After Tarmogoyf saw print, I and I am sure several other thresh players were toying around the idea of developing a version of Threshold that sticks with UG to have a manabase that can support Wasteland alongside Stifle as we've wanted to do for so long.
Now I heard over the grapevine that Peter Olszewski aka. DicemanX not only tested and tuned such a list but managed to win the 2007 Legacy Championship with it!
It makes sense that the same person who was a huge proponent and driving force behind budget decks in Vintage before the format split introduces us to this deck. Congratulations are certainly in order.
I think it would be good to get a discussion going for UG Thresh as I think the deck is certainly a viable alternative for players wanting a more stable manabase, wanting to play land destruction in Thresh, or are on a tighter budget.
1 Breeding Pool
2 Island
2 Wooded Foothills
2 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
4 Tropical Island
4 Wasteland
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Werebear
4 Nimble Mongoose
4 Force of Will
4 Daze
4 Stifle
4 Predict
4 Portent
4 Brainstorm
4 Spell Snare
1 Rushing River
1 Snapback
Sideboard
4 Counterbalance
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Krosan Grip
2 Hail Storm
Here are some questions to direct the discussion.
Was the Breeding Pool the correct call or should it be another fetchland or perhaps a basic forest?
Should the deck be playing Serum Visions in place of some of the Predicts? 4 Predict seems like overkill without Serum Visions. And Serum Visions has great synergy with Tarmogoyf as well.
Should the deck be playing Engineered Explosives? It synergies with Goyf nicely and acts as removal.
Rushing River and Snapback as 1 ofs, is one card better than the other? Is creature bounce the only way to make up for the deck's lack of removal? Or should we be looking at cards like Piracy Charm (extremely versatile) or maybe even Ovinize if we're really desperate to deal with larger blockers? I think Ovinize is certainly subpar but thought it was atleast worth a mention.
Spell Snare, yes or no? I personally am a fan.
Is the Counterbalance/Top engine worthwhile in the sideboard?
Does Jitte as a 4 of in the board make sense in spite of the low creature count?
And most importantly of all, is the trade off (no removal) worth the mana disruption the deck can finally run.R
I'd go...Originally Posted by SuckerPunch
1 Breeding Pool
2 Island
3 Polluted Delta
4 Flooded Strand
4 Tropical Island
4 Wasteland
Since the creature base includes 8 threshold creatures, then I'd say it is the right call. Either you want to go with Predict or mental note depending on your play style.
Meta game call.
This is the reason I prefer to play NQG w/ red. It makes the Goblin match up so much easier. Something tells me he didn't play against too many Goblins decks. Since this isn't the question, I'd say it was a good call. The way you also need to look at it is that you don't just use it as removal, but to bounce your own creatures in the face of removal.
Again, a meta game call. Apparently the top 8 has shown that.
You are either going with it or more of a standard board.
This is the one I don't agree with. You can only equip it to 8 creatures and the build in question has almost no creature removal. I'd have to see his notes to see how often he boarded them in. Looking at the top 8, Tarmogofy vs. Tarmogofy leads to a stale mate unless someone has a way to ping for the extra point of damage, which red splash does.
On a side note what I do hope is more people start playing this build, since my MD Pithing Needles and SB graveyard hate just become infinitely more valuable.
"Good, bad, I'm the guy with the gun." --Ash
I really don't think Breeding Pool belongs unless your particular meta is packed with Stifle effects.
I think a case could be made that the build may be better off going with the 2 Serum Vision + 3 Mental Note or 3 Predict plan.
I definately agree with you that Jitte doesn't make too much sense.
I think we should atleast consider Piracy Charm.
It kills Lackey dead.
Giving Goyf islandwalk against chump blockers or a +2 when he is unblocked will win many games.
It will let you trade your Mongoose with a Jotun Grunt. It will even let you trade your Wearbear or Mongoose with an opposing Goyf early on if you're desperate.
And instant speed discard is pretty damn nice when your opponent doesn't have board advantage and is in top deck mode.
If only this deck had more Rancor targets, it would be absolutely fantastic with Goyf and Werebear.
Misdirection also has potential in both counterwars, and to turn removal aimed at your creatures into the much needed removal aimed at their creatures.
Snapback and Rushing River are no removal spells unless they are paired up with countermagic. I would prefer something else and more of it: Repeal, 2 Jitte main or Pongify+Repeal (which is really strong).
Explosives can only hit things for 0-2 in this deck and all your permanents cost 1-2 so I think it's actually pretty bad to play it.
Predict is much better than Serum Visions here not only because of the reasons kabal mentioned. It's also very strong when playing Portent on your opponent and Predict a strong card away or against your opponents with Counterbalance or "top of the library" tutors.
I don't see the reason to play Balance/Top in the board with the already large number of good counters main. I would at least cut it down to the usual numbers 3 Balance / 2 Top or play Top main to help set up the four Predicts. Also four Jitte's seem total overkill and Hailstorm is nice but I found it hard to cast against Goblins when playing UGw Thresh although I ran 4 Stifle/2 Needle against their mana denial. I guess Blue Blasts are better here because they are also strong against combo.
TS Crew
In the end, I look at this build as being a meta game call. If you expect a lot of Ugx Threshold/NQG then I'd bring it. It can heavily disrupt their land base and has more counters then the typically Ugx Threshold/NQG build contains.
"Good, bad, I'm the guy with the gun." --Ash
The TES and Belcher matchups are also better than with UGx Threshold. It just looses a bit of power in the aggro-matchup due to the lack of decent removal but with Spell Snare handling Tarmogoyf it should still be good enough.
TS Crew
Well I was thinking of going straight U/G but the lack of removal really was a problem for me. I felt it would run into the same problems U/G Madness runs into. I would be interested in seeing is match-ups. But if your meta is filled with Goblins or Landstill I don't think it's very viable.
Well I think the mana base could go either way. Since it is only 2 colors you could run it as is. I'd probably run the Forest with maybe add in Windswept Heath in there.Was the Breeding Pool the correct call or should it be another fetchland or perhaps a basic forest?
Should Visions replace Predict? NO. Visions could replace Portent, which is in that slot. But I'm not starting that all over(see other Gro/Thresh threads). As far as Predict goes, the deck needs some way of drawing extra cards and the cantrips just don't cut it. Basically Portent is the other set-up spell for the deck.Should the deck be playing Serum Visions in place of some of the Predicts? 4 Predict seems like overkill without Serum Visions. And Serum Visions has great synergy with Tarmogoyf as well.
Hmm.. Well you could only get it to 2 so I would say board it if you expect ETW to be showing up in force. While you do have 4 Stifle MD sometimes you don't get a chance to use if your on the draw.Should the deck be playing Engineered Explosives? It synergies with Goyf nicely and acts as removal.
@Rushing River:Gives you the chance to bounce 2 non-lands.Rushing River and Snapback as 1 ofs, is one card better than the other? Is creature bounce the only way to make up for the deck's lack of removal? Or should we be looking at cards like Piracy Charm (extremely versatile) or maybe even Ovinize if we're really desperate to deal with larger blockers? I think Ovinize is certainly subpar but thought it was atleast worth a mention.
@Snapback: You can play it just pitching a blue card.
That said I really don't like just having bounce as my main form of dealing with stuff. Yes it's alright with counterspells but you are always going to 2 for 1 yourself. So it seems meh. As for replacments Pongify might be worth a look. It deals with just about anything, except for a few played creatures. As far as the token goes well most of your creatures are bigger then it.
It does hit alot of the format. So you could get away with it main deck. I'd almost board it but eh.Spell Snare, yes or no? I personally am a fan.
I've never been a fan of it. But it can be really good in the Storm Combo match. Most of the time it wiffs. So I'd probably not run it, but alot of people will/would. This is more a play style thing if anything.Is the Counterbalance/Top engine worthwhile in the sideboard?
You could probaly get away with 2. Since only 8 of your creatures can carry it. Unless Dryad where added in then maybe bump it up. But 2 is proably enough.Does Jitte as a 4 of in the board make sense in spite of the low creature count?
Quote Scrumdogg @ Amrod's:
"Didn't you know that Mike Glow invented this format?? We are all just renting it."
The EPIC Syndicate - Grindermen
Team Disquailified Poster Duey Cheatem & Howe.
I don't like Dryad as the deck already plays a lot of green.
But perhaps Vinelasher Kudzu combined with a higher fetchland count has potential.
Seems iffy to me but it's worth mentioning if you were considering adding Dryad.
It's an option to replace Werebear. And it does play alot of Green? In a 60 card deck not even a quarter of the deck is Green (12), where Half of the deck is Blue (30). So Dryad, I think is a viable option.I don't like Dryad as the deck already plays a lot of green.
Quote Scrumdogg @ Amrod's:
"Didn't you know that Mike Glow invented this format?? We are all just renting it."
The EPIC Syndicate - Grindermen
Team Disquailified Poster Duey Cheatem & Howe.
What do you guys think, is the Landstill matchup better with this deck than the old UG/w or /r ?
“Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn.
It's probably not actually good, but yes, it's better. Wasteland and Stifle allow you to play very RDWesque beatdown role in the match-up, trying to deny them the chance to actually get to cast their big spells. 12 creatures means that they won't have enough cheap removal to keep your back. And the fact that all the creatures are big enough means that your opponent is on a relevant clock even with one creature in play.
Not sure if that was a deciding point for the Breeding Pool, but LD on a Tropical Island followed by Extirpate would have been decidedly unfun.
Slightly exotic thing to directly take into account though.
I would be infinately more concerned about Magus of the Moon or a Crucible + Wasteland lock both of which Pool is just as vulnerable to. Scenarios like that are why I brought up the idea of running a single basic forest. Every one of your 12 threats is green. So it would suck if you were Blood Mooned out of the only color that can cast any of your threats.
Why would you ever replace Werebear with Dryad? Dryad is strictly inferior to Werebear. There's a reason it hasn't been played in a single Thresh list in years where as Werebear was played as 4x in every one, eventhough the thresh lists during that year ran 4 fewer green cards than this list does.
Once you cut cards to make room for Dryad, you will have 26 blue cards. That really is a low number. Look at any of the old gro lists back when Dryad was popular, they ran atleast 36 nongreen spells and still fell out of favor for Tog and such because they couldn't pump Dryad fast enough.
If I absolutely wanted to up the threat count. I would absolutely run Vinelasher Kudzu before I would Dryad.
But I am hoping someone has a third option thats even stronger.
Hidden Gibbons (or Hidden Herd, for that matter)? I guess Wild Mongrel is the other option. There's also Albino Troll, Plant Elemental, etc., but I think that Hidden Gibbons would best occupy the slot. The one drawback is that he isn't much of a topdeck later on--on the other hand, in the early game, he's gonna smash face and pump up Tarmogoyf. I suppose Eternal Witness might be another option, too, but I suspect that's an entirely different kettle of fish.
As for removal, the only blue options, really, are Psionic Blast and Pongify. Of course, neither is going to stop a horde of goblins or goblin tokens. I think I'd prefer either one to Snapback, really. I<m not saying they<re optimal or what you necessarily want in that slot; just that they're pretty much your only in-colour options without going towards EE.
I wholeheartedly agree. Generally, I think that consistency > resilence (at least make your opponent work for screwing you), but the manabase should be reliable enough with a single forest.
Yeah, Hidden Gibbons is solid.
There is still a small group of decks that don't run many or any instants (goblins comes to mind). But they seem to be decreasing in number.
The problem with all the Hidden cards is that they can really suck mid-late game as your opponent already casted the cards they needed to.
Another possible option is Skyshroud Elite. Playing it as a 2 of insure that you usually see it midgame, when your opponent is guarenteed to have a nonbasic already out.
But a 2/3 body, while solid looks crappy compared to a 3/3 untargetable.
Maybe we should be looking at a nice fat beater comparable to Mystic Enforcer. Iwamori of Open Fist, while not quite as good as Mystic Enforcer, is still a very solid beatstick at the same casting cost. As a bonus, unlike Mystic Enforcer, he is unaffected by graveyard hate.
It would be good to have one big threat that doesn't give a crap about the graveyard.
So what do you guys think of adding 1-2 Iwamori of Open Fist to the list where Mystic Enforcer used to be played?
As for removal, Psionic Blast seems to be the best option. I think its the best option as far as removal is concerned actually.
One rather unorthodox option is Control Magic. Stealing your opponents best creature is soooo much easier than killing it or countering it and then having to play a threat of your own.
It would make up for the low threat count. And it's at the same casting cost as Mystic Enforcer, only pitchable to Force of Will as well.
I am 80% sure that Control Magic atleast warrants a few sideboard slots.
what about Hidden Herd
G (1), Enchantment
When an opponent plays a nonbasic land, if Hidden Herd is an enchantment, Hidden Herd becomes a 3/3 Beast creature.
"Good, bad, I'm the guy with the gun." --Ash
I mainly dislike Hidden Herd because it's a lot worse in the midgame than Hidden Gibbons is.
It's easy for a deck to just stop playing any more nonbasics once they reached the midgame and have several lands down already. It's harder on them to avoid playing cards like Swords to Plowshares and Force of Will.
Plus a 4/4 is a lot better than a 3/3.
Really though, I think those cards are more suited for the sideboard than the maindeck. For the maindeck, I think Iwamori, and Psionic Blast have more potential than either card.
And I definately think Control Magic belongs in the sideboard (or possibly the maindeck) even if only to steal opposing Goyfs and Dreadnoughts.
The other problem with Hidden Herd is that Fetchlands don't play non-basic lands: they put them into play.
Other than Iwamori, the only feasible things I can think of are Giant Solifuge, Gigapede, Simic Ragworm, Anavolver, Centaur Chieftain, Forgotten Ancient, Ernham Djinn, Kavu Primarch, Pouncing Wurm, Timbermare, Ifh-Biff Efreet, or Waterspout Djinn.
They're not great choices, but I've put the better options (in my opinion) in bold: what interests me most, personally, is Anavolver. On the other hand, paying the kicker cost doesn't make it particularly cheap, and probably means that Iwamori will simply be a better choice. Ifh-Biff Efreet is very interesting, however: it gives you a chance to do some major damage without even attacking. Too bad its ability doesn't hit Goblin tokens.
Control Magic is the interesting third wheel.
I was under the impression that Phan made the deck and that Olszewski picked it up right before the tourney.
info.ninja
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