When the 2/1 is better than the 2/2 against Engineered Plague, there is no "try."
The seven cardinal sins of Legacy:
1. Discuss the unbanning ofLand TaxEarthcraft.
2. Argue that banning Force of Will would make the format healthier.
3. Play Brainstorm without Fetchlands.
4. Stifle Standstill.
5. Think that Gaea's Blessing will make you Solidarity-proof.
6. Pass priority after playing Infernal Tutor.
7. Fail to playtest against Nourishing Lich (coZ iT wIlL gEt U!).
Best movie ever.
Just sayin.
Originally Posted by Lemnear
Qasali Pridemage kills Jitte at instant speed. Given that Jitte is far and away the most important card for this card to deal with, I will continue to play the Pridemage. The synergy with Wirewood Symbiote is overrated since it comes up in so few match-ups (DnT, MUD, Affinity, Tezz), most of which are played very rarely. Killing Jitte before it triggers is the most important factor in the decision, accounting for much more than the 5% of cases you assign it.
No Excuses, Play Like a Champion
I'd argue that synergy with Wirewood Symbiote is also relevant against Miracles, Burn (Eidolon, Bridge, Pillar, possibly Grafdigger's Cage), Enchantress, Painter, and Shardless BUG (all sorts of sideboard cards in addition to maindeck robots) as well. Some of those were already good matchups, but I think cumulatively, that more than makes up for the ability to blow up Jitte at instant speed (and only if they don't have removal for the Pridemage).
I don't like play the savannah and don't like play white, I prefer Julian manabase and play reclamation and decay;this kills the jitte instant speed too, (and va the pridemage they can kill it with a bolt, stp, or counter it, the decay not)
I love the reclamation sage, and the sinergy with symbiote it's fu**ing awesome
And what about use the "flex slot" for swan song? Or it's just better the mind break trap?
Regards!^^
I too, have never been a fan of the white splash, seems to hinder us as much as the OP usually....
And yeah: I'll trade a RecSage for a E-Plague ANY FUCKING day of the week :D
I'm still on the Jund version of the deck, which gives me access to Ruric-Thar... In DK, there's a fairly combo heavy meta, so a game 1 Ruric-Thar is house :D
Many Elves decks currently play 6 discard spells in their sideboard. I am currently running 5, along with 2 Surgical Extraction (shaving some sideboard slots traditionally dedicated to Delver). I would like to propose that the optimal configuration involves a better split of discard and Surgical Extraction and would like your opinions.
Here is my reasoning:
1) I would never bring in all my discard spells except against dedicated combo. Four discard spells is more than sufficient for any fair deck I can think of.
2) Early discard allows us to bridge our early turns into our midgame, and hopefully our end game, which often involves either a Natural Order for a lethal Hoof or a Ruric Thar. Occasionally, this may involve just attacking with a sea of dorks. During this period, we are susceptible to top decks, and discarding a key combo piece, followed by wiping it out is one way to get rid of this problem entirely.
3) Most of the super fast combo decks (ANT, Reanimator, LED Dredge, Tin Fins, and All Spells) are often too fast and too redundant to be significantly affected by discard, but are extremely susceptible to Surgical Extraction, which I think this can easily take the place of the much more narrow Mindbreak Trap. The only matchups where I'd rather have more discard or Trap are against TES and Belcher.
4) Most of the slower combo decks (Sneak Attack, High Tide, Omniscience) other than the mirror (against which I would rather max out on discard) are blue decks with a ton of cantrips. Discard is terrific in this matchup, but they are very good at protecting the cards on top of their library. Surgical Extraction in combination with discard offers two possibilities: (a) "the dream" of sniping every single copy of their main engine card, or (b) the ability to reset their library after they leave their best card on top with a Ponder in anticipation of discard or to even grab their three best cards if they respond to your discard spell with Brainstorm. Against these decks, I'd argue that the first discard spells are much better than Surgical Extraction, but that Surgical Extraction in combination with discard is better than two discard spells. This is in addition to considerations such as Leyline of Sanctity which is often present in the sideboard of these matchups.
5) Surgical Extraction can also be brought in as gravehate against random fair decks that involve Loam.
6) Surgical Extraction is also great against something like Miracles since it allows you to shuffle their library, fizzle their Snapcaster trigger, and probably most importantly, get rid of all subsequent copies of Terminus (remember to do this in response to the Miracle trigger for most value).
So enough with the theorycrafting. I'm thinking of a 4-3 discard-Extraction split in the seven slots I currently have, but I'm worried that this may not be enough discard.
Hi everybody.
I would like advice in some cards changes i saw in new lists :
- bitterblossom: good against Mari Lage and Miracles. Any other pairing you will side in? I think that would be good against RUG or URW delver decks, if casted soon to gain tempo and put creatures in play to make cradle powerful. am i OK?
- Wren's Run Packmaster : dies with STP but could be used against a lot of pairings w/o massive removal. Good agains RUG/UWR delver and all aggro decks. Not good against control or combo.
- Ruric Thar, the Unbowed : i used to play it, removed from my deck but trying it again. Win condition against storm decks and burn!
- cabal therapy. I'm never sure about the card to name if i don't know cards in hand of opponent. LED could be the 1st choice against storm, but if no led in hand i don't like to loose the turn. Ritual or tutor are good options too. I prefer playing duress to be sure of discarding something. Therapy is good if i play gaddock (not my case) to sacrifice it and then play NO FTW.
If someone tells me the main naming for each pairing i will be thankfull.
- progenitus : is good in some pairings, but needs 2 turns to win (to much in some pairings) and could be removed with council's judgement. I don't play it anymore
- Choke : bitterblossom took their slots in my SB. Good against miracles, but not good against decks with decay. Could be good against RUG/UWR delver if enter the battlefield soon, but a delver in play makes me to play other options before choke.
- Pendelhaven : Most elves decks play same 19 lands (2 forest, 9 fetch, 2 dryad, 2 bayou, 4 cradle) + 1. That one could be a 3rd forest, taiga (for ruric), tropical (for swan songs) or pendelhaven. Last one is my current choice, but sometimes my fetches become unusefull (9 fetches for 6 forests instead of 7). Thinking to change 1 fetch for 3rd forest or taiga. What do you think?
For a bit of discussion, what do people think of this list played by Nick Kennedy who placed 16th at last week's SCG open. Noticable differences are only 2 NOs in the 75, and 1 Regal Force. Main deck is also not getting techy with the creature base, 0 ooze, 0 reclamation sage main (2 board), 0 packmaster.
Creatures (33)
2 Birchlore Rangers
2 Craterhoof Behemoth
4 Deathrite Shaman
2 Elvish Mystic
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Heritage Druid
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Quirion Ranger
1 Regal Force
4 Wirewood Symbiote
2 Dryad Arbor
Lands (17)
3 Forest
2 Bayou
1 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
4 Gaea's Cradle
Spells (10)
4 Glimpse of Nature
4 Green Sun's Zenith
2 Natural Order
Sideboard
2 Reclamation Sage
2 Wilt-Leaf Liege
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Mindbreak Trap
4 Cabal Therapy
The sideboard is also very straightforward, with very few silver bullets.
Edit:
Regal is crap; no Sage in the MB is madness now that Miracles and SFM cover a large part of the metagame. Packmaster just dominates any fair or aggro-related matchup like Jund or Junk
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Bitterblossom: It's for slow white control matchups - usually Miracles and Blade - as well as UB Tezzeret. It's probably just too slow against Delver oftentimes, but I really want to get some testing done on that. Still, it's probably bad because it's too slow.
Packmaster: Good against nearly every fair matchup. Is hard to remove (Decay+Bolt-proof), doesn't necessarily have to attack, and with Cradle just takes over games with ease, if a 5/5 body didn't do that already. Can protect a guy from Terminus and force Miracles to Terminus or lose. She's a fair game all star.
Ruric: Often a win against Storm and sometimes against Burn, yes. Can also do good work on the board against RUG. Primary ability is turning tapped-out NOs/big GSZs into pseudo-kills which speeds up the deck dramatically in the combo mirror.
Therapy: Is a boss. Be mindful of treating ANT and TES differently - against ANT you probably have a turn, so play a T1 dork, T2 fire off the Therapy. Against TES you have much less time, so T1 Therapy for LED is where you probably want to be. You can use Surgical to scout for the Therapy sometimes, which is sweet.
Progenitus: Worldspine Wurm does the same or better in nonwhite matchups usually, but I keep Progenitus around for Maverick and to an extent D&T which are quite cold to it but laugh at Worldspine. Progenitus is also much better against Miracles because it needs more specific answers.
In modern Burn double-bolting a Ruric often means 16 to the dome. CoV exists but I think you oversell Ruric's answerability. How many lists even run 3?
Thanks for the reply.
You mean globally it's better choke than Bitterblossom? Maybe choke is better than bitterblossom against miracles. But bitterblossom is the best option against dark depths i think and also works against miracles. I took that decision according to my local meta.
I play Ruric in main and Packmaster in side. Aggainst aggro i can play freely lots of elves because in G1 they don't have massive removal like golgari charm or zealous. In G2/3 it's diferent and packmaster is a very good way.
The same with ruric, for storm. In G1 it's GG and my unique option, in G2 we have to combine with discard.
What about meekstone? i have doubts about 3 decay + 1 meekstone or 4 decays SB. Decay is more usefull.
The big problem with progenitus is drawing it. I'm a expert in that task. Massive removal or CJ are 2 added problems.
What is a decklist you are playing currently?
[QUOTE=apon;825257]The same with ruric, for storm. In G1 it's GG and my unique option, in G2 we have to combine with discard.[QUOTE]
With Eidolon and Thalia in the metagame, you should be prepared to face CoV from various storm decks. ANT currently runs 3 CoV in the side while TES as two, but with the printing of Void Snare the Wish variants have even more outs to Ruric Thar which makes a total of 6 aside the Option to delay your ruric with discard for your NO/GSZ or simply kill you before the banisher of cowards enters the battlefield.
The idea of "Ruric = win" is a bit arrogant
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It puts them on the spot for having Chain in hand right now AND probably be able to win on the following turn, which is very good odds.
Other than the Ruric Thar, the general plan vs Storm, especially ANT, has always been to get them down to 12 asap with an active DRS or Ooze, preferably with an Quirion Ranger around as well. TES has better odds of still living through an AdN from 10 respectively 8 life, but I like the odds there.
The seven cardinal sins of Legacy:
1. Discuss the unbanning ofLand TaxEarthcraft.
2. Argue that banning Force of Will would make the format healthier.
3. Play Brainstorm without Fetchlands.
4. Stifle Standstill.
5. Think that Gaea's Blessing will make you Solidarity-proof.
6. Pass priority after playing Infernal Tutor.
7. Fail to playtest against Nourishing Lich (coZ iT wIlL gEt U!).
I really like this plan in theory. How has it been in practice? What kind of sideboard concessions have you had to make to fit in all those Surgicals? Do you find yourself boarding them in sometimes where it isn't 100% appropriate, just for the thrill of trying to "get" somebody? Perhaps a 5-2 split would be more appropriate? There was a Ponder vs Preordain thread where they agreed that the Preordain is better as the third cantrip, whereas the Ponder is better as first two. This is similar to your 4th point. However, you don't get to choose in which order you draw your cards, so perhaps it would be best to hedge your bets and run a 5/2 split, to ensure that you hit that discard spell first instead of a Surgical?
Just some thoughts.
Elves Discord Channel: https://discord.gg/2EVsdw2
5 discard
2 surgical
prog/worldspine
2 bitterblossom
2 null rod / needle
3 decay
= good board. Needs that 4th NO main tho.
I've been recently running actually running a 5-2 split: 3 Decay, 3 Thoughtseize, 2 Cabal Therapy, 2 Pithing Needle, 2 Surgical Extraction, 1 Null Rod, 1 Rclamation Sage, and 1 Ruric Thar in the sideboard, although I constantly change things and I'm by no means locked into this.
I haven't had enough matches with this configuration to tell you how it's worked "in practice". I have brought in Surgical Extraction against both my Miracles opponents, but so far, I've never had the opportunity to use them (they never found a second Terminus before I won those games, although one of them Cliqued away my Surgical instead of other more threatening cards in hand).
The first discard spell is much better than Surgical Extraction against the slow combo matchups, but I'd argue that our worst combo matchups are actually the fast ones I mentioned in section three (ANT, Reanimator, LED Dredge, Tin Fins, All Spells, TES, and Belcher). Furtheremore, in all of these matchups other than TES and Belcher, I believe that Surgical Extraction is faster and more disruptive against than discard, and the combination of the two is even more devastating.
My question is whether the considerations in favor of Surgical Extraction (primarily against fast combo and random Loam strategies) justify shaving the 5th discard spell for a 3rd Extraction, at the cost of weakening the slow combo matchups (where I'm not entirely sure I'd want Surgical at all, but where it certainly remains a consideration).
I figured I would chime in with my brief time playing surgical extraction. Surgical has always treated me well and added a very different dynamic to the miracles matchup. My common uses were to remove terminus and trump graveyard based combo, as well as exile punishing fires. In regards to sideboard construction, I shift around the metagame dependant combo slots the most frequently. Sometimes I have a sylvan library for grindy matchups but the only thing that ever stays the same are at least 3 abrupt decay and at least 2 hand disruption spells.
I think Surgical is primary an anti combo card and useful if you are playing an endless sea of punishing fire. If you are facing a lot of graveyard combo I think going up to 3 is reasonable just because it provides relevant interaction on turn 0 where we would otherwise have none, where a mass of discard is often too slow. I always want the first discard spell and sometimes the second, but after I've spent a mana to buy myself 2-3 turns I want to shift gears and actually kill my opponent.
Last edited by starfox444; 07-31-2014 at 04:24 AM.
Now with the new lists with WRP, what is the best 1mana dork configuration between Birchlore, Heritage and Llanowar? I thought I would just run 1 Birchlore, 4 Heritage, 0 Llanowar (I'm playing 61 cards with Ruric, Sage, 3 NO and trying the WRP out)
also: how do you feel about Meekstone atm? Just ordered a 7th foil copy yesterday :)
I don't know why you need 7 meekstones ;P
Birchlores are not required if you a) run 2 colors only, b) are not too fond of machinegun DRS for the midgame c) don't want to run too many cards supporting the fragile Glimpse combo, d) want more cards which actually do something on their own. Hertiages require several elves in play to feed NO, GSZ or Glimpse combo mainly, but Controlling 3+ creatures can become a real problem with Terminus, Deluge and Golgari Charm. Llanowars are solid for the early game and to rebuild after a sweeper, but do we really need more than 8 T1 accelerator? I doubt that.
Personally, I chopped the Nettle/Heritage core as well as the NO/Hoof package for Crop Rotations (+ toolbox lands like Bog/Karakas against Reanimator, SneakShow and dredge which are bad matchups) and more Packmasters to play a more stable midrange gameplan as I have the impression that stomping your opponent with Hoof for lethal is not only less common with all the sweepers in the metagame but also not required against the average meat most opponents control on their side of the battlefield. The creature/spell ratio didn't change much, so I'm still able to run Glimpse as a creature-fueled Ancestral Recall
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