup removal. Maybe it's still the right call.

While I loved the Choke's in my straight GW SB, I feel in Punishing Maverick Blast effects are better, since they are better against Delvers, Jins and Show and Tell decks in general.

angel882
02-26-2012, 04:41 PM
In: 2 Choke, Thrun, Walker
Out: 1 StP, Goyf, 1 Mystic. I somehow hesistate to recommend cutting the 2nd StP since you have no REBs as backup removal. Maybe it's still the right call.

While I loved the Choke's in my straight GW SB, I feel in Punishing Maverick Blast effects are better, since they are better against Delvers, Jins and Show and Tell decks in general.

Yeah I think that too. Blast is also better lategame draw and you can bring it in against Reanimator when they side in Show and Tells.

Koby
02-26-2012, 04:55 PM
Yeah I think that too. Blast is also better lategame draw and you can bring it in against Reanimator when they side in Show and Tells.

The red splash is still viable in GW stock lists:
Maindeck:
-1 Savannah
+1 Taiga

Sideboard:
+3 REB

It's not any stronger than the blue splash for Spell Pierce/Flusterstorm however. Blue gives you Geist of Saint Traft and/or Rhox War Monk however.

Koby
02-26-2012, 11:49 PM
So... I've been thinking.

We're usually soft to Burn and definitely to Combo decks. What do they have very much in common? Targeting players.

Has any had testing experience with Leyline of Sanctity? It may be good for the Grand Prix metagame. I'm thinking as a 3 of.

I don't see it being a part of an E-tutor sideboard, so that's going to be an all-in style Sideboard plan. Right now I'm playing with the blue splash to pack Spell Pierce, which helps yet against against both Combo and Burn (sort of a combo deck). It helps vs UW control's planeswalkers too, and random wierd stuff that isn't normally covered by the Etutor plan.

Lejay
02-27-2012, 12:43 AM
Wow that's a genious idea ! Great ! It can also be good against hymn to tourach decks or cut hivemind's intuitions. I'll definitely play some of these in my sideboard !

lordofthepit
02-27-2012, 12:57 AM
So... I've been thinking.

We're usually soft to Burn and definitely to Combo decks. What do they have very much in common? Targeting players.

Has any had testing experience with Leyline of Sanctity? It may be good for the Grand Prix metagame. I'm thinking as a 3 of.

I had experience with Leyline of Sanctity as a 4-of in my sideboard back when I was playing Big Zoo, which is as similar to Maverick as I guess you can realistically get.

Ran into the same burn deck twice in an Underground Seas tournament (Swiss and Top 4), which I ended up winning. Ironically, I think I lost both Game 2s, where I got a Leyline, but kept weak hands (didn't have a white source). This was right before Survival of the Fittest got banned.

I think I went 3-0 against Storm decks during that same timeframe, although I was pretty lucky in each case. I also ran Faerie Macabre as my other source of hate to shut down IGG loops, but that was never relevant. Empty the Warrens was still a beating though.

In my opinion, Maverick has a softer matchup against burn and combo than Zoo does, at least preboard, due to its slower clock. Zoo was slightly favored against Burn to begin with, because of its clock. However, Maverick probably needs and benefits from the Leylines more than Zoo would, especially since it buys the time necessary to get a Jitte, SoLS, or Batterskull online. Leyline still probably doesn't get there against Storm by itself, since Maverick's clock is pretty slow, but with the ability to grab Jitte, Maverick is much better equipped to deal with Empty the Warrens. Plus, it gets you enough time to drop a Ethersworn Canonist, which I didn't run in Big Zoo.

I eventually stopped running Leyline of Sanctity because the banning of Survival brought Counterbalance back in the meta, which shut down combo decks (and burn never really was a significant presence). When New Phyrexia hit, I began to use Mental Misstep maindeck as a better, more versatile anti-combo card that doesn't suck against the rest of the format, plus Surgical Extraction could shut down graveyard-based decks while still being pretty solid against Storm combo. Obviously, Surgical Extraction is the nut low against burn, so it wouldn't shore up your weakness there.

Edit: I never tried Leyline of Sanctity against Intuition-based decks, since it seemed pretty narrow (Hive Mind, Painted Stone, etc. weren't real decks then). If you're worried about those decks, Surgical Extraction is obviously much better. I wouldn't bring in Leyline against a deck with just a couple of Jaces either, just like I wouldn't bring it in against a black-based aggro deck with a couple of discard spells.

Another thing I forgot to address is that you lose a lot of the benefit of the Enlightened Tutor package if you run Leylines. I'm not sure it's the best idea in G/W Maverick, unless you're willing to cut out some important sideboard space to accommodate all that anti-combo hate.

Edit #2: I just remembered I also ran Null Rod as an Affinity/Counterthopters hate deck that had collateral damage against Storm, usually as a three- or four-of. In retrospect, I'm not sure I would have won any of my Storm matchups with Leyline alone, since Leyline usually bought me just enough time while protecting my other hate pieces. Moreover, since I had a faster clock than Maverick decks can reasonably put up, I was able to dissuade my opponents from going the Ad Nauseam route early; Leyline by itself without a way to quickly reduce your opponent to around 8-10 (against TES) or 13-15 (against normal ANT) probably isn't good enough in Maverick.

Koby
02-27-2012, 01:04 AM
That's some really good info, thanks lordofthepit!

The way I see it right now, the SB slots against RUG Delver and UW StoneBlade are so minimal cuz the deck generally crushes blue decisively that it gives us many options to answer the tough matchups. This includes the fringe Linears like Affinity, Burn, and Combo. Of those 3 main Linears, Leyline shuts them down enough to get our game going. Affinity I'm willing to accept as a loss, but still have the necessary tools in the maindeck to answer a mediocre Affinity draw, barring a nut turn 2 Cranial Plating win.

Any other thoughts?

Water_Wizard
02-27-2012, 01:20 AM
@ Ruckus - the only problem I see with Leyline is that it fits into the Storm players sideboard plan. A storm player is going to cut discard and chant effects to add bounce, so it really doesn't matter to them if they are bouncing LoS/Ethersworn/Teeg. Also, Leyline doesn't prevent them from comboing, imo, a good storm player is going to see Leyline and laugh, thinking, "Okay, I can still cast Ad Nas, I will draw 20 cards and a bounce spell, drop my cheap artifact mana, bounce your leyline and storm you out."
Also, if you are serious about drawing a Leyline in your opener, I would run 4. I know with 4, it's about 40% to find one in your opening 7, 35% in your next 6 and you really need leyline in your opener, because if you wait to cast it, even with hierarch, turn 3 might not be quick enough.
With our current build, Teeg and Ethersworn is the best bet.
Thalia merits discussion. Against Storm, she is a Mom-protectable, thorn-of-amethyst, 2-power beater - may be worth a 3-of in the sideboard.
Also, chant effects are very solid against Storm. Most likely, discard is the first thing they are going to drop (the Epic lists all run duress, although lists that run thoughseize might keep it in), and chant effects are unexpected, although probably not worth the sideboard slot (they don't do much against most of the meta).
Finally, we could always go back to Mindbreak Trap, which has the added benefit of being nuts against High Tide (if you expect to see any of that).

Regarding burn, I think ET package with COP:Red or Aegis is still the best bet. However, Thalia looks very solid against this match-up as well. She stops Goblin Guide, Hellspark and a mini-Figure of Destiny and punishes a list that is notoriously tight on mana.

Conclusion, if you are not running ET Tutor package, I think Thalia is the best use of 3 slots (as opposed to LoS).

If you are running ET package, I like the Canonist/Thorn/Stony Silence package against Storm and Aegis/COP against Burn. Since MUD just won Memphis, who knows how much that will pop up and rumor has it, stony silence and/or silence just wrecks MUD.

EDIT: Ruckus, just read your post above, and Stony Silence also is nuts against Affinity. I think it may be best to keep the ET package, with 3 Thalia slots, 2 PTE and 2 Choke + 2 ET and ~6 ET targets (+/- an equipment or Maze).

REEDIT: Not sure if Thalia and the ET package necessarily comport. May be best to drop Thalia for more ET slots (seems like the matches we would bring Thalia in against would also be the matches we would bring ET in against, and there is no need for both).

As an aside, is anyone worried about Dredge? I didn't watch the SCG coverage from today, was it well represented? I'm curious how much of people's sideboards they are dedicating to dredge hate. If so, what are people running? Surgical, Wheel of Sun and Moon, Tormod's Crypt? We already have Ooze md, but it can be slow.

BlackStarDeceiver
02-27-2012, 02:42 AM
Played Pun Mav yesterday to 4-1-1 (draw against Thopters, 4 more Turns and he'd be dead) and lost the last round against Reanimator with him having the perfect hands both games:
G1 T1 Study binning Elesh/Jin --> dual reanimation in two turns with double Fow backup.
G2 T2 Jin with triple Fow Backup.

Played against
2-0 Reanimator
2-0 NicFit Punishing
1-1-1 Thopters (time)
2-0 Nic Fit GWB
2-1 Dredge
0-2 Reanimator

My sideboard yesterday was:

3x REB
3x Surgical Extraction
2x Choke
1x Garruk Relentless
2x Wheel of Sun and Moon
1x Path to Exile
3x Ethersworn Canonist

Wheels were great, a bit slow against those Reanimator hands but strong against Thopter, Dredge und especially Nic Fit, shutting off the Explorers. The only cards i did not board were the Canonists because i did not meet Storm/Enchantress.

I played without Stoneforge/Mindscensor using the slots for Finks, Witness, Thrun and another Sylvan, played 2x Jitte 1x SoLaS and it was perfectly fine.


I dont want to explicitly talk about the maindeck, as that was just a spontaneous decision to cut SFM but the Sideboard seemed strong.

@rukcus:

How about:

3x Leyline of Sanctity
3x Spell Pierce
3x Surgical Extraction
2x Enlightened Tutor
1x Wheel of Sun and Moon
1x Ethersworn Canonist
1x Sundial of Infinite
1x Phyrexian Metamorph

Combined with Teeg/Thalia main it seems like a solid choice, if you are splashing blue for Geist and Spell Pierce only.


Edit: MUD is already a very good matchup for us, just Zenith Teeg and you are good to go. Even the Chalice version is more 65% in our favour preboard and doesn't change a lot postboard.

I'd expect to see the usual suspects --> Stormcombo/UR Delver/Maverick (GW/x) and probably lots of dredge.

maurobad2k4
02-27-2012, 09:27 AM
So... I've been thinking.

We're usually soft to Burn and definitely to Combo decks. What do they have very much in common? Targeting players.

Has any had testing experience with Leyline of Sanctity? It may be good for the Grand Prix metagame. I'm thinking as a 3 of.

I don't see it being a part of an E-tutor sideboard, so that's going to be an all-in style Sideboard plan. Right now I'm playing with the blue splash to pack Spell Pierce, which helps yet against against both Combo and Burn (sort of a combo deck). It helps vs UW control's planeswalkers too, and random wierd stuff that isn't normally covered by the Etutor plan.

I tried a playset of Leylines a few months ago. Against Burn it worked as expected, but against TES I lost the g2 to EtW tokens, but managed to win the g3 because I had MoR, Canonist and Gaddock. So, in the end, I dont think the Leylines helped me that much. If you're having trouble against Burn just run Finks, since it helps in others matches as well.

arcannys
02-27-2012, 11:09 AM
Leyline is terrible, it forces you to keep loose hands or mulligan strong hands...
agaisnt burn I run 2 finks and 1 rhox war monk. Jitte is not very reliable against them because of smash to smitherins, thats why I run rhox.
And finks and Rhox arel also very good against Zoo and canadian threshold.

zulander
02-27-2012, 12:43 PM
Why are you running sundial in your board for? Pact decks?

ThePrevailer
02-27-2012, 12:43 PM
Against Burn, I have a single COP:Red in my Enlightened Tutor board. It comes down turn three most games, and as long as they don't have a god hand, that's fast enough to stop them. Mono-red can only effectively answer COP with Chaos Warp, if they have it; Pridemage deals with the rest of their SB. It's important to get your life gain online ASAP after sticking the enchantment though, or the Burn player will just wait 'til they have more spells than you do mana.


Against combo:
I feel like out best options are Teeg, Canonist, and Thalia/Thorn of Amethyst. The creatures are better because they can be protected my Mom, which is a big deal. The only reason I'm not sold on Thalia yet is that unlike the other two we (I) have no way to search for her, and being legendary means I don't want to maindeck more than one. Thorns get really good in multiples, and Thalia doesn't.

In my SB, I also have a single Ratchet Bomb (wish it were E. Explosives) to deal with token strategies, including Belcher, a Stony Silence for their artifact mana, and a Pithing Needle for everything from Goblin Charbelcher to Candelabra of Tawnos.


I learned the hard way that some combo decks, especially Belcher, will just shrug at an Ethersworn Canonist, play a bunch of 0cc artifacts, and combo off anyway.

RKPW
02-27-2012, 06:08 PM
I'm thinking of playing some Maverick for the GP in Indy. Been testing some new things.

here's my main
2 Aven Mindcensor
1 Birds of Paradise
1 Gaddock Teeg
4 Knight of the Reliquary
2 Mother of Runes
3 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Rhox War Monk
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Tarmogoyf
1 Terravore
1 Thrun, the Last Troll

4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Punishing Fire
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte

1 Bojuka Bog
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Forest
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Karakas
1 Maze of Ith
4 Savannah
2 Taiga
3 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills

been thinking about changing the singleton bird into the 3rd Mom

Rhox War Monk is great in the main, good GSZ target for 3. Most people assume i'm grabbing a KoTR. He's won me several matches, and loves exalted triggers. Steals games from burn.

Main decking the bojuka bog, good against random things. Dredge, reanimator, good in the mirror, and randomly, it's really good after a high tide player has cast a time spiral lol. I've never found it to be bad in the main.

And i've thought about replacing the Scryb Ranger with Silhana Ledgewalker. But I think Scryb is better in the slot.

sideboard:
1 Dueling Grounds
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Ethersworn Canonist
4 Natural Order
1 Progenitus
2 Red Elemental Blast
1 Runed Halo
1 Stony Silence
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon

I like Runed Halo. Names stuff like Progenitus, Tendrils of Agony, Words of War, Brain Freeze, Delver/Tarmogoyf against RUG. Or the shroud fatties that reanimator might push through.

I'm not entirely sure about the natural order package in the sideboard. I don't think it's necessary, but I believe it wins the mirror. if I cut it, the sideboard would probably add

COP:Red
Pithing Needle
Phyrexian Metamorph
another REB
1 ?

mini1337s
02-27-2012, 07:29 PM
Rhox War Monk is great in the main, good GSZ target for 3. Most people assume i'm grabbing a KoTR. He's won me several matches, and loves exalted triggers. Steals games from burn.
I would suggest upping your Noble Hierarch to 4x, and cutting your BoP by -1 if you are running Rhox, especially without a Tropical Island. Also, as you said, Rhox + Exalted = Good Times so you might as well maximize on that while fixing your mana.

RKPW
02-27-2012, 07:37 PM
I would suggest upping your Noble Hierarch to 4x, and cutting your BoP by -1 if you are running Rhox, especially without a Tropical Island. Also, as you said, Rhox + Exalted = Good Times so you might as well maximize on that while fixing your mana.

I originally had it as four Nobles, then cut one for the Bird. My logic was, sometimes you might need a flyer for some reason to GSZ for. Scryb Ranger is the only other in the deck. Birds can make the blue mana, and fly with some equipment.

I've never had any real problems with actually casting the War Monk. Usually always have the blue mana, or just grab with GSZ.

If I was going to change the BoP, it'd probably be for the 3rd Mother of Runes/4th Noble.

My biggest concern is the NO Package in the sideboard.

mini1337s
02-27-2012, 08:11 PM
I originally had it as four Nobles, then cut one for the Bird. My logic was, sometimes you might need a flyer for some reason to GSZ for. Scryb Ranger is the only other in the deck. Birds can make the blue mana, and fly with some equipment.

I've never had any real problems with actually casting the War Monk. Usually always have the blue mana, or just grab with GSZ.

If I was going to change the BoP, it'd probably be for the 3rd Mother of Runes/4th Noble.

My biggest concern is the NO Package in the sideboard.
That's certainly reasonable. I do the 3/1 split too, but I'm definetly considering cutting it. To be honest, while the singleton Birds of Paradise can occasionally win games or chump dudes, the case are very few and far between. I think I would rather just increase my clock more than have the ability to occasionally "GOTCHA" my opponent with BoP. I'm leaning towards running 4x Hierarch, 2x Scryb Ranger, taking out the BoP and my 2nd Scavenging Ooze.

RKPW
02-28-2012, 04:55 PM
So I have two possible sideboards,

Sideboard 1:
1 Dueling Grounds
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Ethersworn Canonist
4 Natural Order
1 Progenitus
2 Red Elemental Blast
1 Runed Halo
1 Stony Silence
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon

Sideboard 2:

1 Dueling Grounds
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Serenity
1 Circle of Protection: Red
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Pithing Needle
3 Red Elemental Blast
1 Runed Halo
1 Stony Silence
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon


I think the NO package is great in the mirror, but that's really it I think..?

Tombstalker
02-28-2012, 10:20 PM
My wife is an maverick player and lately I've been toying with the idea doing a 3/2 split of gsz/birthing pod. Anyone tried this yet? gsz us a great engine but pod would open up even more options like one-of targets like Thalia or transforming a bop/hierarch into a sfm who sacs for finks and so on. Basically it would function as a card quality engine to compliment gsz giving maverick the most superior toolbox in gsz/pod/sfm and the curve already supports pod but its inclusion would allow for even greater variation of threats and answers. Thoughts?

Koby
02-29-2012, 02:29 AM
Let's take a critical look at Gaea's Cradle -

Is the card justified for GW Maverick? Are the risks of it being a non-land worth it? Are the situations where it powers up GSZ or equipment transfers "win-more"?

BlackStarDeceiver
02-29-2012, 02:55 AM
For me it has totally justified it's place because it won me several games just because of sheer speed. T1 Noble into T2 Ooze + Cradle has happened against Dredge ;)

As a 1-of you rarely get to the point where Cradle makes you mulligan your 7 (e.g. 2 Waste 1 Cradle in opener).

The only matchup i've found it underwhelming was RUG Tempo, where it can easily be sided out for Maze/Bog.

lochlan
02-29-2012, 03:15 AM
Gaea's Cradle

I don't think it's worth it, I recently cut it from my list. It's obviously a good card, but it's not a great top-deck and I almost never want to find it with Knights. I usually search for either something with more utility (like Maze of Ith or Bojuka Bog) or I find a fetch.

The times when I get the most value from Gaea's Cradle are when I have an Ooze on the board or equipment in my hand--but if my board is developed enough that I'm getting a lot of green mana out of Gaea's Cradle, I was probably going to win anyway. And if I'm having trouble building my board, then Gaea's Cradle won't give me much value.

walker
02-29-2012, 05:00 AM
gaea's cradle isn't necessary for maverick to be a powerful deck. I wouldn't cut it though. it's by far the most powerful card in the deck. the one ofs in maverick are the source of it's weakness as well as the source of it's strength. these situational cards should be minimized for maximum efficiency, but in the case of cradle i think it should stay. it's the one unfair card in the deck and it can make amazing plays. that said, i'm not an expert and it's possible for a long tournament the added efficiency could help a maverick player. if this decision is made, maybe another horizon canopy would be a good choice.

klaus
02-29-2012, 05:27 AM
Why hasn't Thalia been discussed in depth yet?

I'm betting my father's balls it'll be a 2-of Maverick core card very soon.

BlackStarDeceiver
02-29-2012, 05:50 AM
Because most people don't like to think for themselves ;)

I am playing her in the Mindscensor slot and she is awesome. She makes so many cards worse on her own while applying pressure and fitting the curve better than Mindscensors.

Edit:

Of course she is used in the straight GW list, GWu might work as well.

arcannys
02-29-2012, 06:23 AM
Ofcourse, thalia is insane.
Its only good in the GW version tho, since paying 3 for a Pfire is kinda bad.
However i think if you're running thalias you have to adjust your decklist according to that. For example i thint its a misstake to run less than 4 SFM if you're running thalia, since paying 4 for an equipment is very painful.

klaus
02-29-2012, 07:30 AM
Ofcourse, thalia is insane.
Its only good in the GW version tho, since paying 3 for a Pfire is kinda bad.
However i think if you're running thalias you have to adjust your decklist according to that. For example i thint its a misstake to run less than 4 SFM if you're running thalia, since paying 4 for an equipment is very painful.

The only real downside I can see is she makes GSZs worse.
I'd go down to 2-3 for sure with 2-3 Thalias in the main.

The upsides outweigh the downsides by far though.

BlackStarDeceiver
02-29-2012, 07:40 AM
I would never cut the Zeniths, even with Thalia it's too powerful to pass and most decks have to handle Thalia as soon as possible or they will probably die due to taxing, whereas we can keep spilling creatures. If they handle her Zenith gets back to full value.

The full set of Stoneforges seems pretty reasonable but might not even be needed.

4 Stp
4 Zenith
2 Sylvan
3 Equips (Jitte +2 Swords for me, SoLaS + SoXaY)

That's probably all you want to play alongside that Jitte swinging lady ;)

RKPW
02-29-2012, 08:12 AM
Ofcourse, thalia is insane.
Its only good in the GW version tho, since paying 3 for a Pfire is kinda bad.
However i think if you're running thalias you have to adjust your decklist according to that. For example i thint its a misstake to run less than 4 SFM if you're running thalia, since paying 4 for an equipment is very painful.

I'm testing her in my Punishing Fire build. I think she has really great potential. Karakas can bounce her back to your hand, after you've assembled a nice little army of dudes. and then lay waste with some fire.

I'll be sure to let you know. I think if i'm running her though, Natural Order out of the board is probably a bad idea, right?

rayray
02-29-2012, 08:35 AM
why does GW not use aven mindcensors anymore while GW/r still use them?

_erbs_
02-29-2012, 08:48 AM
Why hasn't Thalia been discussed in depth yet?

I'm betting my father's balls it'll be a 2-of Maverick core card very soon.

Hello,
Im currently running a GW maverick hybrid of DT, i've posted my list on the DT section but the posters shot down the idea.

I had a successful run with my build in a 107 man tourny in our country. I wasn't able to enter the top 8 but landed a 5-2 record. My ichorid matchup was really weak thus i wasn't able to enter the top 8.

Decks i've beat where:
2 uw geist stoneblade
1 mbc
1 loam pox
1 maverick

Decks to which i lost
1 ichorid
1 steel city (MUD)

Here is my list for reference

Lands [22]
4 wasteland
3 rishadan port
1 karakas
2 plains
1 forest
4 savannah
4 windswept heath
2 flooded strand
1 maze of ith

Spells [11]
1 sofi
1 solas
1 jitte
4 stp
4 aether vial

Creatures [27]
4 mother of runes
3 noble hiearch
3 thalia, guardian of thraben
4 stoneforge mystic
3 qasali pridemage
4 serra avenger
4 knight of the reliquary
2 mirran crusader

SB [15]
3 parallax wave
3 flickerwisp
2 glowrider
2 beast within
2 jotun grunt
1 bojuka bog
2 gaddock teeg

majikal
02-29-2012, 09:16 AM
Let's take a critical look at Gaea's Cradle -

Is the card justified for GW Maverick? Are the risks of it being a non-land worth it? Are the situations where it powers up GSZ or equipment transfers "win-more"?
Cradle has saved my ass more times than I can count by allowing me to hardcast Batterskull and equip it, or blow out an opposing Knight of the Reliquary with Scavenging Ooze, or GSZ for Thrun early in the game.

Yeah it sucks drawing it as the only green source in your opener, but this happens very rarely, and the times where it is useful, at least for me, are far more than the times where it is crap.

sdematt
02-29-2012, 09:47 AM
I'll agree. Cradle has been nothing short of the tits for me.

Anyone here going to GP Seattle for the side events?

-Matt

csy
02-29-2012, 11:53 AM
Cradle is in no way win more. Its just pure amazement.

sdematt
02-29-2012, 11:57 AM
You may even want to get it tattooed on your arm.

-Matt

Koby
02-29-2012, 12:08 PM
I see it as a High Risk/High Reward card - there have definitely been games I lost if it was instead a Fetchland, and others that I had no business winning since I pumped an extra 2-5 mana from it to GSZ/Ooze/Equipment (many of these on camera too).

I am comfortable taking the risk with this card, but I wanted to examine whether everyone else had similar experiences with its variance.

TheInfamousBearAssassin
02-29-2012, 02:12 PM
Running one ofs in the hope of randomly drawing into it when it's beneficial and not when it isn't seems like terrible deckbuilding to me, so the question is really how often do you want to use Knight to tutor for it.

If you're running it in a spell slot with 4 equipment that include multiple Swords and even a Batterskull it seems fine, if a little iffy (because you won't usually have the Cradle I don't like Batterskull in this deck, and two singletons that are best together is sketch, even with some tutors.)

I'd like it a lot more with maindeck or sideboard Garruk, Primal Hunter, a card I've been thinking about running in the board of my GW list for the Blade Control matchup and slower attrition matchups generally.

The question is really if you have room in a spell slot and how much mileage you can get out of it that exceeds just attacking with the Knight or grabbing a Wasteland, rather than fetching a Cradle.

TehGems
02-29-2012, 04:06 PM
What are you guys thinking about Elspeth right now? I run her as a 2of at my last tournament (70+ players) and I lost my last game to get into top8.
I didn't enjoy her very much, she was usually a Giant Growth + Updraft or even worse a 1/1 for four mana.
Also, I'm seeing that most lists that are doing good are not playing any PW, but instead are going back to Sylvan Library, which to me seems a very good way to get back in shape after a mass removal.
Also, what do the people who tested Thalia think of her? On paper she looks pretty sexy, but I wouldn't play more than the 2, probably in side.
What do you say?

Arcadia
02-29-2012, 04:29 PM
For me cradle is awesome. there are few situations where it is painful, and I search it time to time, mostly due to equipments, or wanting to speed up with zenith + other things. I wouldn't cut it.

In my meta there is a lot of GW maverick, and some Gwu. What would you run MD or SB for the mirror? I'm thinking in 3rd qsali, 2nd scavenging ooze, or elspeth, which wins many games alone.

Koby
02-29-2012, 04:41 PM
In my meta there is a lot of GW maverick, and some Gwu. What would you run MD or SB for the mirror? I'm thinking in 3rd qsali, 2nd scavenging ooze, or elspeth, which wins many games alone.

All three. :cool:

JUNI0R
03-01-2012, 09:31 PM
I see it as a High Risk/High Reward card - there have definitely been games I lost if it was instead a Fetchland, and others that I had no business winning since I pumped an extra 2-5 mana from it to GSZ/Ooze/Equipment (many of these on camera too).

I am comfortable taking the risk with this card, but I wanted to examine whether everyone else had similar experiences with its variance.

I'm in the same boat. Occasionally you get a bad draw (cradle, maze, wasteland) and have to mull but that is rare compared to how often it allows you to pull way ahead on board. Even with the cradle I don't feel I an lacking white when I need it.

rayray
03-02-2012, 11:11 PM
why is it said that red maverick is weaker in comboMU?

VITASOY
03-03-2012, 04:24 AM
Anyone know where i can watch some replays of people playing UW Maverick?

BlackStarDeceiver
03-03-2012, 08:59 AM
why is it said that red maverick is weaker in comboMU?

Because you have at least 4 more cards that do nothing in that particular matchup (e.g. Fire, the occasional Adn to 2 Life doesn't count). Red and GW both have a pretty bad Matchup against fast combo, the blue version is the only one with advantages via Vendilion Clique and SPierce out of the board.

rayray
03-03-2012, 11:56 AM
but comparing red and GW, red version has red elemental blast to fight combo decks with blue better.

BlackStarDeceiver
03-03-2012, 12:47 PM
It's better when you have a hatebear on board with the redblast in hand, anyways, each version of Mav has a pretty horrible Combomatchup ^^

rayray
03-03-2012, 11:00 PM
game 1 autolose..

Jak
03-04-2012, 03:21 AM
This is the list I'm going to be running next week at a local tourney coming up. Unsure of the meta but I expect it to be little combo so I believe Maverick will do me good. I expect a lot of random, Maverick, StoneBlade decks, Zoo, Burn, and probably other cheap decks like Elves. Anyway, the list:

4 Windswept Heath
2 Misty Rainforest
4 Savannah
2 Forest
1 Plains
4 Wasteland
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Karakas
1 Gaea's Cradle
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Maze of Ith

4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Sylvan Library
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
1 Sword of Fire and Ice

4 Noble Hierarch
4 Mother of Runes
3 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scryb Ranger
4 Knight of the Reliquary
1 Kitchen Finks
1 Thrun, the Last Troll

SB
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Krosan Grip
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Worship
1 Stony Silence
1 Aura of Silence
1 Choke
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Bojuka Bog

I like the main deck a lot and have been on the fence between 2 Thalia main or 2 Elspeth. I went with the former to be more aggressive and at least have a shot if I run across any combo. I am most concerned with the SB. I basically filled it to answer a broad number of things. I opted for Worship over COP:Red, but I think either could work. Anyone have any thoughts on the two?

So how does it look for my suspected meta? Any thoughts or concerns?

Koby
03-04-2012, 05:49 AM
RE: Rhox War Monk vs Kitchen Finks

Which one has led to more wins in SB games versus UR Delver and Burn?

arcannys
03-04-2012, 10:22 AM
RE: Rhox War Monk vs Kitchen Finks

Which one has led to more wins in SB games versus UR Delver and Burn?

I run 2 finks, 1 rhox.
Rhox is better against Burn particularly, but fink are rlly good against Deed and wrath of god decks. Rhox i good as a GSZ target, fnks are good on their own, and i board them in in a lot of MU.

Machahiko
03-04-2012, 11:54 AM
SB
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Krosan Grip
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Worship
1 Stony Silence
1 Aura of Silence
1 Choke
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Bojuka Bog

I am most concerned with the SB. I basically filled it to answer a broad number of things. I opted for Worship over COP:Red, but I think either could work. Anyone have any thoughts on the two?

So how does it look for my suspected meta? Any thoughts or concerns?

Only thing I have to say about your mainboard is that you might add another Umezawa's Jitte, it would help a bit with Elves. Maybe 1 Elspeth also if you suspect a lot of stoneblade. About your sideboard: You have only one krosan grip, it cannot be tutored for and odds drawing that one-of seems a bit thin to make a difference. Only one choke. Now, choke is a really, really good card but it isn't a good one-of. You also can't think that you'll use Enlightened Tutor to find it, because you're playing against a blue deck and you don't want to lose 2 cards for one counterspell. Not sure about Aura of Silence, wouldn't rule of law be better? If you want something against enchantments serenity is good.

You have a lot of graveyard hate, if you suspect a lot of graveyard based decks move Bojuka Bog into mainboard for better G1 and wider sideboard. If you're expecting a lot of UW StoneBlade decks, I'd suggest you to play Garruk Relentless and Elspeth, Knight-Errant in the sideboard. Maybe even 5-mana Garruk.

These are my thoughts, hopefully some of them make you think and help you find the best possible sideboard.

Jak
03-04-2012, 04:55 PM
Only thing I have to say about your mainboard is that you might add another Umezawa's Jitte, it would help a bit with Elves. Maybe 1 Elspeth also if you suspect a lot of stoneblade. About your sideboard: You have only one krosan grip, it cannot be tutored for and odds drawing that one-of seems a bit thin to make a difference. Only one choke. Now, choke is a really, really good card but it isn't a good one-of. You also can't think that you'll use Enlightened Tutor to find it, because you're playing against a blue deck and you don't want to lose 2 cards for one counterspell. Not sure about Aura of Silence, wouldn't rule of law be better? If you want something against enchantments serenity is good.

I love Jitte so that may be a possibility. I'm really tight on spots already, so from my list posted, I am probably going to have to shave a land to get it to 60. I may go with the random 1/1 split of Sylvan and Elspeth, just because I like both cards and I have seen that done before, but it may be a little too random for my tastes. I really like my creature count too. I'll have to give it some thought.

I threw in one Grip because I already have the one Aura of Silence. It isn't ALL that random but yes it still is. I want to have a couple outs to Humility or Deed so that's why those two are in there. Aura is good against combo, makes Deed cost a shit ton, and is just good in those corner cases you see in Legacy.

I totally agree with you on Choke and didn't realize that before. I was trying to get maximum space, so I will definitely add another. I'll probably get rid of the Metamorph since Prog has fallen out of favor from what it looks like (Damn, it's been a while since I've played Legacy ha).


You have a lot of graveyard hate, if you suspect a lot of graveyard based decks move Bojuka Bog into mainboard for better G1 and wider sideboard. If you're expecting a lot of UW StoneBlade decks, I'd suggest you to play Garruk Relentless and Elspeth, Knight-Errant in the sideboard. Maybe even 5-mana Garruk.

I kind of flt the same way, so I think I may cut the Crypt. Wheel is really good against Dredge so I want to keep that and Surgicals are more versatile. I like Garruk a lot actually. It looks very powerful in that MU and anything with Black as well.


These are my thoughts, hopefully some of them make you think and help you find the best possible sideboard.

Thank you very much! This is what I've restructured my board to:

SB
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Enlightened Tutor
2 Choke
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Worship / COP:Red
1 Stony Silence
1 Aura of Silence
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Bojuka Bog
2 Garruk Relentless

TheBirdMan
03-04-2012, 05:51 PM
If anyone is interested, here is the list I won the Jupiter Event with yesterday:


Maindeck:

Artifacts
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
1 Umezawa's Jitte

Creatures
2 Aven Mindcensor
1 Birds of Paradise
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Mother of Runes
3 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Eternal Witness
1 Scryb Ranger
4 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Tarmogoyf
1 Gaddock Teeg

Instants
4 Swords to Plowshares

Planeswalkers
1 Elspeth, Knight Errant

Sorceries
4 Green Sun's Zenith

Lands
3 Forest
2 Plains
4 Windswept Heath
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Maze of Ith
3 Misty Rainforest
4 Savannah
3 Wasteland
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Karakas

Sideboard:
1 Thrun, the last troll
1 Sword of feast and famine
1 Thalia, Guardian of Threban
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Circle of Protection:Red
1 Stony Silence
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Ghostly Prison
1 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Life from the Loam
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Manriki-gusari
1 Tower of the Magistrate

maktus
03-04-2012, 05:53 PM
Hi guys, any suggestions for sb to my decklist, my biggest threats are junk, uw stoneblade, and mirror (punishing mav).

4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Mirran Crusader
1 Eternal Witness
3 Stoneforge Mystic
3 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Scryb Ranger
4 Mother of Runes
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Sylvan Library
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of war and peace

1 Dryad Arbor
2 Forest
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Karakas
1 Maze of Ith
2 Plains
3 savannah
4 Wasteland
2 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath
1 Marsh Flats

Koby
03-04-2012, 06:03 PM
If anyone is interested, here is the list I won the Jupiter Event with yesterday:


Maindeck:

Artifacts
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
1 Umezawa's Jitte

Creatures
2 Aven Mindcensor
1 Birds of Paradise
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Mother of Runes
3 Noble Hierarch
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Eternal Witness
1 Scryb Ranger
4 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Tarmogoyf
1 Gaddock Teeg

Instants
4 Swords to Plowshares

Planeswalkers
1 Elspeth, Knight Errant

Sorceries
4 Green Sun's Zenith

Lands
3 Forest
2 Plains
4 Windswept Heath
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Maze of Ith
3 Misty Rainforest
4 Savannah
3 Wasteland
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Karakas

Sideboard:
1 Thrun, the last troll
1 Sword of feast and famine
1 Thalia, Guardian of Threban
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Circle of Protection:Red
1 Stony Silence
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Ghostly Prison
1 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Life from the Loam
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Manriki-gusari
1 Tower of the Magistrate

Congrats man! Can you talk about how your sideboard worked (or if it didn't)?

Thanks!

TheBirdMan
03-04-2012, 06:38 PM
Overall it worked well. I liked having many options that could be used against multiple decks. Like leyline for combo/burn as well as the cop for goblins/burn etc. The only card I am unsure of for the board is Ghostly prison but it seems really great against dredge and aggro decks. I didnt get a chance to play against a lot of aggro to see. The mvp for me out of the board would have to be Thrun. He won me a game against stoneblade and I was able to karakas it if they played a wrath effect. Thrun also won me the 2nd game against rug in the finals.

The sb choice that may seem wierd would be feast and famine in the board over the main, but I don't really like it except against control. I like the other 2 swords mb to be able to protect knights from any kind of removal when mother of runes doesnt stay on the table. Also being able to recur creatures and burn delvers is pretty great too.

Zand
03-04-2012, 07:57 PM
Maverick mirror on SCG live at the moment.

Koby
03-04-2012, 10:12 PM
Woot! Maverick wins another event! 4c "Fearless" build lol

Machahiko
03-04-2012, 10:16 PM
Not really a fan of this "4c fearless" build, I feel like the red wasn't needed. GZ for William Cao! Was fun to watch the finals with a friend who plays dredge:


Sami K says
"masterfully draws jitte from the top of his library"
"you can see how he got into the finals"

Jak
03-04-2012, 10:27 PM
I also think the red was lacking. Blue seemed to pull its weight throughout the matches I watched and Punishing Fire was just lousy, only finishing someone off when the win seemed evident anyway. I think you can fix up the manabase and add in more creatures or whatever to improve consistency.

Geist, Rhox War Monk, and Pierce in the board looked really good. Crucible is also going into my 75.

Koby
03-04-2012, 10:32 PM
I don't really like the Spell Pierce plan - even when playing 4 you have to take out a lot of gas to make it work, and you rely too much on random luck to draw it and be useful. For a deck that doesn't control the stack, trying to play counterspell seems really out of place.

Jak
03-04-2012, 10:35 PM
I don't really like the Spell Pierce plan - even when playing 4 you have to take out a lot of gas to make it work, and you rely too much on random luck to draw it and be useful. For a deck that doesn't control the stack, trying to play counterspell seems really out of place.

Still seems like one of the best options against combo. Against control it also is a good way to ensure your bombs resolve/stay around. If I ever play a blue splash, I would definitely try at least 3 in the board.

enemyofarsenic
03-04-2012, 11:04 PM
Maverick mirror on SCG live at the moment.

Link please :)

Goddik
03-05-2012, 07:26 AM
Hi guys.

After having tried seemingly everything within control i have reached the conclusion that Legacy after misstep is a collection of bad decks and Maverick. Given that Bazaar of Moxen and Ghent are coming up this summer I guess i should join the winning team instead of just spying;)

With that in mind i have a bunch of questions to the wise and experienced people in this thread.

What is your experience with the 3 Thalia package that i have seen in some lists? Is it good enough to win games against combo pre-board or are we trying to solve an unsolvable problem? How often does a singleton Teeg main steal games against combo?

How good is Thalia against control?

Have you experimented with running more than 1 Jitte, my team were discussing cutting the stoneforges for a 3 off jitte to allow more blowouts in the mirror with Jitte equip t3.

How about a second cradle? Seems like the deck goes nuts whenever you draw it.

How good is batterskull against non-burn decks? When do you want batterskull instead of Jitte?

Here is the first draft list for reference. I am a firm believer in getting down to the essentials. I don't like Geist and I think you loose more games to your own manabase then you win by running punishing fires.

4 Mother of Runes
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Scryb Ranger
2 Ooze
2 Quasali Pridemage
1 Teeg
4 Knight
2 Aven Mindcensor
4 Green Sun's Zenith

2 Elspeth
2 Silvan Library
3 Jitte
1 Maze of Ith (I love this one in equipment battles)
1 Eternal Witness
4 Sword to Plowshares

1 Dryad Arbor
2 Forest
1 Plains
4 Savannah
4 Windswept Heath
3 Misty Rainforest
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Cradle
1 Karakas
3 Wasteland

If we were to run Thalia i would cut 2 Elspeth and a mindcensor for 3xThalia

Moving back to the stoneforge package would entail cutting 1 Jitte, 2 Elspeth for 2 stoneforge and a sword.

SB:
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Pridemage
1 Null Rod/Stony Silence
3 Choke (don't know if this is the best control hate at the moment, but i have certainly lost a lot to it)
1 Tower of the Magistrate
1 COP Red/other monored hate
1 Thorn of Amathyst
2 Path to exile
1 Tormod's crypt

maktus
03-05-2012, 08:00 AM
Woot! Maverick wins another event! 4c "Fearless" build lol

how is this 4c "Fearless" build?

lordofthepit
03-05-2012, 09:04 AM
Congrats man! Can you talk about how your sideboard worked (or if it didn't)?

Thanks!

Sounds like he beat the best pilot of the most explosive Storm combo deck in the quarterfinals, so I'm guessing it worked quite well. :laugh:

Tournament report, please!

DrHealex
03-05-2012, 09:53 AM
Not really a fan of this "4c fearless" build, I feel like the red wasn't needed. GZ for William Cao! Was fun to watch the finals with a friend who plays dredge:
Serious Question: Is your friend normally as bad of a dredge pilot as he appears on camera? He IS playing adam prozak's self-admitted suboptimal decklist from SCG cinci...

I have been playing punishing maverick over 6 months and the fires were great in the beginning but they have been becoming more and more underwhelming. I believe I am going to switch the 3 fires for 2 geist and 1 monk, 3 groves for 1 tropical, 1st cradle, and 3rd wasteland. Also switch 2 mindcensor for 2 thalia and see how I feel on that for the GPindy.

I am worried I am going to miss that removal for cliques, elves/mana dorks, delvers, confidants, metalworkers, and so many other great targets though...

Fade
03-05-2012, 10:59 AM
I top 8'd yesterday at a small event in Columbus playing GW Maverick. Here was the list I was playing:

Equipment (3)
1 Batterskull
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
1 Umezawa's Jitte

Creatures (26)
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Mother of Runes
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Scryb Ranger
1 Terravore
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Rhox War Monk // Played him for testing purposes, still thinking I should have Thalia in the list somewhere as a 2-3 of

Instants (4)
4 Swords to Plowshares

Planeswalkers (1)
1 Elspeth, Knight Errant

Enchantments (1)
1 Sylvan Library

Sorceries (4)
4 Green Sun's Zenith

Lands (21)
2 Forest
1 Plains
4 Windswept Heath
2 Horizon Canopy
2 Wooded Foothills
3 Savannah
4 Wasteland
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Karakas
1 Gaea's Cradle

Sideboard (15)
2 Enlightened Tutor
2 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Choke
2 Path to Exile
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Maze of Ith
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Elspeth, Knight Errant
1 Stony Silence
1 Worship

I'm still trying to find room to fit in for another land that taps for mana, but I don't think I can justify cutting any of the creatures as stoneforge can just be a blowout against some decks. I cut a Qasali Pridemage to test out the Rhox War Monk and I feel like it is very strong. I wasn't playing any blue sources at the in my manabase which did become a problem in the top 8. I was matched up against UB ANT and I was able to win game 1 when he resolved an infernal tutor for LED and casted a LED, LED, and in response to the second a pridemage blew up his first one. This made him miscount his mana and he was off by one from going off. Game two I had stuck a stony silence and he was able to go off by just casting the artifacts and with enough dark rituals he was able to win. During this game I had a Rhox War Monk in hand the entire game and not having a Tropical Island or Tundra in the deck killed me as I am sure I would have won if I was able to cast it and start beating with it. Game 3 we both mulled to 5 and I had to keep a 3 land, Sylvan Library, Swords to Plowshares hand. I ended up drawing a Worship and GSZ but I was not able to find the fourth land for the Worship and decided I had to go for Teeg. When I was one attack away from winning he slaughter pacted the Teeg and went off.

Conclusions: Rhox War Monk would've been great if I had put in at least one blue dual land but I had thought that the Noble Hierarchs and GSZ would have been enough to cast a one of spell with a blue mana in it. Even though I love Worship in casual play I can't justify playing it anymore yes it helps against the burn matchup and the RUG Delver matchup when they don't expect it but I think it would be better served as either another Rhox War Monk or Kitchen Finx.

Koby
03-05-2012, 12:44 PM
FWIW, I have the Teeg in the sideboard. It has very little value in the maindeck oftentimes, and I've taken it out in sideboard games on too many numerous occasions.

arcannys
03-05-2012, 12:46 PM
I dont think rhox war monk belongs to the maindeck, its a very narrow creature that does nothing against a lot of MU. Its fine to have it in your sideboard against the Mu in which it really shines. Having it in the MD will make you draw it too often since won't be your prime GSZ target, and potentially make you loose games because of having a dead card in your hand.
In the Mu where you rlly want to have rhox, you won't be upset by GSZing for a noble in order to cast it (in case you were unlucky enough to draw it), where if you have to GSZ for a noble just to not have a dead card in your hand rather than GSZ for something more usefull you'll want to cut your vains.

TheXile
03-05-2012, 01:12 PM
Hi guys.

After having tried seemingly everything within control i have reached the conclusion that Legacy after misstep is a collection of bad decks and Maverick. Given that Bazaar of Moxen and Ghent are coming up this summer I guess i should join the winning team instead of just spying;)

With that in mind i have a bunch of questions to the wise and experienced people in this thread.

What is your experience with the 3 Thalia package that i have seen in some lists? Is it good enough to win games against combo pre-board or are we trying to solve an unsolvable problem? How often does a singleton Teeg main steal games against combo?

How good is Thalia against control?

Have you experimented with running more than 1 Jitte, my team were discussing cutting the stoneforges for a 3 off jitte to allow more blowouts in the mirror with Jitte equip t3.

How about a second cradle? Seems like the deck goes nuts whenever you draw it.

How good is batterskull against non-burn decks? When do you want batterskull instead of Jitte?

Here is the first draft list for reference. I am a firm believer in getting down to the essentials. I don't like Geist and I think you loose more games to your own manabase then you win by running punishing fires.

4 Mother of Runes
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Scryb Ranger
2 Ooze
2 Quasali Pridemage
1 Teeg
4 Knight
2 Aven Mindcensor
4 Green Sun's Zenith

2 Elspeth
2 Silvan Library
3 Jitte
1 Maze of Ith (I love this one in equipment battles)
1 Eternal Witness
4 Sword to Plowshares

1 Dryad Arbor
2 Forest
1 Plains
4 Savannah
4 Windswept Heath
3 Misty Rainforest
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Cradle
1 Karakas
3 Wasteland

If we were to run Thalia i would cut 2 Elspeth and a mindcensor for 3xThalia

Moving back to the stoneforge package would entail cutting 1 Jitte, 2 Elspeth for 2 stoneforge and a sword.

SB:
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Pridemage
1 Null Rod/Stony Silence
3 Choke (don't know if this is the best control hate at the moment, but i have certainly lost a lot to it)
1 Tower of the Magistrate
1 COP Red/other monored hate
1 Thorn of Amathyst
2 Path to exile
1 Tormod's crypt

I'll be honest and can't claim too much expertise with Maverick (though I have done VERY well in all tournaments I've played it in..just haven't gotten to play in a huge number of tournaments yet). But I absolutely love the deck and have put a lot of thought into it. Here are my takeaways from your list.
First--Bojuku Bog to SB and 4th Wasteland instead. The reason is simple the bog is only amazing as a tutorable graveyard remover...except the decks you really want to do that against can be crippled by an ooze (re-animator and to a minor extent dredge..and before people disagree about dredge..play it a bunch..and then let me know they only run 8-10 dredgers..if you can remove 1-2 a turn that should hit them all). The other issue is you can't fetch the bog until turn 3 at the earliest (assuming you got your turn 2 KoTR) which means you had to have drawn KoTR within the first 2 turns (plus you're starting 7), whereas Ooze you can either draw or GSZ out by turn 2 and remove all the relevant threats by turn 3 as well..except you gained some life and got a big ooze).
Second--3 Jitte's a waste. I understand you want to win the Jitte war but if that's the case run another Eternal Witness (who has a lot more other uses). The only reason I see running the 3 jitte's is turn 2 Jitte more often. Batterskull is good against more than mono-red. It's amazing against Stoneblade because you're deck runs more threats AND you have maindeck solutions to their equipment (pridemage's). Remember Stoneblade still wins via damage...you get out a batterskull faster than them and then just wasteland the crap out of them. I run the standard 1 FaF/1 Batterskull/1 Jitte main and I'm happy with it.
Third--Thalia really is awesome. A lot of legacy decks are stingy on lands and often don't hit more then 3 in a standard game, forcing almost all their stuff (against a lot of combo/control decks) to cost 1 more and only a few of your cards (often mostly dead ones ala swords) you gain a huge advantage...such an advantage that I run 4 Thorn of Amethyst in my SB as it's amazing against all Combo/Control decks. Also keep in mind that her ability means Dredge has to actually PAY to cast Cabal Therapy/Dread Return..which given how small their mana base is means turn 2 thalia (off of a wasteland and savannah) can often be just as much game over as turn 1 tormod's crypt.
Fourth--I believe Choke is unnecessary currently. While it is really good against a lot of control/combo decks you can often waste-lock them faster. The Thorn of Amethyst/Thalia also serves a similar purpose (don't let them play their spells)..except those aren't restricted to people playing islands (which other than merfolk are all control/combo)
Fifth--It may be based on my metagame but we have a lot of affinity players around and your current sideboard is very weak to affinity. The problem is spot removal (ala StP) is marginal against them because they play so many similar creatures.

Those are my thoughts. please feel free to comment and let me know if you disagree.

Fade
03-05-2012, 01:18 PM
FWIW, I have the Teeg in the sideboard. It has very little value in the maindeck oftentimes, and I've taken it out in sideboard games on too many numerous occasions.

Tonight I am going to test the Teeg in the board over Worship and take out the Rhox War Monk for 2 Thalia main. I'll let you guys know how it goes.