No videos, sorry - i have never streamed anything and i currently have no plans to change that.Originally Posted by Vervandi
About these matchups:
Infect i need more data with this build. I'm currently 3-0 against it, but some of my older lists had big problems with Infect, so i would be surprised if it stayed that good.
How to play that matchup: The Cloudpost plan is usually too slow, and i board out the Eldrazi package including 2 Cloudposts. Depths is often good - they can chumpblock it with Inkmoth and postboard they could have Submerge, but otherwise it's hard to beat. The midrange plan also works. Discard their pumpspells (unless they have no threats on board and just 1 threat in hand). Lingering Souls as a sideboard card has overperformed against them, since it can block Inkmoth. In my current sideboard i play 2 Pernicious Deed, in this matchup that's probably better than Toxic Deluge because it kills Inkmoth. The most problematic games are those where they have just 1 threat and enough pumpspells to kill in 1 attack, almost impossible to win those games, especially if they have protection too - but those are the nuthands, everything else is beatable. My older lists without the NicFit package and without spotremoval had around 30-40% winrate against them, but i think Cabal Therapy alone makes this much better already, Lingering Souls and Pernicious Deed out of the board too, so i think it's probably favorable now - but needs more testing. (If you want more spotremoval, i would go for Swords to Plowshares.)
Stoneblade is a Cloudpost matchup. Depths is not good (because they have Swords to Plowshares - you can sometimes check for this with Therapy and go for it, but i would still board it out, they have Jace too and with Batterskull they are often over 20 life). Usually you try to stay alive and keep up with them with a grindy game plan. If a Tracker lives and keeps drawing you cards, it can be good enough to win the game. Many games you will fall behind, but often get the time to get the mana and Eye of Ugin for an Eldrazi and cast that - Ulamog is often good enough to win the game, Emrakul almost certainly is (and with Karakas you can cast Emrakul every turn, that's always good enough - with more mana and no active graveyard hate on their side, Tower + Eye of Ugin can also make an infinite Emrakul loop). The easiest way to get there is probably to resolve a Primeval Titan (if you can, check for FoW before you go for it).
Overall i think the matchup is favorable, but it depends on the list how favorable. Esper Stoneblade is probably the easiest matchup, i think 70%+ winrate. Didn't play enough against 4-Color yet, i think it could be slightly worse, but should still be pretty favorable. UW Stoneblade could play Back to Basics, and that can be problematic for the Cloudpost plan, but if they don't it's probably even easier than the rest.
(With this build i'm 3-3 against 4-Color, 2-0 against Esper and 1-0 against UW. When i was playing my older builds, 4-Color didn't exist yet.)
Burn is a race. I'm 3-1 with this build against Burn, with my older builds i also had around 70% winrate, but everybody else who tried my older builds had problems against Burn and when i tried to play both decks against each other, i had real problems against Burn too. Maybe the Burn players on xmage are just bad, i don't know. I think this build has more options against Burn than my older builds, but it's hard to tell if it's favorable or not - more Collective Brutalities (and maybe some maindeck) can make it better in case it's not good enough yet.
General strategy: If your hand can do it, kill them as fast as possible. Dark Depths is the best way to do it and Crop Rotation often very important to help with that - very rarely i have a hand that can play Turn 4 Emrakul, but usually that plan is too slow and i board out the Eldrazi package including 2 Cloudposts. A couple Trackers or just a large Knight can sometimes race them too (try to play the Knight as a 4/4 at least). Discard can buy you life. Collective Brutality out of the board is very good. Scooze and Courser can bring some life. Glimmerposts are a way to gain life, but keep Price of Progress in mind (i have attacked with Primeval Titan against them without searching out any lands because of that).
Overall, the current build can keep up with those decks, but it definitely doesn't dominate them. And if you are only facing those 3 decks, you can get rid of some cards like Gaddock Teeg or Bojuka Bog and probably play some other sideboard cards too (out of the current sideboard, i wouldn't board in Surgical against either of these decks, and while Ethersworn is ok against Infect, something else could be better too for those matchups - among cards i have played in my board in the past, i would board in Krosan Grip in all 3 matchups: kills Inkmoth through any protection, kills Equipment, kills Eidolon + Sulfuric Vortex and some possible Burn sideboard cards like Ensnaring Bridge. and i could see a couple Swords to Plowshares, it's good against Infect and Burn and probably playable against Stoneforge).
I would practice online with the deck - it's not always straight forward, there are many possible lines and just goldfishing is probably not enough.
That's a very thorough reply, thank you for your time.
Search my posting history, I tried it extensively. It won me a few games, but I used it as a SB option and it mostly went unused. I actually sided in Thespian's Stage just to be an additional land more often than I sided in the full combo.
Use Crop Rotation over Knight of the Reliquary. It's a full 2 turns faster. Also, each piece being a 1 of isn't enough to combo off consistently. For that you need to run multiples. I used 3 DD 4 Stage.Any suggestions would be appreciated.
I'd keep in 1 Knight as a GSZ target. Can't do that w/ Crop Rotation.
Knight is what makes the combo more consistent, even though it's slower. One is enough as a GSZ target, but that one you want. (Of course you want Crop Rotations too.)
With Knight you can combo often enough with just one of each land. Very often you will have 1 Crop Rotation too, so just 1 active turn with Knight is good enough. Also, Knight is much better against Delver - they can counter Crop Rotation, but they can't counter the Knight activation - maybe they Stifle it, but then you're still only 1 turn slower. They often can't kill a big Knight either, and being 1 or 2 turns slower is usually not a problem against Delver (especially with a big Knight that can block on the ground) - and if they can deal with the combo (usually by leaving up a Wasteland), the Knight alone is often good enough to kill them.
I think with 3 DD and 4 Stage you are too Allin on the combo plan. The only decks playing more than 1 Depths and 1 Stage are Turbo-Depths and Lands, and those decks don't really have another reliable wincondition. Maverick, Aggro-Loam and 12-Post sometimes play the combo, but always just 1 of each land. I'm playing 2 Stage right now (and it took me very long to try that, i'm still not 100% convinced it's good), but you really don't want a 2nd Depths, drawing that when you don't want it hurts too much - especially in a deck without Mox Diamond.
And i think sacrificing 7 sideboard slots just for that is almost certainly not good. You want the combo against combo decks, but actual combo hate is much more important postboard (because your combo is still slower than their combo most of the time), with those 7 slots reserved for the combo you can't run enough other relevant cards, and i'm not surprised that didn't work out.
So im going to play in the side events in a GP this weekend and im sleeving up something that looks like this:
3 vet
3 drs
1 ooze
1 witness
3 tracker
1 courser of kruphix
1 ramunap excavator
1 meren of clan nel toth
1 woodland bellower
4 gsz
4 therapy
4 crop rotation
1 fatal push
3 abrupt decay
1 diabolic edict
1 library
2 pernicious deed
1 to the slaughter
1 nissa vital force
3 forest
3 swamp
2 bayou
4 verdant
3 heath
1 flats
1 dryad arbor
1 wasteland
1 karakas
1 treetop village
1 bojuka bog
1 phyrexian tower
1 maze of ith
Board:
3 surgical
3 thoughtsieze
1 pithing needle
2 golgari charm
1 toxic deluge
1 to the slaughter
1 massacre
1 reclamation sage
2 lost legacy
The list isnt perfect but it seems to be doing okay in testing. I want another needle in the board somewhere and maybe a garruk relentless. I might cut a crop rotation for another push, but that's kind of where im at right now.
Last edited by removedfromgame; 07-19-2017 at 01:22 PM.
I like the Woodland Bellower tech. Are you missing GSZ from the list? I did a quick count and it didn't seem to add to 60.
Food for thought: 1 Azusa, Lost But Seeking + 1 Ghost Quarter. Combined with Ramunap, that is 3 GQ activations every single turn. I'm salivating at the thought lol. Bit weak to removal (hi Meren), but you have GSZ/Bellower to find the creatures, and Crop Rotation to find the Ghost Quarter, so it is both fairly consistent and won't screw your regular plan.
Yeah i just realised i forgot to add in gsz. Theyre a 4 of.
GQ might actually also make the cut. I was not sure if i wanted to add another waste effect but with vet it makes sense. Azusa seems great but kind of win more-y. There's potential i think.
Speed matters. The KotR route takes 4 turns. 1 to summon, 1 for each land, and 1 to swing. Crop Rotation can assemble it all at the end of a single turn and kill from nowhere.
I've found that my builds grind extremely well, too well in fact. As a result I've spent a pretty significant amount of effort in finding ways to speed the clock. Crop Rotation vs KotR is one of those. You don't want to add 4 turns to your clock, that way lies madness and miracles.
@removedfromthegame: Please do well. I so want this to work.
I normally run an Abzan list of Nic Fit but i am trying to make a GB version work this is my tentative list
// 60 Maindeck
// 17 Creature
4 Veteran Explorer
1 Eternal Witness
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Tireless Tracker
1 Thragtusk
1 Deathrite Shaman
1 Reclamation Sage
2 The Gitrog Monster
2 Titania, Protector of Argoth
1 Meren of Clan Nel Toth
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Ramunap Excavator
// 4 Enchantment
3 Pernicious Deed
1 Recurring Nightmare
// 5 Instant
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Fatal Push
// 24 Land
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Bayou
4 Forest
3 Swamp
4 Ghost Quarter
2 Wasteland
2 Dust Bowl
1 Phyrexian Tower
// 10 Sorcery
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Life from the Loam
// 15 Sideboard
// 4 Artifact
SB: 2 Thorn of Amethyst
SB: 2 Trinisphere
// 2 Enchantment
SB: 2 Choke
// 7 Instant
SB: 3 Surgical Extraction
SB: 2 Golgari Charm
SB: 2 Fatal Push
// 2 Sorcery
SB: 1 Massacre
SB: 1 Toxic Deluge
Any input would help.
I've done a lot of work with GB. In order to justify GB, you need to answer four questions;
What is White not doing for you?
What is Blue not doing for you?
What is Red not doing for you?
What are you hoping to gain from two color?
With the builds I like to run, my answers to those questions for reference are:
White: Removal exists in other colors, my build doesn't want Sigarda.
Blue: Too many sacrifices need to be made for FoW. The cantrip cabal can be matched in GB.
Red: Punishing Fire wrecks the mana, Huntmaster isn't enough in the 4.
What I hope to gain: Consistency and speed.
First, your land. I don't like the mana denial strategy here, with GB you'll gain more consistency and that means you want mana to play your cards on time. Denying your opponent a color when Veteran Explorer fixes them seems like a bad idea. Also, those colorless slots have a cost, you only have 13 green and 12 black sources with your current setup. Considering you're only two colors that's not good. Ideally you want to be in the range of 15 t1 green sources.
The other thing I would look at is speed. Being just two colors you should be able to act faster than a deck that needs 3 colors. That probably means having more cards to act on our fast starts. Below average starts should get you to 3 mana on T2 while best possible starts get you to 5 mana. This means setting your curve up to use that mana. I see lots of 5's in your list, but few 4's. Thus, on a good start (which isn't consistent in your build anyways) you can't GSZ for something.
With Titania specifically but Gitrog too you need more fetches, and you probably want Crop Rotation as well.
Finally, what's your plan to cast these cards when you're giving up 3 lands per game to land destruction?
Increasingly, b/r reanimator and dark depths decks are taking over my meta. Abrupt Decay and Deeds do little and if I can't interact with them on turn one, the game is lost.
How can I gear the deck to have a chance against b/r reanimator and dark depths?
Cut deeds and Decay to make room for 4 Thoughtseize?
Play 4 Needles and 4 Leylines in the side?
Give up on Nic Fit and switch to a deck that can beat Depths and B/r reanimator? If so, what decks have a good matchup against these two decks?
Crop Rotation for Bojuka Bog (against Reanimator) and Karakas (against both) help a lot against these two decks (and having the Depths combo myself helps too). My winrate against Reanimator has always been pretty high with my deck, and most of it is because of Crop Rotation (still need Surgical postboard, but Crop Rotation gives me another card to blow them out). Not enough data against Turbo Depths, but i'm pretty sure that matchup is good for me too. And Lands is one of my best matchups, to a large part because of Crop Rotation with those 2 Lands to get.
And while my build is pretty unique with the Cloudpost part, other builds are starting to play a few Crop Rotations too, so it should work in every NicFit deck if you are playing those 2 utility lands at least and gets better if you play a few other things. Look up my build a few pages back for my NicFit-Cloudpost-Depths hybrid, or Braels build for a more fair approach with Crop Rotations.
Junk Fit has tools to answer threats of either.
Which tools? Most of the Nic Fit lists I've seen here don't play crop rotation and Scooze and Shaman are far too slow to help against B/R Reanimator. Most lists don't even play a full play set of Thoughtseize to accompany the Cabal Therapy which I think is a mistake in a format where some decks routinely combo off and win turn one or turn two.
B/R Reanimator more often than not gets down a turn one Griselbrand and combos off and wins with it that same turn using Children of Korolis and Laboratory Maniac, or alternatively they play a turn one Sire of Insanity and make you discard your hand. So if you can't interact with them on turn one, there typically won't be a turn two.
Thanks for the suggestion. I'll try incorporating some crop rotation, a karakas, a wasteland and a bajuka bog into my build. It helps that I also play a Dryad Arbor I can grab with it if I need a creature at instant speed.
Another card I like in GB is Diabolic Edict. It fills the same type of role, killing a big creature like Emrakul, Marit Lage, or Griselbrand that Swords/Path do for junk builds.
Junk Fit is one of the few decks that can support Path to Exile, which lets you get away with quite a lot of stuff.
Your description of B/R Reanimator leads me to believe you're talking about Tin Fins, though. Not a single B/R Reanimator list on The Source runs Children of Korlis. And since ours is a non-blue deck, ofcourse we're going to have a problem vs. such glass cannon combo decks. Crop Rotation for Bog is nice and all, but does very little for you when they're on the play. And just 1 Bog won't save you G1.
G2/3 you usually have at least 7 discard spells and a number of Lost Legacy and Surgical Extraction. This, combined with your DRS/PtE, is usually enough to take G2. G3 is where the real challenge lies, since they'll likely be on the play. If they have the nuts, there's nothing you (or most other decks, for that matter) can do. I've had the pleasure of seeing B/R Reanimator's T1 end with them having Griselbrand, Iona/Chancellor of the Annex (I forgot which it was) AND Sire of Insanity on the board while I had a wonderful hand of everything that was good vs. them.
So Eschelon, i took that list to the side events and it was not good. The deck has a lot of play to it, but it suffers in not being able to really apply pressure amd close games. All my losses were heartbreakingly close, but later of i jammed a bunch of games against Wilson Hunter's grixis control and i was not even in the games. I decided to revert back to rhinos, but keep in a crop rotation sub package. I'll post a list later.
Going over my matches against Reanimator (currently 8-1 against different flavors, no Tin-Fins but most of it BR):
1. As you said, they are a glass cannon combo deck. Long term that means there will be a decent number of games where their deck just doesn't work. I won some games where my opponent's deck did just that, they either mulliganed into oblivion and conceded or they never found a combo.
2. Crop Rotation was by far the most important card for me and responsible for the majority of my wins. Again, they are a glass cannon deck. Crop Rotation for Bog is just a blowout, they have to completely rebuild from that, meaning get another creature in the graveyard and find another reanimaton spell, and the creature they actually wanted is gone forever - much stronger than just a discard spell. That gives me a lot of time to either find more disruption in the form of discard, get Scooze to lock up the game, or just kill them with other stuff. Many games, just one Crop Rotation was enough to win me the game.
3. Crop Rotation for Karakas is an out if they did get a Griselbrand into play. It's not always good enough if they got other stuff too, but more often than not, they don't have something to get around Karakas.
You can't win every game against a deck like BR-Reanimator. Sometimes they are on the play and just have the Nuts - only Surgical can save you then, but against a Chancellor even that is not good enough. Just try to win the games you can actually win, and Crop Rotation helps a lot with that.
Other options: I played Swords to Plowshares in earlier builds. It's good against Reanimator and definitely helps, but Crop Rotation is still stronger - you don't really want that Griselbrand to get into play at all, if they draw 7-14 cards most of the damage is done. Path to Exile does pretty much the same.
Diabolic Edict is less good, because they just need another reanimation spell to go off again and they could have Grave Titan.
I have Toxic Deluge in the deck, has the same problems as Edict but actually deals with Grave Titan at least. Sometimes this will do something, and it's certainly better in the matchup than Pernicious Deed.
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