Hanni
10-30-2006, 06:37 PM
Well, I've been toying around with quite a few Survival variants lately and I decided to post this one up. I had tested around with G/R/w and G/R/b Survival Advantage as well.
This deck is basically G/b The Rock with Survival added for consistency. The deck differs drastically from Surival Advantage because the deck is not trying to play fatties with haste. Instead, it's trying to play the control role with some solid beaters.
The deck is not highly tuned yet, since I threw it together and only did a few tweaks here and there. I'll list the deck before I go into more detail:
Lands (23)
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Windswept Heath
4 Bayou
7 Forest
4 Wasteland
Creatures (19)
4 Birds of Paradise
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Genesis
3 Ohran Viper
3 Eternal Witness
3 Troll Ascetic
1 Bone Shredder
1 Masticore
1 Spiritmonger
Spells (18)
4 Rancor
4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Pernicious Deed
Sideboard (15)
1 Viridian Shaman
1 Cabal Therapy
2 Withered Wretch
3 Diabolic Edict
1 Bone Shredder
4 Engineered Plague
3 Pithing Needle
With the lands, I wanted to run Wasteland as additional disruption rather than manlands (Factories), even though it's probably a toss-up since the Factories work well with Deeds. So far, I've liked the additional disruption that I've gotten from Wasteland. The rest fits the curves pretty well.
Birds of Paradise might have some anti synergy with Deed but it helps accel into turn 2 Viper/Troll much better. It also helps round out the manabase nicely with Survival. Birds are very good in this deck.
Aside from that, I didn't feel like the deck needed much else for acceleration. One difference between Survival Advantage and this deck is that this deck has a fundamental cc curve of 3 for its beats, whereas SA has a cc curve of 4. I did add 1 Rofellos, but that's simply because he helps accel into Witness + cast what Witness grabbed from the yard. It helps speed up the deck a bit and is still a solid 2cc drop.
Squee and Genesis are obvious inclusions. I normally don't like Genesis in Survival because it's slow... but this deck is slow. It's nice to be able to Deeds the table (killing Survival anyway) and then Genesis guys back to gain a big advantage.
I decided I wanted to go less aggressive and more controllish, so I went with Ohran Viper. He's a solid 3cc 1/3 that draws a card every turn... unless it gets blocked, in which case it destroys any creature that blocks it. 3 toughness makes it pretty sturdy, and it fits the control role very nicely. I also put in 3 Eternal Witnesses. Both Viper and Witness give the deck card advantage/quality, which suit the control role nicely. Being able to Witness for a Bone Shredder has won me quite a few matchups, as well as Witness for Duress/Therapy or Pernicious Deed. Witness isn't too bad at 2/1, but he isn't the strongest aggressor.
To round out my fundamental 3cc creature slots, I decided to toss in 3 Troll Ascetic. My other 3cc guys were lacking in fat and Troll Ascetic puts on the aggression pretty nicely. He doesn't lack in the control role though, being hard to remove with untargetability and regeneration.
The reason for 3cc guys rather than 2cc is because often I want to Deed for 2, and it doesn't affect my 3cc guys. Also, the 4 Rancor are their to turn my weak aggressors like Ohran and Witness into actual threats. Rancor on Troll wins games.
In addition to the 9 3cc creature core, I added a tiny toolbox. Masticore comes in as a 4cc 4/4 fattie but is also hard to remove with Regeneration and acts as control by killing off the opponent's creatures (pretty great against Goblins, etc). Masticore is great creature and Squee makes him solid. I almost always add 1 Masticore in my Survival variants. Since this deck doesn't have access to red for Flametongue Kavu, I decided to run 1 Bone Shredder. He deals with most problematic threats like Exalted Angel, etc. The last spot in the toolbox was Spiritmonger. Spiritmonger's purpose in the toolbox is mainly to act as a big 5cc finisher (especially with a Rancor). He still fits the control role somewhat with Regeneration and he surives Deed (I have yet to blow up Deed for 5+).
Rancor makes my aggro more aggressive and it's reusable.
Survival helps to increase the consistency of my game plan, giving me access to Witnesses etc when I need them but also allowing me to toolbox for guys like Bone Shredder when necessary. It also helps thin the deck out so that I draw into lands and spells. It puts Genesis in the yard so that I can easily recover after I cast Deed for 3+.
The 7 1cc discard plan gives the deck a nice control start, removing problematic cards like Pithing Needle etc. With Survival and etc, Cabal Therapy has the ability to completely tear an opponent's hand to shreads. The discard also greatly improves the combo matchup.
Pernicious Deed gives the deck a board sweeper. This helps the deck recover from early game assaults, Pithing Needle, Jitte, etc. It's alot less symmetrical in here since it usually gets popped for 1-2 but when it gets popped for 3+ I usually have card advantage/quality to recover with (Viper/Witness and even Genesis). It's just a very solid card overall that has won me countless games. I feel that Deed is well supported in here, even though this is an aggro/control deck.
The sideboard was just randomly tossed together so I won't elaborate.
Comments/Suggestions are welcome. This is mostly just a fun deck for me so feel free to bash with "this deck sucks and will never survive in the Legacy format" all you want (although I would prefer positive/constructive criticism rather than negative feedback).
This deck is basically G/b The Rock with Survival added for consistency. The deck differs drastically from Surival Advantage because the deck is not trying to play fatties with haste. Instead, it's trying to play the control role with some solid beaters.
The deck is not highly tuned yet, since I threw it together and only did a few tweaks here and there. I'll list the deck before I go into more detail:
Lands (23)
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Windswept Heath
4 Bayou
7 Forest
4 Wasteland
Creatures (19)
4 Birds of Paradise
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Genesis
3 Ohran Viper
3 Eternal Witness
3 Troll Ascetic
1 Bone Shredder
1 Masticore
1 Spiritmonger
Spells (18)
4 Rancor
4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Duress
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Pernicious Deed
Sideboard (15)
1 Viridian Shaman
1 Cabal Therapy
2 Withered Wretch
3 Diabolic Edict
1 Bone Shredder
4 Engineered Plague
3 Pithing Needle
With the lands, I wanted to run Wasteland as additional disruption rather than manlands (Factories), even though it's probably a toss-up since the Factories work well with Deeds. So far, I've liked the additional disruption that I've gotten from Wasteland. The rest fits the curves pretty well.
Birds of Paradise might have some anti synergy with Deed but it helps accel into turn 2 Viper/Troll much better. It also helps round out the manabase nicely with Survival. Birds are very good in this deck.
Aside from that, I didn't feel like the deck needed much else for acceleration. One difference between Survival Advantage and this deck is that this deck has a fundamental cc curve of 3 for its beats, whereas SA has a cc curve of 4. I did add 1 Rofellos, but that's simply because he helps accel into Witness + cast what Witness grabbed from the yard. It helps speed up the deck a bit and is still a solid 2cc drop.
Squee and Genesis are obvious inclusions. I normally don't like Genesis in Survival because it's slow... but this deck is slow. It's nice to be able to Deeds the table (killing Survival anyway) and then Genesis guys back to gain a big advantage.
I decided I wanted to go less aggressive and more controllish, so I went with Ohran Viper. He's a solid 3cc 1/3 that draws a card every turn... unless it gets blocked, in which case it destroys any creature that blocks it. 3 toughness makes it pretty sturdy, and it fits the control role very nicely. I also put in 3 Eternal Witnesses. Both Viper and Witness give the deck card advantage/quality, which suit the control role nicely. Being able to Witness for a Bone Shredder has won me quite a few matchups, as well as Witness for Duress/Therapy or Pernicious Deed. Witness isn't too bad at 2/1, but he isn't the strongest aggressor.
To round out my fundamental 3cc creature slots, I decided to toss in 3 Troll Ascetic. My other 3cc guys were lacking in fat and Troll Ascetic puts on the aggression pretty nicely. He doesn't lack in the control role though, being hard to remove with untargetability and regeneration.
The reason for 3cc guys rather than 2cc is because often I want to Deed for 2, and it doesn't affect my 3cc guys. Also, the 4 Rancor are their to turn my weak aggressors like Ohran and Witness into actual threats. Rancor on Troll wins games.
In addition to the 9 3cc creature core, I added a tiny toolbox. Masticore comes in as a 4cc 4/4 fattie but is also hard to remove with Regeneration and acts as control by killing off the opponent's creatures (pretty great against Goblins, etc). Masticore is great creature and Squee makes him solid. I almost always add 1 Masticore in my Survival variants. Since this deck doesn't have access to red for Flametongue Kavu, I decided to run 1 Bone Shredder. He deals with most problematic threats like Exalted Angel, etc. The last spot in the toolbox was Spiritmonger. Spiritmonger's purpose in the toolbox is mainly to act as a big 5cc finisher (especially with a Rancor). He still fits the control role somewhat with Regeneration and he surives Deed (I have yet to blow up Deed for 5+).
Rancor makes my aggro more aggressive and it's reusable.
Survival helps to increase the consistency of my game plan, giving me access to Witnesses etc when I need them but also allowing me to toolbox for guys like Bone Shredder when necessary. It also helps thin the deck out so that I draw into lands and spells. It puts Genesis in the yard so that I can easily recover after I cast Deed for 3+.
The 7 1cc discard plan gives the deck a nice control start, removing problematic cards like Pithing Needle etc. With Survival and etc, Cabal Therapy has the ability to completely tear an opponent's hand to shreads. The discard also greatly improves the combo matchup.
Pernicious Deed gives the deck a board sweeper. This helps the deck recover from early game assaults, Pithing Needle, Jitte, etc. It's alot less symmetrical in here since it usually gets popped for 1-2 but when it gets popped for 3+ I usually have card advantage/quality to recover with (Viper/Witness and even Genesis). It's just a very solid card overall that has won me countless games. I feel that Deed is well supported in here, even though this is an aggro/control deck.
The sideboard was just randomly tossed together so I won't elaborate.
Comments/Suggestions are welcome. This is mostly just a fun deck for me so feel free to bash with "this deck sucks and will never survive in the Legacy format" all you want (although I would prefer positive/constructive criticism rather than negative feedback).