[Deck] Sneak and Show

[Nocley]

How was SDT for you? I see that you ran 2 of them. Are you going to up the count of Daze or is three the number you think is optimal. I admit, Westcoast seems to produce a lot more combo, so I think flusterstorm is a better choice right now as well.

Top won me more games for opponents thinking I'm on Miracles and countering it on sight turn 1 than actually getting advantage. Maybe one game it was deep enough? The issue is that we want our colors that much and I really don't think we have the number of fetches to abuse shuffle effects with it, nor the mana to consistently manipulate with it. I was bringing it out against a lot of the faster combo matchups which took up a lot of my day. I'd much rather have Preordains in their slot as a means of getting crap to the bottom.

As for flusterstorm, my combo matchups were Reanimator, the Omni-Tell loss, and Belcher. Really shouldn't have won the Belcher game 3, he went off...to hit me only for 14. Only Belcher really is Flusterstorm a truely powerful counter, in the other's it's just a spell pierce that requires at least two counters. I still like it in the counter wars though.

[JPA]

Congrats on making Top 8! Looking forward to your report.

[Nocley]

Report is up here - http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...Sneak-and-Show

I'm going to probably take out the Tops for Preordains if I play it in LA next week...but I just don't know if I will. I'm expecting a meta shift towards BUG, Miracles, and Death and Taxes, none of which are great matchups for us. Probably going to the darkside to run BUG. I'll decide Saturday night.

[GoblinZ]

Report is up here - http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...Sneak-and-Show

I'm going to probably take out the Tops for Preordains if I play it in LA next week...but I just don't know if I will. I'm expecting a meta shift towards BUG, Miracles, and Death and Taxes, none of which are great matchups for us. Probably going to the darkside to run BUG. I'll decide Saturday night.

Congratulations！I also played daze along with preodains for a while, I think it's a right choice.

[Kl'rt]

Apologies if this question is stupid, but in Nocley's report, he boarded out all Show and Tells vs Miracle. Is this always correct?

[JPA]

The question is not stupid, but it has been answered in this thread before. You will find some answers on page 5.

Quick summary: It's definitely viable to board out all 4, but by no means mandatory. Personally, I would rather board out 2 Lotus Petal 2 Show and Tell than 4 S&T.

I'm going to probably take out the Tops for Preordains if I play it in LA next week...but I just don't know if I will. I'm expecting a meta shift towards BUG, Miracles, and Death and Taxes, none of which are great matchups for us. Probably going to the darkside to run BUG. I'll decide Saturday night.

Good luck! Hopefully you will make the "right" decision.

[apple713]

Apologies if this question is stupid, but in Nocley's report, he boarded out all Show and Tells vs Miracle. Is this always correct?

S&t is much weaker in this match but that doesnt mean you should take them all out. Ttb and sneak are obv the better threats but in my experience you need to keep sdt off the table if possible and play threats so they run out of answers or cant find them

There is no great way to beat miracles in general. Their deck is designed to have answers to all the decks. Either have counters for them or prevent them from finding them.

[Technicolor Mage]

Is this deck losing it's potency? I realize we just top 8'd but I sense the meta is gunning for us these days.

The rise of a couple of decks that give us problems doesn't help either

Not sure if I should shelve it and play something else or just weather the storm so to speak

[JPA]

Is this deck losing it's potency? I realize we just top 8'd but I sense the meta is gunning for us these days.

The rise of a couple of decks that give us problems doesn't help either

Not sure if I should shelve it and play something else or just weather the storm so to speak

Well, before Team America and Miracles we had to deal with UWR and RUG, which are also quite difficult matchups. With Blood Moon + Pyroclasm we have good chances against TA. Defense Grid is a lot worse against them than against RUG and UWR, because TA has a lot of discard + Liliana post-board. Pithing Needle and more REBs are options to tackle the Miracles-matchup.

Death and Taxes didn't increase in popularity and it has been a big part of the metagame since Strasbourg already.

However, I also think that people are more prepared to beat Sneak and Show. That doesn't change anything about the raw power of the deck or the fact that it's still quite difficult to hate out anyway.

[jimmythegreek]

Well, before Team America and Miracles we had to deal with UWR and RUG, which are also quite difficult matchups. With Blood Moon + Pyroclasm we have good chances against TA. Defense Grid is a lot worse against them than against RUG and UWR, because TA has a lot of discard + Liliana post-board. Pithing Needle and more REBs are options to tackle the Miracles-matchup.

Death and Taxes didn't increase in popularity and it has been a big part of the metagame since Strasbourg already.

However, I also think that people are more prepared to beat Sneak and Show. That doesn't change anything about the raw power of the deck or the fact that it's still quite difficult to hate out anyway.

This may be the most degenerate deck in magic history....sometimes I will be tempted to keep a hand full of cantrips cuz it can win with so few cards. About preordain....I dont think this deck needs more cantrips. With eight monsters, eight ways to cheat them in and eight cantrips (not counting probe) I dont see variance as an issue. Usually a monster or enabler plus cantrip will get me there. I was thinking of going 2/2 split of probe and daze. I still use misdirection and intuition, are either of those falling out of favor? Also, can someone give me some guidelines on what to put into play when you have emmy and grisel in hand. Against an unknown opponent I would guess grisel is the right call. What about against other decks to beat?

[apple713]

Is this deck losing it's potency? I realize we just top 8'd but I sense the meta is gunning for us these days.

The rise of a couple of decks that give us problems doesn't help either

Not sure if I should shelve it and play something else or just weather the storm so to speak

This deck is the gold standard for combo decks. It has become the rug delver for combo decks. Because of this more ppl prepare for it. The deck is still absurd though. It doesnt really have BAD matchups.

[Kl'rt]

Is this deck losing it's potency? I realize we just top 8'd but I sense the meta is gunning for us these days.

The rise of a couple of decks that give us problems doesn't help either

Not sure if I should shelve it and play something else or just weather the storm so to speak

The top two Decks to Beat now are Team America and Miracle Control. Akatsuki, responsible for popularizing Team America (top 16 SCG Baltimore, top 8 GP Washington) has said Sneak Show is hard for him, even post-board. Einherjer, who top 4'd GP Paris with Miracle said the Sneak Show match is probably 50-50, though he'd rather not face it. PV Damo da Rosa (top 8 GP Paris with Miracle) said Sneak Show for him is not a favourable match.

The only decks I can think of that Sneak Show is weak to are Death & Taxes and maybe Reanimator. If you haven't noticed, D&T has been pushed out of DTB status thanks to TNN. Reanimator seems to be struggling in the current meta too.

This deck's worst opponent is probably itself. Sometimes it just craps on itself and you don't have the pieces to do anything.

[Andreas Schnaas]

Hello everyone.

After a lot of playtesting yesterday I've played with Sneak & Show in a local tournament. I've made top 8 facing in the swiss: Countertop Balance (lost 1-2), ANT (won 2-0), Goblins (won 2-0). I lost in quarterfinals vs UWR Delver (0-2).

I'd like to discuss my impressions after playing the deck quite a bit with more expert players.

First of all, I think 4 Gitaxian Probe are a little to much. I've missed often Daze the turn I could go off, so I'm thinking to add a 2-3x to the main.

I'm a little torn about Misdirection and Intuition, I'm thinking to swap them for 2x Preordain. It's true that we have already a lot of cantrips, but sometimes with Brainstorm there's nothing you can do when seeing all bad/useless cards apart putting them on the top.

About the sideboard: is it a good idea to add a Wipe Away and 2x Defense Grid? The cards I'm thinking to cut are 1 Pyroclasm (at the moment I have 3) and 2x Ashen Rider. The rest of the side is pretty straightforward: Blood Moons, Grafdigger's Cages, Pyroblast, Swan Songs, Through the Breach.

Thank you very much in advance.

I apologize in advance for my english, I'm from Italy.

[Nocley]

Yea I think the deck does have some hate against it, but it also deserves a lot of it. We really do cheap things with minimal card investment.

As for fatty sequencing, it is dependent on whether you are facing a karakas, or playing them off show or sneak. If it's a super early show (turn 1 or 2) I usually drop emrakul unless I feel threatened by them having a combo in which case grisel draws 14.

If it's sneak, grisel comes first usually for me unless I need to take out their board. But if you have both in hand with a sneak online, you usually are in a good position.

I got 17th in Los Angeles yesterday losing to Belcher and death and taxes in rounds 4 and 6 respectively. Dnt loss was because I mistimed a daze and it set me back a critical turn because I was so narrow minded about playing around the rest of his hate. Daze is the nuts against rug I learned, but mainly I faced a wide variety of decks and never felt like I was behind in many of the games. Sure there were some hands and that did nothing, but as you play you mull with them a lot better. The hate comes and goes, with two top 8 now I feel like people remember this is a deck again, which is why I wouldn't run this in Charlotte, especially because the type of player at the invitational will be more likely to run something that has access to karakas, probably the worst hate spell against us (though still very possible to play around)

I wasn't actually planning on running this yesterday, but a couple people convinced me to at 940am because the meta was combo and deliver all over.

Also as for defense grid, I really dislike It with daze for obvious reasons. I've just never been sold on it or leyline in the board for this deck

Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk

[Technicolor Mage]

Heard part of the interview from Charlotte where they discuss SnS and how some pro's think players are playing too conservatively. Rather we should be trying to jam our combo down the throats of the opposition as fast and often as we can.

Thoughts?

Here is the link, I can't remember if it was Hewey or Brad who was talking but it's about half way in when discussing the meta game.

http://www.starcitygames.com/events/...y_metagam.html

[JPA]

Heard part of the interview from Charlotte where they discuss SnS and how some pro's think players are playing too conservatively. Rather we should be trying to jam our combo down the throats of the opposition as fast and often as we can.

Thoughts?

Here is the link, I can't remember if it was Hewey or Brad who was talking but it's about half way in when discussing the meta game.

http://www.starcitygames.com/events/...y_metagam.html

I think Brad referred to the situation where you use Gitaxian Probe to know whether the coast is clear, to go off then. In contrast to the lists without Gitaxian Probe, where you have to play more "conservatively".

You will obviously jam your combo as fast and often as you can. But if that advice makes you do stuff like going off with FoW in your hand WITHOUT a card to pitch instead of waiting one more turn to be safe, or cast your enablers into your opponent's soft-counters, it's clearly bad advice. Gitaxian Probe allows you to know if you have to play around anything, thus making it possible to play more aggresively.

[Final Fortune]

This deck is the gold standard for combo decks. It has become the rug delver for combo decks. Because of this more ppl prepare for it. The deck is still absurd though. It doesnt really have BAD matchups.

This, I think the meta game is finally settling post True Name Nemesis and now that every good True Name Nemesis deck is playing Deathrite Shaman Show&Tell is clearly better than Reanimator and probably better than Storm. I think the trick going forward is to know what MD and SB cards to run, Leyline of Sanctity is bad, Defence Grid is bad and I think we're getting to the point where Red Elemental Blast is a MDable card and Pyroblast is the best SB card. Once you start rocking 8 blasts Miracles ain't shit no more, also I think Swan Song is an underrated MD card, Divert is an underrated SB card and if you guys haven't noticed nobody is really playing Surgical Extraction any more so Intuition is pretty fucking awesome again. Furthermore red seems pretty bad in aggro-control right now and nobody is playing Island so maybe you should push the Moon plan with Magus as well since the whole format is volunteering to make that card a win condition. I think if UWR Nemesis drops out of the meta game because it can't beat BUG, UWBg, Jund and Junk then Lightning Bolt doesn't really have a home in aggro-control any more and Moons can run a muck.

So if you want to next level the meta game, I think MD Divert or Red Elemental Blast is pretty strong and Moons are absolute wrecking balls. If I were a sadist I'd MD Blood Moon at this point because it's such a brutally effective win button game 1 when nobody is expecting it. This is probably the last deck in the format that will be left standing with Volcanic Islands unless people jump on the URphid plan while everybody else is dropping their pants.

[Andreas Schnaas]

Any opinion about mainboarding a couple of Jace, the Mind Sculptor? It seems that lately is having a lot of success, I think that's because there are more and more Miracles around.

I've just seen the feature match of the Charlotte Open and Jace + post-SB Boseiju have complitely wrecked the opponent.

[DavidHernandez]

Hey guys, I haven't posted in this particular thread before, but wanted to let you know I took 1st place at the Star City Games Invitational Qualifier in San Diego tonight with Sneak & Show. In the meantime, my list was unconventional based on what I expected to see at this tournament.

In the main, I had:

1 x Elesh Norn
1 x Red Elemental Blast
1 x Empyrial Archangel

Here is the complete list:

Lands:
2 city of traitors
1 mountain
3 island
3 flooded strand
3 volcanic island
3 ancient tomb
4 scalding tarn

Creatures:
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
4 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
4 Griselbrand
1 Empyrial Archangel

Artifacts:
4 Lotus Petal

Spells:
1 Flusterstorm
4 Sneak Attack
2 Gitaxian Probe
1 Misdirection
2 Spell Pierce
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Show and Tell
4 Force of Will
1 Red Elemental Blast

SB:
1 Wipe Away
1 Echoing Truth
1 Flusterstorm
1 Through the Breach
4 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Blood Moon
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Pyroclasm
1 Echoing Truth

MVP's were Leyline of Sanctity (vs discard), Through the Breach (vs Pithing Needles!), and Elesh Norn (vs Goblins!).

I think I'll be going to the Seattle, WA Open this year!

Thanks to the OP for the detailed info on how to use this deck. The info on using Emrakul during the opponents end-step when they had Karakas out was the thing that won for me.

Dave

[JPA]

Any opinion about mainboarding a couple of Jace, the Mind Sculptor? It seems that lately is having a lot of success, I think that's because there are more and more Miracles around.

I've just seen the feature match of the Charlotte Open and Jace + post-SB Boseiju have complitely wrecked the opponent.

He basically played 2 Jaces instead of 2 Intuition, which is a pretty good idea vs a Miracles-heavy metagame, because you will have a lot of time to find your combo against Miracles anyway. Jace is a really nice late-game weapon against them, sometimes even an alternate win-condition.

But seeing Todd keep a hand of Griselbrand, Emrakul, Lotus Petal and 4 Lands in the quarterfinals made me turn off the stream immediately.

Hey guys, I haven't posted in this particular thread before, but wanted to let you know I took 1st place at the Star City Games Invitational Qualifier in San Diego tonight with Sneak & Show. In the meantime, my list was unconventional based on what I expected to see at this tournament.

Congrats on your win! How did the metagame look like, which decks did you face? And what did you expect that made you play 1 Empyrial Archangel?