[DTB] U/R Delver

[TheManWithaPlan]

I'd like to ask a specific question about Harsh Mentor. Since the Shock effect will disincentivize people from using fetches and Deathrite activations, do y'all think Mentor is better suited for Stifle/Wasteland shells that want to punish people's mana development? Having the opponent finally cave and play into Stifle while also taking 2 seems decent. Plus Stifle/Wasteland (instead of Price) helps Mentor survive more things and chip away for more damage because they wouldn't necessarily have the lands to cast their removal. Granted this would be a very different-looking list than the Prowess versions, but I wanted to get thoughts on the idea.

Thanks!

I would feel that you would have to play an aggressive shell around that to make the Harsh Mentor playable. Doing that in UR wouldn't be to hard evidently. You can play 4 Delver, 4 Swiftspear/Goblin Guide, X Mentor, and maybe a curve topper or two like Bedlam Reveler or True-Name Nemesis. I am unsure as to how Goblin Guide would work out, it would be a little awkward with your mana denial plan. I could see you wanting to play out the game to strangle their manabase early and capitalize with Harsh Mentor, but one thing from playing Stifle Grixis is 2 drops that don't do anything right away and Stifle is a little awkward.

[Claymore]

They can play out their non-basics and get nuked by Price. Or they can fetch up basics and get shocked by Mentor. DRS can't stabilize. Mother can't stonewall. It's reach against Miracles. This is a completely MD card for the meta.

[Poron]

2x MD 2x SB

"everyone needs his fucking milion/playset" [A good year]

[Chatto]

No can do.

The implication was that I asked for conversation about the new Mentor and what came immediately after was a spastic reaction to other rather unplayable spoiled cards, not meaningful in any way to this thread or the conversation requested lol.

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Aah ok I do think that the only real interesting card spoiler for UR Delver is Harsh Mentor. As stated by TMWaP it isn't very hard to imagine a aggresive UR Delver-shell. Would it require a lot tinkering? Not really. Swap Stormchaser Mage, and TWrath if you play the card (I personally don't like the card) for a third PoP main. Maybe pack some, I forgot the name, 1cmc Misdirection in the sb?

[theMonster]

I would feel that you would have to play an aggressive shell around that to make the Harsh Mentor playable. Doing that in UR wouldn't be to hard evidently. You can play 4 Delver, 4 Swiftspear/Goblin Guide, X Mentor, and maybe a curve topper or two like Bedlam Reveler or True-Name Nemesis. I am unsure as to how Goblin Guide would work out, it would be a little awkward with your mana denial plan. I could see you wanting to play out the game to strangle their manabase early and capitalize with Harsh Mentor, but one thing from playing Stifle Grixis is 2 drops that don't do anything right away and Stifle is a little awkward.

Hmm, Guide + Wasteland/Stifle is definitely a non-bo, and Swiftspear + Stifle seems awkward, too. I'd assume one would play more proactive cards with Swiftspear, playing spells both before and in combat. Stifle doesn't jibe with that plan. I guess the burn-centric list with Price is the way to go then ... unless there's some other one-drop threat you could play besides those two. (I can't think of a viable one; Lavamancer feels too slow.)

Thanks for the response.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

I'm actually a pretty big fan of Nivmagus Elemental here. It gets bigger every time they counter something. If they are about to win a counter-war, just exile all yours before the stack resolves. Makes stifle less dead later in the game, as you can target any trigger (even yours), eat the Stifle and allow the trigger to resolve.

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[Chatto]

Nivmagus Elemental is certainly a cool card, but I think we don't need another one-drop. Besides, you want to go as fast as you can, and Nivmagus Elemental isn't fast. It makes you want to exile cards from the stack (best case scenario after a counter-war), and most of the time you just want to have your Burn-cards to resolve.

PoP to three, SCM replaced by Harsh Mentor, and perhaps one or two Caverns of Souls (main or sb, but that is really stretching it) to make my humans uncounterable (thus keeping counters in hand for protection). That's what I'm thinking about.

[TheManWithaPlan]

I should clarify. By building an aggressive deck around Harsh Mentor, I meant that we would have to build an aggressive deck, however slow it down from the existing UR Delver deck. Stifle and Wasteland lend themselves to that sort of strategy. If we were to run a Stife+Wasteland build of this deck, we want to build our decks like Canadian Threshold. The concept would be to ideally play a 1 drop on turn 1 then proceed to strangle the opponent's manabase, and then capitalize with Harsh Mentor. We need 8 1 drops and Swiftspear is not one of them, due to its lackluster performance in a void. That said Nivmagus Elemental sounds interesting. Too bad it doesn't fly.

[BigBopper]

Problematically Canadian is not putting up great results at the moment, mostly due to Shaman, but also Leovold and TNN are problematic. Choosing UR allows a rock solid mana base and is able to punish opponents for being greedy (PoP). If you drop PoP and Prowess for Wasteland, Stifle and Harsh Mentor do you create a better deck than RUG or Grixis? Please don't get me wrong I like the idea, but I just don't see it. UR doesn't offer the best removal for a long game (lacking StP and Fatal Push) but has a "combo" like playstyle as you can go with the burn route completely orthorgonoal to what your opponent is doing.
Jonathan Alexander tried to attack opponents mana base to a great extend playing stifle, Wasteland and Winter Orb MD (https://theweeklywars.wordpress.com/...eshold-primer/) and even he switched to a BUG shell now that you can play Shaman, Decay, Push and Leovold. I guess a UR control build would feature

4x Delver
2-3x Lavamancer
4x Harsh Mentor
0-2x Snapcaster
0-2x TNN

4x Daze
4x FoW
4x Stifle
0-1x Winter Orb

4x L.Bolt
2x Forked Bolt
0-2x Dismember

4x BS
4x Ponder

4x Wasteland
3-5x Basics
3-4x Volcanic
7-8x Fetches

There is nothing innovative to that list and I don't see it superior to the previous build, where you just go PoP, Firebalst, swing for 10-14 damage a turn.

[theMonster]

All valid points, BigBopper. So given the current UR Prowess shell, do you think Harsh Mentor has a place in its 75? Is it better than Stormchaser Mage? Doesn't die to Pyroblast, but it can't be pitched to Force; no evasion; hates on lots of the format (if it gets to survive). I see lots of situations where the opponent fetches to Decay it, so you dealt 2 and got a card out of their hand. Worth it? The upside is awesome, of course, but how often do they not just have untapped mana and Bolt/Swords/Push? Guess we just gotta test it and find out(?).

Considering there'd potentially be no Stormchaser, I'd imagine you could cut some number of Probes to play either more burn or more stack interaction like Spell Pierce.

[BigBopper]

I don't see Harsh Mentor as a contribution to the MD. It's main purpose seems to fight Miracles. In my board I already play 1 Pithing Needle and 1 Winter Orb to fight them and they both outclass Mentor as whey are harder to remove and easier to cast. I also play 3 Eidolon in the side to fight Storm and other decks like Elves and D&T. RR can be hard to cast but Harsh Mentor essentially doesn't do the same as Eidolon. Resolving Eidolon against any of these decks is either game over or they need to dig for answers where you contribute damage. Mentor doesn't do a thing. I guess Mentor would compete with Young Pyromancer the most for slots and what they do in terms of damage and we don't play YP.

I will certainly test him but I guess he might end up staying at home unless there is some sort of awesome combo I haven't seen yet.

[theMonster]

Eidolon against DnT, interesting. I'd think that with all the Aether Vial tricks, they wouldn't have to cast that many spells. Plus getting RR consistently against Wasteland and Port seems tough. I see Mentor as better than Eidolon against DnT because every Port, Wasteland, Karakas, Aether Vial, Mom, Stoneforge, and equipment activation pings for 2.

[BigBopper]

I agree. Basically FoW and to a major extend Daze are dead draws against D&T I try to board in more creature to fight their plan (especially if they play around Dazr and you boarded it out). Mentor is definetly better than Eidolon in this MU but I'm not sure that makes him worth including, unless it turn that MU around entirely. I gotta see.

[kamikaze360]

I am new to the deck and have only been playing online on Cockatrice for about a week. I am loving the current configuration of the deck and am on the 2 PoP, 1 Fireblast, 3 SCM, 1 TNN, 1 Lavamancer type build. I did have one question that perhaps you all could answer regarding the sideboard. I get all the 1 ofs and 2 ofs since lot of them are similar in their use, can be useful against multiple decks, and can be found with Brainstorm and Ponder. However, why do we run only 2 Smash to Smithereens? Chalice on 1 is devastating and Smash is a nice clean answer if I don't have Daze/FoW. Is it because if they don't have Chalice Smash can sit dead? Has anyone had experience or tested 3? I am inclined not to do so since no lists seem to, just curious on the thought behind the SB.

[TheManWithaPlan]

I am new to the deck and have only been playing online on Cockatrice for about a week. I am loving the current configuration of the deck and am on the 2 PoP, 1 Fireblast, 3 SCM, 1 TNN, 1 Lavamancer type build. I did have one question that perhaps you all could answer regarding the sideboard. I get all the 1 ofs and 2 ofs since lot of them are similar in their use, can be useful against multiple decks, and can be found with Brainstorm and Ponder. However, why do we run only 2 Smash to Smithereens? Chalice on 1 is devastating and Smash is a nice clean answer if I don't have Daze/FoW. Is it because if they don't have Chalice Smash can sit dead? Has anyone had experience or tested 3? I am inclined not to do so since no lists seem to, just curious on the thought behind the SB.

We only ever run 2 Smash to Smithereens in our deck because we have 12 cantrips to find them. Smash to Smithereens is also a very narrow card and drawing them when you don't need them can be a bit of a liability. Another reason why only 2 Smash is sideboard space. Legacy is a very diverse format and you should have ways to deal with an array of different decks, thus that sideboard space is quite valuable.

[wizard_of_gore]

guys, what are you think about engima drake in u/r shell ? I mean, he dodges lightning bolt, and he can hit so hard it't not even funny :/

[kamikaze360]

We only ever run 2 Smash to Smithereens in our deck because we have 12 cantrips to find them. Smash to Smithereens is also a very narrow card and drawing them when you don't need them can be a bit of a liability. Another reason why only 2 Smash is sideboard space. Legacy is a very diverse format and you should have ways to deal with an array of different decks, thus that sideboard space is quite valuable.

Thanks, that makes tons of sense!!!

I have another question... and I'm sure its a common one. What do people do against Miracles? I have read the whole forum discussion and it seems its a tough matchup but some people have had success just bum rushing the Miracles player. What is the general consensus and sideboard plan? I have tested against a handful of times and it seems........ not good.

[BigBopper]

@wizard_of_gore: enigma drake is not a good card. If you care for a creature to stick and dodge removal play TNN. If you want to deal more damage play an additional PoP.

@kamikaze360: versible SB cards are Pithing Needle (vs. Miracles naming top), Winter Orb, Sulfuric Vortex and now Harsh Mentor. I guess Pyroblast and REB do come in mind but they are just defenses against Counterbalance and Jace, while not doing anything. Bedlam Reveler is quite good if you play one, as they cannot counter it with counterbalance, only counterspell if available and terminus gives us another chance to replay it and draw 3 cards.

@all: What is the thought on playing Barbarian Ring? I know Burn does it and to be honest I picked the idea up in the Canadian threat. We easily get threshold, it's 2 almost uncounterable damage (also on DRS) and we seriously don't count our life total (playing 4 probes). I'll give it a try for the 9th fetch.

[Chatto]

Working on updating the primer to add Sneak&Show and Grixis Delver to the matchups section as well as some version of BUG. What version of BUG would you guys like to see? Ried Duke BUG, or BUG Delver? Also adding Thunderous Wrath to the primer.

I've added some changes to the primer, courtesy to TMWAP

[paradigm72]

I like the matchup descriptions in the primer! Nice work guys :).

Speaking of UR's matchups, what is everyone's opinion on the Sneak and Show matchup? There's a discussion erupting in the Show and Tell FB group - it seems like in MA pateuglow and Jerry think it's heavily in favor of UR Delver, whereas in Madison John and I think it's 80/20 in favor of Sneak. We can't both be right :).

Here's how I board for Sneak and Show:

In:
+1 Flusterstorm
+2 Pyroblast
+1 Sulfuric Vortex (on the play)

Out:
-1 Grim Lavamancer
-2 Price of Progress
-1 Forked Bolt (on the play)

My experience is that I can usually count on finding one Force of Will, but it's not enough to get the job done. My opponent is always able to either Force back on-curve, or wait an extra turn and Pierce/Flusterstorm. The few times I win this matchup, it's when I'm on the play and can put together a turn-4 kill. Is the issue that I'm not reaching deep enough in the board to cards like Pithing Needle (which I don't run)? Is running Thunderous Wrath and pushing hard for a turn-3 kill the way to go?

This matchup is still a big puzzle to me - I'm at 2-6 lifetime record against Show and Tell, one of the few matchups that's negative for me in the past half year or so.