Took Bug Delver to the top 8 of Aus Eternal Weekend. Lost in the quarters to SnS but let's not talk about it -_-
I took some notes so will write a report soon.
//Creature (12)
4 Delver of Secrets
3 Gurmag Angler
3 Tarmogoyf
2 True-Name Nemesis
//Enchantment (1)
1 Sylvan Library
//Instant (20)
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Daze
1 Dismember
2 Fatal Push
4 Force of Will
2 Spell Pierce
//Sorcery (8)
4 Ponder
4 Thoughtseize
//Land (19)
1 Bayou
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Polluted Delta
3 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
2 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland
SB: 1 Bitterblossom
SB: 1 Darkblast
SB: 2 Golgari Charm
SB: 1 Grafdigger's Cage
SB: 1 Null Rod
SB: 4 Sinkhole
SB: 1 Spell Pierce
SB: 2 Surgical Extraction
SB: 1 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 1 Tyrant's Scorn
Originally Posted by nedleeds
Some fresh content just released.
https://youtu.be/XQiaHOnrl08
I'm trying to build a version of this deck that is slightly favored versus Miracles. I'm not really sure where to begin, honestly, but I actually like Thoughtseize over Hymn a lot right now, especially with both Karn and Narset existing. 3 Abrupt Decays also makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside; I love that card. I'm looking to try out Hexdrinker at an Eternal Weekend Trial in two days, and was considering a list that looked something like this:
9 Fetchlands
3 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
1 Bayou
4 Wasteland
4 Delver of Secrets
2 Hexdrinker
3 Tarmogoyf
2 Gurmag Angelr
2 True-Name Nemesis
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
2 Spell Pierce
1 Spell Snare
3 Thoughtseize
2 Fatal Push
3 Daze
1 Diabolic Edict
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Dismember
4 Force of Will
Changes from the above list:
Changed a Trop into a fetch,
-1 Thoughtseize
-1 Gurmag Angler
-1 Daze
-1 Sylvan Library
+ 1 Spell Snare
+ 1 Diabolic Edict
+ 2 Hexdrinker
I don't know if I like having 4 thoughtseizes in the main; it's a lot... I also am less sure of the third angler, I've found Library to be a bit of a brick against Narset and I feel like Daze is worse than it used to be, especially against Miracles and the big mana decks.
Spell Snare hits a surprisingly large number of things these days; I like having an extra removal spell in the main, and I want to try out hexdrinker as an additional aggressive option in the creature suite.
There isn't really a slam-dunk wreck-Miracles card that is maindeckable in these colors, unfortunately. I mean, I guess I could just throw two Narsets into my board and see if it does enough, but IDK if that will get there.
Anyway, if you have an updated sideboard, let me know what you think!
https://thesaltminesite.com/2019/06/...ck-discussion/
My report and thoughts on bug as promised.
@Karlomancer
Do not cut Sylvan Library, that card is so powerful right now. We have so many ways to answer Narset, they only have so many ways to deal with Library and if they don't we get to start necroing (aka win)
As for the rest of the changes, if you are going to also play 4 Sinkhole then you shouldn't shave a Daze. I also don't know why you would want to shave Daze when Legacy is so explosive at the moment, I would think we would want more free interaction not less.
Sell me on Hexdrinker cos I don't see it.
I like Spell Snare and I can see playing another removal spell but if I was to do that I would probably play another Dismember or the 4th Decay over Edict.
And since Legacy is so explosive right now, wouldn't stifle be a powerhouse in a BUG delver list?
I'm not sure Stifle is that much of a powerhouse at the moment.
With the coming of Prismatic Vista several decks can find their basic land better and stabilize their mana around wasteland/stifle. Even RUG is playing 3 stifles (next to 1 or 2 Wren&6 to be fair, going on the lists I see in the discord).
Also I think that Assassin’s Trophy is one of the best removal/panic buttons you can have for BUG and it plays a bit awkward next to Stifle. So I rather play Thoughtseize instead. But if you're not on the Trophy-train, it would be fine depending on if you want to play more reactive or pro-active.
Edit:
The list I'm trying at the moment. Really like it so far.
Creatures: 12
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Nimble Mongoose
2 Grim Flayer
2 True-Name Nemesis
Spells: 29
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
1 Preordain
4 Force of Will
1 Force of Negation
4 Daze
2 Spell Snare
3 Thoughtseize
3 Assassin’s Trophy
3 Fatal Push
Lands: 19
4 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Bayou
4 Wasteland
// sideboard
1 Pithing Needle
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Grafdigger’s Cage
1 Faerie Macabre
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Garruk Relentless
1 Dread of Night
1 Unmoored Ego
1 Bitterblossom
1 Marsh Casualties
2 Flusterstorm
1 Hydroblast
So is anyone still jamming some BUG? It is my favorite playstyle (used to play Shardless and BUG Delver back in the day). Tarmogoyf and Decay seem great right now.
While that is true, I think right now, unfortunately, BUG is "suffering" the usual "non-Red problem." Wrenn and Six is really that good, not to mention access to Blasts and possibly Arcanist.
I don't think BUG is terrible, just likely sub-ideal in the meta, right now. You need to really have good reason to not be in Red (if you are in Green) and right now, there isn't seemingly much pay-off for it.
"The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
—Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order
Yeah I have 4c Pile put together as well, it just feels like such a....meta deck. Like it is really good, but everyone is playing it.
Yeah, but does BUG, or TA, really beat that, or the meta? I'm not so sure. While our mana would be marginally better, we, at least in TA, don't run Basics, and so will suffer at the hands of Wrenn and for the lack of our own. If we run Basics, well, we aren't TA and I think we would need a different approach.
Likely something more like this "Snow" list that Ark411 has played a bunch of on his stream.
"The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
—Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order
No I agree with you, I think if you want to play a fair U deck right now, it is 4c Pile, Miracles, or RUG. If W6 wasn't around I would say BUG would be a fine choice but it is so easy to splash for him, and getting access to Punishing Fire, Dack, Wrenn, and Kommand and blasts is pretty darn good
I still guess that there may be, once the Wrenn and Six meta slacks (if it does), something to a Hymn-Hexdrinker-Liliana sort of TA deck. But, likely such a thing would really need a DRS surrogate playable mana-creature. Although, even then, that idea might just be better with Red and so Wrenn. That is, if it's even worth trying.
"The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
—Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order
Here's the list I've been working on lately:
3 Underground Sea
3 Tropical Island
1 Bayou
4 Wasteland
3 Polluted Delta
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Verdant Catacombs
3 Gilded Goose
1 Lotus Petal
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Tarmogoyf
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
1 Bitterblossom
1 Uro, Titan of Nature's Wrath
2 Oko, Thief of Crowns
4 Force of Will
4 Daze
4 Ponder
4 Brainstorm
1 Veil of Summer
1 Sylvan Library
4 Abrupt Decay
2 Fatal Push
SB ("all takers"; not heavily meta-gamed):
3 Plague Engineer
1 Null Rod
1 Assassin's Trophy
1 Pernicious Deed
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Crop Rotation
1 Karakas
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Winter Orb
1 Flusterstorm
1 Veil of Summer
Why BUG Delver?
Fairly consistent 5/6 and 6/7 Tarmogoyfs. Access to Black removal and sideboard options. The singletons are insane in the right matchup.
Now, there are some things that look a little weird, but let me explain. The singleton Lotus Petal could just as easily be the 4th Gilded Goose or some other spell, but it's mainly there to grow Goyf and also provide occasional explosive early turns or enable a nuts filter sequence that sets you ahead. I suppose you could try a 2/2 split with Gilded Goose, but you really just need 1 artifact in the bin to reap the rewards. With the filtering provided, usually it's not that unlikely that you'll end up with an artifact or enchantment in the 'yard at some point by the time you've cleared a path for your Goyfs to swing in for the win. Goose is basically a replacement for Deathrite Shaman in this deck; while it lacks aggression, the combo with Oko and incidental lifegain are actually really helpful against Burn and UR Delver, which traditionally are very difficult decks for BUG to handle without a nuts draw. Leovold and Bitterblossom could be other threats if you feel the need, but they're both quite good in a vacuum and do a lot to help out in certain matchups.
You're also capable of efficiently answering other Goyfs and Planeswalkers with the removal suite. Without Bolt and this slightly less aggressive build, you're more likely to end up in the mid or late-game, but that's where you go overhead your opponent's inferior threats (against lower to the ground decks), or you pivot on the Daze/Wasteland and Delver/Goyf beats to close out games quickly against control and combo.
Force of Negation is worth considering, and the singletons in the maindeck could be adjusted around depending on your metagame. But nothing is really useless, aside from the removal against combo decks -- but if you were playing RUG, you'd be siding out your Bolts anyways, so it's generally not that big of a change. It turns out that sometimes Wasteland and Daze and Delver just gives you free wins; hence the focus and direction of this build over a more midrangey build featuring Baleful Strix, Arcum's Astrolabe, etc. You basically want to land an early threat or two, and kick your opponent's ass before they really have the window to come back and stomp you.
We all know how much of a pain opposing Okos and Teferis are, that's why we are running 4x Abrupt Decay if we didn't get the chance to counter them or cut them off 3 mana.
The sideboard could be remixed to your liking; there's plenty of good cards in BUG that you can add as needed to beat whayever flavor of the month you expect to face. Perhaps some more planeswalkers might be worth playing.
With some very minor tweaks, this deck can run Lurrus of the Dream-Den. Move the higher CMC permanents to the board, shift some slots around and you're there: an on-curve 3 CMC card advantage "secret 8th card up your sleeve".
Maybe some additional low sacrificable artifacts, e.g. multiple copies of Lotus Petal or Mishra's Bauble or Urza's Bauble, additional copies of Bitterblossom, maybe an Engineered Explosives, etc.
And in the sideboard, Seal of Primordium suddenly seems great.
Perhaps Dark Confidant deserves a slot again? He's best in a lower CMC build anyways.
Alternatively, Hymn to Tourach seems attractive again.
Alright, here's a revised list, that I think uses Lurrus to good effect:
19 Lands (3 Sea, 3 Trop, 1 Bayou, 4 Wastelands, 8 fetch)
1 Lotus Petal
4 Gilded Goose (still good at helping you cast all the 2 drops, combos with the Oko in the SB and fits in as a pseudo DRS)
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Tarmogoyf
1 Bitterblossom
1 Sylvan Library
4 Force of Will
4 Daze
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Ponder
4 Brainstorm
4 Abrupt Decay
2 Fatal Push
*you can cut the Lotus Petal or a gilded goose for a Carpet of Flowers if you expect a lot of Blue. I would lean towards cutting a Goose personally.
*you could cut something for 1 Once Upon a Time -- leaning towards the 3rd Hymn as they bad in topdeck mode.
SB:
1 Lurrus of the Dream-Den
2 Oko, Thief of Crowns
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Plague Engineer
2 Veil of Summer
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
1 Collector Ouphe
1 Seal of Primordium
Vampire Hexmage also looks good as a way of killing Planeswalkers and some permanents that rely on counters.
Collector Ouphe is great.
Main adjustment is to drop Gilded Goose and run... Nimble Mongoose in its place. Goose for goose.
The mana ramp isn’t as essential when the main consists of a much lower curve; as good as Bauble is I still like Lotus Petal for how it combos with Lurrus and the rest of the deck’s 2 drops. Cut something for a second, and possibly 3rd copy.
While I love Hymn, discard might not be ideal now.
From Discord user zerzab11:
Some people are reporting good results with the list.
"The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
—Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order
In DTB now, since it's a delver deck that can sport Lurrus.
As an example, Julian23 7-0 in the Super Qualifier:
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Nimble Mongoose
1 Tarmogoyf
4 Ponder
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Daze
2 Fatal Push
1 Force of Negation
4 Force of Will
1 Spell Pierce
2 Spell Snare
3 Stifle
4 Mishra's Bauble
1 Bayou
3 Misty Rainforest
3 Polluted Delta
3 Tropical Island
3 Underground Sea
2 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland
Sideboard
2 Tarmogoyf
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Force of Negation
1 Spell Pierce
1 Bitterblossom
1 Dead Weight
1 Flusterstorm
1 Lurrus of the Dream Den
2 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Null Rod
2 Winter Orb
Return of Mongoose and Stifle!
"The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
—Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order
So, I think Nimble Mongoose really deserves the slot in BUG tempo now. Justifications:
1. This deck benefits from having an additional 1 drop threat to go alongside Delver. It helps play into the tempo angle. If you aren’t about this and want to play a grindier midrange strategy, you can definitely do that in BUG colors, but it’s not really BUG tempo anymore. It was always a card I considered, but most conventional lists eschewed it for alternatives, e.g. DRS in that era. But now, I can’t really think of a superior 1-drop for this deck.
2. Mongoose has become fantastic in the format now with the ubiquity of cheap removal in all colors as well as repeatable removal in the form of Planeswalkers (most popular right now, Oko.) Since Liliana of the Veil and edict effects in general are at all time low, a shrouded threat is even better.
3. There’s no tension with Tarmogoyf, and in fact, the ‘tap out’ versions of this deck have no trouble achieving and maintaining threshold in short order. Goose never gets better than 3/3 shroud, but the problem with Hexdrinker is that its not safe during its initial 2/1 phase, and is not really as good in BUG specifically as we lack Bolts, and thus are not trying to race to 20 damage as quickly as the RUG cousin deck.
The main problem that this deck seems to run into is a creature wall: Baleful Strix and Icefang Coatl are particularly troublesome as they are a 2-for-1. The solution I think is running 3 copies of Plague Engineer (I have them in the board now), so you can just clear the board of these permanents in one fell swoop. Plague Engineer is just simply fantastic in plenty of matchups as well, and handles the creature token problem quite nicely.
In the post-Lurrus metagame, I expect to see an increase in the 80 card companion decks, these being UWgx midrange slugfests. A card that I’ve considered running again is Hymn to Tourach. Generally, the card Veil of Summer is still relegated to sideboards, and if a deck is forced to run 80 cards, then it’s even more unlikely that they will see one in time. I still think playing Mindtwist is a powerful thing to do be doing, and it’s fairly rare that it’s not great against the majority of matchups.
I’m running 2 copies of Oko myself in the main, along with 1 copy of the UG titan. Otherwise, the main 60 is comprised of mostly one and two drops. I think this deck will still have a place in the new metagame, as it has all the tools necessary at its disposal to beat whatever comes its way. Plus, GB removal (decay and trophy) are just so versatile; this deck doesn’t just roll over and die to a resolved permanent like RUG can tend to.
Hmm, interesting points. It does seem that, at least from a historical point of view, that Mongoose does better in Stifle versions rather than Hymn ones though.
As you say though, Strix/Coatl's are a problem and one "issue" for Hymn is that it can never actually get rid of Yorion itself. The best case is that you screw them early on mana with a Hymn and then win quickly. In that sense, you might want to build for speed and less for mid-range slugfests. The thing is that all the deathtouch makes it hard to do that. Maybe a combination of Spell Snares and Pierces would be good. But all of this is leading right back to wanting Stifle over Hymn, at least, in theory.
Hard to say though, we will have to see how the Yorion decks shape up though.
"The Ancients teach us that if we can but last, we shall prevail."
—Kaysa, Elder Druid of the Juniper Order
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