Message to all SCG grinders finding Show and tell dumb or just wanting to win

[TsumiBand]

Yeah I mean let's not get to carried away here. Don't forget guys were are still dealing with...

1: What is essentially usually a 3 card combo
2: Make that basically a 4 card combo if you want counter backup.
3: No way to go off before turn 4 without S&T (and that's basically still a 3 card combo since you only have 4x Sol lands in this build).
4: No meaningful way to interact with the opponent outside of Force of Will.
5: No meaningful way to interact with board outside of Cunning Wish targets.

I'll reserve my judgement until I see more results, but just from goldfishing I can say it's not always easy to get the combo assembled in a timely manner even without disruption from the opponent.

Given the choice between playing against this and Sneak/Show there are definitely decks where I'd rather play against this and decks where I'd rather play against Sneak/Show.

In fairness, even a 3 card combo is not that difficult to assemble in a deck with Brainstorms.

I cannot find the relevant math online, but it was taught early to me in Magic why 2-card combos were acceptable using the example of a trick you can do using a 52 card deck. You can pretty much go through a deck of cards and guarantee that for any given card value 2 through Ace, you'll see another random value within one card of each other by the time you're at the end of the deck (basically within a 3 card range) - for example just go pick up a deck of cards and riffle through them and say "I will see a Queen and a 7 within one card of each other" and odds are it will just happen. It can totally whiff of course, b/c random deck is random, but do it like 10 times with ten different card values, shuffling in between and watch how often Value A is no further than one card away from Value B. Adding tutors and card draw to the mix is only going to make it that much easier to assemble the win.

I don't know that there's a cause for banhammering anything, but at some point there is kind of a responsibility to break the format as much as you can, so if someone wants to just go ahead and do it I think that's swell.

[Star|Scream]

In fairness, even a 3 card combo is not that difficult to assemble in a deck with Brainstorms.

I cannot find the relevant math online, but it was taught early to me in Magic why 2-card combos were acceptable using the example of a trick you can do using a 52 card deck. You can pretty much go through a deck of cards and guarantee that for any given card value 2 through Ace, you'll see another random value within one card of each other by the time you're at the end of the deck (basically within a 3 card range) - for example just go pick up a deck of cards and riffle through them and say "I will see a Queen and a 7 within one card of each other" and odds are it will just happen. It can totally whiff of course, b/c random deck is random, but do it like 10 times with ten different card values, shuffling in between and watch how often Value A is no further than one card away from Value B.

wat

[Megadeus]

All I was asking when it came to Meddling Mage is that the BoM list cannot beat a Meddling Mage naming Cunning WIsh. SOmeone earlier mentioned MM naming SnT or ETI. I said just name Wish!

[bruizar]

Lejay, what you did with the deck is ... at the very least ... huge. I know that you worked hard on the list.
That's important to remind that it's not the first time Lejay is showing us that he's a brillant deck builder beside being a brillant player, see Doomsday deck last year at the BoM.

And UB Planeswalker before Caleb ran it. Lejay is awesome and he's on my watch list when it comes to awesome new decks.

[U-S-ho]

No need to swing the banhammer. The deck doesn't break the format

******** UGr

"the first tests against tempo were very simple. We crushed them preboard" ; "positive tempo thresh match-up all the way" ; "win about 2/3 of the time" --> ??!!

- not a fast clock?! Double Delver, or Delver+Goyf or similar are not that slow considering all the Lightning Bolts and Chain Lightnings going straight to your face...
- Wasteland doesn't hurt you as much, but Stifle to a fetchland is still a timewalk at least. If you wanted to use the Fetchland to shuffle away two bad cards from a brainstorm for example, it's even worse. Wasteland can be used to force you to fetch, if they have Stifle in hand.
- They just have more counterspells than you (pre- and postboard). Even if Daze and Spell Pierce are no hard counters, playing around 1 Daze can set you back a turn and playing around Spell Pierce is probably way too slow. Postboard there are even REBs/Pyroblasts and Flusterstorms. Sure, Defense Grid is strong here, but they also have Ancient Grudges against it usually or just counter your Defense Grid. "defense grid idea ... proved to be all we need." I wouldn't be too sure about this.
- The Krosan Grips in their sideboard can kill your plans, especially before EtI.
- A boarded in Vendillion Clique can also be a pain with the right timing. Even, if they just put it into play via your Show and Tell, it can ruin your plan.
- Surgical Extraction see below. (Even Thought Scour could be effective against you to extract something you really need like Omniscience for example)
- Hardcasting a Dream Halls against Daze and Spell Pierce is very hard without enough counter backup.


Maverick

"When we tested against a maverick with tons of hate at the beginning we had a negative match-up post sb. But not only it's just post sb ... the deck is also almost not run anymore."

Doesn't Maverick's maindeck consist of "hate" against you?

- Gaddock Teeg: Your plan is Emrakul, but they run Knight of the Reliquary, so they have Karakas which you have to get rid of as well. So you need a Wish and Rushing River to bounce it, which is not always as easy as it sounds. Also, you have to get Emrakul first.
- Knight of the Reliquary
- Karakas
- Thalia: "Emrakul is your main plan against Thalia decks"
Show and Tell -> Emrakul = 4 mana, but hard to find a singelton Emrakul with your 2 mana cantrips. No extra turn here.
Show and Tell -> Omniscience -> Cunning Wish -> Eladamri's Call -> Emrakul = 7 mana!
Show and Tell -> Omniscience -> Cunning Wish -> Slaughter Pact = 6 mana, but you better have the other cards needed to win that turn also.
Show and Tell -> Omniscience -> Emrakul = 5 mana but you still have to get your singelton Emrakul first.
Cunning Wish -> Slaughter Pact/ Sapphire Charm = 5/6 mana same turn ... okay Wish in one turn and removal next turn are not that expensive, but then it better works, if it get's disrupted in any way...
... there are also some ways that are even more expensive, maybe I'm missing something here?? "Against Thalia decks Emrakul is the plan as you just need 1 mana to cast enter and then you can untap and play spells you want"
- Mother of Runes: protects their Hatebears, so it's not that easy to get rid of them. Same thing with Sylvan Safekeeper and the like
- Surgical Extraction: see below
- Oblivion Ring: see below
- Qasali Pridemage: can be effective if you only have Dream Halls in play
- Choke!
- Ethersworn Canonist: you need a wish and time/mana to get rid of it and combo

Even if GW Maverick is played a bit less, there are also Punishing/Dark Maverick... with heavy Discard, Extirpate, Lilianas, Slaughter Games, Pyroblasts, Krosan Grips and whatever...

Blade Control

- Discard AND Counterspells (and Snapcaster)
- Surgical/Extirpate (and Snapcaster )
- O-ring/D-sphere
- Meddling Mage
- V.clique
- Venser
- Counterbalance/SDT
everything effective. no need to explain every detail, I think.


I don't want to write about every possible matchup here, just some others that seem questionable to be crushed all the time off the top of my head:

BUG
Sneak Attack
Storm
Dredge
...
and you said yourself:
"3 bad match-ups for the deck. Reanimator, Tin Fins and UR Omniscience mirror with flusterstorm (Testing against dredge was 50/50 post sb but it’s probably negative overall too)"
so this doesn't seem to be true: " the deck has positive match-ups against almost the entire field." "the best deck" "As long as people are running sufficient grave hate, this deck is the best deck in the format (with not enough grave hate it's reanimator)"
Seems like there are quite a few decks, that can beat this one.
"People can adapt to this deck as I said in the format discussion section, but that will still result in an unhealthy metagame" Like we just saw, many decks don't even need to adapt that much. The metagame seems just fine at the moment.

Some other cards, which are good against the deck:

- "flusterstorm (our worst enemy)" as you said
- Chalice @ 1 very hard to find a 3 card (or more) combo without any of the 12 cantrips. Getting rid of it?! Okay, 3 mana Cunning wish + 3 mana rushing river = 6 mana to bounce it until next turn.
- Slaughter Games: on Omniscience kills the deck, right? No casting Emrakul, no infinite Release the Ants... just Show and Tell -> Emrakul directly, okay that would be possible, but even on other targets, Slaughter Games is very strong here, for example on Cunning Wish.
- Surgical Extraction/Extirpate: on Show and Tell it makes the deck a lot slower. On Omniscience see above. On a milled or discarded Cunning wish also very usefull.
- Oblivion Ring/Detention Sphere/Angel of Despair: can be answered with the instant speed RtA kill or Wish -> Trickbind. But EtI is sorcery speed and Wish -> trickbind means another card, that you need in your hand.
- Liliana of the Veil: not answered by Leyline
- Nevermore/Meddling Mage
- Venser
- Confusion in the Ranks
- Thorn of Amethyst, Trinisphere
- Counterbalance, SDT
- Discard and Counterspells in general
- probably quite a few I just forgot right now

Sure, there are answeres to a lot of these things mentioned here in theory, but you don't allways have the right answer in hand.
"counter cantrips which is pretty weak" -> not true, a well timed countered cantrip hurts a lot!

"1 Trickbind : answers most post sb hate by cunning wishing it under omniscience." but then you need for example: Show and Tell, Omniscience, Enter the Infinite and Cunning Wish (like a 4 card "combo"?) not mentioning counterspells to backup.


some other things:

"This kill still doesn’t answers the emrakul’s decks" meant is Brain Freeze with 2 SDT. But Emrakul could still be extracted (Wish -> Surgical) when it hits the graveyard.
"Dream Halls : Yes it costs 5 mana but this is also show and tell + omniscience in one card if you have enter the infinite" ...and a blue card, and if the opponent doesn't do anything (means you should have some counterspells also)
"deal with a board with rushing riverx2 (kicked and maybe noxious revivaled)" why not, if have a Cunning Wish, 6 mana, 2 life and 2 lands in excess
" if you draw one of those, FF becomes useless" meant is 2 cc spell or Intuition with Firemind's Foresight. If you draw the maindeck Intuition, there is still 3 cc Cunning Wish -> Intuition.


Show and Tell doesn't need to be banned:
Sure, it's a good card, but it doesn't dominate the format. Show and Tell decks are an important part of the format, that define Legacy and make this format (and it's metagame at the moment) as cool as it is. If it would be banned, Sneak and Show and UR Omniscience would also leave the format (less diversity, crying collectors and players ) and other decks would rise of course. Then, what would be the next thing to ban? LED? Or some staples that every deck plays and which define the format even more (ban brainstorm discussion and the like ). Or ban some storm things? Ban all the nice combos and play Modern2? Seriously, people need to stop crying because they don't like a specific card or decktype. And I think that's the real reason for some of your statements as you give a hint here: "Like many players I don't like show and tell decks because I see very dumb players winning far more than their fair share with it, and the deck is of no interest for someone wanting to play a game of thoughts. At the GP I told most of my opponents that the main reason I worked on it and played it was to get S&T banned." Seems like you want to depict yourself as the great savior of the format, but really only have a personal dislike against S&T. Just play the game. It is fun as it is right now. And fun is in the eye of the beholder.

Some things that people allways forget when hating on Show and Tell is, that even if the S&T-decks are build around it, it's still ´symmetrical´ (opponent can just put answers or bombs into play theirselves - so it just can't be compared to a giant ritual), it is card disadvantage and vulnerable to every kind of hate and it requires a deck totally build around it with tutors and cantrips to find everything needed.
Even if I don't play S&T myself and can understand your hate to some point, it would just be wrong to ban anything right now. Maybe Show and Tell is "dumb" for you; for others it's dumb to just turn creatures sideways or to wait 10min until opponent finally managed his storm count or to reanimate a giant creature in the first turns or to just throw burn spells to your face or whatever. As long as things don't get out of hand and we have top8s full of a specific deck over a specific time period, we should just let people enjoy their game and do it ourselves as well.

To intensify it a little more If your deck crushes the format, why couldn't I find you in top 16 decklists? ah, I forgot: "I barely made day 2 after going 7-2 (first defeat round 6 against the undefeated ANT player that will get Dqed for stacking, and another very unlucky defeat to a friend playing Tempo thresh). Starting day 2 with a very very very close defeat versus counterbalance put me in a difficult bracket and I lose to team America and reanimator.
Christoph Alsheimer aka Nemavera also played the same 75 I ran and fell short of one win from the top8 after going 8-1 day 1."

I hope you don't feel offended and I don't just feed the trolls

Carlos

[Lejay]

I said the deck isn't Hulk flash. What I meant is that it's objectively the best deck, and that if people would start really playing it (like 10% of the players) we would have consistent top8s which would lead to a ban. Since I'd be happier in a S&T-free format I wrote this message to SCG grinders.

EDIT : and I won't respond since there are a lot of misconceptions or mistakes (or stupidities), clearly you didn't playtest.

[alderon666]

All I was asking when it came to Meddling Mage is that the BoM list cannot beat a Meddling Mage naming Cunning WIsh. SOmeone earlier mentioned MM naming SnT or ETI. I said just name Wish!

SnT -> Omniscience -> Enter the Infinite -> Emrakul -> Untap, draw last card attack for 15 -> Enter the Infinite drawing zero, put something back on top -> Untap, draw last card attack for 15

What is that I am missing here?

[Koby]

"If only the unwashed masses would learn how to play <Tin Fins/Omniclash/Food Chain Griffin/Rogue Hermit> and find out how dumb it is, or just want to win!"

Basically, players are their own worst enemies, each deck has game and some rely more on the pilot's abilities.

[Dark Ritual]

SnT -> Omniscience -> Enter the Infinite -> Emrakul -> Untap, draw last card attack for 15 -> Enter the Infinite drawing zero, put something back on top -> Untap, draw last card attack for 15

What is that I am missing here?

You don't even need to EtI again when they sack their meddling mage to emrakul's trigger and you proceed to win the same turn with cunning wish into release the ants then enter the infinite a 12 drop on top.

I want SnT banned more than anyone else, I find the card to be ridiculously stupid to play against. Herp derp I drew 2U, show and tell, FoW + blue card, and griselbrand. Let's put turn 2 griselbrand into play effectively winning the game. This deck is roughly the same thing, put in omniscience, draw my deck with EtI and proceed to instantly win. I hope the deck wrecks the SCG circuit so SnT gets the axe.

[Megadeus]

SnT -> Omniscience -> Enter the Infinite -> Emrakul -> Untap, draw last card attack for 15 -> Enter the Infinite drawing zero, put something back on top -> Untap, draw last card attack for 15

What is that I am missing here?

*facepalm*

Im referencing the BoM list that played 0 Emrakuls.

[Lejay]

The BoM List would probably side in a bounce or Lab maniac.

[Julian23]

Let's just see what happens over the course of the next 2-3 months. I mean, there's not really a point in arguing against Lejay's logic on the base of comparing cards that are good against Omniclash. His point is that despite the abundance of cards that are considered "good" against the deck, the general metagame is currently weak to this deck. The pure existance of cards that can have an impact against a certain kind of deck doesn't mean that said deck can't be overpowered.

So let's just chill out and relax. I for my part would rather not face a combo deck with 4 Pact of Negation and doesn't revolve around a whacky card like Hive Mind.

[Adryan]

I said the deck isn't Hulk flash. What I meant is that it's objectively the best deck, and that if people would start really playing it (like 10% of the players) we would have consistent top8s which would lead to a ban. Since I'd be happier in a S&T-free format I wrote this message to SCG grinders.

EDIT : and I won't respond since there are a lot of misconceptions or mistakes (or stupidities), clearly you didn't playtest.

10 %? Sounds fair that there are many Top 8s when 10 % are playing it^^

[Lejay]

I said 10% because it's what I find to be the max proportion for top decks in a given metagame in Legacy. If there are 10% of players playing it (which is highly probable once people understand it's the best deck overall) and we see a constant 3-4 occurences in each top8, then we can talk about a ban.

[Koby]

I said 10% because it's what I find to be the max proportion for top decks in a given metagame in Legacy. If there are 10% of players playing it (which is highly probable once people understand it's the best deck overall) and we see a constant 3-4 occurences in each top8, then we can talk about a ban.

This is pretty much so far outside of reality it's laughable.

Canadian Threshold sometimes sees 20% in a given tournament, and only shows up 1-2 times in the Top 8.
Likewise with UW/x Stoneblades.

Your assertion is Stephen Menendian-level of laughable at exaggerated numbers.

[Lejay]

Your assertion is Stephen Menendian-level of laughable at exaggerated numbers.

TAKE THAT BACK IMMEDIATLY !!!!

[GradStudentGuy]

Honestly any 12 Sphere mud build eats the deck alive. When all their spells cost mana the deck just sits there.

[Koby]

Honestly any 12 Sphere mud build eats the deck alive. When all their spells cost mana the deck just sits there.

We're discussing Legacy, not Vintage Workshop decks here. There is no successful 12ball Legacy deck even remotely in anyone's radar.

[feline]

Show and Tell is a good setup, if I wasn't so addicted to playing High Tide & I was playing based on the numbers, I'd consider other decks with more of a showing, which definitely includes Show and Tell because it's just stupid good.

If High Tide becomes seriously unfavorable, the decks I would look at would probably be combo or control, so Show and Tell / Ad Nauseam storm type decks are the combo ones I'd consider pushing. Elves is doing good to but for some reason I just can't get into elves, I don't know why. Maybe because out of all the Tribal decks, I like Goblins, because they just keep coming!

[Lejay]

In case you didn't notice, this deck makes High tide quite obsolete.