[Deck] RG Survival Advantage

[Citrus-God]

Many still play the original RG Survival Advantage, as it's Aggro match-up is strong, and with consistent threats and cutting edge cards that create virtual card advantage, via board dominance or strong blockers.

The many reasons to run the orginal RGSA over RGbSA is even though discard strengthens the Combo match-up, threats are highly favored over Discard agaisnt aggro decks.

I really want to see more discussions on RGSA honestly, as I believe it's still a powerful deck in this format... even without the Black splash, it has a stronger Goblins match up due to the consistent mana base.

Here's a build Vardaman took to Top 4 at Minnesota's monthly Top 4 Prize Draft, which he snaged a playset of Force of Wills with...


RGSA
4 Bird of Paradise
3 Sakura Tribe Elder
1 Rofellos
4 Troll Ascetic
4 Ravenous Baloth
3 Flametongue Kavu
1 Masticore
3 Eternal Witness
1 Tin Street Hooligan
1 Anger
1 Genesis
1 Squee

4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Burning Wish
3 Umezawa's Jitte

2 Mountain
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Windswept Heath
4 Tiaga
10 Forest

Sideboard
1 Hull Breach
1 Pyroclasm
1 Rolling Earthquake
1 Tsunami
1 Ruination
1 Seeds of Innocence
1 Anarchy
1 Shard Pheonix
1 Duplicant
1 Loaming Shaman
2 Tormod's Crypt
3 Chalice of the Void


A build mine has is a bit more "controllish" with more midgame elements that you would find in decks like The Rock....


// Lands 21
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Windswept Heath
2 Mountain
4 Taiga
9 Forest


// Creatures 28
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
4 Troll Ascetic
4 Flametongue Kavu
2 Ravenous Baloth
3 Eternal Witness
1 Deranged Hermit
1 Genesis
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Anger
1 Tin Street Hooligan
1 Indrik Stomphowler
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary


// Spells 12
4 Sword of Fire and Ice
4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Burning Wish


// Sideboard 15
1 Seeds of Innocence
1 Hull Breach
1 Pyroclasm
1 Rolling Earthquake
1 Ruination
1 Tsunami
1 Flashfires
1 Anarchy
1 Loaming Shaman
3 Tormod's Crypt
3 Chalice of the Void

Mine is different from Vardaman's build because it takes a more controllish approach agaisnt Goblins. Thought Gabe's build has Jitte, he's might be more successful since it's actually aggressive. I do however, run Sword of Fire and Ice, which I love. Versus Goblins, it hits and connects. versus Threshold, it draws to make sure you have more threats before it gets Needle'd.


1.) Wall of Blossoms or Troll Ascetic?

2.) Equipment?

3.) Llanowar Elves, Sakura-Tribe Elder, or Werebear?

4.) How many Lands? 21? 22?

5.) More Pyroclasms in the Sideboard for Goblins?

6.) What utility creatures do we need?

[AngryTroll]

The most recent build of RGSA I played, before adding Black, was something like this.

4 Birds
3 Fyndhorn Elves
4 Troll Ascetic
3 Eternal Witness
4 Ravenous Baloth
4 Flame Tongue Kavu

1 Squee
1 Genesis
1 Anger
1 Rofellos
2 Tin Street Hooligan

4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Burning Wish
3 Sword of Fire and Ice

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Tiaga
2 Mountains
11 Forest

Clearly, there is some flexability. Baloths and Spike Feeders can be moved around a little, a Tin Street Hooligan can become a Indrik Stomphowler, and etc.

Sword of Fire and Ice is a house. Seriously, that card is amazing. You can supplement it with some Jittes, but I would not cut it from the deck entirely.

The manabase is much, much stronger than the three color version. You are really only running 4 non-basics. There is room to play with the land some in this build...but I just end up playing basic forests over cute things like Treetop Village or Gaea's Cradle.

There are several new cards that can or should see play in this list. Magus of the Moon seems like it should find a spot in the deck, and the ever present Rootwalla Question can be considered here too.

Overall, this deck has a better matchup against Aggro decks than the three color version, a much worst matchup against combo, and the control matchups are similar. Trolls are great in some "control" matchups, while Duress shines in others.

I don't have more current and/or specific testing than that, because I have been playing with the three color build lately, but this build is certainly fair to play.

[Citrus-God]

I love Sword of Fire and Ice personally. I think this is the card that gives you the edge in the control match ups.

Rootwallas are awesome for combat tricks. I should test them out more. I havent picked this deck up for a long time. It's sad that I only play this in testing over on MWS against close testing partners.

I might build this deck because of Magus of the Moon in this deck. Magus of the Moon is probably one of the coolest utility cards I've seen in awhile.

[DragoFireheart]

How has this deck been doing? Now that Goyfs are running all over the place how much has this Arch-Type of R/G changed?

I ask this as I want to turn my R/G beats deck into a survival deck.

[kabal]

How has this deck been doing? Now that Goyfs are running all over the place how much has this Arch-Type of R/G changed?

I ask this as I want to turn my R/G beats deck into a survival deck.

My last build of of this archetype looks like the below. I hasn't add any goyfs, since this build can't take advantage of him.

// Lands
10 Forest
1 Mountain
4 Taiga
2 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills

// Creatures
1 Anger
4 Birds of Paradise
3 Eternal Witness
4 Flametongue Kavu
1 Genesis
3 Llanowar Elves
4 Ravenous Baloth
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Tin Street Hooligan
4 Troll Ascetic
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Deranged Hermit
3 Wall of Blossoms

// Enchantments
4 Survival of the Fittest

// Artifacts
3 Sword of Fire and Ice

// Sideboard
SB: 4 Chalice of the Void
SB: 3 Earthquake
SB: 3 Krosan Grip
SB: 1 Loaming Shaman
SB: 1 Magus of the Moon
SB: 3 Pyrostatic Pillar

[DragoFireheart]

My last build of of this archetype looks like the below. I hasn't add any goyfs, since this build can't take advantage of him.

// Lands
10 Forest
1 Mountain
4 Taiga
2 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills

// Creatures
1 Anger
4 Birds of Paradise
3 Eternal Witness
4 Flametongue Kavu
1 Genesis
3 Llanowar Elves
4 Ravenous Baloth
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Tin Street Hooligan
4 Troll Ascetic
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Deranged Hermit
3 Wall of Blossoms

// Enchantments
4 Survival of the Fittest

// Artifacts
3 Sword of Fire and Ice

// Sideboard
SB: 4 Chalice of the Void
SB: 3 Earthquake
SB: 3 Krosan Grip
SB: 1 Loaming Shaman
SB: 1 Magus of the Moon
SB: 3 Pyrostatic Pillar

Really? no Goyfs? I'm sure theres ways to take advantage of him! Maybe once the new set comes out there will be tribal creatures, Enchantment creatures or something or another. I mean, he's always a great beater and since you will have a creature and a fetch land in the yard and your opponent will most likely have an instant or a sorcery/enchantment/artifact in their yard he can still be a 3/4 or a 4/5.

[DragoFireheart]

If I were to try and fit the Goyf main deck I would try something like this:

// Lands
10 Forest
2 Mountain
4 Taiga
4 Wooded Foothills

// Creatures
1 Anger
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Birds of Paradise
3 Eternal Witness
3 Flametongue Kavu
1 Genesis
3 Llanowar Elves
3 Ravenous Baloth
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Tin Street Hooligan
4 Troll Ascetic
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Deranged Hermit
2 Wall of Blossoms

// Enchantments
4 Survival of the Fittest

// Artifacts
3 Sword of Fire and Ice

[Balu]

Up^^

I love to play 'classical' RG Survival Advantage, although it is no so called 'Deck-to-beat' at present.

Some ideas to be discussed:

- Has anybody tried Heartwood Storyteller in a built that runs only 4 Survival and no Swords of Fire/Ice, Wishes etc. They could be another solid Draw-Engine in this Deck and every removal, disenchant, discard or counterspell would let us draw a card... maybe in the Wall of Blossom slot, but I really like them to play as a 4off.

- Vigor could replace a radom fatty. Great synergy with Survival and extremly funny combined with "Squirrel Beatdown". Of course it is pointlessly in the early Game without a Survival or enough manaacceleration.

Really? no Goyfs? I'm sure theres ways to take advantage of him! Maybe once the new set comes out there will be tribal creatures, Enchantment creatures or something or another. I mean, he's always a great beater and since you will have a creature and a fetch land in the yard and your opponent will most likely have an instant or a sorcery/enchantment/artifact in their yard he can still be a 3/4 or a 4/5

Hmm... I tested him and I really don't liked him... the problem is, that you can't make him broken with your own deck (no discard, no instants, no sorcerys, no artifacts (?))and you need your opponent to make the Gofy awesome... often I could played an Elvish Warrior in the same slot without difference... the point is, that a potentially 4/5 Beater is good, but because your opponent decides how big he finally becomes, Gofy would be not the optimal choice. So I think Tarmogofy is worse than in the GBx Survival, Baseruption or other decks.
When your oppontent plays Gofys at his own, you are forced to block his Monster with your own until it gets swordet (or whatever). I think, Troll Ascetic would make a better job here because of its consistence.
Just my opinion.


Finally my built:

4 Taiga
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Mountain
12 Forest

4 Birds of Paradise
4 Llanowar Elves
2 Sakura-Tribe Elder / Werebear (?)
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary

3 Flametongue Kavu
1 Goblin Sharpshooter

3 Ravenous Baloth
1 Vigor
1 Deranged Hermit
4 Troll Ascetic

1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Anger
1 Genesis
3 Eternal Witness
1 Tin Street Hooligan

4 Heartwood Storyteller

4 Survival of the fittest

[Tao]

I think the acceleration slot of Elder/ Bear is not needed. Elder seems weak in your deck and Bear is much more unlikely to grow than Tarmogoyf.

So you could replace that slot and maybe the Vigor with Jitte (maybe Sword of Fire and Ice, but I would prefer Jitte all day), Burning Wish or something like Wall of Blossoms. I think you should go with Jitte.
Storyteller will still be awesome because you still play much less spells than your opponent.

[Der_imaginäre_Freund]

One inclusion that could really push this deck over the top is probably Magus of the Moon.
There's no deck in the Meta at the moment that can really ignore him and he's just game winning against decks like Landstill or NQG.

But anyways, I don't really see a reason not to splash an additional color, for instance black, to have access to more disruption to push your survival onto the table.

Taking Anti-American's list as a basis, this could be a starting point.

// Mainboard (60 cards)
// Lands (20)
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Windswept Heath
1 Mountain
4 Taiga
8 Forest

// Creatures (29)
4 Birds of Paradise
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
3 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Werebear

4 Troll Ascetic
4 Flametongue Kavu
1 Ravenous Baloth

3 Eternal Witness
4 Magus of the Moon

1 Genesis
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Anger
1 Viridian Zealot

// Spells (11)
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
2 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Survival of the Fittest
4 Burning Wish

// Sideboard (15)
1 Hull Breach
1 Rolling Earthquake
1 Ruination
1 Loaming Shaman
1 Spore Frog
4 Tormod's Crypt
4 Chalice of the Void
2 Blood Moon

If you'd splah black, you'll have access to main- and sideboard disruption in form of Thoughtseize, Duress and Cabal Therapy. You'll also then have access to the totaly awesome Perish and/or Deathmark in the Wishboard.

In this version, the Wishboard is stripped down to the absolute necessary spells to still have access to cards you can actually board in.

Possible inclusions to this list would be Mogg Fanatic (good in the Breakfast/Ichorid Matchups).

The good thing about Sakura-Tribe Elder is that it is an out in the Ichorid Matchup while still alowing you to run a lower land count. I like him, but you could replace some number of them with another mana creature (Werebear) or Tarmogoyfs.

[Tao]

The good thing about Sakura-Tribe Elder is that it is an out in the Ichorid Matchup while still alowing you to run a lower land count.

Elder sucks in pure RG/SA. You don't any mana fix.

I think that a single Spore Frog should be ran in the maindeck. Because of the brilliant metagame it sucks against Aggro, but randomly hates on most combo decks (Ichorid, Cret Belchers Empty the Warrens, Ceph Breakfast). Furthermore recurring the frog with Genesis wins from time to time against some decks.

[bigredmeanie]

Goyf isn't necessary but things are a lot harder w/o him. Your opponent will be playing them on turn 3 or so and they WILL be 3/4's every time. By turn 5 they will be 5/6's pretty consistantly. FTK quickly becomes hard pressed to deal with them on his own. Run your own or lot's of creatures with regenerate.

If you run your own than SoFI is better than Jitte, because you will win the Goyf war more easily.

Burning Wish is too slow in the current meta. Plus it doesn't do anything besides help strong match-ups.

Magus is a really good card, but 4 is entirely to many main. If you want to run some extra in the board, fine. Otherwise 1 in enough.

Heartwood storyteller isn't so hot in this deck. He is too expensive for his size.

I don't think either list is running enough 'big' creatures. Goyf will quickly tie up the ground and make it impossible for you to attack. I started running 2 River Boa as a solid regenerating creature. It also happens to get free attacks against half the decks in the format.

[kabal]

If I was to play classic RG Burning Survival w/o Goyf it would look like so:

1 Anger
4 Birds of Paradise
1 Deranged Hermit
3 Eternal Witness
4 Flametongue Kavu
1 Genesis
3 Llanowar Elves
1 Spore Frog
3 Ravenous Baloth
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Squee, Goblin Nabob
1 Tin Street Hooligan
4 Troll Ascetic

3 Burning Wish

4 Survival of the Fittest

3 Sword of Fire and Ice

1 Bloodstained Mire
10 Forest
1 Mountain
4 Taiga
1 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills

Sideboard
1 Pyroclasm
1 Reverent Silence
1 Rolling Earthquake
1 Ruination
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Magus of the Moon
1 Loaming Shaman
1 Hull Breach
1 Meltdown

[from Cairo]

I'm pretty sure Survival is better with Goyf than without it; why are so many of these Goyf-less?

Regardless, I don't see much appeal to this 2-color set up anymore: Flametongue gets laughed at by the common/average 4/5 Goyf (Creature, Sorcery, Instant, Land) where Shriekmaw is a pimp, and Burning Wish into answers turn 4-5 isn't as proactive/effective as Thoughtseize-ing or Cabal Therapy-ing the threats away. Outside of Anger Red offers so little, it's probably worth using it still, but it doesn't seem to carry enough to be the only support color to the deck.


To contribute something supportive I would add Mogg Fanatic is a house. Sacrifices to remove bridges, pings Nomads/Illusionists/Confidants, kills opposing Goyfs (when in Goyf stand off mode) after you swing into one with your own, obv kills any stray Lackeys, and provides an OK chump blocker or something to lay down and hold Unthreshed guys from swinging in early game.