I said your list was good ;)
But with 3 Mother of Runes and 2 Qasali Pridemagess as well as 4 Fauna Shaman and 4 GSZ to tutor Qasalis you shouldn't be overly worried about Equipment. Maze and the second Rootwalla are easily saved slot in the long run.
Gaea's cradle, I can see not making it in, but I could never take out maze of ith. That card does so much for this deck. It pretty much goes hand in hand with KotR. In some decks its pretty much my only toolbox.
I agree with Slate- here.
Also, if I was overly worried about the Painter match up, I would throw Emrakul and Loyal Retainers in the board. Jitte might be the best equipment against Painter, but I definitely don't think Jitte is good against Painter, as it is extremely slow. I would rather rely on Pridemages, Wastelands, and Swords than getting Jitte online.
The second Rootwalla would be the first card out of the deck.
Yeah, those cards are better if you draw them, but you gotta work with what you have. Cutting Jitte in GW is just flat out bad.
For the Equipment slot I think there is one correct setup atm and that is 4 Stoneforge, 1 Jitte, 1 Batterskull and 1 Sword of Body and Mind. Not playing at least those seven would be a mistake.
I have it from PV's article on channelfireball why to play SoBaM, like 99.9% of the time he is right. It lets you attack through Goyfs and KotRs and gives you a chump blocker for their big guy.This works out quite well and protection from Merfolk and Jace is a nice bonus. SoLaS was never good for me and SoFaI is worse because there is much less red than green.
SoFaI still has the best ability of any of the swords. Especially when it's on a creature like mirran, giving him protection from everything but white (sadly).
Yeah, that is true. Playing an additional target for SFM is okay. Some prefer SoFaI for the value, some like SoLaS for the colors.
But not playing all 4 SFM plus Skull, SoBaM and Jitte seems like a mistake to me.
In the end I found all kinds of splash not worthy, so I came back to straight GW. This allows to play a full package of Horizon Canopy, great with KoR and to smooth the deck. With 4 GSZ, Hierarchs and Cradle it’s common to have a lot of mana, the ideal situation to profit your Canopies.
My current list:
// Lands (23)
4 Horizon Canopy
4 Savannah
4 Windswept heath
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Gaea’s Cradle
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Karakas
1 Maze of Ith
4 Wasteland
// Creatures (24)
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Mother of Runes
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Mirran Crusader
3 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Tarmogoyf
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Terravore
1 Eternal Witness
// Spells (13)
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
The list is very solid. I really like the Mirran Crusaders. With exalted and equipments they do crazy shenanigans, an equipped Crusader is usually GG: I never missed Rafiq.
The full package of MoR serves well the equipment strategy, they’re never dead.
My 2 cent about the equipment debate. The point is that you always want to see one, while two or more are usually dead early game. I used to play Faerie Stompy, a deck packing 6-8 equipments: its main problem was consistency. The high number of equipments was one of the causes, too often you had too many dead ones.
That’s one of the reason why SFM is so damn good. She tutors for the equipment you want AND she is a creature: at worst, you can equip herself.
In my testing, the best compromise between versatility and consistency is 3 SFM + the 3 consolidated must-have (Jitte, SoFI and SoLS). I don’t think you need the new swords, they’re a bit underpowered and the pros in versatility don’t value the cons of increasing the number of equipments.
Batterskull is another story. It’s extremely valuable in certain matchups, even if slow without SFM. In the end I chose not to maindeck it for the sake of consistency, but it’s more a meta choice. Jitte, SoFI, SoLS and Batterskull is a strong configuration for sure.
Last edited by Morte; 06-07-2011 at 09:37 AM.
I've been eying this deck for quite some time now and comparing deck lists with eachother and this one really apeals to me. My question was what were your main reason for not playing a No Pro package as many other ones do.
More or less the same reason why I don’t run Batterskull – consistency.
The best shell to run the NO-Pro package is something like Bant GSZ. Here, we have
- no counter to protect your NO
- no way to reshuffle Pro if you draw it
Moreover, against decks with tempo package or Junk it’s not always easy to reach 4 mana – note that I cut everything but Elspeth with a cost greater than 3.
The deck has already plenty of crazy powerful combos by playing all-around reliable cards only.
If you want a 2-card coolness consider SFM + Batterskull before NO-Pro. It costs one slot only, fits perfectly the shell of the deck (SFM equipment strategy with MoR to protect SFM) and in the worst case it’s just slow, not totally dead.
It’s a matter of taste; personally, I think that choosing cool things over consistency is more or less like valuing fun over probability to win.
I don't think Batterskull fits into "fun vs win%". It actually helps the deck much better than Sword of Light and Shadow for the MD. It also single-handedly beats Merfolk without much effort, and that's not to be dismissed. (Jitte on the same token, requires some careful maneuvering and judicious use of -1/1 effects)
My list is nearly identical to Fatal's listed above, with a few random green dorks cut to go for 4 SFM. I think this move is a no-brainer considering how powerful equipment is to this strategy.
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The consistency argument I can understand, but isnt a second jitte or batterskull better than the SoLaS or is it rand for its color combi and whats your take on summoning trap sb as a weapon against t1 missteps?
Playing batterskull over the solas is a no brainer indeed as many decks go down when facing one but isnt the thought of running a mirran crusader so far fetched maybe instead of rafiq. Noble into crusader into turn 3 elspeth pumping your crusader to a 6/6 double strike flying isnt all that bad.
Turn 2 KotR/Crusader are both fast clocks. Crusader is a solid answer to black based removal too, but stills gets plowed. The only selling point for SoLaS is providing protection from both black and white removal, and allowing recursion. The latter is useful with Qasali Pridemages against the mirrors too.
On that note, I think in this metagame trying to maximize Pridemages is the right call. When I played over the weekend, 4 out of the 6 matches I played feature equipment wars.
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The point is rather that you should play more Pridemages (who can provide Exalted) rather than GSZ/Fauna Shaman for them in a clutch spot. I can't begin to describe my horrible mana luck with this deck in the past week, but drawing one naturally is almost always preferred to the reactionary tutoring. It's also cheaper on the mana cost. (compare to or )
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I'm gonna run a build close to Morte's tomorrow, but I'm afraid it's close to impossible to have a good MU against UW LS ( I ran a build tailored to beat control in my last tourney and got my face grinded in). Maybe I should just give up on this MU, or does anyone have any ideas?
Against UW Landstill, you might want to consider a man-land or two. Stirring Wilderness wouldn't be a bad idea (but it might not be good enough still).
You pretty much want to resolve Elspeth in these control matchups.
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This list is a tad different than some of the other ones here, but it follows the same vein. I've been seriously considering cutting the blue splash recently, but it tends to work quite well for me, as it's very rare that I'm forced to play one of my Tropical Islands against Merfolk, which is the only match-up that suffers heavily from the splash.
Anyways. Here's my list. Feel free to critique as you please.
Maindeck
4x Green Sun's Zenith
4x Noble Hierarch
2x Qasali Pridemage
2x Knight of the Reliquary
2x Scryb Ranger
2x Mother of Runes
1x Mirran Crusader
1x Eternal Witness
1x Birds of Paradise
1x Trygon Predator
1x Rhox War Monk
2x Stoneforge Mystic
1x Jitte
1x Sword of Feast and Famine
1x Sword of Fire and Ice
1x Batterskull
1x Elspeth
4x Swords to Plowshares
4x Mental Misstep
2x Sylvan Library
4x Wasteland
2x Horizon Canopy
1x Maze of Ith
1x Karakas
4x Savannah
4x Windswept Heath
2x Forest
1x Plains
2x Tropical Island
Sideboard
3x Relic of Progenitus
2x Choke
2x Path to Exile
2x Krosan Grip
1x Sword of Light and Shadow
1x Gaddock Teeg
2x Aven Mindcensor
2x Mindbreak Trap
The deck's a bit slower than other lists here, but it tends to work out for me, especially with Mental Misstep included. If you haven't tried it, I strongly suggest that you do, it's a great card.
The SB is kind of thrown together, but it also tends to work fairly well for me. Suggestions on that are especially welcome, if you have any.
Sorry, but I really don't like 2 Moms, it's just too random, especially in a equipment heavy list like yours ( I also wonder about only 2 Mystics) you want the maximum number of Mothers.
The problem isn't that I don't want more Mother of Runes, it's mostly what I would have to cut for them.Sorry, but I really don't like 2 Moms, it's just too random, especially in a equipment heavy list like yours ( I also wonder about only 2 Mystics) you want the maximum number of Mothers.
Looking critically, the only cards I would consider cutting would be everything in the blue splash (Rhox War Monk and Trygon Predator, probably going down to 20 lands and up to 3 Qasali Pridemages), one of the Scryb Rangers, the Sylvan Libraries, or the Sword of Feast and Famine. What would you advise to test cutting first?
In addition, the Mental Missteps, Swords, Batterskull, and Mirran Crusader are all rather good at dealing with removal on their own, so Mother of Runes is generally an added bonus, not a necessity. Just something to consider.
As for Stoneforge Mystic, I have never been in favor of playing more than three in a list like this. Still, if you'd like to suggest a third card to cut, I'd be open to testing it. Might end up better, might not.
Thank you for the feedback.
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