[Deck/Primer] Countersliver (MeatHooks)

[Khamul]

Have you guys been testing further this deck? My results online have not been that good those last days so I'm still hesitating to run Burn but it's less fun.

One of my problems, too. However, I'm more willing to give the Brainstorm lists a try. It's that Brainstorm helps finding the right Sliver for the right circumstances. If you're already in good shape, it's mediocre, but great for digging for stuff and shuffling away lategame Vials. I like Brainstorm especially in post-board games (and keep 3 Chalice in the board for those MUs where it's good)

Still not sure if there's any reason to run Slivers when you can also play Merfolk - On the core, it really comes down on the decision between being better vs Blue decks or sometimes losing to your own fragile manabase. And heaven forbid, cutting a color doesn't work. Without even one of those - Hibernation or Crystalline or 9+ Lords - the Deck simply doesn't work... I tried replacing Hibernation with Diffusion and cutting black, I tried replacing Crystalline with Diffusion and cutting white, I even tried cutting the green Lords and playing the full set of Images, but nothing comes even close to 4 Hibernation, 4 Crystalline, 9+ Lords :/

[Ultrab77]

I went to the weekly yesterday (24 players) and I must admit it went poorly. A combination of misplays and manabase.

I took the following:

Creatures (24):
4 Galerider Sliver
4 Hibernation Sliver
4 Crystalline Sliver
4 Sinew Sliver
4 Predatory Sliver
1 Muscle Sliver
1 Syphon Sliver
1 Winged Sliver
3 Phantasmal Image

Spells (13):
4 Force of Will
4 AEther Vial
3 Chalice of the Void
2 Warping Wail

Lands (21):
3 Mutavault
4 Cavern of Souls
2 Sliver Hive
4 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
2 Wasteland
1 Tundra
1 Tropical Island
1 Scrubland
1 Island

Sideboard (15):
2 Harmonic Sliver
3 Faerie Macabre
1 Submerge
2 Echoing Truth
1 Misdirection
2 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Chalice of the Void
1 Warping Wail

R1 vs D&T lost 0-2
G1 I play vial, I Fow his vial pitching a HS. He plays Revoker naming Vial. I warping wail it. I have HS and Galerider on the board. He double plays Revoker, naming Vial and HS, swords my HS and equips a Jitte. I concede.
G2 He plays Stoneforge, I warping wail it. He plays another Stoneforge and somehow manages to equip a Batterskull token with Batterskull, Jitte, SoFI. I can't find HS nor Harmonic and die.

R2 vs Storm lost 1-2
G1 Chalice on 1 is GG but I just see an Underground Sea and BS and can't decide if he's on storm or Delver
G2 I side in the 4th Chalice, can't find it and he kills me turn 3
G3 he mulls to 5, doesn't seem happy with his hand a plays a ponder. I decide to Fow it (misplay). Next turn he goes for Dark Ritual x 2 and Ad Nauseam while I watch with Fow, WW and Predatory in hand... I should have kept my Fow and won this one.

R3 vs Grixis Delver lost 1-2
G1 T1 Chalice on 1, T2 Warping Wail his Shaman, T3 I Fow his Angler and he concedes
G2 I have to mulligan (no land) keep a mediocre hand and he manages to drop 3 DoS on T2 and Young Pyro on T3
G3 I start well with Winged, Crystalline, Syphon on the board. Engineered Explosive at 2 + Lightning Bolt leave me with an empty board and his Angler and 2 Shaman finish me.

I then dropped because it was already late.

My thinkings:
- Wasteland was not so good but I didn't get into Eldrazi nor Lands (they mostly won their first rounds )
- I could cast Warping Wail everytime I wanted to thanks to the 11 colorless lands and it was good (just used the StP capacity though)
- Still some problems to cast my slivers and mulligans due to Wasteland + Mutavault in hand
- Eldrazi are spreading, they are faster and we don't have Jitte nor TNN: we need to find some answers
- I have to work on my SB (remove Submerge, maybe add an Harmonic
- The blue count at 20 is low

I'm pretty sure I will go to the side events of GP Paris with Burn but will test the deck again in the next weeks

EDIT:

Thinking of making -1 Wasteland -1 Syphon +1 Winged +1 Sliver Hive and following SB:
1 Chalice
2 Pithing Needle
2 Ethersworn Canonist
3 Harmonic Sliver
2 Syphon Sliver
2 Rest in Peace (or Faerie not yet decided: maybe RiP is better vs Loam and BUG)
1 Misdirection
1 Warping Wail
1 Wasteland

What do you think of Worship in the SB? For decks like Eldrazi, Delver etc. who don't expect it, the time for us to build a nice flying Army with Crystalline on the board?

[LordFury]

So, there hasn't been much of a discussion lately, so can please someone post his or her current\latest list with sideboard? Anyone? I would like to ask a few questions, but I gotta start somewhere. Is it possible for this deck to beat eldrazi? If yes, then how?)

[Curby]

Still not sure if there's any reason to run Slivers when you can also play Merfolk

Flavor and reminiscence. Play Slivers because you like Slivers. They're not bad ... just worse than Merfolk.

The stated goal of this thread was to make the best modern (not Modern) Countersliver deck. As I've posted many times before, Sliver creatures simply don't do enough compared to the other tribes, and too many cards that benefit Slivers also benefit Merfolk.

The only way that Slivers can pull ahead of Merfolk is if (1) truly spectacular Slivers get printed (I'm talking Crystalline-level of power), (2) no new Merfolk are printed and (3) we get better sideboard options to take advantage of our shaky manabase. The hard part is that all three are required, the first two are highly unlikely.

[DanielNunes]

Good night, I just joined this forum to discuss slivers.

There is been two years since I started playing slivers in competitive legacy and I am very satisfied with the results. I love playing the deck and think it have a unexplored potential in legacy.
As a merfolk player and huge fan of the deck too, I disagree that it is just a better slivers deck, they are very different despite having the same lords and beatdown plan.

Slivers work pretty good in many bad matchups for merfolk like jund, elves, painter, Goblins, Eldrazi, MUD etc and have good and bad points very different than the merfolks.
Using slivers I have already done some powerfull and funny stuff that merfolk can't. Like hunting down all of opponent's creatures with Hunter Sliver, going back from a bad shape using Syphon Sliver, killing both Wurmcoil Engine and Steel Hellkite on the block with a surprise Striking Sliver via Aether Vial, dealing with a Ugin using Hibernation and Vials or simple putting opponents out of the game with some hatebear he wasn't expecting from sideboard. Sure the deck have it's difficulties but I wouldn't call it a worse Merfolk.

In generall I think that the ideal of the deck is going in heavy creatures versions. I don't think cards like brainstorm or daze fit well in the plan of the deck, you want to play as many creatures and as fast as possible in order to make the lords true valuable, builds focussed on creatures let you play a consistently mana base with no dual lands, and also using 5 colors give you acess to some very powerfull slivers like striking and hunter. Striking sliver with Venom sliver or Hibernation Sliver is really cool, since you can bounce the creature beetween the first strike and regular damage steps and Hunter sliver is insane against the majority of fair decks.

My first decklist was that one: http://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=10661&d=260985&f=LE

After the banning of DTT and consequent reduction of Young Pyromancer decks I cutted the sidewinters for more strikings and added two venoms on maindeck. Played with something like this for a while: http://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=11139&d=263388&f=LE

The game against fair decks costume to be good ones, some people just concede when you play crystalinne sliver through cavern of souls and basically shut down their hands full of counters and removals. Combo is the challenge for the deck, sometimes a turn 4 kill with a force of will or Karakas backup is sufficiently and the hatebears in the sideboard can help improving the game.

In the recent metagame I made some changes. Now playing with 4 striking sliver, which is very good in the eldrazi and tarmogoyf decks matchups since with it you can produce a first strike wall to defend against big monsters, 2 winged slivers in the place of the hunters to fly and use force of will more consistenly and 4 hibernation sliver maindeck to deal with miracles and other people trying to control you like shardless bug and jund. Moved the Syphon slivers to the sideboard and added a third Venom sliver into it.

I have considered playing bonescythe sliver and hearth sliver, but I don't think there is place for it in the deck. I have never tested Darkhearth sliver but think that Syphon sliver works better. As for chalice of the void, I like playing a more agressive line with more drop 1 creatures, so you can very often kill your combo opponent on turn 4, but think it is a good choice if the goal is to improve combo matchups.
I apologize if there is any grammar issues, english is not my mother language.

There is also a report I wrote six mouths ago about a tournament I was able to win with slivers. With you want to check up (in portuguese): http://insidegamestore.com.br/public...ml?pid=2309096


@LordofFury: Striking sliver is a beast against eldrazi, I often stay in a defensive first strike wall until can fly above or go bigger than the opponent. Combined with Venom Sliver things become really sweet. I've had something like 50-50 results in training against eldrazis

[James718]

Any updated decklists? Ralf? Volt?

[Ultrab77]

Thanks Daniel!

This is my list:

Creatures (28):
4 Galerider Sliver
4 Hibernation Sliver
4 Crystalline Sliver
4 Sinew Sliver
4 Predatory Sliver
3 Muscle Sliver
2 Winged Sliver
3 Phantasmal Image

Spells (11):
4 Force of Will
4 AEther Vial
3 Chalice of the Void

Lands (21):
3 Mutavault
4 Cavern of Souls
2 Sliver Hive
4 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
2 Wasteland
1 Tundra
1 Tropical Island
1 Scrubland
1 Island

I feel uncomfortable to go with just FoW and only 18 blue cards to support it.

But maybe I should just test the full slivers version with hatebears, but I would add 2 PI to reach the magic 20 blue cards (the lower limit to my mind).

[Ralf]

Thanks Daniel!

This is my list:

Creatures (28):
4 Galerider Sliver
4 Hibernation Sliver
4 Crystalline Sliver
4 Sinew Sliver
4 Predatory Sliver
3 Muscle Sliver
2 Winged Sliver
3 Phantasmal Image

Spells (11):
4 Force of Will
4 AEther Vial
3 Chalice of the Void

Lands (21):
3 Mutavault
4 Cavern of Souls
2 Sliver Hive
4 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
2 Wasteland
1 Tundra
1 Tropical Island
1 Scrubland
1 Island

I feel uncomfortable to go with just FoW and only 18 blue cards to support it.

But maybe I should just test the full slivers version with hatebears, but I would add 2 PI to reach the magic 20 blue cards (the lower limit to my mind).

I'm really not sure we can afford playing Wasteland in such a build.
I didn't have time to make adjustments lately but I would look first at Warping Wail. It seems the card could be included in our shell since we are usually playing 4 Cavern 4 Muta 4 Sliver Hive.

My two cents.

[Ultrab77]

Report from Xander Niazy who top 4'd a 100+ man event in Milwaukee.

https://www.reddit.com/r/MTGLegacy/c...nament_report/

List

http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckd...?DeckID=102535


1 [UNH] Island
1 [UNH] Plains
1 [R] Tropical Island
1 [R] Underground Sea
2 [AVR] Cavern of Souls
2 [R] Tundra
3 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
4 [KTK] Flooded Strand
4 [M14] Mutavault
1 [M12] Phantasmal Image
3 [SH] Hibernation Sliver
3 [TE] Muscle Sliver
4 [SH] Crystalline Sliver
4 [M14] Galerider Sliver
4 [M14] Predatory Sliver
4 [PLC] Sinew Sliver
1 [MR] Chrome Mox
4 [DS] Æther Vial
2 [5E] Sylvan Library
1 [CNS] Swords to Plowshares
3 [] Brainstorm
3 [NE] Daze
4 [AL] Force of Will

Side

3 [DKA] Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 [CMD] Flusterstorm
3 [RTR] Rest in Peace
3 [RTR] Pithing Needle
3 [TSP] Harmonic Sliver
1 [PLC] Necrotic Sliver

[Curby]

Delightfully old-school, without Sliver Hives or Chalices. I hope that success is repeatable!

Any thoughts about running exactly one Chrome Mox and one StP? I wonder if the Mox is for acceleration (faster postboard hatebear?) or mana-fixing.

EDIT: Slight vindication for:

And lastly, it confuses me that Sylvan Library doesn't get any love here. I would play 2 Sylvan Library before even considering the first Impulse assuming we're on a fetchland manabase.

Re: Volt's earlier warning, Mox and Trop make only two real green sources in the deck for Library, but I guess you only draw a Library by turn 4 in a third of games anyway.

[Ultrab77]

Delightfully old-school, without Sliver Hives or Chalices. I hope that success is repeatable!

Any thoughts about running exactly one Chrome Mox and one StP? I wonder if the Mox is for acceleration (faster postboard hatebear?) or mana-fixing.

EDIT: Slight vindication for:

Re: Volt's earlier warning, Mox and Trop make only two real green sources in the deck for Library, but I guess you only draw a Library by turn 4 in a third of games anyway.

Yes I would suggest the following adjustments on the manabase:
-1 Tundra
-1 plains
-1 Mox
-1 Sea
+2 Cavern
+1 Fetch
+1 Scrubland

This leaves you with 1 trop + 8 fetches = 80% to have green mana for Library turn 2 and possibility to have Trop + Scrubland on the table to cast every single sliver.

Again same debate your manabase is weaker than with Hives but lets you use BS and Library with 8-10 fetches.

I would also:
-1 StP
+1 Image

and on the SB:
-3 Thalia
-1 Necrotic
+4 CotV

[ThaDopestXander]

Waddap? I got directed here from reddit... My name is Xander Niazi and I've been playing slivers for almost 20 years... This thread is awesome and a great resource for beginners its really exciting to see people have enthusiasm for the deck... For a lot of years there I thought I was the only one! I see my list and tournament report have already been linked so I won't be redundant... I'm really glad to have been made a part of this thread I'm excited to talk slivers with y'all. Anyone feel free to hit me up whenever! Sorry if there a delay in replying I'm still figuring this site out... Lastly... Whose going to Columbus?

[ThaDopestXander]

Delightfully old-school, without Sliver Hives or Chalices. I hope that success is repeatable!

Any thoughts about running exactly one Chrome Mox and one StP? I wonder if the Mox is for acceleration (faster postboard hatebear?) or mana-fixing.

EDIT: Slight vindication for:

Re: Volt's earlier warning, Mox and Trop make only two real green sources in the deck for Library, but I guess you only draw a Library by turn 4 in a third of games anyway.

Hello friend! Need not wonder anymore! The mox is 94% mana acceleration 5% land drop 0.089% mana fixing and nobody knows what the last thing it is, is. Okay I'm being funny... But its there to power out sick turn 1 plays such as library, crystalline, mutavault lord... Swinging for 5 on turn two is a savage clock and your using one creature to do it... And as you mentioned out of the sideboard turn 1 thalia is nasty or even slivers turn 1 chalice for 1 can be devastating. I traded a misty for it and its one of the best choices I've ever made... It's a super land, way way swingier but a land never gives u the option to ramp into something sweet and drawing a land and a chrome mox in the late game are similarly dead... iMHO the down side is minimal... I think y'all would be surprised by how many games that little lonely mox he's won me.

The trop... Yea I know it's sketchy but I wanted to test out my second basic in plains and at the time I decided I wanted the tundra... I'm not sure it's 100% incorrect but I immediately traded a tundra for trop when I got home... That being said I didn't even get close to have issues with my mana at the classic. Even got to turn one land mox pitch library play library so that was like really really supreme... The thing is the LIBRARY is the only spell that wants it, and you don't need to cast two (sure they can kill it blah blah but its non vital and if they kill tiny don't need to replace it or lose the game) so you just don't fetch the trop until you have a very good reason too use it. That strategy worked out for me...

And thanks for the love, this deck... These cards.... They're very important to me and they mean a lot to me since they've been by my side as long as I can remember.. I played back in the plated sliver days, before mutavault and cavern and sliver hive and vial... The deck never needed all these tools, and it still doesn't. The trick is finding a way to balance them so that you can reliably answer as many problems as possible while not diluting it to the point of the answers becoming ineffectual.

Sliver hive is bad... I just don't like it... It would need to make a Sliver for like 3 mana then maybe... But its just a really bad cavern of souls... Also my list is hardly even 4 c so you don't need the fixing from cavern and sliver hive so your playing those cards for their other abilities... So yeah cavern... Seems like an obvious 4 of right? Well not in my oppinion. Heres the things, cavern is actually only good against miracles... Most of the time if they are forcing one of your slivers they are forcing the wrong the spell. Cavern of souls doesn't give them the option to make this mistake... Sure sometimes you need a crystalline to resolve but most of the time you have another way... I personally love when my delver opponents force a lord... Thats so bad for them and I want them to have the chance to make that mistake to my advantage... If miracles wasn't the easiest most free roll-y match up the deck had then 4 would be great... But miracles can't beat 2 cavern so I think that's enough... If ur worried about miracles you could always play one I'm the board too...

And chalice... I suprising don't have a lot to say about that... Cards amazing can be amazing in the deck... But not my style of sliver slangin... I will give no reason other than I like to vial in thalia and I can't vial in chalice... I guess brainstorm is just insane and seeing three new cards is often enough to win with slivers.

Thanks again, anyone feel free to start a chat about slivers, I'd love to join ya

[ThaDopestXander]

Yes I would suggest the following adjustments on the manabase:
-1 Tundra
-1 plains
-1 Mox
-1 Sea
+2 Cavern
+1 Fetch
+1 Scrubland

This leaves you with 1 trop + 8 fetches = 80% to have green mana for Library turn 2 and possibility to have Trop + Scrubland on the table to cast every single sliver.

Again same debate your manabase is weaker than with Hives but lets you use BS and Library with 8-10 fetches.

I would also:
-1 StP
+1 Image

and on the SB:
-3 Thalia
-1 Necrotic
+4 CotV

Hey so thanks for your input, but I've got some disagreements that I would like to pose respectully and for the sake of discussion...

If your cutting the tundra I would only add a trop there, and I would hesitate to decrease my island count for daze.. Turn one vial daze is back breaking for anyone and I like to minimize the chances that I don't have that option while having daze in hand.. Its perfectly reasonable to cut the mox for essentially any other land... But you'll never blow people out with a turn 1 misty... I like having advantage (obviously not of the card variety) built into my mana base... I personally believe you just give yourself a way nicer ceiling with mox and the floor is not that much lower... If it is at all... I played one basic for a long time and wasteland was just way to good against me... The island plains is huge casting 12+ of your slivers right there and thats not even mentioning the fact that lands just slaughters us and strips us outta the game... Not so much when I go basic basic RiP... When Sliver hive was first printed I obviously tested it immediately and game after game I kept wishing I had a blue mana for brainstorm or whatever... And on top of that I wanna be able to play colored spells outside of slivers in the deck so they really hindered my ability to cast them... And as you said brainstorm and library are a lot better with fetches... I actually think the brainstorm locking myself was the straw the broke the camels back for the Sliver hives....

So I'm not sure if you read my tournament report, but I traveled for the modern open and when that failed I decided to play legacy I didnt bring all my cards to Milwaukee from Colorodo and hadn't really been planning on playing it... So my deck still had 3 swords in it from some massive testing sessions and by the time I realized I only had one phantasmal image on me and I basically said well shit... Lets make do... Ideally I would be on 2 image and I'm testing more currently. But to be fair... I miss top 8 and top 4 if I didn't pack the 2 of swords and 1 of image... So its kinda odd.. I wasn't happy with the card... But it won me games... Idk need much more testing to know if a 1 of like that is possibly correct

Again the whole thalia v CotV thing is kinda a personal preference thing imho I think the fact that I value my brainstorm super highly and thalia being able to be vialed in is why I play her over chalice... But I have a set sleeved up sitting next to the SB waiting for action.... I also think if ur playing chalice there is absolutely no reason to skimp on the mox!! Just my 2 cents hope to have an awesome discussion with everyone enjoy!

[Volt]

Congrats on that result, Xander. That list looks fantastic.

Question: Necrotic Sliver. I read your report, and I think you mentioned using it... once? Were there other times? Is it actually worth the SB slot?

[ThaDopestXander]

Congrats on that result, Xander. That list looks fantastic.

Question: Necrotic Sliver. I read your report, and I think you mentioned using it... once? Were there other times? Is it actually worth the SB slot?

I'm kindandrawing a blank, but if I only wrote about it one time I probably only did it once. Necrotic is a nice catch all, mana intensive sure, but sometimes you just need do destroy something harmonic can't get... I think the deck naturally lends itself to some 1 of sliver because of how many of them have diminishing returns on stacking (galerider crystalline ect) I know I'm not running a lot of 1 its but I do think a Necrotic or a syphon off the top of my head are worth the slot, I play four harmonics a lot in my local meta usually having two in the main and I basically thought of Necrotic as the fourth harmonic with a bit different utility the more I'm thinking about it that slot could potentially be used better, I'll let you know where I land on that and what I think I'd replace it with... Syphon is defiantly an all star thats absent from the list I ran there... Let me know what you would replace it with!

[ThaDopestXander]

It makes me sad that the deck could benefit so much from Sylvan Library but can't easily support it. Another example of this increasingly being a multicolor deck that can't capitalize on being multicolor.

P.S. I wonder why we didn't run Libraries back in the day.

If you care my list is packing 2 mainboard libraries and I've played I'm null red since early 2000's they are incredible in a force of will aggro deck

[Ultrab77]

Hi Xander,

I invited you on Reddit

So I read your answers and I will take most of your list to my weekly tomorrow (24 players - 4 rounds).

I just don't have Chrome Mox yet, did the -1Stp +1 Image and will take 3 Caverns because of a heavy Miracles meta.

Keep up the good work!

[ThaDopestXander]

Hi Xander,

I invited you on Reddit

So I read your answers and I will take most of your list to my weekly tomorrow (24 players - 4 rounds).

I just don't have Chrome Mox yet, did the -1Stp +1 Image and will take 3 Caverns because of a heavy Miracles meta.

Keep up the good work!

Awesome!!! Thanks again for leading me here! I'd love to hear how it goes (went). I think the list I'm taking to Columbus will look very similar to that, I'm planning on running cavern in the sideboard though. I feel super torn on caverns because miracles just cannot touch me... I have not dropped a sanctioned match to miracles... Ever... So I might not even do that. The other thing I keep thinking about is Savannah... It probably requires going to 1 basic but last night out of 10 games I would have had my entire hand live 6 times if I could have gotten Savannah. I know a lot of people like trop scrub to cast every sliver but you can't fetch scrub with misty so thats my issue there. It would replace plains, chrome mox or one of the duals (so one of each) chrome mox is one I will not cut for Savannah but if anyone wanted to I wouldn't fault them. Plains is the most likely. Again let me know how it goes!!

Oh and btw I forgot to weigh in on brainstorm Vs chalice of the void in detail, so I'll plan to do that tonight or tomorrow. If its not obvious by my list, I have some strong oppinions on both cards that many disagree with. I've got some logic and math I'll share with you as to why I run my list the way I do in regards to those two cards
Until then, embrace the hum.
Xander

[Curby]

Is Misty an availability thing? I'm wondering if running some number of Polluted Delta will help spread risk and increase chances of being able to fetch the duals you need. Back in the day we ran Strand/Delta, and were then able to grab our Scrubland when needed.