Another wednesday another 2-2
Match 1 I played versus Grixis Tezzeret
Game 1 i went off pretty fast while he durdled
Game 2 I board in null rod and take out a strix and misdirection. I had seen wasteland G1 so i fetch for island and swamp, then draws into an Underground Sea with 3! decay and the whole combo in hand. Meanwhile he has chalice and ensnaring bridge and the thopter foundry. when he plays sword of the meek i respond with brainstorm and he falls to the trick, i draw into a fetchland and gets my green mana for the the combo. He scoops when emrakul hits the board eventhough I think he could have stayed in the game, making thopters to for anihilator trigger and for blocking and eventually drawing into another bridge. So first game 2-0.
Match 2 I face Elves for the first time ever. I know this guy is a pretty good magican so i think I get a bit intimidated by both him and the match up I'm unfamiliar with.
So G1 he mulls to 5 so I start off with Thoughtseize taking a Natural Order i think. Then he plays glimps of nature T2 which i FOW. It looks pretty good to me and I assemble a Zombie Fish for some preasure. After fowing a natural order: we're both down to one card in hand and he has quite a few elves out. My card is IoK so I play it. He reveals Behemoth, d'oh. Next turn he plays it for the win.
Game 2 I SB in 2 grafdiggers cage, needle, drift of phantasms, Engineered plague and Golgari charm. I take out.. the strixes and misdirect and hand disruption i think. Turns out he SB:ed out natural order since I saved a FOW for it so maybe Grafdiggers cage wasn't as useful after all? Anyway I draw a hand of cantrips, needle, lands and a DRS so I keep. I put the needle on Symbiot thinking that otherwice my abrupt decays will be useless. Perhabs this was bad cause he get to use Ranger to get alot of mana and from there on it's a landslide. I think I might have survived had I drawn the golgari charm cause he draws his entire deck save a few cards and have 20+ elves on the board when he plays Hoof. Gogalri charm would have basically cleared most of the board and the sentinels were summing sick. Better luck next time I guess.
Match 3 my opponent start with probe into cabal therapy so I take it he's on storm. Next turn he plays Satyr wayfinder, so I'm a bit confused. Turns out the plays zombie bombardment.. zombardment? Really fun deck. Unfortunatly for me he draw 2 or even 3 cabal therapy and shreds my hand.
G2 I board in surgical extraction, needle, grafdiggers cage, drift of phanstasms and engineered plague. From last game vs elves I realize that Drift not only finds combo pieces but also finds Plague which is nice. I take out Strixes thinking he's a combo deck and misdirect since he relies on permanents more than "spells". This is probably bad SB:ing but I assemble T3 combo and win.
G3 gets very close because he gets on a beat down plan and I have no blockers. We ends up with me having 2 life, 4 lands and a DRS + needle on Goblin Bombardment on board while he has a Gravecrawler and Satyr wayfinder, a DRS and Bombardment. I have to think a long time for the right play: I have decay, drift of phantasms, food chain in hand plus Griffins in exile. I end up decaying his DRS and playing Drift as a blocker (tapping my own DRS for mana). He attacks and gets me down to 1 then passes the turn. I play Food chain, exile Drift for the Griffins and exiles a creature with DRS to stabilize at 3 life. From there on i take over the game. Very close and fun game. A decay on my needle, for instance, would have ended the game, right there. About the boarding I think i should have taken out FOW and some discard and left in the strixes.
Match 4 begins in the same manner - probe into cabal therapy, and this time it's storm. I have already mulled a no land hand kept a hand with 2 land, 2 fow, cantrip, fate. So when he plays cabal therapy I realize I have to FOW it or he takes both of them. A few turns later he strips the other FOW and goes off with past in flames. I board out 2 empath, emrakul, abrupt decay and some strixes. In comes 2x grafidiggers, 2x null rod, 2x spell pierce and surgical extraction.
Game two he tried the same route but I'm ready to remove the important cards in graveyard with DRS and Surgical.
Game 3 I keep a questionable hand, with vendillion clique and DRS being the only disruption. I draw into Grafdiggers cage and choses to play it instead of vendillion clique turn 2. He goes off without using the graveyard.
So losing against storm was kind of disappointing since I feel pretty good about the match up.
About the sideboard. I've taken out my duress from the SB to run more creature hate. But I'm beginning to wonder if it discard isn't better than counters in this matchup. The Meddling mage option as Holmen suggests sounds kind of good too, except I'm not sure if my weak mana base can cope with another colour, even with Scrubland in SB. I'm also considering taking out Dread of Night. Maybe for a Toxic deluge or another spot removal.
@Holmen How did it go for you, Jesper? I saw you beating fish :) Eldrazi seems ok for us but I also want a SB card too that can kill big beaters. However I think it would be nice if that card would also kill a Griselbrand. Go for the throat doesnt kill Lodestone and Maelstrom is at sorcery speed :/
Managorger seems fun, but being able to sac Empath for mana for griffin is crucial to my deck, that doesn't have Shardless agent as three drop. I'm gonna try agent on Cockatrice once more and see how it goes. I guess I'll just test your entire list. :D
Hi! Harsh meeting both storm and elves for you, they are hard matchups.
Yeah, I beat merfolk game one without much problem as usual – they can't stop the chain. (in all fairness, Merfolk is very good against our removal, on the other hand we don't care about chalice, back to basics or curse catcher which are their prime lock pieces. Their jitte can be problematic since all guys have islandwalk)
Game two i met Hannes on miracles (very good player), we had the craziest finish: He has Jace, top, counterbalance, 3 life, no cards in hand. I have Brainstorm and Emrakul in hand, 2 griffs out, food chain. I attack for lethal, he uses top and in response puts it on top. Reveals terminus, I exile griffs, he rearrange his library. I know his only out is e venser or jace on top to lock me out of griffins, so I safely brainstorm, find empath, gets tasigur, play him for 1 mana, exile both to hardcast Emrakul. Tight!
Game three i meet dark maverick, lose the die roll and draw poorly, lose 2-1. Maverick is hard, they attack on many fronts and usually have marit lage as their own combo finish. Here I usually want to combo fast or lose.
Game four I meet the mirror – fortunately for me, he plays discard over Shardless, so I grind him out easy with greater value and Deathrites 2-0. In the mirror, it's important NOT to be combo deck, since we have a great mirrorgame with the abrupts. Not having the 2/2 beatsticks hurts a lot in this matchup.
3-1 in total.
I play one Murdeorous Cut in main. It brings back griffs, goes around taxing effects (can always cost 1) and kills all.
Originally Posted by JackaBo
@Holmen Yeah, that card is exactly what I want. Do you think submerge is too.. much "tempo play"? Nice to win ramping with the delve guys into Emrakul. That route is usually unexpected.
So, in which match ups do you guys take out FOW? I mean, the general rule of thumb is to sideboard it out versus all fair decks since it's card disadvantage. In this deck, however it isn't necessarily so. I know it depends on what's in the SB to replace it, but I'm guessing we've got pretty similar cards.
For me, the matches i definitely want to keep FOW in are vs storm, reanimator, show and tell and burn
And I generally take it it out versus delver decks, unless they run TNN
But the other matches I'm not sure.
Elves: I'm leaning on keeping it in for glimpse and the bombs
Miracle: I'm leaning on keeping it in for terminus, counterwars over food chain and entreat. I can also see myself FOWing Jace.
Shardless; I'm leaning on keeping it in as well. Hymn is pretty nice to FOW if you got more valuable cards to protect, Visions is actually CA to FOW. And Jace.
Lands: I dont know.. Fowing gamble or exploration is nice I guess. In this matchup we need to stall and FOW kind of does that.
Death and taxes: In this match up I think I want to take it out because of Vial.
Maverick: Probably take it out?
Chalice decks: i dont know, versus MUD i might want to keep it, versus Loam I think it goes out.
Stoneblade decks: Not sure.. maybe keep?
How do you guys do versus different decks?
Hey guys!
I've been testing Food Chain for some weeks and have really liked the deck. Haven't got to play in a tournament yet so testing has been pretty limited, still results are good. Usually I've played blue tempo decks (RUG) but wanted some change with so many Chalices and such rolling around and because this deck feels sweet :)
I like that it can attack from so many different angles and has lots of card advantage and isn't easily disrupted. I think the weaknesses are fast combo decks (at least pre-board unless we get faster hand or FoW is enough) and possibly tempo decks with Daze and Stifle, because our stuff are pretty costly.
From my experience, if we get to mid/late game then we're in favor because so many value cards and the Griffins. At the moment I'm playing with Shardless Agents and also made room for Tarmogoyf because it's nice beater that can grow big in this deck, also it has won me many games in the past ;) Vela the Night-Clad as instant win-con, because I like to win fast and it's in some cases hardcastable.
Regarding Force of Will, I think I would keep it against all the combo-decks, burn, tempo decks, and basically all the decks that want to keep the game short and focus on the early game, excluding aggro decks that play cavern of souls (maybe keep some against merfolk or eldrazi). Also I think I'd keep them or at least some of them against big mana-decks or decks that play high-impact cards (12Post, Stompy decks, Miracles). Against midrange and fair decks, I don't think there's many cards that this deck couldn't handle without the Forces. And when the game is usually won with CA, FoW feels like the card to cut if there's something to bring in. Depends on the situation how to board and what to expect though.
At the moment my sideboard is mostly combo and aggro hate because I feel our fair deck matchups are already pretty good. Against most fair decks I usually sideboard in 2 disfigure (if they play drs/delver/sfm/etc), Umezawa's Jitte and Maelstrom Pulse. Against DnT and Maverick and other "weenie" decks I bring also Engineered plague and Golgari Charm obviously (or Deluge, if you have). For graveyard hate I have 3 Leyline of the Void and against combo 3 Duress and 2 Thoughtseize (could be used in some midrange or control matchups too). I've thought about Meddling Mage, but for now I'm going with the discards.
Still learning and tuning it the way I like. Best is to test yourself for different options, I don't think there's A correct list or sideplan, but this is my experience so far. Let's keep evolving, Peace :)
hello and welcome. just wanted to point out that FOW isn't really losing CA in this deck as much as other decks, because we are usually throwing away griffin and the griffin comes back. so its just a free counterspell sometimes. Also, sometimes 4 force of will isn't the way to go but maybe a 3+1 split with misdirection depending on your meta. misdirection on things like thoughtseze/hymn to tourach/burn spell/maelstrom pulse/abrupt decay are all pretty sick.
Hey,
It's been awhile since I've posted on here, but I've been playing Food Chain for awhile and wanted to share my thoughts.
I picked up the deck right before GP SeaTac as it seemed the perfect call for the meta. I went in with zero byes and ended day 1 at X-2. A mediocre day 2 ended up leaving me in 135th out of 2,012. I've played it a few times here and there in local Seattle tournaments since, but hadn't touched the deck in about two months. I decided to take it for a spin tonight at Card Kingdom's weekly legacy event. Here's the list:
(19) Creatures
4 Misthollow Griffin
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Baleful Strix
2 Fierce Empath
2 Shardless Agent
1 Tombstalker
1 Gurmag Angler
1 Vela the Night-Clad
(22) Non-Creatures
4 Abrupt Decay
3 Manipulate Fate
4 Brainstorm
4 Food Chain
4 Force of Will
1 Sylvan Library
1 Painful Truths
1 Dismember
(20) Lands
4 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Verdant Catacombs
3 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
1 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Island
Sidebaord:
1 Flusterstorm
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Engineered Plague
2 Carpet of Flowers
1 Dread of Night
2 Pithing Needle
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Disfigure
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Thoughtseize
I went 3-1 tonight, beating Burn x2, BUG Nic Fit, and losing a close match to MUD.
Here are some thoughts on my list and why I chose what I did:
4 Griffin
In my opinion the choice to run 4 Griffins impacts this list more than anything else. While I understand why people want to go down to 3, I think the card is surprisingly good on it's own. A 3/3 flier that doesn't die to abrupt decay, swords to plowshares, punishing fire, forked bolt, disfigure, or counsel's judgement can sometimes just win games. Running 4 Griffin makes it just a tad easier to switch into beat down mode while also making you more likely to combo off. Just having Griffin + Food Chain enables a lot of broken things.
2 Shardless Agent
I didn't play Shardless Agent at the GP and I've only recently come around on him in the list. I still don't think you want more than 2, as having multiple in hand feels terrible. I think it's a better 3 drop than Clique and really helps to make your opponent feel like they're on the back foot. I've tried to make my maindeck and sideboard as wiff free as possible to make sure the card is always hitting value.
1 Tombstalker, 1 Gurmag Angler
I ran Tasigur at the GP, however I don't think he's worth it. I rarely found myself appreciating his ability and more often frowning at my opponent's Karakas. Running 1 Tombstalker and 1 Gurmag allows you to tutor the more appropriate one for the situation, however both are fine draws. These two also help to enable the beatdown plan a little better as they are fat and return dead Griffins to exile.
1 Vela the Night-Clad
I'm still deciding how I feel about her vs Emrakul, but she certainly got the job done tonight. I wound up pitching her to force of will in a few clutch moments tonight, a utility Emrakul could never hope to provide. I like that she picks up wins in situations Emrakul can't, but I'm really afraid of my opponents holding up pyroblast or swords for her. I'm going to stick with Vela for now, but Emrakul might be a correct meta choice at times.
1 Sylvan Library, 1 Painful Truths
Instead of ponder, I'm running these two as well as playing 20 lands. Because I'm focusing more on the beatdown plan, I want more pure card advantage than early filtering. Sylvan Library is insane. Enough said. I was impressed with Painful Truths. You can control the life loss when it matters, but more often than not it's a draw three. Going T1 Deathrite, T2 Painful Truths on the play is so strong.
1 Dismember
This is a bit of a meta call, but I also prefer removal not be hit by Shardless agent. Dismember does that while also taking out pesky Eldrazi, Tarmogoyfs, Delvers, and Goblin Guides.
4 Polluted Delta, 4 Misty Rainforest, 1 Verdant Catacombs
20 lands because I'm running 4 Griffin, Painful Truths, and no ponders. Got flooded a few times tonight, but I never really minded because I was doing a lot with the mana. But fetches because I often want basic island for casting Griffin.
2 Bayou, 2 Tropical Island
I'm running an extra Bayou over a fetch and an extra Tropical over an island. I wanted to ensure my Painful Truth would hit 3 with no problems. I want to play the second island, but I also want to cast turn 2 abrupt decays. Life is pain.
Sideboard:
2 Thoughtseize, 1 Flusterstorm
The maindeck is rather soft to combo, so these are the heavy hitters to bring in. A lot of the matchups I board flusterstorm in I'm also boarding out Shardless, so no bad feelings there
1 Umezawa's Jitte, 1 Dread of Night, 1 Disfigure
These allow you to beat up the creature decks pretty well. I don't love disfigure, but it is a necessary evil for all the 1 drops that want to kill you quickly.
2 Carpet of Flowers
Comes in against decks with lots of islands. Very good when you have 4 Griffins to be casting with all the mana.
1 Engineered Plague
The Seattle meta has seen an uptick in Goblins and merfolk, so this is an easy call. It's also very good against Grixis Delver on Human.
2 Relic of Progenitus
I really like this card against goyf/deathrite shaman decks. Lets talk about how sweet this card is. It allows you to chump block every turn by recuring your Griffin. It allows you to shrink their Gofy by removing the Food Chains that have likely wound up in your yard. It allows you to blank their deathrite activation on things your graveyard. It shits on nimble mongoose. Relic also provides your usual grave hate for Reanimator/Storm/Tin Fins/Dredge/etc.
2 Pithing Needle
All around good stuff.
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Very helpful in the grindy matchups
1 Scavenging Ooze
A little extra grave hate that happens to beat down and gain you life. What more could you ask for?
The deck is a blast to play and I think it's still pretty well positioned in the meta. I need to test against eldrazi more to get a feel for the matchup, but overall I think it's a great choice.
I'm playing a Ponder build, but had no difficulty vs. Eldrazi last weekend. To be fair, the player wasn't the most familiar with the deck, but I never really felt under much pressure, even with reality smasher beating down. Decay handles Chalice and Revoker no problem, and you can afford to FoW Thought-Knot Seer to protect your Food Chains in hand.
Trample ends up being your biggest problem, because you can't just perma-block Reality Smasher. Everything else is a breeze.
@Arbiter and Movingtonewao: Yeah maybe I take it out to often. Taking one or two out vs fair decks may be right - depending on what comes in of course. Since I play discard there's also a balance between taking out counters or discard, and weather I'm on the play or draw. I've been playing 3+1 FOW/Misdirect but will be moving over to 4 FOW. Misdirect have been awesome occasionally, but sometimes I've just regretted it wasn't FOW.
@JonBarber: Nice list! I like how everyone have their own take on the numbers and "flexspots". The beatdown plan is usually what ends up happening so sounds good focusing on it.
@Cambriel: I've been running a 4 ponder build as well and like it so far. However if the meta turns into more chalice of the void i think I would like less cantrips and more action. Maybe go down to 2 ponder and up one land and a mainboard pulse. Did you feel too "cantrippy" playing vs chalice?
I never allowed it to resolve unless I was holding a Decay, so Chalice never felt like a problem. I freely admit, however, that I'm very new to this deck archetype and my experiences are only anecdotal.
I'm considering shaving a single Ponder, because I do feel cantrip heavy sometimes. The issue becomes what goes in its place. I'm playing 20 creatures / 22 spells / 18 lands right now, with Shardless Agent and Ponder feeling like the weakest links. I may try pulling those for maindeck discard effects and either a Library or or Misdirection.
I'll just make a quick report on last legacy event. Again I went 2-2. I dont feel bad about it, as I'm still learning this deck. I'm even glad I can compete with 50% ratio.
Game 1 versus same Elves player as I lost 0-2 to, the wednesday before. I lost 0-2 again. But it was pretty close. I had learnt a few things since last time. In G2 Elves tend to weaken their combo potential bringing in decay and other cards to fight through hate. Last time my opponent did SB out Natural order and went on a beatdown plan. I did not sideboard in Grafdiggers cage for this reason, and kept misdirect in (which is a dead card in game 1, but is nice versus decay). I switched out one fow, one strix, duress and therapy and in came Golgari charm, Engineered plague, Submerge and Diabolic edict. My low land count kept me on 2 lands and DRS kept in check from opposing DRS + Ranger. More land drops and I might have taken a game.
Game 2 playing against a budget (unfinished) POX deck. 2-1
He didnt have wasteland nor liliana. And with no wastelands he played Sink hole in SB - good for me! Game 1 I mulled to five and got hit by hymn. G2 I was in trouble but managed to stabilize a DRS gaining life and Grffins to beatdown. G3 I assembled the combo. SB:ing was hard in this matchup. I knew he ran Zombie Fish of his own so i didn't wanna take out Strix. He had Bottomless Pit instead of Liliana so I didn't wanna SB out Decay. I didn't wanna SB out FOW or misdirect since because of hymn. I ended up weakening my combo to fit my 2 spell pierces. Worked out great. Unifinished deck is unfinished deck though: Liliana, Wastelands and Sinkohle would have been more scary.
Game 3 versus Jund. 2-0
Game 1 he decays my Food chain mid combo, with Empath on the stack. I fetches my second angler with one already in play. Game 2 i beat down with griffins, saving my food chain from Decay using a Misdirect. Felt much easier than I expected, since I fear both Hymn and P.fire. I sideboarded in my Surgical extraction, Submerge and Diabolic Edict. Out came Clique, Duress and Therapy.
Game 4 versus Eldrazi 0-2. Game 1 I defended myself well with strix and finally stabilized with 4 mana and 3 griffins in exile. Unfortunatly I made the mistake to attack with one Griffin of my two griffins on board versus his lone Mimic and four mana sources. He draws land an in comes Smasher. I had to block, and since I couldnt double block I couldnt stabilize. G2 I drew no action and got overrun. In game 1 I had no mana problems but in Game 2 my weak Mana base punished me (again).
So I've decided to up the land-count by 2.
I'm thinking of adding 2 fetches or 1 fetch and one more dual. I'm pretty sure I want to cut one ponder, because often I ponder for lands and I would rather have a land in that spot. The other spot is harder.
- I could take out one discard but I think that 3 discard feels a little weird. I almost rather run 2 than 3 discard for some reason. I guess therapy is the first discard to go?
- I could also take out one Zombie Fish (I'm running two) but I feel that playing the first for preasure and saving the other to delve dead Griffins is nice. Also double Anglers on board is hard for many decks to deal with.
- I guess Vendillion clique is also a flex spot, but I need my third 3 drop creature and it fits well into the discard theme of the deck, making Therapy better.
- I guess I could cut a second ponder.
How would you guys go about it?
I have also thought about testing 2 shardless agents, partly because I lose alot of life to small creatures attacking and another body on the field would be nice. Against non-aggro deck I sometimes feels like I would want a better clock than Baleful Strix beatdown, and Shardless is twice as good a clock. I also feel like cascading into discrad spells versus combo and controll is damn nice. problem is.. what to cut?
Hi! Rough with the 2-2 again :/
I like that you are sliding into the shardless route :) So much value! One of my most regular combowins are Agent, next turn chain. Most people don't want to kill agent since it has given us value already, which is the perfect start of a chain. Also goes around Canonist which is relevant many games: since it's an artifact you get to play what you cascade in to.
I also like the plan to up your land count, 19 is a fine number if you play agents.
I feel one Angler is plenty, the Murderous Cut as a second enabler for delve has been great.
I had another 3-1:
2-0 against helmcombo, easy games
2-1 against infect: I boarded out all my combo game 2-3, won on the back of infinite removal
2-0 against aggroloam: We remove eachothers stuff for X turns, when we both are out of cards I start jamming one griff a turn from exile.
0-2 against Elves: poor draws, hard matchup, not much dedication in my board. I'm going to commit something more in the board against the deck. Kind of interested in a red splash in board for Sharpshooter, Kozilek's Return or Staticaster. Or just an Elesh Norn to combo out through an Angler.
I will actually consider elves a difficult matchup. In a way they are very similar to us, they are ok playing the grinding game, and they also have a combo finish, but their combo is faster than us. The thing is that after sideboard it can get pretty nasty with their reclamation sages. If you have discard in your opening hand it helps, but even then its still difficult. Definitely one i try to avoid if i can.
Golgari Charm and Engineered Plague both help, but it isn't perfect. Ultimately they just flood the board with little dudes that can nickel and dime you to death while you're holding mana up to defend against hoof.
this is correct. if the elves player knows what they are doing, it will be rough, and i don't see the point of preparing more sideboard cards for what i consider a rare matchup, unless you have a local meta full of elves.
Agreed, it's one of our hardest matches. I will try one NoSB instead of plague in board along with one Elesh Norn. I like a second fatty in board and 8 mana is very easy to chain out without griffins. I will also switch one disfigure for one darkblast. Minor changes but might prove relevant.
With ~8 mana bombs carpet of flowers become a better SB card. hard to find the space though. As I said I've been testing with a Griselbrand in my 75 and angler into griselbrand or carpet into griselbrand is actually feasible. Norn is of course awesome both in offense and defense. The only issue I have is that more bombs make more starting hands bad. If only mana drain were unbanned :)
I'm not quite there yet :) But I have been seeing the discard spells' problem more and more, topdecking duress can be really bad in a lot of matchups. And now if Eldrazi "chases away" both storm and miracle I guess discard becomes even worse. I'm not even sure if the meta will shift at all in our little stockholm metagame, though. People will play what deck they have, right? i'm gonna take baby steps with my configuration: On Wednesday I plan start with one less ponder and one more catacomb. Moving towards only black fethclands sounds like a good idea. I usually also fetch swamp T1.
I'm curious about your current list, Movingtonewao, since you both advocate discard and shardless, if I'm not mistaken. Have you found room for some number of both? If I move away from discard maindeck I would certainly want to dedicate more of the board towards combo. Do you guys feel your sideboard makes G2 and G3 favorable versus storm? As it is now I run 8 relevant cards maindeck (4 discard, 4 FOW) besides DRS which is somewhat relevant. I can board in up to 7 cards versus storm with my current sideboard (2 spell pierce, 2 null rod, 2 grafdiggers cage, 1 surgical extraction). Maybe I have too much storm hate between maindeck and sideboard?
Howdy All,
Been messing around with food chain and was finally able to finish the deck recently. This is the list I threw together for 2-2 finish, in what was a very strange meta, so I wont go through a report (spoiler played dredge 2x and R/W stompy once...yuck..)
Anyway here is my list:
4 Drs
4 Griffin
4 Strix
2 Empath
1 Angler
1 Tombstalker
1 Clique
1 Tidespout
4 Brainstorm
4 Decay
4 FoW
4 Food Chain
3 Manipulate Fate
1 Sylvan Library
1 Ponder
1 Thoughtseize
1 Duress
4 Misty
4 Delta
2 Verdant
3 U-Sea
2 Trop
1 Bayou
1 Swamp
1 Island
1 Forest
SB:
1 Engineered Plague
1 Scooze
1 Duress
1 Thoughtseize
1 Null Rod
2 Relic of P
2 Flusterstorm
1 Disfigure
1 Golgari Charm
1 Murderous Cut
2 Carpet of Flowers
1 Jitte
Granted I don't have too many reps with this list, but here are my initial thoughts. The beatdown plan felt strong with the griffins, but I did wish a times for more ponders as sometimes I would have a food chain (or 2) in hand, and wished that I would have a ponder to look more for the other part of the combo. 19 Lands felt ok, I might cut a fetch to add in a second ponder, but there is some tension with having a deck that can get some clunky draws, necessitating more lands, but also wanting more cantrips to search for the combo cards. I actually found myself siding out some lands vs combo, as I would also take out most of my combo, which helped free up some slots in those match-ups.
I've also had thoughts of going down to 3 food chains as having 2 in hand feels bad at times, although I did win some games by forcing the opponents abrupt decay on the first food chain, only to untap and combo them with the 2nd.
Love the clique, as I was able to play it on their end-step, to clear the way then untap, play a food chain, then combo out with exiling the clique. Wish I could go to 2 MD, but there really just isnt room.
I really like the 2 maindeck discard. It seems like a solid number, as I've used it much more to clear the way pre-combo, vs a control piece that it seems like Eli's build pushes it in.
With 3 delve cards post board, it felt kinda heavy on delve. Probably also a side effect of the matchups that I wanted angler and Tombstalker in I also wanted the cut in. Might change the cut to a dismember in the board.
Going to be trying out the deck with an emrakul soon, just didnt have access to one when I played before. Granted tidespout got a concession every time it hit the table, and is actually just be hard cast off carpet or even food chain + an angler which gives it some great non-combo value vs emrakul.
The sylvan library is obviously a house when it sticks, but seemed strictly worse vs ponder as in some games it just folded to an abrupt decay. Still undecided about this slot.
Haven't tried out the shardless route, but I feel with the Griffins the deck can grind pretty hard anyway. Also having your manipulate fate FoW'ed is prolly one of the sweetest feelings.
Thoughts?
@Ltj999: I like the 4 griffin build, even if I haven't ventured there myself. Wouldn't it be nice with misdirect when you run four Griffins? I'm also undecided on library - the games I tend to lose is because I don't have enough time - and in those cases ponder is way faster than sylvan. I run 4 discard and are having trouble reducing them. I feel like they are strongest in the opening hand and worse as topdecks, so four increases the chance of T1 or T2 discard but also increases the chance of bad topdecks later on...
So last wednesday didn't go too well. I decided to to go down to 3 ponder and up to 18 lands. My plan was adding verdant catacombs, but I didnt get hold of any so I threw in a fourth USea.
G1 versus merfolk (again). Both games were close,but both games were lost to unblockable fishes and nice topdecks on his side. More blue duals vs less fetch kind of hurt, cause I was seriously planning on fetching swamp,forest and bayou and rely on DRS for blue source initally. I boarded in carpet (to further enhance that plan), engineered plague and golgari charm. Took out duress, one FOW, Usea and clique.
G2 versus Food chain :P So mirror match is pretty bizarre. We both ran the Eli Cassis list, basically, his a bit more exact than mine. Both games were strixes staring down on each other. So the game 1 was his due to CA of resolving Manipoulate fate and start summoning Griffins. Game 2 were a stalemate where he drew combo finnish before me. We both boarded carpet, but he boarded in sylvan while I boarded in golgari charm. I took out a land since he didnt run waste and I ran 2 carpets. So 0-2.
G3 versus Grixis delver. He won the dice roll and that kind of decided the outcome. Game one he mulled to 6 but had doubble delver + daze + bolt. Couldn't handle that. Game 2 i beat him down with griffins, boarded in diabolic edict (which was stupid versus pyromancer deck), engineered plague ,golgari charm and carpets. Out came thoughtseize (dont wanna take 2 damage unecesarily) 2 FOW, Clique and a ponder. Game 2 I stumble on 2 mana with a grip full of 3+ drops (including the combo). I even diabolic edicted versus Pyro tokens just to fill my grave for a Zombiefish. So 1-2.
G4 i finally got some redemption. I faced of a home-brewed UR miracle build, with bolts instead of plows and bonfire instead of terminus.Felt like he never had an answer to anything. Game 1 I beat down with a griffin and a clique. Game 2 I won with a single Angler.
So,once again I felt the discard were really good. I got some nice picks in TNN and bonfire of the damned and even struck two tidal couriers with cabal therapy. So for now,the discard is staying.I'm definitly going up to 4 catacombs though as T1 swamp is really nice with 8 black one-drops.I think I'm going to cut edict - it's been mostly disappointing. Replacing it with murderous cut probably which seems like the best black removal. I have been thinking of shriekmaw.. but maybe it's too cute.
Hi.
(Sorry for my English)
This past weekend I made Semifinals in a 30 player tournament with JonBarber's list with some small changes.
http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=19835&iddeck=151061
(19) Creatures
4 Misthollow Griffin
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Baleful Strix
2 Fierce Empath
2 Shardless Agent
1 Tombstalker
1 Gurmag Angler
1 Emrakul the aeon's thorn
(22) Non-Creatures
4 Abrupt Decay
3 Manipulate Fate
4 Brainstorm
4 Food Chain
4 Force of Will
1 Sylvan Library
1 Painful Truths
1 Dismember
(20) Lands
4 Polluted Delta
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Verdant Catacombs
3 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
1 Swamp
1 Forest
2 Island
Sidebaord:
2 Flusterstorm
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Carpet of Flowers
1 Toxic deluge
2 Pithing Needle
1 Painful Truths
1 Disfigure
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Thoughtseize
JonBarber's list contained 19 lands, but he said he played 20 lands. I decided to ad a second Island and play 61 cards in the maindeck. This second Island gave me the game against Lands in cuarterfinals.
My pairings were:
R1 Eva Green 2-1
R2 Team America 2-1
R3 Eldrazi Stompy 2-1
R4 BG Depths ID
R5 Imperial Painters ID
Quartefinals Lands 2-0
Semifinals Team America 1-2
I side out the combo (4x Food chain + 1x Emrakul) vs Eva Green and Team America. They have Abrupt decay plus sideboard cards against our enchantment and we can't defend with force of will. Sometimes I played Misdirection, but in this version the maindeck is very tight.
I like a lot delve creatures. Before I refused to play them, but I have really enjoyed.
I think the match against combo is a bit risky, We don't have enough cards against them.
Regards.
So this is probably nothing new but really want to recommend Null Rod as sidebaordcard. I have ran 2 null rods in my sideboard and it's an excellent sideboard cards versus a bunch of match-ups, including storm which can be a tough match up. Running discard, counters and permanent disruption is very taxing on their post board configuration. Like, boarding in both xanthrid swarm and decay either reduces combo-pieces or the number of discard they they run - great for us. Of course, Null Rod comes in versus Stoneblade, Death and taxes and Maverick (to fight equipment), miracle (to fight sensei) and can also be brought in versus i.e. Twelvepost (sensei and expedition map), Tezzeret (thopter foundry, mana rocks) and MUD (metalworker, monolith, forgemaster) ect ect. A great utility card.
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