i've been goldfishing the list that went 5-0 on mtgo a few weeks ago and it's quite fun. i played belcher at my last weekly and went 3-1, so i think it's fine to play spanish. you still have to be okay with losing to counters! also there's a lot of lightning bolts going around, so be careful with that as well.
-rob
up to you. belcher is likely the more consistent deck but you won't get turn 1 kills as much. i haven't played recross version, it does interest me as a doomsday player, but haven't played it.
SI is a better turn 1 deck. it can also mulligan to 3 or 4....i guess it can mulligan to 2 on the draw and still potentially win on turn 1 (DR, draw4, mana source)
when i played belcher i ran blood moons in the sb which felt pretty strong in this meta. SI can't really do that. it also comes down to preference. there's certainly a lot more decisioning when it comes down to SI vs Belcher, i wouldn't necessarily define that as skill. there's still a lot of skill in playing some belcher hands out and mulligan decisions can be more complex depending on the matchup (although you don't have to and can just say f it)
-rob
Very interesting observations, thank you.
After messing about with both decks, I found I much preferred PSI to Belcher. It's just more fun. I'm currently putting together the following list to try taking to local events while I ease myself back into Legacy.
1 Ill-Gotten Gains
4 Goblin Charbelcher
1 Tendrils of Agony
1 Empty the Warrens
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Infernal Contract
4 Cruel Bargain
1 Deathrite Shaman
2 Manamorphose
4 Summoner's Pact
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Chrome Mox
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Culling the Weak
4 Land Grant
1 Bayou
1 Dryad Arbor
This is essentially the list from the primer swapping Eternal Witness for Empty the Warrens and Slithermuse for Ill-Gotten Gains. I have messed with the ToA to Belcher ratio somewhat due to the discussion on this point around pages 30-36.
My question, though, is about sideboarding. This is the sideboard I'm considering.
4 Carpet of Flowers
4 Duress
1 Forest
3 Empty the Warrens
3 ???
The Forest is because I don't have a Taiga and want a basic land for the grind game.
My basic plan is to -4 Pact, -4 Culling, -1 Arbor for +4 Carpet, +4 Duress, +1 Forest against anything blue. I also have -3 Belcher, +3 EtW for anyone running Leyline of Sanctity or Pithing Needle. Against anything else, I'm just going to try and race the hate.
Is this a reasonable plan? And is there anything useful I could be doing with those three spare slots?
Seems like (at least when i play the deck) slithermuse is an all-star, being able to tutor for it on the play is so satisfying. Also, quite often you will natural tendrils through draw fours, maybe up you toa to at least two. Just my 2 cents.
i'd recommend lowering the number of belchers to either 2 or 1. sometimes you can be dependent on using chrome mox and belcher doesn't provide anything. also hands with multiple belchers are quite poor.
i'm not sure that the maindeck empty the warrens is a good idea. a lot of times you will need the pact to generate mana, and you won't be able to attack the following turn because you'll be dead.
there's a list that went 5-0 a few weeks ago which ran a sb of
leyline of the void
carpet
lotus bloom
and 3 autumn's veil.
my guess is that carpet, bloom, veil came in for all the pact related cards and just decided to overwhelm the opponent. leyline is probably a nod to all the storm and reanimator on modo. if you're going to play leyline then you might want to also include a helm of obedience and/or play more ill-gotten gains.
-rob
Bought into the deck (still waiting for all the pieces to arrive), the latest 5-0 deck online.
I understand that Skullwinder is easier to cast than E.Witness, but letting the opponent get a counter back from the grave is a huge downside for me (unless you are playing with the Leylines of the void), so I might switch that with E.Witness.
I like the Dark Petition als tutor #5, don't know if it is exactly necessary though.
Is Lone Wolf still interesting? As extra, recurrable fodder if you don't go off that turn, or with therapy's from the side. (although if you need to pact the wolf, there might not be an extra turn :-)
In the side I was thinking about:
4 Lotus Bloom
4 Carpet of Flowers
3 Autumn of Veil
4 Thoughtseize/Duress/Unmask
Maybe changing the bloom's for 4 Xantid Swarms, against the bluedecks, although against control decks I see the plus side of the blooms.
Or maybe extra discard, I think for the cost of 1 card for Unmask (can discard a DRS and extras can be pitched to Chrome Mox), a free discard and secure feeling against counters might be worth it.
I'm also very willingly to play the man plan, but how good is Tomb of Urami in a field full of decays, fatal push and STP's? But you should assume they will board those cards out in game 2, but you never know. At least it is 'counterfree' (except against stifle) to activate it, assuming you don't drop it too soon ;-)
I'm now recording all my goldfishing (starting hands and kill cards), and EtW never shows up, so I agree that it's a sideboard card for certain matchups.
Leylines in the side are very interesting; we mull so well that we can probably mull for them more aggressively than many other decks. I'll have to see how my meta shakes out, though, before deciding whether they make the cut.
Which build of the deck would you recommend to a Legacy veteran new to SI? The 5-0 MTGO list with 4 Pacts? I feel like the deck is in a good place for small FLGS tournaments now in the topless meta.
PSI is pretty well established but for 3-4 slots. These are used for culling targets (DRS, Skyshroud, Wild Cantor, etc), Infernal tutor targets (EtW, Slithermuse, IGG, etc) and utility slots (Manamorphose, Eternal Witness, etc). Play the ones that work for you.
That said, I have considered -2 ToA, +2 Dark Petition. The number of times that I see ToA in my opening hand and wish it was a business spell...
Thanks! Based on a few hours of goldfishing, I think the following has been relatively easily approachable for a newbie like me:
1 ToA
2 Belcher
1 EtW
Thinking if I could fit 1 more Belcher/EtW into the MD somehow. This would save me 1 SB slot.
1 PiF
0 IGG
1 Slithermuse
0 Dark Petition
DP seems awful in my test opening hands because it requires 5 mana and 2 instants/sorceries in gy. I would rather just get to 4 mana and drop Belcher or cast EtW "blindly" in g1. Or spend 4 mana for PiF and start re-casting Dark Rituals. Or just hard cast Slithermuse "blindly".
0 Witness
0 Skullwinder
0 Manamorphose
0 Skyshroud (NOTE: Have not done any goldfishing with Skyshroud yet)
1 Wild Cantor
1 Tinder Wall
IMO Tinder Wall supports MD PiF better than Manamorphose due to Pacts and better than WC due to RR = +1 mana total, and increases the gy card count for Cabal Ritual better than SSG. Also having an additional CtW target castable with ESG mana doesn't hurt.
Witness and Winder seem terrible in my test opening hands. I prefer being able to get rid of all cards in my hand easily (even without LED or multiple Chrome Moxes) to enable IT and Slithermuse for greater profit.
This setup has enabled me to decrease my mulligan and fizzle rate while goldfishing. Not sure how well the setup will work after sideboarding vs a live opponent, though.
First, you are right to think that every pilot needs to tune his deck to his own particular decision tree. But let me flag up a few things.
In my opinion, it is generally wrong to have more than one of Slithermuse, Empty the Warrens, Ill-Gotten Gains, and Past in Flames in the deck. That is because these all answer the question 'what do I get with Infernal Tutor?' While each has their own strengths and weaknesses, and in any given situation one may be better than another, with limited deck space you generally can't afford more than one. And all of them are painful draw into (although IGG the least so).
Slithermuse is explosive, but unreliable. Think of every time you mull your starting seven: that could have been a Slithermuse fizzle. It also gets worse on the draw, or as the game goes on.
Empty the Warrens just wins. Unless you had to Summoner's Pact this turn.
Ill-Gotten Gains needs you to float at least one mana into it, to start off your chain again. It also only really works with Dark Rituals & LEDs in your graveyard. Hope they don't have GY hate!
Past in Flames also needs you to float at least one mana into it. It also only really works with lots of rituals in the Graveyard. Hope they don't have GY hate!
EtW aside, five is probably the correct number of kill spells. The ratio of ToA to GCB is a matter of taste. ToA can be imprinted, and you can just randomly win mid-combo by drawing into it. GCB is far more awkward, but there are plenty of starting hands that you would have to mull with with ToA that just win with GCB. As you say, though, the more GCB you have in your maindeck, the more SB space you free up.
I note that you've not mentioned Odious Trow/Deathrite Shaman. Do keep in mind that being able to Pact for black to imprint is very useful. Especially if you are running GCB heavy, as you will have fewer 'dead' spells to imprint with.
Last edited by Silent Requiem; 06-05-2017 at 10:47 AM.
Thanks for the input!
1) I have not tested Skyshroud exactly because I don't believe it's worth running compared to WC, Tinder Wall and DRS. Storm count +1 with +5 life is negative for ToA math unless you have CtW to exploit it, and even then saving 1 green mana is very marginal corner case.
2) I used a mtgtop8 deck list as the basis, which had 1 IGG + 1 Slithermuse. I thought that 1 Slithermuse + 1 PiF was slightly "less clunky" than that, and would not allow the opponent to recover their used Spell Pierce / Daze / Surgical (some lines of play where we cast Land Grant can open us up for Surgical, especially if the opponent has more cards to board out than in for the MU -> Surgical in). It didn't cross my mind that I could only run only one card out of the three, and replace the second one with ToA/GCB/EtW. In this case, Slithermuse is the one to cut due to being the most conditional on t2+ and being off-color in addition to that. I guess I should goldfish a list without Slithermuse next.
3) Yes, I have been playing with DRS. Bayou, DRS, go is a potential T1 opening play. Potentially I get to exile opposing fetchland for mana before casting CtW to go off. Pacting DRS to imprint black to Chrome Mox is also a nice option or line of play.
Did a bunch of goldfishing with the following list, seems solid (flex slots in bold):
Sorcery (21)
4x Cruel Bargain
1x Dark Petition
1x Empty the Warrens
1x Ill-Gotten Gains
4x Infernal Contract
4x Infernal Tutor
4x Land Grant
2x Tendrils of Agony
Creature (7)
1x Deathrite Shaman
4x Elvish Spirit Guide
1x Tinder Wall
1x Wild Cantor
Instant (16)
4x Cabal Ritual
4x Culling the Weak
4x Dark Ritual
4x Summoner's Pact
Artifact (14)
4x Chrome Mox
2x Goblin Charbelcher
4x Lion's Eye Diamond
4x Lotus Petal
Land (2)
1x Bayou
1x Dryad Arbor
Currently wondering about sideboard plans.
Option 1:
Sideboard (15)
4x Carpet of Flowers
2x Duress
2x Empty the Warrens
4x Lotus Bloom
1x Taiga
2x Thoughtseize
Option 2:
4x Carpet of Flowers
4x Lotus Bloom
4x Leyline of the Void
1x Helm of Obedience
2x Thoughtseize
I think I am mostly concerned about non-blue Chalice MU (Eldrazi), which is quite popular in my metagame. Carpet of Flowers doesn't really help, and I am not 100% convinced about Lotus Bloom either if they play Chalice @ 0. How bad is t1 Chalice @ 0 or 1 or t1 Thorn of Amethyst against us when we are on the draw? I get that t1 Revoker naming Belcher can be nasty. Should I dedicate some slots to artifact hate (which hate?)? Or should I just purchase more Helm of Obediences for a transitional sb? Man plan sb does not really work vs Eldrazi.
EDIT:
My thinking vs Eldrazi:
1)
For artifact hate cards, I am considering Serenity, Hurkyl's Recall or Meltdown combined with a 1of splash color land for Land Grant.
2)
Not sure if it's just better to dedicate 0 slots to the MU and hope to dodge it
3) or if I should just load the SB with cmc1 spot discard, hoping to win g1 t1 on the play, and mulligan into spot discard in g3 on the play
4) or try transitional Helm-Line, even though it does yake up a lot of slots
Last edited by Karhumies; 06-06-2017 at 04:32 AM.
A combination of plan 2 and 3 :-)
Remember, they need to mulligan to a Chalice on turn 1 too. Which isn't always that obvious for Eldrazi.
What is everybody's thought about Unmask over TS/Duress? Against Eldrazi, you can cast it turn 1 even without going off and without exposing yourself to a wasteland, or using a petal.
OK, you 'lose' a card, but save a Mana (plus it goes through CotV on 1 :-)). And for the goldfishing I have done, the first was less worst than missing that extra mana.
And what is the best option against blue decks for the sideboard?
4 carpets is a no-brainer
maybe the Lotus blooms but only in grindy matchups
and what else, right now I'm shifting between autumn veil and xantid swarm. Swarm can help you over serveral turns, but can be removed and you need to wait a turn to go off. Autumn's Veil can be cast when necessary (if you keep one green open) but folds to a double counter (counters the veil and your business spell)
Of course I include some discard as well. (choice between Unmask/TS/Duress is still not sure)
But with all these awesome sideboard choices, what do you remove? I assume the following:
4 Pacts (need to go off in multiple turns probably)
4 Culling (no pacts means less flexibility to get a culling target)
1 Skullwinder/Eternal Witness (pact target)
1 IGG (more vulnerable to grave hate + opponents can recure counters)
If I need to add more, what is the following on the chopping block to board out?
Sorry for the double post.
Not an experienced SI pilot, but here are my thoughts anyway:
First of all, which blue decks in particular? I think that currently a popular counter setup for tempo lists is 4 FoW, 4 Daze and 1-2 Spell Pierce main with 1-2 Flusterstorm in the sb. Midrange and grindy control lists might not be running any Dazes md to avoid bad late game topdecks. Some Mystic equipment package lists might be running 1-2 Counterspell and 0-1 Spell Snare with 2-3 Snapcaster Mage for high mana cost counter recursion.
For such a light counter density now that top is banned and CB decks are not tier 1/DTB, I feel that a good approach is to just overload them with threats: 4 Carpet, 4 Bloom is probably already more "key spells" than their list is prepared to handle due to them having so many irrelevant cards in the 75 for this MU.
What I am mostly worried about then is not U decks, it's Ub decks which combine counters with spot discard. If this buys them enough time to land a Leovold who stops our draw effects, they are probably winning the MU.
What to cut:
I would start by cutting the 4 Pacts for obvious reasons.
Then cut 1-of Pact targets which don't really progress our game plan all that much when drawn into and played naturally, especially if you plan to cut CtW as well. Namely Skyshroud, Wild Cantor, Death-Rite Shaman, Dryad Arbor, possibly even Eternal Witness. Tinder Wall can be left in because it's essentially a ritual due to +1 mana.
In magical Christmas land, you could attack with Swarm first, then use CtW on it yourself to go off in second main phase. But I don't recommend leaving the full set of CtW in since you open up yourself to 1:2 if CtW gets countered. But I could probably justify leaving a 1-of in if you have a Swarm list.
Then, cut stuff which gets randomly hosed by Surgical or other gy hate. Namely IGG, probably also PiF.
Then, if you have ToA in md with alt win cons in the side (e.g. EtW) you can swap those around since ToA needs a really high storm count which might be unfeasible and non-lethal Tendrils can be very sad panda.
What to bring in:
Extra land or 2 can help in playing grindy games and through tax counters, especially if you are cutting the Dryad Arbor.
Carpets and Blooms to overload them with our density.
EtW > ToA
Your choice of spot discard, Defense Grid/Xantid Swarm/Autumn's Veil. Personally, I like spot discard a lot because it's useful also in non-blue MUs vs. Ethersworn Canonist, Chalice of the Void, Phyrexian Revoker, Pithing Needle, etc. Veil is good if you suspect the opponent to leave in permanent hate to kill Swarm/Grid. This can happen "accidentally" if they have not enough sb cards to bring in vs storm, and they have to choose "the least horrible cards" to keep in the 60. Keeping Abrupt Decay in to destroy our LED, or keeping in 1-2of Lightning bolt to shoot in our face if we pay too much life to D4s, for example, can be a solid choice, and those can randomly hit Swarm/Grid as well.
Quote back from page 38:
I stumbled across some potential new tech, or at least, new to me.
I've been running 4 ToA, 1 GCB and I was wishing that ToA was less of a dead card. So, I tried dropping 2 ToA for 2 Dark Petition. The logic was that in your opening hand it still imprints for black, but some hands will be able to turn DP into business in a way that ToA could not. And in the late combo it's essentially ToA for +2 mana. So far so obvious.
What I had not expected was the amazing synergy with Infernal Tutor. If you can hit 5 mana, DP can fetch LED, and give you back 3 mana, which is enough to cast IT with 4 floating after cracking LED. That's perfect for Slithermuse, Empty the Warrens or ToA.
So by running a couple of DP, I'm suddenly turning on those IT that sit (nearly) dead in your hand when you have no LED available.
Has anyone else had success with Dark Petition?
1 Bayou
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Chrome Mox
4 Cruel Bargain
4 Culling the Weak
2 Dark Petition
4 Dark Ritual
1 Deathrite Shaman
1 Dryad Arbor
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Ill-Gotten Gains
4 Infernal Contract
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Land Grant
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
1 Skullwinder
1 Slithermuse
4 Summoner's Pact
2 Tendrils of Agony
1 Wild Cantor
1 Goblin Charbelcher
//SB:
4 Leyline of the Void
4 Carpet of Flowers
3 Autumn's Veil
4 Lotus Bloom
i was also trying out a 2nd iggy over the charbelcher since it's a mox target and i really like the leyline + iggy interaction.
-rob
-rob
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