Couple of questions for you:
There's 2 losses to DnT, which is normally a fairly straightforward matchup. I know you said most losses were variance (which lines up well with how I'd normally expect to lose to DnT), but was there anything in particular you felt caused these losses beyond this? Were the cards you weren't prepared for? Would you build your deck differently? I feel this is a matchup I need to expect to play a lot more of than I was pre-ban
Secondly, you've gone back to Hurkyl's over Echoing. I've always a little torn on this decision, hurkyl's is quite narrow but when it's good it's busted, Echoing is never busted, but always fine. What tipped you towards Hurkyls?
My first loss to DnT I would have lost to any deck. I died on turn 10 with a Dread of Night in play and 0 hatebears because I never drew a blue card or a tutor. I kept my hand on the back of Dread of Night + Removal + Thoughtseize both games. That might have been a mistake but it was just the fail rate of Storm.
My 2nd loss to DnT was getting nut drawn while on the draw vs them. G1 they had Vial-Thalia-Portx2-Prelatex2 and G3 I played a Dread of Night and they drew Revoker - Revoker - Prelate off the top.
The matchup is still favored. I lost every postboard game with Dread of Night in play so I might test Massacre again. My opponents also had cards like Leonin Relic Warder and Devout Lightcaster for Dread of Night which makes me doubt its effectivness.
Echoing is better against Turbo Depths and Moon Stompy, Hurkyl's is better vs Eldrazi and Lands. There are more of the latter in the metagame so I am on Hurkly's.
It depends a lot on the context of your hand. In general I like to use early discard and flusters to disrupt their combo but save at least one discard spell for my combo turn. Usually this works fine because we are a turn faster so our combo turn discard isn't too slow to stop their combo anyways.
Pretty much exactly what happens every time I lose to D&T, which is more times than I'd like. Postboard, I either go off T1–2 or they just start playing an endless succession of bears.
Your experience with Dread of Night also sounds a lot like mine. A question about Massacre: do you cut Ad Nauseam? I really want to like Massacre but I also feel like cutting our card-barfing card is counterproductive in the matchup. I'm also interested to know whether people have tried other sweepers in that matchup or others.
For what little it's worth, I'm on 3x Hurkyl's Recall right now. Narrow and Christmasland-ish, but I don't know of anything I'd rather have against Chalices and their ilk. Maybe Phyrexian Obliterators are finally worth a try.
All Spells Primer under construction: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e...Tl7utWpLo0/pub
PM me if you want to contribute!
No, I don't. Ad Nauseam is one of the most important cards in the MU. Our average CMC is still fairly low since we should be cutting Dark Petition post board. But this is a big reason I play Dread of Night.
Pyroclasm is really strong but doesn't get around Mother of Runes. I like to play it if I am also playing a Badlands.
Holy spice cabinet, Batman!
http://www.hareruyamtg.com/en/k/k110530/
Anybody tried anything remotely like this? Feels much more TES/Belcherish than what we're doing, but I'm curious to hear thoughts.
All Spells Primer under construction: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e...Tl7utWpLo0/pub
PM me if you want to contribute!
I had a sort of mess-around/goldfish pile like this that I tooled around with before. There is an issue that the Ad Nauseam doesn't actually seem all that good with so many 4CMC cards and Seething Song. It might be better to run Death Wishes or something for extra business over Ad Nauseam and a couple other cards, since Death Wish can convert to draw-7s or Goblins like a Wish could. It may also be worth considering some combination of Taiga/Bayou, as Land Grant generates storm count. Lastly, it kinda makes me sad there's no Tomb of Urami in there for the classic all-in spice.
Edit: Dark Petition is also a consideration if you're not running Ad Nauseam, though you may want to squeeze in Cabal Rits to increase spell density and black conversion even higher.
Drowned Secrets looks interesting.
All Spells Primer under construction: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e...Tl7utWpLo0/pub
PM me if you want to contribute!
Congrats on your finish and sorry if I am late to the party but I have some questions, you might be able to answer. Might be total noob questions, sorry about that :)
- Did you use Flusterstorm and if yes, what for? I have seen the card on a lot of sideboards but I never quite figured what to do with it. It seems to have horrible anti-synergy with Infernal Tutor, so it can't really protect us against countermagic. Is it just to disrupt over combo players?
- What made you choose two Dark Petitions over two Past in Flames? I love DP but a lot of player seem to prefer tow PiF over it
- Did you face Surgical Extraction in your match-ups? How do you handle it?
- I have always played with 14 lands, do you think that the additional land is worth it?
For what it is worth, I also have had bad results with Dread of Night lately and I think Massacre might be better at the moment
I know you weren't asking me, but a couple of things:
—Flusterstorm is for fighting combo decks. It's not terrible with Infernal Tutor; just wait to keep an extra blue mana open, fire the Tutor, target Tutor with Flusterstorm, then crack any LEDs. Once the Flusterstorm trigger resolves and all the copies go on the stack, have all the Flusterstorm copies target the original Flusterstorm.
—I used to run [EDIT: double-Petition, singleton Past in Flames]. It's significantly faster than double-Past in Flames, but much less resilient to countermagic and graveyard hate. Pick your poison; one can get aggro-ed out more often; the other folds harder to Leylines and Forces.
—Until we lost Probe, I had always played 14 lands in the maindeck. I don't think we have the free digging power to do that anymore, so I'm on 15.
Hope that helps!
Last edited by Ronald Deuce; 09-20-2018 at 05:59 PM.
All Spells Primer under construction: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e...Tl7utWpLo0/pub
PM me if you want to contribute!
Thank you! No worries, I'm always happy to answer questions. Ronald answered them pretty well EDIT: (up above) but I'll throw in my two cents as well.
Yes, I brought in Flusterstorm in 7 of my 14 matches. It is one of my favorite cards in the sideboard. I bring it in against other combo decks and also Hymn to Tourach decks because it is the best way to fight topdecks which our deck often struggles with. It is not so great at fighting counterspells but we have discard for that. It is not actually that bad with Infernal Tutor, it just adds U to your combo turn because you can just target any spell with Flusterstorm and then target the original Flusterstorm with all copies of Flusterstorm. In addition, if you feel like you need to combo off soon it is fine to fire off a Flusterstorm on a Brainstorm or Ponder from your opponent. It doesn't need to be saved for Reanimate/Show and Tell/Infernal Tutor!
I always played 2 Past in Flames before the banning but I have felt that my bottleneck most often has been not being able to find a tutor. Game 2 it is fine to board some number out, and you should board out all copies against Leyline of the Void. Without Gitaxian Probe to flashback multiple times I just feel that Past in Flames has lost some value.
I just basically always assume my opponent has Surgical Extraction postboard and try to play around it. Don't fire off non-hellbent Infernal Tutors to reveal spells postboard unless you have another payoff spell like Dark Petition, Ad Nauseam, or Empty the Warrens in hand. Don't go for Past in Flames when Ad Nauseam will get you there 90% of the time and don't go off blind! Storm almost always gets better by waiting.
Yeah I consider 15 lands essential and we might even want 16 now. We don't have free redraws from Gitaxian Probe and also want to be using more of our mana every turn with 4 Preordain. In addition I added Rain of Filth which wants you to play a lot of lands.
Thanks CyrusCG and Ronald Deuce for the advice, I never realized that Flusterstorm could target itself :D
Edit: And a follow-up: How did Tormod's Crypt fare? Did you use it in your matches?
Cyrus, against the Hymn decks, is that the primary target for Flusterstorm? Are you also countering cantrips and single card discard often? When are you usually looking to utilize Flusterstorm since later in the match they are more likely able to pay for the storm cost. Thanks!
While I'll let Cyrus speak for himself, I'm happy to trade fluster for thoughtseize/other targeted discard. Holding fluster for a hymn that might never happen is a recipe for disaster.
In terms of cantrips, I'm probably not flustering a ponder/preordain unless I already know their hand. I'd be strongly considering flustering early brainstorms
I'm not sure it is even correct to bring it in against the Hymn decks but it feels like without Leovold and Deathrite Shaman the only way these grindy midrange decks can beat us is Hymn-Snap-Hymn or Thoughtseize-Snap-Thoughtseize so I have liked Fluster because it directly fights on their most effective axis. The issue I have with it is that Flusterstorm is an awful draw after you have been Hymned. I would not use it to counter anything but discard or a sweeper in most contexts. I don't think it's correct to fight over cantrips as Storm.
I ran into a pretty neat sequence in this last game, where Dark Petition allowed me to beat Eidolon on the draw, while also beating Fireblast as an out (saves the 4 life compared to Infernal Tutor)
T1
Open: Misty Rainforest, Dark Petition, Swamp, Infernal Tutor, Cabal Ritual, Lotus Petal, Underground Sea, Preordain
Fetch Island, Preordain (Dark Ritual on top, bottom the other card)
Opponent
Cast no spells in my End Step, went Eidolon the following turn
T2
Draw: Underground Sea
Play Swamp (UB)
Cast Dark Ritual (UBBB, Storm = 1, Life = 17)
Cast Cabal Ritual (BBBBB, Storm = 2, Life = 15)
Cast Lotus Petal, break for red (BBBBBR, Storm = 3, Life = 13)
Cast Dark Petition for Lion's Eye Diamond (BBBR, Storm = 4, Life = 13)
Cast Lion's Eye Diamond (BBBR, Storm = 5, Life = 11)
Cast Infernal Tutor for Past in Flames, break for black (BBBBR, Storm = 6, Life = 9)
Cast Past in Flames (B, Storm = 7, Life = 9)
Cast Dark Ritual (BBB, Storm = 8, Life = 7)
Cast Cabal Ritual (BBBBBB, Storm = 9, Life = 5)
Cast Dark Petition for Tendrils of Agony (BBBB, Storm = 10, Life = 5)
Cast Tendrils of Agony (Storm = 11, Life = 5)
It felt pretty cool to have the 4 land hand actually win out on the draw against Burn, and it was pretty interesting to navigate the line. There were also a couple of red herrings like trying to get Threshold on Cabal Ritual, or doubling something up with Tutor to get an exact Tutor chain kill, possibly one to play around Fireblast. Though, it is kinda late where I am now, so maybe I just couldn't puzzle either of those out in the moment.
Nice line wonderpreaux. I have only played DP on occasion. I like some of the interactions like this where it nets +1 mana with LED and PiF lines but I still prefer GT if I played 4+
On a side note, if your opponent plays mtn pass, do you play out your LP with your hand? I probably would.
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)