[Deck] The Rock [Archive] - Page 5

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sdematt

11-13-2010, 11:39 AM

Tabernacle isn't AS good against Zoo unless you're playing Stax. Tabernacle does tax their manabase, but they're still able to swing in. I mean, obviously combined with Ghostly Prison it's better, but I'm sure they will have boarded in Grips against Deed, and if not, they have Qasali's for your lonely Ghostly Prison. Tabernacle is good in Stax because of the overall deck design of taxing creatures, manabase, and attacking, but here, I'm not sure. I'm not sure if they run enough guys to make that worth it.

If you're having trouble with Zoo, Finks and Sanctity should be able to get you there. Suppression field kills them as well, but not sure if you want to run it.

Also, I was thinking about Storm as I made the list about where Leyline of Sanctity is good, but forgot to put it down. My bad. TES is coming back, especially since it blows Survival out of the water, and many decks aren't prepared enough for it.

Woo, post 1001 of the thread :P

-Matt

AggroSteve

11-13-2010, 04:46 PM

i definitely love the idea of dueling grounds, with maze and our fat beats, it is definitely a way to battle fish, goblins, and even dredge as well if you want^^, actually all the matchups i had problems with till now, i think dueling grounds will definitely find a way in my sideboard, at least to test how it works.... i think as a 2-of

sdematt

11-13-2010, 05:30 PM

I've been playing the following list happily for the last few weeks:

4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath
4 Bayou
3 Scrubland
1 Savannah
1 Bojuka Bog
2 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Maze of Ith

3 Noble Hierarch
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Dark Confidant
1 Eternal Witness

4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Thoughtseize
4 Swords
2 Path
4 Vindicate
3 Top
1 Pulse
0/1 Deed

It differs from Junk with a few reasons:

No Mox Diamonds, but instead Noble Hierarch. You win more Goyf battles here, but it doesn't pump Goyf (if you discard Mox to pump). I like the Exalted trigger, but doesn't allow for a turn 1 2-drop. I don't think it's necessary.

Less Gerrard's Verdict, more Path. I like Path more in this slot, takes care of Vengevine.

Eternal Witness added in gives me a little bit more reuse-ability of spells, such as Swords and Path.

Bog/Maze are great for us, so I'm using them. Could be Karakas if need be.

My manabase is more stable with more Basics and more mana producing land. A trade-off for Wastelands. I prefer the stability, especially against the abundance of Tribal.

Other than that, it's pretty good, just different.

-Matt

TiB

11-13-2010, 06:24 PM

Hi guys,

I'm thinking of taking this list to the open dutch legacy championships tomorrow, it's kind of a mash-up of the old enlightened rock and "Dark Horizons" lists.

3x Scrubland
2x Bayou
2x Savannah
3x Salt Marsh
3x Windswept Heath
2x Verdant Catacombs
1x Horizon Canopy
1x Plains
1x Forest
1x Swamp
2x Wasteland
1x Volrath's Stronghold
1x Nantuko Monastery
1x Maze of Ith

4x Dark Confidant
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Knight of the Reliquary

3x Sensei's Divining Top
4x Thoughtseize
4x Swords to Plowshares
4x Vindicate
3x Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2x Enlightened Tutor
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Pernicious Deed
1x Ghostly Prison
1x Oblivion Ring

sb:
4x Duress
2x Enlightened Tutor
1x Wheel of Sun and Moon
1x Runed Halo
1x Dueling Grounds
1x Chalice of the Void
1x Pithing Needle
1x Choke
1x Ethersworn Canonist
1x Bojuka Bog
1x Crucible of Worlds

I haven't taken this list to a tournament yet, but it did pretty well in (admittedly limited) testing.
against:
Zoo: 4-1
Goblins: 3-2
Merfolk: 1-2
Emrakul combo: 2-0
Vengevine: 1-0

I stopped using Engineered Plagues after I noticed them not really cutting it anymore.
Against merfolk they're just underwhelming unless you get 2 on the board before them getting any lords (good luck with that)
Against goblins they do something but not as much as say a Ghostly Prison or Dueling Grounds.

I'm not sure of the Explosives in the main. That's kinda an everchanging slot. It's been a Duress, Jitte, Witness and now an Engineered Explosives. I suppose I could make it a Karakas if I can get a hold of one.

What do you folks think?

blue_mage

11-13-2010, 11:11 PM

TiB

11-14-2010, 03:00 AM

Haven't really tested the mirror, rock variants seem to be not really popular around here atm.
But yeah I guess that'd be bad news for me. I just don't really like playing with so many discard spells myself. The problem is just that all those spells are essentially dead in the lategame, especially with the aggro metagame that's going on now. Also the power of discard is less in legacy than for example in standard because the card quality is generally so high; one topdeck can ruin your game anyway.

The O-Ring is there because often I just wanted to get rid of something and got stuck with just a Tutor in my hand. The ring solves that problem nicely I think. The splash damage against Emrakul is just gravy :P

What do you people think I should run in the open slot in my list (that has an Engineered Explosives I'm not entirely happy with right now)?

ZeinVoncy

11-14-2010, 09:14 AM

What do you people think I should run in the open slot in my list (that has an Engineered Explosives I'm not entirely happy with right now)?

Armageddon! :D Otherwise, either another Deed, Damping Matrix or E. Tutor.

If Survival is going to be big, I'd suggest trying out Identity Crisis. Somewhat high curve, but leaves them dead in the water when resolved.

snowbubble

11-14-2010, 11:16 AM

Hello, everyone. I am from Hong Kong.
Just finished in a Local store 12-man tourney ending in Top4.
Use exactly the same list with the one in starcity event last week with some minor amendment in sideboard.

I don't like Mox Diamond at all. It is quite a dead card if it is not in your opening hand.
I think i will use Noble Hierach instead.

and i find this deck has troublesome when facing powerful enchantments.

I lost to CounterTop Thopter in Top4. Moat and The Abyss got me. Both games I die to Jace's Utimate...
I Sided in Choke, Engineered Plague and Deed. All show up. but i don't have ways to remove his Jace since Deed can't remove it
i saw none EE and Vindicate both games...I think Elsepth should deserve a place in this deck....

ZeinVoncy

11-14-2010, 11:49 AM

I don't like Mox Diamond at all. It is quite a dead card if it is not in your opening hand.
I think i will use Noble Hierach instead.

I stated the same early, as I play with Hierarchs, trying a combination of 3x Hierarchs and 2 moxes. So far, still not impressed with Mox.

and i find this deck has troublesome when facing powerful enchantments.

I feel that either Krosan's Grip or Nature's Claim would be good S/B cards.

I lost to CounterTop Thopter in Top4. Moat and The Abyss got me. Both games I die to Jace's Utimate...
I Sided in Choke, Engineered Plague and Deed. All show up. but i don't have ways to remove his Jace since Deed can't remove it

I myself am not sure what to do about Planeswalkers other then trying to use Pulse or Vindicate or S/B in Pithing Needle. Anyone have suggestions for Planeswalkers? I know when I played Rock in Standard, I used either Vampire Hexmage or Pithing Needle for them.

sdematt

11-14-2010, 12:17 PM

For Thopters, run Engineered Plague/Deed (naming Thopters). Also, I run 4 Vindicate 1 Pulse, but I used to run 2 Pulse and never had trouble with Thopters. For dealing with Jace, side in Leyline of Sanctity so he can't target you. Then Deed away their Counterbalance/Enchantments and Vindicate him if you can.

I think Leyline is your best bet because you can play it on turn 0 without fear of it being countered. Also, you could Engineered Explosives on 4 if you played Mox Diamond but again, I think Hierarch is better.

-Matt

AggroSteve

11-14-2010, 02:24 PM

SpikeyMikey

11-14-2010, 03:42 PM

to be honest i did not test leyline yet, but i am not very sold on the idea of mulling into her, simply because it is only good against combo, not for control-matchups, i think there would be a better card for that slot

just pointing out, for example runed halo would solve the jace-problem as well, and would still be a usefull card in the combo matchup, naming tendrills, and it would be even possible playing it 1st turn if you have mox diamond main

just my 2 cents

i just noticed that dueling grounds even helps the vengevival-matchup as well, funny this card seems just like its made for this deck

Every once in a while, having knowledge of every janky and semi-playable card out there serves me well! :)

I wouldnyt run it against GW Vengevival though; they can just string walla into Pridemage, trigger vines off the Pridemage and then eat your Groiunds. Still, I've always felt that the Vengevival matchup is generally positive. GW is definitely the more difficult to beat; they can match us pound for pound in the fat department, but even there, Extirpate can often cut them off of a given fatty.

I've been considering moving from Hierarch in the board to the new Baloth with the pitch trigger. I'm loathe to switch from GW to the more difficult GG requirement for mana, but for the mirror, it makes it scary to Hymn me and Verdict downright dead. I'm also thinking of cutting the Sejiri Steppe and a Wasteland for a pair of Horizon Canopies, or perhaps 1 Canopy and a second Savannah. I've only used Steppe once or twice since it's inclusion and both games couldve been won without it although it would've taken longer. Generally, if I've got KotR on board long enough to use him, I'm winning the game anyway. That would help with color requirements.

AggroSteve

11-14-2010, 06:29 PM

well grounds could at least help a lot against the UG-Vengvival-deck, since they have only trygon predator to get rid of it once its in play, and we have got maze of ith to stop that

against the GW lists dueling grounds would be awefull, as you said, they would just get their pridemage and there goes the dueling grounds

i tried multiple horizon canopys in the manabase, actually it is not that awesome in my opinion
i have 1 horizon canopy maindeck, and no savannah, i think the savannah is not needed, but i would not cut the sejiri steppe, because it makes sure that your knight for example sticks longer, or it pushes the last 6-8 damage throught for the win
i think sejiri steppe is very important to protect one of your guys specially because we do not have a lot of big threats anyway (8 is not that much, compared to how many other decks have)

Magicsk8ngenius

11-14-2010, 07:33 PM

It has been my experience that sejiri steppe blows. It comes in handy only in a very specific situation which very rarely comes up: say 1 in 50 games. There are times when I may need to top deck a land or start with it in my opening hand and that comes into play tapped is just horrible how much it slows us down. I tried the 1 steppe and have since replaced it with 1 horizon canopy. The only cipt land I run is bojuka bog, and as I'm sure you all know... is pretty sick a lot of times, making it worth the comes into play tapped downfall.

Tib, I noticed in your list you have 3x salt marsh... I can't quite figure out why this is. I'm guessing these are supposed to be marsh flats?

ZeinVoncy

11-14-2010, 07:44 PM

It has been my experience that sejiri steppe blows. It comes in handy only in a very specific situation which very rarely comes up: say 1 in 50 games. There are times when I may need to top deck a land or start with it in my opening hand and that comes into play tapped is just horrible how much it slows us down. I tried the 1 steppe and have since replaced it with 1 horizon canopy. The only cipt land I run is bojuka bog, and as I'm sure you all know... is pretty sick a lot of times, making it worth the comes into play tapped downfall.

Agreed. I played Bant in Standard with KoTR and Steppe really was a bad xp. Even with 2 of them, they did not really pay off. Good once in awhile, at times, it was game changing. (I.E - swing for lethal w/ one time protection)

AggroSteve

11-14-2010, 08:58 PM

actually i am quite surprised you had so much bad expierience with sejiri steppe, this land helped me out quite a few times, and as long you only use one CIPT land it does almost not matter because you will not be slowed down in any way (if you fear this, just pitch it to mox) but in my expirience more than one will slow you down and hinder your developement drastically thats for sure
i for my part have been not that overwhelmed by bojuka bog, sure it is i would say the best utility land we have access to, but only for particular matchups, for this reason i am running one in my sideboard to replace steppe if needed in game 2 and 3, but steppe is mainboard simply to be able to punch the lethal with one time protection, ... maybe i chose steppe over bog due to playstyle i don't know

i think i should do more testings with both lands, but i would love to hear more about other people expiriences with Bojuka Bog and Sejiri Steppe

one thing i was wondering about... actually, since i changed to the "Dark Horizons"-list it was allways dark confidant i wanted to see every game, i even won a game only on the back of 2 confidants and a divining top, simply because of me allways drawing removal and discard the same time, and just punching with the 2 bobs, ...... the question now is, what other options do we have to provide more draw (horizon canopy not counted, since its usefulness is more in mid-late-game, i would need something that would fit the early midgame)
if someone may have a reasonable suggestion, i would consider changing the 2 verdicts for more draw

ZeinVoncy

11-14-2010, 09:51 PM

the question now is, what other options do we have to provide more draw (horizon canopy not counted, since its usefulness is more in mid-late-game, i would need something that would fit the early midgame)
if someone may have a reasonable suggestion, i would consider changing the 2 verdicts for more draw

Creature wise? Spell wise we have Night's Whisper or Sign in Blood. I used them with my original list but with the Thoughtseizes and either of those two, you end up spending a lot of life that ended up hindering me. Could try it again since I've changed my original OP decklist a bit since posting.

The Treefolk Master

11-14-2010, 09:58 PM

sdematt

11-14-2010, 10:09 PM

Arena is very close to the next best thing. At one more mana, if you have a higher curve, you needn't worry about Top, is harder to destroy, and saves you life (depending on your curve).

If you want more draw, auto replace Verdicts for Arenas.

-Matt

Evincarcrovax

11-14-2010, 10:36 PM

I would like some advice on my list

6 Swamp
1 Godless Shrine
1 Plains
2 Grassland
1 Murmuring Bosk
3 Tainted Field
3 Tainted Wood
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Ovegrown Tomb
3 Marsh Flats
3 Mishra's Factory

1 Basilisk Collar
3 Duress
4 Hymn to Tourach
2 Gerrard's Verdict
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Maelstrom Pulse
4 Pernicious Deed
2 Phyrexian Arena
1 Elspeth Knight-Errant

3 Nantuko Shade
3 Eternal Witness
4 Loxodon Hierarch

SB:
2 Cabal Therapy
4 Engineered Plague
2 Gerrard's Verdict
3 Choke
4 Leyline of the Void

sdematt

11-15-2010, 02:11 AM

Seems to me like you're going for a control build of the Rock, and for that, I approve.

First thing you'll need to do is upgrade to revised duals and fetchlands. If affordability is an issue, run proxies when you can, and Ravnica duals or borrow Revised ones when you can't proxy. Revised duals and real fetchlands (not Mirage ones, Onslaught and Zendikar) are miles better in terms of consistency and speed.

To be honest, I'm not sure why you're running the Factories. Several reasons why they're good: they produce mana, they block, etc. But, you have no way to search them, and they produce colourless mana in a colour-hungry deck. I suggest more Fetchlands and less basics.

You're also running 22-23 Lands, which is great. You always want to have a bit of extra land to either have Wastelanded away or Stifled. You want a stable manabase in this deck.

My changes for your manabase:

1 Volrath's Stronghold (and possibly a Maze of Ith)
2 Swamp
4 Scrubland
1 Plains
2 Windswept Heath
4 Bayou
2 Horizon Canopy
3 Marsh Flats
1 Forest
3 Verdant Catacombs

------

Maindeck is very interesting, I'm loving the Elspeths backed with Deed. It reminds me very much of Landstill. One note: Thoughtseize is a lot better than Duress because it can grab many of the things Duress can't, namely creatures. Getting rid of a Goyf early on and saving a Swords can be worth a ton. The life seems to be inconsequential, as you're playing Hierarchs.

Change: -3 Duress, +4 Thoughtseize.

You're not really a fast deck, so I'd take out the Verdicts and make room for some more board control. Hymn is fine here. -2 Gerrard's Verdict.

4 Swords, good. 4 Pulse? Pulse is good, but it doesn't hit lands. I suggest running 3 Vindicate 2 Pulse, or 4 Vindicate 1 Pulse, or 4 Vindicate 2 Pulse if you're feeling brave. Vindicate hits tricky lands like Maze of Ith/Rishadan Port, but I can see where Pulse has definite advantages.

I'm assuming we're doing the design around 4 Deeds as your board control element, so I won't change this, as it's very good. But, watch out: it can be a tad slow at times, so use other destruction spells accordingly.

Basilisk Collar seems out of place, and seems like it's going to cry to Deed all the time. -1 Collar.

I'd up your Elspeth count, considering you're playing a full set of Deeds. I'd go to 2 or 3.

3 Phyrexian Arena is the way to go here, methinks.

Nantucko Shade I believe is not the way to go, unfortunately. He'll constantly get blown up by Deed. I suggest Knight of the Reliquary, as he gets very big very quickly, and allows you to make him bigger and bigger.

Hierarch and Witness seem good. Stronghold, Deed, and Witness allow for recurring Deed loops, which pretty much ruins anyone's day.

As well, I advise the use of at least 2-3 Sensei's Divining Top. They give you a bit more consistency and allow you to filter much better. It stops you from being in topdeck mode too often.

So, for the main:

3 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Loxodon Hierarch
3 Eternal Witness

2 Elspeth, Knight Errant
3 Vindicate
2 Maelstrom Pulse
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Thoughtseize
4 Hymn to Tourach
3 Phyrexian Arena
4 Pernicious Deed

+1/2 Slots open (depending if you want to go up to 61 cards or not). I suggest putting in 2 Tops.

In total:

1 Volrath's Stronghold (and possibly a Maze of Ith)
2 Swamp
4 Scrubland
1 Plains
2 Windswept Heath
4 Bayou
2 Horizon Canopy
3 Marsh Flats
1 Forest
3 Verdant Catacombs

3 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Loxodon Hierarch
3 Eternal Witness

2 Elspeth, Knight Errant
3 Vindicate
2 Maelstrom Pulse
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Thoughtseize
4 Hymn to Tourach
3 Phyrexian Arena
4 Pernicious Deed
2 Sensei's Divining Top

-------

As for your Sideboard, you won't really know until you play it more, but a few key points in today's metagame:

1. Survival Vengevine is very popular, and in many tournaments you'll face it often.
2. Zoo, Goblins, and Merfolk are very popular decks which are very fast.
3. Combo decks prey on the above listed decks, so they'll be around as well.

I think you should gear up to face Vengevine and combo in your board, as it'll help the most in bad matchups. With this much maindeck destruction, you should plow through most midrange decks. Aggro and combo are going to be somewhat troublesome I suspect.

To fight combo, you have to play discard or protection or Counterspells. Running 8 discard in the main is excellent, but more in the board doesn't hurt. +3 Duress.

To fight Zoo, you need lifegain or protection. Hierarch has you covered, as would Kitchen Finks, which pairs very well with Deed. Leyline of Sanctity does many duties against Burn, Zoo, Combo, Jace the Mind Sculptor, Wheel of Sun and Moon, etc.
+4 Leyline of Sanctity, or + 3/4 Kitchen Finks if you're in a heavy Zoo metagame.

To combat tribal, use cheap efficient removal, mass removal, or Engineered Plague. Path to Exile in the board improves your Vengevine matchup, but Goblins can get taken down hard by Engineered Plague.
+4 Engineered Plague, or possibly +3 Path to Exile.

You need some cheap, efficient Grave hate. Leyline of the Void fits this well, as does Extirpate. At the moment, Extirpate is a bit better, as it's harder to get around. Extirpate hits Loam decks and Vengevine very hard, as does Combo (you can remove a key piece in an Ill-Gotten Gains loop). Leyline is easily destroyed by Trygon Predator, Grip, Nature's Claim, etc. Leyline is better against Dredge, though. But, considering you have 4 Deeds, I'd go with +4 Extirpate.

You board looks something like:

4 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Duress
4 Engineered Plague
4 Extirpate

Obviously this is just a suggestion, I don't know your metagame. Let me know what you think.

I'm sorry to other people that I don't go this in depth, but I honestly had an hour to kill just at the right moment :smile:

-Matt

Charos

11-15-2010, 01:35 PM

After a 150 player tournament I made the following observations and I would like to share them with you:
Elspeth, Knight-Errant is amazing. Run 2 if you are not already.
Pernicious Deed; I love this card, but it is just too slow in this meta. Having to blow up your Pithing Needle or Bob SUCKS. 2 Engineered Explosives in the main are better and a couple of Deeds in the side.
Sensei's Divining Top is good, but max 2 main.
Qasali Pridemage should be in this deck. He is the only way to deal with Survival of the Fittest FAST.

Therefore, my recommended list would be:

4 Thoughtseize
4 Hymn To Tourach
4 Vindicate
4 Swords To Plowshares
2 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Engineered Explosives

4 Dark Confidant
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Qasali Pridemage
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

3 Scrubland
3 Bayou
1 Savannah
4 Marsh Flats
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Plains
1 Swamp
4 Wasteland
1 Maze of Ith
1 Bojuka Bog

Evincarcrovax

11-15-2010, 04:31 PM

Thanks for all those suggestions on the deck. I am working on a budget so that's why I'm not using things like thoughtsieze and original Duals. I would be able to get another phyrexian arena, the D tops, KotR and a few more fetches but that's about it. I'm wondering though if Duress or Inquisition of Kozilek is a better thoughtseize replacement. I'll be playing the deck this saturday and I'm not sure what the meta will be like, although I hear Zoo, fish and deadguy are popular decks at that place. Also I'm wondering if worldly tutor or enlightened tutor have any place in this deck as I have playsets of both and wondering if I should use them.

SpikeyMikey

11-15-2010, 04:58 PM

Definitely Inquisition. The scariest thing for Rock is a balls fast aggro deck. Being able to strip Goyf or Nacatl will make a bigger difference in your win % than being able to hit NO or FoW.

Charos: Elspeth is great, but I never want to see her in my opening. Completely agreed on Deed. Sad that it's too slow, but there you have it. Still in board for midrange MUs where it wrecks house. Honestly though, I can't see running less than 3 tops. Against anything that's not Zoo, I want top to be my turn 1 on the play and usually my turn 1 or 2 on the draw.

keys

11-15-2010, 07:36 PM

Qasali Pridemage should be in this deck. He is the only way to deal with Survival of the Fittest FAST.

Isn't Extirpate the fastest way to deal with Survival..?

On topic: Michael Melnick also sported Aven Mindcensor in the board at the SCG Boston Open. I'm probably going to test this as a 2-of at my next tourney. It seems like it could be good against a variety of decks.

Charos

11-15-2010, 07:56 PM

Isn't Extirpate the fastest way to deal with Survival..?.

Of course. Though not enough. Qasali gives 3-4 more outs against them and helps against painful matchups like Stax.

SpikeyMikey

11-15-2010, 08:09 PM

What I don't understand is why I'm the only person maining Extirpate. It's so good in so many MUs.

JimmyC27

11-15-2010, 08:36 PM

Has anyone tested The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale as a 1 of in the maindeck?

-Jimmy

JimmyC27

11-15-2010, 08:40 PM

Has anyone tested The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale as a 1 of in the maindeck?

-Jimmy

I read a couple pages back, but only saw discussion in regard to zoo. If I need to thumb back further, lemme know.

blue_mage

11-15-2010, 09:20 PM

ZeinVoncy

11-15-2010, 09:38 PM

What I don't understand is why I'm the only person maining Extirpate. It's so good in so many MUs.

I run with 2 M/D and 1 in S/B. It is M/D worthy, whether you get a fetchland or goyf, it's helpful.

Magicsk8ngenius

11-15-2010, 10:16 PM

sdematt

11-15-2010, 10:18 PM

I find Tabernacle is only useful against Empty the Warrens, because with everything else you don't tax their manabase enough. If you play more LD however, then I think it'd be perfectly suitable.

@Aven Mindcensor

I was running him back when Reanimator was on Top, and it did very well. The only thing I'm hesitant about him is his fragility, but I'd be willing to give him a shot.Hhowever, I feel Extirpate is a more solid answer.

-Matt

Cthuloo

11-16-2010, 07:13 AM

I tried yesterday the Brad Nelson version (basically identical list, -1 Deed, +1 Mox) and felt it is a bit light on threats. I played a dozen or more matches vs various aggro-controls, and often happened to lose game were I was in full control for the lack of a finisher. I even managed to lose a game were my opponent had no cards in hand, nothing on the board except lands, I had 2 Vindicates and a top. I think the deck could benefit from an extra monster or two. Anybody thought about this? I was thinking of adding 2x Terravores, I'm just not sure what to cut. Even though I like Verdicts a lot, the decks probably plays too much discard, so they're the first candidates to go. Any suggestion or comment?

AggroSteve

11-16-2010, 08:18 AM

i thought of the exact same thing that the deck could use another beater, but i am not sure if terravores are the right choice, they shrink with the exact same hate as our other beaters, and i do not like that at all, ...... but at the same time i love gerrards verdict, basically i love it to allways have a at least 2nd turn discard 2 even if hymn is sooooooo much better

i would say these two slots are depending a bit on your meta, i was thinking of putting loxodon hierarch if burn or zoo heavy meta, elspeth or terravor for a unknown one, verdict if controll- or combo-heavy meta, even if its aggro-control verdict works fine, but i will at least try out the 2 terravores maybe

if you do, tell me about your experience with them please

Cthuloo

11-16-2010, 08:36 AM

TiB

11-16-2010, 08:54 AM

Tib, I noticed in your list you have 3x salt marsh... I can't quite figure out why this is. I'm guessing these are supposed to be marsh flats?
Whoops, I always do that. Marsh Flats seems better in here yeah :P

So anyway I was at the dutch open legacy championships on sunday, with 208 people starting. I went 1-3-4...

ended up playing this:

3x Scrubland
2x Bayou
2x Savannah
3x Marsh Flats
3x Windswept Heath
2x Verdant Catacombs
1x Plains
1x Forest
1x Swamp
1x Horizon Canopy
2x Wasteland
1x Volrath's Stronghold
1x Nantuko Monastery
1x Maze of Ith

4x Dark Confidant
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Knight of the Reliquary

3x Sensei's Divining Top
4x Thoughtseize
1x Duress
4x Swords to Plowshares
4x Vindicate
3x Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2x Enlightened Tutor
1x Dueling Grounds
1x Pernicious Deed
1x Oblivion Ring

sb:
3x Duress
2x Enlightened Tutor
1x Runed Halo
1x Pithing Needle
1x Wheel of Sun and Moon
1x Ethersworn Canonist
1x Chalice of the Void
1x Crucible of Worlds
1x Ghostly Prison
1x Choke
1x Bojuka Bog
1x Damnation

1 Ooze Survival 1-1
G1: finds triple Vengevine on turn 3 and I die.
G2: In comes the hate. I get down a Peedle on Survival and a Dueling Grounds. He eventually manages to remove the Peedle and tries to go for the Ooze kill. I fetch up a Bog with KotR and remove his Phyrexian Devourer and Triskelion. He scoops 'em up.
G3: I deadlock him again with assorted hate cards but haven't got enough time to push through for the win.

2 Dream Halls 1-1
G1: I die turn 2 by Dream Halls shenanigans and a False Cure/Beacon of Immortality.
G2: He goes S&T into Progenitus and gets one hit in. I land a Halo. I 'Seize and Duress him for a bit to strip him of Dream Hallses. Elspeth+KotR seal the deal.
G3: He goes turn 2 S&T and drops a Dream Halls. I drop an Ethersworn Canonist. He makes a frowny face. I start beating face with a flying KotR again but I am exactly 1 turn short. If only the judges had waited literally 5 more seconds before calling time...

3 Big Zoo 1-1
G1: He starts laying down the beats, and I start killing his beats. Then I make my first big mistake of the tournament. He paths my active Knight and I somehow forget to fetch up a Maze. I die not much later.
G2: I find a Maze and more big guys than he has Paths (over a looong period of time that is). He does destroy my Elspeth with his Elspeth but I had kept another one on top with my Top so no biggie.
G3: Time was called when we were shuffling up for game 3. He said he wanted to try it anyway. He goes t1:Wild Nacatl, I go t1: Maze of Ith and we proceed to fill out the match slip.

4 Ubw Control 0-2
G1: He cantrips a bit and then churns out a Baneslayer Angel. I spend 2 StPs and a Vindicate on it, but he has a FoW and 2 Counterspells. I die.
G2: Long, drawnout affair. He eventually gets out an Elspeth and manages to churn out 4 tokens before I kill it with my own Knight-Errant. He then proceeds to remove all my creatures and prod me to death.

5 TES 1-2
G1: I die of goblin token overdose.
G2: I dish out the hate; 2 Thoughtseizes and some hating enchantments. He suggests we try game 3.
G3: My second big mistake of the tournament. I Top and see: Duress, Chalice and something else. Instead of what I should've done (leaving Duress on the top, drawing it with my Top and make him discard) I go for hoping that he cantrips for 1 more turn so I can lay down the Chalice for 1 and hopefully seal the deal. Next turn I was hit with a Tendrils for 30. Afterwards he assures me that even with the Duress he probably woul've gone off 'cause he had the nuts.

6 Merfolk 1-1
G1: Don't remember much of this game. I guess he just did what Merfolk do; play out an Aether Vial and some lords and beat face.
G2: He mulligans to 5. I thoughtseize him, taking his Vial which leaves him with an incredibly slow hand. And when he taps out I drop a Choke. This gives me lots of time to build up a good defense (and maybe some offense if my deck can be bothered). KotR tutors up a Maze so his Jitte is nullified and eventually I win with a flying KotR (again).
G3: He does some stuff, I do some stuff. Neither of us does enough stuff and we go to time. Don't remember anymore.

7 Ooze Survival 2-0
G1: Without Vengevines but with Iona-Retainers and Ooze kill. I start beating down with 3 Goyfs (haven't seen them the entire tournament, and now they come all at once). He powers out an Iona on white but I have a Maze which I use to continuously save the goyf that gets blocked by Iona (he couldn't attack with her because that would leave him too open) for the kill.
G2: Again I get Maze + 3 Goyfs which once again proves to be a lethal combination.

8 Bant Vengevine 2-0
G1: I get an opening hand with Maze and Dueling Ground, seems good. I never hit my third mana and die of a bad case of Vengevine. :(
G2: Things are going well. My hate enchantments are keeping my opponent busy again and he can't beat with his hardcast Vengevine because of my active Monastery. I get a Knight active and an Elspeth out and then it's time for my final big mistake of the day; I get reckless. Instead of taking my time and beating with a flying 4/4 soldier token I wanted to kill a turn earlier and beat with an 8/8 flying KotR instead, keeping an inactive KotR and a soldier token behind for blocking. Next turn he plays a trop and survivals for 2 Vengevines and a Wonder (that was where I thought; "oops") and flies over my blockers' heads for exactly lethal. This shouldn't have happened if I kept the KotR untapped to fetch up either a Maze or a Wasteland to kill his trop. But well.

conclusions:
- This deck is too light on threats for my taste. As you may have read, I got in control game 2 and 3 almost every time, but failed to capitalize on it because I couldn't find a kill. As suggested a couple of Pridemages may solve this as well as improve some of my matchups pre-board.
- I loved the tutoring board. Opponents can often get around 1 hate card, but 2 or 3 different ones can get a lot harder. Didn't like the Crucible though. It's cute and all and has some synergies with Wasteland and Horizon Canopy but I never wanted to board it in (only boarded it in against the control deck, where it netted me a couple of extra cards, but nothing extravagant)
- Horizon Canopy; it's cute and all and grows my Knights, but more often than that it just hurt me a lot and I wished it were a Savannah. One game it gave me 5 damage because I couldn't find other land.
- Maze of Ith was great. A lot of decks are incredibly hindered by that thing. I'm going to test a second one.
- Dueling Grounds main (a switch I made during the car ride to the tournament) was great as well. It locks in combination with Maze or to a lesser extent Elspeth and buys me time like there's no tomorrow.

Your thoughts?

SpikeyMikey

11-16-2010, 10:01 AM

I agree that Extirpate is main deck worthy when you're playing the 10x discard spells. The problem is that the list is so tight, there really isn't anything that I would want to take out for it. I mean everything else that you play is an answer (vindicate, EE, deed, swords) or a win condition (goyf, bob, kotr). We already agree that this deck is short on threats, so none of those can go. When it comes down to it, I really don't want to get rid of an answer to put in it's place a potential answer (extirpate).

I say potential answer because there are a lot of times it does next to nothing: goblins, merfolk, zoo, any control deck... There's only a very small percentage of matchups where it really shines, that's why you keep it in the sideboard.

I have tried Tabernacle in the main, and it isn't worth it. It's similar to extirpate which only has a couple matchups where it shines, and therefore best in the sideboard.

I'm not packing any Hymn effects in mine, which is where I get room for Extirpate and Pridemage. But I would disagree with Extirpate not being worth it against control and Zoo. Especially against control which is usually relying on Factory and Jace as win cons. 2 Extirpates and they have no kill conditions. Against cat sligh, I need to be able to get rid of PoP and against big Zoo, I want to get rid of either 'goyf, KotR or 'vore. Otherwise it gets difficult to manage their threats.

But the other caveat is that I run a 3/3 split of StP and Edict, so I'm more likely to put creatures in the bin.

sdematt

11-16-2010, 11:35 AM

That's also why I run Nobles: it turns Dark Confidant, or even Noble Hierarch into an attacker.

Understandable, though. I think if you want more attackers, add 2 Elspeth. She constantly poops attackers, or makes your better :P

-Matt

Arsenal

11-16-2010, 12:27 PM

For aggro Rock players, I'm pretty sure that a playset of Hierarch, Pridemage, Confidant, Goyfs, and KotR is the right call. That accounts for 20 of your 22-24 creatures slots, leaving about 16-18 slots for non-creatures spells, then about 20-22 lands.

How are aggro Rock people not running Hierarch and Pridemage still? Collectively, they solve a number of problems early and cheaply; mana smoothing and fixing (less disruption from Wasteland, etc), artfiact/enchantment removal before your opponent's CB/Survival come down, and Exalted makes them decent topdecks that swing combat in your favor.

ZeinVoncy

11-16-2010, 01:20 PM

My updated list:
Junk Rock: 61
Creatures: 15
3x Noble Hierarch
4x Dark Confidant
2x Eternal Witness
4x Knight of the Reliquary
2x Desolation Angel

Sorcery: 13
3x Thoughtseize
4x Hymn to Tourach
3x Vindicate
2x Maelstrom Pulse
1x Identity Crisis

Instant: 4
2x Swords to Plowshares
2x Extirpate

Artifact: 8
2x Mox Diamond (still not impressed with this, prolly going to drop for another hierarch)
3x Sensei's Divining Top
2x Umezawa's Jitte
1x Sword of Light and Shadow

Enchantment: 1
1x Pernicious Deed

Land: 20
3x Bayou
2x Savannah
4x Verdant Catacombs
4x Wasteland
2x Forest
2x Swamp
1x Plains
1x Volrath's Stronghold
1x Bojuka Bog

S/B:
3x Chalice of the Void
1x Extirpate
2x Diabolic Edict
2x Pernicious Deed
3x Pithing Needle
2x Qasili Pridemage
2x OpenSpace

Considering adding the Pridemages back to the deck. They are helpful in many ways and at times find myself wanting them.
Got 2x Moxes and added them, but as I originally stated, they are not a good as they are for other decks. Considering getting Elspeth, seems like a good idea to me, or even Gideon, but I do not feel that he makes the cut.
Looking for another Thoughtseize and 2 other Gerrards Verdicts to replace the Hynms and open a slot or make the deck dead 60 instead of 61.
The Leyline of Sanctity sounds good, or Runed Halo, sound pretty good for the last slots in S/B.
3x SDT is okay, might go back to 2, still undecided.
Once I get a Sword of Fire and Ice, I'll be dropping one Jitte for it.

Any thoughts? (other then Desolation Angel seeming out of place, she's a mid-late game bomb that wins games for me, not to mention no one expects it. She's been working for me and is going to stay)

Arsenal

11-16-2010, 01:25 PM

conclusions:
- This deck is too light on threats for my taste. As you may have read, I got in control game 2 and 3 almost every time, but failed to capitalize on it because I couldn't find a kill. As suggested a couple of Pridemages may solve this as well as improve some of my matchups pre-board.
- I loved the tutoring board. Opponents can often get around 1 hate card, but 2 or 3 different ones can get a lot harder. Didn't like the Crucible though. It's cute and all and has some synergies with Wasteland and Horizon Canopy but I never wanted to board it in (only boarded it in against the control deck, where it netted me a couple of extra cards, but nothing extravagant)
- Horizon Canopy; it's cute and all and grows my Knights, but more often than that it just hurt me a lot and I wished it were a Savannah. One game it gave me 5 damage because I couldn't find other land.
- Maze of Ith was great. A lot of decks are incredibly hindered by that thing. I'm going to test a second one.
- Dueling Grounds main (a switch I made during the car ride to the tournament) was great as well. It locks in combination with Maze or to a lesser extent Elspeth and buys me time like there's no tomorrow.

Your thoughts?

For 4 mana, isn't Jitte almost better than Elspeth here? Both have pros/cons, but an equipped Jitte can pretty much end a game/control the board in ways that Elspeth simply cannot. You also run Enlightened Tutor, so finding a 1-of Jitte wouldn't be too difficult.

Charos

11-16-2010, 03:30 PM

Why run Maelstrom Pulse over Vindicate? I think that being able to blow a land happens far more often than 2-for-1-ing something.

Arsenal

11-16-2010, 03:32 PM

I think people run Pulse (I do) to have an out versus Iona naming White.

SpikeyMikey

11-16-2010, 04:20 PM

I run 3 Pridemage and 3 Hierarch now. The Hierarchs are a recent addition. Used to be a 23rd land, the 3rd Vindicate and the 4th Extirpate.

SpikeyMikey

11-16-2010, 05:33 PM

When you and your oppoment are both desperately trying to topdeck something to break the game open, Elspeth wins, Jitte sits there. When you're facing down Moat or a fat blocker, Lespeth jumps you over it. Jitte sits there. We don't really need more removal and the lifegain is too slow in the MUs we need it in. I can't ever see wanting Jitte. Maybe SoFI or SoLS for the CA but Jitte just doesn't do enough.

Arsenal

11-16-2010, 06:43 PM

Interesting. Between Vindicate, Maelstrom Pulse, and Qasali Pridemage, I've never personally found Moat to be a problem. I do agree that Elspeth > Jitte if you and your opponent are in topdeck mode.

To me, because aggro Rock uses the red zone to win games, Jitte allows for far more combat tricks than sorcery speed Planeswalker activations. You say that Jitte's lifegain is too slow in the matchups we need it in, but you can cast and equip it to a big beater as early as turn 3 (t1 Hierarch, t2 2cc beater, t3 cast + equip Jitte); that's pretty fast. That's just as fast as you'd be able to cast Elspeth (again, assuming t1 Hierarch).

Also, I think you're discounting the fact that Jitte costs 2 to cast and 2 to equip. Against some decks, it may be difficult to hit 4 mana, or have 2 white mana available to you all at once. Jitte gives you more flexibility in casting and equipping versus Elspeth.

Something to keep in mind. I definitely see the advantages of Elspeth > Jitte, but I think you're discouting Jitte's absolute dominance of the board/red zone once it gets a couple counters on it.

ZeinVoncy

11-16-2010, 08:23 PM

I run 3 Pridemage and 3 Hierarch now. The Hierarchs are a recent addition. Used to be a 23rd land, the 3rd Vindicate and the 4th Extirpate.

Could you post your play list? I don't believe I've seen it yet. Jitte has its moments where it just dominates the board, esp against like fish or zoo. Shooting for a selection with having Jitte, SoFI and SoLS as options.

keys

11-16-2010, 09:04 PM

Do you guys board in E Plague for the Merfolk matchup, or is it just used for Goblins, Elves, and (maybe Fae)? I don't have any experience with the Rock vs. Merfolk matchup but I imagine it's no cake walk. Pernicious Deed is probably MVP if you can resolve it.

sdematt

11-16-2010, 10:31 PM

The Merfolk matchup can be very tricky, you're correct. Your discard and Swords effects are good here, and Pulse is amazing (takes out multiple Vials/Lords). The key here is killing their Lords. Remember, they can't Islandwalk you here. Your creatures are bigger, so make use of that. Block when you can, Swords key Lords, and use discard to it's fullest. Deed is MVP here, but don't rawdog one out. Use bait first, then let it land. If you can land it and sweep the board, you can usually recover better than them.

As well, if you can resolve Dark Confidant here, that's usually a HUGE help. Getting the card advantage on them, either with Discard or Bob is key. I find Plague is not great in this matchup, because they have so many Lords. Mind you, if you're playing Duresses, take them out for Plagues. Needle on Vault is good, as is on Vial.

@ Maelstrom Pulse

Pulse is good in many, many matches. Blowing up two Goyfs is worth its weight in gold, as is killing Iona, killing Goblin tokens from Belcher, Thopter tokens, multiple Ghostly Prisons, and the list goes on. Most of the time you're using Vindicates on non-land permanents anyway, but having the ability to landscrew someone makes Vindicate the go-to option. If you can afford Vindicate, Maelstrom is a fine replacement, and I play both for the versatility each provides.

@ZeinVoncy
There's no reason why you shouldn't be running 4 Swords to Plowshares. Cut 2 Mox D for a Noble Hierarch and 2 Swords, ad find something else to cut. Swords it too good not to play 4 of.

-Matt

ZeinVoncy

11-17-2010, 08:42 AM

I'll add another StP, but I feel that 4 of should not be necessary. Looking to get a Maze of Ith, which should be a great replacement in place of the 4th.

Arsenal

11-17-2010, 09:59 AM

I'll add another StP, but I feel that 4 of should not be necessary. Looking to get a Maze of Ith, which should be a great replacement in place of the 4th.

With VV hasting through the format, 4 Swords is more necessary than ever, with some aggro Rock lists running an additional 2 PtE for insurance. Unless you draw into Maze of Ith, tutoring it via KotR can sometimes be too slow, and even if you do tutor it out early, Maze is only a temporary fix for VV whereas Sword/PtE are permanent solutions.

ZZZ

11-17-2010, 10:58 AM

So anyway I was at the dutch open legacy championships on sunday, with 208 people starting. I went 1-3-4...

ended up playing this:

3x Scrubland
2x Bayou
2x Savannah
3x Marsh Flats
3x Windswept Heath
2x Verdant Catacombs
1x Plains
1x Forest
1x Swamp
1x Horizon Canopy
2x Wasteland
1x Volrath's Stronghold
1x Nantuko Monastery
1x Maze of Ith

4x Dark Confidant
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Knight of the Reliquary

3x Sensei's Divining Top
4x Thoughtseize
1x Duress
4x Swords to Plowshares
4x Vindicate
3x Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2x Enlightened Tutor
1x Dueling Grounds
1x Pernicious Deed
1x Oblivion Ring

sb:
3x Duress
2x Enlightened Tutor
1x Runed Halo
1x Pithing Needle
1x Wheel of Sun and Moon
1x Ethersworn Canonist
1x Chalice of the Void
1x Crucible of Worlds
1x Ghostly Prison
1x Choke
1x Bojuka Bog
1x Damnation

Your thoughts?

I like the list a lot (I usually play similar builds). The Dueling Grounds main seems pretty good at the moment. I'm going to give your list a try with a few changes; I want to try a Pithing Needle in the main and 6 StP effects. Targeted discard also seems good with all the Survival decks running around, if I find the room I'd like to play the 2nd Duress.
A couple of questions for you, if you don't mind:
- How useful were Stronghold and Monastery? I think the land toolbox should include a Karakas but I don't want to cut a colour producing land for it so one of these would be my choice to cut (I'm thinking Stronghold).
- Do you really need the full playset of E-tutor? I usually run 3 or 2 depending on how many things I have to board in for each matchup and I've never really wanted the 4th Tutor.
- Why the Ghostly Prison side if you already have Dueling Grounds in the main?

By the way; I was there as well on Sunday but I played Ichorid (which I immediately regretted when I saw the available space on each table) but I dropped when I was 2-2, much too crowded and not enough oxygen for my taste.

SpikeyMikey

11-17-2010, 01:32 PM

I think Plague is outdated and simply outclassed by Dueling Grounds. You don't need multiples to lock an opponent out. The only MU where Plague is preferrable is combo elves. Fish and Goblins you'd rather have Grounds.

You can have Jitte equipped turn 3 and swinging, but you're not using any discard or removal and you're already low from Nacatls and Lynxes or Piledriver. Even in the Zoo mirror, Jitte is too slow and they pack more removal than we do with all the burn.

Wess

11-17-2010, 01:52 PM

In the current metagame, maindeck Extirpate is BOSS. I cut the gerrard's verdict's for them, and they are MVP's. Not only do they make the survival matchup great, its fantastic agaisnt: Aggro loam, lands, dredge, combo, and the satisfaction of extirpating a wasted/vindicated dual land and locking the opponent out of a colour is quite fun.

Another addition is haunting echoes in the sideboard.... game ending card against control, goblins, merfolk, survival etc. or a non-basic lands deck.

Maindeck

Extirpate X 2
Thoughtseize X 4
Hymn to Tourach X 4
Vindicate X 4
Swords to Plowshares X 4

Tarmogoyf X 4
KOTR X 3
Dark Confidant X 4

Sensei's Divining Top X 3
Engineered Explosives X 2
Mox Diamond X 3

SpikeyMikey

11-17-2010, 03:45 PM

Could you post your play list? I don't believe I've seen it yet. Jitte has its moments where it just dominates the board, esp against like fish or zoo. Shooting for a selection with having Jitte, SoFI and SoLS as options.

4 Thoughtseize
3 Extirpate
3 Swords to Plowshares
3 Diabolic Edict
2 Engineered Explosives
2 Vindicate

4 Dark Confidant
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Noble Hierarch
3 Qasali Pridemage
3 Knight of the Reliquary

3 Sensei's Divining Top
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

3 Bayou
3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Wasteland
2 Scrubland
2 Windswept Heath
2 Marsh Flats
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Savannah
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Swamp
1 Forest

//Sideboard

4 Obstinate Baloth
3 Cold-Eyed Selkie
3 Aven Mindcensor
2 Dueling Grounds
2 Pernicious Deed
1 Enlightened Tutor

The Deeds in the board are probably going to go. I had Deeds main and EE board, but to be honest, the matchups where I want sweepers, EE is usually better (faster) and the only matchup where I REALLY want Deed is Affinity, and 2 Deeds is not enough to really swing the MU. They'll probably become something like a pair of Null Rods which serve double duty against both Affinity and Storm.

I changed from Loxodon Hierarch to Obstinate Baloth when I made the switch to Noble Hierarchs and Horizon Canopies in place of a Wasteland and a Scrubland. The GG isn't as tough to support now and it's better for the mirror where it can easily be dropped off of a hymn. The regen ability of Hierarch rarely comes into play, so I consider it a straight upgrade. I may cut back to 1 Canopy and make the second one into a Savannah to better support KotR. I just haven't done any testing with this configuration, so it's hard to say what's right.

TiB

11-17-2010, 08:51 PM

- How useful were Stronghold and Monastery? I think the land toolbox should include a Karakas but I don't want to cut a colour producing land for it so one of these would be my choice to cut (I'm thinking Stronghold).
- Do you really need the full playset of E-tutor? I usually run 3 or 2 depending on how many things I have to board in for each matchup and I've never really wanted the 4th Tutor.
- Why the Ghostly Prison side if you already have Dueling Grounds in the main?

- Yeah I would've liked a Karakas but didn't have access to any. In the end I didn't need it anyway. Didn't face any Emrakuls and only 1 Iona. Stronghold is just the touch of inevitability I like when the game goes long (which it almost always does). I never actively search it but I'm always happy when I have it. Monastery is an absolute monster, Merfolk absolutely hate it and it blocks Vengevines like mad. The first thing I search for with Knight is either Maze or Monastery. If you wanted to replace something with a Karakas I would say Horizon Canopy.
- The full set of Tutors is what made it possible for me to chain hate together and lock the game down, though I do sometimes have my doubts about the two in the main. It seems to me that just a little too often I don't have anything I want to get with it preboard. If you go for a Needle main that might change though.
- Yeah the Prison could easily be something else. I just wanted a little extra something to combat Ichorid, Vengevine and Goblins.

Funny you played Ichorid and are now coming back to the Rock. I just started playing Ichorid because I'm starting to get a little tired of going into the extra turns every match with the Rock.

AggroSteve

11-17-2010, 09:47 PM

i am thinking of now testing monastery instead of my sejiri steppe mainboard, ... if it really is a "monster" i definitely want it in the deck, plus it can be counted as a threat as well, so with a land i can get the threat-count a little higher, which is working fine for me i think

sdematt

11-17-2010, 11:33 PM

I tested Dueling Grounds in the board, and it's a beast. Too bad the art is terrible, I'll have to get a set altered, I guess :cool:

Thanks for the Dueling Grounds suggestion, everyone. Far superior to the Engineered Plague :P

-Matt

Charos

11-17-2010, 11:50 PM

What do you guys think about Cabal Therapy instead of Hymn To Tourach?

f|i[p]

11-18-2010, 01:09 AM

@charos

If you read the posts, the deck is already light on threats. You have nothing to sacrifice to cabal therapy to make use of its full potential.

ZZZ

11-18-2010, 05:01 AM

- Yeah I would've liked a Karakas but didn't have access to any. In the end I didn't need it anyway. Didn't face any Emrakuls and only 1 Iona. Stronghold is just the touch of inevitability I like when the game goes long (which it almost always does). I never actively search it but I'm always happy when I have it. Monastery is an absolute monster, Merfolk absolutely hate it and it blocks Vengevines like mad. The first thing I search for with Knight is either Maze or Monastery. If you wanted to replace something with a Karakas I would say Horizon Canopy.
- The full set of Tutors is what made it possible for me to chain hate together and lock the game down, though I do sometimes have my doubts about the two in the main. It seems to me that just a little too often I don't have anything I want to get with it preboard. If you go for a Needle main that might change though.
- Yeah the Prison could easily be something else. I just wanted a little extra something to combat Ichorid, Vengevine and Goblins.

Funny you played Ichorid and are now coming back to the Rock. I just started playing Ichorid because I'm starting to get a little tired of going into the extra turns every match with the Rock.

I switch between decks quite often. I played TES a lot the last months but now I wanted something which wouldn't give me a headache after 8 rounds hence Ichorid. The Rock is definitely my pet deck though.

I agree Monastery is good in a more controlling list like this (I have played it in previous lists); I just don't want to play to many utility lands so I'd be inclined to play the Karakas in place of the Stronghold for now. I already replaced the Canopy with a Savannah.

alphacat

11-18-2010, 07:11 AM

I top 4'd in a local tourney last week, and a few observations to share with everyone.

1. I played the list with Gerrald's Verdict and Mox Daimond from SCG Open, and feel like Noble would be a much better inclusion than the Mox.

2. I mained 4 Vindicate. However, I feel like both Vindicate and Maestorm Pulse have a place in the deck. Vindicate won me at least two games by mana screwing my opponent. Although, there are times, especially against Merfolk and Gob, where if I have Pulse instead of Vindicate, it would be game ender. I think I'm leaning towards some combination of Vindicate in main and Pulse in SB.

3. Dueling Ground was a beast. Resolving it against Zoo or Gob = GG. There were games where I resolve DG first to slow the aggro deck down,then fetch an Ith to completely nullify the opposing deck. However, I lost a game to Merfolk because he had 2 Reejay to tap down my Knight and Maze. However, I still don't think DG was awesome.

4. I maindecked 2 Extirpates, and they were useful in almost every single game. I think with Survival on the loose, maining Extirpate is the way to go.

Charos

11-18-2010, 11:03 AM

;501870']@charos

If you read the posts, the deck is already light on threats. You have nothing to sacrifice to cabal therapy to make use of its full potential.

I am playing this deck, I know it is light on threats. Though I was wondering if it is better because:

- Mostly it costs B instead of BB
- Also we are already playing Thoughseize therefore it is more likely that it will hit stuff.
- Lastly a list with Hierarch/Qasali has more things to sac.

So, anybody tried it?

Arsenal

11-18-2010, 11:08 AM

Noble/Pridemage has much more value on the table than as Therapy fodder. Unless your deck has 100% disposable creatures (tokens, recur), I'd say stay away from Therapy as everything you want it to do, we already have comparable options available to us.

keys

11-18-2010, 02:46 PM

1. I played the list with Gerrald's Verdict and Mox Daimond from SCG Open, and feel like Noble would be a much better inclusion than the Mox.

I would say the benefits of Mox Diamond over Noble Hierarch are as follows:

1. It speeds up the deck faster than Hierarch by enabling 2cc plays on turn one (e.g. Hymn to Tourach, Gerrard's Verdict, Dark Confidant), the turn one Thoughtseize -> Wasteland play, or the turn two Hymn -> Wasteland play, etc.
2. Doesn't die to creature removal (ex. Firespout) or your own EE on 1.
3. Grows Knight of the Reliquary (granted so does Exalted, but this is more permanent)
4. Gives you all three colors
5. You don't need to fetch a nonbasic (in most BGW Rock decks, Bayou is the only green source)

IMO the card disadvantage is acceptable because the deck has at least 10 ways to create card advantage with Hymn effects and Confidant.

Getting double black is very important, and the difference between Hymning on turn 1 and turn 2 can often be the game, especially against decks that frequently keep 1 land hands.

makochman

11-18-2010, 03:11 PM

I would say the benefits of Mox Diamond over Noble Hierarch are as follows:

Thing is, you can't keep a hand with 1 Mox Diamond and 1 Land unless you also have a Top.

What about Chrome Mox? Theoretically it should be pretty decent. It allows you to run less land than Mox Diamond.

Wess

11-18-2010, 03:15 PM

Have a weekly semi-causal Legacy playgroup, this Wednesday, play "Rock",

Conclusions:
-Dueling grounds is a must in the board, both matches I lost were very close, and if I had a dueling ground I would have easily won. Still came 2nd though, so no worries. Of note: I crushed both survival decks 2-0, wasn't even close either game, maindeck extirpate is awesome.
-Extirpate maindeck = BOSS
-Dark Confidant - Land him and go the control route, NOT aggro. Very effective this way.
-Mox Diamond is far superior to any mana dork. With the format being so fast, a T1 hmyn, or thoughtsieze/extirpate or T2 vindicate, deed, ee activation is HUGE.

1-0 BG Survival

Round 1: T1 Thoughtsieze, T2 Hymn, T3 Confidant - GG
Boarded in 2 extirpate, 2 duress
Round 2: T1 Wasteland, T2 Vindicate Land- GG

1-1 Zoo

Both games extremely close. MVP was extirpate in the main. 1st game extirpated 2 PTE in his opening hand and his lightning bolts. Both games came down to a our KOTR and Goyf's staring each other down. Dueling grounds would have easily won me the game had I utilizes it. Although, I sided in: 2 Jitte's, 2 Perniscious Deed, 2 EE ...I didn't draw any of my sweepers both games I lost despite having BOB+TOP :(

1-2 Elves

Got swarmed both games...uughh. Again, dueling grounds would have been great. His main play is natural order into progenitus turn 2, but I had Karakas, so no worries, just got swarmed, and again, drew none of my sweepers :(

2-2 UG Survival

Round 1: T1 Play swamp, Mox diamond, Thoughtsieze, take Survival, extirpate survival. Rest of match was on cruise control. (UG survival doesn't play fauna shaman) so I outclassed him with my creatures.
Siding: I sided out my hymn to tourach's, vindicates, and sided in perniscious deed's, aven mindcensors, and extirpates, duress
Round 2: Long game where I eventually established superior board control and beat for the win. This game I allowed him to get his survival engine online just so I could extirpate his Vengevines. Then dropped deed to clear board.

3-2 UW Tempo
Both games were long and drawn out. I never really felt threatened during the matches, as this deck relies on cheap card advantage tricks which are negated by our discard, and our creatures are superior. EE, Extirpate and BOB were MVP's in this matchup. Once I extirpated his mother of runes, I didn't feel like there was any threat that couldn't easily be answered. Also, damn, weathered wayfarer is really annoying to play against, really makes me wish I had a crucible.
Edit: Actually, I did lose a round to flying Serra Avengers...oops.

4-2 RG Berserk Combo

Not much to say here, never got to see how his deck worked, as both games I picked apart his hands T1 and T2. His deck relied on getting a creature on the field, then casting enchantments and berserks on it, playing mana acceleration for a T1 kill. Again, can't state how effective a T1 Mox diamond is.

Maindeck

Extirpate X 2
Thoughtseize X 4
Hymn to Tourach X 4
Vindicate X 4
Swords to Plowshares X 4

Tarmogoyf X 4
KOTR X 3
Dark Confidant X 4

Sensei's Divining Top X 3
Engineered Explosives X 2
Mox Diamond X 3

Land

Bayou X 3
Scrubland X 3
Marsh Flats X 4
Verdant Catacombs X 4
Karakas X 1
Horizon Canopy X 1
Swamp X 2
Plains X 1
Wasteland X 4
Maze of Ith X 1

Sideboard

Tabernacle of Pendrell Vale X 1
Bojuka Bog X 1
P.Deed X 2
EE X 2
Jitte X 2
Extirpate X 2
Duress X 2
Aven Mindcensor X 3

ZeinVoncy

11-18-2010, 06:20 PM

@ Wess

Thanks for the input. How did you feel when you were drawing Moxes later in games though? Did it end up being a dead card? Thoughts about adding anymore aggression or did you feel your creature setup is adequate?

@ Maelstrom Pulse

My list doesn't run Tarmogoyf's, so hitting goyf's wouldn't be issue with me, my creature variety offers different methods of aggression. Vindicate can do the job, but Pulse adds a nice element to my gaming options.

@ Charos

Cabal Therapy is nice, but not for this form of Rock. Maybe Eva Green G/B Sui. Even with Volrath's Stronghold, Therapy doesn't fit this decktype.

@ Dueling Grounds

I love that idea! Trying to get 3x for my S/B and can't wait to see the results.

@ Keys

I've tried and dislike Mox Diamond. I understand the potential of what a T1 can do, coming from the older Vintage setting, but I am seeing bettere results with Hierarch. Once I am able to get 2x Gerrard's Verdict, I'm replacing my Hynms with them. I won't need BB for anything other then late game cards. Which at that point, Mox is dead to me.

Genericcactus

11-18-2010, 07:26 PM

Wess

11-18-2010, 07:38 PM

@ Wess

Thanks for the input. How did you feel when you were drawing Moxes later in games though? Did it end up being a dead card? Thoughts about adding anymore aggression or did you feel your creature setup is adequate?

@ Dueling Grounds

I love that idea! Trying to get 3x for my S/B and can't wait to see the results.

Contrary to what one would think, drawing moxes mid-late game is still a good play, I was almost always happy to see a mox diamond in the late game. The reasons being:

1. No life loss to Dark Confidant (revealing mox, same as why EE is also better than deed), seriously, BOB almost killed me in multiple close match-ups, having extra zero's is great (as opposed to 1 mana dorks).
2. Mox allows you to pump and abuse KOTR while still having stable mana (mana dorks don't have this benefit). Especially when fetching a maze of ith or bojuka bog.
3. Pitch mox to the yard to pump goyf (again, mana dorks can't do this).
4. Takes the sting out of price for progress, winter orb, etc. I had to wasteland my own duals sometimes to keep alive :(

You don't need anymore aggression. I was playing it more as a control deck, which I think it is. Very rarely would you just try to race and out-aggro an opposing deck. Most of my games came down killing the opponent with one creature after establishing board control. More that a few games I killed with BOB...slowly.

keys

11-18-2010, 08:00 PM

I got 10th at Jupiter Games on 11/13, winning 4x Tundra and 4x Scrubs with this list:

4x Dark Confidant
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Knight of the Reliquary

4x Thoughtseize
4x Hymn to Tourach
2x Gerrard's Verdict
4x StP
4x Vindicate
3x Sensei's Divining Top
3x Mox Diamond
1x Pernicious Deed

3x Scrubland
2x Bayou
4x Verdant Catacombs
4x Marsh Flats
2x Swamp
1x Plains
1x Karakas
1x Maze of Ith
1x Horizon Canopy
4x Wasteland

Sideboard:
4x Engineered Plague
2x Elspeth, Knight Errant
3x Diabolic Edict
3x Extirpate
1x Pernicious Deed
2x Inquisition of Kozilek

I went 6 - 2, beating UGw Survival, Survival Elves, Enchantress, UBr Faeries, UG Survival, and Affinity. I lost to UB Storm and UGB Landstill/Control. The worst card in the deck was Gerrard's Verdict, though admittedly I didn't play against Zoo, the matchup where it shines. I don't think there is a legitmate argument to running Noble Hierarch over Mox Diamond. Turn 1 Bob or Hymn is pretty broken. Fetching a swamp and playing Diamond allows you to cast most of your deck without you ever being vulnerable to land destruction. Hierarch forces you to fetch bayou, which is pretty bad, and doesn't even add for black, which is a far more important color than green in the deck. The board was solid, but the maindeck and sideboard Deeds could be EEs. Dueling Ground seems cute too.

Thanks for sharing your results. I'm going to play a similar "Dark Horizons" list at a tournament this weekend, and I have a few questions:

How was maindeck Pernicious Deed? I'm torn between EE and Deed in that spot, since EE doesn't bolt you with bob and it doesn't always blow up your moxes. That said, Deed is a beast...

Was the life loss from Thoughtseize ever a problem for you? I never like revealing them with bob because it's another 3 damage (yeah 13 ways to bolt yourself off Confidant seems rough). Right now I'm testing a split with Inquisition and it's working fine.

The sideboard is probably the most debatable. Can you explain your card choices and how they performed? Why not Duress? Were the Edicts and Elspeth any good?

Thanks!

Dzra

11-19-2010, 02:12 AM

I haven't been around here too much lately... but a couple things.

Mox Diamond is much better than Noble Hierarch in this deck. It makes us more aggressive. Noble doesn't. Both are almost dead draws late in the game, but Noble doesn't put Goyf out of Bolt range and let's say you want to attack with two Goyfs or a KotR and a Goyf? Too bad, no +1/+1 from the Noble. You can't keep a one land/Noble hand any more than you could a one land/Diamond hand. Nobles get hit by all sorts of removal. If you seem the slightest bit mana screwed, don't doubt that your Noble has a Bolt aimed right at him.

I run 1 Elspeth, 4 Bobs, 4 Goyfs, and 4 KotR. I've tried Terravores, but double Green was too difficult. I very rarely have trouble with not having a threat. Perhaps you need to bait more and rely more on hand disruption. Between that and Bob/Top, killing them usually isn't an issue. My only trouble is dying to fast aggro every now and then.

Path is very hot against Merfolk. Discard is good there... but more removal is better in my opinion. We have a much better late game than they do. I SB +4 PtE, +2 Deed, +2 Choke for my 8 Discard. In my experience, they can't handle that kind of board control.

I'm still a big fan of Sejiri Steppe. When you have a Maze out, you can attack without ever having to worry about your Knight getting removed. Monastery is good, but I'd rather keep my Knight than play a smaller creature that can't attack until next turn anyways. You could run both I suppose, but I really don't know why you'd care about fetching a manland when you already have a KotR. I choose Karakas over it MD and Bog in the SB.

I used to run EE, but I recently changed to Deeds. My thinking was this: Most of my important permanents are at 2cmc. The most problematic cmc's are 1 and 2. Either way, if I EE or Deed for 1, I avoid most of my permanents. Either way, if I use EE or Deed for 2, I hit my 2cmc dudes. So why wouldn't I rather run the more powerful Deed so that I don't have to worrying about frustrating situations where they have a lot of guys with varying cmcs. Not to mention, Deed is the only Enchantment in the deck for Goyf. There are only two legitimate advantages to EE in my opinion: It gets around Counterbalance and it can kill Planeswalkers. However, I think Deed at 3cmc is pretty tough for CT anyways and we have a whole lot of ways to get rid of Planeswalkers MD already.

Genericcactus

11-19-2010, 02:47 PM

Thanks for sharing your results. I'm going to play a similar "Dark Horizons" list at a tournament this weekend, and I have a few questions:

How was maindeck Pernicious Deed? I'm torn between EE and Deed in that spot, since EE doesn't bolt you with bob and it doesn't always blow up your moxes. That said, Deed is a beast...

Was the life loss from Thoughtseize ever a problem for you? I never like revealing them with bob because it's another 3 damage (yeah 13 ways to bolt yourself off Confidant seems rough). Right now I'm testing a split with Inquisition and it's working fine.

The sideboard is probably the most debatable. Can you explain your card choices and how they performed? Why not Duress? Were the Edicts and Elspeth any good?

Thanks!

I never actually drew my main deck Deed throughout the tournament except for against Enchantress when the match was already in hand. It blows up moxes but is generally a more powerful effect than EE. The match ups where Deed is best, Tribal decks and Zoo, EE is probably equally good. A close call.

Life loss off of Thoughtseize was never relevant, though I did not play against Zoo or Merfolk where my life total becomes more of a factor. I am considering cutting Verdicts for two Inquisitions maindeck.

Inquisition is just better than Duress in this deck. The only card it doesn't hit is FoW which I would rarely take anyways since my opponent 2-for-1-ing himself is good for an attrition based deck like Dark Horizons. Being able to grab both a Fauna Shaman or a Survival is amazing. Edict is the best instant speed removal card available considering Path flies in the face of my LD plan. Elspeth is beast in the mirror and against control decks.

keys

11-19-2010, 04:01 PM

Dzra

11-19-2010, 04:25 PM

Genericcactus

11-19-2010, 04:29 PM

The only thing about Inquisition is it can't get Jace, Humility, Moat, Wrath, and other cards in the Landstill matchup. Duress is strictly better against storm combo as well.

I feel like Inquisition and Thoughtseize are competing more for the maindeck spots, and Duress is best in the Sideboard.

Landstill with Humility, Wrath, and Moat is a bad deck that makes up less than 1% of any given meta. I'd rather lose to that than play Duress which is worse than Inquisition in almost all match ups. Duress may be strictly better than Inquisition in the storm match up (unless they play Bob), but it gets a total of THREE cards more (at most) in the deck: 1x Ad Nauseum, 1x Tendrils, and 1x Empty the Warrens, with Ad Nauseum being the only one I would want to hit with a Duress.

keys

11-19-2010, 04:48 PM

Diabolic Edict is just no substitution for PtE. Against Tribal decks where you need the extra removal to keep lords off the table, they will simply sac a token or useless creature. Edict is simply not spot removal. If you don't run Path, I might consider Ghastly Demise, Smother, or Condemn. Unless you see a lot of NO, Edict is a wasted slot.

I agree with all of this, EXCEPT... that Edict is an answer to a resolved Iona, whereas PtE will get shut out with the rest of your removal. Ghastly Demise, Smother, and Comdemn do not help either.

Koby

11-19-2010, 05:21 PM

Deathmark perhaps?

Dzra

11-19-2010, 06:15 PM

Ghastly Demise might get there, but I agree it's not ideal. Deathmark is actually pretty good. I think the most versatile option is Karakas which is MDable. The top deck that uses Iona now is GW Survival and they have enough creatures where Edict won't get there anyways. Against GW Survival I'd probably board +4 PtE (for VV), +4 Extirpate and drop the Vindicate and Hymns. With my Karakas MD, I feel pretty good. When you talk about SBs you have to make sure to put it into context of a deck. :)

SpikeyMikey

11-19-2010, 07:43 PM

I main a 3/3 split of Plow and Edict. It means I don't autolose game 1 to NOPro or SnT. I'm not fast enough to beat people to death before they get a chance to topdeck outs. Of course, I also main Extirpate which means sometimes I don't *want* to RFG something. Or rather, I do, but I want to make sure it never gets played again. Like "eff you, only *I* get to play with KotR this game. And sometimes, since I'm a balls slow control deck, I don't want to get hosed by things like Gigapede, Progenitus and Emrakul. Boarding in 4 PtE's every match seems like a ridiculous soak of sideboard space. Fish can and sometimes still does have Kira in board and then you're screwed. I dunno, there are times when Edict is slightly subpar, but there are also times when it's the dead nuts and your only out. I imagine there are times when I'd want Watchwolf over Pridemage but not enough to ever justify it. Path works poorly with Waste/vindicate.

Dzra

11-19-2010, 08:33 PM

Decks you'd likely want more removal would be Elves, Goblins, Merfolk, Vengevine decks, and possibly some kind of mirror. Against mono-colored tribal decks, your mana screw plan is already very iffy. Not to mention they use Vials anyways. The best you can do usually is to keep them off their splash color. (the exception being Merfolk since you can hit their basic islands with Choke and PtE still works well with Choke since the land comes into play tapped) If Merfolk does play Kira then that's why I board in more Deeds. Even if they run Kira, Edict still won't help because they simply aren't going to sacrifice the creature you want them to.

Against Vengevine, Path is obviously better because it removes them from the game and Survival has enough mana dorks to negate LD anyways.

PtE is also the nuts against Affinity.

Against the mirror and other 3 color decks, LD can become important, so I'd say that PtE might not be ideal here. Wanting to be able to kill Dark Confidants keeps me from using Ghastly Demise.

I haven't lost to SnT yet due to hand disruption + Karakas but admittedly there are no NO decks in my meta.

If I'm looking at the right list, you don't run Hymns or 4 Vindicates. Not running Hymns slows your deck down by a lot and not running 4 Vindicates already makes your LD plan weak. I think you should try the "stock list" except instead of Verdicts, you can try the 2 Extirpates since that seems to fit your playstyle and isn't really a bad idea. Maybe you can also cut the MD Deed for an Elspeth.

sdematt

11-19-2010, 11:55 PM

I think we're all along the same page, but we're in a few different camps on a few different subjects. My thoughts:

Duress vs. Thoughtseize vs. Inquisition

My thoughts are Thoughtseize is strictly the best. It hits everything we want it to hit, including Moats, creatures, Jace, Force, etc. If you can't afford Thoughtseize, or want 6 in the main, play 4 Thoughtseize 2 Inquisition. Duress is suited for the board, as an extra measure against combo and getting the run on Landstill and other non-creature permanent based control decks.

Deed vs. EE

Simple here. EE blows up a certain CMC, Deed does cost and under. Deed is much better against Tribal if it succeeds, but it is a turn slower. An EE for two takes two turns, usually running turn 2 and 3, wheres this is turn 3 and 4. Mind you, you probably wouldn't want to rawdog an EE on two with two colours against Counterbalance, so it ends up being the same. For me, I choose Deed unless you plan on facing Belcher or something, and need an out in the first 2-3 turns.

Diabolic Edict vs. Path vs. Swords

Although they serve slightly different purposes, you're still trying to kill creatures, plain and simple. Targeted removal is usually the best next to mass removal. Having someone sac Cursecatcher and save their Coralhelm Commander is terrible. Swords on Coralhelm would be better, in my opinion. Mind you, Ion on white takes away Path and Swords. I agree with Karakas in the main: if you expect Dredge/Reanimator/Emrakul, pack a Karakas backed with Extirpate in the board. If you're playing Knight, that is. I suggest running AT LEAST 4 Swords in this meta (Vengevines, Lackey, Lord of Atlantis). I also like having an extra 2 Path. Saved my ass plenty of times.

Maindeck Extirpate vs. 2 Path or something

Again, if you expect a ton of Vengevine, you could even pack 4 maindeck Jailers for all I care. It depends on your meta. If you have a ton of Veggies, packing 2 Extirpate isn't a terrible idea. I pack 2 extra Path, as it's more versatile in other matchups, such as Merfolk and Goblins. Yes, stripping a dual off a Hymn + Extirpate is good in the main, but so is just Hymning them and Pathing a dude.

Dueling Grounds vs. Engineered Plague

To be totally honest here, since I've discovered Dueling Grounds, I wouldn't go back to Plague. Plague is VERY good against Elves and Goblins, but Grounds trumps it by taking care of Merfolk and helping out with Vengevine. So far, the only problem is the fact that it has terrible art.

Noble Hierarch vs. Mox Diamond

Seems to be the most sway here. It really comes down to explosivity vs. stability. Mox Diamond allows for turn 1 Hymns, Verdicts, and such. I won't disagree. Turn 1 Noble into turn 2 Hymn is decent, only because you have to fetch a Bayou turn 1 for the Hierarch and play another land turn 2. If Hierarch tapped for Black, there wouldn't be any discussion. I agree Mox pumps your Knight, very true, but Hierarch pumps my Goyfs against his, and you have no way to get lands back. Mox allows for explosive plays, but it can also lead to lagginess afterwards if you don't follow up with big plays. Noble gives you a blocker, exalted, mana, and is good in multiples for the bonuses.

I've tried Mox, and I found myself mana hungry because I was losing lands. With Hierarch, I can survive Wastelands and keep trucking, and swing with Dark Confidant on turn 3 for 3. I like it, but Mox isn't a bad choice. I think it comes down to how your deck is built and personal preference.

Sideboard: to be continued, Dexter's on Bravo :tongue:

-Matt

Charos

11-20-2010, 01:13 AM

Thank you Matt, very well explained.

Talking about sideboards, what would be the best choice for an unknown meta? I am leaning towards this:

3 Dueling Grounds
3 Extirpate
3 Yixilid Jailer
3 Pithing Needle
2 Diabolic Edit (or any removal)
1 Bojuka Bog (or any utility land)

ZeinVoncy

11-20-2010, 01:18 AM

And sometimes, since I'm a balls slow control deck, I don't want to get hosed by things like Gigapede, Progenitus and Emrakul. Boarding in 4 PtE's every match seems like a ridiculous soak of sideboard space. Fish can and sometimes still does have Kira in board and then you're screwed. I dunno, there are times when Edict is slightly subpar, but there are also times when it's the dead nuts and your only out. I imagine there are times when I'd want Watchwolf over Pridemage but not enough to ever justify it. Path works poorly with Waste/vindicate.

Kudos! I agree that Edict is a fail safe from cards like Progenitus, it's not exactly lackluster, but what else would you do when staring a 10/10 Pro. Everything? It's a good S/B imo. As to Path, I agree totally that it doesn't fit Waste/Vindicate flow.

I think we're all along the same page, but we're in a few different camps on a few different subjects. My thoughts:

Duress vs. Thoughtseize vs. Inquisition

My thoughts are Thoughtseize is strictly the best. It hits everything we want it to hit, including Moats, creatures, Jace, Force, etc. If you can't afford Thoughtseize, or want 6 in the main, play 4 Thoughtseize 2 Inquisition. Duress is suited for the board, as an extra measure against combo and getting the run on Landstill and other non-creature permanent based control decks.

Deed vs. EE

Simple here. EE blows up a certain CMC, Deed does cost and under. Deed is much better against Tribal if it succeeds, but it is a turn slower. An EE for two takes two turns, usually running turn 2 and 3, wheres this is turn 3 and 4. Mind you, you probably wouldn't want to rawdog an EE on two with two colours against Counterbalance, so it ends up being the same. For me, I choose Deed unless you plan on facing Belcher or something, and need an out in the first 2-3 turns.

Diabolic Edict vs. Path vs. Swords

Although they serve slightly different purposes, you're still trying to kill creatures, plain and simple. Targeted removal is usually the best next to mass removal. Having someone sac Cursecatcher and save their Coralhelm Commander is terrible. Swords on Coralhelm would be better, in my opinion. Mind you, Ion on white takes away Path and Swords. I agree with Karakas in the main: if you expect Dredge/Reanimator/Emrakul, pack a Karakas backed with Extirpate in the board. If you're playing Knight, that is. I suggest running AT LEAST 4 Swords in this meta (Vengevines, Lackey, Lord of Atlantis). I also like having an extra 2 Path. Saved my ass plenty of times.

Maindeck Extirpate vs. 2 Path or something

Again, if you expect a ton of Vengevine, you could even pack 4 maindeck Jailers for all I care. It depends on your meta. If you have a ton of Veggies, packing 2 Extirpate isn't a terrible idea. I pack 2 extra Path, as it's more versatile in other matchups, such as Merfolk and Goblins. Yes, stripping a dual off a Hymn + Extirpate is good in the main, but so is just Hymning them and Pathing a dude.

Dueling Grounds vs. Engineered Plague

To be totally honest here, since I've discovered Dueling Grounds, I wouldn't go back to Plague. Plague is VERY good against Elves and Goblins, but Grounds trumps it by taking care of Merfolk and helping out with Vengevine. So far, the only problem is the fact that it has terrible art.

Noble Hierarch vs. Mox Diamond

Seems to be the most sway here. It really comes down to explosivity vs. stability. Mox Diamond allows for turn 1 Hymns, Verdicts, and such. I won't disagree. Turn 1 Noble into turn 2 Hymn is decent, only because you have to fetch a Bayou turn 1 for the Hierarch and play another land turn 2. If Hierarch tapped for Black, there wouldn't be any discussion. I agree Mox pumps your Knight, very true, but Hierarch pumps my Goyfs against his, and you have no way to get lands back. Mox allows for explosive plays, but it can also lead to lagginess afterwards if you don't follow up with big plays. Noble gives you a blocker, exalted, mana, and is good in multiples for the bonuses.

I've tried Mox, and I found myself mana hungry because I was losing lands. With Hierarch, I can survive Wastelands and keep trucking, and swing with Dark Confidant on turn 3 for 3. I like it, but Mox isn't a bad choice. I think it comes down to how your deck is built and personal preference.

Sideboard: to be continued, Dexter's on Bravo :tongue:

-Matt

Agree with pretty much all of this. Testing out the 3x Mox vs 4x Hierarch right now, I'm undecided at the moment.
How many Dueling Grounds would you run S/B?

sdematt

11-20-2010, 02:04 AM

If I had to go to a Star City Games Tournament tomorrow, I'd bring the following side:

Sideboard:

4x Extirpate With Loam, Vengevine, and other graveyard based decks running around, I don't leave home without these. Whether you're running some in the main or not, you should have at least 4, if not 7 of these between the main and side. I may be tricky to hide 7 Extirpates between the main and side, but it's that good.

3-4x Dueling Grounds: I'm undecided on the correct number of these as of late, but I feel 3-4 feels right. It lets you compete with fast aggro, improves Vengevine matchup again, can help you take on Merfolk, Zoo, Goblins, Dredge, Elves Thopters, etc. I've found Plague to be not as good in comparison now that's I've played with it. But, I wouldn't say anything against running a mix of Dueling Grounds and Plagues, or Plagues if you don't have Grounds. It's not good against decks with singular large beaters, like Reanimator and Emrakul/Sneak and Tell shenanigans.

1x Bojuka Bog: As hokey as some of you may think this is, it is a very useful tool as a one-of in either the side or the main, so long as you're running Knight of the Reliquary. An instant speed graveyard removal destroys the opposing Vengevines, Terravores, and puts their KoTR's into the small zone. There's nothing like blocking a 10/10 KoTR with a 6/6, then searching for Bog before damage. As well, Maze of Ith cannot also be underestimated: It's very good with Dueling Grounds.

4x Leyline of Sanctity: I'm not really sure why no one is playing this card. As the popularity of Vengevine rises, the popularity of the "counter" to Angry Salad, ANT or TEPS, also increases. Leyline gives you a turn 0 out to combo, and buys you what you need: Time. Time is a combo deck's worst enemy. The main goal is to besiege you with a flurry of spells in turns 1 and 2, then kill you. Leyline makes them dig for an answer before they go off, allowing you to use your discard to strip away key search cards, or just to lay out threats. Leyline also protects you from Siege Gang Commander under a Dueling Grounds, Wheel of Sun and Moon, the opponent's discard, Jace the Mind Sculptor, Burn Decks, Zoo, just to name a few. Even running it out on turn 3-4 is still good, honestly.

2x Pernicious Deed: You should be running 2 Deeds or EE's between the main and board. I'm thinking about running a 1:1 split, just because it's useful in many matchups. Not a necessity, but helpful.

3x Duress: If you don't like Deeds, Bogs, or what have you, I think this is the next card you should consider. Again, with Combo on the rise, having 7 pieces of turn 1 discard backed with Leyline of Sanctity gives you a much better edge. As well, On the play against Survival gives you more ways to take Survival away before they can play it. It's good against Control by taking Jace, Moat, Humility; It's good against other Rock decks; It's good against everything non-tribal. This is totally fine though, we have tribal matches covered with some combination of a bajillion Swords/removal and the Vindicate/Pulse/Deed/Dueling Grounds/bigger creature approach our decks tend to take.

Honourable mentions for obvious reasons goes to Pithing Needle. If you feel the need to, play it.

My board so far looks like:

4 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Duress
1 Deed
4 Extirpate
3 Dueling Grounds

Comments, questions, etc. post away. I'll be home tomorrow to answer :cool:

-Matt

SpikeyMikey

11-20-2010, 04:28 AM

I've dropped from 4 Vindicate to 3 to 2 because I found that a lot of decks ran too many basics to seriously crimp their mana base and it's too slow in a lot of matchups. It might be ok against Big Zoo where it can be used to kill a KotR or a Thoctar. It's not nearly as exciting against Cat Sligh where the first 2 turns are going to consist of them dropping some form of 3+ power beaters. Lynx into T2 double Nacatl is way too fast to be Vindicating things, even if you're on the play. Which is also the reason I run EE over Deed. Deed is better. Once it's on the board. But for answering nasty things that come down early like Nacatls and Vials, EE is just a bit faster, and that can mean the difference between being at 9 when I stabalize and being dead. Is Vindicate still useful? Yes, I just put Wastes and Vindicates to good use against AnT. Then later, I had 3 Wastelands in play against Quinn and they were dead. Obviously, it's still worth running some LD, but it's become less and less what my deck is focused on.

I'm playing more to the long game. Maybe it's a matter of play-style. I won G1 against Quinn because twice I extirpated him during his upkeep after an EoT E. Tutor, which kept him from getting Chant on a stick. Had that happened, I would've lost since I have no answer to it. Now maybe if I'd have been more proactive, running a full set of Hymns, Wastes and Vindicates, I could've avoided it through resource denial. Maybe. But whereas Hymn might hit that Chant and leave him with a dead stick in hand, Extirpate shuffled the stick away and removed all his Elspeths. Looking to the long game, I'd rather strip a win con (one of only 2 real win cons, since Painter/Stone is less than scary when you pack Plows and Edict, so the lone chicken factory was the only real threat at that point).

Also, on a different note, I would say that DG is far better against Gobbos than Plague. If you hit 2 Plagues, it's good, but if you only hit 1, they can still do nuts things with Warchiefs and Ringleaders and Piledrivers. DG means the biggest threat you face is a 2/2 swinging into you. Significantly less scary than say 4 1/1's and a 8/1.

makochman

11-20-2010, 06:32 AM

I'm probably going to take this to a local tournament in a couple of days:

MD
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Knight of the Reliquary
2 Doran, the Siege Tower
4 Dark Confidant
2 Qasali Pridemage

3 Chrome Mox

4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Thoughtseize
3 Vindicate
2 Maelstrom Pulse
4 Hymn to Tourach

3 Sensei's Divining Top

2 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Plains
2 Scrubland
2 Bayou
2 Savannah
1 Windswept Heath
3 Marsh Flats
3 Verdant Catacombs
1 Bojuka Bog
2 Wasteland
1 Maze of Ith

SB
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Nihil Spellbomb
3 Extirpate
1 Duress
1 Tidehollow Sculler
2 Pernicious Deed
2 Path to Exile
2 Faerie Macabre
2 Engineered Plague

Chrome Mox is there so I can reduce the land count, as opposed to Mox Diamond, which eats up a land. I have 20 mana-producing lands/fetchlands + 1 Maze of Ith. I can usually keep a hand with 2 lands or 1 land and 1 Mox, so it's like I have 23 lands. The deck has a few ways of generating card advantage to offset pitching a card to the Mox.

Comments and criticism would be very welcome.

AggroSteve

11-20-2010, 07:42 AM

i do not like chrome mox here at all, since besides confidant we have no drawengine, i'd rather loose a land, that pumps my knight than a businessspell, i think you understand my point, if you would have another "sick" drawengine or cardadvantagegenerator in your list i would approve of it
just as example, since you have enought threats i would recommend 2x jitte, ....just an idea, in that case i would up the count of mealstrom to 3 and cut the vindicates, since your LD is quite weak compared to the usual 4 wastelands and 4 vindicates

sdematt

11-20-2010, 06:57 PM

I'm not a fan of the Wastelands, I prefer to run more basics instead. I think it makes you better against Tribal, since they have few things to Wasteland anyway.

Thoughts about Sideboard analysis?

-Matt

Evincarcrovax

11-20-2010, 07:20 PM

how do you deal with show and tell decks? I played rock today at a local tournament and show and tell is the only thing that beat me.

jandax

11-20-2010, 07:32 PM

Karakas helps.

ZeinVoncy

11-20-2010, 07:55 PM

Thoughts about Sideboard analysis?

-Matt

Solid analysis I think. Everyone is different, but I feel that you covered most of the most reasonable choices. As of the moment, my S/B looks like this:
3x Chalice of the Void
3x Dueling Grounds
1x Pernicious Deed
2x Qasali Pridemage
3x Pithing Needle
1x Extirpate
2x Diabolic Edict

sdematt

11-20-2010, 09:09 PM

IsThisACatInAHat?

11-20-2010, 09:39 PM

how do you deal with show and tell decks? I played rock today at a local tournament and show and tell is the only thing that beat me.
Karakas is essentially useless, despite the weird misconception that it actually does anything. Off Sneak Attack (assuming Emrakul), a Karakas activation is negated with an extra R. Off SnT, they're only going to drop Progenitus anyway. Look for a hand with lots of early hand disruption and possibly a threat. SnT decks are weak to tempo matchups, so play that way; a Tarmogoyf, KotR or pair of Bobs backed by a constant stream of black discard is your best chance.

SnT decks need at least 2 of 3 types of cards to keep a hand; a threat, a cheat card and protection (which can alternately just be fast mana against nonblue decks or redundant copies against blue decks). If they've got redundant cards in-hand (i.e. 2 threats), take their cheat card or tutor instead. If can find an Extirpate, take Emrakul or a cheat card (prioritizing Sneak Attack > SnT > Emrakul, assuming none in play) and extirpate it. Obviously it's easier said than done; the matchup is obviously extremely unfavorable for you, but it's not unrealistic to pull away with a win if you can land an early Bob and follow up with discard+ an Extirpate or two.

Assuming Brad Nelson's top 8 list, your board strategy is -1 Pernicious Deed, -4 Swords to Plowshares, -4 Vindicate, +3 Duress, +3 Extirpate, +3 Diabolic Edict. You can adjust it to your particular list, but the idea is more or less the same whatever list you play.

Evincarcrovax

11-21-2010, 10:42 AM

@ Evincarcrovax

What decks did you win against? I'm saying if you beat all other major archetypes/decks (Tribal, Combo, Survival, Landstill) and only lost to Show and Tell, need we shore up the match?

Most of the stuff they play is Legendary, or is targetable by Swords. Iona and Emrakul get raped by Knight of the Reliquary fetching Karakas, and most other beasts get taken out by targeted removal. I suggest siding in discard against these types of decks.

-Matt

There was 4 rounds . First round I played against a really bad U/W control deck, the person told me it was his first time playing legacy so this was a pretty easy match. won 2-0

The second one was the show and tell deck, I lost 1-2. I did win one of the matches only because I drew a lot of discard.

Third round was fish, and I won 2-1. Choke and Plague and discard helped here.

The fourth round I played goblins and the lost the first match. I sided in dueling grounds, and engineered plague and won the next two.

I placed third and won 5 boosters of scars. First place was from the vault relics.
This was my list.

4 Swamp
2 Godless Shrine
1 Plains
1 Windswept Heath
1 Murmuring Bosk
3 Tainted Field
3 Tainted Wood
1 Horizon Canopy
2 Overgrown Tomb
3 Marsh Flats
3 Mishra's Factory

4 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Hymn to Tourach
2 Gerrard's Verdict
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Maelstrom Pulse
4 Pernicious Deed
2 Phyrexian Arena
1 Elspeth Knight-Errant

3 Nantuko Shade
2 Doran
3 Eternal Witness
4 Loxodon Hierarch

SB:
3 Duress
2 Duelling Grounds
3 Engineered Plague
3 Choke
4 Leyline of the Void

I'll take the leylines out of the sideboard and add in my Diabolic edicts instead. Out of like 20 people nobody played any graveyard based decks. I'll try and find some karakas as well.

SpikeyMikey

11-21-2010, 03:25 PM

ZeinVoncy

11-21-2010, 05:29 PM

I'm waffling on Deed vs. EE again. When I was running Deed, I wanted EE instead most of the time. Now that I've made the switch, I find myself never liking EE when I see it. It's no good against Humility or Jace. I think I'm going back to Deed.

Well, just to play devils advocate, Deed doesn't help against Jace either. I've never been a big fan of EE, even when I played 4cc in Vintage. It's too narrow to be that great. Deed gives more play room once it's actually on the field, as opposed to EE which is limited once on the field.

AggroSteve

11-21-2010, 06:06 PM

i for my part play deed and prefer it over EE, exactly for the above stated reason, deed gives more options, ... just for example, it hinders an aggroplayer from overextending, and that way you keep control of the game, otherwise if deed comes a bit later it just wipes the board clear, and that is exactly why i like deed better than EE

honestly in what matchups is EE better than Deed if you are playing a Dark Horizons list? i cannot think of one other than belcher and to a lesser extend maybe dredge or TES if they are going for ETW

SpikeyMikey

11-21-2010, 06:40 PM

Not playing Dark Horizons though, playing a very controlling version of Rock. And the things that come immediately to mind are fast Zoo, Cat Sligh and Fish.

JimmyC27

11-21-2010, 06:41 PM

I've been running 2x EE over 2x Deed lately, so I'll share a couple things I've noticed. It's definitely nicer to topdeck 0 than 3 with Bob. Also, if you have board position, it's nice to pinpoint exactly what CC you want to wipe. If you're being overrun by Goblins, you want Deed. But, for example, if they're attacking my manabase then I want to keep Mox Diamond around post-wipe. In a way, EE feels like a 5th and 6th Vindicate to me.

Ultimately, I believe the choice comes down to paying attention to your metagame.

Cheers,

Jimmy

sdematt

11-22-2010, 12:09 AM

I'm hoping to rewrite the Rock Primer for Friday. Give it a bit of an update with new card choices, matchup analysis, etc. I'm hoping the mods can put it at the front of the thread with citanul's, so we have a much longer comprehensive primer for people to read.

Also, we'll have a bitchin' banner, done by Xeroninja for us over on Mtgsalvation. Give him some kudos if you're a member over there.

http://i163.photobucket.com/albums/t284/XenoSlicer/TheRock.jpg

http://i163.photobucket.com/albums/t284/XenoSlicer/TheRock.jpg

-Matt

AggroSteve

11-22-2010, 06:53 AM

nice picture, did you make it matt?

@ spikeymikey: in a controllish build i would allways play deed over EE, simply because every rock-build, and specially the controllish ones have problems against fast aggro decks

luckily we have a sideboard to solve all of our problems^^

sdematt

11-22-2010, 10:47 AM

Unfortunately, I'm fail at Photoshop, so I had a guy over on mtgsalvation do it :D

-Matt

Charos

11-22-2010, 12:33 PM

I won (T4 split) a 21 person tourney over the weekend with our favorite deck. My list is a couple pages back. The MUs and some comments where:

Rd1 vs Bad Eva Green/Rock [Liliana Vess, no duals, no wastelands]: Simply outclassed. 1-0 (2-0)
Rd2 vs Mox powered Rock: I play less acceleration for more consistent mid-late game. I was able to deal with his early threats and take the mid-late game twice. 2-0 (4-1)
Rd3 vs TES: Game 1: He goes first and has 8 goblin tokens round 1. Fortunately I have Engineered Explosives and kill his tokens after only one attack. He is not able to build enough momentum in the few short turns that I beat face after that, as I attack his hand while casting critters. Game 2. He goes first and Goblin Charbelcher's me turn 1. Game 3. I go first and play Pithing Needle on Belcher. He is not able to deal with it fast enough. 3-0 (6-2)
Rd4 vs Mono-Blue Control: Game 1: I keep a LD heavy hand which is irrelevant for him. Jace, Vedalken and B2B seal the game. Game 2: I have needles for Jace and Shackles with one more backup if they are destroyed. I bait with critters until I feel it is safe to land a Bob. It is downhill from there. We decide to draw since our chances are very good to T8 with a draw and the MU is close. 3-0-1 (7-3)
Rd5 vs Eva White: ID for T8 3-0-2 (7-3)

T8 vs same opponent as Rd5: Knights are much bigger than his critters, although he has Perish. Card advantage with Bob is critical in these MUs so I play around that and win. First 2 games are similar, I manage to win the 2nd despite the colossal mistake to play EE for 3 instead of 2. I win Game 3 in short order by destroying his hand and first couple of lands. 4-0-2 (9-4)

T4 split for $100 credit each. Other decks on the T4 were the MUC from Rd4 and a Red Burn deck. I am not sure of the other one. Surprisingly not much Survival around.

Arsenal

11-23-2010, 12:13 PM

Considering the vast majority of sideboards consist of artifacts and enchantments, I'm curious as to why more people aren't running the Enlightened Tutor SB package. Assuming you're on the play, EOT Tutor can be backbreaking against certain decks. I mean, Dueling Grounds, Wheel of Sun and Moon, Plague, Crypt, Relic, EE, Deed, Choke, etc. are all commonly played SB cards that can be tutored up with E. Tutor. Is the card disadvantage and loss of tempo too great for the versatility of Tutor?

sdematt

11-23-2010, 01:49 PM

True that it allows you to tutor, but you lose actual sideboard slots for tutors. I'm not saying tutors don't turn into the things you want, I just think I'm more of a "I'd rather have 4 copies of this than having 4 tutors and fewer copies." Also, it's usually a two turn investment (even EOT you need to keep mana open and such). I'd rather have redundancy than versatility (of being able to have, say 10 different artifacts/enchanments), in this case.

I have nothing against a tutor-board, I'm just not a fan. If it works for you, go for it.

-Matt

ZeinVoncy

11-23-2010, 02:24 PM

Arsenal

11-23-2010, 03:02 PM

x 2. I feel that Rock should have enough answers on its own.
If this became a tutor decktype , why not just use Living Wish M/D over a S/B tutor and find an answer for a threat via S/B critter?

The difference between Living Wish + creature/land SB and Enlightened Tutor + artifact/enchantment SB are many. They're really not even close in terms of speed and utility.

EDIT: Also, many lists are running the KotR + toolbox land package. The E. Tutor + artifact/enchantment package is simply a SB extension of what we already have going in our maindeck, and would allow for a more varied attack at the opponent's gameplan (Wheel of Sun and Moon + Crypt + Relic is better than Crypt x 3).

Dzra

11-23-2010, 03:17 PM

SpikeyMikey

11-23-2010, 06:00 PM

It's not a bad idea maybe. It could help the Survival MU. Speaking of which.... I haven't liked my SB plan against them. It feels like I'm recovering too much lost ground. I might try a more discard heavy approach and see if that works better.

I don't think it will. Once a SotF hits the board, the first creature they draw becomes 4 hasty VV's. I run the Extirpates main and 3 Aven Mindcensors in the board. Mindcensor is the best option, I think, because it serves double duty against storm combo, whether it's AnT, TES or DDAnT hybrid. Pithing Needle, Leyline and Relic are only effective in corner cases. Mindcensor stops IT and DD, often in response to an LED being cracked and it supplements your LD plan; they run more fetches than duals so Mindcensor is almost as good as Mindlock Orb and it beats and it's instant speed. Against Survival, it neuters the VV plan AND shuts down the NO they're brining in G2 to counteract whatever hate you may have.

Magicsk8ngenius

11-23-2010, 06:58 PM

I like the aven mindcensor idea here, except for the fact it has no protection. They either have FoW or swords and we have no way to stop that except for discard. Thoughtseize really comes into play here but even then it isn't always a for sure thing. I like needle a bit better but it's only good if they don't switch to the NO plan.

SpikeyMikey

11-23-2010, 07:25 PM

But Needle can be forced as well and is vulnerable to Nature's Claim, which they will bring in. And UG doesn't have swords and 3 color decks are even more susceptible to both Wasteland and Mindcensor. Mindcensor is vulnerable to removal like Swords but it avoids the normal answers they have for hate; Spell Pierce and Nature's Claim. And Needle doesn't stop Intuition either. Intuition is rather unimpressive under Mindcensor. It's like a giant Mental Note.

sdematt

11-23-2010, 10:09 PM

Someone said they're having trouble with Survival. I have a few answers to that, and questions.

If you're playing Discard and Swords, which you should be, side in 4 Extirpates, 3 Dueling Grounds, and 3-4 Duress. Pithing Needle is also very good if you run it. You can't totally discount a sideboard card because they have a counter to it. Not only do you have to try hate, they have to draw hate for your hate.

Aven Mindcensor is a good plan. They only have 4 Swords, and you have tempting Dark Confidants, KoTR, Tarmogoyfs, and the like. I can't see them drawing a Swords to ALL your threats. Plus, it shuts off their fetchlands (essentially). They have to hit a land in the top 4 or get hit with a massive "Fail to find" and only get to shuffle. I agree with the Mindcensor plan (I'm running Duress in it's place, as I have more Control in my meta, but I'm sure this is the "flex" sideboard slot).

Remember kids, we can also block Vengevine.

At this point in the game after boarding, you're now running 4-6 Swords effects, 3 Dueling Grounds, 4 Extirpates, and Anywhere from 8-14 pieces of discard, along with Bojuka Bog if you run it. The only way I could see you losing this game is not drawing a huge threat, or losing to bad Confidant topdecks. I'm pretty sure the correct play is to have them go all-in for a hasty wing for 16, blocking some, Pulsing the others, then Extirpating them away.

I'm not saying we're going to boast 140% win ratios against Survival like it boasts about every deck in Legacy, but putting enough hate in, backed with threats, usually will put you at a slight advantage. Just maybe.

You should be especially good against the G/W version: nothing of yours gets countered! Huzzah! :tongue:

I'm hoping to do a careful matchup analysis for Vengevine within the primer, but I think I'll wait a week and see if I quit Legacy or not (at least, sanctioned Legacy). I'll be very upset if they ban Survival, it's my favourite card in Legacy :(

-Matt

Dzra

11-24-2010, 04:32 AM

The Survival MUs I've done, we've both SBed in 4 PtE. (I also side in 2 more Deeds and 4 Extirpate) So it's basically a giant removal fest except their deck runs a lot more creatures. Perhaps I've been unlucky, but instead of a board-control plan, next time I'm going to go heavy discard + Extirpate and see what happens.

alphacat

11-24-2010, 04:59 AM

Noticed that the MU analysis in the OP is slightly dated, I'm wondering if anyone can comment on the following MU's:

Combo affinity (with Glimpse)
VV Survival
S&T Emrakul
Elves!
Enchantress
Stax

I have yet to play these, so I'm wondering how Rock would do against them. Also, what kind of MU is Rock weak against? Zoo and Gob?

ZZZ

11-24-2010, 07:01 AM

I have ran an E-tutor sideboard a lot and I’ve recently switched back to it. Not only does it allow you to have a versatile sideboard, it also allows you to diversify your hate. This can be important in the storm combo and dredge matchups.

I'd rather have redundancy than versatility (of being able to have, say 10 different artifacts/enchanments), in this case.

I have nothing against a tutor-board, I'm just not a fan. If it works for you, go for it.

-Matt

A lot of these 10 different artifacts/enchantments will often fulfil the same function so I don’t think a tutor board is necessarily less redundant. Also playing a tutor board doesn’t mean you have to dedicate your entire board to it. I’m currently trying out the following sideboard in a Dark Horizons type build:
- 1 E-tutor (1 main)
- 1 Pithing Needle
- 1 Tormod’s Crypt
- 1 Ethersworn Canonist
- 1 Choke
- 1 Oblivion Ring / Runed Halo
- 3 Extirpate
- 3 Duress (1 main)
- 3 Diabolic Edict
I have a Deed and a Dueling Grounds main (along with 1 Enlightened Tutor).

You should be especially good against the G/W version: nothing of yours gets countered! Huzzah! :tongue:
-Matt
I haven’t tested the GW survival matchup a lot but is it really better for us than the GU lists? It seems to me they are less dependant on Survival and a lot less vulnerable to Extirpate. Because they run Goyfs and Knights as well, they can easily become a GW aggro deck. It seems they have a lot more things that we need to answer than the GU versions. Again I haven’t tested this a lot but on paper it looks to be a worse matchup than GU Vengevival.

SpikeyMikey

11-24-2010, 03:07 PM

Dzra

11-24-2010, 03:31 PM

GW is definitely harder for me. Fortunately, it's far more infrequently played. The have more fat than I do and they are more resilient when you take their Survival away. I think of the two decks as ATS and RGSA. ATS was always more played because it had game against combo, but RGSA was harder to beat with the style of decks I play. GW is the same way. No real disruption to speak of but a threat every damn turn.

Yeah, GW is a lot harder in my opinion. And luckily enough there are two in my meta now... >_> They have all the same fat, almost as much removal, and moms. Moms are really the worst. One game, the dude played 2 before I had any removal, so while he's swinging at me with his one Vengevine, I have to wait until I have 3 PtE/Swords before I can kill the damn thing. >< (Meanwhile he's PtE/Swording all my dudes) I think Pernicious Deed is really good here and Extirpating their Swords or PtE can really up your game.

Last time, my SB plan was -4 Vindicate, -4 Hymn, +4 Extirpate, +4 PtE (and later I tried +2 PtE, +2 Deed). This time I'm going to try -4 Vindicate, -4 Swords, +4 Extirpate, +2 Gerrard's Verdict, +2 Pernicious Deed. My thinking now is to try to beat them for CA. (Bog also, but I won't take anything out for it)

Mana Drain

11-24-2010, 03:40 PM

Hey everyone! I don't play this deck but keep getting blown out by it playing U-control like Landstill and such. Thoughtseize + Hymm/Verdict+ big dudes is pretty hard to deal with for control. Could anyone tell me what cards you DON'T want to see on the table from a blue deck, other than the obvious Jace or Humility? Is there a sideboard card that just ruins you day? Color is irrelevant, as I run all of them. Also, I already run 3 Top.

Thanks in advance guys!

Dzra

11-24-2010, 05:40 PM

damionblackgear

11-24-2010, 05:51 PM

Mana Drain - Mess with the manabase before we get online. That's the best way to fight a Rock styled deck. Pick a color, usually white since there are a lot of white requirements now, and cut it off as best you can. It'll buy you a lot of time. The deck is designed to have a 50-50 vs the meta and try to improve after board. It's a skill>draw deck. Pm me though, I'd like to chat about Landstill, but not in the Rock forum.

Everyone Else- Is the survival deck really causing that much of an issue? They really can't keep up with a Leyline from you. There is enough removal and hand disruption that you usually run through them with it + Leyline. And if you don't have it they're already worrying about extirpate because it's become popular. Also, an Active Knight still beats 90% of those decks (Bog).

For Mom there really isn't anything outside of Deed or EE that you can do to beat her in play. I would suggest, if you can, Thoughtseizing her instead of the decks namesake. Can't use a survival without a creature and most of our lists have reverted back to old style with tons of hand disruption. I've seen better outcomes going after the mom than the survival.

Other options include, Getting a bigger creature that can block the one their swinging with and then using removal when they try to force through. Otherwise, you're in a blocking standstill which will benefit you more than them.

sdematt

11-24-2010, 07:41 PM

Welcome back, Damion.

@ Mana Drain

We will tell you nothing, now shoo!
But in all seriousness, as I was talking about in the Landstill thread, play Leyline of Sanctity. No discard will touch you until we blow it up. Deed is good against us, as we don't run many threats. Most Rock decks play 12 creatures or thereabouts, and I know as a fellow Landstill player we can deal with 12. Basically: Stop discard, play and protect Jace and win.

Perish is a card I don't want to see, Leyline of Sanctity is bad for me, Leyline of the Void is moderately annoying, 4x Jace and 4x Pernicious Deed are ugh, and Humility makes me cry at times. Moat is bad because we need to find something to blow it up.

-Matt

rogue.nine

11-24-2010, 08:05 PM

^ speaking of which I've been, in a casual sort of way, tinkering with putting in loam lion's over some discard MD, is there a reason that I don't see that done more?

-Increases threat count to ~15-16
-tempts people to blow removal early on a 2/3
-none green creature, immune to perish/hibernation/submerge

Clearly this takes the deck into a slightly more aggro direction with a worse game 1 versus combo but rock tries to side into game 2 and 3 anyways. Its not the greatest topdeck latter in the game but I play in a high agro meta and I've liked having more "beef".

sdematt

11-24-2010, 09:43 PM

I think if you feel the need to run more creatures, I'd say Qasali Pridemage or even Doran would be better choices I think. Loam is just too small for this deck. A 2/3 isn't impressive against most things in Legacy. Qasali gives other things Exalted, or swings for 3 by itself, and Doran is a 5/5 on turn 2/3.

-Matt

OuterCrow

11-25-2010, 02:25 AM

I agree - I think if you're looking at adding more creatures, Qasali Pridemage has to be first in line. No other creature comes to mind that can top it in terms of a balance of utility/offense.

SpikeyMikey

11-25-2010, 02:37 AM

I'd definitely go Pridemage over Doran. This is a utility deck. Even our best beater is a utility card (KotR). I've cut the Hierarchs out of my build again. It's not that I don't like them, they can be explosive, but they can often be meh at best. Still better late than Diamond, but not good enough. Finally added the Maze of Ith. It is a great tutor target, I'm just worried that I'm going to have games where it clogs up my hand when I don't want it. Still, everyone else loves it, so we'll stick with it for now.

sdematt

11-25-2010, 11:42 AM

I agree, Qasali is first in line if you're adding more, but if you want to add, say 6 creatures, I'd say 4 Qasali and 2 Doran. As in, add Qasali first, then Dorans.

-Matt

Dzra

11-25-2010, 02:15 PM

I think taking out the discard and adding more creatures is the wrong approach. Without the discard package, we are just a bad Zoo deck.

Edit: I was also looking around and its been a while since we've talked about Tidehollow Sculler. Possible alternative to Gerrard's Verdict... although Verdict is pretty nice.

damionblackgear

11-26-2010, 11:29 AM

What's up Matt, Happy to see you kept the thread alive.

I agree with Drza. Less discard for more creatures turns us into Aggro Rock which, according to what I've noticed, has done worse than standard Control Rock builds. Sculler is an option to be looked into though as it accomplishes both. I guess it turns on to a what is better argument between targeted singles (which may not stay gone) and multiple of choice (which may lead to a issue in the future).

I think right now that the meta is extremely graveyard based and giving them the choice could lead to worse outcomes that we are able to deal with. If you can get lucky and limit their hand early I'm all for hitting two more cards but early I'd rather have the ability to choose what's going away.

On a separate note(s): How many lands are you all ending the game with? Just wondering since I haven't really been playing Rock as much since Reanimator left the format.
And what's with this name of Dark Horizon's? Did they finally give BGW decks multiple names?!

Dzra

11-26-2010, 02:40 PM

Yeah, Dark Horizons basically tries to disrupt with early hand and land disruption and finishes with KotR or Goyf and uses Bob/Top and 2 for 1 discard for CA. Brad Nelson's list from Columbus was the first one to start getting attention.

I usually end with anywhere between 2 and 6 lands depending on how much Wasteland action there is (from eiter of us).

sdematt

11-26-2010, 03:44 PM

Dark Horizons I think is a big mistake in the name. I think they just said it was like New Horizons because it played KotR and black, so therefore, Dark Horizons. Most of the time it's referred to as Dark Horizons, BWG Rock, or Junk, but it's all the same basic deck.

I usually end the game with 4-6 lands or more. I play more basics and such, and I win in the later game (turn 8+)

-Matt

Magicsk8ngenius

11-26-2010, 07:32 PM

Quasali Pridemage is king. That is the next creature worth putting in. For a while I tried 2x Quasali in place of the 2x gerard's verdict because my meta is heavy enchantress with a few counterbalance decks floating around. It turns out pretty good when you can drop it on turn 1 with mox. That puts a real clock on any deck being able to attack for 3 on turn 2. Also the utility with Quasali makes it very much worth it's weight. I tried sculler and have always been disappointed in it. In fact I love when I have to play against it because it is just so easy to kill (even Quasali kills it).

@ Mana: Same as everyone else says, remove the 12 threats that most decks play and you should be able to grind it out in the end. Other than that, a well place Submerge is really good and very annoyinng. For this reason I tend to keep no forests in play when playing against a deck that runs submerge. I don't think that leyline of sanctity is really worth a sideboard slot.

Dark Horizon's is a pretty bad name. A while back I was looking for a new deck and was playing aggro loam at the time. This is when New Horizons had come out. I had talked to a friend about playing new horizons but using black instead of blue for discard effects and sinkhole. I joked to call the deck dark horizons. This name fit that idea of a deck, but it really does not fit this new more rock style control deck. I simply call it the rock now.

Dzra

11-26-2010, 08:37 PM

Well I for one like the name. :p

SpikeyMikey

11-26-2010, 08:58 PM

I usually end up with 4+ lands in play. I run 23 now that I've pulled Hierarch back out.

I don't like Sculler in here. While it will often strip the only removal out of their hand to protect itself, 2 damage just isn't enough of a clock on it's own. A Pridemage can sometimes go the distance but Sculler is going to need to swing 8-9 times to put the game away as opposed to 5-6 times for Pridemage. If we ran Swords (FI or LS) I would call it worthwhile but as is, it's just too unimpressive.

sdematt

11-26-2010, 09:06 PM

SpikeyMikey

11-27-2010, 02:33 AM

I would agree that it's definitely a pain in the ass for most decks. The problem is, what's bad enough in your sideboard that you'll want to cut it for 4 Leylines?

sdematt

11-27-2010, 03:50 AM

Many lists run Diabolic Edict, I guess for the Emrakul matchup? I figure I've got tutorable Karakas. I put the Leylines in first and build the board around them. They're so good in so many matches that I couldn't have them excluded. You can bring it in against many matchups, and that's what I like about it.

-Matt

sdematt

11-27-2010, 04:43 AM

Test for the new primer. Tell me if there's anything more you want to add and such, or any mistakes or wrong stuff.

The Rock

http://i163.photobucket.com/albums/t284/XenoSlicer/TheRock.jpg

1. Origins
2. Playstyle
3. Evolution
4. Card choices
5. Basic Strategy
6. Aggro vs. Control
7. Decklists
8. Sideboard choices
9. Matchup analysis
10. Records
11. Additional information

1. Origins
The Origins of the Rock deck are found in Citanul’s post, do copy paste that. :tongue:

2. Playstyle

The Rock refers to the control ability of the deck. It is what you fall back on, your “Rock.” When I first started playing in late 90’s early 2000’s, I remember first hearing of the “Rock” deck and wondered what it meant. I received various responses, but many replied with, “Answers to everything.” The Rock plays varying amounts of threats, coupled with both proactive and reactive spells to control the game to the point where we can win. This sounds like most decks, but it really isn’t. Rock is typically played in some combination of Black, White, and Green. Rock rarely plays vanilla creatures, opting instead for Evasion, comes into play effects, or creatures that are just plain devastating and must be answered when they hit the table. Rock also plays efficient trumps to other threats, commonly known as “answers.” Most of these include spell based answers to permanents, and discard for hand-based threats. Rock is very much a reactive deck, foiling your Plan A with its regular style of play, called “Plan A” by the Rock player. Should your Plan B happen to come online, Rock usually has some sort of answer for that too, also commonly called “Plan A” by the Rock player. What Rock lacks in specified answers it makes up for in cards that are generally good in most situations, rather than pinpoint reactions against pinpoint cards. Most choices cover an archetype of a strategy, such as Aggro or say, Control trumps. This is quite the opposite of many inclusions in many decks, in which X is an answer for Y, whereas in Rock, Z is an answer for M through Z.

Rock typically goes one of a few ways: either heavy control, disruption based aggro, or mid-range beats with a good amount of answers. Typically the middle-road is taken, as it takes on the very essence of Rock: being good against many things, but not overwhelmingly amazing against any particular archetype.

3. Evolution

Rock has changed as each passing block adds more card to the deck. As time passed from Urza’s block onward, changes didn’t occur rapidly to many lists. Many played the standby list of big fatties with discard and removal, all of which had very limited option until Invasion block hit. Invasion is probably the premiere influence in the evolution of modern Rock-based decks, and started turning Rock into the deck it’s known for post-2000. Invasion block focused on multicolour concoctions, and had been in production for years to showcase the similarities, strengths, and differences of the different colour schemes. This led to a very important evolution of the deck: the start, or the increase in the number of Rock decks running three colours. Pre-Apocalypse, Rock was primarily in Green-Black, with some people splashing for Swords to Plowshares. Apocalypse brought Pernicious Deed, Phyrexian Arena, Vindicate, Spiritmonger, and loads of other good stuff. The true Rock deck of the modern age was born.

Since then, sets have added cards here and there. Onslaught added Fetchlands for improved consistency, Fifth Dawn added Engineered Explosives and Eternal Witness (although EE was not used to its full potential until much later), Champions of Kamigawa added Top (again, not used until much later). Then came Ravnica, which added Loxodon Hierarch, and more importantly, Dark Confidant. Dark Confidant, and card draw in particular, gave the deck its ultimate strategy: use efficient answers, in combination with massive card advantage to overwhelm your opponent. Having more answers to fewer threats was paramount for the Rock deck. Later sets brought Tarmogoyf, Kitchen Finks, Maelstrom Pulse, Knight of the Reliquary and the use of utility lands, Thoughtseize, and other cards to name a few. The combination of powerful creatures at the cost of multiple colours/high cost, efficient removal and card advantage was finally hatched, creating Legacy Rock.

4. Card Choices
In Rock decks of modern day, many of the builds share similar cards. I’ll refer to the core cards used in a large percentage of Rock decks, followed by those used in some decks, but not all.

Creatures:

Tarmogoyf: The new staple creature of Legacy, Tarmogoyf provides a formidable beater early in the game and gets larger as Rock blows more crap up. An efficient creature is an auto-include in most aggro to midrange Rock decks.

Knight of the Reliquary: The new kid on the block, KotR is soon becoming a staple in Rock builds of all types, due to his ability to get bigger than most other creatures previously used in Rock, and for his land fetching capability. He prevents colour screw by tutoring for the lands you need and gets bigger by doing it. He can also find fetchlands, which can crack to find other lands, pumping himself up by 2. Some combat tricks used with him are: blocking, and before damage searching for lands to increase his P/T ratio; attacking then untapping after damage but before end of combat using Maze of Ith, which can also be tutored for by Knight; searching for specialty lands to hose the graveyard (Bojuka Bog), provide blockers (Nantucko Monastery), and provide recursion (Volrath’s Stronghold). All in all, Knight is proving his worth as a 5/5 to 10/10 and up creature for 3 mana.

Eternal Witness: Usually played in more controlling builds, Eternal Witness allows you to replay backbreaking spells over and over again. Most people running Aggro builds have dropped Witness in favour of faster answers. Coupled with Pernicious Deed blowing up for more than 3, Witness and Pernicious Deed can combo in loops, with Witness fetching Deed, playing Deed and blowing up for more than 3, and returning Witness with Volrath’s Stronghold.

Dark Confidant: Used in Rock builds with lower mana curves, Confidant provides serious card advantage that is used to crush your opponent. Although very fragile, he can also attack when you don’t have any other pressure on board. Coupled with Sensei’s Divining Top, Confidant can draw you cards while manipulating your library for minimal loss of life. Coupled with fetchlands, you rarely take huge damage from Confidant. He’s pretty much an auto-include in most builds today.

Stoneforge Mystic: Used in some Aggro builds, it allows you to fetch weapons tech to flesh out creature on creature battles. A very useful tool, but does have to be built around.

Loxodon Hierarch: Another creature used in slower builds, Hierach is a 4/4 beater than nets you life as a CiTP ability. Being able to regenerate your team can very, very crucial in certain times during certain games. Although deemed slow, he’s still an inclusion in many control builds to stay online late enough in the game to win.

Kitchen Finks: The quicker replacement for Loxodon is a 3/2 Persist that nets you 4 life total over its lifetime. It is used against other Aggro based strategies, as it provides you with two blockers and 4 life. It also combines very well with Deed, and gives you creatures after a Deed on 3 or more, and you get some life out of him too. Many rock builds play him in either the main or board, or both.

Tombstalker: Not as common as the other creatures listed, but a worthy inclusion in many builds needing a large beater with evasion. In some builds, he can come down very early to seal the game. In others, he beats for five when there’s nothing left to stop him after you’ve ground out your opponent. He’s not played very often due to the popularity of Dark confidant, and the possibility of blind revealing a Tombstalker and getting hit for 8 isn’t appealing to most players. When he is played, he’s played usually in control based builds, or those without Dark Confidant.

Qasali Pridemage: Used in tempo builds to combat the rising use of powerful artifacts and enchantments. It also gives all your singular attacks an extra boost, making your Goyf bigger than theirs. All in all, a very solid utility creatures, especially with recursion.

Doran, the Siege Tower: Although the mana cost isn’t the easiest to get on turn 3, Doran is a 5/5 beater for 3, which is great. He turns any walls you play (in Control builds) into 4/4 and 5/5’s, and lets your Birds attack for damage, and makes Goyf bigger. Many lists have dropped him for Knight of the Reliquary, as Doran’s 5/5 isn’t as good as a 10/10 down the road.

Nantucko Shade: Again, not another common choice now, but more relevant in the past. Nantucko swings for 5 on turn 3 if played on turn 2, and is a very efficient beater. As of late, he’s been outclassed by other creatures, and he does hog your mana base as you usually want to pump him up. Not a terrible choice in the slightest, but not as common as other creatures.

Shriekmaw: Again, not very common, but used in control builds usually coupled with recursion. It’s usually played for its Evoke cost and returned later in the game.

Lord of Extinction: Some play this in control builds. If this card had trample, it’d be epic. Unfortunately, it’s just a big dumb beater with no evasion. But, it’s very good after Deeding away the board, and then swinging in with impunity.

Spiritmonger: One of the main fatties used when Rock burst into its new era post-Apocalypse. Since then, cheaper creatures have made Spiritmonger largely irrelevant, but he still sees some play in older lists.

Spells:

Thoughtseize: Most Rock decks like to use hand disruption as card advantage, and Thoughtseize is the best of them all, allowing you to take any non-land card you want at a cost of two life. If a Rock deck is playing hand disruption, this is an auto-include.

Hymn to Tourach: Another piece of hand disruption that is too good not to play if you’re in hand disruption mode.

Gerrard’s Verdict: Usually played a supplement to Thoughtseize and Hymn, or played in place of Hymn if the deck has trouble getting double black on turn 2. It is somewhat worse because it allows your opponent to choose what they discard.

Duress: Usually played in conjunction with Thoughtseize to combat combo and control based strategies.

Inquisition of Kozilek: Played along with Thoughtseize, or as a replacement for Thoughtseize. As you have an upside for not losing life, you lose the ability to nab anything that costs 3 or more. Usually used as Thoughtseizes 5-6, or when on a budget.

Swords to Plowshares: One of the main reasons to splash white, removing any creature for an exchange of life for one white makes this an auto-include in every Rock deck I know. There’s no reason you can’t play 4.

Path to Exile: Usually played as Swords 5-8 in the main or board, Path exchanges creature removal for tempo advantage. It’s used in more agro builds where you don’t want to give your opponent life.

Vindicate: Permanent removal at its finest. For 1BW, kill any single permanent on the board. At 3 CMC, it usually dodges Counterbalance and can kill Jace, a land, any creature…anything. Most Rock decks play at least 2, if not 4.

Maelstrom Pulse: A Vindicate that doesn’t hit lands, but hits multiple non-land permanents. It’s very useful in all of Vindicate’s non-land destruction applications, with the added bonus of being able to kill one to however many things are on the board. Useful for killing tokens, planeswalkers, creatures, multiple enchantments and artifacts (Ghostly Prisons, Mox Diamonds). Also, it’s not usually the colour named against Rock by Iona (White), so it deals with Iona, too. Be careful of friendly fire, though. Usually used as Vindicate #5-6, or as a split.

Pernicious Deed: Blowing up the world X and under for X is good. Really good. Problem being is it kills your own stuff. It’s typically used in more control builds, as it kills your own stuff and is better with long game recursion engines. But, it clears away tokens, and kills everything, A very solid board control card used in many builds.

Engineered Explosives: Allows you to pinpoint Deed the board on the CMC that’s giving you trouble. It’s usually a turn faster than Deed, but doesn’t blow up everything on the board. Usually used in more Aggro builds. Remember you can dodge Counterbalance by paying more in one colour (ex. Pay 2 Green and 1 Black for Sunburst 2, but CMC 3 against Counterbalance/Spell Snare).

Phyrexian Arena: Card draw engine used in Rock builds with higher mana curves. Not as fast as Dark Confidant, but the life loss can be much less, and harder to remove. Use extensively before Dark Confidant, it’s now much less common due to sheer speed.

Sensei’s Divining Top: Over the past couple of years, Top has been used to abuse Dark Confidant, and to make the deck more consistent when in topdeck mode. It allows you to dig 3 per turn, or 4 with Confidant, allowing you to find the cards you need when you need them. Usually an auto-include in most builds for consistency purposes.

Elspeth, Knight Errant: Played in control builds or in Aggro builds as a 1-2 of, it allows you to create blockers and get attackers flying in the air against either Planeswalkers or the opposing player. It’s a bit slow, but doesn’t get hit by Deed and is hard to Explosives away. Once you go ultimate, you needn’t worry about opposing land destruction or Maelstrom Pulse friendly fire. Also helps against Moat, in case you needed any, but usually puts 10/10 KotR’s into flying mode.

Mana sources/accelerants:

Noble Hierarch: Doesn’t tap for black, but pumps your creatures, provides a blocker, and overall puts you ahead by one in mana. Basically, the best mana accelerant in most midrange builds.
Mox Diamond: Used in many tempo rock Builds, Mox Diamond pitches a land to pump Knight and gives you some mana. Some don’t like it due to mana instability (it’s easily killed, plus you have to pitch lands you can’t get back). In decks concerned about tempo, this isn’t an issue, and allows for many turn 2 plays on turn 1. Tied with Noble in terms of mana acceleration and overall usefulness.

Birds of Paradise: Used in control builds, usually alongside Doran. Produces all colours and blocks, but doesn’t do much else. Easily dies to Deed and EE’s like all mana acceleration.

Wall of Roots: Usually played with Doran, proves a good block against Aggro until you can get up and running.

Wall of Blossoms: Not really a mana producer, more of an accelerant. Played commonly with Doran, and help you fight Aggro and gives you some card advantage.

Sakura Tribe Elder: Another control Element, it allows you to block and sacrifice before damage, allowing you to search out basic lands and chump a dude for a turn.

Veteran Explorer: Gives both you and your opponent an advantage, but many Legacy decks play few or no basics. Used in Control Rock builds with many basics, and where you benefit from the acceleration more than they do. Not terribly common.

5. Basic Strategy

Rock has a few main strategies it uses to win and to interact (or not) with opponents.

Discard:

Discard provides card advantage by getting rid of stuff before it hits the table. It’s very useful for getting a peek at what your opponent it actually playing, and allows you to map out their plays for the next couple of turns. Most aggro builds run a suite of discard, as it allows you to get an early up on your opponent, and gives you game against combo. As the game progresses into the late game, discard can becomes less relevant. For that reason, many Control-Rock lists don’t run discard at all.

Removal/board control:

If and when something does hit the board, Rock packs a powerful removal suite in either pinpointed destruction or mass sweepers. This allows Rock to handle most things that the opponent can throw at us, from Enchantments to Planeswalkers to creatures. Rock is particularly good out either outclassing or straight up destroying opposing creatures. When the number of creatures becomes too great, this is where Rock can have some trouble.

Card Advantage:

Most Rock decks play some form of card advantage or manipulation to allow them to play more responses than you have threats. This is usually in the form of Dark Confidant, sweeper effects (virtual card advantage) or Phyrexian Arena. Clearing away multiple threats allows you to get the most out of your spells, and can put you ahead of your opponent very quickly. Most, if not all, Rock decks play some form of card advantage, either through drawing extra cards or blowing crap up.

Fatties:

Rock plays a suite of beefy creatures that usually roll over your opponent’s creatures, or are hard to remove, or have an ability attached. Your creatures outclass your opponents most of the time, making your opponent go on the defensive against a player who has big attackers and answers to any creatures used to counter your creatures.

6. Aggro vs. Control
There is a large divide in the Rock community about which is better: Aggro builds of the Rock or Control builds? The answer is neither; both decks have advantages to their strategies and disadvantages.

Aggro will usually run a large suite of discard with less removal and more creatures to put your opponent on the defensive early. This strategy is very good against most decks, which can’t compete with some removal and discard backed up by creatures early on. Most games played with Aggro Rock don’t run out the clock as much as Control matches do, but are worse against decks that do just that. Aggro-Rock does very well even into the mid to late game, but after that, it has no real recursion engines to keep fighting once the initial onslaught has been fended off.

Control usually scraps the Discard plan and some creatures for more removal. Discard is deader late in the game, so Control focuses on staying alive in the early game using removal, then plays board control pieces and large creatures to seal the deal. Control usually plays a recursion engine for its dead creatures to bring them back for further use later on. Control Rock has a tough time winning against super-aggro, as it plays little early game disruption. If the game can go past turn 4-6, then Rock does usually grind out a win. The problem with playing a deck that goes to time in a large tournament is the stress of reporting, de-sideboarding, and the possibility of tying a game from an opponent purposefully running out the clock. Be wary of the stress and play mistakes that come with going to time in an 8-hour tournament. Four rounds aren’t bad, doing eight is horrendous.

Mid-range is a mix of the two: usually playing more board control than Aggro, but more creatures and discard than Control. Most competitive Rock decks nowadays are midrange, and do well over the course of the entire game, but do suffer slightly in the early and very late games. It’s best to weight the advantages and disadvantages of playing any one of the major types in your particular metagame.

7. Decklists

8. Sideboard choices

Sideboard choices really depend on your build, as it’s really just a BGW removal + fatties deck. It’s highly customizable, as you can see from the decklists. I’ll go over the major archetypes, and what cards we can use to deal with broad strategies. I’ll cover some narrow use cards as well, but ideally cards in your sideboard cover multiple matchups so you have as much coverage of the metagame as possible.

Creature based Aggro: Tribal, Zoo, Burn, Dredge

Most of the above listed decks play large amounts of creatures that swing many at a time. Mass removal is always a good choice, but with aggro, you don’t always have the time. So, you can shut off their ground attacks, destroy all their creatures, or allow fewer creatures to attack at once. With burn, you need to stop them from burning you, or gain enough life to withstand their direct damage.

Ghostly Prison: Makes all their creatures cost more to attack you. A very solid card against decks with mana creatures and light manabases. After ripping apart their hand and popping some of their lands, Ghostly Prison becomes an effective counter to tokens of any kind, Elf swarms, Goblins, and Merfolk. Doesn’t apply for attacking Elspeth, so be wary.

Engineered Plague: Makes tribal decks cry. This isn’t good against Merfolk anymore, they play 16 Lords. Unless you have 4 in play at the same time, it isn’t doing any good here. But, it’s VERY good against Goblins, Elves, Thopter tokens, Goblin tokens, Horror or Illusion against Dredge, etc.

Moat: You could play this as a sideboard card if you were running Elspeth, since you could boost creatures over your Moat. Goblins can’t deal with it, Dredge can’t deal with it, and Merfolk barely deals with it. Good, but you have to build around it.
Sphere of Law: Makes red decks cry, as most of their Burn now only does 1 or no damage to you. Siege Gang Commander is useless, Lackey doesn’t do damage, etc. Very solid, but at 4 CMC, it’s hard to pull off.

Leyline of Sanctity: Shuts off Burn and Discard, period. A must-include nowadays.

Path to Exile: Targeted removal is good against decks with many lords. Allows you to also pinpoint your removal, allowing your creatures to block less intimidating targets, or gives you time to get creatures out.

Kitchen Finks: Blocks, persists, gives you life. Very good in creature on creature based matchups, especially Zoo.

Peacekeeper: Stops an opposing army, and your own, from attacking at the cost of tying up two mana. Allows you to stabilize and ready your troops before they can slaughter you with theirs. Although fragile, if you can keep it alive you’re usually set.

Dueling Grounds: Last but not least, the Grounds. Takes all decks that attack with multiple creatures and puts them at a standstill. Allows you to block with large fatties, and they can only block with one guy. Pretty rough beats against Dredge, Zoo, Goblins, Merfolk, Vengevine, Elves, Thopters, etc. I see this as a must-include nowadays. Side at least 2, if not 3-4.

Combo: ANT, TEPS, Dredge,etc.

To properly deal with combo based decks, you need to limit the spells they play in a turn to stop them from building a storm count, counter key spells, or use discard. Since we can’t counter anything, discard and spell-limitation is basically the only way to go.

Leyline of Sanctity: Prevents you from being targeted with the Combo player’s discard and their Storm Spells. Very useful as it buys you time to play your own discard and threats before they find answers. To me, this card is an absolute must. Gives you a turn 0 answer before they can combo off.

Extirpate: Allows you to break Ill-Gotten Gains loops if key pieces are in the graveyard already.

Engineered Explosives: Destroys tokens created from Empty the Warrens.

Ethersworn Cannonist: Limits the number of spells they can play, limiting their storm count. A very popular choice as of late.

Aven Mindcensor: Prevents them from using their tutors and fetchlands effectively. Another popular choice against Survival based decks. Fragile, but also has flash.

Pithing Needle: Prevents the use of Goblin Charbelcher, and other activated abilities many combo decks play.

Rule of Law: Same thing as Cannonist, limit their spells to slow their search of answers and to prevent them from building Storm.

Duress: Another key card in this matchup. Taking away their search abilities for answers allows you to keep other answers online, and stalls them from pulling off their combo. I suggest running at approximately 12 pieces of discard, along with another piece of hate (Leyline of Sanctity) to give yourself a better chance.

Runed Halo: Usually naming Tendrils is the way to go, or goblin Charbelcher. It’s an easily castable spell so long as you can actually get it down before they combo.

Chalice of the Void: Allows the countering of key bounce spells, mana acceleration, tutors, etc. Chalice on 2 shuts off their tutors (Infernal tutor and Burning Wish) and Cabal Ritual; 1 shuts off Brainstorm, Ponder, Chain of Vapour, Duress, Orim’s Chant, Silence, Xantid Swarm, Dark Ritual, etc. ; Chalice at 0 shuts off Lotus Petal, Lion’s Eye diamond and Chrome Mox. Remember though: Storm counts spells cast, not resolved. They can still run 0 drops through a Chalice at 0, having them all get countered but still building up Storm. If on the play, Chalice at 0 followed by Duress/Thoughtseize is good, but Chalice at 1 stops a lot of their spells. I prefer to Chalice at 1, as it stops their search and bounce, and really slows them down.

Gaddock Teeg: Stops them from playing Ad Nauseum and Tendrils of Agony and Empty the Warren, key components in getting the combo off. Mind you, he’s easily killed.

Leyline of the Void: Nullifies the possibility of Ill-Gotten Gains Loop while on the board, and decimates Dredge decks so long as it stays on board. More relevant in the grave-based matchups (Lands, Aggro Loam, Dredge, etc.)

Graveyard Based Strategies: Dredge, Lands, Life from the Loam, Vengevine, Reanimator, New Horizons

These strategies utilize the graveyard to their advantage, so get rid of it.

Leyline of the Void: Stops them from having a graveyard, and comes into play on turn 0. Try not to keep a crap hand containing only Leyline as its good card. All in all, a very solid card and if played, play 4 in the board to increase your chances of opening with one on turn 0. Susceptible to counterhate via Grip, Trygon Predator, Nature’s Claim, etc.

Extirpate: Targeted graveyard removal. Get rid of their Life from the Loam, Vengevine, Iona, Wasteland, or whatever you feel like. It’s uncounterable except for a Counterbalance reveal trigger, so be wary. I think this is the best removal right now due to its ability to get rid of Vengevine and not be countered. Always do so in response to the return trigger.

Planar Void: A turn 1 answer to graveyard strategies, but basically means your Tarmogoyfs amd KotRs are useless. I’m not a huge fan, but if you need more cheap answers to totally shut out their strategy in a grave-based meta, it’s VERY good.

Wheel of Sun and Moon: Doesn’t let stuff get put in their graveyard for them to use. Somewhat useful for Dredge and the like, and also good against opposing Knight of the Reliquary. Be careful though, it allows them to reuse everything, though. If they run a tutor-based deck, this might not be the best idea.

Tormod’s Crypt: Not as good as it used to be before Vengevine. Most of the time you’ll be forced to crack it for the bare minimum just to keep yourself alive. Again, another solid card against Dredge, but not so much against Veggies.

Relic of Progenitus: Better against slower graveyard strategies, but the same problems as Crypt, with a cantrip attached.

Morningtide: Removes all graveyards, including yours. A kick in the pants to you, but a possible choice if it’s all you have.

Control Strategies: The Rock, Landstill, Stax, Thopters, Enchantress

The trick here is to either out aggro the control deck, and put them in a bad position and make them make bad decisions (ie. Using sweepers on one creature) or do better than them at control. Early discard hurts them very much, as does targeted removal.

Maelstrom Pulse: If you’re not packing Pulse in the main and need more targeted removal, Pulse is right for you. Takes out multiple Thopters, Planeswalkers, Stax pieces, and Enchantress pieces when not under the shroud umbrella.

Pernicious Deed: The end-all-be-all against control. It’s devastating against Enchantress, Stax, Thopters and many control variants. It’s hard to Counterbalance against, and blows up everything. You might lose a few creatures, but Stax loses Crucibles, Smokestacks, Ghostly Prisons, Trinisphere, Chalices, etc. Thopters loses Thopter combo and Counterbalance lock, along with Ensnaring Bridges, Crucible, Back to Basics, etc. It’s a hard counter to Enchantress, but be wary of Replenish bringing it all back. Try to also remove their graveyard with Bog or Relic as well, or makes them discard Replenish.

Duress: Comes up again as it’s very good against a Control matchup. If you can mash up their hand before they can lay big threats or hard counters, you can have the game in your grasp by playing threats soon afterwards. You can take out a Trinisphere before it gets played, the shroud giving Enchantress enchantment, and other discard on the part of the Rock player.

Leyline of Sanctity: Protects you against many control decks counter cards, such as other discard, Wheel of Sun and Moon, and Words of War. It’s a hard threat for many decks to answer early on, so it buys you time, and possibly even permanents to sacrifice to Smokestack.

Leyline of the Void: Even though these are control matchups, many do so well because of playing out of the graveyard. Stax loses its edge with no land recursion, Enchantress can’t replenish, Thopters can’t Academy Ruins + EE lock you or bring back broken combo pieces/combo off at all, and most Rock decks like their graveyard for either recursion or pump.

Vampire Hexmage: If you had a meta with a large amount of Planeswalkers floating around, this is a good card. Kills Jace and Elspeth, the two main planeswalkers you’ll see in Legacy, and is a decent creature at a 2/1 First strike for BB.

Kitchen Finks: Creatures with recursion use up the control elements control decks have to play. Recurring creatures of any kind, be it Kitchen Finks, Nether Spirit, Bloodghast, etc. all have game against these types of decks unless they’re RFG’d by Swords. Multiple sacrifices to Smokestack makes Stax players (including myself) cry, and it gives you breathing space against their eventual threats.

Gaddock Teeg: Takes Control to town. They can’t play many Stax pieces, EE, relevant Planeswalker, Replenish, hard core Enchantments (Humility/Moat), and even Leyline not on Turn 0 (which does tend to happen). Especially good since most decks run EE as removal for your threats, and this really makes this disadvantageous to them.

Nelis

11-27-2010, 05:34 AM

Has anyone tried Putrid Leech in an aggro build? That card has been very successful in my peasant rock list so I wonder if there's a place for him in Legacy Rock.

ZeinVoncy

11-27-2010, 09:35 AM

Section 4, Mana accelerants: Fix Mox Diamond.
Section 8, Sideboard for Aggro: Fix Rule of Law.

Overall, very well done! Great explanations as to why and why not for selected cards. All I can think of to add is:
Land selection: Maze of Ith, Nantuko Monastary, Volrath's Stronghold, Horizon Canopy, # of fetches, duals vs basics, etc.
Equipment if using Stoneforge Mystic package.
Toolbox selection if using Elightened Tutor package.

Otherwise, the introduction started to lose me around the end, haha. Plan A, Plan B, X, Y, think my eyes just crossed. . . .

Props! Great start for reintroduction I say! And I like the banner, tell that person they did a great job. (Aside from the fact that my build doesn't use goyf's)

@Putrid Leech: There just is no place for Leech. There are too many spells that can get rid of leech in response to you pumping him. Not to mention on turn 2, you have a goyf. I'd rather run Pridemage over Leech. You could run Leech in a very aggressive version, but leech just is not a Legacy worthy card imo.

brianw712

11-27-2010, 12:39 PM

I wholeheartedly disagree about Leyline of Sanctity's inclusion; for me, it's an auto-include. Burn is cold against it, Combo has to get rid of it first, Words of War can't get you via. Enchantress, Wheel of Sun and Moon doesn't target you, no opponent's discard gets through, Zoo can't bolt your face, Tormod's Crypt targets a player, no opposing Diabolic Edict, no Siege Gang Commander usefulness against your face, no Jace the Mindsculptor screwing up your draws, etc. I'd say it's pretty decent.

When I come up with more, I'll let you know.

I'm not sure I agree with this. Yes, burn is cold against it, and yes, it's pretty good against combo. It's also good against opposing Rock decks (especially if they run Bojuka Bog/Diabolic Edict). But you wouldn't side it in against Enchantress; if they have an active Words of War, then that means they have the potential to draw a ton of cards per turn, and should have no problem finding an O-Ring to get rid of Leyline. Or they'll just kill you with Sigil of the Empty Throne. I also wouldn't side it in against opposing Wheel of Sun and Moon/Tormod's Crypt, since you pretty much don't care about graveyard hate anyway. Against Zoo, sure it keeps burn from hitting your face, but that burn can still hit your creatures, making Leyline card disadvantage for you. And they can always just Pridemage it away if they need to. I also wouldn't side it in against Goblins, since only half-nullifying Siege-Gang's fling ability isn't worth a slot to me. Same with Jace: even if he can't fateseal you, he can still Brainstorm you out of the game. You still have to deal with Jace even with Leyline out. So pretty much the only two decks I would side it in against are combo and the mirror (and burn, but that's not too prevalent). That might be enough to merit a 4-of in the sideboard, but it's definitely not an auto-include.

EDIT: Nice primer, by the way. Looks great!

sdematt

11-27-2010, 12:45 PM

I'll make the changes and finish up hopefully tonight! :D

Thanks for the props/suggestions! I honestly totally forgot about the land selection, it was 1am my time when I was doing the last bit of it :P

-Matt

Dzra

11-27-2010, 12:49 PM

I've only had time to skim for now but it looks good. I'll have more to say later, but you should probably mention Choke in SB choices.

The Treefolk Master

11-27-2010, 01:55 PM

Land selection: Maze of Ith, Nantuko Monastary, Volrath's Stronghold, Horizon Canopy, # of fetches, duals vs basics, etc.

That :P

The primer looks great, good job. And the banner is simply amazing.

Magicsk8ngenius

11-27-2010, 06:59 PM

Awsome primer sdematt! Besides what the previous people have mentioned, looks like you have no decklists. I'm assuming that you just didn't add any in yet. Let us know if you're looking for a particular list so we can all share our lists for each style. Also you did not even mention Ghastly Demise! I know some of you really don't like it, but honestly I put it in over Path to Exile most of the time and it rocks. I think it merits some mention/consideration in deck depending on your list and meta.

On a side note I was at a 16 person tournament recently and noticed prior there were a lot of zoo decks floating around. I last minute switched up my sideboard and didn't have any Path to Exiles on me (i like them a lot in the zoo matchup). So I threw in some... DOOM BLADEs and it actually worked pretty well for me not only in the zoo matchup but I ended up playing against two affinity decks where the doom blade was also awesome. Yes I said Doom Blade!

sdematt

11-27-2010, 07:01 PM

I've added in most of the changes, I'm just going to do the matchup analysis and then get some decklists together. I'll post the relevant tournament wining ones, and if you guys want a list up there, just post it and I'll see if I can get it in there. I don't want a million lists, but a few examples would be nice. A few midrange, a few pure aggro, some Control, etc.

-Matt

Magicsk8ngenius

11-27-2010, 07:19 PM

Also it would be nice to have card tags. I'm sure most of us know all these cards but it is nice for new players especially.

Dzra

11-27-2010, 08:10 PM

Something that I've been thinking about recently was that we really have 3 game plans: a tempo plan, a board control plan, and a CA plan. The tempo plan uses Wastelands, Mox Diamonds, and Vindicate to gain tempo on the opponent. The board control plan uses spot removal (Swords, Path, Ghastly Demise, etc) and sweepers (EE/Deed) to dominate the board. The CA plan uses Bob/Top, discard (Hymns and Verdicts), and sweepers (EE/Deed) to attempt to get 2+ for 1s and overwhelm with CA. There's obviously some overlap as mana-screwing an opponent can create virtual CA as well.

The way I've been approaching the deck is that pre-board, most likely at least one of these plans will work against the given deck and post-board I usually give up one to two of these plans to strengthen the others. Long story short, I'd like to see some sort of match-up analysis and potential SBing plans and that sort of thing. :) Looks good though. <3

sdematt

11-27-2010, 10:30 PM

1. Origins
2. Playstyle
3. Evolution
4. Card choices
5. Basic Strategy
6. Aggro vs. Control
7. Decklists
8. Sideboard choices
9. Matchup analysis
10. Records
11. Additional information

Not to be a bother, but it'll be in there :D

Also, what are the nice cardtags that let you run over it with your mouse and the card shows up? How do you do those?

-Matt

sdematt

11-29-2010, 02:23 AM

So I've done some of the Matchup analysis. Again, if you want a list on here, repost it so I don't have to dig for it. I've done these ones so far, so correct me if I'm wrong on anything, or if you want to hear more about a matchup, anything at all. I still have yet to do these matchups:

Painter-Grindstone, Bomberman, Aluren, 43 Lands, Aggro Loam, Vengevine Survival, New Horizons, Rock.

If there's any more I should add, let me know. I've only played against New Horizons once, if anyone has more about their lines of play and gameplans, boarding plans, etc. let me know.

9. Matchup Analysis
Goblins
Goblins can be a bit of a tough matchup. Goblins is a fast, aggressive deck that gets off the line quickly. Answering a Turn 1 Lackey is key, either with removal or a blocker. You’re basically trying to stabilize and either rip apart their hard and put them into topdeck mode or blow up the stuff they play. Not letting Lackey/Instigator hit you is key here if you can; try to save your removal for dangerous creatures such as this. If you can get enough fat on board, swing in conservatively if you’re outnumbered. Watch for them screwing your manabase: fetch basics so you don’t get Wastelanded out. Doran is very good in this matchup if you play him, Piledriver suddenly doesn’t look so good. There are many builds: R, RB, RG, RBG, etc. They all function the same way in a basic sense: Play lots of Goblins, turn them sideways.
In against Goblins: More sweepers and creature removal, dueling Grounds/E. Plague, possibly Leyline of Sanctity as it prevents them from Siege-Ganging you out under a Dueling Grounds.
In against you: Most likely gravehate and artifact/Enchantment removal.
Out against Goblins: Keep your discard in, but side out Duress if you’re playing it main. Side out more expensive removal as you may be cut off of mana due to their denial plan.
Overall: Slightly unfavourable preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.
Zoo
Like Goblins in that they play a bunch of creature that turn sideways, but they also play some removal along with a bunch of burn. The key here is killing their threats and putting out bigger ones before they kill you. Thoughtseize isn’t a bad card here; just make sure you’re taking something that will cost you more than 2 life over the course of the game (which is pretty such everything). Lay out fatties when they’re out of Burn range. Don’t be afraid of playing Dark Confidant here. Try and squeeze as much card advantage out of him as you can before he dies. Zoo is also a land light deck: focusing on killing lands can do you some good. Long story short: Take the burn out of their hand, blow up their lands, play bigger creatures and swing in. Kitchen Finks is EXCELLENT in this matchup, as is fetching for basics against Price of Progess.
In against Zoo: Leyline of Sanctity, Pulse of the Fields, Kitchen Finks, Circle of Protection: Red, Dueling Grounds, Pernicious Deed.
In against you: Grave hate, enchanment/artifact hate.
Out against Zoo: Maelstrom Pulse, Vindicate, Dark Confidant (if you’re really feeling the hurt).
Overall: Slightly unfavourable preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.
Merfolk
Oh look, another aggro based matchup: with counters! Basically very similar to Goblins matchup, except they’re running less mana denial and counterspells! Hooray! Just kidding. This is a hard matchup depending on what they’re running. The black version is bad because it runs Perish in the board. They also run so many Lords, everything gets so big. Don’t get caught offguard by Cursecatchers, and save your Plows for relevant Lords (Coralhelm, Reejerey) or Mutavaults. Try to stabilize by blowing crap up and swinging in big. Resolving Confidant, especially with Top, is key here. You need card advantage to help you get there against so many threats. Don’t play around Counterspells: they’re inevitable. Mind you, don’t make a backbreaking play with no Daze mana open unless absolutely necessary. Don’t walk into easy counters, but don’t hold back to the point where you lose tempo by just sitting there to get to 5 mana so you can Vindicate even if he has Spell Pierce. Your creatures outclass his most of the time, so take out their Lords and hopefully swing in. Post board, Dueling Grounds is key. You can block everything except Coralhelm Commander, and you’re bigger than he is. If Dueling Grounds sticks, you should be good.
In against Merfolk: Dueling Grounds, Pernicious Deed, Path to Exile, Pithing Needle, etc.
In against you: Hibernation, Perish, Grave-hate.
Out against Merfolk: Hymn to Tourach/Gerrard’s Verdict, or Vindicate effects.
Overall: Slightly unfavourable to even preboard, slightly favourable postboard.
Mono Red Burn
In game 1, rip apart his hand as best you can. Don’t be afraid to drop Dark Confidant for some card advantage. Lay out beats as early as possibly, it’s a race. Don’t be afraid to Swords your own creatures to stay in the game. Most of your stuff is useless here, which makes for a bad game 1. Game 2, bring in life-gain and Leylines. If you can drop Leyline, they basically have no answer except Sulphuric Vortex and their few creatures, which you can easily blow up/remove.
In against Burn: Life gain of any kind, Leyline of Sanctity.
In against you: Grave-hate.
Out against Burn: Path to Exile, a few Confidants (if you need room), Thoughtseize (replace with Duress), Maelstrom Pulse, a few Vindicates, Pernicious Deed.
Overall: Very unfavourable preboard, favourable to very favourable postboard.
Dredge
Dredge is a very difficult matchup, but can be won game 1. Keep early pressure on, and use targeted discard. Random discard is good for Dredge, so try not to use it. Maelstrom Pulse is good at blowing up tokens, as are Deed and EE. Try to keep the Dredge player off 3 creatures for the Dread Return; Swords/Remove Narcomoebas and other creatures when possibly. Use Knight to tutor Bojuka Bog or Karakas for an impending Iona. Lay beats down, and hope they don’t go off too quickly.
In against Dredge: Extirpate, Leyline of the Void, Grave-hate, Karakas, Bojuka Bog, Duress (if on the play), Pernicious Deed/EE, Engineered Plague, Dueling Grounds, Diabolic Edict, etc.
In against you: Grave hate of some kind, or not much at all.
Out against Dredge: Path to Exile, Hymn to Tourach/Gerrard’s Verdict, some Vindicates (keep a few), Discard (if on the draw).
Overall: Unfavourable to very unfavourable preboard, favourable to very favourable postboard.
ANT, TEPS, and other Tendrils based combo
Depending on the build, most of these decks basically build a storm count by playing mana artifacts for free, then casting Ad Nauseum to draw a ton of card to kill you with either an Ill-Gotten gains Loop, Empty the Warrens for tokens, or Tendrils of Agony. I suggest reading an article by Max McCall on Starcitygames.com called “So you want to kill your opponent on Turn 1?” It’s an enlightening article about how much mana is need to do certain things, when to do things etc. I’m not going to explain it all here, but always makes sure their mana count is correct, and always call their bluff. Make them fully go through the combo, as many times it can fail due to poor counting. I’m not saying stall the clock and be an idiot, just make sure they’re got the mana and storm they say they do. Try to hit them in the early game with discard backed with threats early on. Sometimes you’ll get them, othertimes not. Focus using Vindicates and such on their lands, as their actual manabase is quite unstable, playing mana non-basics and playing fewer lands in general. In game 2, side in Leyline of Sanctity with maximal discard. Make them discard, then back it up with threats to put them on a clock. It’s a race between who has answers and who doesn’t. If he can’t find his answer to your answer, he loses. If not, you lose. Try to keep a singular white open if you have large creatures in play: He may combo off, but in response you can Swords your creature to gain enough life to possibly survive the ordeal. It doesn’t always work, but at times it can be worth a shot. Make sure all the Storm copies are on the stack before you play your spell, you don’t want to add to the Storm.
In against ANT: Leyline of Sanctity, Duress, Runed Halo, Leyline of the Void, The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale, EE (for ETW tokens).
In against you: Usually a Burning Wish board.
Out against ANT: Path to Exile, Pernicious Deed, some StP, a few Vindicate, etc.
Overall: Very unfavourable preboard, slightly unfavourable to even postboard.
Dreadstill
Dreadstill usually packs an impressive array of Standstill, Stifles, Dreadnought, Factories and heavy countermagic. As of late, Spell Pierce is now Spell snare with all the Survival running around, and that helps you greatly. Phyrexian Dreadnought relies on 4-7 Soft counters (Daze, Spell Pierce/Spell Snare) and 4-8 Hard Counters (Force of Will and Spell Snare) to counter key spells, as well as its counterbalance-Top engine. Luckily for us, we’re playing a few more three drops than they’d like. The key here is blow up their Counterbalance if you ever want to get a Swords/Path through. It’s never getting through a good Dreadstill player. Play aggressively in this matchup, as they’re trying to lay down a fast Dreadnought: they can’t play the late-game as well as we can. Drop down an EE or a Deed when possibly. Keep your Vindicates and such for Dreadnought. Once he runs out one or two and you deal with them, he’s basically done. Stay on your toes, hit them early with discard, and blow their crap up. Don’t be afraid to crack Standstill as soon as possible and hopefully at the end of their turn before they discard. This will force them to discard back down to 7 after having drawn three wonderful cards. This shouldn’t be a terrible matchup so long as you keep Counterbalance off the table and keep the pressure on.
In against Dreadstill: Path to Exile, Deed, EE, Diabolic Edict, Maze of Ith.
In against you: Perish, grave-hate, possibly Peacekeeper.
Out against Dreadstill: Bits and pieces here and there to fit in as much removal as possible.
Overall: Slightly favourable preboard, slightly favourable to even postboard.
Enchantress
Enchantress relies on early mana acceleration to play many enchantments, that eventually end up having shroud. It stalls the game using Elephant Grass and other creature control elements. It amasses huge card advantage through the use of Enchantresses Presence and Argothian Enchantress. It wins by using either Sigil of the Empty Throne or Words of War. It plays an enchantment with multiple Enchantress effects on board, and decides to skip the drawing to burn you for each card not drawn, which usually kills you. The key to this matchup is attacking their early manabase, and their hand early. Get around their shroud by laying down Deed and EE. Try to attack as much as possibly before Elephant Grass starts to lock you out. Continually pick at their hand and get rid of Replenish and Sterling Grove, and swing in as much as you can. Eventually you’ll get there. Karmic Justice can be a beating: make sure you destroy it before blowing Deed or something.
In against Enchantress: EE, Deed, Leyline of Sanctity, Duress, Leyline of the Void, Extirpate, etc.
In against you: More creature control, Karmic Justice, some gravehate as well.
Out against Enchantress: Targeted creature removal.
Overall: Even to slightly unfavourable preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.
Reanimator
With the unbanning of Mystical Tutor a possibility, I better talk about Reanimator. With or without Mystical tutor, it’s still a good deck. Reanimator plays Entomb with Reanimation effects (Reanimate, Exhume) backed with discard and counterspells. Usually, they’ll either rawdog the early Entomb and try to go for a fast win, or they’ll go off whilst protected with discard and/or counterspells. Either way, at end of turn they’ll Entomb Iona/Inkwell Leviathan/Terastodon/Sphinx of the Steel Win and reanimate next turn. Be wary if they use Exhume: you choose to bring back something of your own as well. They key here is disrupting them early enough in the first game to take control. They play very few lands, and few if any basics, so discard backed with Wasteland/Vindicate is key. If you can put them off their lands they’ll have a bunch of trouble getting back online. If Iona does comes out, pray to hit Pulse or Diabolic Edict or Karakas, or have an online KotR. Iona is usually named on white and second most on black. I always suggest to my Reanimator opponent that Black is paramount, but they usually pick White just the same. After you side, bring in discard and massive amounts of gravehate.
In against Reanimator: Bojuka Bog, Maze of Ith, Diabolic Edict, Leyline of the Void, Extirpate, Planar Void, etc.
In against you: Again, everyone thinks grave-hate is the bomb against us. Newsflash: not so much.
Out against Reanimator: Deed, Path (Keep some Swords in case they don’t go Iona), EE, non-targeted discard.
Overall: Unfavourable preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.
Thopters
Thopters is a Counterbalance-based control deck utilizing the Sword of the Meek/Thopter foundry Combo with various white and blue control cards including Humility, Moat, Jace the Mind Sculptor, Back to Basics, Crucible of Worlds, etc. It’s very much like old-style Landstill crossed with Counterbalance. Thopters plays 7-8 hard counters (Force of Will and Counterspell) along with Counterbalance, Enlightened Tutor, and Moat (it looks more and more like Vintage Keeper circa 1996). The main problem when playing against Thopters is they usually have a small tutor arsenal with Ensnaring Bridge, Crucible of Worlds, Moat, Humility backed by the infamous Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Having that guy behind an Ensnaring Bridge or Moat, continually sculpting your draws while your creatures can’t attack him is quite annoying. The good thing? You play board destruction, and usually 4-6 anti-Planeswalker spells, not counting the fact you have creatures that attack. Thopters plays anywhere from 6-10 basic lands, so the Land denial plan is probably pretty bad. Early on, Thopters is susceptible to discard, so take Counterbalance, Jace, and Back to Basics when you can. Once Counterbalance lands, they’ll be looking to either fulfill Thopter combo or use Jace to lock you out. Here, blow up Counterbalance and go for Deed as much as possible. Deed levels their field almost as bad as Stax, but leaves Jace. When possible, either attack of Vindicate/Pulse Jace. With enough removal, hand disruption, and board sweep, you should end up victorious.
In against Thopters: Pithing Needle, EE, Deed, Engineered Plague (naming Thopters), Dueling Grounds, Choke, Leyline of Sanctity, Suppression Field, some Gravehate if you suspect Wastelock plan/recurring EE.
In against you: More Moats/Humility/Swords/Path, Graveyard hate, Back to Basics (if not in the main).
Out against Thopters: Swords/Path.
Overall: Favourable preboard, slightly favourable to favourable postboard.
Goblin Charbelcher
Goblin Charbelcher is an explosive combo deck that wins on turn 1 or 2 a good portion of the time. It uses mana accelerants and usually 1-2 lands to run out a Goblin Charbelcher, and activate it to kill you. Another way to combo out for them is by building a Storm count and using Empty the Warrens. Warrens is easier to pull off because you don’t have to bring in 20 tokens, even 8-12 are enough that early in the game. As a non-blue based deck, this makes your job very difficult. Game 1 unless you get extremely lucky with your discard and you back it up with early pressure and he draws nothing, you lose. The key here is games 2 and 3, where you side in defenses against tokens and Charbelcher. If you can deal with Belcher, and have ways to deal with token, you’re good.
In against Belcher: EE, Leyline of Sanctity, Duress, Engineered Plague (on Goblins), Pithing Needle.
In against you: I don’t think they side in anything terribly relevant.
Out against Belcher: Swords/Path, a few creatures.
Overall: Unfavourable pre-board, slightly unfavourable postboard.
Team America
Team America is a tempo deck utilizing Wasteland, Stifle, Sinkhole, Tarmogoyf and Tombstalker. It plays very early manabase disruption by Stifling fetchlands and Wastelanding non-basics. Some versions still play Sinkhole, which is devastating against most decks. In this match, fetch for basics and play out your mana accelerants as soon as possible. You’re going to lose many lands in this matchup: this is where having 23 lands comes in handy. Mind you, Team America is a threat-light deck with usually 8-9 threats. Here, you have to play control. You have a much better long game than they do, as you have much better removal and possible recursion. Wasteland away their black sources (if possible) and keep them on their toes. Lay out as many threats as you can, as they don’t have a ton of answers except creatures to resolved threats. Their counterspell base is alright, with 4 Force of Will, Dazes and Spell Pierces. Don’t play too heavily around soft-counters; this isn’t a matchup where you can lollygag around waiting to see if they have the counter. This deck is good against Rock because of the fact it disrupts our manabase early on, which is the key. If you can draw the game out to the late game, however, you should win.
In against Team America: Path, EE, Leyline of Sanctity (not necessary, but helpful), Pithing Needle.
In against you: Grave hate, not sure what else.
Out against them: Maelstrom Pulse, some Vindicates, Deed.
Overall: Slightly unfavourable preboard, slightly unfavourable to even postboard.
White Stax
White Stax will try to use its multiple lockpieces to slowly turn the gamestate into a quagmire of upkeep effects and cost alterations/negations. White Stax is Prison at its finest: Good, but highly inconsistent. Stax loads up the board with permanents to drag you down to a point where you can’t play anything, then slowly kills you. You easily defend against this by heavily disrupting them in the early game when they’re most vulnerable. Stax can’t function to its full potential without Crucible of Worlds: it sacs lands to Crucible to outrace you on Smokestack, it uses Armageddon to the point of being absurdly lopsided, and it used Wastelock to take you out of the game. But, Stax itself is vulnerable to early Wastelands. Stax’s lowest CMC is 3, not considering Chalice of the Void. Wastelanding their first turn Ancient Tomb is brutal, as they usually can’t follow it up immediately. As well, the fact you have targeted permanent removal means even if they play an awesome lockpiece, like Smokestack or Crucible of Worlds, you can easily remove it without hesitation. Pernicious Deed is the bane of their existence here. An active Deed onboard with mana open literally spells the end of the game for Stax unless they already have no permanents on board. Remember to pay Tabernacle upkeep effects, or to be sneaky with an active Smokestack on board, stack the triggers to sac to Smokestack first, then pay for Tabernacle effects. All in all, blow stuff up; disrupt early, swing in often. Remember: Ghostly Prison doesn’t apply to Planeswalkers.
In against Stax: Deed, Maelstrom Pulse, Pithing Needle, Duress (if on the play), Gaddock Teeg.
In against you: Karmic Justice, Leyline of Sanctity.
Out against Stax: Path to Exile/Swords.
Overall: Slightly favourable for you preboard, slightly favourable to favourable postboard, depending on how many Deeds you play.
CounterTop Bant/ NO Bant
Counter-Top Bant uses the Counter-Top engine combined with efficient creatures to kill you with big creatures, with the option of adding in Natural Order/Progenitus package. I’m considering these decks one of and the same, as they are pretty much the same: Most play White, Green, and Blue, most play Natural Order and Progenitus. Some play Dark Confidant and Engineered Explosives, some don’t. I’m going to assume we’re facing Bant colours with Countertop and Natural Order, playing some creature base of Rhox War Monk, Tarmogoyf, Knight of the Reliquary, Noble Hierarch, etc. Their game plan is to hopefully lock you out with Counter-Top, and then unleash hell by bringing in a Progenitus to quickly end the game, using Natural Order on one of their small dudes (Noble or Dryad Arbor). They lack a huge amount of actual counterpower, usually playing 4 Force of Will, some Dazes, and possibly Spell Snares/Pierces, but not as likely. You don’t have a huge counterwall to go through, but you have CounterTop backed with Swords and Counters, which against is tricky. Here, disrupt early on as much as possible. Attack their hand and manabase. If they can get up to 4 mana with a creature online, they can end the game two turns afterwards. Be aggressive, and blow up Counterbalance when you can. Try to keep their creatures off the tablet to prevent them from casting Natural Order. They have limited card draw (Top and Brainstorm), so once you get the initial few plays out of the way, you should be home free. It’s not an easy matchup, as it has a wide variety of answers, but play aggressively and you should be fine. If you see Jace, attack him or Vindicate him as soon as possible.
In against NO Bant: Path, Deathmark (if many creatures), Diabolic Edict, Gaddock Teeg, Choke, Perish, Pithing Needle. All in all, there’s not much you should put in here: All of you stuff is good against them. A few tweaks for Perish/Edict against Progenitus is the main thing here.
In against you: Tormod’s Crypt, Path, Relic of Progenitus, Wheel of Sun and Moon, Krosan Grip, Trygon Predator.
Out against Bant: Deed, EE, (If fewer creatures) Swords/Path.
Overall: Even preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.
Landstill:
Landstill is the premiere control deck in Legacy. It plays zero creatures with the exception of Manlands, and uses Pernicious Deed and Jace, The Mind Sculptor backed with a heavy counter package to wipe the board and ride Jace to victory. Landstill is literally removal, counters, and bombs. Landstill also absolutely dies to very fast aggro. Against Landstill, you can’t play the control game: they’re too good at it. Here, you need to disrupt them early on using Hymn and Thoughtseize, and lay down early threats. Don’t overextend into Deed, but don’t lay back and wait for them to remove their stuff. They have lots of Counters, so try to bait what you can and just throw it out there when you can’t. Because you have so much early disruption, it can be hard for them to get a handle on the game if you’ve got an online confidant and have dealt heavy blows to their hand on turn 1-3. Cards to take with targeted discard are removal and Jace. Let them have their counters unless you really need stuff to go through. Landstill doesn’t have a draw engine like it used to with Fact or Fiction, it relies on Jace and Brainstorm to get there, which isn’t enough past the initial opening hand. You should be able to play the Aggro plan and win against Landstill. Landstill comes in a few flavours: UWBG for Deed and Swords, UBGR for Deed and Firespout, they can play a Wishboard with Cunning Wish, or have no Wishboard at all.
In against Landstill: Hand disruption, Extirpate, Leyline of the Void, Choke, Pithing Needle.
In against you: Path, Swords, Firespout, Extirpate, Leyline of the Void, the Abyss (possibly), Deed, EE.
Out against Landstill: Deed/EE, Swords to Plowshares/Path.

ZZZ

11-29-2010, 10:23 AM

Matt, excellent job! Must have been a lot of work.
One card I'm missing in the 'anti-combo' section of the sideboard is Thorn of Amethyst.

Two comments about the matchup analysis section:
Goblins: I think Ringleader should be mentioned here, as it's the one card which makes Goblins the aggro deck which is best capable of recovering from a sweeper. Ripping a Ringleader (or Matron) with Thoughtseize can be crucial.
Dredge: you mention siding out Path to Exile which is wrong imo as they don't play any basics. If you want to side out spot removal, Swords to Plowshares is the better choice.

Just some minor things that I thought were worth mentioning. But overall, hell of a job!

sdematt

11-29-2010, 10:57 AM

Thanks very much! You're definitely right about the changes. In my head, I knew about Ringleader and recovering, but it's remembering what I need to put in the primer is hard. It's like explaining Calculus without explaining what a function is :smile:

The hardest part is grinding out test games, but slaving over a hot computer (:tongue:) takes a few hours. I should have the rest of the matchups done by tomorrow or Wednesday. I just copy and pasted the last part and didn't format it nicely, so sorry if it hurt anyone's eyes. The final one will be nicely formatted with card links.

Does anyone know how to do the nice card links that you don't need to click on them to show the cards (like on Starcitygames)?

-Matt

Arsenal

11-29-2010, 08:32 PM

Noble Hierarch

{cards}Noble Hierarch{/cards} - replace the { } with a [ ] to close.

sdematt

11-29-2010, 10:08 PM

I owe you a cookie :tongue:

Thanks!

-Matt

f|i[p]

11-30-2010, 01:04 AM

@ sdematt

Can you possibly put some words on bold.

Like Merfok and maybe put a little space in between different match ups and maybe Side in and out for each match up...It looks so cluttered.

Good job however...

Regarding match up analysis.. I can see most aggro decks are almost unfavorable. So I think that if you are in an aggro infested metagame, you can actually leave some discard and some slower spells on the sideboard and have your creature control mainboard... Just switching both could at least give you a favorable match up game 1 as you will mostly face aggro anyway.

sdematt

11-30-2010, 02:19 AM

That's the unedited copy. I'm pasting in the bolded one with spaces as we speak.

In my experience, fast aggro isn't a good matchup for a lot of stuff, even dedicated control (Landstill, Stax, etc.). I would say if you personally want to put more creature control main, more power to you.

-Matt

Dzra

11-30-2010, 02:24 AM

Played in two tournaments this past weekend. Did well both times. Thought I'd share, mainly SBing, since all of my SBing seemed to work really well.

Saturday Split Top 8

Round 1: Dreamhalls/Show and Tell
SB: -4 Swords to Plowshares, -2 Deed, +4 Extirpate, +2 Gerrard's Verdict
Threw the match because I forgot that Dreamhalls was global. >_>

Round 2: Deadguy Ale
SB: -2 Vindicate, +2 Deed
Easy match, lot's of discard flying, but my creatures beat harder and Deed melted face.

Round 3: Dreamhalls/Show and Tell
SB: -4 Swords, -2 Deed, +4 Extirpate, +2 Verdict
Both games, I used a strong mana denial plan thanks to early KotR fetching Wastes and Vindicate. Early Hymn helped put pressure.

Round 4: Mono-Red Goblins
SB(g2): -4 Hymn, -4 Vindicate, +4 Path, +2 Deed, +2 Verdict
T1 Goyf and Thoughtseizing Matrons slowed him down enough to stabalize.

SB(g3): -2 Verdict, +2 Vindicate
Swords/Pathed his t1 and t2 Lacky's before I dropped a Deed t4 to seal the deal.

Sunday Top 4 Split

Round 1: Affinity
SB: -4 Hymn, -2 Vindicate, +2 Deed, +4 Path
Tough match. Game one, he got the nuts and there's just nothing you can do. Game 2, Deed owned and game 3 I established early control with Bob/Top and KotR/Maze.

Round 2: Ooze Survival
Game one, crushed with t1 Hymn, t2 Hymn + Wasteland, t3 Thoughtseize + Goyf. He didn't have a chance really.
SB: -4 Swords, -2 Vindicate, +4 Extirpate, +2 Deed, +1 Bog
(My new Survival plan was to out CA them. Even though they discard a lot of creatures themselves, they need to be able to decide what to discard and when)
Game two, I Vindicate his only Forest and eventually Deed with Elspeth on the board for the win.

Round 3: RUGW Goodstuff
Game one, I'm crushed by this deck's massive CA.
SB: -4 Swords, +2 Deed, +2 Gerrard's Verdict, +1 Bog
Game two, long story short... I Hymn him three times, Wasteland him twice, and Vindicate 3 basics and he's still in the game due to Ancestral Vision, Bloodbraid, Jitte, and Brainstorm. I eventually land a KotR and Elspeth to hold him off long enough to drop a Deed, clean up, drop a Bob, win. Super long game.
Game three, Thoughtseize is good and I land two KotR and a Goyf in the first few turns with a Deed in hand, just in case. He kills one KotR, but he doesn't find enough answers.

Round 4: My buddy (Zoo) and I draw since we're the only 3-0-0s.

sdematt

11-30-2010, 02:32 AM

The Rock

http://i163.photobucket.com/albums/t284/XenoSlicer/TheRock.jpg
Thanks to Xenoninja from Mtgsalvation for the awesome banner!

1. Origins
2. Playstyle
3. Evolution
4. Card choices
5. Basic Strategy
6. Aggro vs. Control
7. Decklists
8. Sideboard choices
9. Matchup analysis
10. Records
11. Additional information

1. Origins

The origin of this name is a G/B deck featuring Phyrexian Plaguelord and Deranged Hermit, originally made by Jelger Wiegersma many, many years ago for Urza Block Constructed PTQs. It was plucked from the internet by Sol Malka, who tuned and popularized it and named the deck “The Rock and its Millions”. Jeroen Remie (the world’s most renowned Rock expert) explained that this name came from a WWE wrestler named The Rock (he later became an actor). His special gimmick was that he channeled the power of all of his fans, so that was The Rock and his Millions. In terms of the Magic deck that borrowed the name, The Rock refers to Phyrexian Plaguelord and his Millions, which refers to Deranged Hermit. People then played this “The Rock and its Millions” deck for a long time, and the “Rock” part of that name stuck even after the namesake cards were removed. People started associating “Rock” with any mid-range Green/Black deck, not just the Phyrexian Plaguelord version. And over the course of the years, “Rock” has become a synonym for any Green/Black mid-range deck.

2. Playstyle

The Rock refers to the control ability of the deck. It is what you fall back on, your “Rock.” When I first started playing in late 90’s early 2000’s, I remember first hearing of the “Rock” deck and wondered what it meant. I received various responses, but many replied with, “Answers to everything.” The Rock plays varying amounts of threats, coupled with both proactive and reactive spells to control the game to the point where we can win. This sounds like most decks, but it really isn’t. Rock is typically played in some combination of Black, White, and Green. Rock rarely plays vanilla creatures, opting instead for Evasion, comes into play effects, or creatures that are just plain devastating and must be answered when they hit the table. Rock also plays efficient trumps to other threats, commonly known as “answers.” Most of these include spell based answers to permanents, and discard for hand-based threats. Rock is very much a reactive deck, foiling your Plan A with its regular style of play, called “Plan A” by the Rock player. Should your Plan B happen to come online, Rock usually has some sort of answer for that too, also commonly called “Plan A” by the Rock player. What Rock lacks in specified answers it makes up for in cards that are generally good in most situations, rather than pinpoint reactions against pinpoint cards. Most choices cover an archetype of a strategy, such as Aggro or say, Control trumps. This is quite the opposite of many inclusions in many decks, in which X is an answer for Y, whereas in Rock, X is an answer for M through Z.

Rock typically goes one of a few ways: either heavy control, disruption based aggro, or mid-range beats with a good amount of answers. Typically the middle-road is taken, as it takes on the very essence of Rock: being good against many things, but not overwhelmingly amazing against any particular archetype.

3. Evolution

Rock has changed as each passing block adds more card to the deck. As time passed from Urza’s block onward, changes didn’t occur rapidly to many lists. Many played the standby list of big fatties with discard and removal, all of which had very limited option until Invasion block hit. Invasion is probably the premiere influence in the evolution of modern Rock-based decks, and started turning Rock into the deck it’s known for post-2000. Invasion block focused on multicolour concoctions, and had been in production for years to showcase the similarities, strengths, and differences of the different colour schemes. This led to a very important evolution of the deck: the start, or the increase in the number of Rock decks running three colours. Pre-Apocalypse, Rock was primarily in Green-Black, with some people splashing for Swords to Plowshares. Apocalypse brought Pernicious Deed, Phyrexian Arena, Vindicate, Spiritmonger, and loads of other good stuff. The true Rock deck of the modern age was born.

Since then, sets have added cards here and there. Onslaught added Fetchlands for improved consistency, Fifth Dawn added Engineered Explosives and Eternal Witness (although EE was not used to its full potential until much later), Champions of Kamigawa added Top (again, not used until much later). Then came Ravnica, which added Loxodon Hierarch, and more importantly, Dark Confidant. Dark Confidant, and card draw in particular, gave the deck its ultimate strategy: use efficient answers, in combination with massive card advantage to overwhelm your opponent. Having more answers to fewer threats was paramount for the Rock deck. Later sets brought Tarmogoyf, Kitchen Finks, Maelstrom Pulse, Knight of the Reliquary and the use of utility lands, Thoughtseize, and other cards to name a few. The combination of powerful creatures at the cost of multiple colours/high cost, efficient removal and card advantage was finally hatched, creating Legacy Rock.

4. Card Choices

In Rock decks of modern day, many of the builds share similar cards. I’ll refer to the core cards used in a large percentage of Rock decks, followed by those used in some decks, but not all.

Creatures:

Tarmogoyf: The new staple creature of Legacy, Tarmogoyf provides a formidable beater early in the game and gets larger as Rock blows more crap up. An efficient creature is an auto-include in most aggro to midrange Rock decks.

Knight of the Reliquary: The new kid on the block, KotR is soon becoming a staple in Rock builds of all types, due to his ability to get bigger than most other creatures previously used in Rock, and for his land fetching capability. He prevents colour screw by tutoring for the lands you need and gets bigger by doing it. He can also find fetchlands, which can crack to find other lands, pumping himself up by 2. Some combat tricks used with him are: blocking, and before damage searching for lands to increase his P/T ratio; attacking then untapping after damage but before end of combat using Maze of Ith, which can also be tutored for by Knight; searching for specialty lands to hose the graveyard (Bojuka Bog), provide blockers (Nantucko Monastery), and provide recursion (Volrath’s Stronghold). All in all, Knight is proving his worth as a 5/5 to 10/10 and up creature for 3 mana.

Eternal Witness: Usually played in more controlling builds, Eternal Witness allows you to replay backbreaking spells over and over again. Most people running Aggro builds have dropped Witness in favour of faster answers. Coupled with Pernicious Deed blowing up for more than 3, Witness and Pernicious Deed can combo in loops, with Witness fetching Deed, playing Deed and blowing up for more than 3, and returning Witness with Volrath’s Stronghold.

Dark Confidant: Used in Rock builds with lower mana curves, Confidant provides serious card advantage that is used to crush your opponent. Although very fragile, he can also attack when you don’t have any other pressure on board. Coupled with Sensei’s Divining Top, Confidant can draw you cards while manipulating your library for minimal loss of life. Coupled with fetchlands, you rarely take huge damage from Confidant. He’s pretty much an auto-include in most builds today.

Stoneforge Mystic: Used in some Aggro builds, it allows you to fetch weapons tech to flesh out creature on creature battles. A very useful tool, but does have to be built around. The main pieces of equipment to use with Stoneforge Mystic are Umezawa’s Jitte, Sword of Light and Shadow, and Sword of Fire and Ice. In this deck, I think Jitte and SoLS are best, because Jitte is VERY good and can destroy opposing Jittes if need be, and SoLS allows recursion.

Loxodon Hierarch: Another creature used in slower builds, Hierach is a 4/4 beater than nets you life as a CiTP ability. Being able to regenerate your team can very, very crucial in certain times during certain games. Although deemed slow, he’s still an inclusion in many control builds to stay online late enough in the game to win.

Kitchen Finks: The quicker replacement for Loxodon is a 3/2 Persist that nets you 4 life total over its lifetime. It is used against other Aggro based strategies, as it provides you with two blockers and 4 life. It also combines very well with Deed, and gives you creatures after a Deed on 3 or more, and you get some life out of him too. Many rock builds play him in either the main or board, or both.

Tombstalker: Not as common as the other creatures listed, but a worthy inclusion in many builds needing a large beater with evasion. In some builds, he can come down very early to seal the game. In others, he beats for five when there’s nothing left to stop him after you’ve ground out your opponent. He’s not played very often due to the popularity of Dark confidant, and the possibility of blind revealing a Tombstalker and getting hit for 8 isn’t appealing to most players. When he is played, he’s played usually in control based builds, or those without Dark Confidant.

Qasali Pridemage: Used in tempo builds to combat the rising use of powerful artifacts and enchantments. It also gives all your singular attacks an extra boost, making your Goyf bigger than theirs. All in all, a very solid utility creatures, especially with recursion.

Doran, the Siege Tower: Although the mana cost isn’t the easiest to get on turn 3, Doran is a 5/5 beater for 3, which is great. He turns any walls you play (in Control builds) into 4/4 and 5/5’s, and lets your Birds attack for damage, and makes Goyf bigger. Many lists have dropped him for Knight of the Reliquary, as Doran’s 5/5 isn’t as good as a 10/10 down the road.

Nantuko Shade: Again, not another common choice now, but more relevant in the past. Nantucko swings for 5 on turn 3 if played on turn 2, and is a very efficient beater. As of late, he’s been outclassed by other creatures, and he does hog your mana base as you usually want to pump him up. Not a terrible choice in the slightest, but not as common as other creatures.

Shriekmaw: Again, not very common, but used in control builds usually coupled with recursion. It’s usually played for its Evoke cost and returned later in the game.

Lord of Extinction: Some play this in control builds. If this card had trample, it’d be epic. Unfortunately, it’s just a big dumb beater with no evasion. But, it’s very good after Deeding away the board, and then swinging in with impunity.

Spiritmonger: One of the main fatties used when Rock burst into its new era post-Apocalypse. Since then, cheaper creatures have made Spiritmonger largely irrelevant, but he still sees some play in older lists.

Spells:

Thoughtseize: Most Rock decks like to use hand disruption as card advantage, and Thoughtseize is the best of them all, allowing you to take any non-land card you want at a cost of two life. If a Rock deck is playing hand disruption, this is an auto-include.

Hymn to Tourach: Another piece of hand disruption that is too good not to play if you’re in hand disruption mode.
Gerrard’s Verdict: Usually played a supplement to Thoughtseize and Hymn, or played in place of Hymn if the deck has trouble getting double black on turn 2. It is somewhat worse because it allows your opponent to choose what they discard.

Duress: Usually played in conjunction with Thoughtseize to combat combo and control based strategies.

Inquisition of Kozilek: Played along with Thoughtseize, or as a replacement for Thoughtseize. As you have an upside for not losing life, you lose the ability to nab anything that costs 3 or more. Usually used as Thoughtseizes 5-6, or when on a budget.

Swords to Plowshares: One of the main reasons to splash white, removing any creature for an exchange of life for one white makes this an auto-include in every Rock deck I know. There’s no reason you can’t play 4.

Path to Exile: Usually played as Swords 5-8 in the main or board, Path exchanges creature removal for tempo advantage. It’s used in more agro builds where you don’t want to give your opponent life.

Vindicate: Permanent removal at its finest. For 1BW, kill any single permanent on the board. At 3 CMC, it usually dodges Counterbalance and can kill Jace, a land, any creature…anything. Most Rock decks play at least 2, if not 4.

Maelstrom Pulse: A Vindicate that doesn’t hit lands, but hits multiple non-land permanents. It’s very useful in all of Vindicate’s non-land destruction applications, with the added bonus of being able to kill one to however many things are on the board. Useful for killing tokens, planeswalkers, creatures, multiple enchantments and artifacts (Ghostly Prisons, Mox Diamonds). Also, it’s not usually the colour named against Rock by Iona (White), so it deals with Iona, too. Be careful of friendly fire, though. Usually used as Vindicate #5-6, or as a split.

Pernicious Deed: Blowing up the world X and under for X is good. Really good. Problem being is it kills your own stuff. It’s typically used in more control builds, as it kills your own stuff and is better with long game recursion engines. But, it clears away tokens, and kills everything, A very solid board control card used in many builds.

Engineered Explosives: Allows you to pinpoint Deed the board on the CMC that’s giving you trouble. It’s usually a turn faster than Deed, but doesn’t blow up everything on the board. Usually used in more Aggro builds. Remember you can dodge Counterbalance by paying more in one colour (ex. Pay 2 Green and 1 Black for Sunburst 2, but CMC 3 against Counterbalance/Spell Snare).

Phyrexian Arena: Card draw engine used in Rock builds with higher mana curves. Not as fast as Dark Confidant, but the life loss can be much less, and harder to remove. Use extensively before Dark Confidant, it’s now much less common due to sheer speed.

Sensei’s Divining Top: Over the past couple of years, Top has been used to abuse Dark Confidant, and to make the deck more consistent when in topdeck mode. It allows you to dig 3 per turn, or 4 with Confidant, allowing you to find the cards you need when you need them. Usually an auto-include in most builds for consistency purposes.

Elspeth, Knight Errant: Played in control builds or in Aggro builds as a 1-2 of, it allows you to create blockers and get attackers flying in the air against either Planeswalkers or the opposing player. It’s a bit slow, but doesn’t get hit by Deed and is hard to Explosives away. Once you go ultimate, you needn’t worry about opposing land destruction or Maelstrom Pulse friendly fire. Also helps against Moat, in case you needed any, but usually puts 10/10 KotR’s into flying mode.

Enlightened Tutor: E. Tutor allows you to run a toolbox sideboard of enchantments, with a little bit of everything for the matchup you need. Most run 1 Enlightened in the main, along with 3 in the board, along with 6-10 tutor targets. It allows some versatility in your answers to certain threats, and makes your opponent constantly guess at what other tricks you have up your sleeve. Some notable inclusions to be used in the tutorboard are: Dueling Grounds, Pernicious Deed, Oblivion Ring, Ghostly Prison, Engineered Plague, Engineered Explosives, Choke, Rule of Law, and others.

Ghastly Demise: Another option in addition to Swords/Path. Most of the time, this will be just as good, but it doesn’t target black creatures, on the other hand, the opponent doesn’t a get a cookie for their creature.

Mana sources/accelerants:

Noble Hierarch: Doesn’t tap for black, but pumps your creatures, provides a blocker, and overall puts you ahead by one in mana. Basically, the best mana accelerant in most midrange builds.

Mox Diamond: Used in many tempo rock Builds, Mox Diamond pitches a land to pump Knight and gives you some mana. Some don’t like it due to mana instability (it’s easily killed, plus you have to pitch lands you can’t get back). In decks concerned about tempo, this isn’t an issue, and allows for many turn 2 plays on turn 1. Tied with Noble in terms of mana acceleration and overall usefulness.

Birds of Paradise: Used in control builds, usually alongside Doran. Produces all colours and blocks, but doesn’t do much else. Easily dies to Deed and EE’s like all mana acceleration.

Wall of Roots: Usually played with Doran, proves a good block against Aggro until you can get up and running.

Wall of Blossoms: Not really a mana producer, more of an accelerant. Played commonly with Doran, and help you fight Aggro and gives you some card advantage.

Sakura Tribe Elder: Another control Element, it allows you to block and sacrifice before damage, allowing you to search out basic lands and chump a dude for a turn.

Veteran Explorer: Gives both you and your opponent an advantage, but many Legacy decks play few or no basics. Used in Control Rock builds with many basics, and where you benefit from the acceleration more than they do. Not terribly common.

Land choices/Numbers:

This will really depend on whether or not you play mana accelerants, which ones you play, and if you play Knight of the Reliquary.

If playing Knight of the Reliquary, as you probably should be, it gives you access to many specialty lands as well as a large creature. You should be playing 7-9 Fetchlands with Knight of the Reliquary. They allow you to fetch for basics is you need to more often, and allow you to get the land you want. They also pump Knight. Total land number is usually in the neighbourhood of 20-23, with most people opting for about 22 with mana sources (either Noble Hierarch or Mox Diamond).

For number of dual lands, it depends how consistent vs. how susceptible to Wasteland you want to be. Truffle Shuffle plays 0 Basic lands and all Duals, but is consistent as it gets in terms of lands. Most Rock decks now play between 3-8 basics, with the average being 3-5. I personally like 4 or 5, since it makes me less vulnerable to colour screw by opposing Wastelands. Most people playing Wasteland in their Rock deck tend to play fewer basics themselves, however. This is really just a personal choice, and what you feel comfortable playing with. In terms of number of Duals, it can range from between 6 to 10, on average. Usually, 4 Scrublands, 4 Bayou, and 1 Savannah are played (depending on the colour ratios, as well), or 4 Bayou, 3 Scrubland, 1 Savannah, etc. I think it’s necessary to play the 1-of Savannah if your main focus isn’t GW because many times you’ll need an extra green to put down more Goyfs, and the extra white to Plow more. Many times however you’ll be going for the black duals, but at times, Savannah is a real life-saver.

Specialty

So we’ve got approximately 8 fetches, 4 Basics, and 8 duals. We’ve got two slots left! If you’re playing Wasteland, you’ll probably have 2-3 Basics with 1-2 slots leftover. This allows us to get to the goodies that the searching ability of Knight grants us access to.

Volrath’s Stronghold: Useful in the fact it allows for long game recursion, and lets you play dead creature over and over. Very useful with Evoke or Sacrifice effect creatures, such as Qasali Pridemage, Shriekmaw, Kitchen Finks recursion, allows Deed loops with Eternal Witness and blowing Deed on 3+, etc. A very useful utility land that should be considered for all decks running KotR that aren’t straight up aggro.

Horizon Canopy: A painland Savannah with the ability to sac to draw cards. Used in New Horizons fame, Canopy gives you card advantage and Knight gets pumped. A decent card to say the least, but many lists have dropped the numbers to 1-2, or none at all.

Nantuko Monastery: In most games, you’ll have Threshold after a few turns. The point? You can have a tutorable 4/4 first striker that can be searched out with knight. 4/4 is nothing to sneeze at, nevermind first strike. A very good offensive and defensive card, many mid-range builds play it as a one of.

Wasteland: I’m assuming you haven’t included it in your 22 lands, so if you have, nevermind. Adding even two Wastelands just for tutoring can be excellent. Mainly, the 4-of Wasteland plan is designed for screwing your opponent over, but can also be done more efficiently by searching them out every turn with Knight, thereby pumping him as well. A very good card, but can lead to some colour screw on your behalf.

Bojuka Bog: With all the graveyards running around, it’s good to get rid of them. Nothing’s more fun than an opposing Knight running into yours, but you block and search for Bog. Win! Also helps against Dredge, Vengevine, Loam, Lands, etc. A very useful card to have around.

Karakas: The tutorable answer to Emrakul or Iona. Allows you to bounce them back to their hand, and lets you keep chugging away. It deserves a slot in either the side or main, unless you expect to see zero Reanimator/Dredge/Retainer Survival/Sneak Attack.

Maze of Ith: Maze is great because it untaps large creatures (ex. Iona) attack you, but you can also untap your own attackers to save them as blockers after they’re dealt damage. Its use significantly improves with the use of Dueling Grounds in the board. All in all, very solid.

Knight of the Reliquary Combat Tricks

Remember your Knight combat tricks: Block, then search for a land (usually a fetch, crack it for another land to pump by 2) before damage is dealt, so you can pump your Knight. Also, if you have Maze of Ith in play, you can attack, and then untap it during the “End of Combat” phase, after damage has been dealt, leaving you with a nice blocker. As well, if you don’t need to crack fetchlands, leave them in play uncracked when you attack. Most opponents may not see the fact you’ve got the ability to pump on demand as they’re too busy making decisions. Then, when he blocks with a slightly larger creature or multiple creatures, crack fetchlands to pump and possibly keep Knight alive.

Overall, you should have 22-23 Lands, and possibly 3-4 Mana accelerants. Mana acceleration is good because you want to play your backbreaking spells and your answers as early as you can. You might stall for a turn playing an accelerant, but it puts you ahead the next turn. Turn 1 Hymn is good, as is a turn 2 Vindicate. Which mana source depends on your play style. Mox Diamond is more aggro and pumps your Knight, but you lose actual lands for more explosive turn 1 plays. Noble Hierarch gives your creatures exalted, and you don’t lose actual lands. Problem is it doesn’t produce black. There are benefits and shortcomings of each choice: Weight them against your particular build to see which is right for you.

5. Basic Strategy

Rock has a few main strategies it uses to win and to interact (or not) with opponents.

Discard:

Discard provides card advantage by getting rid of stuff before it hits the table. It’s very useful for getting a peek at what your opponent it actually playing, and allows you to map out their plays for the next couple of turns. Most aggro builds run a suite of discard, as it allows you to get an early up on your opponent, and gives you game against combo. As the game progresses into the late game, discard can becomes less relevant. For that reason, many Control-Rock lists don’t run discard at all.

Removal/board control:

If and when something does hit the board, Rock packs a powerful removal suite in either pinpointed destruction or mass sweepers. This allows Rock to handle most things that the opponent can throw at us, from Enchantments to Planeswalkers to creatures. Rock is particularly good out either outclassing or straight up destroying opposing creatures. When the number of creatures becomes too great, this is where Rock can have some trouble.

Card Advantage:

Most Rock decks play some form of card advantage or manipulation to allow them to play more responses than you have threats. This is usually in the form of Dark Confidant, sweeper effects (virtual card advantage) or Phyrexian Arena. Clearing away multiple threats allows you to get the most out of your spells, and can put you ahead of your opponent very quickly. Most, if not all, Rock decks play some form of card advantage, either through drawing extra cards or blowing crap up. You can gain huge card advantage with little recourse using Dark Confidant and Sensei’s Divining Top to manipulate your draws to lose the least amount of life possible, while still maintaining an advantage over your opponent.

Fatties:

Rock plays a suite of beefy creatures that usually roll over your opponent’s creatures, or are hard to remove, or have an ability attached. Your creatures outclass your opponents most of the time, making your opponent go on the defensive against a player who has big attackers and answers to any creatures used to counter your creatures.

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In most games, with the basic strategies of removal, tempo advantage (discard and destruction), along with large creatures, you should be able to take out most other strategies. Use discard to plow through their hand, while using Vindicate to deny them their mana. Mana acceleration will allow you to do this early on, and by turn 5-6, you should have a good grasp of the game. You’ll probably disrupted them enough and have creatures on board so you can start ending the game. Play tight against decks with sweepers (Landstill, heavy control) as you have very few threats and less recursion to deal with it.
Post board, shore up the strategy that works best against the deck you’re facing. If you need to go aggro to beat them, add in some discard to disrupt them early on. If you’re trying to go control, slow the game down to a crawl and play it your way. Use board control elements such as Rule of Law, Choke, and Pernicious Deed. There’s a little something for everybody with Rock: you get to remove creatures, cause people to discard their favourite cards, play with Tarmogoyf, and blow up more expensive cards than yours.

6. Aggro vs. Control

There is a large divide in the Rock community about which is better: Aggro builds of the Rock or Control builds? The answer is neither; both decks have advantages to their strategies and disadvantages.

Aggro will usually run a large suite of discard with less removal and more creatures to put your opponent on the defensive early. This strategy is very good against most decks, which can’t compete with some removal and discard backed up by creatures early on. Most games played with Aggro Rock don’t run out the clock as much as Control matches do, but are worse against decks that do just that. Aggro-Rock does very well even into the mid to late game, but after that, it has no real recursion engines to keep fighting once the initial onslaught has been fended off.

Control usually scraps the Discard plan and some creatures for more removal. Discard is deader late in the game, so Control focuses on staying alive in the early game using removal, then plays board control pieces and large creatures to seal the deal. Control usually plays a recursion engine for its dead creatures to bring them back for further use later on. Control Rock has a tough time winning against super-aggro, as it plays little early game disruption. If the game can go past turn 4-6, then Rock does usually grind out a win. The problem with playing a deck that goes to time in a large tournament is the stress of reporting, de-sideboarding, and the possibility of tying a game from an opponent purposefully running out the clock. Be wary of the stress and play mistakes that come with going to time in an 8-hour tournament. Four rounds aren’t bad, doing eight is horrendous.

Mid-range is a mix of the two: usually playing more board control than Aggro, but more creatures and discard than Control. Most competitive Rock decks nowadays are midrange, and do well over the course of the entire game, but do suffer slightly in the early and very late games. It’s best to weight the advantages and disadvantages of playing any one of the major types in your particular metagame.

7. Decklists

Dark Horizons, 4th Place at SCG Open: Charlotte:

3 Mox Diamond
3 Sensei’s Divining Top
4 Dark Confidant
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Knight of the Reliquary
1 Pernicious Deed
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Gerrard’s Verdict
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Thoughtseize
4 Vindicate
1 Plains
2 Swamp
2 Bayou
1 Horizon Canopy
4 Marsh Flats
1 Maze of Ith
3 Scrubland
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland
1 Karakas
Board:
4 Engineered Plague
2 Pernicious Deed
3 Diabolic Edict
3 Extirpate
3 Kataki, War’s Wage

(Still have to add more)

8. Sideboard choices

Sideboard choices really depend on your build, as it’s really just a BGW removal + fatties deck. It’s highly customizable, as you can see from the decklists. I’ll go over the major archetypes, and what cards we can use to deal with broad strategies. I’ll cover some narrow use cards as well, but ideally cards in your sideboard cover multiple matchups so you have as much coverage of the metagame as possible.

Creature based Aggro: Tribal, Zoo, Burn, Dredge

Most of the above listed decks play large amounts of creatures that swing many at a time. Mass removal is always a good choice, but with aggro, you don’t always have the time. So, you can shut off their ground attacks, destroy all their creatures, or allow fewer creatures to attack at once. With burn, you need to stop them from burning you, or gain enough life to withstand their direct damage.

Ghostly Prison: Makes all their creatures cost more to attack you. A very solid card against decks with mana creatures and light manabases. After ripping apart their hand and popping some of their lands, Ghostly Prison becomes an effective counter to tokens of any kind, Elf swarms, Goblins, and Merfolk. Doesn’t apply for attacking Elspeth, so be wary.

Engineered Plague: Makes tribal decks cry. This isn’t good against Merfolk anymore, they play 16 Lords. Unless you have 4 in play at the same time, it isn’t doing any good here. But, it’s VERY good against Goblins, Elves, Thopter tokens, Goblin tokens, Horror or Illusion against Dredge, etc.

Moat: You could play this as a sideboard card if you were running Elspeth, since you could boost creatures over your Moat. Goblins can’t deal with it, Dredge can’t deal with it, and Merfolk barely deals with it. Good, but you have to build around it.

Sphere of Law: Makes red decks cry, as most of their Burn now only does 1 or no damage to you. Siege Gang Commander is useless, Lackey doesn’t do damage, etc. Very solid, but at 4 CMC, it’s hard to pull off.

Rule of Law: Stops the flow of constant creatures and spells that usually smack you in the face.

Leyline of Sanctity: Shuts off Burn and Discard, period. A must-include nowadays.

Path to Exile: Targeted removal is good against decks with many lords. Allows you to also pinpoint your removal, allowing your creatures to block less intimidating targets, or gives you time to get creatures out.

Kitchen Finks: Blocks, persists, gives you life. Very good in creature on creature based matchups, especially Zoo.

Peacekeeper: Stops an opposing army, and your own, from attacking at the cost of tying up two mana. Allows you to stabilize and ready your troops before they can slaughter you with theirs. Although fragile, if you can keep it alive you’re usually set.

Dueling Grounds: Last but not least, the Grounds. Takes all decks that attack with multiple creatures and puts them at a standstill. Allows you to block with large fatties, and they can only block with one guy. Pretty rough beats against Dredge, Zoo, Goblins, Merfolk, Vengevine, Elves, Thopters, etc. I see this as a must-include nowadays. Side at least 2, if not 3-4.

Combo: ANT, TEPS, Dredge,etc.

To properly deal with combo based decks, you need to limit the spells they play in a turn to stop them from building a storm count, counter key spells, or use discard. Since we can’t counter anything, discard and spell-limitation is basically the only way to go.

Leyline of Sanctity: Prevents you from being targeted with the Combo player’s discard and their Storm Spells. Very useful as it buys you time to play your own discard and threats before they find answers. To me, this card is an absolute must. Gives you a turn 0 answer before they can combo off.

Extirpate: Allows you to break Ill-Gotten Gains loops if key pieces are in the graveyard already.

Engineered Explosives: Destroys tokens created from Empty the Warrens.

Ethersworn Cannonist: Limits the number of spells they can play, limiting their storm count. A very popular choice as of late.

Thorn of Amethyst: Thorn makes every non-creature spell cost one more. Most effective if played turn 1 or 2, so here, having Mox Diamond is advantageous. Watch out for your own stuff costing more, though. This throws off the Storm player because it can mix up their counting, causing a failed combo loop (resulting in wasted cards and time), or in just them taking longer to combo off to get enough mana to do so. A very popular choice of creature based decks to fight Storm based combo.

Aven Mindcensor: Prevents them from using their tutors and fetchlands effectively. Another popular choice against Survival based decks. Fragile, but also has flash.

Pithing Needle: Prevents the use of Goblin Charbelcher, and other activated abilities many combo decks play.

Rule of Law: Same thing as Cannonist, limit their spells to slow their search of answers and to prevent them from building Storm.

Duress: Another key card in this matchup. Taking away their search abilities for answers allows you to keep other answers online, and stalls them from pulling off their combo. I suggest running at approximately 12 pieces of discard, along with another piece of hate (Leyline of Sanctity) to give yourself a better chance.

Runed Halo: Usually naming Tendrils is the way to go, or goblin Charbelcher. It’s an easily castable spell so long as you can actually get it down before they combo.

Chalice of the Void: Allows the countering of key bounce spells, mana acceleration, tutors, etc. Chalice on 2 shuts off their tutors (Infernal tutor and Burning Wish) and Cabal Ritual; 1 shuts off Brainstorm, Ponder, Chain of Vapour, Duress, Orim’s Chant, Silence, Xantid Swarm, Dark Ritual, etc. ; Chalice at 0 shuts off Lotus Petal, Lion’s Eye diamond and Chrome Mox. Remember though: Storm counts spells cast, not resolved. They can still run 0 drops through a Chalice at 0, having them all get countered but still building up Storm. If on the play, Chalice at 0 followed by Duress/Thoughtseize is good, but Chalice at 1 stops a lot of their spells. I prefer to Chalice at 1, as it stops their search and bounce, and really slows them down.

Gaddock Teeg: Stops them from playing Ad Nauseum and Tendrils of Agony and Empty the Warren, key components in getting the combo off. Mind you, he’s easily killed.

Leyline of the Void: Nullifies the possibility of Ill-Gotten Gains Loop while on the board, and decimates Dredge decks so long as it stays on board. More relevant in the grave-based matchups (Lands, Aggro Loam, Dredge, etc.)

Graveyard Based Strategies: Dredge, Lands, Life from the Loam, Vengevine, Reanimator, New Horizons

These strategies utilize the graveyard to their advantage, so get rid of it.

Leyline of the Void: Stops them from having a graveyard, and comes into play on turn 0. Try not to keep a crap hand containing only Leyline as its good card. All in all, a very solid card and if played, play 4 in the board to increase your chances of opening with one on turn 0. Susceptible to counterhate via Grip, Trygon Predator, Nature’s Claim, etc.

Extirpate: Targeted graveyard removal. Get rid of their Life from the Loam, Vengevine, Iona, Wasteland, or whatever you feel like. It’s uncounterable except for a Counterbalance reveal trigger, so be wary. I think this is the best removal right now due to its ability to get rid of Vengevine and not be countered. Always do so in response to the return trigger.

Planar Void: A turn 1 answer to graveyard strategies, but basically means your Tarmogoyfs amd KotRs are useless. I’m not a huge fan, but if you need more cheap answers to totally shut out their strategy in a grave-based meta, it’s VERY good.

Wheel of Sun and Moon: Doesn’t let stuff get put in their graveyard for them to use. Somewhat useful for Dredge and the like, and also good against opposing Knight of the Reliquary. Be careful though, it allows them to reuse everything, though. If they run a tutor-based deck, this might not be the best idea.

Tormod’s Crypt: Not as good as it used to be before Vengevine. Most of the time you’ll be forced to crack it for the bare minimum just to keep yourself alive. Again, another solid card against Dredge, but not so much against Veggies.

Relic of Progenitus: Better against slower graveyard strategies, but the same problems as Crypt, with a cantrip attached.

Morningtide: Removes all graveyards, including yours. A kick in the pants to you, but a possible choice if it’s all you have.

Bojuka Bog: Easily fetched with Knight of the Reliquary, Bog becomes an instant speed Crypt out of nowhere. Can be done in response to cycling trigger on a fetchland, Vengevine return to play trigger, or on a Dread Return so they can’t get Iona out.

Control Strategies: The Rock, Landstill, Stax, Thopters, Counterbalance, Enchantress

The key here is to either out aggro the control deck, and put them in a bad position and make them make bad decisions (ie. Using sweepers on one creature) or do better than them at control. Early discard hurts them very much, as does targeted removal.

Maelstrom Pulse: If you’re not packing Pulse in the main and need more targeted removal, Pulse is right for you. Takes out multiple Thopters, Planeswalkers, Stax pieces, and Enchantress pieces when not under the shroud umbrella.

Choke: Many control builds have blue in them, and being able to slow them down to a crawl is very good. Coupled with Land Destruction, Choke is a solid card against Merfolk (somewhat), Thopters, and Landstill. It makes it hard for Landstill to Deed you out or cast huge spells, and when they do, they’re tapped down. Thopters can’t make more than one round of tokens, and it doesn’t allow them to do anything else. Choke is particularly good when combined with Suppression Field, Ghostly Prison, or any other tax on their manabase (Magus of the Tabernacle, Tabernacle itself, etc.)

Diabolic edict: Allows you to get rid of a resolved Progenitus or Emrakul, and usually Iona, as most players name White against Rock. A useful card in many matchups.

Perish: Even though it kills your stuff, it helps you deal with Vengevine decks and can kill a resolved Progenitus.

Pernicious Deed: The end-all-be-all against control. It’s devastating against Enchantress, Stax, Thopters and many control variants. It’s hard to Counterbalance against, and blows up everything. You might lose a few creatures, but Stax loses Crucibles, Smokestacks, Ghostly Prisons, Trinisphere, Chalices, etc. Thopters loses Thopter combo and Counterbalance lock, along with Ensnaring Bridges, Crucible, Back to Basics, etc. It’s a hard counter to Enchantress, but be wary of Replenish bringing it all back. Try to also remove their graveyard with Bog or Relic as well, or makes them discard Replenish.

Duress: Comes up again as it’s very good against a Control matchup. If you can mash up their hand before they can lay big threats or hard counters, you can have the game in your grasp by playing threats soon afterwards. You can take out a Trinisphere before it gets played, the shroud giving Enchantress enchantment, and other discard on the part of the Rock player.

Krosan Grip: Uncounterable artifact/enchantment removal that ends the stack. Seems good.

Sacred Ground: Against decks that pound your manabase. If there’s a lot of Stax, New Horizons, Team America and their ilk, Sacred Ground is a very good counter.

Leyline of Sanctity: Protects you against many control decks counter cards, such as other discard, Wheel of Sun and Moon, and Words of War. It’s a hard threat for many decks to answer early on, so it buys you time, and possibly even permanents to sacrifice to Smokestack.

Leyline of the Void: Even though these are control matchups, many do so well because of playing out of the graveyard. Stax loses its edge with no land recursion, Enchantress can’t replenish, Thopters can’t Academy Ruins + EE lock you or bring back broken combo pieces/combo off at all, and most Rock decks like their graveyard for either recursion or pump.

Vampire Hexmage: If you had a meta with a large amount of Planeswalkers floating around, this is a good card. Kills Jace and Elspeth, the two main planeswalkers you’ll see in Legacy, and is a decent creature at a 2/1 First strike for BB.

Kitchen Finks: Creatures with recursion use up the control elements control decks have to play. Recurring creatures of any kind, be it Kitchen Finks, Nether Spirit, Bloodghast, etc. all have game against these types of decks unless they’re RFG’d by Swords. Multiple sacrifices to Smokestack makes Stax players (including myself) cry, and it gives you breathing space against their eventual threats.

Gaddock Teeg: Takes Control to town. They can’t play many Stax pieces, EE, relevant Planeswalker, Replenish, hard core Enchantments (Humility/Moat), and even Leyline not on Turn 0 (which does tend to happen). Especially good since most decks run EE as removal for your threats, and this really makes this disadvantageous to them.

Kataki, War's Wage: Absolutely trounces Stax, but most people are playing it against Affinity. Against those decks, it's an absolute bomb. Other prefer Pernicious Deed against those decks, but this comes out a turn earlier.

sdematt

11-30-2010, 02:34 AM

9. Matchup Analysis

Goblins

Goblins can be a bit of a tough matchup. Goblins is a fast, aggressive deck that gets off the line quickly. Answering a Turn 1 Lackey is key, either with removal or a blocker. You’re basically trying to stabilize and either rip apart their hard and put them into topdeck mode or blow up the stuff they play. Not letting Lackey/Instigator hit you is key here if you can; try to save your removal for dangerous creatures such as this. If you can get enough fat on board, swing in conservatively if you’re outnumbered. Watch for them screwing your manabase: fetch basics so you don’t get Wastelanded out. Goblin Ringleader and Siege Gang Commander are their primary card advantage engines, and allow them to recover from sweepers very easily. When possible, take Ringleader/Siege Gang with Thoughtseize. It saves you a lot of hassle down the road. Doran is very good in this matchup if you play him, Piledriver suddenly doesn’t look so good. There are many builds: R, RB, RG, RBG, etc. They all function the same way in a basic sense: Play lots of Goblins, turn them sideways.

In against Goblins: More sweepers and creature removal, dueling Grounds/E. Plague, possibly Leyline of Sanctity as it prevents them from Siege-Ganging you out under a Dueling Grounds.

In against you: Most likely gravehate and artifact/Enchantment removal.

Out against Goblins: Keep your discard in, but side out Duress if you’re playing it main. Side out more expensive removal as you may be cut off of mana due to their denial plan.

Overall: Slightly unfavourable preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.

Zoo

Like Goblins in that they play a bunch of creature that turn sideways, but they also play some removal along with a bunch of burn. The key here is killing their threats and putting out bigger ones before they kill you. Thoughtseize isn’t a bad card here; just make sure you’re taking something that will cost you more than 2 life over the course of the game (which is pretty such everything). Lay out fatties when they’re out of Burn range. Don’t be afraid of playing Dark Confidant here. Try and squeeze as much card advantage out of him as you can before he dies. Zoo is also a land light deck: focusing on killing lands can do you some good. Long story short: Take the burn out of their hand, blow up their lands, play bigger creatures and swing in. Kitchen Finks is EXCELLENT in this matchup, as is fetching for basics against Price of Progess.

In against Zoo: Leyline of Sanctity, Pulse of the Fields, Kitchen Finks, Circle of Protection: Red, Dueling Grounds, Pernicious Deed.

In against you: Grave hate, enchanment/artifact hate.

Out against Zoo: Maelstrom Pulse, Vindicate, Dark Confidant (if you’re really feeling the hurt).

Overall: Slightly unfavourable preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.

Merfolk

Oh look, another aggro based matchup: with counters! Basically very similar to Goblins matchup, except they’re running less mana denial and counterspells! Hooray! Just kidding. This is a hard matchup depending on what they’re running. The black version is bad because it runs Perish in the board. They also run so many Lords, everything gets so big. Don’t get caught offguard by Cursecatchers, and save your Plows for relevant Lords (Coralhelm, Reejerey) or Mutavaults. Try to stabilize by blowing crap up and swinging in big. Resolving Confidant, especially with Top, is key here. You need card advantage to help you get there against so many threats. Don’t play around Counterspells: they’re inevitable. Mind you, don’t make a backbreaking play with no Daze mana open unless absolutely necessary. Don’t walk into easy counters, but don’t hold back to the point where you lose tempo by just sitting there to get to 5 mana so you can Vindicate even if he has Spell Pierce. Your creatures outclass his most of the time, so take out their Lords and hopefully swing in. Post board, Dueling Grounds is key. You can block everything except Coralhelm Commander, and you’re bigger than he is. If Dueling Grounds sticks, you should be good.

In against Merfolk: Dueling Grounds, Pernicious Deed, Path to Exile, Pithing Needle, etc.

In against you: Hibernation, Perish, Grave-hate.

Out against Merfolk: Hymn to Tourach/Gerrard’s Verdict, or Vindicate effects.

Overall: Slightly unfavourable to even preboard, slightly favourable postboard.

Mono Red Burn

In game 1, rip apart his hand as best you can. Don’t be afraid to drop Dark Confidant for some card advantage. Lay out beats as early as possibly, it’s a race. Don’t be afraid to Swords your own creatures to stay in the game. Most of your stuff is useless here, which makes for a bad game 1. Game 2, bring in life-gain and Leylines. If you can drop Leyline, they basically have no answer except Sulphuric Vortex and their few creatures, which you can easily blow up/remove.

In against Burn: Life gain of any kind, Leyline of Sanctity.

In against you: Grave-hate.

Out against Burn: Path to Exile, a few Confidants (if you need room), Thoughtseize (replace with Duress), Maelstrom Pulse, a few Vindicates, Pernicious Deed.

Overall: Very unfavourable preboard, favourable to very favourable postboard.

Dredge

Dredge is a very difficult matchup, but can be won game 1. Keep early pressure on, and use targeted discard. Random discard is good for Dredge, so try not to use it. Maelstrom Pulse is good at blowing up tokens, as are Deed and EE. Try to keep the Dredge player off 3 creatures for the Dread Return; Swords/Remove Narcomoebas and other creatures when possibly. Use Knight to tutor Bojuka Bog or Karakas for an impending Iona. Lay beats down, and hope they don’t go off too quickly.

In against Dredge: Extirpate, Leyline of the Void, Grave-hate, Karakas, Bojuka Bog, Duress (if on the play), Pernicious Deed/EE, Engineered Plague, Dueling Grounds, Diabolic Edict, etc.

In against you: Grave hate of some kind, or not much at all.

Out against Dredge: Swords to Plowshares, Hymn to Tourach/Gerrard’s Verdict, some Vindicates (keep a few), Discard (if on the draw).

Overall: Unfavourable to very unfavourable preboard, favourable to very favourable postboard.

ANT, TEPS, and other Tendrils based combo

Depending on the build, most of these decks basically build a storm count by playing mana artifacts for free, then casting Ad Nauseum to draw a ton of card to kill you with either an Ill-Gotten gains Loop, Empty the Warrens for tokens, or Tendrils of Agony. I suggest reading an article by Max McCall on Starcitygames.com called “So you want to kill your opponent on Turn 1?” It’s an enlightening article about how much mana is need to do certain things, when to do things etc. I’m not going to explain it all here, but always makes sure their mana count is correct, and always call their bluff. Make them fully go through the combo, as many times it can fail due to poor counting. I’m not saying stall the clock and be an idiot, just make sure they’re got the mana and storm they say they do. Try to hit them in the early game with discard backed with threats early on. Sometimes you’ll get them, othertimes not. Focus using Vindicates and such on their lands, as their actual manabase is quite unstable, playing mana non-basics and playing fewer lands in general. In game 2, side in Leyline of Sanctity with maximal discard. Make them discard, then back it up with threats to put them on a clock. It’s a race between who has answers and who doesn’t. If he can’t find his answer to your answer, he loses. If not, you lose. Try to keep a singular white open if you have large creatures in play: He may combo off, but in response you can Swords your creature to gain enough life to possibly survive the ordeal. It doesn’t always work, but at times it can be worth a shot. Make sure all the Storm copies are on the stack before you play your spell, you don’t want to add to the Storm.

In against ANT: Leyline of Sanctity, Duress, Runed Halo, Leyline of the Void, The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale, EE (for ETW tokens).

In against you: Usually a Burning Wish board.

Out against ANT: Path to Exile, Pernicious Deed, some StP, a few Vindicate, etc.

Overall: Very unfavourable preboard, slightly unfavourable to even postboard.

Dreadstill

Dreadstill usually packs an impressive array of Standstill, Stifles, Dreadnought, Factories and heavy countermagic. As of late, Spell Pierce is now Spell snare with all the Survival running around, and that helps you greatly. Phyrexian Dreadnought relies on 4-7 Soft counters (Daze, Spell Pierce/Spell Snare) and 4-8 Hard Counters (Force of Will and Spell Snare) to counter key spells, as well as its counterbalance-Top engine. Luckily for us, we’re playing a few more three drops than they’d like. The key here is blow up their Counterbalance if you ever want to get a Swords/Path through. It’s never getting through a good Dreadstill player. Play aggressively in this matchup, as they’re trying to lay down a fast Dreadnought: they can’t play the late-game as well as we can. Drop down an EE or a Deed when possibly. Keep your Vindicates and such for Dreadnought. Once he runs out one or two and you deal with them, he’s basically done. Stay on your toes, hit them early with discard, and blow their crap up. Don’t be afraid to crack Standstill as soon as possible and hopefully at the end of their turn before they discard. This will force them to discard back down to 7 after having drawn three wonderful cards. This shouldn’t be a terrible matchup so long as you keep Counterbalance off the table and keep the pressure on.

In against Dreadstill: Path to Exile, Deed, EE, Diabolic Edict, Maze of Ith.

In against you: Perish, grave-hate, possibly Peacekeeper.

Out against Dreadstill: Bits and pieces here and there to fit in as much removal as possible.

Overall: Slightly favourable preboard, slightly favourable to even postboard.

Enchantress

Enchantress relies on early mana acceleration to play many enchantments, that eventually end up having shroud. It stalls the game using Elephant Grass and other creature control elements. It amasses huge card advantage through the use of Enchantresses Presence and Argothian Enchantress. It wins by using either Sigil of the Empty Throne or Words of War. It plays an enchantment with multiple Enchantress effects on board, and decides to skip the drawing to burn you for each card not drawn, which usually kills you. The key to this matchup is attacking their early manabase, and their hand early. Get around their shroud by laying down Deed and EE. Try to attack as much as possibly before Elephant Grass starts to lock you out. Continually pick at their hand and get rid of Replenish and Sterling Grove, and swing in as much as you can. Eventually you’ll get there. Karmic Justice can be a beating: make sure you destroy it before blowing Deed or something.

In against Enchantress: EE, Deed, Leyline of Sanctity, Duress, Leyline of the Void, Extirpate, etc.

In against you: More creature control, Karmic Justice, some gravehate as well.

Out against Enchantress: Targeted creature removal.

Overall: Even to slightly unfavourable preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.

Reanimator

With the unbanning of Mystical Tutor a possibility, I better talk about Reanimator. With or without Mystical tutor, it’s still a good deck. Reanimator plays Entomb with Reanimation effects (Reanimate, Exhume) backed with discard and counterspells. Usually, they’ll either rawdog the early Entomb and try to go for a fast win, or they’ll go off whilst protected with discard and/or counterspells. Either way, at end of turn they’ll Entomb Iona/Inkwell Leviathan/Terastodon/Sphinx of the Steel Win and reanimate next turn. Be wary if they use Exhume: you choose to bring back something of your own as well. They key here is disrupting them early enough in the first game to take control. They play very few lands, and few if any basics, so discard backed with Wasteland/Vindicate is key. If you can put them off their lands they’ll have a bunch of trouble getting back online. If Iona does comes out, pray to hit Pulse or Diabolic Edict or Karakas, or have an online KotR. Iona is usually named on white and second most on black. I always suggest to my Reanimator opponent that Black is paramount, but they usually pick White just the same. After you side, bring in discard and massive amounts of gravehate.

In against Reanimator: Bojuka Bog, Maze of Ith, Diabolic Edict, Leyline of the Void, Extirpate, Planar Void, etc.

In against you: Again, everyone thinks grave-hate is the bomb against us. Newsflash: not so much.

Out against Reanimator: Deed, Path (Keep some Swords in case they don’t go Iona), EE, non-targeted discard.

Overall: Unfavourable preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.

Thopters

Thopters is a Counterbalance-based control deck utilizing the Sword of the Meek/Thopter foundry Combo with various white and blue control cards including Humility, Moat, Jace the Mind Sculptor, Back to Basics, Crucible of Worlds, etc. It’s very much like old-style Landstill crossed with Counterbalance. Thopters plays 7-8 hard counters (Force of Will and Counterspell) along with Counterbalance, Enlightened Tutor, and Moat (it looks more and more like Vintage Keeper circa 1996). The main problem when playing against Thopters is they usually have a small tutor arsenal with Ensnaring Bridge, Crucible of Worlds, Moat, Humility backed by the infamous Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Having that guy behind an Ensnaring Bridge or Moat, continually sculpting your draws while your creatures can’t attack him is quite annoying. The good thing? You play board destruction, and usually 4-6 anti-Planeswalker spells, not counting the fact you have creatures that attack. Thopters plays anywhere from 6-10 basic lands, so the Land denial plan is probably pretty bad. Early on, Thopters is susceptible to discard, so take Counterbalance, Jace, and Back to Basics when you can. Once Counterbalance lands, they’ll be looking to either fulfill Thopter combo or use Jace to lock you out. Here, blow up Counterbalance and go for Deed as much as possible. Deed levels their field almost as bad as Stax, but leaves Jace. When possible, either attack of Vindicate/Pulse Jace. With enough removal, hand disruption, and board sweep, you should end up victorious.

In against Thopters: Pithing Needle, EE, Deed, Engineered Plague (naming Thopters), Dueling Grounds, Choke, Leyline of Sanctity, Suppression Field, some Gravehate if you suspect Wastelock plan/recurring EE.

In against you: More Moats/Humility/Swords/Path, Graveyard hate, Back to Basics (if not in the main).

Out against Thopters: Swords/Path.

Overall: Favourable preboard, slightly favourable to favourable postboard.

Goblin Charbelcher

Goblin Charbelcher is an explosive combo deck that wins on turn 1 or 2 a good portion of the time. It uses mana accelerants and usually 1-2 lands to run out a Goblin Charbelcher, and activate it to kill you. Another way to combo out for them is by building a Storm count and using Empty the Warrens. Warrens is easier to pull off because you don’t have to bring in 20 tokens, even 8-12 are enough that early in the game. As a non-blue based deck, this makes your job very difficult. Game 1 unless you get extremely lucky with your discard and you back it up with early pressure and he draws nothing, you lose. The key here is games 2 and 3, where you side in defenses against tokens and Charbelcher. If you can deal with Belcher, and have ways to deal with token, you’re good.

In against Belcher: EE, Leyline of Sanctity, Duress, Engineered Plague (on Goblins), Pithing Needle.

In against you: I don’t think they side in anything terribly relevant.

Out against Belcher: Swords/Path, a few creatures.

Overall: Unfavourable pre-board, slightly unfavourable postboard.

Team America

Team America is a tempo deck utilizing Wasteland, Stifle, Sinkhole, Tarmogoyf and Tombstalker. It plays very early manabase disruption by Stifling fetchlands and Wastelanding non-basics. Some versions still play Sinkhole, which is devastating against most decks. In this match, fetch for basics and play out your mana accelerants as soon as possible. You’re going to lose many lands in this matchup: this is where having 23 lands comes in handy. Mind you, Team America is a threat-light deck with usually 8-9 threats. Here, you have to play control. You have a much better long game than they do, as you have much better removal and possible recursion. Wasteland away their black sources (if possible) and keep them on their toes. Lay out as many threats as you can, as they don’t have a ton of answers except creatures to resolved threats. Their counterspell base is alright, with 4 Force of Will, Dazes and Spell Pierces. Don’t play too heavily around soft-counters; this isn’t a matchup where you can lollygag around waiting to see if they have the counter. This deck is good against Rock because of the fact it disrupts our manabase early on, which is the key. If you can draw the game out to the late game, however, you should win.

In against Team America: Path, EE, Leyline of Sanctity (not necessary, but helpful), Pithing Needle.

In against you: Grave hate, not sure what else.

Out against them: Maelstrom Pulse, some Vindicates, Deed.

Overall: Slightly unfavourable preboard, slightly unfavourable to even postboard.

White Stax

White Stax will try to use its multiple lockpieces to slowly turn the gamestate into a quagmire of upkeep effects and cost alterations/negations. White Stax is Prison at its finest: Good, but highly inconsistent. Stax loads up the board with permanents to drag you down to a point where you can’t play anything, then slowly kills you. You easily defend against this by heavily disrupting them in the early game when they’re most vulnerable. Stax can’t function to its full potential without Crucible of Worlds: it sacs lands to Crucible to outrace you on Smokestack, it uses Armageddon to the point of being absurdly lopsided, and it used Wastelock to take you out of the game. But, Stax itself is vulnerable to early Wastelands. Stax’s lowest CMC is 3, not considering Chalice of the Void. Wastelanding their first turn Ancient Tomb is brutal, as they usually can’t follow it up immediately. As well, the fact you have targeted permanent removal means even if they play an awesome lockpiece, like Smokestack or Crucible of Worlds, you can easily remove it without hesitation. Pernicious Deed is the bane of their existence here. An active Deed onboard with mana open literally spells the end of the game for Stax unless they already have no permanents on board. Remember to pay Tabernacle upkeep effects, or to be sneaky with an active Smokestack on board, stack the triggers to sac to Smokestack first, then pay for Tabernacle effects. All in all, blow stuff up; disrupt early, swing in often. Remember: Ghostly Prison doesn’t apply to Planeswalkers.

In against Stax: Deed, Maelstrom Pulse, Pithing Needle, Duress (if on the play), Gaddock Teeg.

In against you: Karmic Justice, Leyline of Sanctity.

Out against Stax: Path to Exile/Swords.

Overall: Slightly favourable for you preboard, slightly favourable to favourable postboard, depending on how many Deeds you play.

CounterTop Bant/ NO Bant

Counter-Top Bant uses the Counter-Top engine combined with efficient creatures to kill you with big creatures, with the option of adding in Natural Order/Progenitus package. I’m considering these decks one of and the same, as they are pretty much the same: Most play White, Green, and Blue, most play Natural Order and Progenitus. Some play Dark Confidant and Engineered Explosives, some don’t. I’m going to assume we’re facing Bant colours with Countertop and Natural Order, playing some creature base of Rhox War Monk, Tarmogoyf, Knight of the Reliquary, Noble Hierarch, etc. Their game plan is to hopefully lock you out with Counter-Top, and then unleash hell by bringing in a Progenitus to quickly end the game, using Natural Order on one of their small dudes (Noble or Dryad Arbor). They lack a huge amount of actual counterpower, usually playing 4 Force of Will, some Dazes, and possibly Spell Snares/Pierces, but not as likely. You don’t have a huge counterwall to go through, but you have CounterTop backed with Swords and Counters, which against is tricky. Here, disrupt early on as much as possible. Attack their hand and manabase. If they can get up to 4 mana with a creature online, they can end the game two turns afterwards. Be aggressive, and blow up Counterbalance when you can. Try to keep their creatures off the tablet to prevent them from casting Natural Order. They have limited card draw (Top and Brainstorm), so once you get the initial few plays out of the way, you should be home free. It’s not an easy matchup, as it has a wide variety of answers, but play aggressively and you should be fine. If you see Jace, attack him or Vindicate him as soon as possible.

In against NO Bant: Path, Deathmark (if many creatures), Diabolic Edict, Gaddock Teeg, Choke, Perish, Pithing Needle. All in all, there’s not much you should put in here: All of you stuff is good against them. A few tweaks for Perish/Edict against Progenitus is the main thing here.

In against you: Tormod’s Crypt, Path, Relic of Progenitus, Wheel of Sun and Moon, Krosan Grip, Trygon Predator.

Out against Bant: Deed, EE, (If fewer creatures) Swords/Path.

Overall: Even preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.

Landstill

Landstill is the premiere control deck in Legacy. It plays zero creatures with the exception of Manlands, and uses Pernicious Deed and Jace, The Mind Sculptor backed with a heavy counter package to wipe the board and ride Jace to victory. Landstill is literally removal, counters, and bombs. Landstill also absolutely dies to very fast aggro. Against Landstill, you can’t play the control game: they’re too good at it. Here, you need to disrupt them early on using Hymn and Thoughtseize, and lay down early threats. Don’t overextend into Deed, but don’t lay back and wait for them to remove their stuff. They have lots of Counters, so try to bait what you can and just throw it out there when you can’t. Because you have so much early disruption, it can be hard for them to get a handle on the game if you’ve got an online confidant and have dealt heavy blows to their hand on turn 1-3. Cards to take with targeted discard are removal and Jace. Let them have their counters unless you really need stuff to go through. Landstill doesn’t have a draw engine like it used to with Fact or Fiction, it relies on Jace and Brainstorm to get there, which isn’t enough past the initial opening hand. You should be able to play the Aggro plan and win against Landstill. Landstill comes in a few flavours: UWBG for Deed and Swords, UBGR for Deed and Firespout; they can play a Wishboard with Cunning Wish, or have no Wishboard at all.

In against Landstill: Hand disruption, Extirpate, Leyline of the Void, Choke, Pithing Needle.

In against you: Path, Swords, Firespout, Extirpate, Leyline of the Void, the Abyss (possibly), Deed, EE.

Out against Landstill: Deed/EE, Swords to Plowshares/Path.

Overall: Slightly favourable to favourable preboard, slightly favourable to favourable postboard.

New Horizons

New Horizons is one of the most manabase destructive decks next to Team America. It has Wastelands, Stifles, and Crucible of Worlds for late game Waste-lock. Some lists have dropped Crucible to the board or have dropped it entirely, but it still can be a scary deck to face: Knights of the Reliquary, Terravore, and Tarmogoyf are their only threats. They play roughly 10-12 threats like you do, but they only play 6 cards of removal (2 EE, 4 Swords). This is bad for them since the common number they’ll want to EE on against Rock, 3, is bad for them. So, essentially they have 4 Swords and 2 cards of friendly fire. Fetch for basics and disrupt them early on. They only play Force and Daze ass counters, as their a tempo build. So, in reality, they have only 4 actual Counterspells, and 4 conditional kind-of counters. Doesn’t seem so hot considering everything we play blows their crap up. Rip apart their hand early on. Take Crucible if they play it, or their creatures. They have no recursion, so taking any of their creatures can be devastating to their plan. Be careful of Terravore. Even as a two-of, he can get way too large for you to handle. Keep some removal back for the eventual Terravore, or search for Maze of Ith. Don’t rely on your non-basics, however. Against it, fetch basics early and stabilize your manabase while trying to pick on them. Don’t worry if some stuff get countered early on; their low threat density means killing one gives you time to draw more removal. Lay out Confidant and try to ride him to victory with sheer card advantage. Don’t forget your Knight searching for Bog; Bog is a great addition against them. Hang in there, and you should be victorious.

In against New Horizons: Pernicious Deed, Path, Sacred Ground, Tormod’s Crypt, Relic of Progenitus, Leyline of the Void, Extirpate, etc.

In against you: Firespout (some splash red), Tormod’s Crypt, Spell Pierce, maybe Krosan Grip.

Out against New Horizons: One of those matchups where all your stuff is good, take out as little as possible to pack the most removal and disruption you can.

Overall: Even preboard, even to slightly favoured postboard.

Painter’s Servant-Grindstone

Painter-Grindstone can be played in many different shells: Mono Black Painter, Black White Painter (like Helm of the Void), Imperial Painter, and Control Painter/Next Level Painter to name a few. Many of these fall into other categories of play, but with the added combo. Control Painter usually plays Dark Confidant, Tarmogoyf, Counterbalance, Force, etc. It plays very much like a Counterbalance based control deck, and you should treat it as such. Get rid of Counterbalance, destroy their combo pieces when you can. Be wary that once they activate with both pieces online, even if you Path or Swords Painter, the activation still occurs. Your best bet here is to keep Deed on board until they get one piece online. If they play Painter first, Swords it. In total, they need 6 mana to pull off the combo: 3 to play the pieces, 3 to activate the Grindstone. Your best bet here is Krosan Grip, Pithing Needle, and Deed. Imperial Painter used Imperial Recruiter to fetch up Painter’s Servant, Magus of the Moon, or other red annoyances. It usually plays it as mono Red or Red/Blue, with mana Pyroblast/Hydroblast/REB/BEB in the main and board. With this, they have a lot of permanent destruction, possible counterpower, and Blood Moon effects to shut off your non-basics. Here, attack their hand as possibly and take away either combo pieces, enablers (Recruiter), or Moon effects. Fetch basics as early as possible, and lay out threats of any kind before they can combo. Put the pressure on and they’ll have to go defensive, putting them at a disadvantage. This matchup is a little harder due to the nature of the beat on this one.

In against Painter Combo: Deed, Krosan Grip, Pithing Needle, Choke (if blue).

In against you: Krosan Grip, Relic of Progenitus, Tormod’s Crypt, Pithing Needle, Perish.

Out against Painter Combo: 1-2 Vindicate effects, 1-2 Swords.

Overall: Slightly unfavourable preboard, even postboard.

Aluren (with Imperial Recruiter)

Aluren is actually a matchup that exists, believe it or not. It’s rather slow though. It takes a 4-mana enchantment to combo off. Basically, they make you lose a bunch of life off of Cavern Harpy or Parasitic Strix, and keep bouncing each other and playing them for free at instant speed. They play 3 Cabal Therapy and 4 Force of Will as their forms of disruption. Here, attack their manabase and their hand. They don’t have much to take you apart with, and the combo can be fragile. If Aluren does get online, make sure they can actually combo that turn, as sometimes they cannot. If not, blow up Aluren as soon as possible. You should be able to out-disrupt them enough to swing the game in your favour and put them on the defense, making it a choice between playing Aluren or finding cards as blockers/creature kill. They can only side in a NO-Progenitus package against you and 1-2 additional pieces of discard. Volrath’s Stronghold is very strong if they can hold you off, so Waste it if you need to. You should be able to win this one.

In against Aluren: Duress, Leyline of Sanctity (their kill condition doesn’t target you, nor their discard), Pithing Needle (on Cavern Harpy), Krosan Grip (very strong here), Rule of Law, Thorn of Amethyst, etc.

In against you: Natural Order + Progenitus, Faerie Macabre, Krosan Grip, Thoughtseize.

Out against Aluren: Pernicious Deed, Maelstrom Pulse, some Vindicate effects, Path (keep some Swords in: if timed well, you can break the combo), very slow cards (Elspeth, most anything 4+ CMC).

Overall: Even to slightly favourable for you preboard, even to slightly favourable for you postboard.

43 Lands

43 Lands is going to be a bit of a bad matchup for you. The fact they play little to discard effectively, coupled with recurring land destruction makes this a bit of an uphill climb. If going first, Thoughtseize away Exploration or Manabond. If given the choice, Manabond. Life from the Loam is their engine, but don’t make them discard it, that’s disadvantageous. If you can put up threats early and they stall out, all the better. As weird as it sounds, try to cut off their blue. They need blue for Intuition and to transmute Tolaria West. Deed is good here if you can get it online, but it can be very difficult. Vindicate away Ports and Tabernacles if you have the mana. If not, keep Dark Confidant and beater alive. Keeping Dark Confidant is key here: he can net you enough cards, and with those cards, lands, to keep you in the game. Fetch for basic lands, but it may not be enough, as they run Ghost Quarter as well. Mind you, Lands can also go nuts and puke out 10 lands on turn 2 against you, hopelessly locking you out. Know when a match is unwinnable. Post board, side in as much grave hate as you can, and hope for the best.

In against Lands: Graveyard hate of any and all description, Sacred Ground, Pithing Needle, Duress.

In against you: Mindslaver, the Tabernacle, Krosan Grip.

Out against Lands: Pernicious Deed, Swords to Plowshares/Path, Hymn to Tourach/Gerrard’s Verdict.

Overall: Unfavourable for you preboard, slightly unfavourable postboard.

Aggro-Loam

Aggro-Loam is pretty much on the same gameplan as you are: play disruption, kill some creatures, then grind the opponent out using big fatties. The problem is they have recurring Wasteland and card draw from Life from the Loam, as well as Seismic Assault. In this matchup, try to make them discard away Chalice of the Void, as it hurts much of your removal. Get rid of their Dark Confidant, and don’t let Countryside Crusher get too big. Attacking their manabase isn’t a good plan here. Stick to blowing their crap up. Life from the Loam isn’t as useful when Seismic Assault isn’t in play, so take advantage of that when you have the chance. An active Assault in the late game can kill you the turn it lands, so be wary. Hit early and often, and remove their creature as often as possibly. Your Knight wont be as big as their full-size Crushers and Terravores, and gravehate (except Leyline) can’t fight Crusher’s ability. Remove him as often as possible. Post board, hate out Life from the Loam and pack more discard.

In against Aggro-Loam: Leyline of the Void, Planar Void, Pithing Needle, Path to Exile, Pernicious Deed.

In against you: Leyline of the Void, Krosan Grip.

Out against Aggro-Loam: Maelstrom Pulse, bits and pieces to pack in more removal.

Overall: Even preboard, slightly favourable postboard.

Rock – The Mirror Match

The Rock mirror match is more likely to happen now than any other time. I’ve never played a Rock mirror before a few weeks ago, but it very much comes down to who’s playing what style. An Aggro Rock build can sometimes trump Control, or sometimes the other way around. It comes down to who plays more disruption the fastest, and who can keep an attacking creature online the longest. Control builds running 4 Deeds and multiple Elspeths packed with recursion may stand more chance against those that explode on turns 2-4. The die roll is key in this game. Save your removal for their creatures, and try to rip them apart with your discard. It comes down to keeping your draw engine online, or removing theirs.

In against Rock: Leyline of Sanctity (stops the opposing Discard), Path, Deed, Bojuka Bog, Pithing Needle.

In against you: Leyline of the Void, Krosan Grip, Pithing Needle, Path, Deed, etc.

Out against Rock: Not much to take out here, it’s going to be tight.

Overall: Even.

Vengevine Survival

Who knows how long this will actually be relevant, considering the B/R update is tomorrow. But, in any case, onto the Elephant in the room. For months, Survival has been running rampant due to several reasons that aren’t going to be repeated here. Case in point: Survival is hard to hate out, is versatile with its builds and answers, but they all have a common weakness: Survival itself. You’re playing Rock. If they decide to spring Vengevines, Swords them. If they land Survival, blow it up. Use your discard early on to take key creatures or spells, such as Survival itself or Knight of the Reliquary/relevant creatures (NOT Vengevine). You have enough disruption and permanent removal early on to allow you to get a foot in the door. Build up a solid manabase including some basics, and play out threats. Dark Confidant is key in this matchup, as are Swords and Path preboard. Keep removing their creatures and removing their graveyard (Bojuka Bog). Remember to bog using Knight only after the last Vengevine trigger for returning them to play goes on the stack, otherwise they can play around you. Generally, your creatures are bigger than theirs, so remember to block as well. Deed is a very good card at removing all their regular creatures and other permanents; put it to good use. The key here is to disrupt early, remove from game often. It won’t be an easy match, believe me. Sometimes they get very good draws and can out aggro you. Remember: vary your hate, remove as you can, disrupt early.

In against Vengevine Survival: Extirpate, Leyline of the Void, Duress, Path, Krosan Grip, Faerie Macabre, Perish.

In against you: Faerie Macabre, Umezawa’s Jitte (not a TON else…)

Out against Vengevival: Deed, odds and ends, Gerrard’s Verdict.

Overall: Even to slightly unfavourable preboard, even to slightly favourable postboard.

Overall, Rock doesn’t have a 140% win ratio against any deck in the format; it’s actually quite the opposite. Rock has decent matchups or at least decent chances of winning against most decks in the format. With a good sideboard, you should be able to take Rock to most metagames and do reasonably well with it.

10. Records

Results can be found for the following tournaments. Most of the time, Rock is named: Junk, BWG Rock, Dark Horizons, or something like that.
If you happen to have any records I should know about, I’ll post them here.

SCG Open Boston: 8th, 13th, 15th places:
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/deckshow.php?&t[C1]=leg&start_date=2010-11-07&end_date=2010-11-07&event_type=SCLO

SCG Open Charlotte: 4th, 5th, 12th, 23rd places:
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/deckshow.php?&t[C1]=leg&start_date=2010-10-31&end_date=2010-10-31&event_type=SCLO

SCG Open Nashville: 6th, 13th places:
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/deckshow.php?&t[C1]=leg&start_date=2010-10-17&end_date=2010-10-17&event_type=SCLO

SCG Open: Denver: 16th place:
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/deckshow.php?&t[C1]=leg&start_date=2010-08-22&end_date=2010-08-22&event_type=SCLO&city=Denver

SCG Open Atlanta: 20th Place:
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/deckshow.php?&t[C1]=leg&start_date=2010-05-02&end_date=2010-05-02&event_type=SCLO[/url]

*The links are a bit finicky, but if you copy and paste the whole thing into your browser, you're good to go*

ZeinVoncy

11-30-2010, 12:41 PM

Overall, Rock doesn’t have a 140% win ratio against any deck in the format; it’s actually quite the opposite. Rock has decent matchups or at least decent chances of winning against most decks in the format. With a good sideboard, you should be able to take Rock to most metagames and do reasonably well with it.

From all results I have seen, 4th is highest placing I've seen this decktype, is this to say that we aim to do well but not win? What are we lacking that prevents us from winning events instead of placing consistantly well?

Also, Primer looks fabulous! Just a few notes: you mentioned Diabolic Edict, Faerie Macabre, Perish and have Kataki, War's Wage mentioned in the presented decklist and I've seen Choke in a few S/Bs as well, yet they are not suggested for any particular matchup. Though I feel Faerie Macabre is something that could be left out.
Think we can add a Sideboard selection and then list the cards considered for S/B? Maybe make a small list of deck types they'd be good against? just a thought, after all, what is our response to a Progenitus?

sdematt

11-30-2010, 01:07 PM

I mentioned in the list of sideboard cards that Choke was good against Landstill/Control matchups, but I didn't list it in the landstill matchup report, true.

I'll add Edict, Perish, Kataki etc. in the sideboard section. Added Perish and Edict, just doing Kataki.

I mean, obviously you can win, don't get me wrong. Right now, Vengevine can get us. It's very fast, and even with the cards we have available, if we don't draw them, then it doesn't work out as we might have planned. Overall though, we don't have a bad matchup against them. As well, I think we haven't seen better results because there aren't a ton of people playing it. IIRC, 1% of people in the SCG metagame play it, and for that number, we're getting a lot of Top 16 compared to how many percent that run Vengevine.

-Matt

SpikeyMikey

11-30-2010, 01:58 PM

The only matchup that really scares me these days is Fish. Based on my testing, Fish is nearly unwinnable G1 and very unfavorable G2/3. Obviously, my build is different than the standard Dark Horizons build, but I just can't seem to ever get enough removal to stabalize, and post board, Kira causes me no end of problems. The version of Fish I was testing against ran white for StP, but on a strong hand, there was just nothing I could do.

Dzra

11-30-2010, 11:25 PM

Well, looking back on the last list you posted, you only have 3 Swords and 2 Vindicate MD. EE is pretty good against them. Diabolic Edict is highly suboptimal though and Extirpate is meh. The only help from the SB you get are 2 Deeds and 2 Dueling Grounds.

MD I run 4 Swords, 4 Vindicate, and 2 Deeds. Post-board, I pick up 4 Paths and 2 more Deeds. I've never usually have a problem with Merfolk, but my setup is very different. I'll usually board Hymns and I'll either board Vindicate or Thoughtseize depending on if I'm on the play or draw. Not saying it's the best plan, but it's worked well.

JimmyC27

12-01-2010, 01:22 AM

Part of the results are based on how many people actually play the Rock. If there's a 50 person tournament, 15 run survival, 10 run merfolk, 10 run goblins, 10 run random stuff, and 5 people run Rock.. the numbers are against Rock being the top overall finisher. I just don't see a lot of people picking this deck up to play in my meta. Might be because if you're gonna spend money, you'd spend money on survival? Dunno.

sdematt

12-01-2010, 03:04 AM

Depending on your build, Rock isn't cheap to build, either. ~10 Duals, 8-10 Fetches, 4 Goyfs, 4 Confidants; there's some money in the deck that's not totally transferable to the rest of Legacy (ex. Blue duals are more useful as you can play more blue decks, for example).

I'd say in a 50 person tournament, you have 0-2 people playing Rock. I've playing at a few 40-60 person tournaments, and I've been the only one.

Also, to all of you reading this, I need some lists from you.

I need:
1-2 Stoneforge Mystic builds
1-2 Rock Control builds (Elspeth, Deeds, etc.)
1-2 more Aggro builds (More Pridemages, Scullers, etc.)
1-2 Midrange builds, or variations on the Brad Nelson list.

I've got the Midrange covered but could use 1-2 more and I'd like some of your guys' that you've tested and done alright with.

-Matt

SpikeyMikey

12-01-2010, 08:04 AM

I'm at 3/3/3 for Swords/Edict/Vindicate right now, with the Deeds moved back to the main. So 11 removal overall MD. So post board, you've got more removal, but I've got more G1 and it's not enough for me. Maybe I'm just playing a luckier fish player.

brianw712

12-01-2010, 09:21 AM

Here's my aggro build:

Lands (22):

3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Windswept Heath
3 Marsh Flats
2 Bayou
1 Savannah
2 Scrubland
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Wasteland
1 Karakas
1 Maze of Ith
1 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Forest

Creatures (26):

4 Noble Hierarch
4 Mother of Runes
4 Qasali Pridemage
4 Tidehollow Sculler
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Dark Confidant
4 Knight of the Reliquary

Spells (12):

4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Thoughtseize
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Sideboard (15):

3 Gerrard's Verdict
2 Pithing Needle
2 Gaddock Teeg
2 Enlightened Tutor
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Ghostly Prison
1 Choke
1 Bojuka Bog

SpikeyMikey

12-01-2010, 03:50 PM

makochman

12-01-2010, 04:15 PM

Here's my aggro build:

With that kind of build... wouldn't Aether Vial be useful?

brianw712

12-01-2010, 05:11 PM

Wouldn't Grounds be better than Ghostly since you have no mana disruption? How's the deck been working for you?

I like Ghostly Prison a lot better than Dueling Grounds, since it doesn't prohibit me from attacking with my creatures, and so I can actually present a decent clock under Prison, which not might always be the case with Grounds. The three decks that Ghostly Prison is probably most useful against (Dredge, Goblins, GU Vengevine Survival) can all win with a Grounds on the table. Dredge can chumpblock my one attacker with their infinite zombies and fly over with Iona or something similar. Goblins can chumpblock all day, and fling each Goblin at me with Siege-Gang. GU Vengevine Survival has at least 4 Rootwallas to chumpblock with once Survival is active, while an exalted flying Vengevine deals 20 to me. With Prison, in each of these scenarios, I can send in my whole team and put pressure on the opponent to find an answer to it. With Grounds, they have tons of draw steps to find an answer/just kill you.

As for how the deck's been working for me, it's been working great. It has favorable matchups against tribal and combo, and is maybe 50/50 against Vengevine Survival, but it has a little bit of trouble with dedicated control like Landstill. I've been trying to tweak the sideboard to make this matchup better, but it's still tough.

With that kind of build... wouldn't Aether Vial be useful?

I've tried this build with -4 Noble Hierarch -colored lands +4 Aether Vial +Wastelands, but it didn't seem to work that well. Aether Vial can't hold a Jitte, it can't ramp up to Elspeth, it doesn't give Exalted, and it's generally slower at ramping than Noble Hierarch is. Not to mention multiples are pretty bad, whereas multiple Nobles isn't that bad.

sdematt

12-01-2010, 11:28 PM

I'm also currently trying an alternate list with a bit more fat:

4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Dark Confidant
3 Doran, the Siege Tower

4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Thoughtseize
4 Swords
3 Vindicate
2 Ghastly Demise
1 Path
3 Mox Diamond
3 Top

8 Fetchlands
3 Bayou
4 Scrubland
1 Savannah
1 Karakas
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Maze of Ith
3 Basic Lands (1 of each, probably)

It's pretty much the usual mid-range list, just subbing out some cards for others. No major changes, but I figure a 5/5 on turn 2, along with all the other good things we play might be worth a try.

-Matt

ZeinVoncy

12-02-2010, 08:21 AM

I've changed my list a bit since I've last posted it. Not sure if it is considered midrange or control and I don't have competitive playtesting results, just semi casual/teaching friends how to play leacy based decks. Trying to meet up w/ local Legacy players this weekend for playtesting. MA's eternal realm has downsized considerably. :( turning into a standard/draft area. I remember when this area was one of the best eternal regions, not to mention some GREAT eternal players. Will post my list later and let you decide if you want to use as an example.

AggroSteve

12-02-2010, 09:18 AM

@ sdmatt: i was thinking the same thing as you matt, of adding some fat/creature instead of lets say gerrards verdict, but wouldn't quasali pridemage be a better fit for the opened slots than doran?, sure i love doran and he is fat even if opponents hate our grave, but pridemage would be one of the strongest utilitys we could have

what do you think? what card would be better fit, doran because of being fat, or pridemage due to utility (and exalted)

sdematt

12-02-2010, 12:14 PM

Not sure, we have a ton of stuff to blow stuff up already, so Qasali may not be required. I love Qasali, but I think in some instances Doran is just a bit better. Qasali is only a 3/3 if he attacks alone, whereas Doran is a 5/5 essentially. I think it's a tough call here, but I'm going to try Doran out just for giggles.

Also, just to let you guys know, this thread is going to be closed tonight. A new one is going to be opened, and discussion will continue there. This thread will not be deleted however, and will remain open just for reference. The thread in general is in need of a reboot, so we'll just carry on over in the new thread. I'll be doing that later today.

Once again, thanks ladies and gents for all the wonderful conversation in this thread over the past few years, and I look forward to continuing that in the new thread :D

-Matt

ZeinVoncy

12-02-2010, 01:14 PM

Thanks for the heads up sdematt, will carry on over to the new thread. for now though: haven't we been over Doran? When I first posted my list asking for help, I got my fingers slapped for using 2x Doran b/c he was "just too slow". He's a 5/5 beater that makes your goyf slightly bigger, if at all. I slightly agree, but I'd make more deck changes if he was in. I'd add either birds (weak suggestion) or hierarch (strong suggestion) to accompany Doran.
Pridemage isn't only a 3/3 beater, but he's another utility to our large inventory. If he's not useful to us against certain matchups, Pridemage is an easy S/B card.
I'd say if Doran is added firepower, I'd add it to S/B for more aggressive deck matchups. 0/5 on T2 that can swing T3, yes please! I'd consider a new critter setup if he was added. (considering more Walls to slow other decks down. Wall of Blossoms/Omens make returns?)
Lets discuss Dorans effect if used over pridemage. What setup would we use him in?
BTW: should we make a list of differences from deck titles such as: Junk, Dark Horizons, Classic Rock, Rock Control, Rock Aggro, etc.

MrShine

12-02-2010, 01:14 PM

And thanks to you! This thread has been needing a reboot for a while now. The new list looks good, I'll give it a whirl. Ghastly Demise is some nice tech :)

sdematt

12-02-2010, 01:26 PM

We shall make those distinctions, yes. Dark Horizons is actually a mistake of SCG, so let's try not to use it a whole bunch unless we're referring to the list of Brad Nelson.

Gives me 5 mins, and the new thread will be up. This one will still be open, but I'll steer traffic away from it by posting the new link soon.

New thread, so refrain from posting here. Continue the conversation over there, just do a brief intro about what you're talking about/contesting, so people who haven't read this one are somewhat up to speed.

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?19432-[Deck]-The-Rock

-Matt

Bardo

12-02-2010, 06:57 PM

The new thread is up. This one is closed.

See: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?19432-[Deck]-The-Rock