Cook’s Kitchen – GP Ghent Results & Analysis

[Bryant Cook]

Article

My thoughts.

[Phoenix Ignition]

Regarding Tristan's junk list: He has 4 tops because the deck loves to hit 1 always. He runs 4 Liliana, so even if he does get extra tops he's always happy to just dump it. I really like the 4 tops with 4 lilianas.

[joemauer]

Good article. I agree with most of what you said.

I'll of course touch on the stuff I didn't quite agree with.

Scattershot Archer(as was pointed out to me on the elves thread) is good versus Lingering Souls and can kill delvers with Quirion Ranger or Wirewood Symbiote. This is a big deal as fliers can fly over all of the elves and their decoy blockers. This can get real bad when flying tokens are holding a Jitte(no wirewood tricks to avoid the counters here).

Also, with Canadian Thresh versus elves I would pick elves to be favored. It's one of the compelling reasons to play elves.

[Chikenbok]

Yeah, the only thing I've got to say in response to your article is that 4 liliana are simply... beautiful in that deck. I run 3 in BUG and started out at 4, but I don't have redundancies (aka, an extra top) to consistently drop out of my hand using her +1, she's generally a board presented edict a lot of the time. But with constant top manipulation playing off of the top makes your virtual hand quite magnificent.

Tristan's list can fully capitalize on the 4 Lili's, at least much more efficiently than than any other deck I've seen recently can (aside perhaps from Pox, but let's be serious).

[dsck]

I disagreed with quite a lot you wrote this time, here are some parts that felt like the writer was very ignorant:

The Dread of Nights I don’t believe are very good but I continue to see them in ANT sideboards.

Stoneforge isn’t good right now!

The random Engineered Explosives should probably be -

It’s frustrating seeing a deck so poorly designed do so well.

the first thing I find awkward or weird is three Gaea’s Cradle.

*Entire analysis about the Junk deck*

Then there’s RUG Delver/Canadian Threshold, I don’t even know what to say. The deck has a fine UW Miracles/Esperblade match-up and it does well versus combo and Elves. Poor players? Bad match-ups? I just don’t know.

If you actually spend some time and look at the top 32 you see people were prepared for the top decks. You notice that there is LOT grave hate, Humility for Sneak and Show, Engineered Explosives for Delver and the list goes on.

[wcm8]

Engineered Explosives is one of the best tools in Esper's arsenal. Kills Delvers, Mongoose (very important), and can often be a one-sided Wrath against decks like Maverick, Elves, Empty the Warrens tokens, opposing Soul/Germ tokens, etc. I would not consider its inclusion 'random'.

[Tammit67]

Also, with Canadian Thresh versus elves I would pick elves to be favored. It's one of the compelling reasons to play elves.

Between submerge, bolt, force, daze, and Fire/forked bolt/vapor snag, elves can't get a foothold before goyf or delver put it too close to dead, at least in my experience. That is not an easy mountain to overcome

[joemauer]

Between submerge, bolt, force, daze, and Fire/forked bolt/vapor snag, elves can't get a foothold before goyf or delver put it too close to dead, at least in my experience. That is not an easy mountain to overcome

Submerge is the only problematic card.
Elves has an easy time playing around daze.
Force of Will equals cards disadvantage. Also, elves generates card advantage too easy: Glimpse of Nature and Elvish Visionary+Wirewood Symbiote which are all must counter spells.
Lightning Bolt and Forked Bolt must be directed at Wirewood Symbiote.
Wasteland is a dead card(in the mono green versions).
Submerge is a problem card but comes in game 2/3.
If elves lands a mid-late game Ooze from the sideboard then it is good game for the thresh player.

It isn't exactly an auto win for the elves player. An early Delver or two backed up with the right amount of burn and countermagic will usually win, but the elves player is still favored.

[Umezete]

you're being pretty unfair trashing some of these deckbuilders decisions without first stating the intended reason for them. They made top 8 of a gp, something obv went right and I think its important to see what.

Dread of night in Ant sb- To be frank thaalia is a 4 of in any deck running white these days and this is the cheapest and most effective removal. Who cares if they pridemage it? If they played thaalia first and you killed it you just go ahead and win when they are busy dealing with your hate. Granted it doesn't kill hatebear gaddock teeg or canonist but it deals with the most consistant maindecked combo hate in the format.

Besides wish into pyro from the board deals with teeg effectively and kinda ok against canonist (even though they get a turn heads up) but its unpractical against thaalia, and impossible if they use turn 1 mother of runes to protect their hatebear. Dread of night stops both of these and since maverick is one of the tier 1 decks of the format this is a strong argument for the card atm.

I can't say anything about the stoneforges in the esperblade deck but I can say that in a format of cheap fat legends two md karakas seems nice. The format is positively crawling with deal with or die legends between sneak and show, reanimator, and the somewhat more rogue hypergenesis combo which just crushes fair decks if it resolves a gristelbrand or emrakul. More protection against these fatty decks is welcomed, especially with how stong going into gp gent sneak and show and reanimator must have looked.


I'm dissapointed you took a counterspell vs counterbalance argument between the miracle decks. Both ran counterspell, the argument was standstill or counterbalance. It would have been interesting for you to discuss that difference rather than chase one that didn't exist. I know you address standstill separately later in the column but the whole first paragraph is wasted on a conflict that didn't exist seeing as both list had 2 md counterspell.

As for junk, the reason for the 4th liliana is that they are practically oblivion rings against show and tell and reanimator. And they are backbreaking to resolve against most "fair," decks.

Also I don't see the argument for path in a deck that ultimately intends to soft lock the opponent out of his/her lands if the game grinds on long enough. Ghastly is good enough to kill a hierarchic or elf and I'm sure it was boarded in against faster decks with cheap creatures. Also top pitches to lilina which is good enough way to get rid of one. And a top is never exactly a bad topdeck if you are willing to grind and if junk can do anything it is grind against other aggro decks.


Not even going to argue with you about mindcensor because I don't understand how you don't see value in this card. It has flash so it can be used as effectively a counterspell and it hurts just about everything. Just going through the top 8 decks it hurts:

Fetches
Grim tutor
infernal tutor
stoneforge mystic
personal tutor
green sun's zenith
crop rotation


And that is all one sided, your stuff is unaffected.

[Shugyosha]

Have to agree with dsck and Umezete. Many sentences where I just thought "You should play this particular deck more".

Dread of Night kills Thalia and Mindcensor. It also kills Teeg and Canonist and is not destroyable by Pridemage if you have two in play, that's the reason you play 4 of them.

Pernicious Deed in the Junk list? A glimpse over the decklist should make clear why this is a bad idea: Mox Diamonds, Souls Tokens and only a few threats in the same range you want to blow the Deed for. Therefore he chose EE which limits your losses.

Not enough ways to get rid of a extra Top is usually a bad arguement. Top helps you not to draw Tops, most decks play 6-8 fetchlands and this Junk deck also plays Knights. The value you can get out of Top in this list is insane.

Stoneforge Mystic is not a good card right now? It is instrumental for Bladecontrol, a DTB. It is perfect for control decks. Geist of Saint Traft also has crazy synergy with equipment (SoFaF), so at any rate play both.

etc.

[Bryant Cook]

you're being pretty unfair trashing some of these deckbuilders decisions without first stating the intended reason for them. They made top 8 of a gp, something obv went right and I think its important to see what.

Dread of night in Ant sb- To be frank thaalia is a 4 of in any deck running white these days and this is the cheapest and most effective removal. Who cares if they pridemage it? If they played thaalia first and you killed it you just go ahead and win when they are busy dealing with your hate. Granted it doesn't kill hatebear gaddock teeg or canonist but it deals with the most consistant maindecked combo hate in the format.

Besides wish into pyro from the board deals with teeg effectively and kinda ok against canonist (even though they get a turn heads up) but its unpractical against thaalia, and impossible if they use turn 1 mother of runes to protect their hatebear. Dread of night stops both of these and since maverick is one of the tier 1 decks of the format this is a strong argument for the card atm.

Oh really? Just because a deck went right once it can't be improved up and is deemed untouchable? Grow up. There's always room for improvement and the article was my views on how to improve those lists.

To be frank, Thalia isn't an auto four of in every white deck. I've seen plenty of lists that run three and a Gaddock Teeg. Teeg has essentially five copies in the lists with four Green Sun Zenith often coming down on turn two. Yes, it's perfectly reasonable to play Dread of Night after Thalia comes down, but then it's basically time walking you and then they can destroy it pretty easily. Why use Burning Wish for 'clasm? When you can be more proactive. Run some Inquisitions/Thoughtseize/some sort of discard that can discard Thalia or Teeg that can be sided against blue decks too. Versatility is important.

I can't say anything about the stoneforges in the esperblade deck but I can say that in a format of cheap fat legends two md karakas seems nice. The format is positively crawling with deal with or die legends between sneak and show, reanimator, and the somewhat more rogue hypergenesis combo which just crushes fair decks if it resolves a gristelbrand or emrakul. More protection against these fatty decks is welcomed, especially with how stong going into gp gent sneak and show and reanimator must have looked.

There aren't enough of these decks to warrant two Karakas in the main. Reanimator and Sneak Shows numbers have been dying down. Which is why I was advocating a one-one split between the main and the board.

I'm dissapointed you took a counterspell vs counterbalance argument between the miracle decks. Both ran counterspell, the argument was standstill or counterbalance. It would have been interesting for you to discuss that difference rather than chase one that didn't exist. I know you address standstill separately later in the column but the whole first paragraph is wasted on a conflict that didn't exist seeing as both list had 2 md counterspell.

I must've missed them in the list. It was a mistake, shit happens.

As for junk, the reason for the 4th liliana is that they are practically oblivion rings against show and tell and reanimator. And they are backbreaking to resolve against most "fair," decks.

Also I don't see the argument for path in a deck that ultimately intends to soft lock the opponent out of his/her lands if the game grinds on long enough. Ghastly is good enough to kill a hierarchic or elf and I'm sure it was boarded in against faster decks with cheap creatures. Also top pitches to lilina which is good enough way to get rid of one. And a top is never exactly a bad topdeck if you are willing to grind and if junk can do anything it is grind against other aggro decks.

I've played against plenty of junk decks, what ends up happening is that players end up discarding excess Lillianas to herself. I'd rather see another card in this slot. Four of a Planeswalker that doesn't straight-up win the game is ridiculous. Even control decks don't play four Jace anymore. I'm not completely out of line.

Path deals with larger creatures quickly without restraints, I believe that makes it more effective. There's still plenty of other removal for one drop mana dorks.

As for Top, I've never liked running four in any deck that doesn't play Counterbalance. That's not going to change, drawing two of them just sucks a majority of the time.

Not even going to argue with you about mindcensor because I don't understand how you don't see value in this card. It has flash so it can be used as effectively a counterspell and it hurts just about everything. Just going through the top 8 decks it hurts:

Fetches
Grim tutor
infernal tutor
stoneforge mystic
personal tutor
green sun's zenith
crop rotation

And that is all one sided, your stuff is unaffected.

Crop Rotation, Personal Tutor, and Grim Tutor? You're really stretching here. Why is shutting down opposing Green Sun Zeniths or Stoneforges more important than the exalted trigger from Pridemage or destroying an artifact. The gain life or graveyard hate from another Ooze would definitely be better than potentially stopping a search trigger.

Pernicious Deed in the Junk list? A glimpse over the decklist should make clear why this is a bad idea: Mox Diamonds, Souls Tokens and only a few threats in the same range you want to blow the Deed for. Therefore he chose EE which limits your losses.

Stoneforge Mystic is not a good card right now? It is instrumental for Bladecontrol, a DTB. It is perfect for control decks. Geist of Saint Traft also has crazy synergy with equipment (SoFaF), so at any rate play both.

Have you ever played with Pernicious Deed? If you have you'd know how insane the card is and why it should be in near every damn deck playing both green and black. Soul tokens and Moxen being destroyed are usually the least of that decks concerns.

Yes, Stoneforge is bad right now. I didn't stutter.

Blade control, one deck. Maverick decks have been shaving or cutting the card all together AND Miracles players have even realized how underwhelming SFM really is.

[emidln]

Have you ever played with Pernicious Deed? If you have you'd know how insane the card is and why it should be in near every damn deck playing both green and black. Soul tokens and Moxen being destroyed are usually the least of that decks concerns.

As someone who has jammed Pernicious Deed in storm combo, I have to agree with this.

[Finn]

Miracle decks cut Mystics because they just don't have room. It has little to do with waning power. If you shoehorn such a large number of cards into a control deck with miracles you get something that does not do either particularly well. Those people who came to this conclusion and decided on the Mystic route have decks we recognize as Stoneblade while those who went without have the Miracle decks. It's that simple.

[Bryant Cook]

Miracle decks cut Mystics because they just don't have room. It has little to do with waning power. If you shoehorn such a large number of cards into a control deck with miracles you get something that does not do either particularly well. Those people who came to this conclusion and decided on the Mystic route have decks we recognize as Stoneblade while those who went without have the Miracle decks. It's that simple.

You misunderstood what I was saying, I was never saying Miracles players were ever trying to jam SFM into Miracles. They're basically the same deck except it comes down to SFM vs. Miracles cards. What I was saying is that Miracles players often realized SFM wasn't getting the job done.

[Ignithas_]

You misunderstood what I was saying, I was never saying Miracles players were ever trying to jam SFM into Miracles. They're basically the same deck except it comes down to SFM vs. Miracles cards. What I was saying is that Miracles players often realized SFM wasn't getting the job done.

I don't think that Miracle player think that SFM wasn't getting the job done, in the same sence like Reanimator decks aren't thinking that Sneakattack wasn't getting the job done. And I think Finn wanted to say this. They don't think that SFM isn't strong enough, they just don't have the room for both. And in my opinion none is stronger than the other, they have only two different gameplans. And it was clear that many Legacy player were longing for pure control decks and would play Miracle Control once they saw it performs well.

[Shugyosha]

Have you ever played with Pernicious Deed? If you have you'd know how insane the card is and why it should be in near every damn deck playing both green and black. Soul tokens and Moxen being destroyed are usually the least of that decks concerns.

That's more of a statement than an argument. A problem I encountered in your article as well. BUG control play Deed because they have few permanents and play the control role. I rarely see Deeds in other decks. The reason is simply. You don't want to pay 1GB + ~3 Mana to clear the board and kill all your stuff as well. This junk deck wants to stick 1-2 beaters while disrupting the enemy constantly. Ther shouldn't be the need for Deeds, especially as it is so hard in this deck to trade to your advantage. EE on the other hand lets you sweep the important CMC 1 range with card advantage easily.

Yes, Stoneforge is bad right now. I didn't stutter.

Blade control, one deck. Maverick decks have been shaving or cutting the card all together AND Miracles players have even realized how underwhelming SFM really is.

Blade Control is one deck that puts up consistent numbers for month. Even with a shifting meta it is still very much a DTB.

Maverick players cut SFM for Thalia, not because SFM is bad. Thalia is needed to make the combo matchup better and is very good against many decks in Maverick. It would make no sense to cut GSZ-able creatures, Mindcensor (helps with combo as well) or Mother (protects all the stuff). Just because Thalia is better for the deck in the current meta does not mean SFM is bad now. Safe from bans and very crazy Flash-like things happening I don't think SFM will fall out of favor in legacy. Unless the print the same with less mana symbols ofc.

[Umezete]

Oh really? Just because a deck went right once it can't be improved up and is deemed untouchable? Grow up. There's always room for improvement and the article was my views on how to improve those lists.

Point taken, but discounting a card as bad because it "only" answers thaalia is just silly. Also don't personally attack me for arguing with you, that is more childish than anything else posted.on this thread.

To be frank, Thalia isn't an auto four of in every white deck. I've seen plenty of lists that run three and a Gaddock Teeg. Teeg has essentially five copies in the lists with four Green Sun Zenith often coming down on turn two. Yes, it's perfectly reasonable to play Dread of Night after Thalia comes down, but then it's basically time walking you and then they can destroy it pretty easily. Why use Burning Wish for 'clasm? When you can be more proactive. Run some Inquisitions/Thoughtseize/some sort of discard that can discard Thalia or Teeg that can be sided against blue decks too. Versatility is important.

I wont say this isn't true but out of the top 16 in Ghent 4 thaalia was the majority play for.maverick. Same for.a couple.of smaller.tournaments as well like the scg events. And its not like the ant player didn't play hand disruption though yes imo Inquisition would.have been a good include.

There aren't enough of these decks to warrant two Karakas in the main. Reanimator and Sneak Shows numbers have been dying down. Which is why I was advocating a one-one split between the main and the board.

This is a Meta call, the decks popularity isn't likely dwindling as much as you think. Sneak and show and reanimator are popular enough at US events that I find this call a bit premature. And its not like you can't simply brainstorm an extra karakas away.

I've played against plenty of junk decks, what ends up happening is that players end up discarding excess Lillianas to herself. I'd rather see another card in this slot. Four of a Planeswalker that doesn't straight-up win the game is ridiculous. Even control decks don't play four Jace anymore. I'm not completely out of line.

Having to pitch lili to herself is a happy problem to have. Junk is all about the soft locks, if you have an active lili in play you are winning.

Path deals with larger creatures quickly without restraints, I believe that makes it more effective. There's still plenty of other removal for one drop mana dorks.

Junk gives not a single fuck about fatties mostly because of lili so it wouldn't event board path in. It does care however about getting swarmed under by more aggressive decks and demise is an efficient way to deal with these without giving them tempo. Again junk likes soft locks with land and this would be counter-intuitive.

As for Top, I've never liked running four in any deck that doesn't play Counterbalance. That's not going to change, drawing two of them just sucks a majority of the time.

Not drawing one sucks more and junk doesn't have the benefit of brainstorm to dig for one. And again the redundancy is fine because worse comes to worse you can pitch one to lili.

Crop Rotation, Personal Tutor, and Grim Tutor? You're really stretching here. Why is shutting down opposing Green Sun Zeniths or Stoneforges more important than the exalted trigger from Pridemage or destroying an artifact. The gain life or graveyard hate from another Ooze would definitely be better than potentially stopping a search trigger.

Its not a stretch at all, I listed every card in the top 8 it affected. If I listed an obscure case then blame gent not me. I don't really know how to argue this here because mindcensor is such an obviously strong card to me because I've played maverick with and without it. It strengthens combo and mirror matches which are absolutely crucial to the deck. Not having mindcensor is really dangerous in the mirror and Gw mavericks combo marchup is pretty terrible without the additional hate.

Yes, Stoneforge is bad right now. I didn't stutter.

Blade control, one deck. Maverick decks have been shaving or cutting the card all together AND Miracles players have even realized how underwhelming SFM really is.

I don't entirely dissagree with this but as it was said stoneforge was cut from.maverick for thaalia, not because it was bad.

[FieryBalrog]

Oh really? Just because a deck went right once it can't be improved up and is deemed untouchable? Grow up. There's always room for improvement and the article was my views on how to improve those lists.

Anyone can write things like "Three FoW seems wrong. Four is better." and "2 Karakas seems ridiculous to me". X seems bad; Y seems good; article complete? That isn't improving a deck; it's just a low utility stream of consciousness about the top 8 decks from the GP.

Perhaps I'm biased, as I found the grammar and writing style to be objectively poor, and as someone who has taught English grammar in the past, it's always more than a little off-putting to see sub-high school level English. It instantly prejudices me against the sophistication of the author. I generally find statements like "X seems bad" to be a lot more credible when paired with an author who is more disciplined about these matters.

[Hopo]

t, it's always more than a little off-putting to see sub-high school level English. It instantly prejudices me against the sophistication of the author. I generally find statements like "X seems bad" to be a lot more credible when paired with an author who is more disciplined about these matters.

I hope people some day understand this and realize that credibility is built from subtle things. And if the grammar is correct, there's less chance of the message being misunderstood. This is a huge issue. Of course, not everybody speaks english as their native language but I believe the author does.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

Of course people end up discarding extra Lilianas to herself. That's a feature, not a bug.

And extra tops get rid of themselves. Just use a fetchland. It's way more important to always hit Top than it is to worry about having an extra. You know extra Brainstorms aren't very good without a shuffle effect, does that mean you want to cut those to a 3 of?

I agree that just top 8ing once doesn't mean a list is perfect but some of these criticisms seem to be based in nothing.