Interesting that you should bring up the topic, Noctalor, a friend will go all in on that but it may take a week or two for him to pick up the deck, test mine etc. I think it seems very promising, easy to set up thanks to Vial, hopefully, and potentially quite powerful.
You could always cut 1 and run another GSZ. Treat em' like legendaries by running 3. I've felt I lack ways to close out games, and sometimes get into pretty crap topdeck situations because my opponent is able to claw himself back into the game. More GSZ can help, and if you have enough mana GSZ->Meren is a pretty good reset. Testing a version with a little more beef in it and liking it so far. Replaced 1 Vial, 1 Levold, 1 Peacekeeper, and 1 Vendillion Clique for 2 Goyf, 1 TNN, 1 Bitterblossom. Goyf so far has surprised me in a good way. On paper it might look shit, but if you want beef your option is that or SFM package.Second TNN so far feels better than Clique. For the same mana I get a beater that my opponent has to answer. Obviously weaker against combo but can't win em' all.
Goyf is reasonable, it can stabilize against Gurmag and/or an opposing Goyf after opponent has dealt with our key creatures or a sweeper.. Personally I won't play it because it's a bit expensive, financially, for the low utility it brings and so I'd just add a (-nother) TNN. Nevertheless, interesting change, Kanti..
I played 3 Vials for years to avoid that clunkiness but now with Brainstorms around it hasn't been a problem. Funny, I just updated the suggested core in the primer to represent that everyone seems to be on a full playset now.
I strongly believe that playing less than 4 vials is deeply wrong. Vial is a powerful but slow card and you want it in your open hand or never, so the correct number is obvs 0 or 4 imho. Playing like 3 vial you reduce its power by 1/4 at least.
I'm really unsure about meren, the fact that is a cc4 without an etb or a protection scares me. Moreover i will play Jailer md before her
I think the whole 0 vs 4 copies discussion of many cards in many decks is usually fundamentally wrong, people have the perception that you're always right to minimize or maximize the number of copies of a card. The chances that any single copy is in your starting hand is not affected by how many other copies you play. You don't depend on having a copy in your starting hand. It's not central to the deck's strategy (many people even run/ran 0). And I disagree that it's only good on t1, although it's certainly at its best then. Anyway we have discussed this topic before, I'll leave it for now. And I agree it's a great card and 4 copies is probably right. But obviously playing 3 copies is the solution to the problem you described.
Jailer is very interesting.. Getting rid of opposing creatures including Showed in Emrakul is great, and getting card draw that's powerful vs control decks is also great. Meren does something very different, it basically turns your graveyard into your library letting you double up on key creatures for a matchup as well as "drawing" double cards every turn and the potential of putting creatures straight into play is just excessive value.
I've realised that i was sideboarding Jailer in like every MU, so the MD is probably his best spot
Another card i've looked upon in the last page is Saskia, i think that i'll test her... on MTGO i've lost 3 games already won due to time, btw.
I think she has many pros, like being zenithable, being able to close the game on spot ecc
Hi thanks for the welcome. Its a surprice kill for planes walker and often does more than 10+ damage, but problem is red i do not want to play that color so in the new version I cut it out.
Still looking for a good creature removal spell, best I found is palace jailer, did you find any better? If not playing red any more?
Last edited by Cermak; 08-18-2018 at 06:41 PM.
I have been brewing with Shapeshifter in MOST for a few weeks but only on xmage and exchanging ideas with, as Cermak said, the Legend Pettdan =)
Hopefully getting to try the deck in paper soon.
This version uses bigger creatures than the usual MOST with the help of VS. Fauna finds the big creatures or puts them in the graveyard for VS.
And other creatures like Elvish Piper or Loyal retainers can put the big creatures on the battlefield, but that's more like a bonus.
Arcane Artisan can also be used to take advantage of the big creatures.
You can do some fun things with VS and I hope I can post a report next week. This is probably the list I will use.
1x Atraxa, Praetors' Voice
3x Birds of Paradise
1x Dryad Arbor
1x Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1x Elvish Piper
1x Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
4x Fauna Shaman
2x Griselbrand
1x Loyal Retainers
1x Meren of Clan Nel Toth
3x Mother of Runes
2x Noble Hierarch
1x Peacekeeper
1x Phage the Untouchable
1x Phyrexian Dreadnought
1x Qasali Pridemage
1x Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1x Tocatli Honor Guard
4x Volrath's Shapeshifter
1x Forest
1x Island
1x Plains
2x Savannah
2x Tropical Island
1x Tundra
1x Underground Sea
7x Fetches
4x Brainstorm
3x Swords to Plowshares
2x Green Sun's Zenith
4x Aether Vial
Sideboard
4x Force of Will
1x Gaddock Teeg
1x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
1x Leovold, Emissary of Trest
1x Meddling Mage
1x Orzhov Pontiff
1x Phyrexian Revoker
1x Qasali Pridemage
1x Sanctum Prelate
2x Surgical Extraction
1x Swords to Plowshares
Last edited by Vickas; 08-19-2018 at 06:49 AM.
I realy got hook by most after last weeks success, and after analyzing why it actually the durability you can the build the deck with so many unexplored variations compared with all other decks. When I started play I always loved playing green and when I did my pro tour debut i played 5 colorish green. So the creature toolbox deck will always be close to my heart.
A team of stockholm gathered yesterday to play test before MKM Paris. After the success last wednesday i noticed that some changes should be done so I took an new grip on the deck.
Very underplayed cards I think is Winter orb.
with 10 mana fixers. 4 vials, 4 mana dorks, 2 mana jumpers winter orb should be really be viable for this version of the deck,
After getting feedback from this thread I also added 2 leovold plus 2 strixes after dying to tarmogoyf, delver and TS.
runes + strix is a lovely greedy combo.
I also have great success birds of paradise with equipments!
So for denial i added 2 thalia + 1 big talia, and took out mana consumption like GSZ
--------------
Last version i played against Punkartz stockholm top player winning most tournament in our meta.
Plays a very aggressive bug sweeper liliana a real nightmare, goyfs, delver, TS beet down, and lilianas pushes and decays to removal.
Last wednesday i playtested 0 wins for me and 45 wins for Mer P.
So we played 3 matches not sideboarding and 4 matches side boarded.
And actually I won 7-0
After that I went to meet another player in the Sthlm meta. He played miracles
Here I hade huge problems, I die 4 games to to sweepers and mentor :(
Please give feedback on the list.
What should I add to kill miracles?
4 Aether Vial
1 Atraxa, Praetors' Voice
2 Baleful Strix
1 Bayou
2 Birds of Paradise
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Edric, Spymaster of Trest
1 Ethersworn Canonist
3 Fauna Shaman
1 Forest
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Karakas
2 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 Mother of Runes
2 Noble Hierarch
1 Orzhov Pontiff
1 Palace Jailer
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Quirion Ranger
2 Recruiter of the Guard
2 Savannah
1 Scrubland
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
3 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
1 Thalia, Heretic Cathar
1 Tropical Island
1 Tundra
3 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath
2 Winter Orb
3 Wooded Foothills
Great thread!
MOST to the top 8!
Last edited by Cermak; 08-19-2018 at 06:43 AM.
@Vickas: Interesting idea, for me in your deck is wrong to play less than 4 MoR and probably even a Safekeeper. Even for the creature package i'm unsure, Why Tocatli? The combo with Dreadnought seems really underpowered, seeing what other things the deck can do. Probably you could want a 2x of Sylvan Library too?
@Cermak: I'm really unsure about your decklist, i fear that you want to do too many different things at once, lowering the already low consistence of the deck. Plus, every time you reduce the number of Fauna, Mother, Dorks to increase lands ecc you also reduce the effectiviness of cards like Quirion and Scryb and, in a more broad view, the structure of the deck.
Winter orb is a strong card but meta-dependent if you want to play it md. You probably don't need Thalia 2.0 or a MD Canonist, anyway, but try it and see =)
@MTGO: Reached a 4-1 with Most, last list but :
-1 Shalai -1 Leovold moved to SB
+1 Jailer +1 Saskia (yeah, without a Taiga, we can do it)
T1: D&T 2-1
g1: I'm otp, i have mother and Fauna, put togheter Iona very fast, no karakas, gg
g2: He has 4 stp in the first 4 turns to every dorks or mother i play + wasteland and vial, easy gg
g3: I have like bop, Fauna, Meddling on stp and a Prelate a 4 with vial, he has SFM equipped with jitte, Flicker and Thalia. I draw Saskia and tutor for Pontiff, gg
T2: Ant 2-1
I'm otd, keep an hand good vs non combo decks, lost t3
g2: Mother+fauna and Iona to ensure the gg
g3: Got some pieces, draw zenith, make some maths -> Saskia, gg <3
t3:Turbodepths 0-2
g1: Perfect hand, 2 seize and combo a t3
g2: Nice hand, vial at 3, jailer, bop+mother, something else... Combo out, Rite of Consumption, no Fauna for Queller, gg
t4: Another D&T 2-0
Two easy win, don't remember much between this one and the other one, anyway another game stolen by Saskia
5t: Elves 2-1
Mull every game but kept good 6-cards hands
g1: peacekeeper t3, gg
g2: Combo off at turn 3 otp
g3: Iona on t4
Good to hear, congratulations on the results, Memories! I agree with all of your comments, will probably spend some time thinking more about it later, maybe tomorrow. For Vickas, I think you could play Varolz, the Scar-striped over Tocatli. But even that may be unnecessary. I'm not sure if Dreadnought is needed at all, seems like it will just be clunky. But I guess an advantage is that if you get a Shapeshifter into play you can easily surprise the opponent by vialling in a Dreadnought and having it go straight to the graveyard, boosting the VS, or just mainphase hardcasting the Dreadnought for 1.
@Memories and pettdan: I know that another MoR instead of Tocatli would probably be better. But I like to experiment and test if she can be useful, not for the Dreadnought, I'm thinking of all other creatures that uses ETB triggers
Snapcaster mage
Baleful strix
Flickerwisp
Stoneforge mystic
Goblins
Recruiter of the guard
Etc etc..
The Dreadnought is just a bonus.
If it doesn't work out I'll probably replace both Tocatli and Dreadnought with another MoR and Scavenging Ooze
Great Vickas, there's so much potential for experiments..
Cermak: regarding your question on beating Miracles, it's a matchup where you need to plan for meeting their answers, I think. It's quite an effort writing about it, but I need to be brief here unfortunately. Vials are great because they don't get to counter your spells and by putting creatures into play at EOT you can pressure them and importantly Jace, they won't be able to plan for how to respond to your threats and they can't interact at sorcery speed. Unfortunately Engineered Explosives seems popular now so they have a great md answer, it may be a good idea to save your secon Vial in hand..
Vialling in Gaddock or Sanctum Prelate lets you stop their Miracles trigger from Terminus. Using a Mother to protect these guys is great. Ooze can exile stp when they try to Snapcaster it. Using Fauna Shaman at instant speed with vial @ 4 to get Glenn Elendra is a very very good play [and once Glenn hits the graveyard after the second countered spell, you can get Meren, bring back GE and that ought to be lights out..]. Leovold can stop Jace, hopefully you get to vial him in in response to Brainstorm or a Jace activation. When you get the chance and think they may be out of answers, get Saskia or whatever attacker you play to threaten their lifetotal. I guess you need to try to threaten attacks every turn, Vial helps with that.
Some games will be all about finding an answer to their Counterbalance, hopefully Vial helps with that (with it in play you ignore CB, still try to get a Qasali into play). Actually Qasali is pretty good at pressuring them and if they have a cb in play you get to hit them for three until they try to answer it, then you blow up their cb with card advantage. Azcanta needs to be destroyed at first sight, probably..
I like hard counterspells from the sideboard.
I'll add when I think of more things.
@Everyone: not sure if I ever commented on that but I've felt like trying Fulminator Mage for a while. It's nice to be able to interact with lands not least Tabernacle but also Stage or Depths, Grove of the B. With Meren it's a real threat, destroying one nonbasic every turn. I always liked that kind of inevitability. I think the Fulminator Mage is not really aligned with what the deck is normally trying to do but it would feel really good to be able to interact with basically anything. I'm a control player at heart, clearly.
Fleshbag Marauder is a pretty sweet lock with Meren. Was testing a split of 1 StP and 1 Edict, then moved onto this dude since I cut Peacekeeper MD (probably wrong). The deck needs a 1-of MD that can deal with Emrakul, Griselbrand, Marit Lage. Peacekeeper, Palace Jailer, Fleshbag Marauder are all pretty decent options.@Everyone: not sure if I ever commented on that but I've felt like trying Fulminator Mage for a while. It's nice to be able to interact with lands not least Tabernacle but also Stage or Depths, Grove of the B. With Meren it's a real threat, destroying one nonbasic every turn. I always liked that kind of inevitability. I think the Fulminator Mage is not really aligned with what the deck is normally trying to do but it would feel really good to be able to interact with basically anything. I'm a control player at heart, clearly.
I go back and forth on Peacekeeper, it's too defensive for my taste but it is a very powerful effect. Fleshbag Marauder with Meren is pretty good, good point. Will consider it. It's a also a nice sacrifice outlet for Hallowed Spiritkeeper which would be more relevant now with Deathrite gone.
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