So I'm not sure what I would replace the Mindcensors with. I am a little low on SFM right now, but I could be convinced to play all 4. Here is my starting list, keeping in mind that I haven't played anything like this in at least 3 years.
4x Knight of the Reliquary
3x Mother of Runes
3x Birds of Paradise
3x Aven Mindcensor
2x Stoneforge Mystic
2x Qasali Pridemage
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Scryb Ranger
1x Gaddock Teeg
1x Dryad Arbor
4x Swords to Plowshares
4x Punishing Fire
4x Green Sun's Zenith
1x Sword of Fire and Ice
1x Batterskull
1x Ajani Vengeant
4x Windswept Heath
3x Arid Mesa
1x Taiga
1x Savannah
2x Forest
2x Plains
1x Karakas
1x Maze of Ith
4x Wasteland
4x Grove of the Burnwillows
Sideboard (super rough)
2x Enlightened Tutor
1x Grafdigger's Cage
1x Oblivion Ring
1x Ethersworn Canonist
1x Containment Priest
2x Pyroblast
1x Nissa, Vital Force
1x Sigarda, Host of Herons
2x Blessed Alliance
3x Choke
Last edited by Mr. Safety; 02-04-2019 at 09:50 AM.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
That's a very strange list, these are the first questions that came to my mind:
Why Arid Mesa over Wooded Foothills? You have Dryad Arbor...
Why 2 Qasali Pridemage instead of the split with Knight of Autumn?
I also think you can cut a Plains for a Plateau and then go down to 3 Grove of the Burnwillows and 3 Wasteland to add some other useful utility lands, like Dark Depths + Thespian's Stage or Horizon Canopy. I think 22 lands + Dryad Arbor is enough
Aren't just 3 Birds of Paradise not enough? I think turn 1 you always want to play either mana accelerant (BoP, Hierarch or GSZ to grab Dryad) or Mother of Runes. I would add the fourth bird or one Noble Hierarch
Cards that you can consider also: Ramunap Excavator, Tireless Tracker, Renegade Rallier, Sylvan Safekeeper, Sylvan Library. I also run some non creature spells, because we don't play Thalia, Guardian of Thraben so we unlock some useful cards like Life from the Loam or Crop Rotation.
In the sideboard, I think that 3 Chokes are too many, 2 are enough. Surely you need 2 or 3 Surgical Extractions, but you can also consider playing Thalia, Guardian of Thraben for those matchups in which Punishing Fire is useless (ANT, S&T, TES, ...)
I do have an Excavator, easy one. I'll cut a Mindcensor for it. Arid Mesa over Foothills is because of card availability, don't have Foothills. Horizon Canopy, same, card availability is nill. Two pridemages was because of mana curve, I was thin at 2 mana for creatures. If its correct to play Knight I will get one and do that. Fourth birds is completely reasonable, I would likely cut the Ajani for it. I also have the Safekeepers/Library's. I didn't know if Safekeeper was necessary with Mother of Runes already in the deck.
So initial changes I will definitely do:
-1 Ajani Vengeant
+1 Birds
-1 Aven Mindcensor
+1 Ramunap Excavator
-1 Grove
-1 Punishing Fire
+2 Sylvan Library
-1 Plains
+1 Plateau (once I get one, working on it)
Sideboard
+2 Surgical
+1 Ajani Vengeant
-1 Sigarda
-2 Blessed Alliance
Thanks for the feedback! I have been away from this style of deck for a long time, it really helps. I was poking through lists on here and I assembled one based on current card availability.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
Yeah, every Maverick deck is thin at 2 mana creatures, but that's okay. Just t1 dork and t2 three mana drop, easy
Library is really bad in multiples, so 1 is enough. I play 4 Mom and 1 Safekeeper, I think is a bit too much but you can play 3 Mom and 1 Safekeeper in my opinion.
Why do you play Ajani Vengeant in the sideboard? I think the right planeswalker is Garruk Relentless, very powerful in this deck.
My current sideboard is:
1 Knight of Autumn
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Red Elemental Blast
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Council's Judgment
2 Choke
1 Bojuka Bog
KoA is there because I split 1/1 KoA/QP in maindeck. Thalia can be cut to three copies, but she is too good against combo. Obviously REB can be also Pyroblast. Council's Judgment because I HATE TNN. Bojuka Bog is fine, I have 1x Crop Rotation in maindeck but it's good also without it (with 4x Knight of the Reliquary...)
Most of the time yes, swap PFire for Thalia is an easy sideboarding
Ajani Vengeant is just a pet card, I'm always trying to cram it into decks. My fun-bias is based on it possibly being good in grindy matchups to lock down individually powerful threats (Gurmag, Tarmogoyf, Griselbrand), cutting off a color by locking down a land, swinging life totals to be favored in a race, and in extreme cases blowing up Miracles/Grixis Control's lands if they deal with my threats. I don't disagree on Garruk Relentless, I love that card and I think it's an underplayed gem as well.
I have some acquiring to do. I need 3-4x Thalia for my sideboard, a Plateau, swap out Arid Mesa for Wooded Foothills, and get some Knight of Autumn copies. Oof, close but still far away, and that's not counting the fact that I don't have Nobles (which are likely pretty important, right?)
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
Warning am tired and didn't take notes, the following may include mistakes! Especially the sideboarding parts!!
Top 16'd (13th) a 6 round event here for $80 credit using this list:
4 Mother of Runes
3 Noble Hierarch
1 Birds of Paradise
2 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Gaddock Teeg
4 Knight of the Reliquary
1 Renegade Rallier
1 Ramunap Excavator
1 Tireless Tracker
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Sylvan Library
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Dark Depths
1 Thespian's Stage
4 Wasteland
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Karakas
2 Forest
1 Plains
2 Savannah
1 Bayou
1 Scrubland
4 Windswept Heath
3 Verdant Catacombs
1 Marsh Flats
2 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Liliana of the Veil
1 Liliana, The Last Hope
1 Assassin's Trophy
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Zealous Persecution
2 Thoughtseize
3 Surgical Extraction
1 Nihil Spellbomb
Yes 0 chokes. I find as good as it is it's surprisingly very narrow and the matchups it's nuts in is either going to disenchant it or massacre you with their already developed board state. I was playing a swamp in the board for a bit and it was good to cast your 100 black cards in the sb but also kinda janky as fetching it sometimes cut you off other colours if you had an awkward draw and they wasteland you. Tireless Tracker and Renegade Rallier have been great but Ramunap Excavator has been pretty meh except the 1 match a month you get vs something like post and it's the best card in the world.
Rd 1 Death Shadow Delver 1-2
Kinda forget what happens but I just die. Game 2 I win with lage.
These boarding notes kinda overlap for rd 1 and 2 as they are both delver. I've been trying boarding out my Thalias for Delver matchups to help me have room and the ability to cast all these removal spells, playing more of the control plan as if I can get to the late game I believe my cards are more powerful. Thalia also doesn't matchup against delver's creatures at all as they either all fly (delver pteramander), are too big (fish, Shadow) or are too skill-intensive (TNN). It didn't work out this time but it has before. Boarding the Liliana in against a wasteland matchup seems very greedy in my deck with 2 black lands but I decided with the bird, Rallier, and Ramunap acting as ways to get more black, I went for it. This specific delver deck I won't bring in last hope as it misses too much, on that note, they also need to show me they have TNN before I'll consider Zealous. I have enough to deal with TNN that I won't just lose if I don't have Zealous when it catches me by surprise (mother, sofi, dark depths)
-4 Thalia
-1 Gaddock Teeg
-1 Tireless Tracker (This card is great if the game goes long but it is so slow and I have my other late game threats. This is a 3 mana card that wants you to still have a land drop so it's easier to get hit by daze. Then it wants you to dump more mana, all the while not acting as removal or anything)
+1 Liliana, of the Veil
+2 Abrupt Decay
+1 Assassin's Trophy
+2 Thoughtseize
Rd 2 UR Delver 1-2
Game 1 he gets lucky. Turn 1 delver, turn 2 double delver they all flip. The last 2 had a lil help from brainstorm. Game 2 I get lucky. He runs out TNN and I topdeck Liliana of the Veil to edict it. He kills Veil and plays two Pteramander's 1 mana short of pumping. I top deck Liliana the Last Hope. Both Liliana top decks in the correct order. He manages to get the other Liliana off the table too but they have done too much damage and I manage to take the game. Game 3 I get lucky again followed by him getting lucky for the win =p. He has unflipped delver, TNN, Pyromancer and I top deck Zealous. Later in the game he has unflipped delver and I go to equip my guy with sofi and his last card is vapor snag, ok whatever, pass. He flips delver showing light up the stage, gets another delver and ponder off the LUTS and ponder finds another snag and sets up the other delver to flip. I lose.
-4 Thalia
-1 Teeg
-1 Tracker
-1 Ramunap
-1 Pridemage
+1 Liliana Last Hope
+1 Liliana of the Veil
+2 Decay
+1 Trophy
+1 Thoughtseize (I might've cut the Sylvan Library for the 2nd one. I honesly cannot remember and couldn't tell you now which I'd do haha.)
+2 Zealous
Starting 0 - 2 vs Delver twice which I consider a pretty alright matchup for me is disheartening, especially as I sit down against miracles for rd 3
Rd 3 Miracles 2-0
Game 1 Im stuck on Savannah and plains but I have turn 1 mom into turn 2 Teeg into scryb ranger. I get back to basic'd but the scryb ranger lets me pick up savannah as I don't draw lands and play out jitte. He eventually votes teeg off the island but my Jitte wielding ranger kills him before he finds Terminus.
Game 2 it's a bit draw go as I have a bunch of lands and some decays and a zenith Im just going to hold onto. I decay a back to basics at some point, plow a mentor (yes I keep plows in because everyone is on Mentor) and like turn 5 I get to Zenith for Tireless Tracker and play a fetch right away. He removes it at some point but I get 2 clues out of it so hey I guess green Ancestral? He Terminus' my ooze which is fair as it's the only one he sees all match. At some point I get to Nihil Spellbomb in response to AK and draw my card as I take away some of his draw, I also clear his yard of plows for snapcasters later. I forget much else of what happens but I think I just beat him down, miracles seems pretty luke-warm when they don't hit their namesake cards.
-2 Noble
-2 Mother
-1 Ramunap
-1 Plow
+2 Decay
+1 Trophy
+1 Nihil Spellbomb
+2 Thoughtseize
The Liliana's seem very lukewarm in the matchup despite planeswalkers being nuts against miracles. I honestly can't remember if I boarded them in instead of thoughtseize, boarded them in over 2 other cards in my main that I forgot that I cut, or just didn't play them. Sorry my memory is very poor and I need to take better notes but I was 0-2 going into this match that I consider a poor matchup so I didn't think I was going to be writing much of a report. I understand I won game 1 with Mother so cutting 2 seems odd but both this and noble make you play out more into sweepers, I'd rather just rely on my stand alone threats (tracker, knight, etc), hope my opponent is heavily on the mentor plan which I have a ton of removal for, and dodge entreat.
R4-6. Elves, UW Blade, Burn. 6-0, Marit Lage hands me all 6 of these games. I'm not even jk.
Board plan for each:
Elves-
-4 Thalia
-1 Ramunap
-1 Tracker
-1 Library
-1 Pridemage
-1 Mother
-1 SOFI
+2 Zealous
+2 Canonist
+1 Last Hope
+1 Veil
+2 Decay
+2 Thoughtseize
I hate this matchup but boarding feels so good vs it. I didn't really have much hate outside some removal spells, his draws were just a bit too slow as I made Marit Lage before he got me. Game 2 I did have canonist on the final turn but he had heritage druid with 3 elves and Wirewood going on for a bit but nothing to really play.
Burn-
-1 Ramunap
-1 Tireless Tracker
-1 Sylvan Library
-1 Wasteland
+2 Canonist
+2 Decay
My board doesn't have much for burn and it can be tough. Trophy doesn't seem great so I don't bring it in. Was tempted to have Veil or some Thoughtseizes but I don't want to depend too hard on black mana against the price deck. I lean towards not bringing in canonist as it can turn a smash to smithereens rotting in their hand into a searing blaze which is brutal, but my opponent wasn't familiar with my deck game 1. I didn't show him the stoneforge package as I killed him with a 20/20. After all this thought on what to sideboard, I just throw another 20/20 at him.
UW Blade
+1 Veil
+1 Trophy
+2 Thoughtseize
+2 Zealous
+2 Decay
-4 Thalia (notice a trend?)
-1 Teeg
-2 Noble
-1 Ramunap
I think this is how I boarded? Again just want to be able to deal with his threats and still have enough of my own. Both games go pretty much he plows some stuff like mothers, plays tnn, then I lage him (some other stuff happens but this is the jist of it)
I end up going 4-2! 8-0 in games after starting 0-2 in matches felt great.
I just had to say that I found these quotes great haha
I'm surprised all the Miracles are running mentor near you; I haven't been seeing them and assumed that Mentor was deemed unfit for purpose or something. Maybe he's in the side or maybe they just haven't been finding him.
With you siding out Thalia so often do you see the opportunity to play Punishing Maverick as being effective? I am building up the deck and I'm close to optimal for a Punishing build, just a handful of cards away. I would sideboard Thalia, likely 3 of them, to bring in against combo matchups.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
Is 4 Colors too greedy do you think? Or is it just too close to Aggro Loam at that point and should shift gears? Not having targeted discard is the one big part of Punishing Maverick I don't like. I would want Thoughtseize and Siege Rhino (which is just uber-greedy outside of a Nic Fit mana engine.) I think the mana gets substantially more fragile, especially with Groves being part of the mix. Curious what your thoughts are. I could play black or red splashes, no problem, so that isn't the issue. The big part is finding a way to customize a list that fits my style without sacrificing consistency or a stable mana-base.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
So four color is out? I know the mana is stable with Grove/Punishing list (I play 4 basics as well), just wondering if its even worth it to go 4-color in order to have discard against combo but still have the P-Fire removal engine. I would think 4x Birds and a minimum of 24-25 lands would be necessary.
These are the cards I would want:
2-4x Thoughtseize
1-3x Siege Rhino
1-2x Toxic Deluge
0-2x Abrupt Decay
If those cards aren't worth splashing black, I'll just stick to Punishing Mav. Siege Rhino always impressed me in Nic-Fit as a hard-to-deal-with threat that really punished fair decks. The other cards are self-explanatory.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
Playing 4c without mox diamonds is suicide. Even aggro-loam with 4x diamonds and 2x loam can sometimes get stuck on mana if they fetch the wrong color early.
@Mr Safety: the easy answer is that if you could play 4 colors with P Fire then people would already do it. I've played it and seen others do it here but you get a less stable mana base and need to skip Cradle / Depths in my experience.
Thanks for the comments, I'm not even going to try, lol. I'll stick with Punishing Mav for now. One last question: Has anyone played 1x Depths/Stage out of the sideboard in Punishing Mav? I don't want it main, I'm already at 24 lands, but I could see it as an alternative line of attack against certain decks.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
I always run 26 lands in Punishing Maverick. That's my girl Marie Lagette and Stage + all of the corny utility lands because why not?
I have no experience playing DD+Stage in the sideboard, but I don't see why it couldn't be good. The alternative is to trim on things like Wasteland (run three instead of four) and basics (only run one of each, maybe two forests at most). People get a little squeamish about trimming Wastelands, but you have KoTR to find them, and giving KoTR more things to do (fetching the combo in this instance) is pretty good.
Happy to see people posting here. Discord is for chumps.
Mom-mom had to die because of the ground chemicals. http://achewood.com/index.php?date=10272003
I like the plan of taking the threats into nuclear territory against some fair decks, but doing it out of the sideboard. I was going to start putting in PW's at the upper end of the curve but I think the option of Depths/Stage is (likely) even better. I'm kind of a sucker for jamming Marit Lage into any deck I can. It isn't really a transformational sideboard, it's still rooted in Knight tricks, but it's a different angle of attack. I noticed in some matchups Wasteland isn't great and Depths would at least be another use of those slots, so that would be a place to make room.
Would you mind sharing your list menloe? The allure of utility lands pulls at me as well. Here is my current mix of lands (need to get more copies of Wooded Foothills, possibly another Savannah or at least a Plateau.)
4x Windswept Heath
1x Wooded Foothills
3x Arid Mesa
1x Savannah
1x Taiga
2x Forest
2x Plains
4x Wasteland
1x Maze of Ith
1x Karakas
3x Grove of the Burnwillows
1x Dryad Arbor
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
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