Treasure Cruise is a great card. However, I don't think its presence invalidates BUG Cascade as a valid, Tier 1 archetype. Shardless Agent + Ancestral Vision is still a powerful combination, and the card advantage and filtering provided by Agent is powerful even when it hits different spells. Shardless BUG also has slightly less reliance on the graveyard than a BUG list that relies on TC for card advantage, and TC requires the deck to be built with it in mind (lots of cantrips and cheap spells, rather than playing mostly midrange haymaker permanents). Rest in Peace would be more frustrating for BUG Delver to deal with, whereas BUG Cascade would view that as more of a temporary speed bump.Originally Posted by DOM
If anything, I think BUG Cascade could still maintain the basic configuration it currently has, and maybe fit in 2-3 TC or possibly Dig Through Time as additional card advantage to go along with Vision + Jace.
The one advantage I'd say that BUG Delver with TC would have over BUG Cascade is a stronger combo matchup. Having Daze and a faster clock goes a long way towards beating combo, and now they have nearly the same option of card advantage as its 'big sister' deck. But luckily BUG Cascade has a strong sideboard configured to specifically deal with the combo matchup.
*one problem though, is if we begin to see a lot more cards like Spirit of the Labyrinth, Draw spells become more unwieldy. So that might be one possible fallout problem that BUG Cascade will have to face due to the TC hype train.
**Another problem: Legacy players as a whole often aren't the most imaginative bunch around, so I would expect many players to adopt the UR lists running TC. BUG has problems dealing with Blood Moon and Price of Progress. The more these cards are run, the worse BUG becomes for a tournament.
More broadly, I think that it's not helpful to think of this is an Ancestral Vision deck. Shardless Agent into Tarmogoyf or Baleful Strix assembles a very strong board presence very quickly. Stapling Hymn to Tourach or Abrupt Decay to your Grizzly Bears is still good. Blood Moon and Price of Progress are problems, but they can be worked around. If I'm reasonably confident that I won't hit too much combo, I'd be happy to play Shardless.
Also, I harped on this a little in the BUG Delver thread, but Dimir Charm is incredible. For Shardless, it's a hard counter for a lot of problematic cards (Infernal Tutor, Show and Tell, opposing TCs/Visions, just to name a few) while also serving as a not-dead cascade in a large number of situations.
EDIT: My current test deck is below.
Creatures (12)
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Shardless Agent
4 Tarmogoyf
Planeswalkers (4)
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Draw/Manipulation (9)
4 Brainstorm
4 Ancestral Vision
1 Sylvan Library
Control (14)
4 Force of Will
4 Abrupt Decay
2 Dimir Charm
2 Thoughtseize
2 Toxic Deluge
Land (21)
4 Polluted Delta
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Wasteland
3 Underground Sea
2 Creeping Tar Pit
2 Tropical Island
1 Swamp
1 Bayou
1 Forest
Sideboard (15)
4 Meddling Mage
2 Golgari Charm
2 Pithing Needle
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Duress
1 Krosan Grip
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Savannah
I'm less sold on Mages and Savannah in the new environment, but I need to test more. It might be worthwhile to do -4 Meddling Mage, -1 Savannah, +2 Chill, +2 Disfigure, +1 Duress or Dimir Charm. I'd also like to find a slot for a Ponder main. If this doesn't work out I'll probably switch to a different BUG Control list.
Last edited by btm10; 10-12-2014 at 09:54 AM.
When I saw dimir charm in your list I was pretty sceptical, but testing ids showing this card to be a real player in what seems to be a treasure cruise meta. Thanks for the tech, it has been way better than I expected!
Might be a silly idea. But what do you guys think about squeezing Grizly Salvage into the list. I have been experimenting before with it, but it seems at least worth a thought in combination with Treasure Cruise
Edit: of course with cutting the visions and maybe (shardless)
Then you would have all the bears ...
No, Grisly Salvage is not advisable. It's tempo loss, demanding on the manabase, and it makes you more dependent on your graveyard at a time when people are poised to attack the graveyard to weaken Treasure Cruise and Dig Through Time.
You dont want all the bears?!
I agree its a tempo loss, but thats the case with every cantrip and I dont meant it to be a tempo giving card, thats why I was suggesting it in a midrange deck thread.
Additionally it makes you less dependent on your normal graveyard fill through fetches, cantrips etc. You have the options to: 1. FIll your graveyard with 5 cards 2. Cantrip for a needed creature while filling your graveyard with 4 cards. 3. Cantrip for fetchland or wasteland, which puts effectively 5 cards in your GY while stocking up on mana. which all works pretty nicely in combination with treasure cruise and tarmofriend.
I see the downside of spending 2 mana. And anything without a instant reward in Legacy is often just bad, especially in the second turn. and the costs of GB makes it not easier to play.
You are probably right, thats why I was talking about a "stupid Idea" Im gonna test it tonight nontheless ;P
Whether a deck is midrange or not, tempo is still important. This is a fast format. Spending two mana on a spell that doesn't affect the board or directly interact with your opponent is suspect. Your goal with Grisly Salvage is to fill up your graveyard faster in order to be able to play Treasure Cruise earlier, but your graveyard is already a soft spot due to Tarmogoyf and Deathrite Shaman. Grisly Salvage also does not allow you to keep any Treasure Cruises you reveal, so the only way you'd be coming out ahead is by already having the Cruises in hand (and having the first one resolve).
Grisly Salvage plays the same role as cantrips, with the cost of being slower and harder to cast. If you want to speed up the process of filling the graveyard, Thought Scour and Mental Note are both probably superior. I could maybe see Grisly Salvage being used if this deck had no blue in it, but obviously that's not the case. Feel free to test anyway.
I don't play BUG Shardless myself, but I gotta ask: Isn't this deck more or less obsolete now that Treasure Cruise is running rampant? What are the reasons for trying to setup Ancestral Visions with Shardless when you can just draw 3 for? And more importantly, are those reasons good enough to stick with Shardless?
It's not like Agent into Visions was the whole thing for this deck. If UR displaces BUG as the premier Delver variant, then perhaps too much combo will start showing up to make Shardless good. Otherwise, the deck still has fine matchups against non-combo decks. I know I said this above, but seriously - Agent into Tarmogoyf, or Brainstorm, or Abrupt Decay are still strong plays. Agent into Ancestral Vision still casts Ancestral Recall. Other decks having access to card advantage doesn't make this one obsolete, especially because of how Shardless generates that advantage.I don't play BUG Shardless myself, but I gotta ask: Isn't this deck more or less obsolete now that Treasure Cruise is running rampant? What are the reasons for trying to setup Ancestral Visions with Shardless when you can just draw 3 for
Just play both :PI don't play BUG Shardless myself, but I gotta ask: Isn't this deck more or less obsolete now that Treasure Cruise is running rampant? What are the reasons for trying to setup Ancestral Visions with Shardless when you can just draw 3 for
Black has a lot of tools to deal with the threats that these decks present. Toxic Deluge, Golgari Charm, and Night of Souls Betrayal are all ridiculous right now. I think the "death of BG/x midrange" is exaggerated in legacy.I don't play BUG Shardless myself, but I gotta ask: Isn't this deck more or less obsolete now that Treasure Cruise is running rampant? What are the reasons for trying to setup Ancestral Visions with Shardless when you can just draw 3 for
Yep. I need to put more time into testing Shardless (been focusing on UR Delver and BUG Delver), but the more I think about it, the more I like the idea of playing Shardless at the GP. My main reservation is the amount of Burn I expect to see.
TBH, if you want to beat burn in shardless, couldn't you just throw a couple of spellskites in the board and cascade into those to close the game out once you empty their hand?
Edit: or maybe like, a batterskull or something lifegainy?
Jitte is the obvious choice as it's Cascadeable, flexible, and cheaper than Batterskull. The downside of Jitte is that it's painfully slow and is an additional target for Smash to Smithereens. Nourish might be worth testing in the narrow context of the GP because the two decks I'm expecting to see the most of are UR Delver and Burn, and it's strong against both. It's probably just too narrow an effect outside of those matchups, though.
Why not run a couple of Chill in the SB, to help control red?
It's great early, but awful when you're at 5 life and they've got 4 lands. On the flipside, it does something against Painter and Sneak and Show, which Jitte really doesn't and Nourish definitely doesn't. It probably doesn't do enough in those matches because of sol lands to be considered as anything other than hate for UR and Burn. Unfortunately I haven't had much time to test this weekend, so this is all just speculation.
Greetings fellow Shardless "Sultai" enthusiasts. This past weekend (11/2/14), I participated in a Grand Prix New Jersey Trial at Battleground Games & Hobbies in Abington, MA. I played the following list:
4 Polluted delta
4 Verdant Catacomb
2 Misty Rainforest
1 Creeping Tar Pit
1 Forest
1 Swamp
1 Bayou
3 Tropical island
3 Underground Sea
2 Wasteland
=22
I hate 21 land in this deck. Just seems like way too few, especially with the Planeswalkers.
4 DRS
4 'Goyf
4 Shardless Agent
1 Tombstalker (won me a game when I drew him)
=13
2 Toxic Deluge
4 Abrupt Decay
2 Thoughtseize
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
3 Ancestral Vision
2 Treasure Cruise
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Liliana of the Veil
Sideboard:
3 Disfigure
2 Duress
1 Liliana of the Veil
1 Notion Thief
2 Golgari Charm
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Seal of Primordium
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Null Rod
1 Pithing Needle
The event itself had 23 participants, meaning five rounds. I completed the swiss with a record of 3-1-1, losing to a BGW Junk/Maverick deck and drawing with U/R Delver. I defeated Miracles, Goblins and "Jeskai" Delver.
I lost in top eight to the same Junk/Maverick deck. :-(
Couple of points on my experience:
1. I never had any trouble keeping Tarmogoyf a sizeable monster playing both DRS and Treasure Cruise. I think, in this archetype, the most the archetype can probably get away with is 1-2 Treasure Cruise.
2. I didn't miss having the 4th Ancestral Vision. It's a terrible draw late (where I'd much prefer to draw Treasure Cruise), no matter how much I'd like to cascade into it.
3. Delver can feel scary, but I think having access to Abrupt Decay really shines here. I also absolutely destroyed the U/R Delver in game two after he player a turn one delver, turn two Young Pyromancer into "make a token." I untapped, calmly cast Golgari Charm and we were onto game three.
4. Tombstalker, while it did win me a game, felt like too much Delve and will be cut. I missed the Baleful Strix, though I realize that card is likely poorly positioned (damn you Forked Bolt).
5. I boarded out the Planeswalkers A LOT, though Liliana less so. I honestly think that Jace just isn't where it's at right now and we ought to be cutting one if not both. I think Ponder, Sylvan Library or something else entirely should likely take up Jace's place. I can see having one in the sideboard, of course. Nevertheless, the card is just to slow right now and severely outclassed by Treasure Cruise. Oftentimes, you just don't have time to cast it.
6. The times that Treasure Cruise was cast against me, I never really felt all that behind, especially since this deck has FIVE draw-three's (not counting Brainstorm). Sometimes, those decks just draw air. Plus, the longer the game goes, the worse their soft permission gets.
7. I fear that this deck is slowly "evolving" to look more and more like Team America ("Sultai" Delver) with Shardless Agents.
8. I missed Dimir Charm. That card definitely would have been very useful.
9. I defeated numerous Rest in Peace's. Card is a little scary, but not unbeatable.
10. As for the sideboard, I really liked Disfigure, Golgari Charm, Maelstrom Pulse, Seal of Primordial, Null Rod and Pithing Needle. Those likely won't change as they all performed really well.
The Notion Thief I just never got to cast. It's probably to slow in this deck.
Grafdigger's Cage, with Dredge winning last weekend's SCG Legacy Open, probably needs to stay.
As for the rest of the slots, I have no idea. I like the idea of Darkblast; I wonder if sideboarding Hymn to Tourach is fine over the Duress (to better compliment the Thoughtseize's in combo match ups). Maybe Vendilion Clique? Should I be trying out the Meddling Mage sideboard?
How else should we adapt to the changing metagame? I'm all ears.
I fell in love with this deck in Dallas at a open when TNN came out.
I wanted to play Shardless for NJ but am having a real problem with the UR delver matchup. It seems to be my worse "fair" deck match other than elves.
with all the treasure druise kids running around i am thinking of dropping the most maindeck discard - 3 thoughtseixe and 2 hymn to the bored, maybe play 3 Lily tops (2 main 1 bored?) and 2 thoughtseize.
Normal build. only differences are running 1 Jitte
3 Strix
2 deluge
1 disfigure
1 pulse
3 vision
I will upload my real list soon.
Any advice?
My favorite builds of Shardless never ran any discard in the maindeck. I love 2x Toxic Deluge and I think upping the strixes to 3 sounds great in a UR meta.
Has Thirst for Knowledge been tried, before or after Cruise?
I've been using it in casual (I know..) next to cruise and it's been pretty sweet. Instant speed allowed me to hold up counters, fill the yard by three while filtering, then cruise@1 a short time later. Unlike Thought Scour or other terrible cards, this has a reason to fill the grave; and with Shardless (and maybe Strix) you could easily toss an artifact and gain CA here.
It's a bit slow in a deck laden with 3 drops, but again, it's synergy with Cruise + semi-desirable artifact seems good while Shardless won't cascade into it (probably good.)
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