Hey guys, we're back! In this episode we talk about some of the things we missed during our hiatus as well as the current state of Legacy, and we outline our plan for future episodes. We already recorded episode 15 as well and will post it next weekend.
http://www.thebrainstormshow.com/unc...sode-014-back/
Welcome back! You've been missed! :)
Thanks, man! We're a little rusty but excited to get back into Legacy and podcasting.Originally Posted by jamie7keller
When people ask about legacy podcasts or whether legacy is growing, I always list y'all as one of the four new legacy podcasts started this year. Now i can remove the "though they are on a hiatus" disclaimer!
I'll be subscribing on itunes/downloading today. Neat that yall are apparently dipping toes in MTGO (judging only off episode tag line). I am too! I hate buying in twice but you gotta do what you gotta do. No deck bought yet though.
Great to have you back. I'm eagerly looking forward to next episode. Also, I would be a big fan of a Legacy Stream from mtgo with you guys playing different decks, threesome-style
@jamie: Even though support for Legacy online has dropped tremendously, it has still been a great way to test decks at home and get our Legacy "fix." MTGO simulates the tournament experience much better than jamming test games on a 3rd party platform like Cockatrice.
@nevil: We just recorded the next episode, and we will post it towards the end of the week. You even get name-dropped near the end haha...
It's good to have you guys back. I am looking forward to watching you guys on some MTGO streams. Less fun music and "personality", more talking through the plays and lines please.
Some questions for you:
- How does the incorporation of Mentor affect Miracles? Is it good (or necessary), or does it just help bad Miracles players close out matches within 50 minutes?
- Does the different MTGO meta encourage you to build your main decks differently? Does this affect MTGO's reliability as a testing tool? Have you seen tech migrate from MTGO into Paper?
- Abrupt Decays in Grixis Delver? Just in the board? Not worth it?
- Any new cards from the last couple of sets that you like? MUD just got some interesting tools, will they help the deck's consistency by filling out the curve? Painful Truths? Really? Read the Bones hasn't seen any adoption but all of a sudden we want a 3-cost sorcery because a big name pro likes it.
- Does Aggro Loam have a place in the American meta? It has become a significant force in Europe.
I will try to answer your questions one by one.
1. Mentor in Miracles has been a contentious point between the three of us for quite some time. I (Paul) find it to be almost necessary at this point, but Phil has been a little bit trigger shy with it. I think we have settled on the fact that you probably have to play some number in the main deck, but whether that is 1 or 2 is kind of up in the air. It is one of your best tools against Delver decks and Shardless BUG, and it can make sideboarding against Miracles very awkward. As you pointed out, Miracles can take a long time to close out games, so Mentor probably encourages less experienced pilots to pick up the deck, though I wouldn't think of it as a crutch by any means.
2. MTGO encourages you to build your deck differently, yes. It isn't a huge difference for most strategies, but with ANT for example, we find ourselves devoting 6 SB slots to Miracles instead of 5. A small change, but a change nonetheless. I don't think the meta is so infested with any given deck that it makes playtesting online unreliable, though. As far as tech migrating from MTGO to paper, I think that there are a lot more experimental strategies being played online vs. paper, and it does feel like the Esper Mentor deck might have flown under the radar without MTGO players championing it.
3. Abrupt Decay in Grixis Delver normally requires you to play 2 of each dual (Volc, Trop, Sea), which makes your mana even more fragile (if that's possible). It feels unnecessarily greedy to me. I would pass on it in favor of more castable anti-Miracles cards, like Sulfuric Vortex and Pithing Needle.
4. Warping Wail seems like it is going to do good work in decks like MUD, but also in decks like Death and Taxes. We will have to see how it plays out, but the card seems very playable. Nothing in BFZ is exciting, even Painful Truths. We have been playtesting it some and can be a good role-player card off the SB from dedicated control decks. Delver shells feels like the absolute wrong place for it. Similarly, nothing from Origins is exciting -- not even Jace. There I said it.
5. At least where I live, Aggro Loam has been tearing up the tournament scene, with multiple Top 8 finishes in local 80ish-man tournaments. It rolls over fair decks pretty soundly. They call it Abzan Aggro on SCG, but it has made a splash on their circuit too. I think when the deck gets its Mox Diamond draws, it is very formidable. My prediction is that as long as Delver decks remain popular, Aggro Loam will always have a place in the meta.
Thanks for your questions.
And thank you for your considered replies :)
Your point about sideboarding against Mentor Miracles is good. It becomes a lot more awkward. If I think it is an old-school list there are often a bunch of removal spells I can board out, but if I see Mentor I get gunshy and find myself shaving here and there instead which is probably bad.
I agree, new Jace is not a mainstay Legacy card. The place I think it can be relevant is in Reanimator but even then I think it slows the deck down way too much.
Actually, Mentor is quite a garbage against Shardless BUG, when you compare it against Entreat. In the Shardless MU and Miracles mirror MU, you want Entreat.
Between Decay, Liliana, and ridiculous different angles of attack from Shardless, you don't want a win condition that would push you into a position of constantly spending cantrips. In this MU, you probably won't have a hand anyway. If you plan to use Mentor and tokens to pressure Liliana and/or Jace from the Shardless side, it'll be quite ineffective. Entreat at least can be casted as an instant, making Shardless difficult to defend, you are most certainly able to take out those planeswalkers when Entreat resolves EOT.
Also, the Mentor + SDT synergy will not happen in the SB games, not when Shardless bring in loads of artifact hate like needle and null rod. Most Legacy players have prepared mentor hate at this point, let it be dread of night or sulfur elemental.
@twndomn: Some of your points show why Shardless is a bad matchup no matter what you do. I agree than Entreat can be a good card against them, but I think it suffers from a lot of the same issues that you are stating here against Mentor. To say that they will have hate for Top like Needle or Null Rod is not just a point against Mentor, but also a reason to not play a clunky miracle that relies heavily on Top activations. To say that they will make you discard your relevant cards is a reason that having an awkward Entreat in your hand could make things even worse. Also Hymning or Liliana plus-ing your lands makes Entreat barely castable. If you add up all these examples you can see why it's unfair to assume that when you cast Mentor they will have a Needle on Top and they will have already discarded your hand, yet in your Entreat example these things do not appear to have happened and you are even able to set up an instant-speed Entreat to pressure their planeswalkers.
I actually think Entreat is good in the matchup, just as I think Mentor is "good," but nothing is ideal. Mentor is a more consistent card that is also easier to deal with than Entreat, but you also have to look at the floor of Entreat and its natural clunkiness against many things Shardless is trying to do. Regardless, I recommend people play several of these types of cards if they want to beat Shardless, because you're usually not beating them without a Mentor or Entreat.
Last edited by Patrunkenphat7; 01-27-2016 at 11:32 AM.
Well hang onto your butts....
Lee Sharpe said that it IS being worked on and IS coming.
https://twitter.com/mtg_lee/status/687817803877892096
Apparently I might have been the only one to see this tweet. I think that means our latest episode had an exclusive spoiler ;)
If you ever have a deck to lend me on MODO, I'l gladly play you sometime. Otherwise it will have to wait until I buy/trade in. I agree that cockatrice etc. is rough since I have no idea how competitive my opponents are...like ok, I win 70% of my matches...that doesn't even necessarily mean my deck is good, let alone that I am good at it.
I just saw this in your episode 8 thread - that is HUGE news! We had no idea! I just texted my friends, super exciting. We may have to take you up on the testing sometime. And yeah, Cockatrice is great for being a free program, but man... Sometimes you play against so much jank, and sometimes people just quit or rage at you when you're playing a competitive deck. MODO is a great testing tool.
I'd be happy to throw my hat in the ring in terms of testing Legacy on mtgo. I can build:
Miracles
ANT
TES
(TinFins)
Maverick
Grixis Delver
Various Esper/Deathblade/Mentor decks.
I'll be happy to play any of these decks if you wanna test something against one of those decks. Also, when one day sanity prevails and they decide to reprint Rishadan Port I'll be able to build Death and Taxes too!
Well the only decks I have "substantial" experience piloting with are elves and burn, but any time i spend with a new deck I can call "research" for our podcast.
I am Jamie7keller on MODO. I am almost never on, but i would be happy to try to schedule a time (late nights/weekends are best, working around job an baby).
Do any of your understand how to stream on twitch? I had been trying to figure that out and hit a wall. That might be a fun thing to do when we test (and no cheating by watching my stream, honor system ;)
@nevil: Sweeeeet. Yeah for a while we were playing no Massacres in our Storm SB online because Ports are stupidly expensive, and we just never run into D+T. I have since added them on principle though.
@jamie: We downloaded some software onto my laptop for Twitch streaming, but I quickly discovered that I really need 2 monitors and a faster computer to make it a good experience, so we are thinking about trying it on Paul's computer. You'll have to ask Paul (lucksackdelver_flip) how he got all the stuff for it, because I honestly have no idea. "My" (cough, cough) online account is the same name as my name here.
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