I'll be in Lille as well, playing Lands. Omnitell will probably be very well represented (just like Miracles), and I'm actually testing a single Iona as a gamble target, like the single chalice versus storm. It completely stops S&T > Omniscience > cantrips (their only out is wishing for Slaughter Pact pre-S&T or topdecking Emrakul), but does not stop S&T > Omniscience > Emrakul. Nor S&T > Emrakul, but in this scenario there's still Karakas.
Still an experiment, but it looks promising.
Between Choke, Sphere and Chalice, I find spheres the strongest as it's the only effective hatecard you can drop when S&T resolves for Omniscience, buying time to cast Krosan Grip or combo first. Often it's hard to resolve hate through all their counterspells.
Last edited by Rivfader; 04-24-2015 at 05:25 AM.
Hello, fellow lands player here.
I have a couple of questions regarding sideboard options.
I'm going to share my current sideboard (which is open for suggestions and improvement)
1 Pithing Needle
1 Dark Depths
4 Krosan Grip
2 Thorn of Amethyst
4 Sphere of Resistance
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Primeval Titan
1 Chalice of the Void
|||||||||||||||||||
How would you improve/change my current sideboard.
As far as playtesting have gone i currently have a 40-60 against Miracles and don't even know about combo matchups (i would say 30-70)
If someone more experienced with the deck could give me a couple of examples how you would sideboard depending on the matchup (decks to beat).
Thank you for your time and play Magic! =)
On Omnitell: I've never faced it, but I know David Long has beaten it, so the matchup is winnable. You probably need a combination of Sphere effects and Choke, or a super fast Marit Lage kill, to win, though.
Your board seems fine, except that I wouldn't go into a Miracles meta (which it seems like every meta is, these days) without at least one Choke. Against it, I board in 4 Grip, 1 Needle, 1 Choke, 1 Prime Time, 1 Dark Depths, and probably even 2 to 4 Spheres of Resistance. My sideboard plan against them is this: Grips so I don't get locked out by CounterTop, Choke and Spheres so that I have a chance of locking them out of playing spells, Needle as a catch-all, Depths because you almost certainly want to board out Crop Rotation, and Prime Time as a dual threat that requires them to have an answer or die. Still, Miracles is an unfavorable matchup, and you're probably not going to win against a really competent Miracles player that often.
No need to worry!
Last edited by Arksz; 04-24-2015 at 02:54 PM. Reason: Fake article
Sadly, I don't think there is one on YouTube. There may be one on Twitch somewhere but I am not great at using that site. Lands is not something that Star City really liked to show off, likely due to limited card sales for the deck, so they tended to skim over it. That big Legacy event they held, two day thing, they spent an afternoon singing the decks praises about how well it was doing and never showed it once.
One of your other options is to get a mate and run the deck though Cockatrice or proxy it across the dinner table. It's not perfect, but it's better than nothing.
This Saturday we had the Russian legacy champs in Moscow. 102 people attended. I prepared to play RG lands with black splash but on the eve before the tourney turned the black into white. Everyone was talking about those Omni everywhere around and as my initial plan was to play Raven's Crime with the support of 2 Choke and 3 Spheres + Grips, after some brainstorming with friends in the kitchen I changed it to 2 Canonists, 3 Thalias, a Trinisphere, a Choke and an Enlightened tutor + Grips, which seemed more solid. I didn't face any Omni though and feel happy about it
So my list (61):
1 Forest
2 Taiga
1 Savannah
2 Wooded Foothills
4 Grove of the Burnwillows
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
4 Rishadan Port
4 Wasteland
1 Ghost Quarter
4 Thespian's Stage
2 Dark Depths
2 Tranquil Thicket
1 Horizon Canopy
3 Maze of Ith
1 Glacial Chasm
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Karakas
4 Mox Diamond
4 Life from the Loam
4 Gamble
3 Crop Rotation
4 Punishing Fire
1 Worm Harvest
4 Exploration
2 Manabond
Sideboard:
1 Dark Depths
1 Primeval Titan
4 Krosan Grip
3 Thalia
2 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Trinisphere
1 Choke
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Zuran Orb
I decided to keep Worm Harvest in the Main deck as a savegame against Miracles in game1. In fact worms have a much stronger effect pre-board, because it is very vulnerable to just any grave hate, so I usually side it out. Now to my games:
Round 1, MonoB Pox
1: We don't have a real game, because I have a strong mana denial hand with loam and my opponent has a slight manascrew. I see a Bloodghast and decide that it is a control grave-centered build and side out 2 Mazes, Chasm and the Tabernacle.
2: His first turn is fetch for Swamp, double ritual, Tombstalker. Do I need to say that I don't see no Crop, no single Maze? It was a typical mistake when you think you are confident about the match up. I had to sideboard with more caution.
3: I bring back the Mazes. He has an early Negator followed by Tombstalker and multiple Wastelands. Luckily I hit double Maze and several Thespians with Loam and keep the creatures untapped. Then I gamble for Punishing Fire which targets Negator and soon brings me victory.
2-1; 1-0
Round 2, 4-c Aggro Loam
1: I have an agressive land hating hand and make sure my opponent can not cast anything.
2: I keep a nice hand with Mox and Exploration, but they get decayed. Then it's his turn to loam-waste my manabase. He keeps me on a single Forest not allowing to Loam, until he finds Scavenging Ooze and removes my Loam. By that time I have punishing fire and got lucky to topdeck a red source and kill it, while he mistakenly taps out (he had a creature in grave). It does not help me to recover though. Soon he plays a large KoTR but does not hurry with killing me, leaving a small chance. I could find Bojuka Bog and Punishing fire and deal with both KoTR and Loam, because he didn't bother to keep a fetch or Wasteland in play for pumping the knight and did keep Loam in Graveyard without a cycling land on hand. I don't get my chances and we move to game 3. In the last turn though he loams into Thespian's stage, which gives me a huge hint.
3: I have success in wasting his manabase until he extracts my wastelands. But it does not matter, as I already have a Port, a Quarter and Worm Harvest.
2-1; 2-0
Round 3, UWR delver
Both games I waste his manabase and kill promptly with Marit Lage
2-0; 3-0
Round 4, MUD
1: A fast hand with Mox, Exploration, Loam does not leave a chance for him. I kill him with 4 worms at leisure.
2: He starts with tomb - Grim Monolith - Crucible and makes a huge mistake putting Chalice at 0, not 1. Again I waste his mana and Crucible can not save him, even that I sided out Bojuka Bog.
2-0; 4-0
Round 5, Team America with stifles and confidants
1: I knew my opponent had a delver deck and decided to keep a risky hand with no business, but with Exploration, Mox and 5 lands including both combo pieces. I don't see loam during this game, but got lucky that my opponent does not have a timely Wasteland. Though he stifles my combo and I fall to 8 life, I manage to make it the turn after.
2: I have a slow hand and can't waste all his lands, giving him time to find answers. He finds a wasteland and beats me to 12 with Delver until I can waste his wasteland and have enough mana for the combo activation.
2-0; 5-0
Round 6, Shardless Bug
I am paired against the 12-point and he refuses to ID. I am ok with that, but something goes wrong. In both games I keep averagely good hands that should be enough for this match up, but I get both Exploration and Mox decayed, then my Loam is countered two times, while my lands Wasted. By that time he untappes with Deathrite Shaman and Tarmogoyf. The second game was very similar with the exception that he started with 2 Shamans... I got really frustrated.
0-2; 5-1
Round 7, Goblins
My opponent offers ID, but I refuse, because I want to be sure that I make top8 and have good standings.
1: I keep a loam-less hand with fast combo, and he has a turbo start with Lackey, putting Ringleader into 4 goblins including Stingscourger and Matron. The Sting-man does not allow me to activate combo before he attacks and he makes some painful beating with the Piledriver. Than he plays wasteland and delays my combo for one more turn. I play wasteland and wait until his end step to finally make 20/20 and untap for the win, but on his turn he plays the second wasteland and this game is lost for me.
2: He has a fast start with Lackey, Piledriver and Warchief, but I Gamble for the Tabernacle and loam-waste his plan.
3: Once again he starts with Lackey, followed by Lackey and Warchief. By that time I have the Taber and Stage in play. He wastes my Taber wich I copy with Stage in responce while Loaming into some nice lands.
2-1; 6-1
Top8, TES
I face my old friend with TES, the deck I would like to avoid more than anything else.
1: I mulligan a wasteland hand into a Crop Rotation hand and hope for a tiny chance. He does not leave it to my with a turn 1 secure kill.
2: I keep a nice hand with Exploration, Trinisphere and lands. Luckily for my he does not kill me on turn 1. I put Trini on my second turn and win soon after. He says, he could play a duress, but was afraid that his single land would be wasted.
3: I double mulligan into a strange hand: Gamble, Depths, Grove, Manabond, Bojuka. He starts without action and I have time to gamble for Canonist, Crop for Karakas and play Canonist. Which is then decayed. I topdeck and play Thalia but he manages to kill me through it. I am happy for my friend though.
1-2. 6-2 overall and I take my first Candelabra of Tawnos as a prize.
I will continue testing this list, as I feel it is well prepared against Miracles and Omni. Always open to a discussion.
Nothing is true, everything is permitted...
Congrats! Some questions:
- what exactly was stifled?
- wouldn't a Choke or two alongside Sphere give you more game?
- How good was Worm Harvest?
there was no video coverage, if you are looking for this. The top8 decklists should be published soon in this thread. The top8 consisted of: TES, miracles, reanimator, elves, shardless bug, dark maverick, infect and me. Infect won the tournament.
- he stifled the Stage ability, delaying the combo for one turn.
- I do play choke. Did play 2 copies. With addition of white I changed the second Choke for enlightened tutor. Thalia is better than the sphere, because it can attack. Also I would not side Spheres against miracles, but would side Thalia. They'd have to spare another stp/terminus on her sooner or later. Sphere is better than Thalia, because it stacks with other spheres, can be cast with colorless mana and affects creature decks. In general, creature decks are good match ups, so it's not a big deal. I play 9 sources that can give white mana and 3 crops as an extra measure, it should be enough. As for stacking effect, I have to test more to be able to judge, how important is it.
- in my tests against Miracles it did not heal the match up, but in about 1 of 4 preboard games it made huge problems for the opponent. Also in some extreme situations, when dark depths is surgically extracted or you face ensnaring bridge or humility with no ways to destroy it, you still have a fast win con. It saves your nerves a lot
Nothing is true, everything is permitted...
Congrats with the result, door! White splash makes sense with Karakas and Horizon Canopy providing white already.
I do think there's a risk involved in depending on a color splash for your hate, as you might not have it available when needed (crop rotating for it could have been a Stage or a Depths instead).
You like them that much more than sphere effects, perhaps because of the body?
Worm Harvest is interesting as preboard tech vs Miracles, how did Primeval Titan do?
That's some serious prizes they hand out at the Russion Legacy Champs, Candelabra of Tawnos sure is a nice reward for your efforts! Just curious, what were the other prices?
I now see that I just wrote down half of my question regarding Choke. The other half was regarding your 'Man Plan', which you have answered for the most part Interesting concept and one I will look into myself. Would Eidolon of the Great Revel or Gaddock Teeg pass as combo-hate/ Miracle-hate in your Man Plan?
Again, congrats!
Thank you, guys!
Yes, as I said, ability to bring damage with your piece of hate is an important factor. The color dependence is the payment for that. Primaval was good as always. Though I think I havn't cast it this time, I have no intention to cut it.
The total prize was 2200$ devided between the top16 in form of credits which you could spend on cards. This time they prepared some really nice staples including most of the legacy wanted cards foil and even unlimited Moxen and the prices were surprisingly low.
Eidolon does nothing against Omni, I'm afraid. And Gaddock needs both green and white, which is too difficult for the first turns, when most of the time you start with just one fetch or a mox and some colorless lands.
Nothing is true, everything is permitted...
@ door: true, but with the rise of Omni I think Storm-combo in all it's forms can be espected to show up in numbers again. Then again, Sphere would do the trick as well. So maybe not Omni, but perhaps other combo (although it's use is narrow). About Teeg; I can see now why that one is easily dismissed.
Nick Byrd made it to 10th place this weekend at Starcitygames Open Series: Cleveland Premier IQ. Some nice SB-choices, including Crucible Of Worlds, Titania, Protector of Argoth and maindeck Bojuka Bog (putting Karakas in the side). Also, 35 lands, dropping a Crop Rotation.
Personally I am having a hard time with the Miracles matchup. Unfortunately I just do not have a good pilot to practice / grind games with. I did have an idea though, what about side boarding in Boseiju, Who Shelters All? It fits our land theme, can be tutored/recurred and means we can never be locked off loam. Miracles doesn't really pressure our health total so it might buy enough time to run them over.
Also curious as to how it works with the spheres. Since everything costs one extra colorless, if I were to use boseiju with to cast a crop rotation or gamble for two mana, would it be uncounertable?
It's at the very least an idea worth testing, and I have been experimenting with the same idea for some time now (Boseiju in the main). But regrettably, for now results weren't as good as you might think. Boseiju breaks the countertoplock, but doesn't disable Top; and I found it hard to create better loamadvantage than Miracles creates with an active top (multiple ways to deal with Marit Lage, Jace, Entreat dodging ports). Unless I had exploration/loam/Stage/Depths. Still an interesting idea, but not the silver bullet like Karakas of Bog can be.
And yes, this works as you say. Spheres in conjunction with Boseiju make crops/gambles uncounterable as well.
Hi fellow Lands players.
I recently been to a small Legacy tournament, I went 2-3 in the end.
I just want to ask you a questions regarding *meddling mage*
I lost 2 of my games due to this card + naming punishing fire.
How to you usually play against Jeskai delver list or other list with meddling mage.
I know it's possible to play without punishing but it makes the matchup so much harder. Do you have any tips & tricks to think about ?
Thank you guys in advance for any answer / feedback =)
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