[Primer] Elves!

[shopshopshop]

Yep, you're right. Draw go for a cycle, then Visionary->NO, I think. Fun game. :)

[MadRhetoric17]

There were a couple of times during the tournament where I had fetches, but no lands to fetch for. That doesn't mean I want fewer fetches but when it came up it was highly important. Is this just a thing that happens or there some way around this?

I had the same experience. In the grindy matchups, it seems I was always getting to a point where I had a bunch of fetches and nothing to get. It may be the case where that fifth land would have been irrelevant, but still felt weird. I guess our other options are removing a fetch for a Pendelhaven, another forest, or another dual for a splash color. Neither of those options seem that great, so I'm not sure how to approach this issue.

[Julian23]

Hey guys, here's a short tournament recap for you guys. We're currently in our NYC apartment and having a great time

R1: *BYE*
R2: *BYE*
R3: UWr Delver - Draw (Off-camera Feature Match)
R4: UWr Delver - Win
R5: UWr Delver - Loss
R6: UR Delver - Win
R7: Death & Taxes - Win
R8: UR Delver - Loss

The list I played was a streamlined, non-midrange oriented version:

4 Gaea's Cradle
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Verdant Catacombs
2 Bayou
2 Forest
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Pendelhaven

4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Quirion Ranger
4 Heritage Druid
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Wirewood Symbiote
2 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Birchlore Rangers
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Scavenging Ooze

4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Glimpse of Nature
3 Natural Order

SB:
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Null Rod
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Elderscale Wurm
1 Progenitus
1 Natural Order

On Day2 I played in the Super Sunday Series. For the SB I decided I would no longer use to the stupid amount of Stoneblade decks I faced, so I added 3 Choke and 2 Sylvan Library in place of 1 Jitte, 2 Null Rod and 2 Thoughtseize; because hey, who plays Storm anyways? Choke is really super underwhelming against Miracles to a point where it's hardly relevant in most games. Against most Stoneblade variants it's actually amazing, especially vs UWr Delver/Stonblade.

R1: Reanimator 2:0 Win
R2: Lands 2:0 Win
R3: UWr Control 2:1 Win
R4: Soldier Stompy 2:0 Win
R5: Storm 0-2 Loss :-(
R6: Storm 0-2 Loss :-(
R7: All-In Hexmage Depths 1:2 Loss because I didn't bring in Elderscale Wurm which I should have because he couldn't remove it

At that point I dropped even though I was still live for prizes but wanted to watch Philipp in his Top8 matches.

I don't feel particularly worried about Elves, especially in the US meta where Miracles seems to still not have caught on as much as it should. If you disagree, I'm happy to invite you to Miracles Hell aka Europe to see what happens on this side of the globe.

So last night we went to a shop in Brooklyn to play in their weekly Legacy. The sideboard I played was:
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Null Rod
1 Pithing Needle
1 Sylvan Library
1 Progenitus
1 Natural Order

R1: Manaless Dredge - Win (local player)
R2: Team America - Win (local player)
R3: Stasis - Loss (Marc)
R4: Miracles - Loss (Tomas)

Everyone at the shop was super nice and I'm really happy we decided to go there :-)

Looking forward to SCG Richmond now!

[MadRhetoric17]

Hey Julian, what shop in Brooklyn was it? I just moved to BK and didn't know there was a shop with a legacy weekly. Also, how did you find Elderscale Wurm? I reraised that card a few pages back and was scolded for it, so I'm kind of surprised to see it in your SB for such a major tournament.

[Lemnear]

Elderscale, playsets of Nettle/Heritage, but no Packmaster ... this reads: "I expect a lot of stupid UR Delvers just folding to it"

[Shagstaman]

So now that Julian played it, I guess it's ok to discuss =)

on that same note, I'm happy my list was quite close to what Julian played! lol and I too ran elderscale... I got quite a few scoops when he hit play. It usually was like "natural order...cool get this thing" "pause...think of outs (spoiler alert, there are none)..look through sb...scoop phase!"

I was on 4 natural order, 3 heritage, 2 birchlore, 1 sage, 1 ooze md..

sb was:
1 choke
1 pithing needle
4 abrupt decay (containment priest reaction, was a great call)
4 cabal therapy
2 thoughtseize
1 progenitus
1 elderscale wurm
1 sylvan library

I won't bore you with my sub-par tournament report, but the tl:dr version is sylvan library and choke were all-stars vs the stoneblade decks (they were EVERYWHERE), wurm colded several decks including: UR delver, dredge, and lands (it's almost as if I wrote a post about this but no one believed me)... and finally, the 4th decay was A-MAZING. 100% the right call when stoneblade is the most popular deck followed by several delver variants.

the deck was amazing, but I played bad or I woulda topped the SSS and day 2'd the GP. Elves is still top tier, just needed a slight evolution.

edit: it colded the mirror too. drs gonna have a hard time chewing through my 17 life.

[Zombie]

So now that Julian played it, I guess it's ok to discuss =)

Yup... if the topic is dropping it for the fourth Decay ;)

EDIT: Reading sideboards is tech.

[Echelon]

So now that Julian played it, I guess it's ok to discuss =)

Well... If I understood correctly, he didn't even make it to day 2... So... No..?

[Lemnear]

Well... If I understood correctly, he didn't even make it to day 2... So... No..?

With all respect: streamlining against UR wasn't unreasonable. I guess the underestimated part were the UWR Blades (and their Plows handling the Wurm which makes it a no-go to board) on top of the untypical amount of combo at the GP compared to a SCG Open. You can interpret him having cut the Wurm for the next event any way you like. Maybe he gets another run at the upcoming Open or we see Ruric and the Midrange package return.

[Echelon]

With all respect: streamlining against UR wasn't unreasonable.

Hence Ross Merriams' build, which performed better.

Admittedly, I don't know what Ross's MU's were so we can't really compare his results to Julians.

[Zombie]

With all respect: streamlining against UR wasn't unreasonable. I guess the underestimated part were the UWR Blades (and their Plows handling the Wurm which makes it a no-go to board) on top of the untypical amount of combo at the GP compared to a SCG Open. You can interpret him having cut the Wurm for the next event any way you like. Maybe he gets another run at the upcoming Open or we see Ruric and the Midrange package return.

Yeah, I think I'd rather run Jitte. Turns all the random Elves into removal vs. threat-light blue tempo/midrange decks full of chaff and is a noncreature source of pressure vs. Miracles. May also accidentally improve your clock vs. combo, but that's super marginal.

[Shagstaman]

Hence Ross Merriams' build, which performed better.

Admittedly, I don't know what Ross's MU's were so we can't really compare his results to Julians.

I'm guessing he didn't play vs the uwr blade deck much, or if he did, he won all his post-board games. Not having sage in game 1 is a huge liability when that's the 2nd most popular deck (and as we know now, probably the best deck).

I'm looking forward to a report tho, always some good reading.

[theross]

My match-ups from the GP

R1-2: Byes
R3: Burn (W)
R4: UR Delver (L)
R5: Jeskai Stoneblade (W) (This was a 2-1 win where I lost game 2. You don't need Sage MD to beat decks with Jitte. They are slow as balls. Just run them over.)
R6: Jund (W)
R7: Deathblade (W)
R8: Burn (W)
R9: Lands (L)

I'm unsure of the order of rounds 5-8 but that doesn't matter much.

R10: No Show (Powerful Wizard)
R11: Reanimator (W)
R12: Sultai Delver (W)
R13: UR Delver (W)
R14: Deathblade (W)
R15: Death and Taxes (W)

[bfeingersh]

Did you just play your list from last week's article?

[theross]

I had a Null Rod in the SB instead of Worldspine Wurm, which I discussed in the primer.

[shopshopshop]

I don't think I GSZ'd for Sage at all over 15 rounds and 5 or 6 rounds of UWR Delver/Stoneblade. I got Ooze and Packmaster a couple times each, and otherwise was just getting the usual Elf/Insect targets. If I played at another tournament soon, I'd probably cut the Sage from the MD and put in the 4th Nettle Sentinel.

If I answered Jitte at all, it was either a block-and-bounce, winning, or post-board Therapy/Abrupt Decay.

[Shagstaman]

you guys must have much better luck than i do... my "normal" stoneblade matches go like this:

t1 bolt/plow ur guy
t2 sfm get jitte (or skull if theyre exceptionally lucky to already have jitte)
t3 clique your action spell
t4 equip for the gg

I had that sequence come up a lot in the past month...first on modo, then in playtesting, and ofc in the gp

anywho, I'm just happy that my deck is still a thing after this weekend. My confidence was shaken leading up to the event but now I feel just as confident as ever. I went x-3 in both events despite playing like hot garbage, so if I can tune it up a bit, game on.

[ventouza6969]

My match-ups from the GP

R1-2: Byes
R3: Burn (W)
R4: UR Delver (L)
R5: Jeskai Stoneblade (W) (This was a 2-1 win where I lost game 2. You don't need Sage MD to beat decks with Jitte. They are slow as balls. Just run them over.)
R6: Jund (W)
R7: Deathblade (W)
R8: Burn (W)
R9: Lands (L)

I'm unsure of the order of rounds 5-8 but that doesn't matter much.

R10: No Show (Powerful Wizard)
R11: Reanimator (W)
R12: Sultai Delver (W)
R13: UR Delver (W)
R14: Deathblade (W)
R15: Death and Taxes (W)

Congrats Ross for the 13-2. Did you remember the strategies which u follow and why? And of course the side in/out?

[Arksz]

Im curious as to what everyone thinks about the MUD matchup. Cutting reclamation sage from the main deck to the sideboard leave us soft to chalice of the void and trinisphere. Does it get better post board?

[Shagstaman]

edit: forgot this was the internet where opinions are like assholes. I'm going back into lurking only mode... sigh.

cool story, I once combo'd off (full glimpse chain into a kill) through a turn 1 trinisphere... =) good times.