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Thread: [Deck] Team Italia

  1. #21
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Apparently Grim Lavamancer+ Basilisk Collar isn't good enough?

    Also top is good as a one of because you never want to draw multiples and it is for the late game when you are in topdeck mode. 3 Tops are way too much. Doesn't fabiano know phillips? It doesn't surprise me he plays a top in the deck.

    I like the idea of mother of runes, but realistically, what are you trying to protect? there are 12 other creatures and the biggest one is a 2/1... Having a creature with more than 2 power seems like a good idea. Maybe figure of destiny isn't the best, but I think something is needed that can kill someone in less than ten turns.

  2. #22
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Apparently Grim Lavamancer+ Basilisk Collar isn't good enough?
    For killing large creatures (without Shroud or Pro Red), sure. That's all you're getting from Basilisk Collar, though. In the meantime, you could instead be swinging with Jitte and either outsizing the large creatures, or actually presenting a clock rather than smacking around with 1-power creatures. Besides, you're already running effective answers to fatties with Swords/Vindicate, and you're banking on Grim Lavamancer to make Basilisk Collar any good. Jitte is amazing on every single creature in the deck.

    Also top is good as a one of because you never want to draw multiples and it is for the late game when you are in topdeck mode. 3 Tops are way too much. Doesn't fabiano know phillips? It doesn't surprise me he plays a top in the deck.
    I play with Top on a regular basis in alot of various decks. Multiple Top's is a nonissue with 10 fetchlands. You cast two Top's, tap one to draw, crack fetch, bye bye second Top. If you see another one in the top 3 later? You don't have to draw it. You want to see Top in the midgame, not the lategame, when you're still cracking fetchlands. By lategame, you really don't want to be drawing any more land. Don't get me wrong, Top is still incredibly strong in the lategame, but it's peak torque is midgame. Plus, with the decks current manabase and no Brainstorm to fix early hands, Top is very useful for smoothing the manabase during the early game.

    I like the idea of mother of runes, but realistically, what are you trying to protect? there are 12 other creatures and the biggest one is a 2/1... Having a creature with more than 2 power seems like a good idea. Maybe figure of destiny isn't the best, but I think something is needed that can kill someone in less than ten turns.
    You run 16 creatures that are all extremely fragile. What are you not trying to protect? Mom + Confidant is extremely strong, since resolving and protecting Confidant wins games. The creatures grow in size from the equipment. You don't need a creature that can get to become a 4/4 by the midgame when you can attach a Jitte to a creature in the midgame instead. A Confidant with a Jitte is swinging as a 6/5 once the Jitte goes active; something which Mother of Runes helps accomplish with minimal casualties. Figure of Destiny provides no utility to the deck, besides being a way to sink excess mana to try and get some fat. Considering that between Confidant and SFM, this deck will have alot of cards in hand that it will want to spend that mana on, I'd say Figure of Destiny seems a bit lackluster. Besides, even a 4/4 Figure of Destiny isn't very impressive. Even if Figure of Destiny was halfway decent in here, it's still not as essential as Mother of Runes is.
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  3. #23
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    I agree with your points but you'd be surprised by the effectiveness of Collar + Lavamancer. It really shuts down some decks and can even kill Emrakul/Reanimator Fatties. Suiting up Grim with a collar has won me plenty of games when I was playing Next Level Threshold and UR AJ Sacher Dreadstill. However, that might have been more relevant in those decks as there was no white for STP. I think Collar warrants testing though. It's proven itself to me but this deck has 4 STP, 4 Vindicate so it might be redundant when what you need is to swing in hard quickly. I'd run 1 in the board just in case, since it's incredibly useful in so many MUs.

  4. #24
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Your statements are well though out Hanni.

    I think it is awkward playing a deck with creatures as its win condition that have stats of 1/1, 1/1, 1/2 and 2/1. If they deal with the equipment your clock is painfully slow.

  5. #25

    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    I was pretty happy with Collar. It was better than I expected. Even just suiting up a sworded or jitted creature is impressive.

    I don't think Mother belongs in this deck though. This isn't about stopping opponent's disruption. This deck is about disrupting your opponent. I have no idea what you'd take out for Mother either. My list is already really, really tight.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ertai's Familiar View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by DragoFireheart View Post
    Interestingly enough, I would argue that BS is the Dark Ritual in this case.
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  6. #26

    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Mirran Crusader seems like it could be tested...

  7. #27
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Bitterblossom+Equipment is underrated and I +1 its testing
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  8. #28

    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    What's your thought's on Student of Warfare over FoD? Less mana needed in order to become bigger, and it's easier to pay it's activation cost rather than FoD. It's double strike ability in it's ultimate form is very relevant together with the Swords and jitte.

  9. #29
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Quote Originally Posted by paladin3056 View Post
    What's your thought's on Student of Warfare over FoD? Less mana needed in order to become bigger, and it's easier to pay it's activation cost rather than FoD. It's double strike ability in it's ultimate form is very relevant together with the Swords and jitte.
    It seems interesting since first strike can be pretty relevant, especially with Jitte and Collar, and you don't have to have 6 lands to buff it at the last level. The biggest issue i see is that you can't pump it with badlands, and those are the lands you fetch first usually. Need some testing.

  10. #30

    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Quote Originally Posted by Gheizen64 View Post
    It seems interesting since first strike can be pretty relevant, especially with Jitte and Collar, and you don't have to have 6 lands to buff it at the last level. The biggest issue i see is that you can't pump it with badlands, and those are the lands you fetch first usually. Need some testing.
    Ah yes now that you mentioned it, this deck seems to be leaning a lot on the BR side, I'll put that into consideration while testing. I just had to stress the good part about Student of Warfare since you do not really have to pay the full cost since it just cost W, and you can just level up if you have the mana to do it. But I think it this might work better in a BW Vial Tempo version.

    Anyway, I was wondering if we can squeeze in Dismember from NPH as another form of removal in the deck since STP doesn't fit here too much due to the life gain and since MM is getting popular recently we would need a decent spot removal which would at least cost 1 but could dodge MM and Dismember fits that role perfectly.

  11. #31
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    I might suggest Elspeth, Knight-Errant, he is a house when you drop him, and works great with weenie creatures.

  12. #32

    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    i've been testing this deck as well lately and I have to say its pretty strong.

    I too have been thinking about adding a singleton Elspeth, Knight Errant in place of the 4th Vindicate. I find that I will often be holding on to 2 vindicates in my hand and never really using the 2nd one. between either Swords/Lightning bolt, lavamancer and vindicate, we can afford to cut one for an elspeth.

    I've been testing primarily versus Merfolk, Elves, Goblins, Rock and Affinity and find that they are all pretty decent to excellent match ups. Havent had much chance to verse straight combo yet, but i imagine thoughtseize, hymn are all boss in those matchups.

    - Been loving the lavamancers...not so sure about the collar. its only been average and never a ground breaker for me, however, i imagine it being pretty good vs. goyfs/KnightofR/etc.

    - love the 9 discard spells. seems like it may be overkill, but really works out fine as you end up playing 2-3 a game and it just shreds your opponents early/midgame plan.

    - figure of destiny has been kind of difficult to pump for me. you are always using your mana in this deck. be it saving mana to vial in your equipment to lavamancer, its hard to reliably get this bad boy up to even level two. maybe i'm playing it wrong, but it seems like so much work for such an effect.

    - been happy with Bolts over STP main vs. tribal matchups.

    Did i mention I really like this deck already?

  13. #33

    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    i also must mention that i have yet to test this deck in a world of Mental Missteps.

  14. #34

    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Quote Originally Posted by yoshencranz View Post
    i also must mention that i have yet to test this deck in a world of Mental Missteps.
    They weren't as bad as I was expecting. Sure, losing a FoD or something is bad, but we have more creatures coming. It's not like Goblins where the 1 drops are critical spells.
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    Quote Originally Posted by DragoFireheart View Post
    Interestingly enough, I would argue that BS is the Dark Ritual in this case.
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  15. #35
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Figure seems more like a mid-late game drop (4/4 with losing only 1 life to confidant is some pretty serious synergy) or an equipment carrier in early game.

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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Anyone considered countryside crusher?

  17. #37

    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Quote Originally Posted by Goddik View Post
    Anyone considered countryside crusher?
    Without the rest of the Loam package, Loam, Cycle Lands, etc..., Crusher just doesn't have the power that he does in Aggro Loam.

    I think the better choice for a potential 3 drop would be Mirran Crusader. With the heavy equipment package, he gets even better.

    Something we're testing out anyway.
    Quote Originally Posted by Ertai's Familiar View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by DragoFireheart View Post
    Interestingly enough, I would argue that BS is the Dark Ritual in this case.
    Tom? Is that you? I thought you were going to go work on DnD?

  18. #38

    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Has anybody else tried a more aggressive and burn-heavy version of this deck? I've been messing around with one on MTGO and it seems to hold it's own. Ideally it wants to stick a t1 mom to protect bob, then draw burn and gas off the top with a little bit of lifegain to mitigate bob. Just a rough decklist born out of late night tinkering, but:

    4 Lightning Bolt
    4 Mother of Runes
    4 Swords to Plowshares
    3 Grim Lavamancer (15 1cmc)

    4 Dark Confidant
    4 Lightning Helix
    1 Jitte
    3 Phyrexian Revoker
    3 Stoneforge Mystic (15 2 cmc)

    1 Sword of Fire and Ice
    1 Sword of War and Peace (hurts mom, but pro from most removal)
    3 Vampire Nighthawk
    3 Vindicate (8 3cmc)

    4 Arid Mesa
    4 Marsh Flats
    4 Bloodstained Mire
    3 Plateau
    4 Badland
    3 Scrubland

    12 fetches might be excessive, but it helps your later draws, and there's plenty of lifegain to make up for it. The nighthawk is kind of weak, but I'm still trying to figure out what works better in that slot. Like I said, I'm still trying to figure out if a more aggressive version is viable, just looking for some feedback.

  19. #39
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    CorpT, so what's your decklist then? I love this deck. Thank you!

  20. #40
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    Re: [Deck] Team Italia by Gerard Fabiano

    Alright, lets get the things moving.

    I love this deck. Seems like an oldchool disruption deck with play beatiful cards. I think though that we should discuss about how to improve this deck. Honestly, I dont think it will ever be a super deck but you have many possibilities and this deck definetly rewards a perfect play. Beating my Bant friend with this underdog deck is priceless.

    Basics of this deck is clear:

    4 Dark Confidant - best creature in legacy
    4 Grim Lavamancer - possibly the best 1cc drop ever
    4 Stoneforge Mystic - I think we should keep 4 since our creatures are very small and we need some reasonable clock

    4 Hymn to Tourach - 2 for 1.
    1 Umezawa's Jitte - game winner against so many decks
    1 Sword of Fire and Ice - possibly the best sword

    As you can see all these cards provide card advantage. I guess Gerrard was actually obsessed with CA since he let the rock player start in the semifinal - and was hymned twiced...

    Then there are cards that allow us to make the things happen:

    3 Thoughtseize
    1 Inquisition of Kozilek
    4 Swords to Plowshares
    3 Vindicate - 4 are to many. Extra SDT is great.
    2 Sensei's Divining Top
    1 Basilisk Collar - disputable card, but combos well with grim and Mystic can block effectively. Gainlife is nice as well.

    As you see I swaped Lightning Bolt with StP. Gerrard said it is better aginst combo and Grim+bolt can kill goyf I think this is clear change. I dont want dealing with every goyf or Kotr to be an epic battle. And since this deck is a Control and not an Aggro we need to stay calm.

    I would leave lands as they are for now. But it is good to understand that we need red only for Grim and sideboard cards. Therfore I would drop one Badland for forth Scrubland. I would definetly stay with 23 lands. It might seem like a lot but we need two three duals to be operational and four of these are wastelands. Not mentioning we run zero basics. (this might change)

    last slots

    1 Ranger of Eos
    1 Gerrard's Verdict
    3 Figure of Destiny

    I guess the slots which can be easily changed. Even from my testing Figure is kind of weird. It might be good topdeck in lategame but I dont like it very much. It could be Mother of Runes or Mirran Crusader as a two of. Mirran would give this deck punch. But then Ranger doesent make much sense. But Ranger+2Mirran+1figure is still a possibility.
    Instead of Gerrards Verdict and since we run 4 Mystics I suggest Sword of Feast and Famine. It is great in the current meta. The sword you tutor in the first place aginst control, combo, team america and many green decks. People still dont know this one very much.

    Side is autoinclusion of 3-4 Perish. I like that this deck doesnt suffer from Submerge, Perish, Llawan and some more.

    Thanks for replies!

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