Sorry. Maybe like 4 times... The single main board ZP was pretty good. I can't think of a match up that I don't want to see (barring the turn 1 combo decks). Maybe burn, but fire walkers help out. The Deck seems well positioned, especially after you get a couple of Scullers in there.
Originally Posted by Richard Cheese
FYI: I've cut Bob from Junk and so far it's been testing very well. He's too fragile in a meta FULL of Forked Bolts and Electrickeries. I've been riding the Phyrexian Arena high and it's been splendid.
I'll be trying out:
4 Deathrite Shaman
3 Tidehollow Sculler
4 Stoneforge Mystic
3 Beefier creature, no idea yet
3 Phyrexian Arena
2 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Feast and Famine/Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Lingering Souls
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Zealous Persecution
2 Darkblast
3 Thoughtseize
3 Cabal Therapy
-Matt
Similar to my list. I'm Still on liliana at the moment and 2 Tomb stalker as my beefy man. Batterskull is pretty alright at being a "beefy threat". I'm not completely sold on arena yet though. Abd in place on therapy, I'm running Scullers
Maybe 3 rhinos? I have thought to test sieges rhino in deadguy, maybe work with your list.
Hehe. Go back like ten months when I said that about Bob and everybody said I was being dumb. Also, DnT has always felt like a bye to me as long as your StP can hit their Mirran Crusaders or Serra Avenger. Not sure how many Zealous Persecutions you play though.
I was quite happy with Bob before cruise shuffled everything up. It's basically only decks like TA (and even they are running more removal now) and D&T that I can reliably get him to trigger. I was thinking of adding Moms in my Lily slots before my hiatus (I'll be playing again in a couple weeks.) The issue with running Mom + Bob I think is that you're adding yet-more 1-toughness to guard against the 1-toughness meta problem.
I think the general DRS + SFM + Sculler is the new "base", where we stick to a bunch of x/2s (and bigger) to stay above water. I worry about Matt's removal config and his Miracles game. I've been playing around with Thopters a bit and I could see matt's list with an extremely lite blue splash, 1x Sword of the Meek, 3 Thopters in the slots missing. (I realize that's a bit blasphemous as well.) Maybe those take up Lingering Slots and the Beef slots stay the way they are. I just think Thopters >>> Souls and if you're not greedy about the splash you won't feel it. It's a serious trump card to Miracles where Souls is a speed bump.
Otherwise, I could see Warden of the Beyond (4/4 vigilance for 3) possibly taking up the beefy slot. It's not amazing, but it's color light almost-batterskull on paper. I think Tombdaddy is well positioned for this slot as well.
I think the ZP should be a Pontiff; just because he's less useless in games that go weird, can hit twice, and can carry a sword. ZP is an easier to use card, but I think Pontiff (as far as 1-ofs go) is better. The haunt trigger is better/easier than it looks next to a Jitte or something. He also triggers easily off of therapy (SEGWAY!) I've been looking at therapy more and I think Matt's list looks good for it. It's just disruption density (2-in-1) that makes it attractive, turning something useless into a thing. Time to start getting good at the game I guess.
I'm surprised he's had success with arena. I guess I can dig mine out (I bought them for Invasion Block Junk in Block Wars :P.) I hope they shake up the ban list come January, as I know I'm not the only one deeply saddened to see Bob start falling off of the last lists he truly belongs in.
Given the above I think I'd modify it to:
4 Deathrite Shaman
3 Tidehollow Sculler
4 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Tombstalker
1 Orzhov Pontiff
3 Thopter Foundry
3 Phyrexian Arena
2 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of the Meek
1 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Darkblast
3 Thoughtseize
3 Cabal Therapy
2?
It's worth noting that Pontiff being a 1/1 also synergizes with Foundry (sometimes you lose your sword and have to card-neutral it back out), and Foundry can turn Sculler into Perma-exile or give you a 1/1 in place of just losing him flat out to removal.
EDIT: It looks like 39 cards + 22 lands would be the config; can't tell.
Thopter Foundry seems interesting. I think everyone is so used to running it in blue shells that we haven't broken ground running it in solid black white. Interesting. Let us know how it goes! I think Thopters is very well positioned.
-Matt
The one unfortunate thing about foundry isthat you needblue mana to cast it
Won't DRS suffice the majority of the time? This is where Chrome Mox is straight junk.
I mean, you don't have consistent access to blue mana, and you're playing three of them. You obviously simply can play some blue duals, but the thing I love about this deck is getting to play basics.
You only really need one blue source one time, right? Run one dual and/or run a basic Island and go heavy on blue fetches.
Meh. I'm not saying it's bad. But if you're going through that trouble you should be playing another fairly decent blue card that I won't mention.
I kinda agree, but there is something to be said about blue counts. If you run a mere 3 cards you only need a couple of lands outside of fetches. If you want to run 7 cards the number of times you need blue goes up drastically. I don't disagree that it'd be weird to not go full-bore (and that it's super obnoxious that the card requires blue) but there is something to be said for not needed blue and merely using it (maybe.)
I think the argument of:
-Run 3 Foundry
-Well.. you're in blue so run 4 BS
-Well... you're 7 cards deep, that's only 4 other cards that aren't FoW to support it
-Well... you're 15 cards deep, you should swap a couple of non-blues to make FoW reliable
While the Slippery Slope argument is a fallacy; it tends to be true when building decks in Legacy (because the mana bases are so manipulable. Even so, I really only want to swap 2-3 basics with their blue versions and get a card that deals with Miracles. Then again, that slippery slope looks immediately attractive for Cruise.
C'est la vie.
EDIT: My point is merely, I think we can do it without going full Esper Deathblade.
Monastery Mentor looks like a quite a card especially if playing with Top, probe / therapy in the deck.
I agree, I think he's really interesting. He doesn't fit into a blue cantrip shell, as Shawn was suggesting, but might not be terrible with Therapies and stuff. I approve.
-Matt
If ever untap with 2 tops and the monk is GG :P
That man is awesome. Excited to try him out
Yet an other strong human for Cavern of Souls
So I tried out my goofy list to a 2-0-2 finish against BUG Fit, RUG Delver, D&T, and Lands; which is alright.
Thoughts:
-Arena needs 2 draws to be as good as Bob untapping once. Why? Because Bob does something (attacks, equips, etc..) Arena helped but I don't know about it. It seems quite bad. I was never happy to see two and thinking back, I'm sure there were situations where I could've equipped and not being able to costed me. Being unable to set up the draws to avoid life loss is a bit annoying too. Also, extremely relevant is that it gets hit by Notion Thief and SotL, both of which happened last night. I'd avoid this card if I were you.
-Being able to run Tombstalker is awesome. He is quite the critter. Landed him every MU and (except when fighting Lage) he was great. If you're not running Bob, I think it's time to run this guy. His huge CMC played a big role as did his flying.
-I still like Pontiff over ZP for a 1-of. He does much of the same thing but with the bonus of sometimes doing it twice or carrying a sword.
-I'm not a fan of having such low counts of removal, especially one as conditional as Darkblast. It may be better in a large tournament..
-BSK is a nice thing but I have a very hard time knowing when to fetch him vs. Jitte vs. Meek. It always feels wrong and games I win with it, it'd be fine as almost any sword. My meta carries an ok amount of things that he trumps (and quickly) but I think the opportunity cost is not worth it if you have other big beaters.
-Thopter combo came out almost every game (except one that I stalled 7-ish turns against active Marit Lage and needed it or a Plow badly.) It was not always a winner due to SoFaI/Revoker or Deed, but I liked the tricks with Sculler, Top, and itself as a way to eek out mild value in odd situations. The life gain is quite relevant
I don't know what Arena will become. I think the list wants planeswalkers so I might head to Tezz-town or something (in which case I'll report elsewhere.)
Quite sure im gonna try out the Elder Pyromancer with tops. Havent really liked top just for the sake of them but with that guy drawing 2 tops will pretty much take over the game and end it the turn after.
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