What does this make your creature mix?Originally Posted by James718
Played a small tournament with ~20 players today and made it to the semis. Here's the list:
Land - 20
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
3 Sandstone Needle
1 Cavern of Souls
8 Mountain
Mana- 11
4 Seething Song
4 Simian Spirit Guide
3 Lotus Petal
Hate- 8
4 Blood Moon
4 Chalice of the Void
Threat Package- 21
4 Sneak Attack
4 Through the Breach
3 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
3 Worldspine Wurm
2 Griselbrand
3 Godo, Bandit Warlord
2 Batterskull
Board
1 Inferno Titan
2 Magus of the Moon
4 Leyline of the Void
1 Sudden Shock
2 Shattering Spree
3 Trinisphere
2 Defense Grid
Swiss:
3 wins (Storm 2-0, Charbelcher 2-1, Burn 2-1)
2 losses: (Miracles 0-2, Shardless 0-2)
Mostly straightforward matches. The blue decks were rough. In all four losses, I was Force of Willed on T1 or T2 when trying to stick a hate piece, Breach, or Sneak. I don't think I kept poor hands or anything. They just seemed to have it.
Quarterfinals:
Defeated Miracles in a rematch (2-1). Had a pretty exciting game 3. I kept a hate-only hand and landed T1 Trinisphere and T2 Chalice for one. What followed was very long and grindy affair. After eventually working him down with Godo and SSG beatdowns, he found a Terminus. A TTB-->Magus of the Moon had to finish the job (I was on 2 life to his 1. Ancient Tombs were working overtime).
Semis:
Lost to an Enchantress deck (1-2) that featured rough mulligans (game 3 I kept a loose 5: just couldn't bring myself to mull to 4. Should've played to win). In both losses I couldn't find fast draws, and I was wrecked by Solitary Confinement . Any suggestions for dealing with hateful enchantments like this? I suppose the answer is to just mulligan into faster hands and blow them out. Bringing any number of narrow cards to fight non-blue slow decks like this is probably wrong...maybe?
Final thoughts: This was my first go with the Godo-package (in place of Titan) and I loved it. Having multiple bodies out was absolutely relevant. I was pretty happy with my maindeck in general, but the sideboard felt off. Leyline never came in, Defense Grid didn't feel great when I stuck it, and a few additional copies of Cavern of Souls might have been nice. I actually wanted to board into a more all-in, hate-light deck against Charbelcher, Burn, and Enchantress. Maybe the fourth Lotus Petal and an additional Emmy in the board would be nice. In an open meta, do you think it's worth making room for extra speed/higher threat density in the sideboard, or are there not enough slots?
Had a blast doing stupid things today. Any other suggestions would be great!
Last edited by Squire Haligast; 06-26-2016 at 03:08 PM. Reason: grammar
For Enchantress, I'd consider Bane of Progress in the board (high-risk).
You'd be better off going with Anarchy
Anarchy seems solid as it also has application against D&T. I was also thinking about a 1-of Ugin, the Spirit Dragon in the board as a catch-all answer to any number of slow decks aiming to gum up the board. Is that too cute?
Against DnT you won't have the option to cast Ugin. He will cost more than 8 mana, and they will shut off your ramp quickly. By the time you find a way to get the 9 or 10 mana to cast Ugin, you will be long dead. Best option is to just use your Sulfur Elementals, Sudden Shocks (or Pyroclasms) and your Shattering Sprees.
Right--I wasn't referring to using Ugin for D&T specifically. Just as a potential answer for any number of potential slow match-ups.
It's probably wrong given that it doesn't work with our combo and misses stuff like Ensnaring Bridge. I've just had plenty of games that have stalled out in which I've had exorbitant amounts of mana and nothing effective to cast. I'm looking for a panacea, but it's just wishful thinking.
Some have considered Chandra Flamecaller as a thing to do with mana that gives you cards. Others have considered Scroll Rack as an attempt to dig wheb you have lands in hand. I personally think the 2 weaknesses of : 1- no manipulation plus 2- weak to countermagic, are the hugest problems with this deck.
I have even contemplated running a deck with the same mana base, but with just mid size creatures. No Sneak or TTB, just a bunch of Dragons, Wurmcoils, Godos, I Titans, etc. Just jam out fatties, like a bad mono red Eldrazi deck. But at that point you might as well just play real Eldrazi.
After having a great finish in Columbus the past 2 weeks (SCG legacy IQ in Orlando and a big local tournament) have been TERRIBLE. The variance of this deck can be extremely frustrating. I basically drove three hours to Orlando to play no magic, and attend an event yesterday to do the same. With 30 mana sources you can somehow still get mana screwed. The deck mulligans terribly.
I have tried Chandra in the board but found her to be too slow. I have thought about scroll rack but after the past two weeks I might take a break for a little and play something else.
I LITERALLY just sleeved up Pox and was going to post something similar. After top4'ing my local Gamers Helping Gamers tournament, and doing well for the surrounding weeks, I took my version of Big Red to EE4, feeling confident in my ability to pilot the deck. I drew ... 4 red mana sources in the first 8 games, and immediately went 0-3. Even tonight, I barely went 2-2 at my lgs. This deck is SUPER inconsistent, and should only be played in a relatively casual meta. Cutthroat players have made so much store credit off of me, just because of this deck. Time to shelve it for a few months, and try something else. Agreed.
An interesting thought. That deck would have access to Blood Moon though. It makes me wonder what a 75 would look like if you had a transformational sideboard that replaced the combo with pure midrange.
Difficult to do, considering Sneak and TTB is 8 cards, and cookie cutter build has 12 threats. If you use 4 Emrakul, 4 Worldspine Wurm / Griselbrand, and your other threats are Godo, Inferno Titan, and Wurmcoil Engine, you could get away with it, and leave 1 Sneak Attack, you could cut 4 TTB, 8 Threats, and sb in 15 dudes, like the other 6 drops, Koth, Stormbreath Dragon, Thunderbreak Regent, etc etc. Only thing is your non sneak creatures would have to already be in the deck, so no "4 emmy, 4 gris, 4 Worldspine" package. You will NEED Inferno Titan and some other moderate creature in those main slots, so that you can board correctly.
Another downside is you will lose access to 3ball, additional moon effects, and any grave hate in the board. Every week that I decided to cut Leyline of the Void for a week, I regretted it. Every time I cut my 3rd Shattering Spree, I regretted it.
Quite true. Nonetheless, I think there's something to your original thought. At a glance, I think being a bad Eldrazi deck that compensates with Blood Moon might be (at least marginally) viable. And hell, Blood Moon wrecks Eldrazi.
Initial list might be: a pretty familiar manabase, SSG and petals, all 8 Blood Moon effects, Chalice, and an assorted package of Titan, Godo/Bskull, Koth, and Wurmcoil. In matchups where Blood Moon and Magus are no good, Thought-Knot Seer can come in from the sideboard (that might mean running a handful of Cavern of Souls/Crystal Vein etc. for enough sources). I think resolving hate-pieces on T1 or T2 and grinding out a win with a fair midrange strategy seems doable. It makes playing off the top of the deck possible (as opposed to getting SA or TTB countered and sitting with a handful of uncastable fatties for the entire game).
Obviously this is a Sneak Attack thread, so I don't want to hijack. My interest is piqued, is all
Is there any reason why this is not in the Established decks yet?
the majority don't take us seriously
Agree. Also, there haven't been any consistent numbers put up. I think Hoogland top 16ed an SCG open or something, but no ones cracked the top 8 of a big event with it as far as I know.
Also, sneak show is the archetype, we're trying to do the same thing, "Cheat big hasty creature into play", they're doing it more consistently (but having nowhere near as much fun).
Part 3...does anyone even know the criteria to "be established" according to the source? (Mods, let us know!)
Hoogland is playing it this weekend or next at SCG Worchester.
It is a real deck, it just lacks credibility because it is wildly inconsistent. I would have gotten top 40ish at the GP if it wasnt for the worst topdecking of all time. Most people just say to play sneak and show or reanimator because it does what this deck does but better. We trade in counter magic and deck manipulation for hate cards, out of all the decks this one is the funnest (when its working). Hoogland sums it up well, If this deck is running you hot, you cant lose.
I think there is still a yet to be found best version. Possibly with scroll rack. But like I said, after a string of VERY disappointing weekends I will be giving this a rest for a little bit and playing something else.
I'll be rocking it as SCG Worchester sauce too.
When I decided I wanted chalice over sensei's top, scroll rack was my first go to. Problem with scroll rack is you 1. need cards in your hand, 2. want shuffle effects. We have neither of these. The deck is card hungry being a heavy >2 drop combo, once you've blown your first try or two and a couple mana sources, we're just out of cards. And sure, our fatties shuffle when they hit the yard but thats not what I'm talking about. If they hit the yard, we've probably won, or are discarding because we blew our mana too early. If you play into it (don't play out your sandstone needles or city of traitors or ssg's), you can "sometimes" build up enough junk in your hand but that leads to another problem. Being a combo, we have to put cards back, but keep the combo in hand, and then if you don't hit what you wanted, you've locked yourself into racking every turn but still only seeing one new card. I really wanted scroll rack to be the "make it" card...it's just not.
The most effective cards I've found for reloading: (@3)Magus of the wheel, (@4)Coercive Portal, (@6) Chandra, Flamecaller (Have yet to cast her, but seems good out of the SB vs the grindy matchups)
Here is what I played at GP Columbus:
Haven't really touched the deck since but I am going to SCG Worcester July 9th. Anything particular with Northeast legacy I could expect to see more than in any other meta?
Jeff Hoogland is playing this in Worcester right now. I belive he's 7-2 going into day 2. They even did a deck tech on him.
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