Even if you did terrible some details are still helpful. What was your list and what decks did you play and what was the end game state like etc? Please :)Originally Posted by Megadeus
I've been tweaking around with a junk/dnt hybrid for a little bit. I orginally posted it in the maverick thread, but it has since become more junk-like (and this thread is just so much more active) so I thought I'd post it here for some evaluation.
I just played it at a 4 round local and came in 4th at 3-1. Here's the current list and I'll give a brief recap of how I did as I didn't take any notes.
Creatures (21)
3x Deathrite Shaman
3x Mother of Runes
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
3x Dark Confidant
3x Phyrexian Revoker
4x Stoneforge Mystic
2x Knight of the Reliquary
Spells (17)
4x Aether Vial
1x Batterskull
1x Sword of Fire and Ice
1x Umezawa's Jitte
2x Sylvan Library
4x Swords to Plowshares
2x Abrupt Decay
2x Lingering Souls
Lands (22)
1x Forest
1x Swamp
1x Plains
4x Marsh Flats
3x Windswept Heath
2x Verdant Catacombs
1x Horizon Canopy
3x Scrubland
2x Savannah
1x Karakas
3x Wasteland
SB:
2x Engineered Explosives
2x Gaddock Teeg
1x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2x Rest in Peace
2x Zealous Persecution
4x Thoughtseize
1x Council's Judgment
1x Sword of Feast and Famine
Round 1: Burn--(0-2)
G1: This was pretty brutal, he basically curves out with goblin guide (not giving me any lands for 3 turns) and I die a flaming death.
G2: Out: 3 confidant; In: 2 EE, 1 Thalia (I could see adding more for this matchup since it seems fairly miserable)
I kept a shaky hand with 5 lands, 1 sylvan, 1 sfm. I probably shouldve just tossed it back, but there aren't any super great hate cards for me to bring in so I figure I might as well just try for a fast sfm->batterskull. Needless to say, I get crushed after my sfm eats a searing blaze and he empties his hand for about 11 dmg on turn 3 or 4.
Round 2: Miracles (2-0)
G1: I was on the play and I had tested this matchup fairly extensively. G1 is not too bad since you have the vials to just get value as well as the thalia+karakas combo to save your creature. This game was pretty simple--he gets flooded without a top on the field; he top decks a terminus around t3/4 to take my mom/drs as i bounce my thalia into my hand. Next turn I make 2 tokens from souls+ vial in thalia to get 4 power on the board. 2 turns later, another terminus comes out and I karakas my thalia and use the second half of my souls for the win.
G2: Out: 4x Swords to Plowshares, 2x Knight of the Reliquary, 4x Aether Vial, 1x Umezawa's Jitte; In: 2x Gaddock Teeg, 1 Thalia, 2x Engineered Explosives, 1x Council's Judgment, 1x Sword of Feast and Famine, 4x Thoughtseize.
I was mostly testing out taking out vials for thoughtseizes to attack their removal/snap/judgment. I honestly don't know if its the correct strategy as I didnt see a thoughtseize until about the game ended (I filtered through it as it was off a sylvan). This game was a slow grind--he got top and karakas online which blanked 2x thalia, 2x teegs in my hand. I eventually just slowly run out 2x stoneforges grabbing batterskull and sofai. At some point I get a library into play and basically whiff on finding anything useful for about 3 turns with fetches. From his end, he swords, snap->swords once or twice; hits 2 terminuses and resolves a jace at some point, but I had a drs equipped with sofai which ends up killing his jace. I eventually get there with a 3rd stoneforge (thalia+teeg were just fogged by karakas continually).
Round 3: UR Cruise Burn (2-0)
G1: This matchup wasnt too bad to be honest. I had a hand with jitte, 2-3 lands, and vial. I started with vial and proceed to put in: drs, eats bolt; bob, eats bolt; then sfm which gets batterskull and sticks. I believe i swords a delver and decayed a pyromancer on his side; at one point he cruises->ponder->brainstorms and finds a singleton swiftspear after all of it. Batterskull+jitte online for a turn eats his board and he concedes.
G2: Out: 3x Dark Confidant, 3x Phyrexian Revoker, 2x Knight of the Reliquary; In: 2x EE, 2x Zealous Persecution, 1x Council's Judgment, 1x Thalia
He sticks a turn 1 grim, while I stick a t1 drs. He doesnt get enough cards into his gy to turn on lavamancer turn 2 and instead plays a delver; I play my land and eat his land to play sfm grabbing batterskull. Eot he brainstorms and gets his delver flip. I find a swords to kill grim and play out a second sfm grabbing jitte. He doesnt have another bolt and on my turn i vial in jitte and strap it onto drs. I use the counters to ping off the delver. On his turn he plays a needle on jitte, but he cant find any more threats. On my turn I make a batterskull and after a while I find a EE, blow it for 1 and strap jitte onto batterskull. He doesn't find any outs in 2 turns.
Round 4: Death and Taxes (2-0)
G1: This was a pretty back and forth game. We both get t1 vials, and we both get fairly slow starts. At about t3/4 his board is vial @ 2, serra avenger, flickerwisp, and a sfm w/o summoning sickness and batterskull in hand. I have a vial@2, drs, sfm, thalia, and unequipped batterskull. He swings in for 6 and I take it; eot I vial in bob. I actually miss his trigger on my turn (been a while since I've played with bob/vial) and I sfm in jitte and equip onto bob, swinging into his batterskull. He makes his batterskull and blocks my bob; I then use the counters to kill the token and put down a revoker naming batterskull. I stabilize with jitte and a swords on his avenger and then basically lock him out with a drs strapped with jitte. From there on, I killed every one of his creatures.
G2: Out: 3x Thalia, 2x Dark Confidant; In: 2x EE, 2x Persecution, 1x Council's Judgment. In hindsight I shouldve taken out 2x kotr instead of 2x bob's. This game was over pretty fast--I basically had infinite removal for all of his threats. He resolves a RIP on me on turn 2, but my sylvan just finds me 2x ZP's, 1x EE, 2x StP's with enough power on the ground to punch through.
Overall, the deck feels pretty powerful as it takes a lot of the strongest elements of DnT and adds in the card advantage, manipulation and power that junk offers. From my limited testing, the deck is pretty good versus sneak as well, because of the kotr-> karakas lines (but I have since cut a kotr so it may have gotten weaker in the matchup). I'm mostly wondering about your opinions on the follow questions:
1) Is the versatility of toxic deluge worth it even though it kills so many of my own creatures
2) Should the 4th thalia be a 4th revoker/3rd teeg/5th discard spell since having legendary creatures makes me more vulnerable to karakas just stalling forever
3) Is there any amazing tech vs elves?
So that's my brew and any critiques or comments are welcome.
I played against a 4 Color walker control variant, a UW Thopter deck, and burn versus a man who was in his second tournament ever. Both the games versus the blue decks I had decent starts and we had great games, in the end it just came down to their cruises and digs being able to find gas. I'll admit my list (which I'll post later) is probably not good, but trying to out attrition these blue decks without a swift clock feels next to impossible
I am definitely deferring to you superior deck building skills and format knowledge. Running your 75 tonight for FNM and I will do my best to take notes.
"The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
—Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order
@something... Any deck that has five 3ofs is suffering from "I can't focus my deck" syndrome :)
Deathrite shaman is one of the best reasons to play black green so play 4 of him
I'm pretty sure Mom gets better in multiples
And you want to see her as soon as you can, so that's a 4 of
You want to use her to protect sweet creatures, so 4
Bobs.
I don't have experience with Thalia, id check out D&T lists to see if you want 3 or 4.
You need to make cuts. You don't need souls I don't think, anti synergy with both vial and Thalia.
And I think you may need to chose between sylvan library and SFM
I'd probably try this:
4 DRS
4 Mom
4 Bob
4 Thalia
3 Revoker
4 SFM
1 Jitte
1 SoFaI
1 Batterakull
2 KotR
4 StP
2 Decay
4 Vial
22 land
As for elves tech, gaddock teeg, EE, Spirit of the Labyrinth, Perish, Zealous Persecution, Humility + Equipment
Hope thay helps :)
Though from what I understand, D&T works with a mana denial plan, you only have 3 wastelands and no ports, because you are 3 colours. I guess the Knights help you find wasteland, but still, you're diluting D&T to add abrupt decay and shaman basically
And this is one of the main reasons why the meta hasn't seen Junk and Taxes. The mana is too important to DnT's shell. You need to run 8 colorless sources: Ports and Wastes. Toss in 3 colors and you'll be hurting for making it come together. If you're pushing for something, I could try 4 waste, 4 port, 7 fetch, 7 mana-producing lands.
The issue with Thalia is that she makes Decay, the best BG, worse.
I understand what you're saying in that D&T has a heavy mana denial strategy and I fully understand that I cannot hope to imitate that heavy mana denial strategy because I simply dont have the ability to run as many colorless lands. As a result, I cut back on the thalia numbers and added more spells. Thalia doesn't serve the same purpose for me as D&T--they use it as an essential lock piece, that along with wastes, ports, and revoker on drs shuts down the opposing player's manabase. Its less powerful as a card in my deck, but still has plenty of uses versus the fast UR cruise decks as well as combo (I see her as my weakest creature at a lot of times, but its still annoying as hell for my opponents so often)
As for the dissynergy with spells such as decay and souls and thalia--I feel like the deck is similar to maverick in that I have a lot more mana to pay for the extra 1 tax (if thalia is on the field). Furthermore, while maverick is using its mana to cast both spells and creatures, an early vial frees up a lot of my mana to just casting spells. DnT uses this vial advantage to use its extra lands to tap down opposing lands with ports, but they also have spells that they want to cast, sometimes even through thalia--judgment, cataclysm, rest in peace, and stranded equipment. I was also initially quite hesitant to run thalia with souls and decay, but both spells have been extremely valuable in so many different situations that to not include them while running the junk colors would have just been wrong.
As for the other 3-of's--I started the list at a bunch of 4 of's (the list Jain_Mor suggested actually has 62 cards), but there were just different situations where each creature was either terrible/amazing. So instead of running 4-of's of each card, I categorize them into cards that basically do the same thing--3 bob/2 sylvan are card filtering/drawing; 3 drs/4 vial are mana accelerants; 3 thalia/3 revoker/2kotr are hatebears (I classify kotr as a bit of a hatebear b/c its great vs certain decks like sneak, reanimator, ad 12 post). That being said, I do occasionally want the 4th mom and it is something I'm looking to put back into the deck. However she does present the problem of adding another creature into the line of fire for your opponents mass sweepers such as terminus, zp, deluge, ee, etc. DRS on the other hand is great as a late game threat in g1, but in g2/3 gy hate comes in and rip will neuter drs from doing any pinging past t3/4 (I am also almost solely relying on their gy for the pings so multiples do become dead fairly fast, especially when they start delving). The 4th bob is also something that I haven't missed--he is great as a singleton on the field, but becomes very suicidal in multiples. I understand the redundancy argument and that a bob that sticks around wins games; however my deck has a lot of creatures that tend to have huge targets on their heads and I can usually sequence bob in there so that he doesnt die or is removal magnet for a kotr/library to survive.
IMO Thalia has two major weaknesses that make her a tough sell: Terminus and Elves. The former is very castable under her, making it hard to keep pressure on. The latter is just not affected by her at all. I also don't like Thalia against Cruise since the tax can be paid via delve. I really believe in the marriage of Spirit and Teeg, since we can break the symmetry of those cards so much easier.
I played a 5 round FNM last night using Matt's list here.
I had a pretty miserable showing, finished 1-3 and a free win in the last round since my opponent had left for the night. I'll try reconstruct what happened, but in summery I had severe mana issues, compounded by misplays.
Round 1: BUG Delver
Game 1: I keep a hand with three lands, but he is fast out of the gate with 2 Delvers in the first 3 turns. They flip, but I manage to Decay one of them. He drops Goyf after Goyf after Goyf, but I draw Goyf, Goyf, Souls, Deathrite, Stoneforge for Sword of Fire and Ice. I end up at 2 and he has Deathrite, but there are no instants or sorceries left in the yard, and with some creative blocking (double blocked one Goyf with Goyf + Deathrite, since it was useless to try to activate when he can activate to counter) I get a Soul with a Sword (lucky that 2 was not a 1 because I needed to fetch), shoot down the Deathrite, chump again, and take over the game with the Sword. Maybe tonight luck is on my side?
Game 2: I keep a Bayou, Plains, Deathrite, double Bob, Stoneforge, Library hand. I figure if he Wastes me, I can still use Deathrite and land a two drop and draw another land. Oh, how wrong I was. Bayou gets Wasted, Bob gets Spell Snared, I never draw another land over the next 5 turns, while everything I play gets Snared (again) or Dazed. Looked at the top of my library, no lands for 9 more cards...well, gee, thanks top deck gods...
Game 3: I open a 1 land 7, so nope, ship it. I open a 6 of Library, Goyf, StP, Decay, a Sea and a Fetch. I do actually draw a land this game, a Bayou, but I made a misplay here that cost me the game and match. He had a Deathrite and he plays a Goyf. I have StP and a Lili in hand, uncracked fetch in play. End of his turn I fetch, get a Scrubland, because I'm thinking, "let me get on all my colors" and oh, how I will be punished for thinking that Scrubland was the right White source. StP gets his Deathrite, I untap draw a second Decay, Lili and kill the Goyf. He untaps Wastes my Bayou, plays Goyf. My deck unmercifully punishes my not getting a Savannah and I never draw another land, dying to 2 Goyfs with double Decay in hand. An ill omen...
Round 2: Huang U/R Burn
Game 1: I lost my life total notes, but he burns my face a bit, but I had double Stoneforge. First gets Fire and Ice, second gets Jitte. I never even need the Jitte and I win.
Game 2: Here I lose to myself. We battle, but I end up with a Stoneforge with a Stoneforge with Fire and Ice and a Deathrite to his 0 cards in hand and a Delver. I mistakenly drop a Wasteland for turn before I attack with the Sword and compound this mistake by tapping it to play an irrelevant Jitte. He topdecks a Price and I die to exactsies. Even worse, I drew a Forest off the Sword trigger. Well, i'll just have to win 3 games this match I guess.
Game 3: Not much doing here, he keeps a creature heavy hand, a Waste on a Volcanic leaves him short of Red mana, and I get a Teeg with Fire and Ice on it. By the time he has Red, it's too late and I win. Turns out Teeg was irrelevant, he could have been a Grizzly Bear.
Round 3: Elves
Game 1: Every time I play his kid (not being pejorative, he's like 17?) he manages to nut draw me (last 3 times I played him), so lets see. I have 3 lands, double Bob, Jitte and Sword or Decay, can't recall. Either way, I kill a Symbiote, but never draw a 4th land to play and equip the Jitte and his turn 4 yeilds him a Cradle and 15 Elves in play off Glimpse and 9 cards in hand. Only reason I am not dead on the spot is he never drew a Heritage druid. He has Cratherhoof in hand though and I do not draw a Wasteland.
Game 2: I open a 7 with 0 lands, ship it to a 6 with 1 land, to a 5 with 2 lands, a Stonefoge, a Decay and a Goyf (I think). Doesn't matter, he turn 2 Natural Order's for Progenitus and I never even draw a 3rd land. Hmm...
Round 4: ANT
Game 1: Double Deathrite and he draws nothing but cantrips in to cantrips and I win.
Game 2: I turn 1 Thoughteize and he Brainstorms (damn...) I take a Ponder over a Ritual. I probably should have took the Ritual, but that would only have delayed a turn and I get Ad Nauseumed.
Game 3: I turn 1 Thoughtseize with a IoK in my hand. See Duress, cantrips and I think I take a Infernal. He Duresses and take the IoK. I get a Goyf and a Lili, plus Library, but the top of my deck is all poop (fetches and Bobs). I fetch a Arbor for some extra damage, plus Lili to discard a Lili, but Goyf was not that big, only a 4/5 now and I can only put him to 2. He plays a fetch and goes off with Past in Flames, Tutor loops and kill me.
Round 5: No show.
I'm out anyway, I would have played just to test some more, but instead I just play some Vintage for fun (at least I can win there).
My play was certainly suboptimal and I was probably punished about as hard as I could be for the mistakes I made. I apologize for these results being not all too relevant, being shrouded in a cloud of hazy mistakes. I don't feel the list was much at fault, it would have been nice to draw a few more lands at some key times, but shit happens and worse shit happens when you make shit decisions. I am going to run this back at next Friday's FNM, see if I can play less like an idiot and gain some actual insight.
"The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
—Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order
@maharis: that's an interesting point--I have been finding that thalia was often the weakest card in the deck, but have felt compelled to keep her in due to the fact that similar decks (maverick/dnt) use her quite a bit. Perhaps the right call would be to just take out thalia for something like teeg mainboard and free up 4 sideboard slots.
Things happen, don't feel bad, H.
I played my list to a 5th place finish at a GPT for New Jersey, with about 25 people. I faced Burn Round 1 and lost horribly. Round 2, I crushed Infect. Round 3, I faced UR Delver and Teeg did work on Treasure Cruise. Round 4 I played Dredge and Ooze is a god. Round 5 I drew with Burn into Top 8. In the Top 8, I lost round 1 to Maverick because I had mana issues and drew poorly, and my Maverick opponent drew REALLY well. It happens. I've played that Maverick player with the deck MANY many times and won about 75% of them.
Overall, I'm happy with the list but the burn matchup is boo. Had I won, I would have faced OmniTell (a likely win) then UWR delver with Cruise in the finals (again, another good matchup).
-Matt
@Something..., the list I brainstormed is in fact 60 cards
You really have to build around Thalia — lots of creatures and cards like Vial and Port that are just weaker in a 3-color deck — while mitigating the advantages of your splash (1BG Decay, 3W/2B Souls, 2G Sylvan, 2BB Liliana). Mav decks that are really light on the black splash while also having extra mana dorks and KoTR into Cradle can break the symmetry a little better (see Thomas Herzog's list from SCG Indy). And D&T can go deeper on mana denial by supporting Port.
But if you really want to play the best black cards like Bob, Thoughtseize, Souls, and Decay I think she's more of a liability than anything. Though if you play against ton of Storm she's perfectly defensible in the 75.
I played Thalia Dega for a long time, sometimes she was great, but against so many common matchups she did little to nothing.
Had some bad fortune last night:
R1G1 - Lose to dredge. First game is T2 (that I happen to have a bog in hand, but it was a bit late for that) I scoop before he can see what I have since he was going to have a billion zombies
G2 - Had Teeg, DRS, Knight IIRC, but it doesn't work out. I should've mulled to stronger hate thinking back. he gets a boatload of zombies T2 and I don't find an answer. He also guesses knight and gets it with therapy.
R2 - Nothing special. Beat a zombardment brew. I will say that had I had draws like these for dredge, that guy would've been screwed..
R3G1 - Go 1-2 with storm. G1 He sees Lilys in my hand with DRS and waste on the battlefield and tries to go off early (so to speak.) AN draws him most of the way but he can't race DRS with goblins and his mana is slightly off.
G2 - Had a beautiful hand of discard, thalia, DRS, something, IIRC. I discard his LED. He gets a lucky cabal and gets thalia. Ugh. It's a little fuzzy what happens next but I get Tendrill'd
G3 - I had an alright hand. I discard something of his. I play a nihil spellbomb with mana open. I think about cantripping it but I knew it was a low chance (turns out to be ~14%) and figure it's smarter to hold open for the grave. this is the right play, but not this game. Turns out I had a teeg on top. At any rate I land my knights and do a wasteland (similar clock and I knew he was really tight on mana. He had 20 and 16 if I attacked, so I believe AN would get him there anyway.) He goes off. Sad times. Probably should've mulled to something stronger.
R4 - He's on a UR delver and a very slow player (new, borrowing the deck.) I don't take it super seriously because of this and the fact we're already out of the money anyway, he just has the right answers at all times. I grind with him both games but despite topping for about 5 turns in a row I never find anything good. Young pyro is good though. Maybe he's found a good home. I'm still mildly surprised he doesn't have a home in RUG.
I felt pretty unlucky the whole night. Losing to dredge is annoying; but I think I'll swap my BO that shouldn't be there for a Cage; still I could've mulled better. The storm was obnoxious because that Thalia would've gotten me into knight (and he had no removal) into a likely double-wasteland win. The dredge MU did have a sideboarding issue where I didn't side in Deluge I believe.
I played in a GP trial yesterday, went 3/1 to make top 8, but lost in round 1 of top 8.
I used a list that sdematt posted a page or two ago, I'll post again so you don't have to try to find it.
4 Deathrite
4 Bob
3 Goyf
3 Stoneforge
2 Lingering Soul
2 Green Sun's
4 Thoughtseize
2 Cabal Therapy
3 STP
1 Jitte
2 Sylvan Library
4 Abrupt Decay
1 SoFaI
3 Liliana
3 Bayou
2 Scrub
1 Savannah
4 Verdant
2 Marsh Flats
2 Windswept
2 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Plains
4 Wasteland
1 Dryad Arbor
SB
---
3 Teeg
2 Krosan Grip
2 Needle
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Sylvan Safekeeper
1 Engineered Plague
1 Chains of Mephistopholes
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Explosives
1 Zealous Persecution
1 Nihil Spellbomb
Round 1
My 7 has 1 land which is wasteland, my 6 has 1 land which is Bayou and 2 Lilianas, so I keep a 5 which has Scrubland, Cabal Therapy, Bob, Sylvan, Stoneforge. I go Scrubland pass. He goes Island Sensei's Top. I don't draw a land, but I want to Therapy. I name Counterbalance, and hit 1. He has Jace, and another land in hand, and I'm pretty sure I can't win. He draws and plays a Karakas, which tips me off that he might be playing the Legendary Creature version of Miracles. I don't draw any more lands, he plays Jace, and I scoop in response to Fateseal. All I showed him was a Scrubland and a Therapy.
I bring in lots of cards, Teeg, Grip, Needle, Tutor, Safekeeper, and Chains. I take out STP, Goyfs, 2 Therapy, and a Thoughtseize.
After 2 very long grindy games, I end up taking the match. Game 3 I paid like 16 or 20 life to Sylvan, which was awesome. Even though the games went long, I felt like I had the upper hand the entire time, which feels great. Miracles is often one of the decks I want to avoid when playing Junk, but this build does indeed make the match up feel pretty good.
Round 2
My opponent is on Omni-Tell, and his Brainstorms and Ponders are the worst. He doesn't find the combo, and I get a bunch of discard. He dies to Sword of Fire and Ice on guys kills him both games. I got really lucky, and don't consider this to be a good match even though I went 2/0
Round 3
My opponent is on Dredge. He doesn't Dredge a Narcomoeba for about 4 or 5 turns, but he ends up getting me anyways. Game 2 I get Deathrite into Ooze which gets him. Game 3 my 7 is sweet, but does nothing vs. Dredge, so I have to mull. My 6 yields GSZ, Scooze, and some other stuff, while he mulls to 5. Turn 1, he Therapies himself for Stinkweed, leaving him with Bridge and Narcomoeba in hand. I turn 1 GSZ for Arbor, so I can have a turn 2 Ooze with G up. He dredges... no Narcos, no Dredgers. I'm def running super lucky today. I cast Scooze, eat something on his EOT. On his next turn, I think he somehow gets 2 Stinkweeds and a Thug in his yard, but I have a 3rd green source on my turn, and he can't do anything else for the rest of the game.
Round 4
Everyone is ID'ing, and I would usually want to, but I'm in an odd spot. We are the only 2 players with 9 points, and the 6 players with 6 all ID'd. He is ahead of me on breakers. So if we draw, he's in spot 1, if I lose he's in spot 1. I can only improve by playing it, and I know he's on D&T, which I feel good about.
I get a sketchy 6, but it had potential. He plays MoM pass. I thoughtseize him, see 2x STP, 1 Aven Mindcensor, Ghost Quarter, Wasteland. I take Aven, but then he plays Leonin Arbiter... the guy who makes you pay 2 to search. He Ghost Quarters my land, and I draw fetches...
Game 2 I get smashed by equipment. Balls.
Round 5
He's on GRUB Delver with TC. He draws a buncha cards, and I die to Pyromancer tokens both games.
-----
So, I ran super lucky vs Omni and Dredge, and got some valuable testing vs. Miracles. I'm happy with this build vs. Miracles, but I want to play with Spirit of the Labyrinth right now. If I can't squeeze it in Junk, I may start playing Maverick, or Green Taxes in preparation for the GP.
@ Jain_Mor--sorry miscounted =X
@ Maharis -- The main issue hasn't been the symmetry of her effect; that has hardly been noticeable as the vials basically act as hierarchs/mana ramp from the maverick decks w/o getting swept by terminus/zp. Rather its been her lack of impact in a lot of matchups that has me questioning her inclusion. She's great versus storm and occasionally delver, but versus the majority of the format the extra mana isn't backbreaking without the aggression of maverick or the ports of dnt.
Hey guy, I did a gpt sunday and have not got around to posting it but I missed it by 1 point going 4-2 winning agenst sneak and show, bug delver, junk and DnT and losing to lands and UR delver il post a list in a bit but I love this deck it just feels like since we cant run brainstorm and the like we are mostly fighting an uphill battle.
Hello, everyone! I've finally decided to make Rock the deck I pilot to SCG: Minneapolis. I had toyed with the idea of taking a Dwarf Stompy build I'm testing as Moon is obscenely strong right now but I decided that it would be bad form for me to try a new build so I'm falling back on my old love, Rock. For the most part I'm satisfied with this list but as I've been inactive with Magic I presently lack much field experience I would rather have had going into this. Generally speaking I believe the meta to be centered around Sneaky Show/Miracles/DnT/Delver/BUG/Elves.
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Dark Confidant
4 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Tarmogoyf
4 Tidehollow Sculler
1 Qasali Pridemage
2 Lilana of the Veil
4 Thoughseize
4 Swords to Plowshare
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Batt3rskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Sylvan Library
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Marsh Flats
2 Windswept Heath
3 Scrubland
2 Bayou
1 Savannah
1 Dryad's Arbor
3 Wasteland
2 Swamp
1 Plains
1 Stirring Wildwood
Sideboard is still a work in progress. Was thinking something Likee:
2 Enlightened Tutor
3 Choke
3 Gaddock Teeg
2 Pithing Needle
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Rest in Peace
2 Krosan Grip
This is the build I had been running. I was considering trading out the Tidehollows for 2 Lingering Souls and 2 Cabal Therapy. I can't particularly afford it but I would really like the Qasali to possibly be a 3rd Liliana. I also think running a 3rd equipment may be a possibility. I was always a fan of Greaves although SoFaF or SoFaI tend to have more utility. Honestly my build varies very little from what I've read the past couple pages but I was just looking for any advice as in a couple days I'll be buying the last cards I need for Rock as well as Enchantress (my friend is borrowing my deck) to make them both primed for SCG so I wanted to make sure my list was finalized.
Forlorn
How to play Belcher:
Step 1) Draw 7 cards.
Step 2) Throw said 7 cards onto the table while making a "BLAH!" sound.
Step 3) Hold up hands quizically and ask: "Do I win?"
Decks
Enchantress
Dragon Stompy
Rock
UG Madness/Thresh (Pauper)
I mostly love the maindeck. Stirring Wildwood might be a little unnecessary and lead to some awkward openers with 3 wasteland and Dryad Arbor since you are trying to make a turn 1 play with B and eventually cast Liliana. I would trim the Scullers as you suggest for another black fetchland, a therapy or 2 (i love this card against other Stoneforge decks as well as against combo), and a third piece of equipment. That would allow you to keep Wildwood in a spell/creature slot. Sculler is too fair of a card IMO and I don't think it's as good against the decks it's good against (Storm and S&S) as Therapy is against a wider range of the field. Hitting on both ends of a Therapy is basically game over for Storm, and you can flash it back off a green fetchland (Dryad Arbor). Then of course you can leave them in against any Stoneforge deck to nail what they draw without losing life, and then potentially remove something else that's problematic if you need to.
I also have been following Matt's strategy of no Batterskull, 3 Bob, 3 Library and it has been really good. Skull is powerful but SoFI and SoFF provide card advantage, so with 3 bob, 3 Library and 2 swords we can keep up with the blue decks pretty easily. Also they are super soft to cards like decay and souls.
On the sideboard I wouldn't bother with Choke, it can be countered pretty easily and delver decks can do a lot of damage before it comes down. I would definitely get some Cages and Zealous Persecutions in there because Elves is a nightmare from which there is no escape. The best we can do is gum up their game plan, two-for-one them and try to clock them before they can rebuild. Since you're playing Goyf, Toxic Deluge can also be a consideration over Zealous since it hits a lot of other annoyances as well, like Merfolk or Goblins if you happen to run into those decks.
Hearing about junk on junk crime is sad. Oh well. UR delver is somewhat favorable, was that match close? Would love to see your list.
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Marsh Flats
1 Windswept Heath
3 Wasteland
2 Bayou
2 Scrubland
1 Savannah
1 Swamp
1 Karakas
1 Forest
1 Cabal Pit
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Maze of Ith
3 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Tarmogoyf
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Dark Confidant
2 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Sylvan Library
3 Liliana of the Veil
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Darkblast
1 Unearth
3 Lingering Souls
4 Thoughtseize
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Swords to Plowshares
SB: 1 Enlightened Tutor
SB: 1 Pithing Needle
SB: 1 Ethersworn Canonist
SB: 1 Choke
SB: 1 Engineered Plague
SB: 2 Gaddock Teeg
SB: 1 Grafdigger's Cage
SB: 1 Toxic Deluge
SB: 3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
SB: 2 Zealous Persecution
SB: 1 Pernicious Deed
game one vs ur delver, which the shop was calling booze cruise, hey just got what i assume is something of the nuts for that deck which was t1 delver t2 pyro t3-6 cantrips and burn spells and i couldn't deal. i may have sided wrong but i put in tutor, shoke, deluge,2 zealous, deed, plague and 3 thalia taking out 4 bob a lili, 4 thoughtseize and i cant remember the last one. probably another lili. i swords his t1 swiftspear i play drs he counters. i unearth it he bolts it. i play another he bolts it. he was really scared of drs his board state was something like pyro, 6 tokens and a swiftspear and i got plague so i named ele and it stuck but by then i was at 9 or so and he just burned me out with PoP and his other bolts.
i still think we are somewhat favored in that match. im going to try to pick up a chains this weekend and tweek my board and might take out the unearth for a loam
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