May I introduce to you Mirri's Guile and a pile of fetchlands..? Does wonders for your consistency problems. Proxy them, give them a go and I'll see you on the other side.
Any Xmage players here? Have you experienced the new Vet/Therapy stack bug? Do you just play through it or do you know of a workaround?
(I actually lost a because of it. Strangely, it was because my opponent didn't have enough mana to cast Brainstorm)
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"What if they're already dead, Sergeant?"
"Then kill 'em again, you numpty. Kill them dead. Don't kill them alive."
Looking to give Nic Fit a whirl. I am a Death and Taxes player that defected to Vintage a few years ago but I still want to support Legacy here and there. I ran my list past a few veteran players in my area and it seems alright, but I feel that I am poor against combo. current list:
Land (24)
1x Bayou
1x Dryad Arbor
3x Forest
1x Karakas
1x Phyrexian Tower
1x Plains
1x Savannah
1x Scrubland
2x Swamp
1x Taiga
4x Verdant Catacombs
3x Wasteland
4x Windswept Heath
Planeswalker (1)
1x Nissa, Vital Force
Creature (18)
1x Eternal Witness
1x Glissa, the Traitor
1x Meren of Clan Nel Toth
1x Primeval Titan
1x Scavenging Ooze
3x Siege Rhino
1x Sigarda, Host of Herons
1x The Gitrog Monster
1x Thragtusk
2x Tireless Tracker
1x Titania, Protector of Argoth
4x Veteran Explorer
Enchantment (3)
3x Pernicious Deed
Sorcery (9)
4x Cabal Therapy
4x Green Sun's Zenith
1x Vindicate
Instant (5)
3x Abrupt Decay
2x Path to Exile
Sideboard (15)
1x Choke
2x Faerie Macabre
1x Gaddock Teeg
2x Golgari Charm
1x Reclamation Sage
3x Rest in Peace
2x Slaughter Games
3x Surgical Extraction
Too much of a top end. If you want to be competitive against combo, you need to be playing cards at a similar curve to them. That means low mana interactive spells. Which is just a good idea in Legacy in general, especially since Nic Fit doesn't have FoW as a general catch all card. You need to play a lot of interaction. The best change I've managed to include to deal with combo is Crop Rotation with some utility lands. Other notable hits have been Lost Legacy, a playset of Deathrite Shaman, and Diabolic Edict.
Also, you definitely do not want Rest in Peace. It's quietly one of the best cards against us in the format (especially when you have such a high curve) because it shuts off Veteran Explorer triggers. It also shuts off DRS which is our secondary ramp, and in your case it also shuts off things like Titania, Gitrog, Scavenging Ooze, Eternal Witness, and Cabal Therapy. If you want a Rest in Peace effect you should look at Leyline of the Void since it's one sided, but be careful as Leyline is also fantastic against you.
would you suggest more discard effects in the board like thoughtseize or duress? i was thinking about crop rotation before i was going to post. thanks for the suggestions.
I think hedging on discard can be ok, but to beat combo what you actually need is discard plus a clock. 1 or 2 extra discard spells can be justified. Many like Collective Brutality, but I actually like Tidehollow Sculler because it's both discard and a clock in one (and unlikely to die). Another good one is Strangleroot Geist believe it or not. Haste helps a lot because it gives combo less life to play with (important against ANT for example), and it leads into a reasonable Cabal Therapy opener, and probably one of the better anti combo openers.
Most run between 0 and 1 additional discard spells. If combo is heavy in your meta I would make it two. It's up to you to split between Sculler and Brutality. Brutality also comes in against Burn while Sculler also comes in against Eldrazi (given you have Glissa).
Crop Rotation however is very good. I don't know the right number to run, but I run 2 MB +1 SB and it has worked for me. Those numbers might need to go up. But it seriously expands your capabilities. manlands, equipment holders, graveyard hate, mana ramp, creature recursion, color fixing, beats Blood Moon, beats Wasteland, removal. The card literally does everything we want.
What Nic Fit lives and dies on though, is being able to play Magic when your mana ramp is disrupted, and being able to make a lot of 1 for 1 trades, and then pull ahead in CA. If you do those things, you'll win.
thanks for the help, i picked up a few cards based on your suggestion. i want to start grinding for EW.
@studderingdave: I'd start w/ cutting Wastelands, Titania, Gitrog and Primeval Titan and instead run a bunch of actual land and some DRS. And Glissa should be a sideboard card (if even that).
As Brael said - lower the curve and let me add this: Run more CA/library manipulation. You have to be able to compete w/ blue decks in the consistency department and want to be able to bury them under cards in the lategame.
I know this deck looks like EDH on steroids, but it absolutely is not.
I didn't even notice the Wastelands, you definitely do not want those.
And yes, CA is king. The most successful lists in this thread have either been very combo oriented like Sneak, or had the ability to keep up with blue decks in cards.
I take the lower curve philosophy to a much greater extent than anyone else here, but I would suggest looking back over the last several pages. I've got a Rhino build in there that's a pretty good halfway point between big stuff, CA, and interaction.
Last edited by Brael; 06-29-2017 at 10:28 AM.
Taking this to a tournament tomorrow.
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Windswept Heath
3 Forest
2 Swamp
2 Plains
2 Bayou
2 Scrubland
2 Savannah
2 Phyrexian Tower
1 Dryad Arbor
4 Veteran Explorer
1 Deathrite Shaman
2 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Nissa, Vastwood Seer
1 Eternal Witness
2 Tireless Tracker
1 Siege Rhino
1 Meren of Clan Nel Toth
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Pernicious Deed
3 Collective Brutality
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Swords to Plowshares
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Kaya, Ghost Assassin
1 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
Sideboard:
3 Surgical Extraction
2 To The Slaughter
2 Lost Legacy
2 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Toxic Deluge
2 Thoughtseize
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
The deck's a bit light on card-draw options, but hoping to make up for it with higher card quality, and all the card advantage I do have is repeatable. Sword of Feast and Famine is the secondary equipment of choice because a) it has text against spell-based combo and b) SoFaI is awful against Leovold. Batterskull doesn't seem necessary when I have Umezawa's Jitte to help against Burn and Sword to beat on combo/control.
Navsi/Echelon: Why no Crop Rotations? They really do put in a lot of work. They give you a lot of game against combo, they make your deck more explosive, and they're basically free slots since you're already using deck slots on what they provide making it an easy swap.
Can anyone think of some good MB cards (preferably only in B/G, but I'll take any suggestions for now) that are solid against Elves? Working on a new GB build and Elves is the only deck in the DTB section that I don't feel confident against, in fact it's nearly unwinnable. Wondering if there's anything I'm missing that could hedge.
I have zero interest in playing Crop Rotations.
If they're going to be good against combo, I'd need maindeck hate lands like Karakas and Bojuka Bog. The mana base is already clunkier than I would like due to the third Forest (for Nissa) and I don't want to make it any worse. Duals and Basics aren't coming out, and dropping Fetchlands makes my Trackers, Nissa and Dryad Arbor worse. Lowering my colored mana counts doesn't seem worth it.
As far as combo hate goes I am already playing seven maindeck discard spells and a Sword of Feast and Famine to lock harder, with 2 more discard spells and 5 extraction effects in the sideboard. I also already have maindeck graveyard hate in Deathrite / Ooze.
If I'm cutting interaction for Rotations, my fair matchups take a hit. Dropping Brutality also makes combo worse.
If I'm cutting creatures, my Equipment gets significantly worse and I either lose some of my few card advantage options (for a card disadvantage spell, instead) or I run lower on finishers. Neither of these options are ones I find particularly acceptable.
If I'm cutting other finishers (walkers / equipment) my lategame and control matchups get significantly worse, and against any fair blue deck I'm in a lot more trouble since Rotation is pretty much completely dead in those matchups rather than a hard to answer threat.
So.. what do you think Rotation is even good against? It seems good solely for blowing out combo decks, but does so by making your manabase way way less good. Against blue decks you can never cast it without 2-for-1ing yourself, and nonblue fair decks all have Wasteland so you aren't getting much value out of it there either, so you're just giving your opponent 2-for-1s all over the place.
Frankly, it looks to me like Rotation is the sort of card that makes cantrips necessary, so you don't draw it when you want an actually good card. I'm playing a relatively small amount of card selection, so I need my pieces to trade well and/or be resilient creatures and threat that I'm happy to topdeck, rather than a combo-specific silver bullet that's probably worse than just playing a maindeck Thoughtseize.
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Re: G/B Elves hate: Toxic Deluge is probably your best maindeck option.
It's good against everything. It gets creatures when you need them (Arbor/Treetop). It gets GY hate (Bog) when you need it. It gets mana acceleration (Tower) when you need it. It gives you card selection late game (Stronghold). It deals with Emrakul/Griselbrand (Karakas), it draws 2 cards with Tireless Tracker (fetch, get something), and it fights Wasteland since you can sac what they targeted.
On top of that, it doesn't take up any deck space because cards like Scavenging Ooze are easy swaps as long as you put a Bog in your manabase.
There is the issue of FoW, but even that isn't that bad. Depending on when and how you use it. It still trades 1:1 with FoW, so you come out even on cards if it's countered, but you also have Therapy to clear the way against FoW in the first place.
Crop Rotation is seriously good. My Legacy league I was playing at school last semester was won almost entirely on the back of that card (well, deck philosophy in general, but Crop Rotation was a big part of that). Ended up going 15-1, 13-1 in the swiss, 2-0 in the top 4, as a non blue deck (though that was pre SDT ban). It offers a level of consistency that you just don't normally see outside of the cantrip cabal.
Already playing one. Looking for a second card that's not horrible. Ideally in the 1-2 CMC range.Re: G/B Elves hate: Toxic Deluge is probably your best maindeck option.
Last edited by Brael; 06-30-2017 at 12:52 PM.
Zealous Persecution. Pushes your stuff through and can board wipe Elves.
I've thought about it, but it has the same issue as Golgari Charm. A -1/-1 just doesn't kill very much. Nettle Sentinel and DRS are 2 toughness, plus they can bounce a couple cards. In the end, those wipes will barely get you a 2-1. Though, Persecution is better on my side than Charm is.
These are the absolute least important creatures in their deck though. They can't fog your dudes, they can't combo very well without additional pieces, and while DRS produces mana, he can be turned off by DRS, Needle, or other cards. It's also instant speed so you can git'em.
I do think Golgari is probably better in this deck since you can nuke your VE with it at the same time, but w/e
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