Hi,
At a small tournament I played a version of similar to Sandro Campigotto version that I found at Deck Check..
http://www.deckcheck.net//deck.php?id=19265
When this combo goes of off, I can draw my deck and make my creatures infinitely huge, and gain infinite life. Goldfishing I have gone off on turn 2, in a tournament I have gone off on turn three.
creatures [38]:
4 Fyndhorn Elves
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
3 Multani's Acolyte
3 Nettle Sentinel
4 Priest of Titania
4 Quirion Ranger
1 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
2 Sylvan Messenger
2 Timberwatch Elf
3 Viridian Zealot
4 Wirewood Symbiote
sorcery [4]
4 Glimpse of Nature
enchantment [3]
3 Concordant Crossroads
artifact [2]
2 Staff of Domination
land [13]
7 Forest
3 Windswept Heath
3 Wooded Foothills
-----
I didn't use any Fetches and played two Gaea's Cradle. (Probably a mistake.) I found that Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary wasn't that good in this deck.. I didn't tap it for more than three mana and he usually only provides two mana.
I really liked these cards.. Multani's Acolyte and Nettle Sentinel and would like to max them out. Multani with Wirewood Symbiote provide an excellent blocker. Nettle Sentinel and Heritage Druid is a pretty broken combo.
Most players scooped once I had Staff of Domination in play, so I reduced the number of Concordant Crossroads in the deck and added a Staff.
There is a new card from Shards of Alara that could go in this deck
Elvish Visionary 1G
Creature - Elf Shaman
When Elvish Visionary comes into play, draw a card.
1/1
I cut Viridian Zealot, it seemed pretty mana intensive for what it does.
Here is what I'm currently Goldfishing:
creature [38]
4 Fyndhorn Elves
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Multani's Acolyte
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Priest of Titania
4 Quirion Ranger
2 Sylvan Messenger
2 Timberwatch Elf
3 Elvish Visionary
4 Wirewood Symbiote
sorcery [4]
4 Glimpse of Nature
enchantment [3]
2 Concordant Crossroads
artifact [2]
3 Staff of Domination
land [13]
7 Forest
1 Gaea's Cradle
2 Windswept Heath
3 Wooded Foothills
I do not feel the Heritage Druid combo is the right idea. The deck relies on having 3 sentinels in play to work correctlly. rely on the following:
4 LLanowar
4 Fyndhorn
4 Priest of Titania
1 Rofellos
As far as defensive measures I would run the following
4 Imperious Perfect (Infinite Elves)
2-3 Elvish Champion
2-3 Wilt-Leaf Liege
Beaters
Talaria Batalion
Sylvan Messanger (this is a bit tricky becasue of the high percentage of non elf cards in the deck)
Wren's Run Vanquisher (as long as there are other elves in the deck.)
Wren's Run Packmaster (infinite wolves with deathtouch)
Taunting elves
The return of a Legend(in his own words)
Not sure if I agree with you on some of the card choices. The elves you listed are all more suited for an offensive style deck, and taking out mana producing pieces isn't going to help you power out elves like the current version of the deck can.Originally Posted by insertnamehere
The real question is: is this deck better than elf aggro? If it is, then is it better than any other combo deck for whatever reason?
Just a thought. I like the list and the concept, but even with the plausible finishes...just how good exactly is this deck?
Please note "They are suggestions" I have run almost the same deck for the last two years with plenty of top 8 finishes
The return of a Legend(in his own words)
Seeing as multiple versions of this deck just top 8ed the pt, seeing interesting.
http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazin...tber08/t8decks
So, the base of the deck looks like this:
16-17 Land
4 Birchlore Rangers
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Glimpse of Nature
Some number of Summoner's Pact/Chords of calling/Weird Harvest
Fyndhorn elves seem awesome in here. As does Viridian Shaman, seeing as chalice for 1 is way more popular in t1.5. Finally, Elvish spirit guide seems really exciting. Especially with Weird Harvest.
Things I don't think work well in this deck are elvish mainstays like priest of titania, rofellos or sylvan messenger.
The jury's still out on cradle. It just hasn't come up in enough games to swing it's weight one way or the other. The land situation in general is awkward, because the deck only really needs green mana to function. Black is the popular option, although that is likely partially because gilt-leaf palace makes it pretty painless in extended. It's probably possible to shave it down to 15 with 4 spirit guides, but then I really don't see how you are using cradle, or many non-basics. Too risky blood moon, wasteland, or dumb luck just hose you.
I really like Grapeshot as the win condition, as it does so many things well without running into common hate.
Last edited by Wobbles The Goose; 11-02-2008 at 03:37 AM.
I'm building something similar for fun and in my list I consider as an auto include Imperious Perfect and Elvish Harbinger.
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Windswept Heath
2 Bayou
1 Savannah
4 Forest
2 Gaea's Cradle
4 Birchlore Rangers
4 Elves of the Deep Shadow
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Heritage Druid
2 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
1 Regal Force
1 Eternal Witness
4 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Glimpse of Nature
4 Summoner's Pact
2 Weird Harvest
1 Gaea's Herald
1 Orim's Chant
4 Thoughtseize
Sideboard
4 Viridian Shaman
1 Gaea's Herald
3 Elvish Champion
1 Forest
3 Wrap in Vigor
3 Umezawa's Jitte
So good. I'd recommend tournament coverage from PT Berlin for how to pilot the deck, including the turn 2 kills.
Cradle is insane assuming it isn't your only land. Makes it way easier to clock by turn 3, as do the ESGs.
Weird Harvest totally seals the game, but you dig fast enough that you don't really need more than 2.
This deck is awesome.
edit:
Decklist updated Nov 11th. I now prefer the "thoughtseize, pass the turn, chant you, pass the turn, attack" win condition rather than grapeshot or a dragon. I go into that more later in the thread. The original list had Elvish spirit guides. They were really good, allowing a turn 2-3 clock, with 2 happening once in every five or six games. This deck as it stands is more turn 3-4.
The sideboard undergoes constant revision.
Last edited by Wobbles The Goose; 11-11-2008 at 04:08 PM.
During my testing with the deck Wobbles posted I was able to power out my deck with just Birchlore Ranger and Nettle Sentinel on the field. I glimpsed and went nuts until i found another Nettle Sentinel that made any color mana practically free. The engine is so quick and can play the aggro role really easily if you run Wirewood Hivemaster.
This is the list I am currently testing:
// Lands
4 [UNH] Forest
3 [B] Bayou
2 [JGC] Gaea's Cradle
4 [ON] Windswept Heath
// Creatures
1 [EVE] Regal Force
4 [EVE] Nettle Sentinel
2 [ON] Birchlore Rangers
4 [FNM] Llanowar Elves
4 [MOR] Heritage Druid
4 [FNM] Elves of Deep Shadow
4 [SC] Wirewood Symbiote
3 [LE] Wirewood Hivemaster
2 [DS] Viridian Zealot
// Spells
2 [RAV] Chord of Calling
2 [SC] Tendrils of Agony
4 [CHK] Glimpse of Nature
4 [MR] Chrome Mox
2 [FUT] Summoner's Pact
2 [ON] Weird Harvest
3 [UL] Crop Rotation
// Sideboard
SB: 4 [GP] Leyline of the Void
SB: 4 [LRW] Thoughtseize
SB: 4 [TSP] Krosan Grip
SB: 3 [10E] Viridian Shaman
Crop Rotation sacrificing a tapped Gaea's Cradle for another Gaea's Cradle or a Bayou for the black mana to cast Tendrils is amazing. This deck is the real deal when it comes to insanely fun and powerful at the same time.
Last edited by rockout; 11-02-2008 at 02:15 PM. Reason: The =/= I
Co-Founder of Team Awesome - I heard Randy Buehler say a while back that good players give themselves the most number of turns to find the answer.
The Source on MTGO - Predator8785 and RockOut
@rockout
How often do you find yourself whiffing while going off? I'd be worried that your build relies really heavily on Glimpse of Nature resolving, because you aren't running Visionary and Chrome Mox is basically like mulliganing. It might explain your preference for tendrils over grapeshot, because when I'm going off I don't have any problem ramping to sufficiently high storm counts. Visionary+ Symbiote is just awesome.
Hivemaster is awesome with chords of calling, but probably bit slower on the whole. I would definitely try out one of the creature win conditions if you are going to use him (mirror entity or predator dragon) because you can fetch them with chords and just focus on that. Weird Harvest and Chords really represent two different modes of attack. Personally I love Harvest with ESG, have you tried them?
Zealot is an interesting choice. I don't like him because there are so few enchantments I care about game one, and he doesn't kill engineered plague game 2. Plus I like my guys to stay around.
Elves of Deep Shadow is interesting, but I find the green mana is so much more important with Fyndhorn, and turn 2 thoughseize not that important. I can seem them being important with Tendrils, but I'm not sold on Tendrils.
Crop Rotation is great. I don't know what I want to cut for it though, because I don't often run out of mana as often as I run out of cards when fighting against force of will. Forcing Glimpse is such a pain. Plus, I'd be worried about fizzling because you draw crop and lands or something.
When I do "whiff," I still put a significant amount of elves into play, in addition, insect tokens from Wirewood Hivemaster that I can easily swing for the win next turn.
My plan was to add Mirror Entity so I could have an instant cast out to say Pyroclasm or something similar. I haven't tested either, but it may be fall under too cool tech.
I do agree with you in regards to Zealot. I'm going to run Viridian Shaman instead.
Elves of Deep Shadow was a 1 cc elf that produced mana. Also, on MWS I have hi-res scan pictures and Elves of Deep Shadow FNM look sexier than Fyndhorn Elves. If I ever brought this to a tournament, I'd obviously run Fyndhorn Elves.
Elvish Visionary just doesn't do anything that Weird Harvest or Call of Cording do better. Find you your engine. Just recently, I remember EOTing a Call of Cording for Regal Force on my opponents turn 4 and proceeding to combo off. Regal Force allows you to draw so many cards that it with Cord of Calling have to be combined. I run a lot less lands than you do. I have a tendacy to draw 4-5+ elves in a row off a single glimpse run which allows me to continue going.
Most games I don't cast Chrome Mox. So that can probably be replaced with something. The main reason I'm running Chrome Mox is I just run a really low land count. Is ESG better than Chrome Mox? -1 Card for reusuable mana versus a 1 time 1 shot deal mana source. I don't think ESG is good enough, but it can be Weird Harvested for so I'll have to try it.
Cards I've considered testing/tested:
Gaea's Herald - It's an Elf. Maybe it'll be good.
Rofellos - No Haste = fail.
Cordant Crossroads - Don't need haste with the engine I run.
Cameleon Colossus - If you want to run Cordant Crossroads, he will swing for the win the turn he hits.
Mirror Entity - If you want to protect your guys g2 and g3 from pyroclasm, but only really good with Cord of Calling.
Any other comments would be greatly appreciated. I have way too much fun playing this deck.
Last edited by rockout; 11-02-2008 at 04:06 PM. Reason: Forgot to answer the question of ESG
Co-Founder of Team Awesome - I heard Randy Buehler say a while back that good players give themselves the most number of turns to find the answer.
The Source on MTGO - Predator8785 and RockOut
Mirror entity does a lot of things: http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazin...e/ptber08/fm11
"Wirewood Hivemaster followed, and with an activation of Wirewood Symbiote he renewed his Nettle Sentinels by replaying a Heritage Druid. After about six more Elves, Doise had 45 life, six insect tokens, 14 green mana, and an army of the little green people. He activated Mirror Entity for 1 to make the Insects into Elves, and then tapped them for mana and used Entity with X = 20 to attack with an army of one gigantic 20/20 Heritage Druid."
I tried Chrome Mox and really didn't like them. They make it seem like you are playing less land, but consider you are playing 13 land + 4 Chrome Mox, while I am playing 17 land. ESG provides the extra boost of mana when you are comboing off, or it is just a free cantrip if you are digging. Combine that with the ability to find it with Pact and you've got an amazing card.
On Visionary. I really like visionary. He makes it so much easier to win through a force of will, because banking on a single weird harvest or chord of calling to resolve won't work once your opponent knows what's happening. Meanwhile, Visionary can often cheaply bait a counterspell or just chain into one another for the win.
I really recommend reading the PT coverage. Lots of cool insight about the deck.
Last edited by Wobbles The Goose; 11-04-2008 at 05:19 AM.
Essense Warden seems good. It builds you enough life to have time to recover if you get wrathed. Apparently Mirror Entity is really good. I forgot it makes everything an elf.
@Wobbles: Let me know what changes you made to your deck so far.
Co-Founder of Team Awesome - I heard Randy Buehler say a while back that good players give themselves the most number of turns to find the answer.
The Source on MTGO - Predator8785 and RockOut
I've also been following the PT coverage, and this deck is absolutely absurd in Extended. However, the there are a few key differences:
- prevalence of Force of Will/Counterbalance/Chalice
- prevalence of sweepers such as EE and Deed
- existence of faster combo
In light of those differences, I think it's pretty crucial to run disruption in the maindeck. While that slows down the combo somewhat, it doesn't hamper you too much. LSV double Thoughtseized and won on turn 3. In Extended. In Legacy, we can do that, and better.
Anyways, Wobbles, your list looks awesome. Have you considered maindeck Thoughtseizes? Maybe replacing some number of ESGs?
EDIT: Chant might be solid too. And it would allow for Horizon Canopy, which seems good. Gaddock Teeg/Ethersworn Canonist also.
Chalice, trinisphere, devastating dreams, cannonist and counterbalance are the big problems. The others really aren't as scary as you might think, especially with how little force causes you to stumble. Deed and EE are slow answers, but obviously problematic if they can slow you down long enough with force of wills. But they really aren't even in the same league as cards like Counterbalance or Chalice. Your best hope is really that they don't mulligan agressively to find those cards game one, then in games two and three you can board in answers. Having a Gaea's Herald maindeck helps a lot, just in general. See above for my current build
This deck seems really strong, and a defensible metagame choice if you are planning on facing Threshold, Landstill, Dredge, Aggro, Survival, and Goblins. At the very least, this deck doesn't quite crumble to trinisphere like most storm combo does, if only because you can still keep plopping out creatures and race. Also, bringing in 4 thorns does awesome things for your combo matches. Much better than thoughtseize.
On splashing white. Those are very good cards, I just don't know about their place in the deck. Frankly, Magus of the Moon is such a pain, I just want to go mono-green. No reason to be throwing away game 1 because you might want to bring in thoughseize. Especially because your thorn package really helps against the combo you would be fighting with the thoughseizes anyway. Canonist basically hoses you, and the merits of Chant v City of solitude are debatable. I really like Gaea's Herald out of the board, it's your one stop shop for all sorts of answers. I also like to transform into Mycoloth/jitte.dec because it demands really different answers.
After playing around with it some more, I think you're right. Thorn is really good, especially when you can drop it turn 1 off ESG. I'm not sure if going mono-green is the best route, since you have 5 basics plus mana-elves against Blood Moon, but it probably doesn't matter too much. I'm also liking Gaea's Herald in the main (with more in the board). Good call.
Yeah, overall, the deck is really strong. It's ridiculously fast. I'm goldfishing turn 2 and 3 consistently, and can kill turn 4 when I fizzle.
This deck really is pretty awesome.
Just for reference, here are all the sideboard cards run in all of the top8 Elf variants:
Burrenton Forge-Tender
Ethersworn Cannonist
Gaddock Teeg
Orzhov Pontiff
Tar Fiend
Viridian Shaman
Voidstone Gargoyle
Naturalize
Thorn of Amethyst
Umezawa's Jitte
Blasting Station
Fecundity
Gleeful Sabotage
Goblin Sharpshooter
Thoughtseize
Seal of Primordium
Brain Freeze
Sundering Titan
Choke
Mycoloth
Nullmage Shepherd
Viridian Shaman
Pendelhaven
Note that a large portion of these cards are creature tutor targets as well as cards with convoke or conspire casting costs, tap creature to use effects, as well as devour.
Beyond the board, I think I might do a rundown of the cards that I think should be swapped out for Legacy-powered counterparts, as well as what should stay and what should go.
The sideboard is probably going to be geared towards your metagame and your precise build of the deck. Specifically if you are splashing a color, running 4 elvish spirit guides, and if you have hate cards in the main.
For example, I really like Gaea's Herald, both for the main and the sb. It's a versatile answer for some of the biggest threats in the deck: chalice for 1 and counterbalance.
Also, Extended builds never have to deal with an engineered plague, which is a brutal card. Reverent Silence, Wickerbow Elder, Imperious Perfect/Elvish Champion/Wilt-leaf liege, or any of the other numerous cards that destroy enchantments are obvious answers. The lords are particularly cute answers, because they also allow a transformation into a more typical beat down deck out of the board. Engineered plague doesn't see enough play right now to really justify maindeck inclusion of a Champion, but your meta may very. Black aggro Eva green and whatnot, hate to see WL Liege. And that is going to be the common matchup bringing in e plagues against you.
Thorn of Amethyst- great card. Especially with 4 Elvish Spirit guides, these seem like your best answer to combo. Other possible green combo answers would be maybe guttural response, faerie maccabre, tormod's crypt, wheel of the sun and the moon (I like this card), leyline or your own chalices for 0. Really the best combo answers are probably in other colors, like orim's chant, stifle, thoughseize, cabal therapy, or gaddock teeg. Just remember that the deck can be just as fast when it wants to be, especially with ESG.
Transformation- one of the keys to LSV's success was his sideboard plan of 4 jitte and 1 mycoloth. It allowed him to basically transform into a neo-secret force deck games 2 and 3. Obviously, this is tempting against things like tmwa, burn, goblins and certain builds of zoo. I'm not sure if 4 jitte is the best answer (you don't typically have to win a jitte war against these decks, but I could be wrong), but the idea is still important.
Of the splash options, black is the most interesting. Discard is great for all sorts of matchups, both to slow down combo and force through against control. White is up there, mostly for chant. Unfortunately, chant doesn't do much against counterbalance, while an early duress/therepy/seize has potential in that area.
Something to consider. I don't see many merits in a blue or red splash, maybe other people do?
Edit:
Current SB, for those interested
Sideboard
1 Windswept Heath
4 Thorn of Amethyst
4 Thoughtseize
2 Viridian Shaman
1 Gaea's Herald
3 Wilt-leaf Liege
Last edited by Wobbles The Goose; 11-04-2008 at 02:18 PM. Reason: current sb
Yea I don't think we need red or blue splashed. B or W seem to handle our problems fine, and there are enough mono-G answers in elf-form. The one thing I would say about going G/B and not running Grapeshot is that Grapeshot plays around Teeg, and is probably the sole reason why LSV used the card over Tendrils.
The thing about plague in general is that I don't really see it anymore anyways. can't think of a popular list that includes plague in the board, and even if they did it'd be a rare chance that you'll run into it. I honestly like Grip out of the board since it answers almost all problems without worry, including Counterbalance.
I actually like Dragon/Mirror Entity elves more because of Wirewood Hivemaster and Chord of Calling. I think both versions are viable, but I just like the idea of having a solid swarm plan ontop of being able to use tokens and convoke for the win. Hivemaster is just insane in here. The problem is the list is super-tight, and one of the only things I can think of adding are Gaea's Cradles. It's also possible, though, that cards like Predator Dragon and Mirror Entity are more vulnerable because they are creatures.
Any suggestions for beefing up the list with Legacy parts? I really just want to have a MD disruption card like Thoughtseize so that if I know I'm playing against instant speed removal and/or counterspells that I can go off or Chord+Dragon and devour my board without worries.
Also, more than most of the time I don't understand why I would need Regal Force in the Dragon version, because to Chord for Regal costs 10 and to Chord for Dragon costs 9...and if you're casting Chord you probably have enough creatures to just kill right then and there. I dunno, just an observation.
Teeg is one reason. Another is that LSV played an eternal witness, so that he could use the grapeshot in the early game to buy time (especially in the mirror) and still kill with it. I'm rarely having problems reaching a sufficient storm count, so I'm not sold on it.
@plague
It's scary. It depends on your metagame, but so many established decks can run it. Decks like eva green, deadguy and red death are just horrible matchups. I seriously doubt that this deck can win those matchups without considerable luck. It's so bad, that it might not be worth the slots. Krosan Grip I'm still doubtful of. Grip presents a speed bump in the combo, can't be tutored for, and is still a slow answer. Depends on your metagame, for sure.
@Dragon/Mirror Entity/Hivemaster
Same engine, different decks. I haven't spent as much time testing those builds, so I can't speak to the relative strengths. GP results suggest that the grapeshot build was faster in extended, and that speed has been reinforced by the legacy additions. I mean, this deck swarms pretty well reguardless, so I'm not sure how important hivemaster really is.
@thoughtseize
I think this move would come at the expense of a lot of speed. If you really wanted to, I would go -1 Llanowar, -3 ESG, -1 Elvish Visionary for 4 thoughtseize and a bayou. But that hasn't been very helpful for me. I imagine a dragon/entity build would be a lot more reliant on this, but I don't see it that important either way.
They are really different cards. I find Regal Force a lot earlier while going off (usually with pacts, which is important). Also, my observation is that the current configuration generates mana so much easier then it does creatures. With Cradle and spirit guides, you get a ton of mana, but you would be banking really heavily to go all in early. And weird harvest is just a lot more versatile for setting up the combo.
Seems that you're putting a lot of money on going off. I understand and recognize that Grapeshot Elves is faster, but it goes all in in order to go faster. This puts a much larger emphasis on resolving and finding a Glimpse, and probably a decent reliance on Regal Force to get you there. Not that speed is a bad thing, I just think that if you wanted speed there are other faster, safer combo decks.
With Gaea's Cradle, going off is never a problem. Even without Gaea's Cradle, going off is hardly a problem. You'd be surprised how amazing Hivemaster is, especially when you start playing out your whole hand and bouncing Visionaries back with Symbiote. The amount of tokens you generate is ridiculous, and is usually followed up with a convoke for the nuts. The deck without Hivemasters only swarms well if you have enough mana to play out a Regal Force or have casted Glimpse. With Hivemaster, almost every hand becomes a lethal swarm.
I'll have to try both versions out more before I come to a firm conclusion though.
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