Hello again! Now that the GP is over, I can share the deck I used at the tournament. Well, I actually couldn't find all the cards in time and had to make some small changes to the decklist.
// Deck file for Magic Workstation (http://www.magicworkstation.com)
// NAME: The Cure (Legacy G/b)
// AUTHOR: Carlos Hoyos (DrJones)
// Lands
4 [U] Bayou
1 [TSP] Forest (1)
4 [ON] Windswept Heath
4 [ZEN] Verdant Catacombs
// Creatures
4 [AL] Elvish Spirit Guide
4 [OD] Wild Mongrel
3 [RAV] Dark Confidant
4 [PLC] Kavu Predator
4 [NE] Skyshroud Cutter
3 [VI] Quirion Ranger
2 [FUT] Tarmogoyf
// Spells
4 [TE] Lotus Petal
4 [ON] False Cure
3 [U] Berserk
4 [MM] Invigorate
4 [NE] Reverent Silence
4 [MR] Chalice of the Void
// Sideboard
SB: 3 [ON] Tempting Wurm
SB: 4 [UD] Compost
SB: 2 [TE] Choke
SB: 4 [LRW] Thoughtseize
SB: 2 [TSP] Krosan Grip
I had to play two land grant due to lack of fetches, and replace a Tarmogoyf with a Putrid Leech. I also played 4x Chalice of the Void instead of 4x Berserk, but I kind of liked how these numbers worked in the tourney, so from now on I will always play four CotV main. The most difficult achievement was finding 3 Tempting Wurm just in time for the tournament. Nobody had heard of them or thought about putting such a bad card in their trading binders. I almost had given up when the owner of a store in Madrid drove off to his house and searched in his crap rare box to sell me one. I also found another one on the very last minute before the start. Although the wurm looks horrible, it's really strong against decks like ANT, landstill, canadian, countertop and even zoo. If you like this deck, go get them NOW before they climb up in price. Once you learn when to cast them, they are plain and simply incredible.
I had doubts with my sideboard. Thoughtseize looks good in paper as a general answer against everything, but I've rarely used it in practice. The other options were Faerie Macabre and Pithing Needle. After thinking a lot about it, I finally added Pithing Needle as a solution against depths, belcher, survival and merfolks. While I tested the reanimator match, the lists on deckcheck all looked too slow to be dangerous. I was wrong.
See, the problem was that these lists weren't good. The lists at the GP all played rituals, show and tell, and lotus petal, so they could reliabily cast Iona on their first turn. Not only that, but during the tournament I had to face not one, but THREE reanimator decks in my first four matches. Eventually, the winner of the tournament was a reanimator deck, so expect their rise in the following weeks. They aren't actually that bad if you get a first turn, but that day I was specially unlucky with my dice rolls. I ended beating one of them and lost to the others in pretty close matches, so the rest of the tourney became an uphill battle in which I couldn't afford any mistake. From a dismal score of 0-2, I proceeded then to win all my matches until the seventh round of the tournament, in which I lost to color-screw against merfolks, a deck that otherwise shouldn't give me problems.
After dropping, I played some casual games against people that specifically came over to see my deck in action. One of those people even dared me to challenge a person named Merrin which had a cool outfit and looked like a real pro (at least, he started the tournament with 3 byes). Just before leaving, I had the occasion of meeting him and asked him for a match, and he agreed! He also seemed to know my deck, but I unfortunately couldn't recognize his. It was a kind of gwb control deck with tons of removal and goyfs. I won the first game but unfortunately had to leave before we could finish the second.
Bummer about the 4-3, this seems like a fun deck to play.
Funny enough you said that Dark Ritual was your big scare card, but between Muller and the two top 8s at the 10k, there's only ONE copy of dark ritual. And between the three of them there are TWO copies of Show and Tell (plus Muller had one in the board).
I would look into the Reanimator matchup again if you're convinced that Show and Tell or Dark Ritual are at all central to being successful with this deck.
// Lands
1 [APL] Forest (1)
1 [DM] Swamp (1)
4 [B] Bayou
1 [U] Savannah
3 [ZEN] Verdant Catacombs
1 [A] Scrubland
4 [ZEN] Marsh Flats
// Creatures
4 [PLC] Kavu Predator
4 [NE] Skyshroud Cutter
4 [RAV] Dark Confidant
4 [FUT] Tarmogoyf
// Spells
4 [ON] False Cure
4 [MM] Invigorate
4 [NE] Reverent Silence
4 [CST] Swords to Plowshares
4 [TE] Lotus Petal
2 [AP] Pernicious Deed
1 [FD] Engineered Explosives
2 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
4 [LRW] Thoughtseize
// Sideboard
SB: 1 Shred Memory
SB: 4 Extirpate
SB: 4 Chalice of the void
SB: 1 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 3 Choke
SB: 2 Krosan grip
I make 3-3 with this one, i like more play the white splash coz make u take less risks i dont sleep so much and i cant play more after lose the 3 match, i think if i have a bit more luck with the pairings i can get a good position.
3 wins: burn (2-0) dragonstompy (2-1) enchantres (2-0)
3 loses: bant progenitus countertop (2-1 all of them)
vs every agro deck i have a really good win%, and vs combo too, i play 8 good cards vs tendrils in main deck (seizes and false cure that makes he die for tendrils) and 8 in sb, extirpate to bug il gotens and mysticals and chalices, dredge isnt hard, some times dont need sb to bet him he need lot of luck for make a good cabal terapy and we can be faster than he, 6 cards in sb vs him, chalice works fine too coz he can side chain of vapor
the deck have really good match ups, i dont like my pairings but i think that i can win with a bit more luck ( one of the bants play submerge in main deck, other one mind harness, that was horrible for me)
So,what do you set the Chalices to? 1, to avoid swords?
Dr. Jones,
This is probably a dumb question, but why run Chalice of the Void and Berserk at the same time? Isn't Berserk a fundamental part of this deck's kill? Like Philipp2293, I'm assuming you set Chalice at 1 to avoid StP, Duress, and the like.
I've built and have been goldfishing this deck (Well, not recently; cards are at home while I'm at college), and am tempted to play it in the local Legacy tournaments this summer. I was wondering, when using Wild Mongrel, what kind of cards do you pitch to him? I often find I don't really have much of anything left in my hand at all, most of the time.
Well, it's not that I'm scared of dark ritual, but in the decks I faced they sure helped against me. I was going to write a proper report but still haven't got the time. Of 8 games against reanimator decks, I won 3 and lost 5. Here is how I lost four of those:Originally Posted by Forbiddian
1st game. I play bayou, quirion ranger and have in my hand 3 invigorate and one false cure (this is a clear 2nd turn win). He then plays underground sea, lotus petal, entomb and reanimate to Iona.
2nd game. I play fetch, he plays fetch. I play chalice at one, he breaks fetch and plays entomb in response to chalice. On his turn, he plays a swamp and exhume to Iona.
3rd game. He goes first. Dark ritual, entomb, exhume Iona.
4th game. I play fetch + lotus petal and chalice at one. He plays a land. I cast tarmogoyf. He plays a land and show and tell for the Iona in his hand. Note that he had no other way to discard Iona because both Thoughtseize and Careful Study cost 1cc.
The berserk good point is that gives us a fast kill, the other one havnt time for found responses, anyway if u get a big kavu and he can kill it coz Chalice smash the swords chains brainstorms entombs paths.. and cant play responses for the big creature u dont need berserk coz 1 turn more for kill him isnt really important at that point.
I almost always set Chalice at 1, but against ANT, belcher and other decks I know that use Chrome Mox and/or Lotus Petal I can set it at 0 because it hurts them and doesn't slow me at all. Chalice is used to stop the following cards: Ponder, Brainstorm, and Sensei's Divining Top. Those cards don't look as frightening as Swords or duress, but they are used by the best decks in the format to find LANDS and search for answers (with the help of fetchlands) which otherwise would come too late to help. So it's there because decks can be slowed up to three turns or more by playing it. Chalice at one also happens to crush zoo, burn, berserk stompy, elves and other combo decks while leaving me virtually unaffected. It shuts down almost all removal and half of the counterspells that could bring me trouble but that usually only slows down the deck. Lastly, I had 3 free slots in the deck and discovered that devoting slots to protection spells like Vines of Vastwood was worse than playing another "must-be-deal-right-now-or-I-lose" card.
Now to the question of why do I run Chalice of the Void and Berserk at the same time. The reason is that I really don't count on Chalice resolving or staying on board. I don't want to depend on it resolving to win, and I don't think I'll even draw it in half of my games, because I don't run anything to search for them. A bit of Friendly fire isn't bad as long as the fire hurts the opponent a lot more than me, and at this moment Chalice at one negates half the deck of most opponents.
Read the first post of this thread for an explanation of Wild Mongrel tactics, and click the link on sample tactics and 2nd turn kills. Mongrel is not good against some decks (burn or canadian, for example), so I usually side in Tempting Wurm in those matches.I've built and have been goldfishing this deck (Well, not recently; cards are at home while I'm at college), and am tempted to play it in the local Legacy tournaments this summer. I was wondering, when using Wild Mongrel, what kind of cards do you pitch to him? I often find I don't really have much of anything left in my hand at all, most of the time.
Don't forget berserk also counts as removal. I played it that way thrice on this tournament on Tarmogoyf, Blazing Archon and that demon with delve.
thats true, well i play swords and no berserk coz it can make lots of damage with out creatures in our table; some of my stp kills:
vs bant in 2º round: Tarmogoyf atacks 3/4 ( sorcery creature and land) i play false cure sac lotus petal and sac perni for 1 killing the hierarch, tarmo pups to 6/7 (instant artifact and enchantment) play invigorate x2 on tarmo ( 6 dmge for the cost with false cure) tarmo 14/15 and cast sword on tarmo for 20 dmge
vs bant in 6º round: he atacks with rhox exalted for 1 noble hierarch, i play false cure and invigorate on him ( 3 dmge for cost) rhox 8/9 i take 8 he heals 8 for lifelink, swords for 8 more and he takes 19 dmge
vs eva depths is really fun just wait with WBB her token and instakill him :P like vs goblins, is really easy kill some one with swords on piledriver
Can you explain Tempting Wurm please.
My personal guess it's a SB choice against decks that don't drop a lot of permanents, e.g. Storm Combo.
Tempting Wurm was the result of a long study trying to understand why my deck had a bad pairing against Canadian Threshold. After playing several games I discovered the following:
1. Racing against Canadian Threshold was the worst thing I could do, because Canadian Threshold was designed to fight early starts. Because Canadian has a slow clock, the deck can afford to wait a bit and evade Daze. (I only rush in my first turn if I start, because then they don't have a land for daze, and FoW can break his early game).
2. Canadian Threshold is constantly sculpting his hand with Brainstorm and Ponder, which increases his hand quality by a lot and finds the early land, disruption and/or wastelands. Discard is pretty useless against those cards, but 4 chalice of the void are pretty strong by themselves and can stop Canadian to recover so fast after the "dust settles".
3. While playing against Canadian, we both usually ended in top decking mode. Theoretically, I should do better in that situation because I play less lands and more threats, but in practice most of my losses came at this time. What was happening here? Then I finally realized that my beaters were bad topdecks, while the creatures in Canadian were all awesome. Mongrel is not as hot with an empty hand, Kavu needs life-gaining effects to become big, Putrid leech can be killed in response to gaining +2/+2 and paying 2 life is risky in the late game. All my creatures were at a disadvantage against 3/3 mongoose and 5/6 tarmos. So, I needed to find cheap creatures that could be strong in topdeck mode. Enter again Tarmogoyfs maindeck, and enter Tempting Wurm in the sideboard.
Tempting wurm is a bit like Phyrexian Negator in that its drawback seems too steep to be of any use, but has the potential to be devastating against certain decks. It just happens that Canadian Threshold is one of those decks. The only permanents the opponent could bring to the table in the early game are 1/1 mongooses and 2/3 tarmos, which are too small to deal with this monster. Later wurms are as strong as the first one you play and have essentially no drawback. Note also that "accelerating" the opponent isn't so bad when your clock is miles ahead his, specially in mid-late game when there are few cards in hand and almost anything that could hurt you has already been played.
I used the wurm effectively against canadian, the mirror, ant, burn, and landstill. In the tournament it was the key piece against ANT and Pikula countertop. I think it could be also useful against merfolks, berserk stompy, and zoo, but as I had not enough time to playtest those matches I deemed it too risky to try.
Hello at all,
i want to show to you my version of the deck:
Mana
4 Bayou
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Fetchlands
1 Forest
1 Swamp
4 Lotus Petal
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
Critter
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Dark Confidant
4 Kavu Predator
Spells
3 Berserk
4 Invigorate
4 Reverent Silence
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Duress
3 Maelstrom Pulse
1 False Cure
4 Vines of Wastwood
I played this deck on a big tournament in Hanau(you might have heard from it) but after a score of 3-3 i dropped out to play some drafts.
There are some differents between my list an the ones that are in this thread.
First: I don's play skyshroud cutter AND Reverent Silence. I don't think thats necessary. You can do it but you don't have to(and by the way, i didn't get any Cutters for this tournament, nobody has them^^). Wich one is better is a metagamequestion. With much Suicide, Pox and other Decks playing edicts or innocent blood cutters are better, if you expect counterbalanca and enchantress, take the silence.
next: Dark Confidant, never play less than 4! It's one of the best card you have in this deck. It takes the opponents removal so that the kavu can attac. And if it not gets removd, the confidant wins.
next:Tarmogoyf: I made the experience, that he grows very fast in this deck. You fetch, you have lotus petal and the opponents do play some cards too.
next: I don't play more creatures, because i want to win with the kavu. Tarmogoyf is just the alternativ plan an can kill fast with berserk(invigorate too, Dark confidant is just to good, but i don't want little creatures in this deck, because they support another strategy the mine.
next:no 4 False cure - sure the card is nice, i think i should play more, but often its useless, i have to test more.
next: duress>chalice i dont't want to counter my own berserk, its so mighty.
Do you think i should prefer the whitesplash to the basics?
Thats a question im asking myself since a few days when i rebuilded that deck.
pls forgive my bad english.
I prefer perni over maelstrom coz can kill moongoses and is more usefull agains naya zoo etc.. the white splash.. the swords are really usefull, can kill a canonist, a bloquer, the oponent confidant or tarmo.. and gives lots of lifes, isnt prob splash it with the lotus petals and 2 white dual lands and have great sinergy with the deck and invigorate, maybe are worst if u dont play 4 false cure coz swords and cure was te best choice to kill if u havnt a kavu in the table.
I've updated the first post of this thread with my most recent decklist. I hope this update will have better pairings against the rest of the field. Tell me if thoughtseize/faerie macabre are good enough to balance the Reanimator matchup, as I currently don't have too much time to write an updated matchup analysis.
@Ponso: Though I understand that you don't have a strong grasp at english, this site has rules against barely readable english. For this reason, and as a way to improve your legibility, please use "because" instead of "coz", "you" instead of "u", and "problem" instead of "prob".
hello there,
i'm new here, but this list immideately cougth my inrest
i'd love to play this deck, though i have a problem, i have no access to berserks nor tarmogoyf nor bayou (actually im using overgrown tomb in my other decks, which hurts a lot)
@DrJones, what would you suggest,
my actual list looks like this:
3x verdant catacombs
3x windswepth heath
2x urborg
4x overgrown tomb
1x temple garden
1x godless shrine
3x forest
2x swamp
1x plains
3x putrid leech
4x kavu predator
3x gaddock teeg
4x dark confidant
4x skyshroud cutter
4x swords to plowshares
4x invigorate
4x false cure
3x might of old krosa
2x rancor
4x thoughtsieze
2x rite of consumption
its 61 cards i know, but thats something no one's gonna change my mind about
here are my problem, for which i hope you could give some helping answers
1. i'm way to slow
2. manabase is not stable (due to lack of real duals)
3. discard does not fit in well
4. would love to have more beaters (but which when i havent got goyfs, and would rather not play mongrel cause of carddisadvantage)
5. beaters without berserk get just chup-blockt (sucks)
6. even with swords to plowshares i feel like i've got not enough lifegiving spells, i mean without reverent silence(which i cannot realy play because of gaddock teeg) the combo does not work properly
7. what do you think about gaddock teeg, actually since my built is quite slow he just protects my from sweepers like wrath,... and engineered exploxives, but his body is way to small, any suggestions?
thanks in the meantime
and PS: does someone know to get hands on some cheap tarmogoyfs and berserks , i would appreciate it
(i'm south tyrolian in italy, and its been quite a while since i wrote something in english, so i hope you can forgive my not so good english)
Hi, AggroSteve. Putrid Leech is a good replacement of Tarmogoyf if you tune up your deck to play faster, in fact, I didn't play him in earlier versions (I know I'm alone in this, all other people play four). You might want to search eBay and online shops (I don't know if I can post their URL here) for copies of Berserk reprinted in From the Vault: Exiled, as they are considerably cheaper than the ones from unlimited. Here are my suggestions:
1. Play 4 lotus petal and 4 elvish spirit guide. Your clock will improve by one turn.
2. Try to acquire a single revised bayou and 4 land grant. Then test if that configuration lets you play Quirion Ranger and reduce the number of lands in your deck. Also, try to squeeze in two copies of sensei's divining top or sylvan library to stabilize your future draws.
3. See the list of "other cards to consider" in the first post of this thread.
4. If you can't afford goyfs and don't want to play mongrel you only have two options left: Ravaging Riftwurm and Manaplasm. Riftwurm is better if you pack Cabal Therapy as your discard outlet. Then you could also try the new Abyssal Persecutor if you already have them.
5. A friend suggested playing Engineered Plague against chump-blockers, but haven't tried it.
6. You should definitely play Reverent Silence. The only other option you have is refreshing rain (which has sinergy with urborg but doesn't work with gaddock) and Nature's claim. You could try the Ashnod's Transmogrant combo with Nature's Claim.
7. I can't say because I've never tested it. Chalice of the Void, however, has worked really well in my testings.
HAve you thought on using TOmbstalker. It has lot of sinergy withh all the deck (specially with mongrel) while shrinks opponent´s tarmogoyf.
I´m playing three of them and they are very good here.
Beside of that I have several cuestions to ask you:
1. If you are playing against ANT. Could false cure kill him or you need to deal at least two damages before he comboes out to win?? I´m not sure about it because the sucession of lifes gained lost is little strange.
2. Arbor elf could be a playable option instead of quirion ranger?? Both of them has its pros and cons but arbor let ypu play more lands if needed.
3. What about playing ankh of mishra in the deck? In this scenario the deck must cvhange a lot but i think this deck can support it.
What do you think?
Tombstalker would work if I didn't played Dark Confidant. I've tested it, but it doesn't work in the stompy approach. In a build like Eva Green he might shine. About your other questions:
1. You can't kill ANT with false cure if he has equal or more life than you. Fortunately, due to Ad Nauseam costing a ton of life that is mostly a non-issue.
2. Arbor Elf is a playable option, but you lose a lot of tricks that only quirion can do; unlike quirion, its ability has "summoning sickness", and the deck doesn't really need that much mana. Might be better if you use a different mana base (or Ankh of Mishra).
3. Ankh de Mishra is great! You can see it already covered in the first post of this thread. It's specially powerful against loam and control decks, but right now I don't feel the need to punish them. So including it in the list is a bit of a meta call. Can replace some berserks if you don't have them. If you use Ankh, try to play 2 land grants to find bayou without taking so much damage.
First of all, I´ve the full set of berserks, so don´t worry for it ;).
In fact I´ve been playin a WG stompy shell with predators invigorates and swords. The deck is good and has solutions for everything but i wanted to test something new because this deck with zoo´s everywhere is not good now. Then i see The CURE deck and decied to give it a try because it plays some of my favorite cards of the game (predator and berserk ;) ).
After reading your posts I found that this deck improves some bad match ups the mine had like ANT (cure and chalices MD are HUGE).
I´m, not very sold about others. You said that zoo is a good match up for this deck but I can´t find why. Zoo decks play lot of cheap removal splitted between burn and path/swords and we are playing very few critters. The lifegaining spells usually are not instants (except invigorate) so Kavu will die easily. Our other threats doesn´t trample (if not berseked) so they can chumpblock if needed.
I´ve been testing the deck in MWS and found that:
1) Confidants hurt a lot if you don´t win on the 3 first turns
2) Sometimes we are manascrewed
3) I think the deck need more threats.
I tested a version without confidants (replacing them with Tombstalkers) and worked very fine (because mongrel is the best friend of "tombi") but if opponent can manage your pressure you are dead (because card disadvantage). I was trying to find a replacement of confidant and thought on cold eyed selkie (which is a house with inviogorate) and has evasion ftw. THe only real problem is that it cost three but .... Not sure about it.
What do you think?
PD: I´m from Spain so first of all sorry for my bad English.BEside of that, if you are from here too we can PM to continue developing the deck if you want to.
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