I agree with you on the poxpoint of view, but this is still a deck with 4 loams and 4 entombs. When I played this deck, it felt like being centered around the 4 smallpox and 2 Liliana, with loams and Pfires to break the symmetry. But without those 6 (counterable) cards, what's left is a loamengine with only mox as acceleration and a lot of cards lost while dredging.Originally Posted by SanderM
This deck always made me feel like it combined too many gameplans hindering eachother: Punishing Fire and Depths/Stage wanting you to make as much landdrops as possible, while smallpox sets you back (making the tripled-color landbase requiring double black hard to maintain). Or loam needing acceleration to translate handadvantage into boardadvantage, while lacking exploration.
For those reasons, aren't 4 loams excessive, and isn't one enough (since the deck isn't dependant on a loamengine and there's still 4x entomb)? Cards like the new Squee break the symmetry from smallpox/Liliana too, although double red is probably an issue (Haas ran the old Squee in his first lists). Maybe Heaven//Earth is worth testing?
I think the main problem people have with understanding this deck is the name. Jund Depths? Fuck the SCG trash naming system. People see the word "Depths" and immediately compare this to Lands or Turbo Depths and that just isn't the case.
I could go on an elaborate rant as to why this deck, or any Legacy deck, shouldn't be called "Jund" (or Jeskai, Sultai, etc.) but that would be a little off topic. So let's focus on the "Depths" part: Why would I name my deck after a 2 of that gets boarded out against the most popular decks in the meta? The only reason Dark Depths is in this deck is because Thespian's Stage was printed and gave us a better way to end a game quickly if necessary. Before Thespian's Stage we ran Batterskull and Buried Ruin as a finisher. We were already playing Loam so it fit nicely. You need to think of this deck more as a BGr Loam Pox than some Dark Depths deck.
@Albarkhane. There is definitely still interest in this deck so keep it up.
@Ingo. Check out Kennen Haas' deck tech, specifically the part beginning, "Life from the Loam is an obvious four-of" and it will help you out. http://www.starcitygames.com/article...nd-Depths.html
@SanderM. Glad to see others are still running the Kennen Haas version. This thread had a lot of people devolving the deck into half Pox and half Reanimator which I never saw necessary. Also, if you're considering running Duress because it's only against combo anyway, try Hymn to Tourach. That's been working well for me, especially against Storm since you can grab 2 cards putting them further from a high enough storm count. I've never tried Collective Brutality so let me know what that's like in this deck.
Mainboard
Lands
3 Verdant Catacombs
2 Bloodstaind Mire
2 Bayou
1 Badlands
1 Taiga
1 Swamp
4 Grove of the Burnwillows
2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Bojuka Bog
3 Thespian's Stage
2 Dark Depths
2 Maze of Ith
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
1 Riftstone Portal
4 Wasteland
Spells
1 Nether Spirit
2 Lilliana of the Veil
4 Smallpox
4 Life from the Loam
4 Entomb
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Punishing Fire
3 Crop Rotation
3 Mirri's Guile
1 Raven's Crime
4 Mox Diamond
Sideboard
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Ray of Revelation
1 Coffin Purge
1 Nature's Claim
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Innocent Blood
1 Flame Jab
1 Terminate
1 Massacre
1 Karakas
1 Crop Rotation
1 Raven's Crime
3 Hymn to Tourach
Taiga is nice to have when you just want another green source or when Urborg is out. Can't afford the 2nd Tabernacle or Drop of Honey. Considered Porphyry Nodes with access to white via Portal and Diamond, but I haven't tried it at all. Terminate is because I wanted a non-edict answer to Grave Titan. It's sometimes a 3rd PFire. Loam makes everything better, especially Mirri's Guile. 2 Liliana feels so weird but decks are going wider these days so she isn't always the best. Smallpox is my favorite answer to my opponent going "Land, Delver, Go" just watch out for Daze. Smallpox and Entomb are also great counter bait when you want to resolve a Crop Rotation or Liliana. People really fear Smallpox.
Why is loam an obvious 4-off? After reading Haas article again (read it 4 years ago too), I still don’t see the answer.
Because there’s a dedication towards lands? BG pox has that too, 4c loam as well. Neither play 4 loams, or 4 virtual copies through 4 entombs on top of that.
I can understand versions of Jund Depths splashing some explorations along the loampackage, making it a better landslike-deck.
I can understand cutting down on some loams/entombs, enforcing the poxpart.
However, I don’t understand an “obvious” 4loam/4entomb-package, while meaning to play the deck in a poxstyle way. If you don’t intend to really abuse this dedication to a loamstrategy in 8! cards, wouldn’t you better play some other cards instead?
I've also tried Hymn to Tourach. It is effective against storm. However i found it lacking against Show and Sneak decks. Since they are not trying to achieve a high as possible storm counter but just need some mana to drop in a gigantic creature. I'd rather just rip the Show and Tell or Sneak Attack from their hand.
It's not about having as much lands as possible on the field. You can use the lands to discard them to Liliana of the Veil, Smallpox, Raven's Crime, Mox Diamond ,etc..
I'd rather discard my Swamp over and over again to any of the above instead of needing to discard an Abrupt Decay or anything similar.
Heaven // Earth could be worth a shot. I'll give it a try and get back to you.
I've been playing a B/G Loam Pox deck with some success at small locals.
The Punishing Fire engine is extremely attractive, but I keep going back and forth on whether I want to add a third color and virtually give up on my Hymns, Bloodghast and Cabal Therapy. I think adding the third color is probably the bigger issue; yes plently of sucessful Legacy decks do it, but they arent running 3-4x Smallpox. Either way, Punishing Loam has proven itself in real tournaments, so theres merit to it.
My thoughts so far..
Pros to PFire:
-Repeatable/Tutorable
-Hits Planeswalkers
-Wincon
Cons to PFire:
-Two part Engine
-Mana intensive
-Adds third color
Here is my current B/G list:
Lands (28)
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Bayou
3 Wasteland
3 Mishra's Factory
2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
2 Swamp
1 Buried Ruin
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
1 Polluted Delta
1 Windswept Heath
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Forest
1 Barren Moor
1 Thespian's Stage
1 Dark Depths
1 Cabal Pit
Creatures (3)
2 Bloodghast
1 Nether Spirit
Spells (22)
3 Smallpox
3 Life from the Loam
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Collective Brutality
2 Hymn to Tourach
2 Entomb
2 Fatal Push
2 Cabal Therapy
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Crop Rotation
1 Raven's Crime
1 Thoughtseize
Planeswalkers (2)
2 Liliana of the Veil
Artifacts (4)
3 Mox Diamond
1 Cursed Scroll
Enchantments (1)
1 Mirri's Guile
Sideboard (15)
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Pithing Needle
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Coffin Purge
1 Garruk Relentless
1 Lost Legacy
1 Duress
1 Karakas
1 Crop Rotation
1 Diabolic Edict
1 Chains of Mephistopheles
1 Bontu's Last Reckoning
1 Ensnaring Bridge
Also you guys planning to run the new Squee?
I can't think of any removal it cares about...
Last edited by streetMage; 04-04-2018 at 04:48 PM.
Looking at your BG list, it already looks pretty solid. Collective Brutality does a lot of work here, basically doing what you would want Punishing Fire to do. You could always go old school and play singles of Eternal Witness/Unearth, which is another way to recur your disruption.
I think the real issue isn't the 3rd color...it's the colorless lands like Factory and Depths (I look at Wasteland as a spell, not a land.) So you're basically already playing a 3 color deck while only in BG, R makes it play more like a 4 color deck. Without Deathrite Shaman or leaning heavily on Urborgs it gets hard to even be functional.
Casting the new Squee is blah. The old squee was a discard engine that worked with Smallpox and Liliana, and a threat only as a last resort really (and an easier casting cost at 2R.)
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
Thanks for the input.
Collective Brutality can't hit planeswalkers doe; my PFire equivalent is really Bloodghast.
Collective Brutality is virtually a soft Smallpox. It drains, can make the opponent discard and kills most nuisance creatures in the format. I of course leverage the escalate ability with cards like Bloodghast, Loam, Cabal Therapy, etc..
You only need 1 loam or Pfire (with grove) to break the discard symmetry of smallpox/Liliana, so I don't think you should rate all cards solely on this type of cardadvantage. Squee can be discarded once though, can be loamed into, can be entombed. Thats pretty sweet for 1 card, and trading with creatures on board is cardadvantage too.
Double red is a big deal though. But I think he's worth a shot.
EDIT: and it plays through gravehate. How hilarious is it to play this through Rest in Peace of Leyline of the void
The double red is really what ends it, honestly. I think pw's like garruk relentless or chandra, pyromaster are better win conditions if you want to get around grave hate.
Different question: Faithless Looting or Mirri's Guile? What's better? Have you guys been testing both?
Even if I played 4x Faithless Looting I would still find a way to cram 1-2x Sylvan Library into my deck. If you like Guile, go with Guile, but the more manipulation you play the more consistent the deck will be.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
Not nearly as hilarious as sideboarding 4x Helm of Obedience.You only need 1 loam or Pfire (with grove) to break the discard symmetry of smallpox/Liliana, so I don't think you should rate all cards solely on this type of cardadvantage. Squee can be discarded once though, can be loamed into, can be entombed. Thats pretty sweet for 1 card, and trading with creatures on board is cardadvantage too.
Double red is a big deal though. But I think he's worth a shot.
EDIT: and it plays through gravehate. How hilarious is it to play this through Rest in Peace of Leyline of the void
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
@Ingo. Loam is a huge card advantage engine. It makes most other cards in the deck better. Sure Entomb is 4 virtual copies of Loam, but Loam is usually one of the last targets I use it for because I don't always want to be dredging. I would prefer to draw Loam naturally and it happens more often with 4 in a non-blue deck without something like Brainstorm. Exploration in this deck doesn't work well with Mox Diamond. SanderM is spot on, once you're up to about 4 or 5 your lands become fodder for something else. Knowing when to keep excess lands in your hand is important.
@SanderM. I have a lot of Storm in my meta so my plan vs. S&S is all discard possible, keep a hand with an edict, and keep them off 5 lands. Heaven // Earth reminds me of Volcanic Spray I used to use for something like Elves, D&T, or Young Pyromancer.
@Mr. Safety. I don't think double red is too terrible with 6 red sources + 4 Mox Diamond. I think new Squee not returning to your hand for free is what ends it.
I prefer Mirri's Guile over Faithless Looting and Sylvan Library. Guile trigger showing 3 lands is a beautiful time to dredge Loam, which becomes Ancestral Recall. Then you get a fresh 3 next turn. And if you don't have a Loam your fetches will give a fresh 3. I haven't tried Sylvan Library but I really enjoy being able to cast Guile for G on turn 1. Not sure how that outweighs being able to draw multiples/draw and dredge later in the game so I'm open if someone has tried it.
Regarding new Squee: Living through Rest in Peace is just ok. He doesn't trade with RiP deck creatures like Mom, Thalia, or Mentor with a Prowess trigger so you'll be paying 1RR all the time. I think he's good under a Blood Moon. Trading with Magus does give him potential.
I've lived the Helm of Obedience and Phyrexian Ingester dreams and it's fantastic. Ingester was the first to come out. It's not dependable against S&S and we're already stacked against Reanimator. Helm came out when everyone stopped playing RiP and switched to Surgical Extraction.
Well thank you ^_^
That's true. i'll give it a try and see how it works out.
Nether Spirit doesn't return to your hand either.
Mirri's Guile gives you extra options on turn 2. Wich could be just the turn you need to survive against combo decks. Also, we want to do so much on turn 2 already that another 2-mana cards seems to much in my opinion.
Example's of things you might want to cast on turn 2: Smallpox, Life from the Loam, Liliana of the Veil if you have a Mox Diamond, Abrupt Decay, Punishing Fire, in my case also Collective Brutality.
Faithless Looting is something you really don't want to draw while being hellbent mid or late game.
This seems like such a weird question to ask. Loam's played in all of those decks because it's giving them CA/Consistency in colors that don't have it available naturally. 4c Loam doesn't need 4 loams as it's also playing things like GSZ, Library, Knight, Confidant but people have gone up to 3 copies in the past. You obviously want to maximize consistency, so hence the 4 copies. What cards are "better" at doing this in this color?
I think what you are missing isn't that this isn't a lands deck, it's a pox deck although the shares some of the same engines. You're not supposed to be wastelanding + loaming your opponent every turn. You really just want to get the opponent hellbent and then you can chip away at the rest of the resources through either smallpox, liliana, punishing fire or loam. A lot of the time Loam in this deck is just used to make land drops, protect your hand from your/opposing lilianas, and sometimes to clear away the top to give you fresh cards to look at.
I see your point in 4c loam, but what about BG Pox? I’ve never seen it with 4 loams and 4 entombs (because it’s not built to exploit loam). What’s different with Jund Depths?
4entomb/4loam is the same configuration as Lands (in gamble/loam), so I think it’s logical to compare both decks in their capacity to exploit this 8-card configuration. What I find hard to understand, is stressing the utmost importance of loam on the one hand, while on the other hand relativating loam’s uses as secondary, because the deck really wants to do something else (that’s mirrored in you post too, paragraph 1 versus 2). Isn’t that a strange contradiction?
Exactly my thoughts on Loam here. Why not test out 2-3 Loams ''only''? At least I'm gonna try that. Otherwise, it seems odd to me to exclude Exploration with 4 Loams. This gives you 1-2 more slots for different interaction, potentially more Library manipulation, discard, flexible removal or the new Squee.
@Alexeezay. Why not test 2-3 Brainstorm in Grixis Delver? Why not test 2-3 Glimpse of Nature in Elves? Playing extra lands with Exploration loses card advantage and conflicts with the rest of the deck. It actually prevents those 1-2 more slots. Having lands in your hand allows you to Raven's Crime, Smallpox, or +1 Liliana while protecting Crop Rotation, Entomb, Abrupt Decay, etc. New Squee conflicts with Nether Spirit's free return.
@Ingo. Don't intend to speak on behalf of CptHaddock but the deck stresses the importance of Loam in the same way 4x Brainstorm or 4x Glimpse of Nature are important to their decks. You won't be winning the game with these cards alone but they help you do what you need to do in order to win.
Glimpse only works when a deck is tweaked to abuse it. Elves does that, at the cost of playing 1/1 weenies. Likewise, Lands does that at the cost of playing mostly lands and accelerators. Loam needs to be built around to translate 'virtual' cardadvantage (because drawing three lands is usually not that great) into real advantage. The more you focus on loam, the more deckslots you should reserve to support these loams. Unlike brainstorm, which is a stand alone card.
I evidently see the value of loams and entombs in Jund Depths, I only question their maxed out numbers without (enough) supporting cards. Just like you wouldn't play 4 Glimpse without support of a lot of onedrop creatures.
Edit: glimpse and brainstorm are also always good in 4-somes in their decks. However you only need one loam and the second/third/fourth are useless after having access to the first.
Last edited by Ingo; 04-07-2018 at 11:44 AM.
When I first built BG Pox I ran 2x Loams and 2x Entomb. I figured Entomb would be my virtual copies of Loam 3-4. But the more I played the deck, the more I realized I always wanted to draw Loam rather Entomb for it. Without library manipulation, this deck really needs a solid opening hand.
Of all the cards in the deck, Jund Depths seems to want to see some combination of Smallpox, Mox Diamond, Entomb and Loam in its opening seven.
That's how I view four ofs' when you don't have manipulation such as Brainstorm and Ponder.
Taking Kennen's latest list:
4x Entomb is virtually X+4 copies of Raven's Crime, Punishing Fire, Nether Spirit and Life From the Loam.
With Life from the Loam already in hand, 4x Entomb becomes X+4 copies of every land in the deck aswell.
In that regard, its slightly better than Brainstorm or Ponder here..
Tbh, the more I look at this deck the more I feel like its just "Dark Lands" lol.
Without cards like Hymn, Toxic Deluge, Innocent Blood/Fatal Push, Cursed Scroll and Mishra's Factory it really feels like its trying to 20/20 or Pfire you to death. Pretty much what RG Lands does.... Contrary to what another poster said, I really don't think the aim is to get you/oppnt hellbent like traditional Pox.
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Reply With Quote