Team Grixis (UBr tempo)

[wcm8]

I'm thinking of going back to the drawing board with this deck. I'm thinking of implementing Dark Confidant to give the deck a card advantage engine and dropping Tombstalker entirely.

A rough list that will need tweaking:

4 Dark Confidant
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Snapcaster Mage

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder (possibly -1 Ponder, +1 Sensei's Divining Top)

4 Lightning Bolt
2 Ghastly Demise

4 Inquisition of Kozilek (or 2/2 split with Thoughtseize)
4 Spell Pierce
4 Daze
3 Force of Will

19 Lands (7 duals, 4 waste, 8 fetch -- possibly 1 Tropical Island to splash for some SB stuff like Ancient Grudge)

Stifle isn't doing enough right now, and I think Spell Pierce is a fine replacement.

Black still opens us up to some good sideboard options that can attack the current metagame -- Perish, Extirpate, Dread of Night, etc. Dark Confidant is definitely fragile, but untapping with him can win the game. If the ground becomes stalled, you can still leverage burn against the opponent. Equipment is a huge problem for your little creatures, but it could be addressed with the SB.

Grim Lavamancer and Unearth also become options...

In any case, I'll have to do some testing to figure out the best configuration. I'm going to try to tune the list to beat Maverick and Esperblade, without giving up too much against the other matchups.

[Curby]

Music to my ears. I didn't like the BB requirements of decks previously discussed in this thread, so I built the deck posted in the last page. Less beef, but Bob gives plenty of threats, and Reanimate/Snapcaster recycles them.

I'm still using Stifle because of all the combo in my meta and the chance to counter the odd Storm Trigger, Charbelcher activation, etc.

I've been trying to find room for [card]Thought Scour[/card] to feed Reanimate/Snapcaster, but I'm unwilling to drop Ponders for it. Any ideas?

[wcm8]

To be honest, I hated Thought Scour when I was testing it in RUG. It never seemed to do what I wanted it to, and so many times I remember binning the top deck I really wanted (confirmation bias I know -- but we want every card in the deck to do something relevant). I think I would consider playing Predict if I really wanted that effect.

I like the idea of Reanimate instead of Unearth since our own creatures won't hurt too badly and stealing the random Goyf/KotR and being pre-side tech against Reanimator/Dredge seems cool. However, I'd probably only start with it as just a singleton and see how useful it really is. The advantage of Unearth of course is that it can be cycled if/when you don't have any targets and obviously doesn't cost life.

edit: I'm also seeing RUG begin to adopt Sulfuric Vortex into the main/SB. I'm a little wary of adding it to a Bob list since we are already damaging ourselves, but it may be a possible idea to help against UWx-Blade and other slower mid-range decks.

Sulfur Elemental is slower than Dread of Night, but the advantage is that it's another attacker/blocker and is uncounterable. I'd consider doing a split.

[GtF]

Why drop big stalks from this list? He seems even better in a deck w/ all these burn spells.

[wcm8]

I still like him, but he is a liability if we are playing Dark Confidant. Maybe 1 or 2 could stay in the list even with Confidant.

[Curby]

Tombstalker is obviously good; I'm just trying out the deck without it. Specific reasons: I like Bob, which doesn't get along well with Tombstalker. There's a lot of yardhate in my meta, and I want to limit my vulnerability to it. I prefer more disruptive options such as V Clique.

[Goddik]

This deck is certainly an exciting idea.

I think your RUG matchup is going to become much worse by the switch from tombstalker to dark confidant. I feel like much of this decks justification lies in being able to play tombstalker in a deck without forests. Without that we are just a RUG tempo deck with a more awkward creature suite but a better sideboard.

Against maverick you are probably also better off racing them to death then trying to win the long game with dark confidant.

[wcm8]

I won't have time in the next several days to test, but how about starting with this list then:

19-20 Lands
4 Delver
4 Confidant
2-3 Snapcaster
2 Tombstalker
4 Lightning Bolt
2-3 Forked Bolt / black 'hard' removal
4 Brainstorm
3 Ponder
1 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Spell Pierce/Stifle (leaning towards Pierce right now)
3 FoW
3 Daze
4 Inquisition of Kozilek -- possibly Spell Snare

Having 5 'big' spells to flip to Bob can be mitigated due to a) the relatively low chance of that actually happening naturally, and b) using Ponder/Brainstorm/SDT to curb the damage.

I could also see adding a few lands and fitting in a Jace or two. (maybe cut a 1 Ponder for 1 Jace TMS)

I was actually planning on testing Tombstalker in some number alongside Bob, but like I said I haven't had an opportunity to test it yet. I know some Team America decks back in the Misstep-era ran the two together and didn't have many problems and in fact won some big tournaments.

[GtF]

Running tombstalker along with bob always seemed pretty ambitious to me. I suppose it can work but it seems like a risk not worth taking. Jace however is super sweet. I've been running it in TA for a while even though it's 4 mana and doesn't really fit with the deck's game plan just because it is that good. It also takes over the dark confidant/sylvan library role that the deck sorta wants. Basically running jace in a deck where it doesn't fit that well has been so good that it's made me think I should just be running in a deck designed to maximize it.

[Curby]

I'd run the hell out of Jaces if I had them. My color choice of UBr is because I don't. =) So I'm going more with small, recurring threats rather than a more traditional control shell with sweepers and other "big plays".

[Tombstalker]

I absolutely love the shell of this deck (both variations) but I've actually stopped testing it for now. Reason is tombstalker is a big part of what makes the deck win vs Canadian and Mav but is bad against stoneblade/scm with so much exile effects as opposed to goose.

I like the card advantage build with Bobs and scm alot but haven't tried it yet.
I do think the main deck reanimate idea has a ton of potential but more than 1 is needed to make it worthwhile. Why not make it an integral part of this deck as a 3 of. Removal, hand disruption and counters, all scm targets make this card a powerhouse and arguably no better place other than in reanimator itself and its natural defense against reanimator, which would be this decks easiest prey it seems.

[Curby]

As I've posted I'm building this deck to attack my combo-filled meta. I've got one top contender with a mill brew maindecking Leyline of the Void, so I'm a little reluctant to run Tombstalkers or the Goyf/Mongoose package, all of which depends a lot on the yard.

However, I have considered running 3 Tombstalkers in the side, to switch with Bobs when I want to go aggro or need more beef to avoid opposing red removal. I know that landstill decks sometimes ran Goyfs in the side for when they needed a faster win. Any ideas on this somewhat transformative sideboard?

For those of you playing no BB spells, how many land do you play? Most people do 18, but I hate mulling, and my use of Snapcasters and V Cliques has pushed me over to 19. It would be nice to free up another slot, but I'm not sure that I can afford it.

[wcm8]

edited

[Curby]

Since I don't run Tombstalkers, I've been running a few Vendilion Cliques. It works well as both an evasive beater and additional hand disruption. I also run Reanimate/Unearth... replaying a Snapcaster or Clique and getting a critter and an additional effect all for 1-2 mana is pretty awesome.

I've been increasingly looking at Predict/Thought Scour. While I don't play Tombstalker, getting more food for reanimate/snapcaster would be pretty neat.

Stifle's been pretty underwhelming for me, but I'm hoping that further playtesting might show its strength.

[wcm8]

Since I don't run Tombstalkers, I've been running a few Vendilion Cliques. It works well as both an evasive beater and additional hand disruption. I also run Reanimate/Unearth... replaying a Snapcaster or Clique and getting a critter and an additional effect all for 1-2 mana is pretty awesome.

I've been increasingly looking at Predict/Thought Scour. While I don't play Tombstalker, getting more food for reanimate/snapcaster would be pretty neat.

Stifle's been pretty underwhelming for me, but I'm hoping that further playtesting might show its strength.

Don't bother with Thought Scour. I've tested it, and found it to be really poor. If you really want something like it that costs 1 mana, look into testing Opt, or better yet Disrupt. But I still think Predict is the best of these sorts of effects.

Stifle is either utterly back-breaking, or complete garbage. It's tempting to play a card that can quite literally win the game for one mana, but these cases are few and far between -- and if a player is bad enough to keep that poor of a hand/play into your Stifle, you'd probably be beating them anyways, right? Further playesting for you is just going to show you the remarkable inconsistency of the card -- that, or you end up letting 'confirmation bias' get the best of you. The card that would be taking its slot, Spell Pierce, is generally always a welcome sight and more versatile in its applications.

[Tombstalker]

I have an off the wall idea which I suggested and tested months ago during the mm era before scm. Why not try surgical extraction main? Along with 4 Bobs 3-4 scm. Back then I found SE combined with targeted discard and wasteland to be brutal but with mm and full set of TS was too much tax on my life total. Now however there's no mm, the formats faster so IoK is more relevant and scm makes SE even better plus bob recovers any lost CA. Seems down right scary actually..t1 IoK -> kotr/mom/gsz/stp/souls/delver etc -> SE. follow up later with scm and someones deck is gonna start looking like Swiss cheese.

[Curby]

It's too matchup dependent, and at times can have too little effect on the game state. In the right meta full of combo decks though, especially 2-card combos like Painted Stone and yard "combos" like Reanimator/Dredge, I can see why it would be powerful.

And to be honest, that's the reason I'm playing Grixis anyway: fighting combo decks.

[Tombstalker]

True on game state as I've experienced testing it in TA, but its also free so it doesn't actually cost any tempo loss. Besides combo plenty of decks have limited wincons and a few truly problematic cards. Id say extracting souls from stoneblade is totally worth the early loss of 1 card, same goes for stp. Against blue it will often be card parity when countered but tempo advantage because its free. Idk maybe the ideas still crap but I like the picture of shredding sometimes deck, plus it makes scm cost 2 if you want.

[wcm8]

I'm crossing my fingers that this newly spoiled creature is real:

[Creature]
UB
2/2
Cascade

If so, this deck has gained a lot more power.

I'd drop the situational counterspell angle (Pierce, Stifle, Snare, etc.) and just try to go for pure card advantage.

A rough draft:

19 lands
1 SDT
4 Delver
4 [cascade-man]
3 Dark Confidant
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder (maybe Ancestral Vision mixed in)
4 Force of Will
4 Daze
4 1 cmc discard (mixture of Thoughtseize / Inquisition)
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Chain Lightning/ Forked Bolt / black removal / maybe Grim Lavamancer
3 Tombstalker

Jace might belong in the maindeck, but if not, definitely in the SB.
Liliana might also make an appearance.

Needless to say, the possibility of this creature is exciting and could make Grixis a true contender.

[kiblast]

I'd drop the situational counterspell angle (Pierce, Stifle, Snare, etc.)

Great! a tempo deck filled with 2/1 and 2/2 dudes @cc2 , which doesn't play ''situational counterspells'' and Stifle. In the meanwhile, Tarmogoyf.