[Deck] BUG "Shardless" Control

[Kyle]

BUG "Shardless" Control

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I. Overview
II. History
III. Core List
IV. Maindeck Card Choices
V. General Strategy
VI. Sideboard Card Choices
VII. Match-ups
ANT
GWx Maverick and Death & Taxes
Miracle Control
Jund
Sneak Attack
Elves
Team America
RUG Delver
UWR Delver
Deathblade / Stoneblade
OmniTell

VII. Decklists

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I. Overview

BUG "Shardless" Control (a.k.a. BUG Cascade, a.k.a. Shardless BUG) is a spin off of BUG Team America Control and has taken some huge leaps forward lately. Surprisingly, something that started as a fun/gimmicky deck by Brian DeMars has cascaded (haha) into Top8s everywhere and is now a "Deck To Beat".

This deck is built around abusing Shardless Agent's Cascade mechanic to cast Ancestral Vision for free, helping you to drown your opponent in card advantage. The Cascade mechanic can also be used to 1-for-2 into Hymn To Tourach, Tarmogoyf, and Abrupt Decay, creating an explosive board presence or overall decent board control.

With the addition of Deathrite Shaman, you can be cascading into awesome as early as T2. Plus, the overall utility DrShaman brings to the table is astounding. Liliana of the Veil and Jace, the Mind Sculptor are also two important inclusions in the 75.

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II. History

In August 2012, Brian DeMars published this article (http://www.starcitygames.com/article/24636_Legacy-Avant-Garde--BUG-Is-Not-A-Shard--It-s-Shardless.html), featuring a new list he put together, which is the basis of the Shardless BUG archetype.

Here are some of the featured cards in his original list that are notably absent from more modern lists. Explanation later.

Sensei's Divining Top
Snapcaster Mage
Vendilion Clique
Ghastly Demise
Pernicious Deed

Out of these cards, Deed is probably the only one sometimes used in the 75, and most often in the sideboard as a sweeper. And as much as I love Deed, it requires A LOT of mana.

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III. Core List

The "Core" List features:


//Creatures:
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Deathrite Shaman

//Sorceries:
4 Ancestral Vision
2-3 Hymn to Tourach
2 Thoughtseize

//Instants:
4 Brainstorm
3-4 Abrupt Decay

//Planeswalkers:
2-3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

//Lands:
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
2 Bayou
3-4 Misty Rainforest
2-3 Wasteland
2-3 Polluted Delta


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VI. Maindeck Card Choices

Assuming you follow the above "Core List," you'll be left with some flex spots which are typically reserved for the following, tailored to your own meta.


3-4 Force of Will
1-2 Maelstrom Pulse
2-4 Baleful Strix
2-3 Liliana of the Veil
1-2 Creeping Tar Pit


... or more loading up on business spells like:


Hymn to Tourach
Abrupt Decay
Thoughtseize
Jace, the Mind Sculptor


You will no doubt notice that this manabase is considered "extremely greedy" and is particularly vulnerable to Wasteland. In the past, I would not have hesitated to run a few basics, typically in order of priority of Swamp, Forest, Island, but recently I have found this deck to be so resilient and reliable, especially in the Card Advantage area, that worrying too much about your manabase isn't necessary.

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V. General Strategy

I figure it's best to quickly discuss the general strategy and some basic "how to play the deck" guidelines before jumping into the Sideboard Options. Here goes...

The First Rule of Shardless BUG is load up on business spells that are 2CMC or less

Clarification: The deck is designed to abuse Shardless Agent's cascade ability, so make sure you're running heavy on really good spells and creatures that will be cast for free off the cascade. Hymn to Tourach is the first card that comes to mind, that is always an incredible joy to cascade into.

The Second Rule of Shardless BUG is try to prime your cascades

Clarification: You obviously want to draw 3 free cards from Ancestral Vision as soon as humanly possibly and as much as humanly possible, and in order to do this you often will need to stack the deck with the card you want to cascade into, using Brainstorm and Jace, the Mind Sculptor.

The Third Rule of Shardless BUG is don't worry about gambling a little with your cascades

Clarification: The 1 and 2 CMC choices in the deck are very rarely going to let you down if you cascade into them without preparing with a Brainstorm or Jace. Tarmogoyf and Baleful Strix can help establish board presence, Hymn to Tourach and Thoughtseize can help rip apart your opponent's hand, and Abrupt Decay can help to clear your opponent's board. The only cards that are a little "meh" that you can cascade into are Brainstorm and Deathrite Shaman, and these two cards are still good.

Lastly:

From amazing to great to good, the cards you want to cascade into are ranked in this order:


Ancestral Vision
Tarmogoyf
Hymn to Tourach
Abrupt Decay
Baleful Strix
Thoughtseize
Brainstorm
Deathrite Shaman


...with none of them being fair or bad.

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VI. Sideboard Options

With the general cascade strategy out of the way we can move on to some of the better sideboard choices and why and where they are helpful or necessary.

Golgari Charm

Awesome utility card: sweep away weenies or take out an Omniscience.

Scavenging Ooze

Not only is it a 2-drop that can be cascaded into, it is great at nulling DrShaman. This deck also has a weak spot against burn and Goblins, so Ooze can help you with some lifegain when if you need it.

Nihil Spellbomb

A must-sideboard graveyard hate card if you are playing Black. It cycles too upon activation.

Vendilion Clique

When you need more disruption against combo, plus a great beater, Clique's the winner.

Whipflare

Requires a greedier red splash, but is a potentially devastating sweeper against non-artifact creatures and can be cascaded into. Some lists run this card with a Badlands MD.

Thoughseize

Speaks for itself - it's great against combo, can rip an important T1 one-drop like Aether Vial, Goblin Lackey, or Mother of Runes out of your opponent's hand, and can also help in midgame to 'yard a Jace or Humility.

Krosan Grip

This deck can sometimes have problems with CounterTop, so you will need to nuke that Counterbalance. It's also great against MUD, Affinity, Goblins and Merfolk (for Vial), or any Batterskull-based deck.

Umezawa's Jitte

Jitte is the best equipment printed ever and works nicely with this deck, with its suite of quick n' dirty creatures. It helps as a pump to close out games, can nuke Delvers, Moms and Thalias, and against Burn it can help with getting back your seared away life total.

Surgical Extraction or Extirpate

Especially necessary against Dredge, Reanimator, Loam.dec, anything with Bloodghast, and very nice against RUG (used on their lands after nuking some with your Wastelands). It can help against combo to steal Burning Wishes and Show and Tells as well.

Dismember

More cheap spot removal - kills opposing 'goyfs and Knight of the Reliquaries, but it can't be cascaded into.

Chill

This deck has a problem against Burn and Goblins, hence Chill[/chill]. It's a blowout against both. Now that Goblins runs Cavern of Souls and BUG Shardless Control does a decent job of clearing away Aether Vials, Chill can be a necessity.

[cards]Cursed Totem

The ultimate hurt against Maverick and can provide a lot of help against Griselbrand. Keep in mind, however, that it will shut off your Deathrite Shamans.

Force of Will

Sometimes this card is relegated to the Sideboard, since Maindeck you are not running many blue cards to pitch to the Force, but often 3-4 is a necessary inclusion in the 75 for Combo hate.

Liliana of the Veil

If you are not running her MD then you better be in the SB. Discard, Board Control, and a great Ultimate. Yeah, she's the second-best Planeswalker around (behind Jace, of course).

Baleful Strix

Many lists are running 2 MD and 2 SB. Strix is so good against Swarm matchups that it is a great inclusion of 4 in the 75.

Maelstrom Pulse

Catch-all spot removal and has the added benefit of taking out tokens (Spirit, Angel, Goblin, or Soldier typically)

Hymn to Tourach

You probably want to have 4 in your 75, but 4 MD might be too much, hence a split between MD and SB. Great against Combo (and everything but Dredge, for that matter).

Notion Thief

Holy toledo bonkers amazing blowouts can come from this dude. Steal a Brainstorm, Griselbrand activation, or here's some fun: an Enter the Infinite draw.

Disfigure

Probably the best 1CMC black spot removal spell at the moment. Nukes Mom, Thalia, Gaddock Teeg, Deathrite Shaman, Stoneforge Mystic, Dark Confidant, Goblin Lackey, and Goblin Piledriver.

Venser, Shaper Savant

Versatile 4CMC flash creature: bounce a permanent or "counter" a spell. What he's probably best for is bouncing an Omniscience of a Show and Tell. Rage Quitting will ensue.

Engineered Plague

Very meta-dependent, but excellent against Goblins, Maverick, Death & Taxes, and Elves. Can act as a reactive board sweeper or just a soft-lock. Two of 'em can be gg in many cases.

Submerge

So good at clearing the board it's not even funny. So many people play green where Submerge is helpful: Maverick, Jund, BUG (duh). Can be a clincher spell at the right time, and is especially awesome when used on a creature in response to an opponent's fetchland activation.

Ratchet Bomb

Cascadeable mass removal, but can be slow.

Life from the Loam

This deck's manabase is pretty greedy, so LftL can be very helpful in Wasteland-heavy metas.

Massacre

Another possible oh-my-god-so-effing-good mass removal spell. HOSES weenie decks, especially when a that weenie deck is white. Some drawbacks: Gaddock Teeg nulls it and it takes out your own Deathrite Shamans, Shardless Agents, and Baleful Strixes. Sometimes swarm decks have to be taken down or they will run over you before you have a chance to set up your business spells.

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VII. Matchups

ANT

Probably one of our toughest match-ups as they are going off on T2 or T3. Thoughtseize and Hymn are your best buddies here, as you aren't typically loading up on Force of Wills maindeck. In a combo-heavy meta, it helps to have 4 FoWs maindeck, though they are not nearly as powerful against a Storm Combo player as discard is. Also, Liliana can be an asset to help with keeping hands down. You need to proactively disrupt your opponent with discard so they have more trouble assembling their Kithkin Shotgun. Nevermind that reference.

GWx Maverick and Death and Taxes

Abrupt Decay all the way. Putting them in topdeck mode with discard is great, and FoW is a little weak because you are running few blue spells to pitch and they have so many threats. Thalia, Mother of Runes, and Mirran Crusader are big problems for you, so having board control and presence is the only way you'll stay alive. Discard route: T1 Thoughtseize, T2 Hymn, T3 Liliana or Shardless Agent. Board presence route: T1 Deathrite Shaman or suspended Ancestral Vision, T2 Shardless Agent or Tarmogoyf, T3 Jace.

Miracle Control

Very touch matchup as we don't have much of an answer to Sensei's Divining Top and Miracles typically runs 3-4 sweepers and 4 pieces of spot removal. But, there's one thing that Miracles has an enormously difficult time responding to: Liliana of the Veil. She can win you games against Miracles just by grinding their hand down. Yes, they can still often dig, but Top is durdly and doesn't always give the card quality they want unless they're digging into fetchlands. As a lover of Miracles myself, I know this firsthand. Grind their hand down and land a Lili and it's often very tough for them to come back. Watch out for Rest in Peace, which can nullify 8 of the bombs in your deck.

Jund

Their 6-8 maindecked removal can be tough, since it hits all of your bombs, but your card advantage and quicker cascader can put you one turn ahead, and a very big goal is to get cards as fast as you can with Ancestral Vision. Nihil Spellbomb as a sideboard card is helpful to nuke their 'yard. Jace can often be sided out, since all he's good for in this matchup is getting pitched to Force of Will. Bloodbraid Elf makes quick work of him. Be wary of Punishing Fire, as it can decimate most of your threats, namely Deathrite Shaman, Tarmogoyf, Baleful Strix, and Liliana, and save your Wastelands for their Grove of the Burnwillows. Pointed discard (Thoughtseize) is very helpful in this matchup to remove Bloodbraid, Abrupt Decay, and Red Elemental Blasts post-board. Lastly, take out their Dark Confidant as soon as you can, as he will bury you in CA before you can get your engine online.

Sneak Attack

Thoughtseize, Hymn, and Liliana are your holy trinity in this matchup, as you want to put them in topdeck mode, pronto. Often, a resolved Sneak Attack or Griselbrand spells GG so getting rid of him as fast as you can is the way to go. Force of Will is necessary postboard. Don't be discouraged, this is a tough matchup, but keeping discard heavy hands is the best way to beat them. Leyline of Sanctity post-board is a common board-in, which can often spell disaster. If you went with the discard plan and can resolve a Liliana and a Jace you can come out ahead. Fatesealing is very helpful.

Elves

You have 4 Abrupt Decay, which are very important to take out manadorks, Heritage Druid, and Wirewood Symbiote. You have 2-3 Force of Wills maindeck, which is very important. Save your Forces for Glimpse of Nature, Natural Order, or a big Green Sun's Zenith. Discard is helpful here (as with any combo matchup). Postboard more removal and/or sweepers -- Disfigure, Massacre, or Engineered Plague are necessary. You need to get your game on early because they can go off as early as T2 and typically on T3.

Team America

Deathrite Shaman is an all-star in this matchup to grind down their 'yard, and postboard Nihil Spellbomb is your friend. Hymn probably isn't as helpful in this matchup as in others, since it can help their own Deathrite Shamans, Tarmogoyfs, and the 5/5 "2-mana" flyer known as Tombstalker. This is very similar to a mirror match, except they run more counters, including Daze and Spell Pierce, which you will have to play around. Some lists also run Dark Confidant, which becomes a big target. Thoughtseize is very helpful to rip out hand-hate and know what's coming.

RUG Delver

Abrupt Decay is what breaks the tension in this deck, as they have absolutely no answer to it, except, maybe, Nimble Mongoose. That's where your maindeck graveyard hate in the form of DrShaman comes in. Post-board if your meta is infested with 'yard-based strategies, Nihil Spellbomb is the biggest help. They can stifle your cascades, so they lose some of their value. Baleful Strix is a big help in this matchup to block anything they throw at you. Also, Wasteland hurts you a lot since you aren't running any basics. Hopefully you can get an unswered Deathrite Shaman online early on.

UWR Delver

Their deck currently plays 7 or 8 pieces of maindeck removal, Stifle and Wasteland to disrupt your greedy manabase, and many of the newest decklists are packing the almost unanswerable Batterskull. So what's your primary strategy? Prevent them from casting anything, meaning pointed discard in the form of Thoughtseize and hand grinding in the form of Hymn to Tourach. A resolved Geist of Saint Traft can be tough to deal with, but thankfully you have Tarmogoyf to keep him from attacking you (hopefully). Everything else can be hit by Abrupt Decay and/or Disfigure. Also, UWR Delver dies a pitiful death to Massacre, so if you can prevent a Batterskull from sticking around and then Massacre the board, you're in good shape.

DeathBlade / Stoneblade

Stoneblade variants can be tough to deal with (see UWR above). Batterskull, if resolved and unanswered, can be a very tough threat. Also, there is now exists a "race-to-Jace," where your card advantage engine and mana acceleration becomes even more important. Your maindeck all-stars are Abrupt Decay, Baleful Strix, and Creeping Tar Pit (as a Jace assassin). Every creature in the deck is a threat if unanswered - Stoneforge Mystic, Deathrite Shaman, Dark Confidant, Geist of Saint Traft, and even Vendilion Clique. Post-board you should bring in more removal and if you're running Massacres, they can be a blowout, as it can nuke everything the've got except for B-skull.

OmniTell

Yet another tough matchup, but like other combo decks, your discard is your greatest ally, particularly in G1, as in G2 OmniTell players are playing Leyline of Sanctity more now, requiring you to board out some discard to prevent filling your hand with crap and getting terrible topdecks. T1 Thoughtseize, T2 Hymn can be your ticket to GG during G1 and if they don't have that Leyline. If they cast and resolve a Show and Tell into Omniscience or Dream Halls, you're doomed. Post-board you take out the Abrupt Decays and bring in Notion Thief and Venser, Shaper Savant, plus more Force of Wills. Notion Thief will probably draw you 46 cards off their Enter the infinite, so have fun and go nuts.

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VII. Decklists

Gerry Thompson - 1st Place at StarCityGames.com Invitational on 4/7/2013
http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=54793

Andrew Tenjum - 8th Place at StarCityGames.com Legacy Open on 8/4/2013
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=58122

[Greenpoe]

Snuff Out over Demise? It would increase the chance of getting the Visions off of Shardless Agent and it dodges situations where you might have to kill your own creature. Plus, free is good, and it means you don't have to wait for a decent sized graveyard. Also, no Tombstalker? He'd give some real beef to supplement Goyf.

[danyul]

How would you change the list if Abrupt Decay were legal right now?

[Wirrsturm]

Well you can always choose not to cast off of a cascade so you never "have" to kill your own creature although you are losing value.

What about this in UGr? Burn can always go to the face so your cascades are never complete blanks.

[Kyle]

@Greenpoe: Snuff Out could definitely work, but since you can opt not to cast the free spell off of cascade it's okay if you hit a Demise when there's nothing else on the board. It's definitely viable, and is great for early game when your life total is high.

@danyul: It goes without saying that Abrupt Decay belongs in this deck. I think 2-3 of them can easily replace the Misdirections in the "tweaked" list. I also forgot to include in the primer that Maelstrom Pulse is a very helpful addition to the deck, specifically to take out cards like Humility and Jace.

@Wirrsturm: A red splash would remove the core disruption and midrange qualities of the deck, I feel - it's very valuable to have Hymn to Tourach and Pernicious Deed. I agree that Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, and possibly Firespout could work as alternatives, but when you cascade you want to really drop a bomb.

[Wirrsturm]

Isn't usually a core aspect of cascade managing the randomness? It seems like consistency is more valuable than splashyness.

Cascading into discard mid-late game will often be pretty weak.

Both cards you mentioned are obviously good but both are also clunky ways to get value in a deck thats is already mostly value. Don't get me wrong I've played a lot of hymn/deed in various bug shells and know they are sweet. The problem is something like hymn forces you to have double black when you're not cascading into it and is bad top deck. Deed is sweet but midrange decks tend to put lots of permanents in play making it very symetrical.

I guess my question is: what about those two cards is so valuable to your game plan that it marries you to the bug shell?

[Kyle]

I guess my question is: what about those two cards is so valuable to your game plan that it marries you to the bug shell?

I wouldn't say I'm necessarily married to the BUG shell - I just think Hymn is a lot more powerful than people give it credit for. I have been happy with topdecking it or cascading into it at least 90% of the time. I think the primary strategy of this deck is to grind down their hand and increase yours. On another note, the build I'm playing utilizes Baleful Strix as well, which requires Black. Strix has been awesome as a flying chump blocker and it cycles for two mana.

Perhaps this is the wrong deck for Pernicious Deed since Deed prefers non- or low-creature builds of BUG, but it's been dynamite in my testing, especially with advantage of Ancestral Visions (i.e. clear the board, draw 3 or 4 cards, go to town). It's great against U/W Miracles, Dredge, Maverick, and RUG Thresh.

If your goal is to have a more tempo deck that is decidedly less midrange and remove the goal of denying your opponent's strategy by putting them into topdeck mode, I definitely think Red would be worth testing to replace Black. I completely agree that it could help decrease Cascade variance by giving you (burn) spells that are always useful.

Here are the cards I'd use to replace Hymn, Pernicious Deed, and Baleful Strix:

Lightning Bolt
Chain Lightning
Rift Bolt

Then you have a weird burn deck. Maybe I'm not taxing my imagination enough. Goblin Guide? Keldon Marauders?

[Wirrsturm]

I think I like the idea of strix more than hymn if bug is the way to go. That card IS sweet and an extra body certainly is something desirable.

You don't necessarily need infinite burn spells just because you're in red, and rift bolt with cmc of 3 for random burn is definitly out.

Grim Lavamancer is an example of a good red card that isn't just focused around doing dmg to the dome. fire/ice is another nice utlity card cycling at worst if there are no other targets.

Random/rough sample red list:


16 Creatures
4x Delver
4x Goyf
4x Shardless Agent
1x Snapcaster
2x Grim Lavamancer
1x Clique

16 Instants
4x Force of Will
4x Brainstorm
4x Bolt
2x Fire/ice
2x Dismember

7 Sorceries
4x Ancestral Vision
4x Ponder



19-20 Lands, with maybe 1x random flex slot for w/e

25 cards to flip delver, more aggressive without being all out agro.

All that being said perhaps black is just better in a midrangish deck especially if having Jace is a priority (And I do think unintuitively JTMS is the best argument for black because black more naturally lends itself to protecting him).

Sylvan library also seems like a decent fit here, since its less mana intensive than top.

[Esper3k]

The reason the list plays black is because the black cards assist greatly with the whole card advantage philosophy of the deck.

Ideally with every cascade, you're getting a 3-for-1 or better (cascading into a 2-for-1 card or Ancestral Visions). Hymn to Tourach has always been one of the best 2-for-1 2 drop cards of all time. Needless to say, Hymn is also amazing vs Control and Combo. Snapcaster mage, while bad to cascade into early, is amazing in the late game, letting you reuse your Ghastly Demises.

The "worst" cascades, Ghastly Demise / Brainstorm / Top, are still all very good when you cascade into them as well.

Pernicious Deed is also very powerful in the deck. Most of the major threats in Legacy are 2 mana or less, especially creatures. A Deed for 2 is usually sufficient to clear the board of most threats. Even if you need to Deed for 3 and blow up your own Shardless Agent, you're just setting up your future 'goyfs to be +2/+2 larger (Artifact and Enchantment now in the yard). Because of the use of Deed, Sylvan Library becomes a much worse card since SDT saves itself when you pop your Deed.

[Kyle]

I will be adding some basic strategy for the deck to the primer that I found improves it's reliability, specifically that the Brainstorms and Tops are there to help you set up a strong cascade. It's really not that hard. The current criticism of the deck is of course the volatility of cascading but with a tight list, you can really take advantage of every cascade. I'm almost never unhappy with the cascade results.

Keep in mind that this deck has a lot of great utility and that the Shardless Agent cascade isn't a requirement for the deck to run, but if you really work at it, it's worth it's weight in gold. Also, midgame when you have 4+ lands, the cascade works as a ridiculously helpful filter.

[mini1337s]

I'm trying to figure out how I want to make this meld together well.

Deck Core:
4x Shardless Agent
4x Baleful Strix
4x Master of Etherium

4x Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas

4x Hymn to Tourach
4x Ancestral Visions

2x Maelstrom Pulse
4x Force of Will
3x Snuff Out


Strong support cards could include the Abyss, Intuition + Related Shenanigans, JTMS, and maybe Vrasra from RTR.
Any thoughts?

[Esper3k]

Why is Master of Etherium in the list?

To make it even marginally useful, that guy requires you to play a bunch of artifact creatures. 4x Baleful Strix and 4x Shardless Agent just isn't enough.

Tarmogoyfs are awesome in the deck because they get up to potentially 7/8 (fairly regularly 5/6).

[mini1337s]

The reasoning was to buff Strix and Agent, along with maintaining my blue count for FoW and another target for Tezzeret. I was considering Ravager as well, as my Goyf replacement.
Theorycrafting here, certainly not suggesting my list is amazing.

[Esper3k]

No problem, but I think Master just takes too much work to make playable, even in Affinity.

DeMars points out one reason he ended up playing SCM over Strix is that the 2 power of SCM really makes for a much faster clock than the 1 power of the Strix.

On the Strix vs SCM debate for me, it's really about your early game vs your mid-late game. Strix is better early on whereas SCM gets much more value at mid/late game.

[bartmanqc]

I've been goldfishing this build. So far, i'm diggin it a lot!

4x Shardless Agent
4x Baleful Strix

3 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
2x Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2x Liliana of the Veil

4x Brainstorm
4x Force of Will
4x Ancestral Vision
4x Hymn to Tourach
3x Abrupt Decay
3x Pernicious Deed
2x Sensei's Divinning top

4x Polluted delta
4x Misty Rainforest
2x Verdant Catacomb
3x Underground Sea
3x Tropical Island
2x Bayou
1x Forest
1x Island
1x Swamp
1x Academy Ruins

Sideboard
3x Thougthseize
2x Vendillion Clique
2x Scavenging Ooze
2x Nihil Spellbomb
1x Garruk Relentless
1x Engineered Explosives
2x Phyrexian Revoker
2x Ensnaring bridge

Seems pretty good. Obviously the artifact count is a bit low for Tezzeret +1, but I think that he deserves a spot for the -1 ability. Maybe I should add artifact land. Might also want to try a counterbalance transformation sideboard, but counterbalance + deed seems a bit poor. The inclusion of 7 walkers is a personnal thing. I just enjoy playing with my full alter walkers, so maybe its not the perfect build, You might prefer using a more aggro build with Tarmogoyf/Snapcaster/Dark Confidant and stuff...

[silvanel]

Sorry for my lack of knowledge but how would snapcaster work with an ancestral vision in the graveyard? Could you cast it for 0 since it doesnt have a mana cost?

[TraxDaMax]

Red would also give acces to Bloodbraid Elf. This already used to be a pretty competitive deck.

[Hanni]

Bloodbraid + Shardless sounds pretty sexy, actually. You would definitely need to build the deck around the Cascade mechanic though. Situational spells like Abrupt Decay and Hymn to Tourach are going to be alot worse than always useful spells like Baleful Strix and Grim Lavamancer. Burn and cantrips are the only instants/sorceries I'd consider running, since they are never dead if you do Cascade into them.

Very interested in seeing how this develops. I was never (ever) a fan of the Cascade combo deck, but Cascade aggro/control sounds like alot of fun.

[Kyle]

Sorry for my lack of knowledge but how would snapcaster work with an ancestral vision in the graveyard? Could you cast it for 0 since it doesnt have a mana cost?

How awesome and thoroughly broken that would be. Unfortunately, the mana cost of Ancestral Visions is nonexistent, and therefore cannot be flashed back.

Compare this to 0 mana cost spells like Slaughter Pact. They have an existent mana cost, and can therefore be flashed back with Snapcaster Mage. The Cascade mechanic says "You may cast it without paying its mana cost" which is how the AV exploit works.

[Zalren]

Red would also give acces to Bloodbraid Elf. This already used to be a pretty competitive deck.
So are you saying to add Red in addition to BUG? Or replace Black with Red?

I am afraid that if you replace black with red, then this deck just becomes an inferior RUG deck. Black gives us access to Pernicious Deed, Baleful Strix, Lilianna of the Veil, and a wealth of discard and removal. Red just gives us lightning bolt.

[Kyle]

Just updated the OP with good, okay, and bad matchups and some basic strategy for each.

I think Black is necessary for the overall goal to this deck - grind their hand down and pump your hand up.

[ScatmanX]

Red would also give acces to Bloodbraid Elf. This already used to be a pretty competitive deck.
I for one am testing something like this:

2 Abrupt Decay
3 Thoughtseize
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Fire/Ice

4 FoW
4 Brainstorm
4 Ancestral Visions

4 Beleful Strix
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Bloodbraid Elf

2 Verdant Catacombs
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Polluted Delta
3 Scalding Tarn
3 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Taiga
2 Bayou
3 Wasteland

Maybe this isn't the right thread, but wanted to share.
The thing I most like about this deck is cascading into Hymn form the SB against combo, while still having access to FoW. (and ofc, BBE>Agnet>Hymn;Visions is just insane)

[mctlegacy]

try using 1x Academy ruins for ur strixes, jittes, and tops

works well with cascade after a deed bomb..

unearth should somehow find its way into this deck. Cascading to unearth would be crazy with GY targets like SCM,goyf, Clique, and strix

[catmint]

If you want to go into red I would check out this thread:
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?24739-Waterfalls-(RUG-Cascade!)/page1

Cascading into Fire Ice is very powerful and since you go pretty aggro the worst case scenarios: cascading into Bolt (for the face) or Noble Hierarch have at least some value. The fact that you don't cascade into situational removal, the more linear "to the face"-gameplan and Bloodbraid Elf make red the better choice for a cascade deck imo. The combo matchup is much worse but overall against the field I think it is stronger.

Don't think you can really support 4 colors.

In Bug Cascade I would go for Baleful Strix but then I would run Cabal Therapy. These 2 cards have a very good synergy.

Edit: has anyone thought about using the RUG cascade deck as a template for a BUG cascade deck with deathrite shaman instead of hierarch?

[whiley85]

I took BUG Cascade to a 50 man tournament and went 4-2 beating Merfolk, TES, Mono B, UW Miracle (all 2-0) while loosing to RUG Delver (1-2, final match with mulligan 5 and one island) and Goblins (0-2, first game loosing with 1 life on his side thanks to shaman, second game misplay since I attacked with all my creatures + jitte when he recovers with ringleader for an alphastrike)

The deck never felt weak against any archetype and ran very smooth, here's my list:

4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Ancestral Vision
1 Island
1 Swamp
3 Bayou
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Polluted Delta
1 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland
4 Baleful Strix
2 Liliana of the Veil
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Deathrite Shaman
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Vendilion Clique
1 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 4 Engineered Plague
SB: 4 Grafdigger's Cage
SB: 3 Pernicious Deed
SB: 3 Dread of Night
SB: 1 Abrupt Decay


Decay was so powerful especially against UW Miracle with CB, also Therapy over Hymn felt right the whole day.
In my meta this build is absolutely competetive, will definitely keep working on it!

[Esper3k]

Did some heavier testing yesterday with my current list as well (testing some Strix and Abrupt Decay).

Abrupt Decay really helps in the RUG matchup which is still tough especially since the current lists are back on the Stifle plan. AD was also amazing against Uw Miracles (as expected).

Baleful Strix is testing well so far - it helps to do what we want, which is keep us alive until T3-4 while still generating card advantage.

[catmint]

Check out my small tourney report yesterday winning with RUG cascasde in the waterfalls thread.

I think between the cascade decks black has obviously a better combomatchup, whereas I felt really comfortably with 4 bolt and 4 Fire//Ice against creature based decks. If you compare Fire//Ice and Baleful Strix, I think Fire//Ice is the stronger choice (altough I really love strix). Cascading into strix is usually stronger, but Fire is a removal when you need it and Strix can only stall but gets easily removed herself. Icing down a land to "pseudo time walk" while you suspended visions is also nice.

Good to see that people are picking up on going the acceleration route with deathrite shaman and also cabal therapy is an easy include with shamans & Baleful strix around.

As for the planeswalker slot: I would start with 2 Jace and decide if there is more Jace or LIliana needed from there on.

[Esper3k]

I also think black is probably better against control, especially the Uw Miracle decks since we have access to Deed (seeya Angel tokens/CB), Abrupt Decay, and Hymn.

I see the red version as having more game against the faster aggro decks like Goblins where you really need to have fast early removal to survive against them.

[Esper3k]

So in sideboarding against Esper Stoneblade, do you guys usually keep Deed in?

I don't think it's that great against them, but it may be necessary to deal with masses of Lingering Souls tokens?

[Kyle]

So in sideboarding against Esper Stoneblade, do you guys usually keep Deed in?

I don't think it's that great against them, but it may be necessary to deal with masses of Lingering Souls tokens?

It may be a mistake, but there is only one deck archetype where I side Deed out - Show and Tell. I'm never unhappy to have it abd this deck does a decent job of filtering if you really don want it. Also, this deck sometimes needs a bit of a delay or "Standstill" effect to get its CA engine going, which Deed can happily provide T3 or midgame.

[Esper3k]

Yeah I love Deed, but I'm not certain how good it is against Esper Stoneblade.

I'm trying to find room to bring in a Clique and Krosan Grip and possibly 2 Jittes from the board.

Maybe Jaces need to come out in that matchup since they have so many things that kill Jace.

[Greenpoe]

Has anyone tried a Force-less, Dark Confidant version of this deck? Maybe something like...
4x Shardless Agent
4x Deathrite Shaman
4x Baleful Strix
4x Dark Confidant
2x Deed
2x Vendilion Clique
4x Hymn to Tourach
4x Brainstorm
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Ancestral Visions
4x Abrupt Decay
20x Lands

Creature-heavy, card advantage-heavy and but still having plenty of disruption/control- Hymn and Clique for their hand, Shaman for their graveyard, Decay, Deed and Strix for the board position.

[Esper3k]

I've really wanted to try and fit Bob into the deck, but I've been finding it difficult to figure out what to cut as well.

I think Force is necessary because without it, our combo matchup gets much worse. Also, with all the card advantage we generate, I actually keep it in against the aggro matchups to pitch early to keep ourselves alive to the late game.

[Kyle]

Has anyone tried a Force-less, Dark Confidant version of this deck? Maybe something like...
4x Shardless Agent
4x Deathrite Shaman
4x Baleful Strix
4x Dark Confidant
2x Deed
2x Vendilion Clique
4x Hymn to Tourach
4x Brainstorm
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Ancestral Visions
4x Abrupt Decay
20x Lands

Creature-heavy, card advantage-heavy and but still having plenty of disruption/control- Hymn and Clique for their hand, Shaman for their graveyard, Decay, Deed and Strix for the board position.

Could work - I have found FoW to be mediocre and the deck really relies on the black disruption package. FoW really needs to be in your opening hand (with another blue card to pitch) in order for it to be really helpful. Mid- to late-game I find it's a card you're happy to cascade over and/or NOT topdeck. So far I've been really digging the 4x Hymn and 2x Wrench Mind for disruption, though I can see Inquisition or Thoughtseize going maindeck.

I'm very partial to Dark Confidant as a card and rely on him a lot, but I still believe the overall strategy is to cascade into bombs: board-controllers i.e. Strix or Goyf, hand-disrupters i.e. Hymn, instant burst card advantage i.e. Ancestral Vision. Bob is great when hardcast, but otherwise isn't very helpful turn 3 or turn 4. I like the idea of Deathrite Shaman (similar to how the RUG Cascade deck is running Hierarch) to help with acceleration, potentially giving you a turn 2 Shardless cascade, but I have the trouble figuring out what to cut. I think this deck requires Sensei's Divining Top to help filter your cascades too. Then again, I'm a bad player so I may not know what I'm talking about.

Also, I love Abrupt Decay, however I think it should run as a 2-of and you should keep your 2-ofs of Ghastly Demise. You need to have a potential turn-1 answer against Lackey or Mom.

[Esper3k]

Greenpoe's list does run 4x Deathrite Shaman, there's an answer to Lackey at least.

Here's the list I've currently been rocking:

// Deck file for Magic Workstation (http://www.magicworkstation.com)

// Lands
2 [B] Bayou
1 [P2] Forest (1)
2 [A] Underground Sea
2 [R] Tropical Island
3 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
3 [ON] Polluted Delta
3 [ZEN] Verdant Catacombs
4 [MPR] Wasteland
1 [DDE] Swamp (1)
1 [8E] Island (4)

// Creatures
4 [FUT] Tarmogoyf
1 [ISD] Snapcaster Mage
2 [MOR] Vendilion Clique
4 [P12] Shardless Agent
2 [P12] Baleful Strix

// Spells
4 [DD2] Ancestral Vision
3 [JGC] Pernicious Deed
3 [FE] Hymn to Tourach (4)
2 [OD] Ghastly Demise
2 [WWK] Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
4 [FNM] Brainstorm
4 [AL] Force of Will
1 [RTR] Abrupt Decay

// Sideboard
SB: 1 [MOR] Vendilion Clique
SB: 2 [RTR] Abrupt Decay
SB: 1 [TSP] Krosan Grip
SB: 3 [SOM] Nihil Spellbomb
SB: 2 [COM] Scavenging Ooze
SB: 2 [GPX] Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 3 [LRW] Thoughtseize
SB: 1 [RAV] Darkblast

Very similar to the original list, just with some slight tweaks.

Played it again this weekend - beat BUG Control (and won a game where I mulled to 4!), beat Sneaky Show, lost to RGB Aggro Loam (mulled to 3 one game, mana screw the second), and lost to Maverick (I lost one game where I kept a greedy hand with a fetchland, Brainstorm, Ghastly Demise, Force and of course I found no lands off the Brainstorm then my Sea got wasted after I had to use it to Ghastly a T1 Mother).

Pretty much with this deck, I always have the feeling that if I hit my first 4 land drops, I generally have a tough time losing the game.

[whiley85]

Pretty much with this deck, I always have the feeling that if I hit my first 4 land drops, I generally have a tough time losing the game.

This is why I just added a 4th shaman to my list instead of one wasteland, don't regret it so far...

[EviLDemon]

I'm trying this build right now:

// Artifacts:
2 Sensei's Divining Top

// Creatures:
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Baleful Strix
2 Vendilion Clique

// Planeswalkers:
2 Liliana of the Veil

// Enchantments:
3 Pernicious Deed

// Sorceries & Instants
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Hymn to Tourach
3 Abrupt Decay


// Lands:
1 Island
1 Swamp
3 Bayou
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Polluted Delta
1 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

It's working pretty well. Liliana is a must, helped in so many games. I tried to fit Deathrite Shaman, but I don't know which cards to withdraw.

[Oiolosse]

I'm just perusing and reading lists and thinking ab the interactions beckons me to recommend the Harpy from planeshift.

[theBloody]

Harpy is nice if you don't worry about fizzling (harpy into nothing).

[Esper3k]

@EvilDemon: I'm running a very similar list right now, but still loving the Jaces. Do you miss the extra Brainstorming at all to set up Cascades?

[whiley85]

I'm trying this build right now:

// Artifacts:
2 Sensei's Divining Top

// Creatures:
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Baleful Strix
2 Vendilion Clique

// Planeswalkers:
2 Liliana of the Veil

// Enchantments:
3 Pernicious Deed

// Sorceries & Instants
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Hymn to Tourach
3 Abrupt Decay


// Lands:
1 Island
1 Swamp
3 Bayou
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Polluted Delta
1 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

It's working pretty well. Liliana is a must, helped in so many games. I tried to fit Deathrite Shaman, but I don't know which cards to withdraw.

You can start with deed. It's in most cases one turn too slow and now when you run shaman, you have to hit 3+ cards to make CA.
While Lili being very strong against a lot of decks you aren't happy everytime you have to discard. She only makes CA with her ultimate or 2x sac. Not that fast imo, maybe I'll try something else in that 2 slots.
I wasn't happy with top. Against aggro it's also too slow and control is a great matchup anyway.
Don't underestimate therapies instead of hymns. With agent and strix you have all possibilities to get rid of the cards you fear atm. Hymn does this at random...
21 lands without acceleration is few in my eyes even if you want to play cc4 spells.

[metamet]

I've been toying with the following list:

1 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Shardless Agent
2 Tarmogoyf
4 Baleful Strix
2 Esperzoa

2 Liliana of the Veil
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Life from the Loam

4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Hymn to Tourach
3 Abrupt Decay

1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Polluted Delta
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

~

Might change a Strix out for another Goyf, but it run really well so far. I like the Planeswalker control lock backed by creatures.

Esperzoa + Jace + Shardless Agent nets you a ton of card advantage, too.

[EviLDemon]

@EvilDemon: I'm running a very similar list right now, but still loving the Jaces. Do you miss the extra Brainstorming at all to set up Cascades?

Nope, the top (with the help of some fetchs) do whatever I need. Also T4 for this deck is hard to reach against some decks, and liliana just helped me a lot. After T4 normally I'll try to stay with no cards in hand(to use the +1 without fear) and keep letting an abrupt decay on top with my top. After I get to this position it's hard to not win, you'll keep getting the right cards on your drawstep(always putting ingame(goyf,shardless,baleful)) and using liliana's hability. Most of the time the other player (if he doesn’t stop liliana soon) he won't be able to do anything.


You can start with deed. It's in most cases one turn too slow and now when you run shaman, you have to hit 3+ cards to make CA.
While Lili being very strong against a lot of decks you aren't happy everytime you have to discard. She only makes CA with her ultimate or 2x sac. Not that fast imo, maybe I'll try something else in that 2 slots.
I wasn't happy with top. Against aggro it's also too slow and control is a great matchup anyway.
Don't underestimate therapies instead of hymns. With agent and strix you have all possibilities to get rid of the cards you fear atm. Hymn does this at random...
21 lands without acceleration is few in my eyes even if you want to play cc4 spells.

I do think therapies are way better than hymns, but you'll need a great knowledge of the enemy's deck (which I don't have right now =/).
Deed helped me a lot against many things, but I'll try. Thanks!
I didn't played a lot, but almost any match I played top I won; It helps so much the cascade and the overall draw.

[Esper3k]

I've found that much of the time I've been wishing I had more than 2 Tops and oftentimes am forced to blind Cascade with Shardless Agent.

However, the times I've had multiple Tops on the board makes me want to punch myself in the nuts (although it's not horrible with fetches).

I've just pretty much never been sad to see Jace hit the board on top of being another blue card to pitch to Force (one of the problems the deck seems to have is a relatively low blue card count).

Another issue I've had with Liliana in testing is that with all the card advantage we generate, I've ended up in many times where I have cards, they have 0 cards so I don't want to +1 Liliana.

[jedi_gof]

I've been having a decent amount of succes with an a bit of the wall build:


//Creatures:
4 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Shardless Agent
2 Tarmogoyf
1 Vendilion Clique

//Spells:
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Ancestral Vision
4 Brainstorm
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Force of Will
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Life from the Loam

//Planeswalkers:
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Liliana of the Veil

//Artifacts:
1 Umezawa's Jitte

//Lands:
2 Bayou
1 Forest
1 Island
3 Misty Rainforest
1 Swamp
3 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
3 Verdant Catacombs
1 Volrath's Stronghold
3 Wasteland

//Sideboard
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Spell Pierce
1 Submerge
1 Thoughtseize
3 Engineered Plague
2 Pernicious Deed
1 The Abyss
3 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Vraska the Unseen


In honesty, vraska and the abyss are not suposed to be in the sideboard. I just enjoy playing some cookie cards! :)

Piloted this to a 5-0-1 at a local turney yesterday.

Small recap:
Round 1: bye
Round 2: Thalia Zoo.
G1: I am able to handle his early pressure, stabilize and bury his lands with recurring loam/waste.
G2: A long one as I am unable to apply pressure, but i keep him away trough a t3 the abyss. I finally get some agents going along with jace and its a win.
Win with a t3 the abyss: Achievement completed! :D
2-0
Round 3: My cusine, playing UG infect.
G1: open a hand of 3x Abrupts, which leads to a blowout.
G2: I make a terrible misplay, and he wins with a misdirection on my decay.
G3: I am able to throw a submerge on his t2 all-in play and takes it from there.
3-0
Round 4: Mirror, against BUG control. Differint build, but mirror nonetheless.
G1: He grinds this one out through 2x thragtusk (Which is awesome in the mirror, sooo much value!
g2: Close one, with lots of grinding away. I do however manage to stick my Vraska, and I win with her assasins following a misplay from my opp.
G3: I am closing in on the win, but time is called and I am a turn or 2 away from closing the deal.
3-0-1
Round 5: Elves.
G1: He combos, i lose.
G2+3: Plagues and deeds, along with timely disruption takes him down, even though i almost punted G2.
4-0-1
Round 6: BW taxes
G1: Lots of discard flowing back and forth, but I stick a jace, and are able to pile a visions to follow a agent twice, and thats enough to seal the deal.
Really long game, means very short time for g2.
G2: I just play defence, not allowing serious threats, and he scoops with an emty battlefield as we go to time.
5-0-1

All in all I loved this deck. I wouldnt consider changing very much from the main, weakest card is lili, she might become a jace.
A couple of thragtusks are also being considered having seen them in action, they are so much value, and I love value and CA.

Bad MUs include burn and S&T. Other than that i feel good. I like never beeing out of a match, as this can com back from a lot! :D

[dscherli]

So I've been playing a list pretty close to Demars' original one and I've been crushing. Played a bunch of games against Burn and UR Delver the other day and very literally just died in a fire almost every time. Any ideas? Early Hymns were good but putting a clock on them was hard. Basically need multiple Goyfs to race. Scavenging Ooze was decent out of the board but not great at all. Has anyone tried a countertop package out of the SB? Seems like its crush burn and a lot of other random rogue MUs. we already have lots of ways to manipulate the top of our deck so it doesn't seem too hard to fit in.

[Esper3k]

Burn is traditionally a tough matchup for BUG anyways. I bring in Oozes and Jitte since that life gain is key to staying alive.

I haven't found UR to be as bad because they tend to have less burn spells for dudes and countermagic... which makes Abrupt Decay better against them.

Post board, I actually take out Hymns, Jaces, and Cliques. Hymns are terrible mid-late game against a deck that can drop it's hand so quickly. Jace is too slow and Cliques only trade with creatures and don't actually defend you like a Tarmogoyf does.

I actually keep Force of Will in because we generally generate enough card advantage to compensate for it and if Price of Progress resolves, we generally die (even if we fetch basics and Wasteland our own lands).

[wcm8]

I've gone back to testing this deck. Although the main list that people are currently working with is good, I think there is one card that would greatly help the deck: Deathrite Shaman.

[edit: going back through the thread, I see that this guy has been suggested several times, but I haven't seen too many lists actually incorporating it.]

In this deck, Deathrite Shaman performs several very important functions:
-It provides both reach AND lifegain, both of which can be a problem for BUG. It can drain the last few points of damage in a stalemate or help keep you alive and out of Lightning Bolt range after you've established board control
-99% of the time it will be capable of providing acceleration as well. In a format full of fetches and Wastelands, you shoudn't typically have much trouble using it for this purpose. This deck is incredibly mana-hungry and has pretty awkward mana requirements.
-It gives you a bit of breathing room against Goblins if they have an aggressive start with Lackey. It also blocks unthreshed Mongeese and unflipped Delvers like a champ, and will help keep Mongoose small.
-It serves as maindeck graveyard hate, and will help out against decks with annoying recursion strategies.
-It's another one-drop for a deck that otherwise doesn't have much early action.

Now admittedly, it's not a very impressive card to flip via Shardless Agent, but that's a small risk to run for so many benefits. And Agent is only one part of this deck's strategy, and the list I've been testing only has 3 anyways.

Now the question is, how do we make room for this card and what changes should be made. I think we can cut the land count down to 21 since Shaman will be providing us some mana, and also we should consider changing the split of Decay/Deed from 3/3 to 4/2. I think we can also shave a Sensei's Top. I'm also thinking we can cut either the Baleful Strix or Snapcaster Mages, or one of each.

As for the sideboard, I definitely feel that 3 Counterbalances are a necessity, and perhaps some more SDT's to help out with that strategy. Without the counterspells, Storm strategies will be problematic, and Counterbalance is also incredibly good against stuff like Burn and RUG. I also think there should be some cards to help out against the UW Miracles deck that is very popular now, and I think more Jaces and Vendilion Cliques are probably the best options. Maybe some Malestrom Pulse(s) too.

[edit 2: I see that both the RUG and BUG cascade decks are beginning to converge into a 4-color monstrosity. I think that this might be a great approach going forward, and that BBE and red removal might actually strengthen the deck more than the midrangey elements found in the pure BUG build...]

[Stoyrm]

As of now, this is my list; i'm going to a tournament on saturday so i'll let you guys know how it goes.

EDIT: Well i went 2-3. I won all my creature based matchups, but lost to U/W Miracles three times. Apparently we have no good answer to Jace, the Mind Sculptor and we need more of it. don't know how to fix it, but we can't pressure Jace enough with the creatures we have, one Terminus and we're gone and we cannot counter it unless we have force of will. The game i won against them i drew 3 force of will. So i was 1-6 against Miracles.

Creatures
1 Snapcaster Mage
3 Tarmogoyf
4 Shardless Agent
2 Vendillion Clique
4 Deathrite Shaman

Enchantments
3 Pernicious Deed

Instants
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
3 Abrupt Decay

Planeswalkers
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Sorceries
3 Ancestral Vision
4 Hymn to Tourach

Basic Lands
1 Forest
1 Island
1 Swamp

Lands
2 Bayou
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Polluted Delta
2 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Krosan Grip
2 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Vendilion Clique
4 Thoughtseize
2 Liliana of the Veil

Let me know what you think, it has some weaknesses to both Mother of Runes and Omniscience, but it has the tools to defeat it to.

[drfontaine]

I've been playtesting alot lately with a rather different BUG list, and im quite suprised i've never really found anything like it elsewhere.


CREATURES (12)
4 Shardless Agent
4 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman

SORCERIES (3)
3 Ancestral Vision

INSTANTS (11)
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will

PLANESWALKERS (4)
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas

ARTIFACTS (8)
1 Umezawa’s Jitte
3 Sensei’s Divining Top
1 Pithing Needle
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Vedalken Shackles
1 Crucible of Worlds

LANDS (22)
1 Bayou
3 Underground Sea
1 Tropical Island
3 Wasteland
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Polluted Delta
1 Academy Ruins
1 Swamp
1 Forest
2 Island

SIDEBOARD
1 Darkblast
3 Engineered Plague
2 Dread of Night
1 Nihil spellbomb
4 Counterbalance
4 Thoughtseize

I really think the deck synergizes well, and i've never really understood why no1 really has tried to play tezz in a non superartifact heavy list. Even though you might not just hit his ulti pretty much as soon as you drop him, hes +1 and and -1 are still really strong! The chance of not finding an artifact on his +1 is superslim even thought only playing 16 artifacts esp considering you play loads fetchlands and SDT, + you got academy ruins.

I think this deck has very strong control mirror match with very strong CA with the baleful + shardless + ancestral vision and both brainstorm + top + jace to set up vision. Tezz ofc also is very strong CA if he lives, which strixes easily make sure he does. Academy ruin strix combo or shardless is also extremly potent lategame, considering there is also crucible in there it's hard to ruin the synergy!

Vs creature decks and aggro its also kinda good, baleful is king vs non mother creature decks, Decay is also very nice vs RUG since you dont have to worry about daze, pierce etc. Sboard is also kinda heavy with anticreature decks esp since mother rune can be annoying with decay as only target removal, however since addition of needle + vedalken in main things are much easier, there is also EE ofc :).

I did playtest loads vs mav, RUG, death tax, and miracles and found those MU to be pretty nice, although i still need to playtest vs combo, although sideboard is mostly decdicated vs combo, IE 4 counterbalance and thoughtsize, figured it would fare ok vs most cept it's probably rather weak vs show and tell. Venser does not seem worthy of SBslots although i feel its the only real counter vs omniscience. Goblins i presume is hard mu as always with bug, esp without deed, therefore i 3 engyplague in board, altho guess still not enough?

From my experience there aint that many slots to switch, the only ones im not beeing fairly certain on are the pithing needle and the vedalken, since mostly those matchups can anyways be handled most of the time. I'd really like to have a 4 Decay since its such a monster card, and also if i could fit a darkblast in main. There is also the option of having ratchet bomb instead of EE although i feel like EE is strictly better cept the fact you can cascade into ratchet, although from my testing its not often you don't know what ur cascading into.

Would really appreciate some comments ! )

[wcm8]

Edit: wrong cascade thread

[Kyle]

@drfontaine: it looks like your list could benefit from 1 or 2 Trinket Mage, as you are running Engineered Explosives, Sensei's Divining Top, and Pithing Needle Maindeck. You could probably drop a Top if you did that.

Also, I'd drop a Shaman for another Jace. In my experience, having a second one to pitch to FoW is helpful, plus the redundancy is great if your opponent takes out the first one.

Fun list and looks like it could be quite effective. The Tezzeret + Strix synergy is awesome. And to help Tezzeret out, you could consider some more mana acceleration from Dimir Signet or Talisman of Dominance.

[drfontaine]

Superbig Thanks for the feedback Kyle!

I would like to avoid the path of U/B tezz deck and play fullset of signet acceleration, and instead rely somewhat on the superallround and powerful deathrite instead, especially since its in most matchups a must remove, which offers protection for my animated b strixes, or other artifacts. Which can otherwize be quite a setback if you -1 tezz and ur creature gets removed by plow.

Concerning the Trinket mage, i feel like shardless is just straight up better since hes an artifact IE can be tutored + animated with tezz, and placed on top with academy ruin. He also is quite good at finding tops on his own, and best of all he casts the spell for free instead of ending up in ur hand :). And in my current version i even reduced shardless to 3 pieces. He suffers the same issues as shardless IE a 2/2 body without eq which is very lacking esp for 3 mana :/, therefore i desperatly need the additional synergy of beeing an artifact ;). I also removed the pithing needle main since it's just too much of a dead card sometimes. I would however like the ability to find EE since its my only reliable tool vs mother rune which is very annoying vs this deck.

I did however try a new approach for the list and can't decide whichever version i'd have the most faith with in a tournament. Right now im trying a version with counterbalance in main instead of SB since it does idd free up some more space in the very powerful sideboard of BUG colors! Also CB is an extremely powerful card to casc into, and it really is strong obv for the combo mu, but naturally also vs RUG, altho i feel this deck with 4x Adecay, 4x Baleful, and 3x Deathrite is exremely good vs rug, the only downside beeing shaky manabase.

I cant decide which version i like the most, since the CB is ofc abit more versatile meanwhile the original list is better vs the fair decks, and esp good in control mirror! The one thing that annoys me is the worse MAV mu with the CB version, since so few counters vs mother rune preboard. Thalia is also very annoying since it messes up the deck while having first strike vs strix, altho dread of night takes care of that postboard.

Tellme what you think of this version pls!! :)

1 vedalken shackles
4 sensei divining top
1 Engy Explosives

4 Baleful Strix
3 Shardless Agent
3 Deathrite Shaman

3 Counterbalance

4 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will

2 Jace
3 Tezz

2 Ancestral Vision
1 Life from the Loam

SB:

1 Grafdiggers cage
1 Nihil spellbomb
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Pithing Needle

X???????

3 Dread of Night
3 Engineering Plague

1 Darkblast

3 Thoughtseize

1 slot unsure

THANKS alot !!

[Esper3k]

I think in any of these decks where you're trying to cascade into Ancestral Visions or suspend it on T1, playing less than 4 is probably incorrect.

[drfontaine]

Regarding amount of ancestral vision i think that's really wrong, at least if your trying to play more of a control build. In that case #1 priority is surviving the early phase of the game, drawing multiple ancestral in early game doesn't improve board state. Imo if you only manage a single ancestral during a game its most often enough to win the game anyways. Praying you will cascade into ancestral is also just complete gamble, and for those kinda decks i think you should be playing WATERFALL cascade which is kinda different deck with RED, there you will blindly cascade into anything improving board state or you can just strike opponent with lightning in face! Those decks are obviuosly alot more about tempo which is quite different.

[Esper3k]

Regarding amount of ancestral vision i think that's really wrong, at least if your trying to play more of a control build. In that case #1 priority is surviving the early phase of the game, drawing multiple ancestral in early game doesn't improve board state. Imo if you only manage a single ancestral during a game its most often enough to win the game anyways. Praying you will cascade into ancestral is also just complete gamble, and for those kinda decks i think you should be playing WATERFALL cascade which is kinda different deck with RED, there you will blindly cascade into anything improving board state or you can just strike opponent with lightning in face! Those decks are obviuosly alot more about tempo which is quite different.

That's the thing - with DeMars' original list, you actually don't pray you cascade into Ancestral that often. Between the Tops, Brainstorms, Jaces, you have a pretty good chance of setting it up yourself.

Also, it's understood that Ancestral is the best thing we can cascade into, so it's important to maximize the chances of doing that or suspending it on T1.

Playing it as a 2-of just means you're 1) even less likely to draw it in your opener, 2) even less likely to be able to set up a cascade into it, and 3) very unlikely to blind cascade into it (worst case scenerio with cascades).

[drfontaine]

That's the thing - with DeMars' original list, you actually don't pray you cascade into Ancestral that often. Between the Tops, Brainstorms, Jaces, you have a pretty good chance of setting it up yourself.

Also, it's understood that Ancestral is the best thing we can cascade into, so it's important to maximize the chances of doing that or suspending it on T1.

Playing it as a 2-of just means you're 1) even less likely to draw it in your opener, 2) even less likely to be able to set up a cascade into it, and 3) very unlikely to blind cascade into it (worst case scenerio with cascades).

Big problem is however there is never in the early game enough time to setup a known cascade, since the only real working scenario is when you find something truly useful from looking at top. Cause brainstorming to set it up early game just costs to much mana, and chances are your mana sources comes from fetches, ie fucking up your setup. And this in conjunction with wastelands, and daze/pierce etc makes it so unreliable anyways. So in a controlling build casting an agent for random cascade is generally not worth it from my pov. Unless ofc the agent itself presents worthwhile board presence on its own.

This is the reason that in a controlling build i find the agent to be rather lacking, altho with the synergy with tezz at least it makes it decent, and considering it wins you game mid/late game in control mirrors or when estabilshed control and you can afford to setup ur cascades i still find it a pretty decent slot.

I am however after further testign rather skeptical about CB in this BUG build. Playing a non reactive spell that can get countered (best case) turn 2 can sometimes already be too late, CB shines when it has access to 1mana wrath, or else it suffers to much tempoloss. There is a possibilty to include it as a 1of and not relying strategywize on the card, but just include as strong card, and therefore making more room in SB.

I do however realize the reasoning is completely different considering a more mid/tempo oriented build. Which i guess this thread originally was about.

I am once again back to playing 3 ancestral in my controlling build, and just reduced shardless as a 3of.

[Esper3k]

In a controlling build, you shouldn't be blind jamming a T3 Agent anyways. The longer you hold off on casting an Agent, the better your cascades become.

Early turns should be spent clearing out the board and establishing your mana / setting up for future turns, imo. It's not like you're really going to be aggroing out with a T3 Agent anyways.

[drfontaine]

In a controlling build, you shouldn't be blind jamming a T3 Agent anyways. The longer you hold off on casting an Agent, the better your cascades become.

Early turns should be spent clearing out the board and establishing your mana / setting up for future turns, imo. It's not like you're really going to be aggroing out with a T3 Agent anyways.

Like i've been saying all along :/.

[phazonmutant]

DrFontaine - Maybe I just like Intuition and Loam too much, but I think adding those two cards would be a powerful addition with all those artifacts. Intuition for Loam, Ruins, and relevant artifact can be backbreaking.

[EviLDemon]

Changed the build a little(thanks to whiley85 and Esper3k):

// Artifacts:
2 Sensei's Divining Top

// Creatures:
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Baleful Strix
2 Vendilion Clique
3 Deathrite Shaman

// Planeswalkers:
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

// Sorceries & Instants
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Abrupt Decay


// Lands:
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Forest
3 Bayou
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Polluted Delta
1 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

The deathrites sure are more handy than pernicious deed. Deed sure helps many times, but the mana advantage and damage from deathrite helps more. Of course I moved deed to the sideboard.
Not that Liliana isn't good, but Jace's control fit better in this deck. I saw that after playing a lot with both.
Cabal Therapy over hymn, always.

[Greenpoe]

I've been playtesting alot lately with a rather different BUG list, and im quite suprised i've never really found anything like it elsewhere.


CREATURES (12)
4 Shardless Agent
4 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman

SORCERIES (3)
3 Ancestral Vision

INSTANTS (11)
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will

PLANESWALKERS (4)
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas

ARTIFACTS (8)
1 Umezawa’s Jitte
3 Sensei’s Divining Top
1 Pithing Needle
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Vedalken Shackles
1 Crucible of Worlds

LANDS (22)
1 Bayou
3 Underground Sea
1 Tropical Island
3 Wasteland
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Polluted Delta
1 Academy Ruins
1 Swamp
1 Forest
2 Island

SIDEBOARD
1 Darkblast
3 Engineered Plague
2 Dread of Night
1 Nihil spellbomb
4 Counterbalance
4 Thoughtseize



How about in the SB -3 Plague, +3 Deed? And for the MD, drop the Shackles for a 2nd Jitte (Jitte is totally AMAZING with all the little guys, Jitte stops Mother, its extra lifegain, etc.). Maybe to improve the combo MU, -1 Jace, -1 Needle for +2 Counterbalance? (Move the Needle to the SB?) I mean Counterbalance is obviously really good, and as just a 2-of you shouldn't run into (dead) multiples. Plus it'll free up SB space. CB is also pretty sweet to cascade into.

[drfontaine]

How about in the SB -3 Plague, +3 Deed? And for the MD, drop the Shackles for a 2nd Jitte (Jitte is totally AMAZING with all the little guys, Jitte stops Mother, its extra lifegain, etc.). Maybe to improve the combo MU, -1 Jace, -1 Needle for +2 Counterbalance? (Move the Needle to the SB?) I mean Counterbalance is obviously really good, and as just a 2-of you shouldn't run into (dead) multiples. Plus it'll free up SB space. CB is also pretty sweet to cascade into.

Thanks mr greenpoe!!

I def think the option with CB is viable for all the reasons you suggested although sometimes it's clonky when you drop it early and since it doesnt affect the current board threats, it can be hard to catch up when you lack the 1mana wrath :/. I think if i were to run it i'd run few copies like perhaps two MD, but right now i prefer CB in SB.

Regarding jitte i played it in main for awhile, thinking it would be another answer to mother etc, although when mother is present she most of the time can prevent combat dmg IE it's hard to get counters on jitte, so in practice it dosnt work as well, also most decks running mother also run jitte on their own, meaning you never really get to land your jitte, and even less likely activate it. Deathrite shaman is better of doing his own work rather than swinging with jitte aswell i figuered. And vs rug/mav gettin active jitte considering their removal is most of the time to slow :/, since they can so easily remove your creature by the time you manage to eq. It's now in SB for games vs goblin/meerfolk! I rather play more EE in main like 2-3 since it can also be dropped for free and animated by tezz same turn for 4 mana for 5/5 haste etc ! Serves as great mother removal etc aswell!

[whiley85]

Thanks mr greenpoe!!

I def think the option with CB is viable for all the reasons you suggested although sometimes it's clonky when you drop it early and since it doesnt affect the current board threats, it can be hard to catch up when you lack the 1mana wrath :/. I think if i were to run it i'd run few copies like perhaps two MD, but right now i prefer CB in SB.

Regarding jitte i played it in main for awhile, thinking it would be another answer to mother etc, although when mother is present she most of the time can prevent combat dmg IE it's hard to get counters on jitte, so in practice it dosnt work as well, also most decks running mother also run jitte on their own, meaning you never really get to land your jitte, and even less likely activate it. Deathrite shaman is better of doing his own work rather than swinging with jitte aswell i figuered. And vs rug/mav gettin active jitte considering their removal is most of the time to slow :/, since they can so easily remove your creature by the time you manage to eq. It's now in SB for games vs goblin/meerfolk! I rather play more EE in main like 2-3 since it can also be dropped for free and animated by tezz same turn for 4 mana for 5/5 haste etc ! Serves as great mother removal etc aswell!

Well I think you can't attack with an 5/5 EE you just dropped in the same turn. Am I wrong? Isn't it still sick?

[drfontaine]

Well I think you can't attack with an 5/5 EE you just dropped in the same turn. Am I wrong? Isn't it still sick?

artifacts dosnt have summ sickness :O, at least thats what i thot )). Anyways its a great way to kill jace. More EE is also strong in miracles mu, in order to kill stoopid angels. Miracles deck which might also be the strongest atm ;)

[arbiter]

artifacts dosnt have summ sickness :O

Creatures do, so if artifact turns into a creature it has summoning sickness =P

EDIT: Sry I wasn't clear, meant that it has summoning sickness if it came to play that turn =) So any artifacts played 1> turn before can attack ^^

[drfontaine]

Creatures do, so if artifact turns into a creature it has summoning sickness =P

Perhaps time to look it up then XD. But with that reasoning it seems i cannot attack with a dimir signet if i animate with tezz that turn, even though it's been in play for a decade no? I mean then it turns a creature and it cannot attack since it gains summoning sicknz the when it gets a creature. That dosnt seem right ).

But perhaps ur right, anwyays if its been in play you can at least animate and attack, so semihaste i guess :/ XD

[whiley85]

Perhaps time to look it up then XD. But with that reasoning it seems i cannot attack with a dimir signet if i animate with tezz that turn, even though it's been in play for a decade no? I mean then it turns a creature and it cannot attack since it gains summoning sicknz the when it gets a creature. That dosnt seem right ).

But perhaps ur right, anwyays if its been in play you can at least animate and attack, so semihaste i guess :/ XD

I'm pretty sure the same problem was with factories for a decade... ^^ couldn't pump itself while blocking when it came into play on your turn. Factory as a land could do that instantly.

Nevertheless the ability of tezz is indeed great since you often animate an artifact you cast one turn before. You usually can't cast Tezz and and artifact that doesn't cost 0 in the same turn.

[drfontaine]

I'm pretty sure the same problem was with factories for a decade... ^^ couldn't pump itself while blocking when it came into play on your turn. Factory as a land could do that instantly.

Nevertheless the ability of tezz is indeed great since you often animate an artifact you cast one turn before. You usually can't cast Tezz and and artifact that doesn't cost 0 in the same turn.

GREAT anyways was confused, just thot of it when i realized i need more EE in main that it can in fact be cast for 0, IE the given example. Thanks alot for clearing it up!! greatly appreciated!!!

[Greenpoe]

Thanks mr greenpoe!!

I def think the option with CB is viable for all the reasons you suggested although sometimes it's clonky when you drop it early and since it doesnt affect the current board threats, it can be hard to catch up when you lack the 1mana wrath :/. I think if i were to run it i'd run few copies like perhaps two MD, but right now i prefer CB in SB.

Regarding jitte i played it in main for awhile, thinking it would be another answer to mother etc, although when mother is present she most of the time can prevent combat dmg IE it's hard to get counters on jitte, so in practice it dosnt work as well, also most decks running mother also run jitte on their own, meaning you never really get to land your jitte, and even less likely activate it. Deathrite shaman is better of doing his own work rather than swinging with jitte aswell i figuered. And vs rug/mav gettin active jitte considering their removal is most of the time to slow :/, since they can so easily remove your creature by the time you manage to eq. It's now in SB for games vs goblin/meerfolk! I rather play more EE in main like 2-3 since it can also be dropped for free and animated by tezz same turn for 4 mana for 5/5 haste etc ! Serves as great mother removal etc aswell!

Hm that's true, maybe 2-3 copies of Inquisition or Clique, since they can be good cascades (and EE is a really bad cascade!) which will help in the combo MU too. (or if a 4c build could be stable, then Tidehollow Sculler could work - he's an artifact too)

[Greenpoe]

Has anyone tried Garruk 1.0 in this deck? I've been testing a build with Garruk Wildspeaker as a 2-of and he's been absolutely fantastic. He does a few wonderful things for the deck: (1) his mana-acceleration means that you can cast him, then drop a 2-drop, or a 3-drop if you've got another land or Shaman open; (2) his mana-accel also helps you play out all the cards you draw with this deck; (3) you can cast him, +1, then ultimate next turn - which is a big deal in a deck full of 1/1's, 1/2's and 2/2's as it means that you can untap and frequently swing with 12 or 16 trampling power....and that's just all the things he does with his +1! His -1 ability is very nice as well. In the build I've been testing, I've been running Tarmogoyf because it's either an either clock vs combo and control or its a giant wall vs aggro. I could justify cutting one, since the deck doesn't want to rush out the floodgates obviously, and because the longer the game goes on, the bigger he'll be (this deck has a lot of different cardtypes - Planeswalkers, Sorcerories, artifacts, creatures, instants and land of course - so you can get him to a 6/7 even without your opponent's yard). But I think either 3 or 4 Tarmogoyf (you could add a Thoughtseize, Decay or Vision) is necessary so that with it + Garruk (+1 then ultimate as needed), you actually have a pretty solid clock. Actually, Garruk has been so good I've considered adding a 4th.


4 Shardless Agent
4 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Tarmogoyf

3 Ancestral Vision

3 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will

2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Garruk Wildspeaker

1 Thoughtseize
3 Inquisition of Kozilek

1 Bayou
3 Underground Sea
1 Tropical Island
4 Wasteland
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Polluted Delta
1 Swamp
1 Forest
2 Island

[.Ix]

Oh man, that's exactly what I thought a few days ago. Haven't actually tried it yet, though. Good to hear that he works well.

[dscherli]

So I've still been doing well with Demars's original version, plus some changes to include Abrupt Decay. I was just thinking of incorporating Deathrite Shaman so glad to see that's pretty much the consensus here. Cutting Deed or at least moving it to the board and trimming a land or two makes sense.

I'm curious why everyone seems to have moved away from Hymn to Tourach? It makes the mana occasionally awkward but that card is a beast for me. Awesome card in general but extra strong in this deck - we have Goyf and now Shaman to benefit, Wasteland to help wreck they're mana if we hit land, and Visions to press the CA further. Plus taking it out seems like it'd make the combo MU worse. Also no one playing Ghastly Demise at all surprises me. i know Decay is Decay but I've liked still having a one-mana removal as there's lots of Maverick and Goblins in my area. The one-of Tiago is something else I was never upset about seeing, and I see that's gone too. And taking out Clique just seems wrong, especially now we're running Shamans and no Deeds - it's a sweet clock which the deck needs, and again, helps combo. Just curious why there has been move away from these cards. Demise or Tiago I could see but no Hymn or Clique just seems bad to me.

Also I love Strix but does it do enough? Seems like we want more high-impact cards. And Therapy is one of my favourite cards ever but I'm not sure this is a Therapy deck, nothing we actively want to sacrifice.

[Esper3k]

So I've still been doing well with Demars's original version, plus some changes to include Abrupt Decay. I was just thinking of incorporating Deathrite Shaman so glad to see that's pretty much the consensus here. Cutting Deed or at least moving it to the board and trimming a land or two makes sense.

I'm curious why everyone seems to have moved away from Hymn to Tourach? It makes the mana occasionally awkward but that card is a beast for me. Awesome card in general but extra strong in this deck - we have Goyf and now Shaman to benefit, Wasteland to help wreck they're mana if we hit land, and Visions to press the CA further. Plus taking it out seems like it'd make the combo MU worse. Also no one playing Ghastly Demise at all surprises me. i know Decay is Decay but I've liked still having a one-mana removal as there's lots of Maverick and Goblins in my area. The one-of Tiago is something else I was never upset about seeing, and I see that's gone too. And taking out Clique just seems wrong, especially now we're running Shamans and no Deeds - it's a sweet clock which the deck needs, and again, helps combo. Just curious why there has been move away from these cards. Demise or Tiago I could see but no Hymn or Clique just seems bad to me.

Also I love Strix but does it do enough? Seems like we want more high-impact cards. And Therapy is one of my favourite cards ever but I'm not sure this is a Therapy deck, nothing we actively want to sacrifice.

In DeMars' version, since the whole idea is to maximize the card advantage you get from your cascades, I think Hymn is great. I also kept a couple Ghastly Demises when I played the list just to deal with Moms and Lackeys.

I personally like Deed more than Shaman since the list is more controlling and Deed gives you a reset button + gets you Enchantment into the yard for 'goyfs. Cascading into Deathrite also feels very underwhelming when you consider all the other awesome cards you could be cascading into instead.

[Greenpoe]

I think Hymn stresses the manabase a little too much for the MD. It's a fairly incredible (game-winning) card for 2-mana, but you'll get Wasted a lot. I think it belongs in the SB so you can bring it in vs. combo/control. Overall, I think this deck is really well positioned. You've got your combo killers (Force, Clique in the MD, then postboard bring in Hymns and targeted discard), your gravehate (Shaman + whatever you've got in the SB), and vs. control you have MD Planeswalkers, plenty of card advantage, and a million ways to fight enemy Jaces from control (Flash+Cascade both make them not bounce your creatures- then postboard, you have Hymns & discard). Then vs. creature decks, you have Shaman for lifegain, Abrupt Decays to stop tempo decks cold, Baleful Strix as your pseudo-removal, and Deeds postboard as your sweepers (And of course, you've got Clique/Goyf/Agent as blockers when necessary). It's a really powerful deck right now and no matter what the matchup, you've always got a good fighting shot.

[Esper3k]

Anyone been watching the Invitationals? Looks like Todd Anderson (went 3-1 on Legacy) is rocking a very similar list to DeMars version. He seems to be running Deathrites as well.

[264505]

Anyone been watching the Invitationals? Looks like Todd Anderson (went 3-1 on Legacy) is rocking a very similar list to DeMars version. He seems to be running Deathrites as well.

Gerry T 4-0ed the legacy portion as well and was playing a nearly identical list.

[EviLDemon]

Anyone been watching the Invitationals? Looks like Todd Anderson (went 3-1 on Legacy) is rocking a very similar list to DeMars version. He seems to be running Deathrites as well.

http://www.starcitygames.com/events/coverage/round_8_todd_anderson_vs_joe_b.html

I'm so happy to see this deck doing so well in a big championship. My first deck in legacy, and I'm still buying the goyf, forces and some other cards, but playing on mws and with proxy. It's good to see that this deck can beat the metagame.

[Koby]

Gerry T 4-0ed the legacy portion as well and was playing a nearly identical list.

He would have been 3-1 if I didnt get cute in sideboarding :P
I saw very little resistance from his deck outside of spot temoval too. Guess i learned my lesson with a trial by fire. Btw im on combo elves. :D

[Esper3k]

Yeah I actually think fast combo can be tough for the deck since outside of Force, we don't have much of a way to interact with them until T2 or 3 usually.

[Koby]

Yeah I actually think fast combo can be tough for the deck since outside of Force, we don't have much of a way to interact with them until T2 or 3 usually.

Thats why its so mich fun knowing a million Legacy decks and how metagame. In my match vs GerryT he never cast a counter, only Hymn and Thoughtseize and Ghastly Demise. I missboarded by bringing in Cabal Therapy that was next to dead. In hindsight i should have brought in Scavenging Ooze to counter his Deathrite and get bigger than 2/2 vs Shardless Agent.

[Esper3k]

Thats why its so mich fun knowing a million Legacy decks and how metagame. In my match vs GerryT he never cast a counter, only Hymn and Thoughtseize and Ghastly Demise. I missboarded by bringing in Cabal Therapy that was next to dead. In hindsight i should have brought in Scavenging Ooze to counter his Deathrite and get bigger than 2/2 vs Shardless Agent.

Makes me wonder if him and Anderson cut FoW from their 75?

[EviLDemon]

Makes me wonder if him and Anderson cut FoW from their 75?

I saw one video of one of his plays, he does use FoW.

[catmint]

How do you guys feel about merging this thread with the BUG-control thread.

I never liked the split, since they are basically decks with the same gamplan and a majority of cards similar with Shardless beeing a possible engine. Now there are decks showing a mixture and also TCdecks is counting shardless as BUG control. Also both decks can profit from each others discussion and the activity is way beyond not beeing able to handle in one thread.

If noone has an objection I would ask the mods to merge the threads; I can add the primer to the front page (have to update the primer anyway covering the latest developments and the different routes BUG control can take).

[Kyle]

I'm not opposed to thread/deck strategy merge by any means, though I'm not sure the BUG Midrange peeps will agree.

[Demonic_Attorney]

I really think the singleton ponder needs to be replaced by Sylvan Library.

[Megadeus]

Anyone try out Natural Order in here? It allows you to just go "I win" vs some people. And that is quite a clock. Ive been testing a Shardless BUG deck to some success with NO.

[EviLDemon]

Anyone try out Natural Order in here? It allows you to just go "I win" vs some people. And that is quite a clock. Ive been testing a Shardless BUG deck to some success with NO.

Can't say that It'll work on this deck, the only things you'll catch are goyf and deathrite shaman(paying 4 mana for that doesn't worth it). Also mana cost of this card is too high for this deck, considering its benefit.

[bruizar]

Can't say that It'll work on this deck, the only things you'll catch are goyf and deathrite shaman(paying 4 mana for that doesn't worth it). Also mana cost of this card is too high for this deck, considering its benefit.

Or splash a dryad arbor.

[Megadeus]

Can't say that It'll work on this deck, the only things you'll catch are goyf and deathrite shaman(paying 4 mana for that doesn't worth it). Also mana cost of this card is too high for this deck, considering its benefit.

I mean Natural Order + Progenitus...

For example here is the list I have been testing: (its very rough I threw in a few things at the end of the building process just so I could test it)

4 Shardless Agent
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Natural Order
1 Progenitus
4 Brainstorm
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Coiling Oracle
2 Wall of Blossoms
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Force of Will
2 Thoughtseize
1 Dismember
2 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Verdant Catacombs
2 Bayou
2 Underground Sea
1 Tropical Island
1 Island
2 Forest
1 Swamp
3 Wasteland

[catmint]

I used to love NO RUG back in the days as a powerful aggro/control deck with an awesome 4 mana creature, but with Canadian (+Team America) & Terminus (+Supreme Verdict) around, I don't want to know what kind of green monster has to be printed to make Natural Order viable again. NO also competes with the blue unfair brother Show&Tell. If heavy disruption delver decks are on the decline and something green with a very powerful come into play effect is printed this strategy could be revived I guess.

Also - shardless is the wrong shell: It is clunky enough and trying to do unfair stuff with cascade. The right shell for this deck surely run's more mana acceleration (GSZ) + Vendiliion Clique - like NO RUG used to.

[Megadeus]

My thoughts were (other than the fact that NO is a sweet card) it is a card disadvantage spell and if in this shell you can still win without needing to go off with NO. It gets to play deathrite which is a mana dorm that can sacrifice to NO and then you get just the basic Shardless out card advantage your opponent win con. Im going to continue testing it. I do see what you are saying though.

[Dark Ritual]

I'd rather simply play 4 jace, the mind sculptor before touching natural order. At least when jace is countered it isn't a 2 for 1. And when jace resolves, you should generally win anyways.

I'm currently tinkering with this archetype and run the following maindeck, the SB I currently have is just a random assortment of good cards.

Lands
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth (probably getting cut for a fetchland)
1 Mishra's Factory (Should probably be the 2nd creeping tar pit, although the 1 mana activation is relevant sometimes as I tap out a lot with my list.)
1 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Volrath's Stronghold (Probably another fetchland to strengthen deathrite shaman not to mention volrath's stronghold is terrible against opposing deathrites. It's occasionally really powerful in conjunction with getting back baleful strix or shardless agent for value though and getting around jace fatesealing.)
4 Underground Sea
1 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland
4 Misty rainforest

Creatures
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Shardless Agent
4 Baleful Strix

Discard
2 Inquisition of Kozilek (Should be thoughtseize and the 4th hymn probably, lots of 4 and 5 drops that you want to discard and abrupt decay handles the rest with ease.)
3 Hymn to Tourach

Countermagic
3 Force of Will

Good Spells
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Brainstorm
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Damnation
1 Liliana of the Veil
4 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Random SB of good cards:
3 Pernicious Deed
3 Extirpate
3 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Garruk Relentless
1 Liliana of the Veil
1 Force of Will
1 Damnation
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Hymn to Tourach

Looking to have no dead cards to cascade into. Cascading into hymn is usually what I want to hit if I don't hit ancestral visions. I run the full playset of jace because jace is typically the win con unless I deathrite them out and the card is actually just game when it resolves usually. Really good in the control mirror as well, which is a grindfest.

Other possible additions include vendilion clique, engineered explosives potentially, snapcaster mage, and like I said the inquisitions should probably be thoughtseize especially considering abrupt decay answers everything inquisition does usually while inquisition doesn't answer opposing jace's, batterskull in hand, force if I really need to grab theirs, etc. etc. Might want to strengthen the manabase as well potentially with basics and/or more fetchable lands.

The damnation maindeck is a concession to the goblins matchup.

But I like this archetype a lot overall, it has a lot of power behind it. Cascade is incredibly powerful.

The playset of jace also locks up the game when you set up agent into visions as the opponent is then buried in card advantage typically. I also like the interaction with brainstorm and being able to act as a pseudo shuffle via putting your cascade target below a land and cascading into it then putting the land or some dead card on the bottom. The above list is simply trying to play an attrition based game of magic by 2 for 1'ing the opponent as much as possible via strix, agent, hymn, jace, damnation, and deathrite's virtual card advantage in terms of shutting down loam or other graveyard based cards.

[Kyle]

After a break from this deck I have revisited it. It's nuts with Abrupt Decay, Deathrite Shaman, Ancestral Vision, and Baleful Strix.

It rips RUG to shreds (mostly because of the Abrupt Decay), but now RUG has so many more things it HAS TO ANSWER to come out on top. I'm running a 2-of of Pernicious Deed and find it's very necessary and can be drawn into really easily with Ancestral Visions. I have to say, Ancestral Vision is ridiculous, absolutely ridiculous.

I've seen a few versions of BUG Cascade now and in my opinion, Tarmogoyf is a complete necessity too. He's constantly 6/7 and angry.

Here's what I'm running now, and I've been amazed by how fun and effective it is:

4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Baleful Strix
4 Shardless Agent
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Creeping Tar Pit
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Verdant Catacombs
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Ancestral Vision
3 Polluted Delta
2 Pernicious Deed
4 Brainstorm
3 Wasteland
4 Hymn to Tourach
3 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
2 Bayou
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Island
SB: 1 Golgari Charm
SB: 2 Surgical Extraction
SB: 4 Thoughtseize
SB: 1 Life from the Loam
SB: 2 Engineered Plague
SB: 4 Force of Will
SB: 1 Umezawa's Jitte

[Greenpoe]

Is Deed really necessary MD? You've already got Abrupt Decay + Goyf as a huge blocker + Baleful Strix as a deathtouch dude. I think you could play 2 Clique instead and moves the Deeds to the SB. Without any Forces, your G1 vs unfair decks looks reliant on Hymns, although I suppose you can side in half your SB post-board.

[Kyle]

Is Deed really necessary MD? You've already got Abrupt Decay + Goyf as a huge blocker + Baleful Strix as a deathtouch dude. I think you could play 2 Clique instead and moves the Deeds to the SB. Without any Forces, your G1 vs unfair decks looks reliant on Hymns, although I suppose you can side in half your SB post-board.

In my past matches I found that Force of Will was not being drawn into enough and was being used 10% or less of the time, so it was taking 4 spots I'd rather use for more utility, e.g. Deathrite Shaman. I'm going to do a lot more testing over the next few days to keep on refinin', but I've been really happy with the results so far and overall resilience without the FoWs.

[Moosedog]

Anyone have any recent success with this style of BUG?

[Lans89]

I played the deck on two small tournaments with some succes. It's a nice deck to play and not very common, but i'm not satisfied with it's performance. It can often win games versus other midrange/control decks, but when you would count the cards that are drawn in the end it's often 35 vs 25 or something like that. You really need to overwhelm your opponent and game 1 can last a long time while trying to deal with Batterskull or something. Against Uwb Blade I need an active Jace for a couple of turns to win a match, while Uwb Blade can win without it. Another downside is that my result vs combo (Sneaky Show, Ant etc.) is 80% of the time a 1 - 2 loss. With my list game 1 will be a loss most of the time, game 2 and 3 I'm well prepared (enough discard, some counters and hate) but even then game 2 ends up in a close win and the 3th game will be lost because the combo player has the advantage of starting (and thus has more time and can pierce your early discard or hide his combo pieces). My current list is as follows:

Maindeck
4x Deathrite Shaman
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Baleful Strix
4x Shardless Agent

3x Ancestral Vision
4x Brainstorm
4x Abrupt Decay
2x Thoughtseize
3x Hymn to Tourach
1x Pernicious Deed
1x Umezawa’s Jitte
1x Liliana of the Veil
3x Jace, the Mind Sculptor

3x Wasteland
3x Misty Rainforest
3x Polluted Delta
3x Verdant Catacombs
4x Underground Sea
3x Tropical Island
2x Bayou
1x Creeping Tar Pit

Sideboard
4x Force of Will
2x Cabal Therapy
2x Extirpate
2x Engineered Plague
1x Krosan Grip
1x Golgari Charm
1x Pernicious Deed
1x Life From the Loam
1x Liliana of the Veil

Btw: Most people don't play Liliana, but I love her!

[Lans89]

The deck made it to the SCG finals yet again! So why is this thread still dead :P?

Aquestion I have to ask: In the list I post above, i'm using 1 Liliana main and 1 side. It really is an extra out in some Sneaky Show matchups or when facing a Geist of Seint Traft.. But I'm not seeing anyone else playing the card, does Liliana have no home in Shardless BUG?

[EviLDemon]

The deck made it to the SCG finals yet again! So why is this thread still dead :P?

Aquestion I have to ask: In the list I post above, i'm using 1 Liliana main and 1 side. It really is an extra out in some Sneaky Show matchups or when facing a Geist of Seint Traft.. But I'm not seeing anyone else playing the card, does Liliana have no home in Shardless BUG?

I've already discussed that with Esper3k in this thread. There's the problem of you generating too much card advantage with this deck and end up don't using the +1 Liliana because you don't want to discard. It's kinda bad, but after some time you see that does happen more often than you think.

[Lans89]

Can we expect a tournament report from Amin Younes who placed #2 at the SCG Legacy Open in Edison =)??

[ac3eb]

I'm surprised this thread is so dead when the deck has posted good results and is also a ton of fun to play. Has anybody tried playing the deck without ancestral visions and replacing those with additional discard and vendilion cliques? In all honesty, the deck does not have a particularly exciting late game and from my playtesting, it seems like you really want more control mid-game. Visions can be a bit clunky at times and while you can set up the "ancestral recall" play with shardless, it does clog your hand a bit. Thoughts?

[Esper3k]

I've been fiddling around with a Waterfalls list that cut Ancestral Visions pretty much for the reasons you stated - it's pretty clunky late game. My issue was that every other card generates so much card advantage and you spend so much time setting up the Ancestral Visions cascade that you oftentimes just die with 7 cards in your hand.

Cascading is really fun as hell though!

[Megadeus]

I'm surprised this thread is so dead when the deck has posted good results and is also a ton of fun to play. Has anybody tried playing the deck without ancestral visions and replacing those with additional discard and vendilion cliques? In all honesty, the deck does not have a particularly exciting late game and from my playtesting, it seems like you really want more control mid-game. Visions can be a bit clunky at times and while you can set up the "ancestral recall" play with shardless, it does clog your hand a bit. Thoughts?

I think the issue is that the people that play the deck at events a lot of the time just read star city articles about the deck and just follow like lemmings whatever the SCG people do.

[ac3eb]

My issue was that every other card generates so much card advantage and you spend so much time setting up the Ancestral Visions cascade that you oftentimes just die with 7 cards in your hand.

Exactly. It'd be interesting if some people posted tournament results here from time to time. I think the deck has a lot of game, though I've been finding the sideboard to be tricky. Because of shardless, some cards are a bit fishy to board in (i.e. spell pierce).

[Megadeus]

Exactly. It'd be interesting if some people posted tournament results here from time to time. I think the deck has a lot of game, though I've been finding the sideboard to be tricky. Because of shardless, some cards are a bit fishy to board in (i.e. spell pierce).

Yeah. I have never seen any reports or anything. Again. While it is a fun and cool deck, most people just see that they can get an ancestral and they flock to it without thinking.

[ac3eb]

Haha quite true. Oddly enough visions was my least favorite card in the entire deck.

[Esper3k]

Haha quite true. Oddly enough visions was my least favorite card in the entire deck.

Yeah really - really the deck plays it because of getting to live the dream of cascading into it :)

[Final Fortune]

Yeah I actually think fast combo can be tough for the deck since outside of Force, we don't have much of a way to interact with them until T2 or 3 usually.

I think this is largely thanks to BUG players being greedy as fuck by playing with Hymn to Tourach and Ancestral Knowledge, if you have Thoughtseize and Force of Will in the MD and/or you play with 4 Wasteland then the Storm match up is bareable.

[Esper3k]

I think this is largely thanks to BUG players being greedy as fuck by playing with Hymn to Tourach and Ancestral Knowledge, if you have Thoughtseize and Force of Will in the MD and/or you play with 4 Wasteland then the Storm match up is bareable.

Yeah I think it's actually probably more correct to play TS + Cliques (along with FoW) in a combo heavier meta than Hymn to Tourach.

[noobslayer]

//Planeswalkers (3):
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas

//Creatures (15):
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Baleful Strix
3 Shardless Agent
1 Snapcaster Mage
3 Tarmogoyf

//Artifacts (5):
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Crucible of Worlds

//Instants (10):
3 Abrubt Decay
4 Brainstorm
3 Force of Will

//Sorceries (6):
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Ancestral Vision

//Lands (21):
3 Wasteland
1 Academy Ruins
3 Polluted Delta
3 Verdant Catacombs
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Forest

//Sideboard:
1 Life From the Loam
2 Jace the Mindsculptor
1 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Thoughtseize
1 Darkblast
2 Engineered Plague
1 Krosan Grip
2 Blue Elemental Blast

My brainstorm to a fun list with some spice and versatility for a wide metagame. It can grind like a hybrid and still beat down like a tempo. Therapy is pretty boss. However I feel the build is overall weaker to combo, particularly storm, and I could figure out exactly what I would want to cut, all the cards look like so much fun to play with.

[mctlegacy]

Creatures for this deck are usually:

4x shardless agent
4x deathrite shaman
4x tarmogoyf
2x vendilion clique / 4x baleful strix


i was wondering how Gilded Drake would fit in this deck.
could replace cliques coz the drake cascades with the agent..but im just not sure if its surprise factor is worth the risk when ur opponent has no critters.

no need for cliques if u hav a few fows and thoughseizes.

[mctlegacy]

btw, since no one wants untimely cascades, how about using seals?

seal of removal / of primodrium / of doom..

will probably hav to cut out some deeds and loams for these

[Raggedjoe]

Sadly seal of Doom costs 2B so we can't cascade into it. If it cost 1B I think it would probably see play. The others are kinda meh IMO. Except Imperial Seal. I wouldn't mind cascading into that ;)

[aznepyon7]

//Planeswalkers (3):
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas

//Creatures (15):
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Baleful Strix
3 Shardless Agent
1 Snapcaster Mage
3 Tarmogoyf

//Artifacts (5):
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Crucible of Worlds

//Instants (10):
3 Abrubt Decay
4 Brainstorm
3 Force of Will

//Sorceries (6):
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Ancestral Vision

//Lands (21):
3 Wasteland
1 Academy Ruins
3 Polluted Delta
3 Verdant Catacombs
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Forest

//Sideboard:
1 Life From the Loam
2 Jace the Mindsculptor
1 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Thoughtseize
1 Darkblast
2 Engineered Plague
1 Krosan Grip
2 Blue Elemental Blast

My brainstorm to a fun list with some spice and versatility for a wide metagame. It can grind like a hybrid and still beat down like a tempo. Therapy is pretty boss. However I feel the build is overall weaker to combo, particularly storm, and I could figure out exactly what I would want to cut, all the cards look like so much fun to play with.

Why the Engineered plague? Also what's your reason on running the Darkblast over the disfigure? Not criticizing your choice; I just want to know your opinion.

As for anti-combo (esp storm), I like Flusterstorm. It's been treating me great so far.

[Esper3k]

The issue I have with Flusterstorm is when you cascade into it, it's just horrible. I would think we'd want stuff that is still usable off the cascade or can't be cascaded into such as Hymn or Clique.

[Razorwynd]

Lejay seems to be winning fairly consistently with an interesting shardless list on MTGO. Has anyone been having any success with the deck in paper? I am curious how bad the combo matchup is.

[Philipp2293]

Any links to Lejays list? I have been playing a lot of Shardless lately and enjoying it a lot. Only thing that I didn't really like that you can't combat random BS on the stack.

[The Treefolk Master]

Any links to Lejays list? I have been playing a lot of Shardless lately and enjoying it a lot. Only thing that I didn't really like that you can't combat random BS on the stack.

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Digital/MagicOnlineTourn.aspx?x=mtg/digital/magiconline/tourn/5196297

[SmokexBeer]

Ive been playing this deck online and I'm having trouble with the mirror matchup. When I change my deck/sideboard to adjust, it ends up doing poorly against other decks, mostly anything red. Maybe it is just my decklist, or the way im playing it, but if anyone else has been having this problem I'd love to know what youre doing to combat it. Other than that Im having a ton of success with my current decklist!

4x FoW
3x JtMS
4x Brainstorm
4x Ancestral Visions
4x Hymn to Tourach
4x Tarmogoyg
4x Shardless Agent
4x Abrupt Decay
4x Deathrite Shaman
3x Baleful Strix


My sideboard is:
2x K-grip
3x Thoughtseize
3x Leyline of the Void
3x Duress
2x Pernicious deed
2x Umezawa's Jitte

Thinking about cutting the Strix and a couple ancestral visions to maybe and adding Liliana of the veil. The disruption in the sideboard may seem excessive but it really helps in the matches that the deck is weak against. Let me know what you guys think thanks!

[Razorwynd]

I would start with Lejay's list... he seems to me having a lot of success with it. If that doesn't help perhaps re-assess the way you play the deck.

[Razorwynd]

I feel like this deck should be in established, if not DTB. It has certainly had more success recently that regular BUG control. For some reason no body on the source seems to feel it is worth discussing. Yeah it has a less than stellar combo matchup but it seems to destroy anything fair. Thoughts?

[Lejay]

Just continue netdecking my lists and cashing in. :)

[Razorwynd]

Just continue netdecking my lists and cashing in. :)

Shhhhhh...maybe nobody knows how good it is. Not even me. I haven't even played the deck, I have just been very impressed with the results it has been putting up ever since Brian Demars first wrote about it may months ago. Your success with it on mtgo and GerryT's performance with it this past invitational makes me want a good source to discuss this deck. Unfortunately, this thread, in it's current form, is not sufficient.

Maybe after the deck does well this weekend more people will be interested in talking about card choices like:
Liliana main or board
Hymn main or board
Thoughtsieze main or board

By the way Lejay, are you gonna be playing the deck this weekend?

[Lejay]

No playing a brew. But I have two friends (Tristan who top8ed in GP Ghent with Junk and Pierre who won GP Amsterdam) that will play the deck. Very close lists to mine.

[Razorwynd]

No playing a brew. But I have two friends (Tristan who top8ed in GP Ghent with Junk and Pierre who won GP Amsterdam) that will play the deck. Very close lists to mine.

Woah! No DDFT or shardless BUG for the master of those two decks...this must be quite the brew. I'll keep an eye on you guys this weekend as I watch from the states!

Good Luck!!!!

[Megadeus]

I feel like this deck should be in established, if not DTB. It has certainly had more success recently that regular BUG control. For some reason no body on the source seems to feel it is worth discussing. Yeah it has a less than stellar combo matchup but it seems to destroy anything fair. Thoughts?

I was just about to say this...

[owenzzz]

I have actually tried playing this deck and it's a blast. I currently have a different shardless deck (no discard MB, with liliana). Please see the link below for the decklist.


http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=4461&d=225878

I just thought that this is an optimal deck since the cascade of Shardless will always give a good cascade in any time of the game (early, mid, late) since discard will have a less impact as the game go mid to late. We will have a less explosive impact on early game but when it became grindy, we are at advantage thru our resources (ancestral vision, jace, liliana).
This is just my thoughts. Did someone test this as well?

[Razorwynd]

I just thought that this is an optimal deck since the cascade of Shardless will always give a good cascade in any time of the game (early, mid, late) since discard will have a less impact as the game go mid to late. We will have a less explosive impact on early game but when it became grindy, we are at advantage thru our resources (ancestral vision, jace, liliana).
This is just my thoughts. Did someone test this as well?

I haven't tested anything yet...but I agree with what you are saying. Watching the coverage of the SCG invitational I can remember seeing cascades reveal Hymn to Tourach (or Thoughtseize) when the opponent had an empty hand. Unfortunately, the same thing can happen with Abrupt Decay and an Empty Board. In either case, I think we are probably in already in a winning (i.e. favorable) position if the opponent doesn't have any cards in hand or abrupt decay targets on board.

I think what it really comes down to is, how good is discard in the expected Meta? How good is Liliana in the expected meta, etc.

From what I can tell:
-Hymn is situationally good against storm combo, burn and most midrange decks.
-Liliana is almost always really strong against RUG and UW control, but is weak to swarms (spirits, elves, goblins, etc.)
-Thoughtseize is more universally strong good against control and combo decks but is pretty unimpressive against decks like RUG
-Baleful Strix is good against RUG, xGW decks, and decks with Tombstalker. It is OK against reaminations/SnT decks and too slow against combo or control.

I think tuning the numbers of these cards in particular, while still maintaing enough live cascades mainboard, is the major challenge of designing this deck.

I think GerryT took an intermediate path by playing 2 Thoughtseize 3 Hymn and 2 Strix main with the remainder of the playsets for each in the sideboard. I was a little surprised by the lack of Liliana in his main deck but if I had to guess it was probably there due to its ineffectiveness against lingering souls (which a large number of the SCG regulars seemed to be playing).

Lejay and owenzzz, How does this analysis relate to your experience with the deck?

[owenzzz]

I haven't tested anything yet...but I agree with what you are saying. Watching the coverage of the SCG invitational I can remember seeing cascades reveal Hymn to Tourach (or Thoughtseize) when the opponent had an empty hand. Unfortunately, the same thing can happen with Abrupt Decay and an Empty Board. In either case, I think we are probably in already in a winning (i.e. favorable) position if the opponent doesn't have any cards in hand or abrupt decay targets on board.

I think what it really comes down to is, how good is discard in the expected Meta? How good is Liliana in the expected meta, etc.

From what I can tell:
-Hymn is situationally good against storm combo, burn and most midrange decks.
-Liliana is almost always really strong against RUG and UW control, but is weak to swarms (spirits, elves, goblins, etc.)
-Thoughtseize is more universally strong good against control and combo decks but is pretty unimpressive against decks like RUG
-Baleful Strix is good against RUG, xGW decks, and decks with Tombstalker. It is OK against reaminations/SnT decks and too slow against combo or control.

I think tuning the numbers of these cards in particular, while still maintaing enough live cascades mainboard, is the major challenge of designing this deck.

I think GerryT took an intermediate path by playing 2 Thoughtseize 3 Hymn and 2 Strix main with the remainder of the playsets for each in the sideboard. I was a little surprised by the lack of Liliana in his main deck but if I had to guess it was probably there due to its ineffectiveness against lingering souls (which a large number of the SCG regulars seemed to be playing).

Lejay and owenzzz, How does this analysis relate to your experience with the deck?

As I was playing the deck, I think i value more doing either land destruction, early ancestral or setting up/protecting my hand thru brianstorm. Hymn will be good if you have a fast clock (i.e bug delver) but will be blank in mid to late game.

I put strix as a card advantage/protection which can bring the jitte. Preboard, you have a good matchup against fair decks and sneak attack/show and tell, bad matchup against storm, burn and tribal. The bad matchup can be compensated by sb strategy except burn.

Reason why burn is abysmal is because of price of progress/lavamancer and very fast clock...

Ill try this deck tomorrow and try to add up some thoughts

[Lejay]

This list is from the Pierre I talked about (and I was the finalist). His list is now closer to mine.

You are not necessarily ahead enough when cascading into discard if the opponent has no cards in hand. Many times you have a board to deal with (the opposite is also true).
Cascading into decay with an empty board won't happen if you just hold the agent. You don't have to rush it, play your cards wisely. Also if you have 2 decays in hand and one in the yard you can safely cascade.

Liliana is supposedly weak against tribal but I discovered it was in fact the best plan vs elves and merfolk when I don't see whipflare. Even against goblins she's doing a good job with her +1.

[Julian23]

Wouldn't you much rather want Engineered Plague instead of Whipflare? The rest of the deck, I can get behind.

Also, is the list at http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=4461&d=225878 your most recent iteration of this deck?

[EviLDemon]

Wouldn't you much rather want Engineered Plague instead of Whipflare? The rest of the deck, I can get behind.

Also, is the list at http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=4461&d=225878 your most recent iteration of this deck?

There are some problems with engineered. First, you can't cascade into it. Second, for some creatures you just nerf them. That can be good sometimes, but not in every match. Also, you have an answer in T2 instead of T3, which I think it’s better. In T3, after you cleared the board, you can put a liliana and control the rest of the match(in a good hand).

[Julian23]

There are some problems with engineered. First, you can't cascade into it. Second, for some creatures you just nerf them. That can be good sometimes, but not in every match. Also, you have an answer in T2 instead of T3, which I think it’s better. In T3, after you cleared the board, you can put a liliana and control the rest of the match(in a good hand).

I can see the point about cascading but you can also T2 Engineered Plague with Shaman. What I really dislike about Whipflare is it killing your own Shaman. You definitely dont side out Shaman against Merfolk (which definitely is a deck again) and Goblins. Also T2 Whipflare doesn't always setup a T3 Lilliana, especially not against Vial decks and also not against Elves.

In the blind, I can see the reasons for playing Whipflare, I'm just not comfortable with it yet..

[owenzzz]

I can see the point about cascading but you can also T2 Engineered Plague with Shaman. What I really dislike about Whipflare is it killing your own Shaman. You definitely dont side out Shaman against Merfolk (which definitely is a deck again) and Goblins. Also T2 Whipflare doesn't always setup a T3 Lilliana, especially not against Vial decks and also not against Elves.

In the blind, I can see the reasons for playing Whipflare, I'm just not comfortable with it yet..

I am so aggressive with my board sweep (pernicious deed). Since I know that I have more advantage after board sweep (cascade, visions).

It will usually depend on your playstyle. :)

[IsThisACatInAHat?]

I have actually tried playing this deck and it's a blast. I currently have a different shardless deck (no discard MB, with liliana). Please see the link below for the decklist.


http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=4461&d=225878

I just thought that this is an optimal deck since the cascade of Shardless will always give a good cascade in any time of the game (early, mid, late) since discard will have a less impact as the game go mid to late. We will have a less explosive impact on early game but when it became grindy, we are at advantage thru our resources (ancestral vision, jace, liliana).
This is just my thoughts. Did someone test this as well?
I threw this list onto MTGO as-is and played a half-dozen matches with it before I got tired of losing to spell-based combo decks. It performed extremely well against fair decks, even without the extra Decays. All of your cascades are good and most of your cards trade up in terms of value, which I loved. On the other hand, Show & Tell and Storm decks, even postboard, felt extremely difficult without lots of cheap disruption to precede either an early goyf to kill them with or planeswalker to put the game out of reach. 2 or 3 turns unmolested is really forever in matchups like that, but instead of interacting, I was casting Baleful Strix or a 2/3 Tarmogoyf while they cantripped into a protected win. If you know you're going to play against mostly fair decks, this version seems much better than with discard. Maybe it's possible to cut Submerge and Deed for more combo disruption, since the rest of the deck is so good at playing the board that they might just be overkill.

[owenzzz]

I threw this list onto MTGO as-is and played a half-dozen matches with it before I got tired of losing to spell-based combo decks. It performed extremely well against fair decks, even without the extra Decays. All of your cascades are good and most of your cards trade up in terms of value, which I loved. On the other hand, Show & Tell and Storm decks, even postboard, felt extremely difficult without lots of cheap disruption to precede either an early goyf to kill them with or planeswalker to put the game out of reach. 2 or 3 turns unmolested is really forever in matchups like that, but instead of interacting, I was casting Baleful Strix or a 2/3 Tarmogoyf while they cantripped into a protected win. If you know you're going to play against mostly fair decks, this version seems much better than with discard. Maybe it's possible to cut Submerge and Deed for more combo disruption, since the rest of the deck is so good at playing the board that they might just be overkill.

We can live removing submerge but not deeds as this is quite good against Rug or other aggro based deck. I am usually designing my deck with a fVorable fair game matchup, then combo.

[pbdr]

Is some number of counterbalance in the board out of the question to shore up the deck against some of the combo decks? Even blind flipping without top seems like it might really help a couple match-ups.

[wcm8]

I like Gerry T's Invitational winning list:

2 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Force of Will
4 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
1 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Thoughtseize
3 Hymn to Tourach
4 Ancestral Vision
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Bayou
2 Creeping Tar Pit
2 Polluted Delta
2 Tropical Island
2 Wasteland
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Underground Sea
4 Verdant Catacombs

SB:
3 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Baleful Strix
2 Sower of Temptation
2 Chill
2 Liliana of the Veil
1 Hymn to Tourach
1 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Thoughtseize

Not much to really say about it that hasn't been discussed in this thread, other than I think the numbers and sideboard choices are very solid. Sower is a pretty huge bomb in the mirror since it dodges Decay, and is obviously GG against most Show and Tell decks. Chill is obviously narrow, but this deck really needs the help against burn strategies. Chill is also surprisingly good against Jund.

I think the discard should be enough to combat most combo decks, although I'd consider fitting a Vendilion Clique in there somewhere. I'd also strongly consider Engineered Plague if the meta is infested with tribal.

[DragoFireheart]

This deck looks awesome. Too bad I don't have most of the B/G cards.

[phazonmutant]

GerryT has been doing a lot of work pushing this archetype, you know, winning the Invitational and all. Mods, can we get this thread moved to Established?

The primer definitely needs to get updated though. Kyle's primer is a good start, but outdated.

[Darkness]

Just went 6-0 at Small LGS 14 people tournament playing Gerry T's 75 minus Hymn in board for FoW. Report coming up tomorrow or Monday.

[Nihil Credo]

Hi, I'm putting this thread in the DTB until the next monthly update. You can read why, and why it wasn't put there before, here (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?23429-DTB-Team-America-%28Midrange-Control-Thread%29&p=719979#post719979).

[Razorwynd]

Thanks! There was a distinct lack of discussion about this deck on the forums. Hopefully this will help!

[Darkness]

I was hoping to revamp the Primer for this deck. I will be working on it this week and attempting to post it as the new Primer.

[Shaka1333]

I don't know if this will help to reignite the topic but you can read my report of GP Strasbourg with the deck here : http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?25883-18th-at-Grand-Prix-Strasbourg-with-BUGr-Shardless

Hopefully, you'll be able to understand my poor english.

[GerryT]

I just wanted to chime in on the differences between mine and Lejay's list.

1) Baleful Strix is good vs other Goyf decks (and can block Emrakul/Griselbrand if they are dead on board the next turn; not always relevant, but it won me a game in Top 8 of the Invitational). They are cuttable depending on what you expect to see.

2) The discard package is my way of beating combo. Liliana of the Veil is a fine tool for Edicting people or destroying control, but in order for it to be good against combo, you really want to curve discard into it. Force of Will + Liliana will leave you with a bad Storm/Show and Tell matchup.

If you play discard, you should typically side out most, if not all of it, against other control decks. The games will go long and they are horrible topdecks.

3) Maelstrom Pulse is the answer to Esper Stoneblade and various other problems you'll face. Europeans don't need to worry about that too much, but on the Open Series, there is a lot of it. Being able to handle Batterskull, Lingering Souls, and Jace with one card is the reason I won the Invitational.

4) Four Wastelands aren't necessary, no matter what version you're playing. Your lands in play are more valuable than theirs. The only reason I play any is to kill problematic lands like Grove of the Burnwillows, Maze of Ith, Creeping Tar Pit, etc. Playing your own Tar Pits makes your mana base better and gives you a solid threat against other control decks. It's also a very good way to pressure planeswalkers.

5) Nihil Spellbomb is very good. I side it in against the obvious Dredge, etc decks but it's also good against Punishing Fire, Snapcaster Mage, and Nimble Mongoose. Those are probably the best ways for other decks to fight you and Nihil is a universal answer. It's far better than something like Leyline of the Void because it also cantrips so you're not losing value against other control decks.

6) Phyrexian Revoker is very good against Sneak and Show. That's basically the only thing I'd want to incorporate from Lejay's list (unless the metagame is suddenly devoid of combo). It's also another card that, like Pulse, lets you beat random strategies.

7) I like Chill. There are random decks out there like Goblins, Burn, anything with Punishing Fire, Sneak and Show with Blood Moon and/or REB sideboard, Belcher, some versions of Storm, etc that have a difficult time dealing with Chill. It's one card that deals with a lot of the randomness that exists in Legacy, so I wouldn't play without it.

[Esper3k]

I just wanted to chime in on the differences between mine and Lejay's list.

1) Baleful Strix is good vs other Goyf decks (and can block Emrakul/Griselbrand if they are dead on board the next turn; not always relevant, but it won me a game in Top 8 of the Invitational). They are cuttable depending on what you expect to see.

2) The discard package is my way of beating combo. Liliana of the Veil is a fine tool for Edicting people or destroying control, but in order for it to be good against combo, you really want to curve discard into it. Force of Will + Liliana will leave you with a bad Storm/Show and Tell matchup.

If you play discard, you should typically side out most, if not all of it, against other control decks. The games will go long and they are horrible topdecks.

3) Maelstrom Pulse is the answer to Esper Stoneblade and various other problems you'll face. Europeans don't need to worry about that too much, but on the Open Series, there is a lot of it. Being able to handle Batterskull, Lingering Souls, and Jace with one card is the reason I won the Invitational.

4) Four Wastelands aren't necessary, no matter what version you're playing. Your lands in play are more valuable than theirs. The only reason I play any is to kill problematic lands like Grove of the Burnwillows, Maze of Ith, Creeping Tar Pit, etc. Playing your own Tar Pits makes your mana base better and gives you a solid threat against other control decks. It's also a very good way to pressure planeswalkers.

5) Nihil Spellbomb is very good. I side it in against the obvious Dredge, etc decks but it's also good against Punishing Fire, Snapcaster Mage, and Nimble Mongoose. Those are probably the best ways for other decks to fight you and Nihil is a universal answer. It's far better than something like Leyline of the Void because it also cantrips so you're not losing value against other control decks.

6) Phyrexian Revoker is very good against Sneak and Show. That's basically the only thing I'd want to incorporate from Lejay's list (unless the metagame is suddenly devoid of combo). It's also another card that, like Pulse, lets you beat random strategies.

7) I like Chill. There are random decks out there like Goblins, Burn, anything with Punishing Fire, Sneak and Show with Blood Moon and/or REB sideboard, Belcher, some versions of Storm, etc that have a difficult time dealing with Chill. It's one card that deals with a lot of the randomness that exists in Legacy, so I wouldn't play without it.

Thanks for the input! Just curious, but what did you bring in/out against Esper Stoneblade? From the looks of it, you brought in some Nihil Spellbombs and I would guess the second Maelstrom Pulse. Did the Baleful Strixes come out there since Esper doesn't really have any good singular creatures for the Strixes to fight?

Was only playing 2 Thoughtseize in the main awkward at all? Thoughtseize, to me, has always been one of those cards you want to see early.

[GerryT]

Thanks for the input! Just curious, but what did you bring in/out against Esper Stoneblade? From the looks of it, you brought in some Nihil Spellbombs and I would guess the second Maelstrom Pulse. Did the Baleful Strixes come out there since Esper doesn't really have any good singular creatures for the Strixes to fight?

Vs Shaheen I probably did:

+ 3 Nihil, 1 Pulse
- 1 Hymn, 3 FOW

Strix is not good against them but I'd rather have a cycler than extra discard spells.

[Shaka1333]

Thank you for sharing your point of view Gerry :)

I totally agree with you that Thoughtseize and Hymn to Tourach are miles better than Liliana against combo (well, Liliana is still very good but you need a turn 1 or 2 discard to survive most of the time) and that's why i changed Lejay's list to include a few discards maindeck.

About the Wasteland, i think it's pretty hard to know for sure if it's better to play Wasteland just as a way to kill problematic lands as you do or to envisage the fact that Wasteland can very easily win you games against greedy/unlucky opponents or just by tempoing them out. I personally won a lot of games thanks to Wasteland during my few tests and during the tournament (especially with Life from the Loam).

I will give Chill a try, it seems worth it.

What do you think about Whipflare ?

Are you sure it's good to keep 4 Abrupt Decay against Esper Stoneblade ? :eek:

[GerryT]

Thank you for sharing your point of view Gerry :)

I totally agree with you that Thoughtseize and Hymn to Tourach are miles better than Liliana against combo (well, Liliana is still very good but you need a turn 1 or 2 discard to survive most of the time) and that's why i changed Lejay's list to include a few discards maindeck.

About the Wasteland, i think it's pretty hard to know for sure if it's better to play Wasteland just as a way to kill problematic lands as you do or to envisage the fact that Wasteland can very easily win you games against greedy/unlucky opponents or just by tempoing them out. I personally won a lot of games thanks to Wasteland during my few tests and during the tournament (especially with Life from the Loam).

I will give Chill a try, it seems worth it.

What do you think about Whipflare ?

Are you sure it's good to keep 4 Abrupt Decay against Esper Stoneblade ? :eek:

Loam seems bad in a field of Deathrite Shamans. I usually board in Nihil Spellbomb against decks that can Loam me anyway. That card is typically ineffective.

Sure, sometimes you can Waste people out but this deck is not designed for tempo. Trying to take the free win is greedy and you probably shouldn't ever do it (unless they're like stuck on one land or something, but even then, you probably still win by just developing your board).

Whipflare is fine if you expect a bunch of non-Affinity aggro decks. I think you can do better though.

I went from siding out all Decays to 3 then 2 then 0. Killing Stoneforge Mystic or Umezawa's Jitte is very important. As long as they can't Batterskull you early, they basically can't win.

[Darkness]

Loam seems bad in a field of Deathrite Shamans. I usually board in Nihil Spellbomb against decks that can Loam me anyway. That card is typically ineffective.

Sure, sometimes you can Waste people out but this deck is not designed for tempo. Trying to take the free win is greedy and you probably shouldn't ever do it (unless they're like stuck on one land or something, but even then, you probably still win by just developing your board).

Whipflare is fine if you expect a bunch of non-Affinity aggro decks. I think you can do better though.

I went from siding out all Decays to 3 then 2 then 0. Killing Stoneforge Mystic or Umezawa's Jitte is very important. As long as they can't Batterskull you early, they basically can't win.

I agree with Gerry about the the Decays in against Stoneblade. You basically stop their early plan and then just start one for one-ing them till you get your two for ones. At that point your so far ahead with your card advantage that they cannot keep up.

[VizzerdrixFTW]

After a long break from the game we all love, I decided to sleeve this little beauty up.


4-Deathrite Shaman
4-Brainstorm
4-Ancestral Vision
2-Thoughtseize
4-Abrupt Decay
3-Hymn to Tourach
4-Tarmogoyf
2-Baleful Strix
4-Shardless Agent
1-Maelstrom Pulse
3-Liliana of the Veil
3-Jace the Mind Sculptor


4-Verdant Catacombs
2-Misty Rainforest
2-Polluted Delta
3-Underground Sea
2-Bayou
3-Tropical Island
2-Wasteland
2-Creeping Tar Pit
1-Forest
1-Swamp

1-Maelstrom Pulse
3-Nihil Spellbomb
3-Rapid Hybridization
3-Force of Will
The rest of the sideboard is always dependent on what I think when I show up.

This has been fantastic in my local meta. Winning (splitting the finals) of both small tourneys i went to. I'm lucky however as there was no combo in the room (pretty much all fair decks-Dead Guy, NicFit, Loam, Goblins, etc). I would like to step up to the plate and head to Mythic Games next month. Any suggestions on tuning this for a more diverse meta

[phazonmutant]

1-Maelstrom Pulse
3-Nihil Spellbomb
3-Rapid Hybridization
3-Force of Will
The rest of the sideboard is always dependent on what I think when I show up.

This has been fantastic in my local meta. Winning (splitting the finals) of both small tourneys i went to. I'm lucky however as there was no combo in the room (pretty much all fair decks-Dead Guy, NicFit, Loam, Goblins, etc). I would like to step up to the plate and head to Mythic Games next month. Any suggestions on tuning this for a more diverse meta

Rapid Hybridization? Not even Pongify? Come on.

Seriously though, Rapid Hybridization? That card doesn't do anything. Throw some Engineered Plagues in, and/or just copy a sideboard from the internet. I'm sure TC Decks can help you out.

[Megadeus]

If you are playing black at least play like a Go for the Throat or something... Rapid Hybridization SUCKS. (Unless you are killing your own undying dude)

[Darkness]

Report from Saturday (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?25930-1st-Place-at-Time-Zone-Games-piloting-Shardless-BUG&p=720725#post720725)

[Lejay]

I just wanted to chime in on the differences between mine and Lejay's list.

1) Baleful Strix is good vs other Goyf decks (and can block Emrakul/Griselbrand if they are dead on board the next turn; not always relevant, but it won me a game in Top 8 of the Invitational). They are cuttable depending on what you expect to see.

Agree about all this. Strix vs fatty from sneak show also came up for me several random times, but not up to the point of keeping them post sb.


2) The discard package is my way of beating combo. Liliana of the Veil is a fine tool for Edicting people or destroying control, but in order for it to be good against combo, you really want to curve discard into it. Force of Will + Liliana will leave you with a bad Storm/Show and Tell matchup.
If you play discard, you should typically side out most, if not all of it, against other control decks. The games will go long and they are horrible topdecks.

Discard is the necessary and only way to beat combo decks quite reliably since counters aren't as available and everything else is weak either against show and tell or storm (and/or other kind of combos).
This deck is great at beating about everything in the format that isn't combo and when I start adding discards problems arise. Since this deck is so much favored at playing a long game, you often lean towards it, and the situation where you are on topdeck mode being slightly ahead, at parity, or slightly behind arises very often. Drawing or cascading discard at this point is horrible. The deck can draw too many lands sometimes, it's too much of an issue if you add discard. That's why I want them in the sideboard against slow control and combo, where I know they will be relevant at almost any point in the game.
I don't believe in the (non-combo at least) deck that will beat the 95% of the format. So I like to optimize what the deck does best, beating 80% of the non-combo field. If your metagame as 30% of combo decks like the GP's day2, then you should probably play another deck (try BUG delver for exemple).
I agree discard isn't really good vs esper and you can't have too many against even miracles. I started with 7 discard sb in my list but testing slowly demonstrated that I had to vary my cards against control. My current sideboard hasn't changed since the week before the GP :
SB: 1 Grafdigger's Cage
SB: 1 Duress
SB: 1 Ancient Grudge
SB: 2 Vendilion Clique
SB: 2 Phyrexian Revoker
SB: 2 Leyline of the Void
SB: 3 Whipflare
SB: 3 Thoughtseize

Main deck hasn't changed in months now.


3) Maelstrom Pulse is the answer to Esper Stoneblade and various other problems you'll face. Europeans don't need to worry about that too much, but on the Open Series, there is a lot of it. Being able to handle Batterskull, Lingering Souls, and Jace with one card is the reason I won the Invitational.

Maelstrom Pulse is part of a group of cards (pulse, loam, jitte...) that I would appreciate as a one-of in my main deck (or even sb) but that after testing were all considered inferior to any other slot. Without whipflare/grudge/revoker I can understand you want it more than me.


4) Four Wastelands aren't necessary, no matter what version you're playing. Your lands in play are more valuable than theirs. The only reason I play any is to kill problematic lands like Grove of the Burnwillows, Maze of Ith, Creeping Tar Pit, etc. Playing your own Tar Pits makes your mana base better and gives you a solid threat against other control decks. It's also a very good way to pressure planeswalkers.

Grove is x4 in decks :). But that isn't my main argument. I tried reducing the number of wastelands, but with shaman wasteland is very strong, allowing you to out tempo your opponents quite reliably. This deck can play the long game with CA so that seems counter-intuitive. But the thing is this deck can generate a ton of CA without any or almost any tempo loss (and since you can't really lose tempo to make CA in this format without being punished severely by a lot of decks, that's the reason shardless is the deck that makes the most CA by far in Legacy).
I don't know how many times I told people playing stone blade how having wastelands in their lists is a mistake. But that just isn't the same thing in a deck playing DRS and 0-1 basic.
About Tar-Pit I feel it is really valuable only against control, and that match-up is already favourable. Therefore, and that may be because I play this deck quite often with tempo-oriented tactics, I don't play any.


5) Nihil Spellbomb is very good. I side it in against the obvious Dredge, etc decks but it's also good against Punishing Fire, Snapcaster Mage, and Nimble Mongoose. Those are probably the best ways for other decks to fight you and Nihil is a universal answer. It's far better than something like Leyline of the Void because it also cantrips so you're not losing value against other control decks.

I play leyline of the void because the kind of grave decks I want some improvements against are either violent ones (dredge, a bit reanimator, tin fins, and oops all spells) or punishing fire decks. I am also very happy for the occasionnal slow loam deck. I don't really want improvement against TT, with my list it's one of my best match-ups with just the maindeck.
Leyline being easy to hardcast with DRS is also nice.
The grafdigger's cage is an additional slot I added when I started to cut some discards. I didn't feel like 3 leylines would come in against punishing fire and I was happy to have one more slot against elfball/maverick.


7) I like Chill. There are random decks out there like Goblins, Burn, anything with Punishing Fire, Sneak and Show with Blood Moon and/or REB sideboard, Belcher, some versions of Storm, etc that have a difficult time dealing with Chill. It's one card that deals with a lot of the randomness that exists in Legacy, so I wouldn't play without it.
Never tested it. I don't focus a lot on these decks or really want discard against the combo ones. I could see myself adapting and playing it in some metagames.



Whipflare is fine if you expect a bunch of non-Affinity aggro decks. I think you can do better though.

Reducing it to aggro decks is wrong. Esper, jund and elves are the deck I use it the most against. It kills all creatures of the UWR patriot tempo and UR delver too but I won't list all the deck it is useful against. I don't even side it against zoo when I occasionnaly face them.
Like I said to you at the GP, every single person I talked to was pessimistic about the red splash. Everyone of them adopted it with enthusiasm after testing.


I went from siding out all Decays to 3 then 2 then 0. Killing Stoneforge Mystic or Umezawa's Jitte is very important. As long as they can't Batterskull you early, they basically can't win.
Without whipflare I can understand the necessity. I currently keep 2 decays in.

[Arianrhod]

Rapid Hybridization? Not even Pongify? Come on.

Seriously though, Rapid Hybridization? That card doesn't do anything. Throw some Engineered Plagues in, and/or just copy a sideboard from the internet. I'm sure TC Decks can help you out.

Copying a sideboard from the internet is one of the most retarded things I've ever heard. Unless you're playing something like Storm or Hexdepths where most of your sideboard is actually a wishboard (and the rest are pretty obvious, like the Decays in TES) -- saying that a blue control deck should copy a sideboard is moronic at best, and malicious at worst.

While I'm not convinced that Hybridization (or Pongify, if you prefer) is actually amazing or completely unplayable, I do recognize it as an out to a problem that the deck has: Mirran Crusader. If Vizz has a lot of Crusader around (and he did specify Deadguy as a local deck with a presence), then I could certainly get behind it. Hybridization also deals with big fat fatties which Shardless would otherwise be completely reliant on planeswalkers to deal with. Not like the deck cares about a 3/3 anyway.

[Iron Buddha]

I like Lejay's list much more.
Basically: the full set of FoW instead of 3, and Lilliana > Hymn.
Why would you ever want to skimp on FoW, if card-disadvantage is the kind of thing you should never have a problem with?

[GerryT]

I like Lejay's list much more.
Basically: the full set of FoW instead of 3, and Lilliana > Hymn.
Why would you ever want to skimp on FoW, if card-disadvantage is the kind of thing you should never have a problem with?

Because drawing multiples is bad, much like the discard, but at least discard is a one-for-one trade. Just because we have card advantage doesn't mean we are ever up enough cards to just throw away our advantage. There are very few things worth FOWing that you can't deal with via a card that trades one-for-one.

[Lejay]

If you want to bring the draw two argument you can. But you also have to realize it won't be a problem very often. It will with bad timing like drawing the second in the next 2-3 draws after using the first, in a non-combo match-up, with nothing valuable to do with it. The rest of the time you can just pitch one fow to the other.
In my list fow is also more often good at protecting the increased number of planeswalkers.

I don't think it's throwing away card advantage. Like I said the build with 4 wastelands+drs can out tempo quite often the opponent and the 4 fows are a good tool for that too. By running 0 discard main deck this version uses very well the fact that cascade isn't just card advantage, but can also sometimes add tempo value.

[VizzerdrixFTW]

To elaborate on rapid hybridization. I understand that it's not the most elegant answer. To be honest though, in a room full of mirren crusaders and other hard to deal with creatures, it is an efficient answer. If not for RH I would lose to any number of crusaders+sword of x and x

[Adryan]

I just wanted to chime in on the differences between mine and Lejay's list.


2) The discard package is my way of beating combo. Liliana of the Veil is a fine tool for Edicting people or destroying control, but in order for it to be good against combo, you really want to curve discard into it. Force of Will + Liliana will leave you with a bad Storm/Show and Tell matchup.

If you play discard, you should typically side out most, if not all of it, against other control decks. The games will go long and they are horrible topdecks.



Why not play Flusterstorm against Combo? Before everyone here calls me stupid think about how awesome Flusterstorm is (hint:very awwesome).

Shardless Agent is extremely bad versus Combo (you tap out and with bad luck you hit Tarmogoyf, Deathrite etc and you die the next turn)

So Shardless Agent out vs combo, 4 Flusterstorm in -> good combo matchup, because of discard, FoW and counters.


P.S.:

The lack of some basic swamps and islands maybe resulted in zero Top 8s at Strassbourg with this deck because the only way RUG can ever beat us is with early threats and a good mix of stifle and wasteland.

I don't like playing Tempo with this deck. Wasting RUG Delver is the dumbest thing you could ever do. Yeah sometimes you will win but in limited you also don't keep a one land hand because once upon a time it worked.

In a meta with almost no dangerous Utility Lands i would never ever play Wasteland in this deck. Wasting Storm is also a bad idea btw.

[GerryT]

Why not play Flusterstorm against Combo? Before everyone here calls me stupid think about how awesome Flusterstorm is (hint:very awwesome).

Shardless Agent is extremely bad versus Combo (you tap out and with bad luck you hit Tarmogoyf, Deathrite etc and you die the next turn)

So Shardless Agent out vs combo, 4 Flusterstorm in -> good combo matchup, because of discard, FoW and counters.


P.S.:

The lack of some basic swamps and islands maybe resulted in zero Top 8s at Strassbourg with this deck because the only way RUG can ever beat us is with early threats and a good mix of stifle and wasteland.

Flusterstorm is obviously good vs combo, but I probably wouldn't side out Shardless Agent unless you didn't have any discard. Buuuut at that point you're a BUG deck with no discard and just trying to beat them with Flusterstorm and FOW probably isn't going to work.

You can't realistically expect to play basics in a deck with Hymn to Tourach, Tarmogoyf, and Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Lejay's list could probably afford more than a single Swamp, but even then, where does it get you? Even if you fetch for basic Island or Swamp on turn one, if your next two lands get Stifled or Wasted, you still can't cast anything and you're going to lose anyway. Unless you're U/W Control with 6-9 basics, that strategy isn't going to work vs RUG. Mono non-basics is a better bet.

[Darkness]

Flusterstorm is obviously good vs combo, but I probably wouldn't side out Shardless Agent unless you didn't have any discard. Buuuut at that point you're a BUG deck with no discard and just trying to beat them with Flusterstorm and FOW probably isn't going to work.

You can't realistically expect to play basics in a deck with Hymn to Tourach, Tarmogoyf, and Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Lejay's list could probably afford more than a single Swamp, but even then, where does it get you? Even if you fetch for basic Island or Swamp on turn one, if your next two lands get Stifled or Wasted, you still can't cast anything and you're going to lose anyway. Unless you're U/W Control with 6-9 basics, that strategy isn't going to work vs RUG. Mono non-basics is a better bet.

I agree. Part of playing the Black shell is using your discard to proactively stop your opponent, find a threat, and then hold up counter magic while you clock your opponent. I can tell you as a TES player that more often then not counter magic is not enough to stop someone from going off. Between cards like Duress, Silence, Cabal Therapy, Force of Will, Misdirection, Spell Pierce and Daze combo players pact as much hate as you do. Discard immediately prevents your opponent from going off, and dig for protection, and puts them back into digging for the combo assembly. This slows them down in turn allowing you a gap to start winning and finding counter magic for when they do find their combo.

[Razorwynd]

I know this goes back to the early days of the deck when Brian Demars was first talking about it, but has anyone tested some form of counterbalance top (as opposed to discard) in the deck to combat non Sneak and Show combo decks? Top seems reasonable to set up cascades and brainstorm can be used to great affect with counterbalance.

My instinct is that it might just be too reactive and clunky instead of proactive in the combo matchups. And it only really shines against RUG and non-Sneak and Show combo.

Thoughts.

[marumari]

Amidst all the complaints about how bad it is to topdeck or cascade into discard late game, has anybody tried Brain Pry at all in their builds? Maybe it's just too far out into left field, but it's the only discard spell (AFAIK) that you can cascade into and will yet never be a completely dead card. It's obviously much better in the versions that run a lot of Thoughtseizes, since it is basically half of a Cabal Therapy strapped to a cantrip.

[phazonmutant]

I know this goes back to the early days of the deck when Brian Demars was first talking about it, but has anyone tested some form of counterbalance top (as opposed to discard) in the deck to combat non Sneak and Show combo decks? Top seems reasonable to set up cascades and brainstorm can be used to great affect with counterbalance.

My instinct is that it might just be too reactive and clunky instead of proactive in the combo matchups. And it only really shines against RUG and non-Sneak and Show combo.

Thoughts.

It's not exactly analogous, but I top8'd a local 20-man tournament with a 4c CB Top list, report here: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?24739-Waterfalls-(RUG-Cascade!)&p=717065&viewfull=1#post717065
I think the same problems I found with that deck would apply to BUG - Vision + CB is dissynergy, you don't really have mana to Top, and you end the game with inf cards in hand but nothing in play.

Also, what would you cut? I played DeMars's decklist at a tournament right after he wrote it and it was awful. DRS added a lot and it's hard to fit DRS and CB-Top.



To elaborate on rapid hybridization. I understand that it's not the most elegant answer. To be honest though, in a room full of mirren crusaders and other hard to deal with creatures, it is an efficient answer. If not for RH I would lose to any number of crusaders+sword of x and x

I'm honestly not sure how this deck has much of a shot against W/x Thalia and Mirran Crusader decks. If that's what's infesting your meta, I certainly would not choose to play this deck. So, if you're winning on the back of an objectively terrible spell, all that tells me is that your meta isn't diverse enough to punish your sideboarding choice. Which is what you asked about in the first place. So yes, I still defend looking to proven sideboard in an open meta for advice on how to build yours for an open meta.

[1rakete]

I'm honestly not sure how this deck has much of a shot against W/x Thalia and Mirran Crusader decks. If that's what's infesting your meta, I certainly would not choose to play this deck. So, if you're winning on the back of an objectively terrible spell, all that tells me is that your meta isn't diverse enough to punish your sideboarding choice. Which is what you asked about in the first place. So yes, I still defend looking to proven sideboard in an open meta for advice on how to build yours for an open meta.

This deck actually shines in creature-heavy metas. Just adapt the build a bit. Play more removal, 4 Liliana, no discard, less Jace, probably no Force and consider some amount of Jitte maindeck. But you are right: rapid hybridization is obviously just a bad card, there are lots of better choices.

I have a question of you all concerning Jace TMS:

I played 6-2-1 in Straßbourg and the best thing Jace TMS did was getting pitched into Force. My matchups where UR Delver, Goblins, Jund, U/W Rest in Peace combo, Burn, MUD, UBW Stoneforge, Tin Fins and UWR Tempo. He got boarded out all matches except for U/W, MUD and UBW Stoneforge. When he did something, it was always something like win-more.

If you reconsider your last games with the deck: What experiences with Jace TMS did you do?

[Esper3k]

It's not exactly analogous, but I top8'd a local 20-man tournament with a 4c CB Top list, report here: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?24739-Waterfalls-(RUG-Cascade!)&p=717065&viewfull=1#post717065
I think the same problems I found with that deck would apply to BUG - Vision + CB is dissynergy, you don't really have mana to Top, and you end the game with inf cards in hand but nothing in play.

Also, what would you cut? I played DeMars's decklist at a tournament right after he wrote it and it was awful. DRS added a lot and it's hard to fit DRS and CB-Top.




I'm honestly not sure how this deck has much of a shot against W/x Thalia and Mirran Crusader decks. If that's what's infesting your meta, I certainly would not choose to play this deck. So, if you're winning on the back of an objectively terrible spell, all that tells me is that your meta isn't diverse enough to punish your sideboarding choice. Which is what you asked about in the first place. So yes, I still defend looking to proven sideboard in an open meta for advice on how to build yours for an open meta.

Yeah, if you're having problems with creatures, this BUG actually has an amazing amount of answers like Pernicious Deed, Virtue's Ruin, Engineered Plague, Dread of Night, or even just more pinpoint removal if you want.

[baptist]

I just wanted to chime in on the differences between mine and Lejay's list.

1) Baleful Strix is good vs other Goyf decks (and can block Emrakul/Griselbrand if they are dead on board the next turn; not always relevant, but it won me a game in Top 8 of the Invitational). They are cuttable depending on what you expect to see.

2) The discard package is my way of beating combo. Liliana of the Veil is a fine tool for Edicting people or destroying control, but in order for it to be good against combo, you really want to curve discard into it. Force of Will + Liliana will leave you with a bad Storm/Show and Tell matchup.

If you play discard, you should typically side out most, if not all of it, against other control decks. The games will go long and they are horrible topdecks.

3) Maelstrom Pulse is the answer to Esper Stoneblade and various other problems you'll face. Europeans don't need to worry about that too much, but on the Open Series, there is a lot of it. Being able to handle Batterskull, Lingering Souls, and Jace with one card is the reason I won the Invitational.

4) Four Wastelands aren't necessary, no matter what version you're playing. Your lands in play are more valuable than theirs. The only reason I play any is to kill problematic lands like Grove of the Burnwillows, Maze of Ith, Creeping Tar Pit, etc. Playing your own Tar Pits makes your mana base better and gives you a solid threat against other control decks. It's also a very good way to pressure planeswalkers.

5) Nihil Spellbomb is very good. I side it in against the obvious Dredge, etc decks but it's also good against Punishing Fire, Snapcaster Mage, and Nimble Mongoose. Those are probably the best ways for other decks to fight you and Nihil is a universal answer. It's far better than something like Leyline of the Void because it also cantrips so you're not losing value against other control decks.

6) Phyrexian Revoker is very good against Sneak and Show. That's basically the only thing I'd want to incorporate from Lejay's list (unless the metagame is suddenly devoid of combo). It's also another card that, like Pulse, lets you beat random strategies.

7) I like Chill. There are random decks out there like Goblins, Burn, anything with Punishing Fire, Sneak and Show with Blood Moon and/or REB sideboard, Belcher, some versions of Storm, etc that have a difficult time dealing with Chill. It's one card that deals with a lot of the randomness that exists in Legacy, so I wouldn't play without it.

1)
In a meta with major players: RUG, ANT, Sneaky Show, Esper and BUG would you consider playing the third or fourth copy of Baleful Strix in the sb?


5)
I can confirm that Nihil Spellbomb was one of my best sb slots for the GP Straatsburg. I board it against RUG, Esper, ANT and Punishing Jund.


6)
What does this mean in regard to your actual sb? Do you still play Sower of Temptation for the Sneaky Show matchup or would you replace these with Phyrexian Revoker.

Would you consider cutting the 2 Thoughtseize md, for the fourth Hymn to Tourach and the fourth Force of Will?

My actual sb is:
3 Thoughtseize (playset FOW and Hymn to Tourach md)
2 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Pernicious Deed
1 Maelstorm Pulse
2 Liliana of the Veil
1 Baleful Strix
1 Sower of Temptation

My main concern is fixing the Sneaky Show matchup, considering that I need to win through a Leyline of Sanctity. Suggestions?

[Kl'rt]

What I'm getting from this thread is that this deck performs very well against fair decks at the cost of being a little weaker against combo. Isn't Jund already the best deck for doing this? What are the reasons for playing this deck over Jund?

On another note, how is this deck's matchup vs Jund? On paper, I would guess it has a hard time dealing with Punishing Fire. Wins goyf wars and kills every other creature in this deck. Anyone have experience with this?

[Esper3k]

What I'm getting from this thread is that this deck performs very well against fair decks at the cost of being a little weaker against combo. Isn't Jund already the best deck for doing this? What are the reasons for playing this deck over Jund?

On another note, how is this deck's matchup vs Jund? On paper, I would guess it has a hard time dealing with Punishing Fire. Wins goyf wars and kills every other creature in this deck. Anyone have experience with this?

It has a better matchup against combo than Jund does which is the reason to play Shardless BUG. While it may have a weaker combo matchup than other BUG lists, you're still playing a deck that runs FoW and hand disruption against combo.

I haven't played much against Pfires, but my thought would be that it's rough but between your yard hate and Wastelands, you should be able to deal with it postboard.

[planarvoid]

Against jund the key is to resolve ASAP ancestral vision.

I don't feel "that" bad playin' against jund, I guess it's 50-50, shardless agent and vision makes the game.

[Sansian]

Yea, I find that when I win pre-board against p.jund it tends to be when I'm able to bury them in cards between Hymn and Ancestral.

[baptist]

Against jund the key is to resolve ASAP ancestral vision.

I don't feel "that" bad playin' against jund, I guess it's 50-50, shardless agent and vision makes the game.

Presb
Ancestral Vision, Tarmogoyf and Abrupt Decay are the cards you want.

Postsb
Do they have Pyroblast for your Ancestral Vision or Jace?

Overall
The most common way to loose is an unanswered Dark Confidant.

[Julian23]

Punishing Fire straight out shuts this deck down no matter how many cards you draw with Ancestral Visions. Therefore, preboard I try to kill them ASAP with Agents cascading into Goyfs and just closing out the game ASAP.

Postboard, I used Surgical Extraction to successfully get rid of Punishing Fire. Once you've managed to done that, the matchup becomes so much easier. Still a fair fight from both sides but no more inevitability for them...

That being said, you can't really run Surgical in a deck that's built on cascade. Maybe Spellbomb is still enough to shut them down for a while despite it being much easier played around by Jund.

[Lejay]

Or you could run leyline if the void and 4 wasteland, keeping them for groves.

[zerzab11]

Lejay, could you please share your current list, do you still think 2 Leyline is the best GY hate?

How did your fellow players perform with this deck at the GP?

[baptist]

Lejay, could you please share your current list, do you still think 2 Leyline is the best GY hate?

How did your fellow players perform with this deck at the GP?

I finished 37th, going 8-1 day 1 and 4-3 day 2. Lost to ANT, Sneaky Show, Esperblade and Deathblade. Won against 2x Esper, BUG control, Merfolks, 2x RUG, Sneaky Show, TES, ANT, Punishing Jund, 3x?

[1rakete]

Or you could run leyline if the void and 4 wasteland, keeping them for groves.

For me, this is one of the main reasons to run 4 Wastelands. They really improve the Jund matchup.

I made a 4-1-1 finish at a local tournament last weekend with this list:

4 Ancestral Vision
4 Brainstorm
4 Abrupt Decay
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Shardless Agent
3 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
4 Force of Will
4 Thoughtseize
4 Wasteland
3 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
4 Polluted Delta
1 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Creeping Tar Pit

//Sideboard
SB: 3 Engineered Plague
SB: 3 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 2 Disfigure
SB: 4 Hymn to Tourach
SB: 3 Nihil Spellbomb

I expected a creature-heavy meta and did right. My matchups:

2-0 vs reanimator
1-0 vs maverick
2-1 vs brw stoneforge (with shamans, lavamancers, dark confidant, hymn, etc.)
2-0 vs goblins
1-2 vs zombardment
id vs goblins

For a bigger tourney or a metagame i dont know i would add some pulses in the sideboard and probably cut plagues. I would also like to play Liliana in my 75 but I dont know what to cut.

[Grand Superior]

How does a Shardless BUG decklist without Baleful Strix look like? I just built this deck (basically by investing in Shardless Agent+Ancestral Vision and converting my Team America list) but Baleful Strix is sold out nearly everywhere. Is it essential to the deck now or are the 12 creatures fine?

[marumari]

How does a Shardless BUG decklist without Baleful Strix look like? I just built this deck (basically by investing in Shardless Agent+Ancestral Vision and converting my Team America list) but Baleful Strix is sold out nearly everywhere. Is it essential to the deck now or are the 12 creatures fine?

Strix is extremely good against pretty much every creature-based deck, and even against combo it pitches to FoW. It also protects your planeswalkers really well. I'd say it's pretty important. It seems readily available at all the usual online suspects.

[Lejay]

Lejay, could you please share your current list, do you still think 2 Leyline is the best GY hate?

How did your fellow players perform with this deck at the GP?

The two I named went 5-0 then 5-3. Tristan just had a different sideboard and Pierre added discard. Two others that never played the deck before started from my list adding discard because they talked much more with Pierre. They had no byes and made 16th (Thiago) and 18th (Shaka1333 whose report is in the tournament report section). Another guy went back from not playing magic at all in a year and made day 2.

Like I said the list hasn't changed much in months and since my last post I've played combo decks for the most part.
1 Badlands
1 Swamp
2 Bayou
2 Misty Rainforest
2 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland
3 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
4 Liliana of the Veil
4 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
4 Ancestral Vision
SB: 1 Grafdigger's Cage
SB: 1 Ancient Grudge
SB: 2 Vendilion Clique
SB: 2 Thoughtseize
SB: 2 Phyrexian Revoker
SB: 2 Leyline of the Void
SB: 2 Duress
SB: 3 Whipflare

The 2/2 duress/thoughtseize split can be balanced according to the expected metagame. If your metagame has a lot of control decks (with planeswalkers) and not much moon effects/tempo decks you can switch the swamp for the creeping tar pit. If your meta has no batterskull I'd cut the grudge for a whipflare unless something else justifies not doing it. Otherwise I play the very same list in any metagame with <20% combo decks. If it is combo heavy, I just switch to a tempo deck or esper even if my post board game is very good.

[Shaka1333]

Ouais papi !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! <3

Rule number 1 : always follow grandpa' Lejay advices ! :laugh:

Rule number 2 : always follow grandpa' Lejay advices !! :cool:

[marumari]

I have a question of you all concerning Jace TMS:

I played 6-2-1 in Straßbourg and the best thing Jace TMS did was getting pitched into Force. My matchups where UR Delver, Goblins, Jund, U/W Rest in Peace combo, Burn, MUD, UBW Stoneforge, Tin Fins and UWR Tempo. He got boarded out all matches except for U/W, MUD and UBW Stoneforge. When he did something, it was always something like win-more.

If you reconsider your last games with the deck: What experiences with Jace TMS did you do?

Having played with this deck a bunch, I'm really not fond of JtMS in the deck. I board him out in probably 2/3rds of my matches as well. The only deck I really like him against is U/W and MUD; Esper Stoneblade runs Lingering Souls, which hurts his effectiveness a lot. He's even mediocre at the killing Jace plan, since the deck already runs so many creatures that are terrible to bounce, and it has 3/2 unblockable manlands. If the deck ended up with more board stalls, it would probably be a lot better. But it's usually either too little to catch up, or it's win-more. I think he'd probably be a lot better in Lejay's build, which is heavy on the Lilianas.

On the other hand, I have been very impressed by Whipflare. I admit that I was a skeptic, but it has done a heck of a lot of work. I have killed a lot of Delvers, Mystics, Goblins, and Deathrites with it.

[Darkness]

I'm planning on trying the Whip flare if my meta becomes more creature oriented. I do not doubt the power of it, aside from our own DRS it doesn't hit any of our dudes and improves our Lingering Souls matchup. I was wondering everyones thoughts on bringing in or keeping Baleful Strix against Sneak and Show. I haven't had a chance to test against it and was wondering everyones thoughts.

[baptist]

I'm planning on trying the Whip flare if my meta becomes more creature oriented. I do not doubt the power of it, aside from our own DRS it doesn't hit any of our dudes and improves our Lingering Souls matchup. I was wondering everyones thoughts on bringing in or keeping Baleful Strix against Sneak and Show. I haven't had a chance to test against it and was wondering everyones thoughts.

Strix is not so good against Sneaky Show, I would board him out if your blue count is high enough after sb, this means at least 18 blue cards. Don't forget you want to take Ancestral Vision out for sure.

[Darkness]

Go in this Saturday to my LGS with the deck again. Won it three weeks ago, hoping to do well with it again. Some minor changes to the deck from last week

Lands 22
4x Underground Sea
4x Polluted Delta
4x Verdant Catacombs
2x Bayou
2x Tropical Island
2x Creeping Tar Pit
2x Wasteland
2x Misty Rainforest

Creatures 14
4x Deathrite Shaman
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Shardless Agent
2x Baleful Strix

Spells
4x Brainstorm
4x Abrupt Decay
4x Ancestral Visions
3x Force of Will
3x Hymn to Tourach
2x Thoughtseize
1x Maelstrom Pulse

Planeswalkers 3
3x Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Sideboard 15
3x Nihil Spellbomb
1x Baleful Strix
2x Sower of Temptation
2x Chill
2x Liliana, of the Veil
2x Thoughtseize
1x Force of Will
1x Maelstrom Pulse
1x Umezawa's Jitte

Basically +1 Jitte -1 Strix, doing this for information gathering. I don't know how well it will actually work. Report to follow in the week.

[Darkness]

If you have SCG Premium, AJ Sacher made a really awesome video explaining game Five of the Semi Finals for the last SCG Invitational, BBD vs GT Esper Deathblade vs Shardless BUG. He explains the roles both decks want to play and what role Jace plays in the match. Valuable information check it out.

[marumari]

I've been going on an absolute tear at my weekly legacy tournaments, going 4-0, 3-1, 4-0 over the last three weeks (and probably 10-3 in random additional matchups). The deck is very solid, it rarely mulligans, resists Wasteland, and draws a ton of cards. I love it, despite its absurd cost. Here's the exact build I've been running:


Land (22)
1x Badlands
2x Bayou
2x Creeping Tar Pit
2x Misty Rainforest
4x Polluted Delta
2x Tropical Island
3x Underground Sea
4x Verdant Catacombs
2x Wasteland

Planeswalker (3)
3x Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Sorcery (10)
4x Ancestral Vision
3x Hymn to Tourach
1x Maelstrom Pulse
2x Thoughtseize

Creature (14)
2x Baleful Strix
4x Deathrite Shaman
4x Shardless Agent
4x Tarmogoyf

Instant (11)
4x Abrupt Decay
4x Brainstorm
3x Force of Will

Sideboard (15)
1x Ancient Grudge
2x Baleful Strix
1x Force of Will
1x Hymn to Tourach
3x Liliana of the Veil
2x Nihil Spellbomb
1x Thoughtseize
1x Vendilion Clique
3x Whipflare

I don't run Chill because nobody at my LGS (roughly 15-40 players) plays Burn. And Whipflare works fine against Goblins. I'm not certain if it's even worthwhile to run Chill, since the Burn matchup is so absurdly bad anyways. I think just running a couple Jittes in the sideboard is probably the better plan anyways.

[Darkness]

Went 3-2 at my LGS. Changing sideboard after this. 3-1 in swiss lost in top 4. Smaller Report coming this week stay tuned.

[1rakete]

FYI: Pierre Sommen made T8 with BUG Shardless at BoM 2013: http://www.watchdamatch.com/tournois/coverage/bom-day-4/

This is his list:

22 LANDS
4 Polluted Delta
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Underground Sea
3 Bayou
4 Wasteland
1 Tropical Island
1 Swamp
13 CREATURES
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Deathrite Shaman
1 Baleful Strix

25 Other Spells :
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Ancestral Vision
1 Hymn to Tourach
4 Force of Will
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Thoughtseize
4 Liliana of the Veil

SIDEBOARD
2 Thoughtseize
1 Sower of Temptation
1 Dreed of Night
1 Umezawa’s Jitte
1 Grafdigger’s Cage
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Abrupt Decay
2 Baleful Strix
2 Vendilion Clique
1 Hymn to Tourach
1 Nihil’s Spellbomb

[JMLL]

Hi all,

Posting this after the T8 that Pierre Sommen did at the BoM seemk weird. First, then, congrats to Pierre.

After this said, I'll just post my smaller success in repeating T8 in a local tournament (37 players, 6 rounds). My deck is more oriented to destroy the board than to get hand advantage, but it's pretty similar to the one posted in here. The reasoning is that , with a <10% Control field, there is no point in trying to win the hand fight if I'm dead when I could get that advantage.

I did Top8 1 month ago and I lost to a Control Deck (UWr Miracle Helm). I did some changes that were awesome. Let me post the deck directly and then the results.

// Creatures (16)
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Shardless Agent
3 Baleful Strix
1 Vendilion Clique

// Spells (23)
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Disfigure
4 Brainstorm
3 Force of Will

4 Thoughtseize

// Lands (22)
3 Wasteland
1 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Sunken Ruins - Not that great. I didn't have a 2nd Tar pit, so it was the best solution to avoid Choke.
4 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
2 Bayou
4 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Verdant Catacombs

// Sideboard
1 Force of Will
2 Spell Pierce
2 FlusterStorm
1 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Pernicious Deed
4 Sinkhole
1 Vendilion Clique

I didn't take notes, so it's entirely out of my memory. Sorry if something is wrong. Also, I only explain the most interesting situations, so keep calm and read if you please.

R1: Uw Miracle Helm Win: 2-0
Destiny made me play against the only deck that won me the last tournament. He ended 2nd then.
- G1: I have pression on the board although there's a RiP. The lone Vendilion is doing wonders. The Tarmogoyf gets bigger after an Abrupt that destroys the Enchantment and lets me kill him.
- G2 I slow him down with Sinkholes but a well played Terminus stops me cold. I have a Liliana and he's got a Jace and we get to this situation:
> Me: Liliana (7), 4 Lands, Sinkhole in hand, 17 life
> Him: 2 Sensei's Divining Top, 1 Jace (3), 1 Plains, 3 island, 1 card in hand, 4 life
I decide to Ulti him with Liliana, and he responds by activating both Tops to draw (error imho) and tapping out to get mana (UUW in pool). I split: 3 Islands Vs Jace + Plains. He sacrifices the Islands and I announce that I'll change phase. He plays Vendilion in Response targeting himself (so he thows a Top at the bottom of the deck). Inthe 2nd phase I play Sinkhole to his plains and he's landless, with a Jace and a Vendilion Clique, and I have lands and a Liliana (1).
We keep playing, he kills the Liliana and I don't draw anything important. Another error here is that he was brainstorming with Jace instead of controlling my top.
We arrive at a point where I play a Shaman + Tarmo and he bounces the tarmo. I use Shaman and he counters the tarmo afterwards. He goes down to 1 life, landless (fetch that can't be activated) and Jace with 1 counter. I'm at 5, a Shaman that's sick and it's his turn. If he attacks and bounces the Shaman, I have exactly one turn to get a solution. Instead, he plays brainstorm with Jace and surrenders. After telling him this, he accepts he lost focus during the game. (to his credit, he ended 1st of the Magic League, out of 70 players, so he's quite a good player :P)


R2: GWb Junk Win 2-1
A really kind guy and one of the great collegues of the League.
G1: I win with Tarmo preassure
G2: I'm short on lands, he kills the Shaman early and I lose to the combination of Ooze + Shaman
G3: I win with a Vendilion that wins over a crowded ground

R3: BUG Control Win: 2-0
He's been getting more and more implications as to become the co-organizer of the league.
G1: I put preassure on the board and I win thanks to controlling the table better, eventhough he resolved 2 Ancestral Visions that brought him too many lands. When the 1st one was resolves, I already had Shardless + Tarmo + Liliana on board.
G2: I put preassure again and I play my cards better, imho. I win easily.

R4: RUG Tempo Win: 2-0
He's one of the best players in the league. He's won me several times and he outplays the enemies.
G1: I win G1thanks to all the removal I have maindeck. I'm landless but with 2 Shamans (error to let them live, imho). If he'd drawn a red source before, i'd be dead.
G2: He kills the Shamans as they appear, but I put preassure with 2 consecutive Shardless.

R5: ID Vs BUG Draw

R6: BG Rock Draw: 1-1
Although I'm Top8 already, I decide to try my best to get more points and try to get classified for the League Finals (as I went only to the 60% of the tournaments, I need a miracle). If not, by winning (if I do) to a player with 12 points, a friend of mine who's also 12 may get in. 2 reasons are enough to try it. I expose the reasons to the opponent, who was surprised, and he surprised me more when he laughed and was friendly eventhough I could let him out of the Top. Really nice.
G1: He has a Top and lands, nothing else, I have controlled the board and his hand, but I only have a Tarmo, that gets killed, and I get to draw 5 consecutive lands. I lose, ofc. I end with 5 lands on the table and 4 in my hand. I just wnated a Brainstorm (I had a fetch ready!)
G2: I stomp him. Jace + Liliana on board, he surrenders fast.
G3: After a long G1, we get on turns. I have the board controlled, I only need 2 more turns to finish him off. We end like with an ID.

TOP8: LoamPox Loss: 1-2
So here we are again, losing to Top8. He's a common player in the League, Top8'd several times. Not bad at all.
Being extremely brief, all the games are won by the one who starts. He starts G1 (ouch) and wins after a long game.
G2: I make him surrender on Turn 4.
G3: He starts and I can't survive. Maybe I did some mistakes in the way of playing against a deck like this.
> He: T1 land go >> Me: Land Shaman
> He: Land Innocent Blood >> Me: Land Tarmo
> He: Land Smallpox >> Me: Land Shaman. All this was to get either liliana or Shardless on the board. And my Jace was also staring at me praying for a Shaman to live.
> He: Land Smallpox #2. >> Me: Land Go. I have Liliana in hand, just let me cast it.
> He: Land Liliana, discard >> Me: WTF!!!
I can't find the hate in the Side and I die (yeah, then I draw the other jace, with 3 lands....) . Maybe I should have expected that, but I wanted to put a T2 CMC 3 card on the board. I was wrong, as playing around Smallpox would have been better. Anyway, I cound fail anyway thanks to a smallpox+Innocent blood he could cast anytime.

I was happy afterwards, 2 Tops with the deck and improving the matchups in each tournament seems really good. If you have any tips in how to face LoamPox, I'd love to hear that.

Thanks for reading.

[Darkness]

Within two Saturdays I've gone 9-2 at my LGS making top 4 both times, winning the tournament once. My loses were to RuG Delver and Death and Taxes, both decks were the same day I decided to remove a strix from the board and test a Jitte. Though the Jitte was awesome, I would have liked to have seen the 4th strix in their as well. I've come up with some changes to the list I would like to try out for this week. Mainly influenced by other people and the fact that I'm just not sold on hymn. The only deck where I really want is are the non GY combo, which is lackluster in our meta. I will highlight in bold, the new cards added since Saturday and what I removed at the bottom.

Creatures 14
2x Baleful Strix
4x Deathrite Shaman
4x Shardless Agent
4x Tarmogoyf

Planeswalkers 5
2x Liliana of the Veil +2
3x Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Spells 19
1x Maelstrom Pulse
2x Thoughtseize
4x Ancestral Visions
4x Brainstorm
4x Abrupt Decay
4x Force of Will +1

Lands 22
4x Verdant Catacombs
3x Polluted Delta
2x Misty Rainforest
2x Wasteland
2x Creeping Tar Pit
4x Underground Sea
2x Bayou
2x Tropical Island

MD changes
-3 Hymn to Tourach
+1 Force of Will +2 Liliana of the Veil

In my testing the only decks I want Hymn for are the multi card combo. Sure against the fair decks it's a two for one, but Liliana gives you more options to hate them. The added Force from the Hymn increases your blue count and makes trying to dig for Force with Brainstorm so much better. Even against decks like Goblins where Liliana isn't amazing, the extra force can be used to stop their advantage till you pull ahead. Force is better at the more resilient combo decks which is what the decks wants imo.

Sideboard 15
2x Baleful Strix
1x Grafdigger's Cage
2x Inquistion of Kozelik
1x Liliana of the Veil
2x Nihil Spellbombs
1x Pernicious Deed
2x Sower of Temptation
2x Thoughtseize
1x Umezawa's Jitte
1x Vendilion Clique

SB changes:
-2 Chill -1 Nihil Spellbomb -1 Force of Will -1 Maelstrom Pulse -1 Liliana of the Veil
+1 Vendilion Clique +1 Pernious Deed +2 Inquisition of Kozelik +1 Grafdigger's Cage +1 Baleful Strix

I wanted the fourth Baleful Strix against the decks that attacked my mana via wasteland. I lost my only two matches last Saturday due to RUG and DnT and would have loved to have had that extra blocker and extra chance to find lands. The I changed 1 Nihil Spellbomb for 1 Grafdigger's Cage. I wanted something to bomb stop Dredge and Reanimator. The Deed though hitting my creatures, will allow me to play more of the controlling deck against creatures decks as well as stop mass permanents that I cannot normally hit, Moat, Humility, esc. The Clique and Inquisitions were just things I wanted for the combo decks. I'm pretty sure Inquisition is better than Hymns in the board, I want to hit specific things against the combo decks not hope I get lucky with a two for one and it's much easier to cast, makes keeping a wasteland or a tar pit hand better. The clique is just to provide the "discard effect" and put a decent clock on them.
Changes pre and post board are subject to changes, however I do think that the Main deck changes are correct, 80% of games the inquisitions came out for other cards so I'm pretty happy about that.

[learntolove6]

how do you guys feel about the esper stoneblade matchup? a lot of the players in the esper thread were touting how good it is for shardless, but i'm not so sure. am i wrong in saying i think it's close to even, both pre and post board?

[Darkness]

how do you guys feel about the esper stoneblade matchup? a lot of the players in the esper thread were touting how good it is for shardless, but i'm not so sure. am i wrong in saying i think it's close to even, both pre and post board?

My testing friend has been playing with Esper Stoneblade for a long time about a year now. I've come to the conclusion after hours of testing that the matchup is definitely in your favor. The only threats that they have are Jace, Batterskull, and Linger Souls. The A. Visions is a huge problem for them and they need to use a lot of resources to stop you. Realistically the only time I've had a problem pre or post board is when you have a lack of visions and they can land many chump blockers. I feel a lot has to go wrong for you to have the disadvantage. Overall, I wouldn't say that it's heavily in our favor, the knowledge of the Esper pilot will change that, but I'd say it's about 55/45 with strong pilots.

[learntolove6]

My testing friend has been playing with Esper Stoneblade for a long time about a year now. I've come to the conclusion after hours of testing that the matchup is definitely in your favor. The only threats that they have are Jace, Batterskull, and Linger Souls. The A. Visions is a huge problem for them and they need to use a lot of resources to stop you. Realistically the only time I've had a problem pre or post board is when you have a lack of visions and they can land many chump blockers. I feel a lot has to go wrong for you to have the disadvantage. Overall, I wouldn't say that it's heavily in our favor, the knowledge of the Esper pilot will change that, but I'd say it's about 55/45 with strong pilots.

ok that's reasonable. both decks have ways to generate a lot of 2 for 1s, but what you say makes sense.

[wcm8]

What is the 61st card in Lejay's list? Unless I'm somehow miscounting somehow? And what would be the first cut? I know that having 61 cards is mathematically unlikely to change much, but I still somehow feel that it's inferior to just making the cut and going down to 60.

[Lejay]

I play 61 cards to adjust the lands to spells ratio.

[wcm8]

I play 61 cards to adjust the lands to spells ratio.

Thanks for the reply. I figured there had to be a good reason for it.

What are your thoughts on the sideboard? Has anything changed since you've last shared it? I love Whipflare and am actually running 4 at the moment, it usually functions as a one-sided Wrath against the decks where you board it in.

[martijnend]

Hi all,

I just picked up Shardless BUG about a week ago and took it to a small local tournament with 26 players which I won. That was the reason for me to take it to the BoM last week, where things went reasonably well. A friend of mine picked it up as well and went top 8 with it in a 400+ trial tournament. I don't have his exact list so I won't be able to post that.
However, on saturday I won the trial for BoM 8 with over 250 competitors and this was the list I played then.

4 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
2 Bayou
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Polluted Delta
3 Wasteland
1 Creeping Tar Pit
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Shardless Agent
4 Deathrite Shaman
2 Baleful Strix
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Brainstorm
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Maelstrom Pulse
3 Thoughtseize
2 Hymn to Tourach
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Force of Will

Sideboard:
2 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Golgari Charm
2 Liliana of the Veil
1 Gilded Drake
1 Baleful Strix
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Force of Will
1 Hymn to Tourach
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Life from the Loam

I played the following rounds:
1: BUG Delver (2-0) 1-0
2: BUG Delver (2-0) 2-0
3: Sneaky Show (2-1) 3-0
4: Omni-Tell (2-0) 4-0
5: RUG Delver (2-0) 5-0
6: RUG Delver (2-1) 6-0
7: BUG Delver (2-1) 7-0
8: ANT (2-0) 8-0
9: Elves (1-2) 8-1

I really like the current list and wouldn't change a thing at the moment. The sideboard especially is satisfying.

[Kanadell~]

Hi all,

I just picked up Shardless BUG about a week ago and took it to a small local tournament with 26 players which I won. That was the reason for me to take it to the BoM last week, where things went reasonably well. A friend of mine picked it up as well and went top 8 with it in a 400+ trial tournament. I don't have his exact list so I won't be able to post that.
However, on saturday I won the trial for BoM 8 with over 250 competitors and this was the list I played then.

4 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
2 Bayou
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Polluted Delta
3 Wasteland
1 Creeping Tar Pit
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Shardless Agent
4 Deathrite Shaman
2 Baleful Strix
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Brainstorm
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Maelstrom Pulse
3 Thoughtseize
2 Hymn to Tourach
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Force of Will

Sideboard:
2 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Golgari Charm
2 Liliana of the Veil
1 Gilded Drake
1 Baleful Strix
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Force of Will
1 Hymn to Tourach
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Life from the Loam

I played the following rounds:
1: BUG Delver (2-0) 1-0
2: BUG Delver (2-0) 2-0
3: Sneaky Show (2-1) 3-0
4: Omni-Tell (2-0) 4-0
5: RUG Delver (2-0) 5-0
6: RUG Delver (2-1) 6-0
7: BUG Delver (2-1) 7-0
8: ANT (2-0) 8-0
9: Elves (1-2) 8-1

I really like the current list and wouldn't change a thing at the moment. The sideboard especially is satisfying.


I like your current list, but I'm surprised that you don't play any Pernicious Deed among the total 75. Is there any specific reason for not playing any of them? Or you just ran out of free spots?
PD. Contratz on your success!

[Lans89]

Hello,

I'm the guy who travelled to BOM with Martijn and finished 8th on Thursdays 420 man 10-round Legacy trial. Martijn, Pierre Sommen and I made sure that Shardless BUG top 8'd the three biggest Legacy events this week!

I didn't make any notes and played a lot of Legacy this week, so I'm not able to write a report. But with some thinking I managed to write down my wins/losses:

Wins (random order): OmniDream, Team America, RUG Tempo, Jund, 2x ANT, TES, Sneak Attack

Losses:

5th round: Elves (0-2 run over.. I'll might try the Whipflare tech because Merfolk scares me too),

9th round: ANT (1-2, due to my own mistake.. He used Tendrills with storm count 3 after I tapped out for a Strix because I thought I had already won.. He only had 4 Goblins, 10 life and 2 cards left versus my board full of creatures. I had Deathrite Shaman active and creatures in the gy to gain enough life if I just relaxed, and even had a Nihil Spellbomb to prevent him from flashbacking Cabal Therapy before taking his turn. Ow, and I even brainstormed a Thoughtseize back on top! So yeah, 3 options: Deathrite +2 life, activate Nihil Spellbomb to prevent 1 storm or cast Thoughtseize to rip a keycard and I preferred to play a 1/1 flyer.. It was a pity to miss a top 4 finish this way (more duals and an extra bye), but I guess everyone will agree that 10 rounds of Legacy is just exhausting!)

My list:

Maindeck
4# Deathrite Shaman
4# Tarmogoyf
4# Shardless Agent
2# Baleful Strix

4# Ancestral Vision
4# Brainstorm
4# Abrupt Decay
3# Force of Will
3# Hymn to Tourach
2# Thoughtseize
1# Maelstrom Pulse
3# Jace, the Mind Sculptor

4# Wasteland
3# Polluted Delta
3# Misty Rainforest
3# Verdant Catacombs
4# Underground Sea
2# Tropical Island
2# Bayou
1# Creeping Tar Pit

Sideboard
2# Thoughtseize
1# Hymn to Tourach
1# Maelstrom Pulse
1# Pernicious Deed
1# Golgari Charm
2# Phyrexian Revoker
2# Liliana of the Veil
3# Nihil Spellbomb
1# Baleful Strix
1# Life from the Loam

Phyrexian Revoker was a boss vs Sneak Attack and Storm, Nihil Spellbomb helped me win 4 out of 5 ANT matches, 4 Wasteland was nice and I'm happy with only 3 FOW (blue count is low). The day before I still played with 2 Creeping Tar-Pit, but I never activated it :P! Golgari Charm helped me destroy a lot of permanents (including white Leylnes) and realy helped versus Death and Taxes. I could cut 1 sea for 1 Badlands and cut Deed, Charm and another card from the sideboard to include 3 Whipflare to fight Elves, Merfolk, Death and Taxes and other matchups, but I'm not sure yet!

Just ask if you have some questions,

Tim

[martijnend]

I like your current list, but I'm surprised that you don't play any Pernicious Deed among the total 75. Is there any specific reason for not playing any of them? Or you just ran out of free spots?
PD. Contratz on your success!

Thanks, Kanadell!
There are two reasons for the absence of Pernicious Deed. The first is that I can't think of any negative matchup in which Deed would be a winner, where Golgari Charm and Maelstrom Pulse wouldn't do exactly the same. I found the most difficult matchups to be Elves and Death and Taxes. Against both Golgari Charm is devastating. The second reason is that Deed is very mana-intensive. Three plus x mana is quite a lot for the deck to handle. Another reason, though slightly less important, is that Deed cannot be cascaded into with Shardless Agent.
The only spot in the sideboard that remains a question is the Gilded Drake, but I really wanted another answer to Sneak & Show. I haven't used it's effect once, but I have been able to lock my opponent down with Revoker (Sneak Attack) on the board and Gilded Drake in hand twice.
I thought a while about Whipflare and understand that it has been used to good effect, but decided against it. The manabase is already very greedy and I thought it would not be a good idea to stretch it even further by adding red duals.

Hope this helps,
Martijn

[Razorwynd]

I like your current list, but I'm surprised that you don't play any Pernicious Deed among the total 75. Is there any specific reason for not playing any of them? Or you just ran out of free spots?
PD. Contratz on your success!
I would image it is because deed kills all of your non-planeswalker permanents and is rather slow. Golgari Charm does most of what you want deed for and it does it earlier in the game.

Edit: I should finish reading the thread before I reply...martijn covered everything I wanted to say in greater detail than I provided.

[Razorwynd]

Has anyone else tried Sylvan Library? I have really been enjoying a singleton in the main deck.

1) It is great to cascade into against no aggro decks
2) It is great at setting up cascades.



For reference here is my current list:

4 Tarmogoyf
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Shardless Agent
2 Baleful Strix

1 Sylvan Library
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

4 Force of Will
4 Brainstrom
4 Abrupt Decay

2 Thoughtseize
2 Hymn to Tourach
4 Ancestral Visions

4 Mistry Rainforst
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Polluted Delta
3 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
3 Wasteland
1 Creeping Tar Pit

Sideboard
2 Golgari Charm
2 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Thoughtseize
2 Vendilion Clique
2 Nihil Spell bomb
1 Engineered Plague
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Life from the Loam

Seems extremely similar to what martijnend is working. I am mostly just curious about Sylvan Library...

[SansSerif]

Has anyone had tried this deck without Ancestral Vision? I have seen people claiming success with this style of deck here:

http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=406385&page=31

[Razorwynd]

Has anyone had tried this deck without Ancestral Vision? I have seen people claiming success with this style of deck here:

http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=406385&page=31

This deck without Ancestral Visions is not "this" deck. Ancestral Visions is one of the defining features of this deck that that distinguishes it from BUG control and BUG tempo. But to answer your question, yes BUG tempo and to a lesser extent BUG control have had varying degrees of success in the past (evidenced by the fact that all three were in the DTB forums for part of the month of April). Though, I would be willing to bet that presently the shardless variant of BUG is the best performing given the state of the meta.

[SansSerif]

I dont know if its a differnt deck, it would just rely on the other BUG staples to build CA. But that is not important though. I'm just not sure if Visions so good with cascade that it offset the negatives of top decking it in mid/late game. It seems that shardless + other BUG staples are good enough, and less cumbersome.

[Razorwynd]

I dont know if its a differnt deck, it would just rely on the other BUG staples to build CA. But that is not important though. I'm just not sure if Visions so good with cascade that it offset the negatives of top decking it in mid/late game. It seems that shardless + other BUG staples are good enough, and less cumbersome.

The problem with playing shardless agent without ancenstral visions is that you lose the amazing power of cascading into 3 extra cards. What do you propose replacing visions with?
(1) counterspells (e.g. spell pierce), those are not so good to cascade into.
(2a) Additional removal (e.g disfigure) sometimes the opponent doesn't have any creatures in play
(2b) Burn, that is really what Jund is
(3) more discard (hymn and thoughtseize) sometimes in the late game the opponent doesn't have any cards in hard
(4) more creatures, I guess this has the most potential as it is the least situational. Stoneforge mystic and dark confidant are the only creatures I would really want to cascade into. Stoneforge is white and perhaps could be good in a shardless bant type deck. Regarding Bob, I think the deck has too high of a converted mana cost and too little deck manipulation (e.g. ponder or SDT) to minimize the damage of drawing cards. Furthermore, I don't think the deck has enough protection (e.g. no daze or pierce) for dark conficant to stick around long enough to to have an impact on the game.

The only almost universally good thing to cascade into is card draw so that you can draw your more situational cards and play the ones that are relevant for the given game state. Ancestral visions count as part removal, part disruption, part creature, part land resulting in a more consistent game plan. I think the power of shardless BUG lies in the synergy between the two cards not the purely additive power of the two cards as individuals. As such, I would be surprised to see widespread success of shardless agent without ancestral visions in a midrange or control deck.

N.B. Top decking a visions late game is not the worst as you can put it back with jace or brainstorm (either for a cascade or a shuffle effect), and with the sylvan library that I am proposing you can float it on top to hit with cascade.

[newsalor]

Hey,

Long time reader, first time poster.

What do you guys think about the pros and cons of Liliana vs. Jace in the context of Shardless BUG?

[phazonmutant]

Hey,

Long time reader, first time poster.

What do you guys think about the pros and cons of Liliana vs. Jace in the context of Shardless BUG?

Pros:
- Liliana vs. Jace would sell lots of comics and would be some hot planeswalker on planeswalker conflict. Who will win - man of many emotions or slut tits?

Cons:
- Liliana would spray her veil all over Jace and then he would be dark and veiny like Garruk, the Veil-Cursed. Not a good long-term plan if he wants to get a real job.
- Jace, the Mind Sculptor, better than all

[JMLL]

Has anyone had tried this deck without Ancestral Vision? I have seen people claiming success with this style of deck here:

http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=406385&page=31


I'm the one playing without Ancestral Visions (yeah, the one to blame :P).

Honestly, this deck is a beast against other midrage, aggro and some combo decks. As there aren't many control decks in my meta, I often don't "have the time" to set up Ancestral Visions or to wait until turn 5 to resolve it and make profit of it. This is: It tends to arrive late, when I'm far behind or when the cards can't give me much.

That's why I play with 4x Thoughtseize, so I can remove the key threats and get the most of my CMC3 cards. Liliana is in my 60 to increase the preassure and make sure I have board control or tear appart their last cards in hand.

I get that Disfigure seems weird, but in my meta, removing a T1 Shaman (which is played by the 45% of the field) wins you games. I want my shaman to be realiable, I count on him for my CMC 3 spells, thats why mine has to stay and the others need to die. I can kill those Goblin guides, Mother of runes, Stoneforges and Delvers that can ruin my dayby pressing me too much. I want to slow the other decks so they can't play Jace (the main issue) or remove it from his hand before it ever sees play (Thoughtseize, Liliana, Pulse) and if it's able to be on the board, I want it to be unable to decide the match, as it will already be on my favor.

Probably, if I had the 3rd Jace, I would give it a chance and go the Whipflare route and play Visions, and I'd probably see that you can also win without needing that board dominance, but by now I made my deck a bit more aggressive than the most you see in this thread as I also have Liliana and Jitte in the 60 maindeck cards.

It's a way to go, it's taste and personal preference, but it's specially meta and adaptation. And it works quite well, at least for me.

[Final Fortune]

Has anyone had tried this deck without Ancestral Vision? I have seen people claiming success with this style of deck here:

http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=406385&page=31

Yes, I use Thoughtseize and Baleful Strix over Hymn to Tourach and Ancestral Visions and feel the deck is better suited to win without resolving Shardless Agent and has a significantly better curve. I don't think you need the "money flips" off of Hymn and Ancestral as much as you need all around reliable cards.

I do play against a ton of Goblins tho', which is why I hate Hymn pretty hard.

[Julian23]

I've never liked Hymn in this deck to start with. You just lose so much tempo against anything that isn't die-hard control. Even against non-blue control like NicFit, it kinda sucks. I'd play Thoughtseize over it any day of the week. Shardless Bug doesn't lose becaus of card advantage but because of inability to make use of card advantage aka tempo.

[JMLL]

@Final Fortune: +1, We do similar tactics.


I've never liked Hymn in this deck to start with. You just lose so much tempo against anything that isn't die-hard control. Even against non-blue control like NicFit, it kinda sucks. I'd play Thoughtseize over it any day of the week. Shardless Bug doesn't lose becaus of card advantage but because of inability to make use of card advantage aka tempo.

I'd say that this deck wins though card quality and the bit of CA that the tools it has can provide.

I want to clarify a point that even creates a contradiction in your words (I'm not here to spot the errors, just to clarify ideas, explaining them helps me getting them too ^^).

Card Advantage doesn't mean Tempo.

That being said, you are in a serious Cards Disadvantage if you have cards in hand that you can't use or that mean nothing with the state of the board at that moment.

Card advantage doesn't mean you are winning, imho. You may be winning if you are able to capitalize that advantage, but
- getting more cards in hand that don't turn a game you are losing,
- or that don't secure a game you are winning,
- or ripping out random cards in opponents hands so you have more than him in yours
All these points don't make you win (in a "fair deck", ignore combo by now). Card advantage doesn't mean you'll have the solution you are waiting for when you need it.

Maybe I tend to play this deck more "tempoish", by gaining board presence and killing my opponent before he can stabilize and find a solution. I do this because I feel we don't have these kind of solutions ourselves, it's not a hard Control Deck. That's why I priorize Card Quality over Card Advantage (although Strix, Walkers and Shardless are Card Advantage by themselves), and this is why I don't feel bad having so much removal in G1: I know I can trade early game because I'll get more value of the cards I'll draw, but not enough to lock the game.

My idea while playing this is being the control deck agains aggro, and being the aggro deck agains hard control.
- Vs Aggro, I'll trade 1v1 until my 2v1 and card quality let me stabilize, and I'll win the game from then.
- Against control, I'll make my cards matter, put the opponent in a clock and remove his "comeback" cards. My 2v1 will make his control tools less effective.
- Against Combo, it's a completely different story, but I still have a chance.

I hope my ideas are clear. That's why I've been playing a different kind of deck (without Visions, for example). At least I know where I am and what my aims are, so I chose what I think are the best tools for this strategy.

[martijnend]

@Razorwind: the thought of Sylvan Library is an interesting one. I don't know what I'd cut for it though. It's hard to cut an answer or threat for it, since we are low on them as it is. And as for the CA it provides, the cards we already have seem better in most situations. How does Library work for you?

The decks without Ancestral Visions really aren't the same deck. The list looks far more like a midrange-control deck. I agree that AV sometimes is an empty topdeck, but the pros of the card far exceed that downside. I actually win quite a lot of matches with the help of AV without cascading into it. Just suspending it on turn 1 and Hymning your opponent on turn 2 or 3 will gain you such an advantage that it will very hard for your opponent to pull back.

@JMLL, can you tell me why there are no Ponders in the list without AV?

[Malakai]

Doesn't Dread of Night just beat every W/x thalia deck, and also take care of any Lingering Souls problems?

My plan against creature decks like Merfolk, Goblins, and (oddly) Elves would be to just sideboard into mono-removal.deck. Vs. combo I like Liliana, but i don't really care for more discard; I'd rather do as some have suggested and bring in a bunch of counters, but I'd keep the discard I already have.

Any slots I had against control would also double as either anti-creature or anti-combo cards.

[SansSerif]

Doesn't Dread of Night just beat every W/x thalia deck, and also take care of any Lingering Souls problems?

Dread of Night is great when it applies, but maybe Engineered Plague is better in the SB? Sure it costs 2 more, but it can also be brought in verus Goblins, Merfolk and Elves.

[Malakai]

I agree it's better once it's in play, but it's a lot harder to land a 3cc enchantment than a 1cc enchantment. Consider that your opponent plays the following:
Wasteland
Rishadan Port
Thalia
Swords to Plowshares (for Deathrite).

Additionally, you can cascade into Dread of Night.

Goblins will similarly bring Ports and Wastelands, and Merfolk will have the Wastelands and Dazes. Additionally, both of those decks are far from dead when you land the card.

E. Plague is definitely much, much better against Elves. I might consider just running Darkblast if I thought I'd face both Elves and Thalia decks.

Golgari Charm also exists.

[Julian23]

...

No offense, but I think you completly misunderstood my post ;-) I am arguing that the inability to make use of card advantage constitutes a loss of tempo. That's why I dislike Hymn. Sometimes you just lose with 2 Hymns in hand and a Visions suspended on 1 counters. I prefer having more cards that actually have an impact on the game state...and I think you seem to agree? I'd much rather cascade into Tarmogoyf on turn2 than basically any other card in the deck.

Regarding Engineered Plague, I've been running it for quite a while and while it's pretty good against Goblins, it won't carry the game against both Merfolk and Elves. At the Bazaar, I tapped out for Engineered Plague several times against Elves only to see them untap and Natural Order me out of the game. They still run enough 2-toughness Elves and green non-Elves to make NO into Hoof a pretty good plan. So don't rely too much on it.

[SansSerif]

True enough, 3cc is much different than 1cc, but I'm just not sure if our SB is big enough for more than 1 Dread of Night, and just adding a single card to address Lingering Souls and Thaila is probably not sufficient.

Darkblast or Golgari Charm seem okay, though they don't combo well with Shardless if your opponent has no x/1 creatures in play. I like Engineered Explosives, its versatile, can help clear a large field and even hits enchantments like choke, but that combos even worse with Shardless. Maybe Disfigure is the answer, or I could jump on the Whipflare bandwagon.

[Malakai]

The Whipflare plan seems powerful against tribal decks. It seems poor against Thalia.dec, however.

[JMLL]

No offense, but I think you completly misunderstood my post ;-) I am arguing that the inability to make use of card advantage constitutes a loss of tempo. That's why I dislike Hymn. Sometimes you just lose with 2 Hymns in hand and a Visions suspended on 1 counters. I prefer having more cards that actually have an impact on the game state...and I think you seem to agree? I'd much rather cascade into Tarmogoyf on turn2 than basically any other card in the deck.

Yup, I'm quite with your thoughts. Maybe I prefer something else as Tarmo is my Wincon and I don't want to risk it on T2, but Cascade into Strix, then Liliana to secure the board and end with tarmo is an awesome T2, T3 & T4. Shardess into chumpblocker, then Jace is also good, ofc, but Jace better with board presence.


The decks without Ancestral Visions really aren't the same deck. The list looks far more like a midrange-control deck. I agree that AV sometimes is an empty topdeck, but the pros of the card far exceed that downside. I actually win quite a lot of matches with the help of AV without cascading into it. Just suspending it on turn 1 and Hymning your opponent on turn 2 or 3 will gain you such an advantage that it will very hard for your opponent to pull back.

@JMLL, can you tell me why there are no Ponders in the list without AV?

I agree they play different, and I play mine more like a tempo (winning in a window of time) than a pure control, but how can this deck be "in control" anyway? By having more cards in hand that may mean more Threats? Maybe THIS is exactly the point I'm missing, I don't think that you control by pure card advantage as the deck hasn't got those powerful cards (Tarmo and Jace are your wincons, you may include Shaman).

About Ponders, at least in my meta, I need to secure the board. Visions don't help me as they come late, so does Ponder. I'm "tempoish", that's true, but I'm better with more pointed removal (name it Strix, Jitte, Disfigure or Thoughtseize) than filtering my next draws. I think my deck is not going to provide me the answers (it's a way of thinking with this deck) so it's better if I already solve what I face "right now" instead of searching for the solution (that's why I usually don't Brainstorm with Jace here, I Fateseal, I already have a wincon, let's stop your answer).

I can stall the board and the game, so why not do so? My card quality are my 4 walkers and the Thoughtseize/Vendilion that will remove that Threat/Answer the opponent had and then I set the game to win in a window of time where I've stopped him, I'm not far behind (I could even maybe trade some life for time) and then I win from then. I felt Ponder was losing me the advantage I already had by just pressing, putting me more "movements" behind my opponents (and I think Sylvan could go here aswell). Imho, Ponder would make me move a turn later (read Sylvan also) so my opponent would have had more time to find the answer or I could be losing the preassure I already was setting. I think it doesn't fit, Brainstorm (with Fetch up) already solves your hand issues, so I must remember to play them well :)

[Razorwynd]

@Razorwind: the thought of Sylvan Library is an interesting one. I don't know what I'd cut for it though. It's hard to cut an answer or threat for it, since we are low on them as it is. And as for the CA it provides, the cards we already have seem better in most situations. How does Library work for you?
I guess I cut something that would be equivalent to the the 3rd thoughtseize your list. It has been amazing for me. The 4th permanent source of library manipulations is exactly what I have been looking for and as a 1 of it is rarely clunky unlike a fourth JtMS. At least give it a shot and see what you think.

[Pojopembo]

Long time lurker, first time poster :)

I'm looking to play Shardless BUG for the first time in a competitive event this weekend, and looking at the lists, I'm just pondering the choice of Graveyard hate in the SB. Is there a specific reason why people mainly use Nihil Spellbomb? Is the threat of Pithing Needle not that great against an opponent on Dredge, or is it mainly the benefit of potentially replacing itself after nuking a graveyard?

I'm also looking at other options, such as a split of 3 artifacts (Tormod's Crypt, Grafdigger's Cage, Bomb), or just running 3 Extirpate or Surgical Extraction. Which one have people seen as the best option and why?

[Water_Wizard]

Long time lurker, first time poster :)

I'm looking to play Shardless BUG for the first time in a competitive event this weekend, and looking at the lists, I'm just pondering the choice of Graveyard hate in the SB. Is there a specific reason why people mainly use Nihil Spellbomb? Is the threat of Pithing Needle not that great against an opponent on Dredge, or is it mainly the benefit of potentially replacing itself after nuking a graveyard?

I'm also looking at other options, such as a split of 3 artifacts (Tormod's Crypt, Grafdigger's Cage, Bomb), or just running 3 Extirpate or Surgical Extraction. Which one have people seen as the best option and why?

Spellbomb is preferred because of its card drawing ability (and you don't want Relic because it removes all graveyards). The card drawing ability isn't as relevant vs. the fast gy decks (like Dredge or Reanimator), but more against the slower or midrange decks that run Lingering Souls, Snapcaster Mage, Zombies, Punishing Fire, Life from the Loam, etc. Sometimes, you bring in your Spellbombs against non-gy decks just to have a cycler. This happens rarely, but it does happen.

Permanent-based hate is preferred to Extraction/Extirpate due to your ability to cascade into it.

[SansSerif]

I'm attending a legacy tourament this weekend in an unknown meta and wanted to get some help with my Sideboard.

I'm going to run Pierre Sommen's decklist with a few tweaks:

Lands:
4 Polluted Delta
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Underground Sea
3 Bayou
3 Wasteland
1 Tropical Island
1 Swamp

Creatures:
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Deathrite Shaman
1 Baleful Strix

Instants/Sorcery:
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Force of Will
4 Thoughtseize

Plameswalkers:
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Liliana of the Veil

SB:
3 Sinkhole or Hymn to Tourach
1 Sower of Temptation
1 Dread of Night
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Abrupt Decay
2 Baleful Strix
2 Vendilion Clique
1 Nihil Spellbomb

My questions are:

1) I'm debating between Hymn and Sinkhole in my sideboard. I like Sinkhole against Jund, Miracle, and decks that's run Punishing Fire, whereas Hymn is a good 2 for 1 discard that can work in several matchups.
2) Should I make room for Galgari Charm? This seems like a great card vs. tier 1 decks and can solve many of the worst problems that we run into.

EDIT: Maybe I split the difference - up my wasteland count to 4, and add 1 Hymn + 2 Charms in the SB.

[martijnend]

I guess I cut something that would be equivalent to the the 3rd thoughtseize your list. It has been amazing for me. The 4th permanent source of library manipulations is exactly what I have been looking for and as a 1 of it is rarely clunky unlike a fourth JtMS. At least give it a shot and see what you think.

I will give it a try. It might be a while since I get a chance to play it though. I'll post my thoughts here afterwards.


My questions are:

1) I'm debating between Hymn and Sinkhole in my sideboard. I like Sinkhole against Jund, Miracle, and decks that's run Punishing Fire, whereas Hymn is a good 2 for 1 discard that can work in several matchups.
2) Should I make room for Galgari Charm? This seems like a great card vs. tier 1 decks and can solve many of the worst problems that we run into.

EDIT: Maybe I split the difference - up my wasteland count to 4, and add 1 Hymn + 2 Charms in the SB.
Today, 09:44 AMWater_Wizard

1. Personally I'm no fan of Sinkhole in this deck. Your plan to up the number of Wastelands to four seems pretty good if you expect Punishing Jund. In that case I'll recommend Life from the Loam. The only two lands that you really want to destroy are Groves and Ports so there doesn't seem to be a need for more land destruction.

2. Yes... very much yes. That card is by far the best answer to most problems. Cut the Dread of Night. I think it's too much of a good thing to expect to land it and keep it on the board as a one of. Especially when people will be on the lookout for enchantments (Pernicious Deed and Engineered Plague primarily).
I don't know about a single Hymn in the sideboard. It will come when you don't need it more often than when you want it. Perhaps some extra targeted discard?


About Ponders, at least in my meta, I need to secure the board. Visions don't help me as they come late, so does Ponder. I'm "tempoish", that's true, but I'm better with more pointed removal (name it Strix, Jitte, Disfigure or Thoughtseize) than filtering my next draws. I think my deck is not going to provide me the answers (it's a way of thinking with this deck) so it's better if I already solve what I face "right now" instead of searching for the solution (that's why I usually don't Brainstorm with Jace here, I Fateseal, I already have a wincon, let's stop your answer).

Clear answer, thanks. We have different styles of play which very much explains our card choices. I just like my blue cards. ;)

[SansSerif]

1. Personally I'm no fan of Sinkhole in this deck. Your plan to up the number of Wastelands to four seems pretty good if you expect Punishing Jund. In that case I'll recommend Life from the Loam. The only two lands that you really want to destroy are Groves and Ports so there doesn't seem to be a need for more land destruction.

There are those, plus a few other annoying utility lands, but I was also thinking of sinkhole as a way to keep Jund off of BB, or any number of multicolor control decks from UU. I suppose I will play test to see how it goes.

[phazonmutant]

Took this deck to a local tournament today. I played a split of Lilianas, Hymns, and Thoughtseize (2,2,2) and it felt pretty solid. Whipflare in the board is amazing - helped to crush Merfolk. I lost to junk depths because I misboarded and cut Force, then he drew Mage/Depths before I could draw and drop Jace.

The main concern I have coming out of this tournament is the Dredge matchup. I've played against dredge with a bunch of control decks and I've practiced with the deck enough to know how I'm supposed to fight it. But despite a reasonable opener with Deathrite both games and him having average draws, I didn't feel like the match was close. Game 1 was close, game 2 was not. How do you guys feel the dredge matchup is with only 2 Nihil Spellbombs in the side as most lists have? To me it doesn't nearly feel like enough.

[Cire_dk]

Took this deck to a local tournament today. I played a split of Lilianas, Hymns, and Thoughtseize (2,2,2) and it felt pretty solid. Whipflare in the board is amazing - helped to crush Merfolk. I lost to junk depths because I misboarded and cut Force, then he drew Mage/Depths before I could draw and drop Jace.

The main concern I have coming out of this tournament is the Dredge matchup. I've played against dredge with a bunch of control decks and I've practiced with the deck enough to know how I'm supposed to fight it. But despite a reasonable opener with Deathrite both games and him having average draws, I didn't feel like the match was close. Game 1 was close, game 2 was not. How do you guys feel the dredge matchup is with only 2 Nihil Spellbombs in the side as most lists have? To me it doesn't nearly feel like enough.

I like the split of Lili Hymn and Thoughtseize. I have been testing the deck and came to thesame conclusion. I tried the Pierre Sommen list but 4 Lily seems to be to much for our list.
I am still not convinced about whipflare. How many do you run? Did you not have mana problems? Can you post your mana base? I agree it is a very nice card but I am worried the extra mana reuirements make it a bit tricky.

Dredge: unfortunately our SB has not a lot of space so we have to make choices. I only run 2 graveyard hate, DRS helps as well. Would revoker on Dread Return be an option?

I am looking forward to some ideas.

[JMLL]

I like the split of Lili Hymn and Thoughtseize. I have been testing the deck and came to thesame conclusion. I tried the Pierre Sommen list but 4 Lily seems to be to much for our list.
I am still not convinced about whipflare. How many do you run? Did you not have mana problems? Can you post your mana base? I agree it is a very nice card but I am worried the extra mana reuirements make it a bit tricky.

Dredge: unfortunately our SB has not a lot of space so we have to make choices. I only run 2 graveyard hate, DRS helps as well. Would revoker on Dread Return be an option?

I am looking forward to some ideas.

I have the same worries when thinking about casting Whipflare. I'll kill one of my Red sources, probably, and Vs decks that can destroy my lone Volcanir or Badlands, I'm going to have problems to cast the 2nd one (unless I set it for cascade). Is this, cascading, the only "relaliable-ish" way to do it?

Concerning the Dread Return, it's being cast, not activated, Revoker won't help. You only can remove its target with DRS in response to the cast or remove the spell itself when they can't cast it.

[martijnend]

I agree about the Whipflares. It seems a stress on the mana base and I'm not really convinced that it's really that good.

Dredge is always difficult in the first match. But after boarding you've got DRS, Spellbombs and perhaps Pulses or Deeds. It seems that you've got a good chance after boarding. In my experience it's pretty much 50-50, but it feels like a positive matchup. Don't forget to kill your own creature to exile their Bridge from Belows. I regularly see people make that mistake.

[phazonmutant]

I agree about the Whipflares. It seems a stress on the mana base and I'm not really convinced that it's really that good.

Dredge is always difficult in the first match. But after boarding you've got DRS, Spellbombs and perhaps Pulses or Deeds. It seems that you've got a good chance after boarding. In my experience it's pretty much 50-50, but it feels like a positive matchup. Don't forget to kill your own creature to exile their Bridge from Belows. I regularly see people make that mistake.

Oh yes, Deathrite was kind enough to take out 4 Bridge from Below game 1. It was too little too late though. The next turn he simply Dread Returned a giant Grave Troll and beat with Ichorids. I did find a Jace, but couldn't deal with the recurring 3/1s in time.

The reason I said Dredge feels bad is because DRS is not fast enough if they have literally any draw spell. 2 dedicated grave hate and 4 semihate cards are not enough against a reasonable dredge draw and opponent.

Regarding Whipflare, it's so much better than EPlague. 1 mana makes a world of difference. It was relevant as a 2-mana removal spell against Junk Depths, and it would have been good against Merfolk and an out to 16 Zombies against Dredge. You obviously shouldn't fetch for the Badlands until you need it and you do have DRS as another red-producer if you really need to cast Whipflare.

The manabase I played is pretty similar to what Lejay suggested:
// 23 land
2 Creeping Tar Pit
3 Wasteland
3 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
1 Badlands
1 Swamp
4 Polluted Delta
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Misty Rainforest

I would consider cutting the basic Swamp for a third Bayou. The basic really didn't do anything because you're already running so many nonbasics that having one basic is pretty irrelevant. I really like the double Tar-Pit, it's so clutch in any blue mirror, and it was relevant as a blocker at least once, as depressing as that seems. I never really wanted to use my Wastes except as anti-manland spells, so 3 seems ok. Both of these were explained pretty well by GerryT before.

[Kl'rt]

The reason I said Dredge feels bad is because DRS is not fast enough if they have literally any draw spell. 2 dedicated grave hate and 4 semihate cards are not enough against a reasonable dredge draw and opponent.


Well, isn't this just as simple as adding more gy hate if you want to beat Dredge? How many decks out there that don't have very much counter-magic can actually fight against Dredge evenly without enough gy hate? Don't think there're too many.

Lejay's list has 3 gy hate cards: A Grafdigger's and two Leylines. Having just one more greatly increases your chances of drawing it in a game. If you really want to beat Dredge, can always add a fourth one.

Personally, I'm more worried about Notion Thief. Since last weekend's SCG, people at my meta are starting to troll with it. This deck just has so many targets for it, and no instant way to kill him reliably.

[Sansian]

Whipflare is the truth. I run the standard 1 badlands and nothing more. I never once have had an issue with the mana. Most games the Badlands will ride out in my hand unless I'm really hard up for mana. That way I can brainstorm it back into my deck for value while keeping the possibility of whipflare a mystery to my opponent. Worst case scenario it's a waste-able swamp, best case it saves your ass from any number of possible bad situations. Plague is nice and all, but flare is just too good to ignore. It also goes a long way in the Jund match up where it acts as a (mostly) one sided Wrath excluding goyfs. In a match up where incremental value is everything, pulling a 2:1 or better is about the best thing you could possibly do.

Leylines of the Void are also pretty solid since they're also one sided.

As for Notion Thief, I think it will fall by the wayside. If it doesn't... well there are literally dozens of ways to deal with it in BUG colors.

[phazonmutant]

Well, isn't this just as simple as adding more gy hate if you want to beat Dredge? How many decks out there that don't have very much counter-magic can actually fight against Dredge evenly without enough gy hate? Don't think there're too many.

Lejay's list has 3 gy hate cards: A Grafdigger's and two Leylines. Having just one more greatly increases your chances of drawing it in a game. If you really want to beat Dredge, can always add a fourth one.

Personally, I'm more worried about Notion Thief. Since last weekend's SCG, people at my meta are starting to troll with it. This deck just has so many targets for it, and no instant way to kill him reliably.

Well yeah, that's pretty much what I'm saying. If beating dredge is a consideration, the sideboards that I've seen in most top-performing lists will not be enough. Dredge is probably not enough of a concern anymore that it's worth it though. I was really just trying to raise awareness of this.

Yeah, Cascade doesn't play well with any of the answers to him that I came up with off the top of my head. The best I can think of is find/get Jitte active before they find their Notion Thief.

[Lans89]

Well yeah, that's pretty much what I'm saying. If beating dredge is a consideration, the sideboards that I've seen in most top-performing lists will not be enough. Dredge is probably not enough of a concern anymore that it's worth it though. I was really just trying to raise awareness of this.

Yeah, Cascade doesn't play well with any of the answers to him that I came up with off the top of my head. The best I can think of is find/get Jitte active before they find their Notion Thief.

And with the upcomming changes Jitte gets some more value again. Jitte was always a card to destroy other Jitte's or would be destroyed by other Jittes which could be tutored in most other decks. It found a place in many Shardless BUG lists. Now Jitte will stay on the board in Shardless BUG, while we have better ways (Abrupt Decay) to deal with this evil piece of equipment from our opponent. Thoughts?

[Cire_dk]

And with the upcomming changes Jitte gets some more value again. Jitte was always a card to destroy other Jitte's or would be destroyed by other Jittes which could be tutored in most other decks. It found a place in many Shardless BUG lists. Now Jitte will stay on the board in Shardless BUG, while we have better ways (Abrupt Decay) to deal with this evil piece of equipment from our opponent. Thoughts?

I have always been a fan of Jitte. You need enough creatures to run it effectively so after boarding in 2 stricx and possibly revoker from the sideboard it becomes a lot stronger in my opinion. Thats why I am currently still have a Jitte in my SB.
After the rule chance it will of course be even better.

[_Fortune_]

Will this deck have to evolve to include more answers for <cards>Notion Thief</cards>? That card seems brutal and pre-board there seem to be very very answers to it.

[1rakete]

Yesterday I played BUG Shardless again at a local event and finished 6th with 4-1-1. My list was the same last month except for a small change in the sideboard:

4 Ancestral Vision
4 Brainstorm
4 Abrupt Decay
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Shardless Agent
3 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
4 Force of Will
4 Thoughtseize
4 Wasteland
3 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
4 Polluted Delta
1 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Creeping Tar Pit

//Sideboard
SB: 3 Engineered Plague
SB: 3 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 2 Golgari Charm
SB: 3 Hymn to Tourach
SB: 3 Nihil Spellbomb

The tourney was somehow very strange. From the four games I won in two games my opponents made huge mistakes otherwise I would have most likely lost the games. I played the following matchups:

2 - 1 vs Merfolk with Stifle and Standstill
2 - 0 vs White Stax
1 - 1 vs BU Control with Snapcaster, Sower, Notion Thief,...
2 - 0 vs Esper-Blade (list with Confidant, Stoneforge Mystic and DRS)
2 - 1 vs Dredge
1 - 2 vs BUG Tempo

For the next tourney (which will be after the rules update) I think I will change decks unless I have a very good idea for an update concerning this list because I think the following issues will come up:

- You have issues handling planeswalkers (after the rules update even more).
- You lack fast spot removal (for example against the new Esper-Blade, with DRS, Stoneforge and Confidant).
- In the current metagame development, I expect an uprise of merfolk which is a very bad matchup.

[Sansian]

Will this deck have to evolve to include more answers for Notion Thief? That card seems brutal and pre-board there seem to be very very answers to it.

I think the answer to this in a few months is Umezawa's Jitte. I could see this deck easily using two copies between the main and the side. It will generate more value when 1/5 of the decks you're likely to play against can't Stoneforge up a copy to blow yours. Another great answer in the meanwhile is Darkblast. It's especially nice because you can dredge it back and burn away draws that your opponent would get from the thief.

[Adryan]

For the next tourney (which will be after the rules update) I think I will change decks unless I have a very good idea for an update concerning this list because I think the following issues will come up:

- You have issues handling planeswalkers (after the rules update even more).
- You lack fast spot removal (for example against the new Esper-Blade, with DRS, Stoneforge and Confidant).
- In the current metagame development, I expect an uprise of merfolk which is a very bad matchup.

@handling planeswalkers: You just have to adapt your MB &SB:
Play something like Maelstrom Pulse, Garruk Relentless, Vendillion Clique, Notion Thief. All these cards pressure opposing planeswalker.

@fast spot removal: Dismember, Disfigure etc.?
@Meerfolk: More Removal, less Wasteland, more Basics, Pernicious Deed?

[1rakete]

@handling planeswalkers: You just have to adapt your MB &SB:
Play something like Maelstrom Pulse, Garruk Relentless, Vendillion Clique, Notion Thief. All these cards pressure opposing planeswalker.

@fast spot removal: Dismember, Disfigure etc.?
@Meerfolk: More Removal, less Wasteland, more Basics, Pernicious Deed?

Thanks for telling us the obvious. But how do you put this together in the BUG Shardless shell with very limited space and without losing the great flexibility of the deck?

[phazonmutant]

Thanks for telling us the obvious. But how do you put this together in the BUG Shardless shell with very limited space and without losing the great flexibility of the deck?

Whipflare is still a card that works really well in this deck. You can also play Liliana yourself to help get ahead in the planeswalker battles.

[Adryan]

Thanks for telling us the obvious. But how do you put this together in the BUG Shardless shell with very limited space and without losing the great flexibility of the deck?

because of your SB i thought nothing is obvious for you. i'm sorry

[1rakete]

@Adryan

You thought wrong. My sideboard is tailored to the meta we have at the tournament which is a lot of tribal (few merfolks atm but will be on the uprise), mid range and random decks, only few treshhold and combo.

@Phazonmuant

Yeah, I think a red splash will be necessary. I could even imagine playing dreadbore (in the sideboard). Or depending on testing more maelstrom pulse are necessary (if its fast enough).

[marumari]

Powered my build (posted earlier) to a 4-1 record, and then a 2nd place finish in the Top 8 (overall 6-2) at yesterday's 27 person Legacy tournament. Came home with a Taiga. Now up about $150 playing this deck over the last two months. Who says that Magic is a money draining hobby?

My two losses were against a very interesting and resilient Affinity build and in the finals against Miracles. The Miracles match was very close -- it went about 30 turns -- and at various points in the match I had Liliana of the Veil at 6 loyalty and JtMS at 11 loyalty. He had very very good top decks. C'est la vie!

I continue to see people who run Chill as a two-of in their sideboards, presumably against Burn. Given that the Burn matchup is so incredibly lopsided already, have people actually found it helpful for winning? I'd almost rather completely give up on ever reliably beating Burn and instead just focus on using those two sideboard slots to shore up other weaker matches.