[Deck] Zoo

[lordofthepit]

Hey guys,

With the recent rise of team america style decks into the forefront of the legacy metagame, does anyone else feel like zoo and other fast aggro decks might be able to make a comeback? Less people are playing show and tell lately, and I feel as though zoo may have a chance to come back out of the woodwork.

If I were on Zoo, I'd want to play against RUG all day. The fact that Zoo wasn't competitive when RUG was top dog doesn't bode well for its prospects going forward.

[Artlee]

The problem with Zoo is not one deck, but many. As mentioned Show and Tell is good against Zoo, but so is Terminus based decks and Maverick can also be quite hard between mom, swords to plowshares and bigger creatures.

[Martin]

Hello!
I am currently testing my deck list in a local store. This is what it looks like:

Zoo
Creatures:

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Grim Lavamancer
3 Steppe Lynx
3 Qasali Pridemage
2 Kird Ape
2 Loam Lion
1 Gaddock Teeg

Burn & Removal

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Magma Jet
2 Lightning Helix
2 Path To Exile
2 Dismember
2 Swords To Plowshares

Utility:

1 Ajani Vengeant
1 Rancor
1 Sylvan Library

Lands:

3 Windswept Heath
3 Wooded Foothills
4 Arid Mesa
1 Taiga
1 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Plains
1 Forest
3 Mountain
1 Sacred Foundry


So, this is my list. I tried to build a list that was similar to the RG-Beatz decks from 2009. As you see, it has some unusual cards in there. It became a really efficient and fast deck.

Why I play certain cards:
Dismember: I use it a lot against GW Maverick and Junk. It easily kills a Knight or a Goyf for any kind of Mana and for 4 life. I think I can handle the life with...
Lightning Helix: It sees less and less play. I actually like it pretty much because a) It is a 3-Damage Burn spell for 2 Mana with a little advantage and b) It can make the deciding 6 difference of your and your opponents life.
Swords: Not really usual for a Small Zoo list. I play them because i had 2 at home and didn't want to waste money on 4 Path To Exiles.
Ajani Vengeant: He is a pretty good Planeswalker against GW Maverick. For example: tapping a Mother of Runes or a Hierarch
Sylvan: Gives you fuel in the lategame. I really like how it works.
Rancor: I like those pesky combat tricks such as T2 5/3 Nacatl and Stuff like winning Goyf wars.
Magma Jet: As a Control player I like to see what I draw. And the 2 damage are pretty awesome sometimes since Dark Confidants, SFM etc. die to them.
Single Gaddock: Betters the Combo Matchup a little bit. Stops Force, Batterskull and Scapegoat into Valakut.
Shock Land: In the beginning i only had 7 Fetches and 2 Duals. Some time later i boight 3 Fetchlands and a Dual. But i was still too unsure with mana. So I took the Shockland I had at Home and play it ever since.

I guess the other cards are clear.

Any suggestions? I am currently trying to get my hands on 2 GSZ to get some MD Graveyardhate in form of the ooze, Combohate(Gaddock), a KOTR Package by replacing some of the basic lands with utility ones, Artifact Hate(Pridemage) and some Recurring in form of Eternal Witness.

[aluisiocsantos]

The use of Dismember is not bad at all! I actually should do some roadtesting myself, even without the Lightning helixes. Besides if it's a burn deck you're againt you'll likely side it out, or versus Canadian, you are at least guaranteed to get rid of a Tarmo. Not bad!

On the Path/StPlowshares discussion, I can see your point! Zoo is an expensive deck for using so many fetchlands, goyfs and duals, however I think Path to Exiles aren't as expensive as those card and since you aren't using neither Thalia nor Wasteland, you should definately consider running 4 of them, specially when you're talking about life advantage towards your opponent.

[Mr. Safety]

Hello!
I am currently testing my deck list in a local store. This is what it looks like:

Zoo
Creatures:

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Grim Lavamancer
3 Steppe Lynx
3 Qasali Pridemage
2 Kird Ape
2 Loam Lion
1 Gaddock Teeg

Burn & Removal

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Magma Jet
2 Lightning Helix
2 Path To Exile
2 Dismember
2 Swords To Plowshares

Utility:

1 Ajani Vengeant
1 Rancor
1 Sylvan Library

Lands:

3 Windswept Heath
3 Wooded Foothills
4 Arid Mesa
1 Taiga
1 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Plains
1 Forest
3 Mountain
1 Sacred Foundry


So, this is my list. I tried to build a list that was similar to the RG-Beatz decks from 2009. As you see, it has some unusual cards in there. It became a really efficient and fast deck.

Why I play certain cards:
Dismember: I use it a lot against GW Maverick and Junk. It easily kills a Knight or a Goyf for any kind of Mana and for 4 life. I think I can handle the life with...
Lightning Helix: It sees less and less play. I actually like it pretty much because a) It is a 3-Damage Burn spell for 2 Mana with a little advantage and b) It can make the deciding 6 difference of your and your opponents life.
Swords: Not really usual for a Small Zoo list. I play them because i had 2 at home and didn't want to waste money on 4 Path To Exiles.
Ajani Vengeant: He is a pretty good Planeswalker against GW Maverick. For example: tapping a Mother of Runes or a Hierarch
Sylvan: Gives you fuel in the lategame. I really like how it works.
Rancor: I like those pesky combat tricks such as T2 5/3 Nacatl and Stuff like winning Goyf wars.
Magma Jet: As a Control player I like to see what I draw. And the 2 damage are pretty awesome sometimes since Dark Confidants, SFM etc. die to them.
Single Gaddock: Betters the Combo Matchup a little bit. Stops Force, Batterskull and Scapegoat into Valakut.
Shock Land: In the beginning i only had 7 Fetches and 2 Duals. Some time later i boight 3 Fetchlands and a Dual. But i was still too unsure with mana. So I took the Shockland I had at Home and play it ever since.

I guess the other cards are clear.

Any suggestions? I am currently trying to get my hands on 2 GSZ to get some MD Graveyardhate in form of the ooze, Combohate(Gaddock), a KOTR Package by replacing some of the basic lands with utility ones, Artifact Hate(Pridemage) and some Recurring in form of Eternal Witness.

The first thing I'd do with that list is get 2 more Sylvan Library in there. It's the stone-cold nuts, seriously. It will get that singelton Teeg more often, and just fuel you to finish fast when you need to. It's probably the best card in Zoo, and definately gets my vote for best card in the deck.

Steppe Lynx isn't worth playing 3 of...play the set, or none. I actually favor it over Loam Lion/Kird Ape because it can turn late game fetchlands (found with Sylvan Library) into 4/5 attacker enablers.

I think you'd actually be better trimming some of your hard removal out for Chain Lightning. Six spot removals (Path, Dismember, Swords) that DOESN'T double as burn seems bad. I've always stuck to the 4 Path's maindeck, play 1-2 Swords in the sideboard. If you want to split the Swords/Paths maindeck, that's fine...but put the 2x Dismember into your sideboard.

Your shockland could be Treetop Village...which is good against Terminus.

Magma Jet is horrible...Sylvan Library is so much better at feeding you card quality (especially with the 10 fetches.) That should be Chain Lightning/additional copies of Helx/additional copies of Rancor.

I also advocate Vexing Devil in zoo. It lets you play a sligh approach more effectively and doesn't suck in the late game. Early game it isn't ideal, but truthfully, getting 4 damage for :r: is good efficiency.

Good luck!

[Martin]

The use of Dismember is not bad at all! I actually should do some roadtesting myself, even without the Lightning helixes. Besides if it's a burn deck you're againt you'll likely side it out, or versus Canadian, you are at least guaranteed to get rid of a Tarmo. Not bad!

On the Path/StPlowshares discussion, I can see your point! Zoo is an expensive deck for using so many fetchlands, goyfs and duals, however I think Path to Exiles aren't as expensive as those card and since you aren't using neither Thalia nor Wasteland, you should definately consider running 4 of them, specially when you're talking about life advantage towards your opponent.

First of all: thanks for the advise!
You're probably right about the Path/Swords discussion but I am going to keep the Sword until I can trade for Paths or something.
Considering Dismember: What I like best about it is that noone awaits to see it in a Zoo deck. It hits RUGs Tarmos and you can easily play around Daze with it.

Sincerely, Martin



The first thing I'd do with that list is get 2 more Sylvan Library in there. It's the stone-cold nuts, seriously. It will get that singelton Teeg more often, and just fuel you to finish fast when you need to. It's probably the best card in Zoo, and definately gets my vote for best card in the deck.

Steppe Lynx isn't worth playing 3 of...play the set, or none. I actually favor it over Loam Lion/Kird Ape because it can turn late game fetchlands (found with Sylvan Library) into 4/5 attacker enablers.

I think you'd actually be better trimming some of your hard removal out for Chain Lightning. Six spot removals (Path, Dismember, Swords) that DOESN'T double as burn seems bad. I've always stuck to the 4 Path's maindeck, play 1-2 Swords in the sideboard. If you want to split the Swords/Paths maindeck, that's fine...but put the 2x Dismember into your sideboard.

Your shockland could be Treetop Village...which is good against Terminus.

Magma Jet is horrible...Sylvan Library is so much better at feeding you card quality (especially with the 10 fetches.) That should be Chain Lightning/additional copies of Helx/additional copies of Rancor.

I also advocate Vexing Devil in zoo. It lets you play a sligh approach more effectively and doesn't suck in the late game. Early game it isn't ideal, but truthfully, getting 4 damage for :r: is good efficiency.

Good luck!

Thanks for the advise to you too!
Considering the Library: I love that card but even the huge advantage it gives us against Control never wants me to see it twice in a game. I will probably go up to 2 but not further. In my opinion, 3 copies of that card are too much.
To the Lynx: I am considering it as the worst topdeck after lands. It doesn't have haste, dies to ALL kind of removal, only gets its boost until end of turn and gibes you 0 life when sworded. It's raw explosivity and speed basically forced me to play it. I wouldn't want to see one unless i can play it T1 and have a fetchland for T2. Afterwards it is too unreliable in my opinion.
I thought about getting atleast a Path more and totally remove the swords but i haven't got time or money to pick some up.
I totally agree with you on the village and I am going to try it since I got a Treetop Village at home.
You might think the Jet is terrible but in my meta it is better than a Punishing Fire or something similar. My Meta is flooded with Maverick, RUG, Miracle and Team America. The only deck it is useless against is Miracle. Everywhere else there is atleast a playset of a creature i can kill with it.
Well I think Vexing Devil is a horrible, death-bringing creature. Your opponent either sees a Terminus with top or already has any other kind of answer if he lets it resolve. Personally, I neve let it live but Zoo is fast. It can deal with those 4 Damage without any problems.

Well, concluding: I wanna thank you guys for sharing your thoughts and wrote a response to each argument you made. I'm gonna test the suggestions I like and give report.
Sincerely, Martin

[wcm8]

I played against someone last evening who had an interesting take on the archetype. I did not really see his list, but going off an educated guess I'd assume it was something like this:

"Haunted Zoo"

21 Lands
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Nacatl
4 Goyf
4 KotR
4 Stoneforge Mystic
3 Lingering Souls
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Sylvan Library
3 Abrupt Decay

Like I said, this isn't an exact list and I'm sure some of the slots could be adjusted accordingly.

Ok, so obviously this deck has issues against non-basic hate. But I think the black splash gives the deck a tremendous boost in power. It also allows for additional options in the sideboard. Decay and Souls will give the deck some resliency against UWx Miracles, and Shaman is a beating against the format.

[Ziveeman]

I'm not the guy that played you, but my brother and I, in coming up with decks for Denver, developed this list that's pretty similar to that list:

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
4 Deathrite Shaman
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Dark Confidant
3 Stoneforge Mystic

4 Lightning Bolt
2 Chain Lightning
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Light and Shadow

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Windswept Heath
3 Bloodstained Mire
3 Bayou
3 Taiga
2 Savannah
2 Plateau

Sideboard
3 Thoughtseize
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Pyroblast
2 Gaddock Teeg
2 Ancient Grudge
3 Oblivion Ring

The numbers are still in the air. Batterskull needs to be in the deck somewhere, etc etc. We are thinking of Goblin Guide instead of Kird Ape also.

So far the deck was pretty good. T1 Nacatl into T2 Thalia provides an insane clock. The deck has several advantages in the current format:

1) Opposing Deathrite Shamans aren't very effective even if they live. Since the deck doesn't run Tarmogoyf or Knight of the Reliquary, eating graveyards doesn't hurt this deck very much.

2) Since the deck is mainly 1-2 drops, Abrupt Decay isn't super great against us, because they are trading a 2 mana card for one of our 1 or 2 mana guys - at least they aren't trading up if we had Knight of the Reliquary.

3) Sweepers aren't a big deal, because you don't spend a ton of mana to get a couple of dudes into play (unlike Maverick where you are basically required to play Mother of Runes + big guy or Noble Hierarch + big guy to be effective). Dark Confidant and Stoneforge Mystic are also excellent ways to recover from a sweeper.

4) Snapcaster Mage gets a bit worse against us because of Deathrite, which is a very good thing, since Snapcaster + STP is what started pushing Zoo out of the format.

Obviously there are a couple of weaknesses too.

1) The manabase isn't very good. It's pretty vulnerable to Wasteland, but then again, Deathrite Shaman can save you too.

2) The deck is pretty soft to Tarmogoyf, so that's why we added a Sword so you can make your guys big enough to fight Tarmogoyf. Deathrites can always keep Goyfs small too. Abrupt Decay can also solve the problem too.

3) Batterskull. Ancient Grudge needs to be in the SB to fight it, but hopefully the 10 removal spells & Grim Lavamancer can take care of the Mystic before Batterskull hits the table.

4) Combo - that's why Thoughtseizes & Inquisitions are in the SB. Also the deck seems very weak to Show and Tell, hence the Oblivion Rings in the SB (Also decent against Miracles too)

Any thoughts would be appreciated. I'm actually considering this deck for GP Denver since 1) I love Zoo and 2) I feel like it's actually decently positioned so I would definitely like some help.

[RaNDoMxGeSTuReS]

You still lose on turn one.

[Vandalize]

You still lose on turn one.

It's Zoo. What would you expect against fast combo?

[JanoschEausH]

I'm not the guy that played you, but my brother and I, in coming up with decks for Denver, developed this list that's pretty similar to that list:

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
4 Deathrite Shaman
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Dark Confidant
3 Stoneforge Mystic

4 Lightning Bolt
2 Chain Lightning
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Light and Shadow

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Windswept Heath
3 Bloodstained Mire
3 Bayou
3 Taiga
2 Savannah
2 Plateau

Sideboard
3 Thoughtseize
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Pyroblast
2 Gaddock Teeg
2 Ancient Grudge
3 Oblivion Ring

The numbers are still in the air. Batterskull needs to be in the deck somewhere, etc etc. We are thinking of Goblin Guide instead of Kird Ape also.

So far the deck was pretty good. T1 Nacatl into T2 Thalia provides an insane clock. The deck has several advantages in the current format:

1) Opposing Deathrite Shamans aren't very effective even if they live. Since the deck doesn't run Tarmogoyf or Knight of the Reliquary, eating graveyards doesn't hurt this deck very much.

2) Since the deck is mainly 1-2 drops, Abrupt Decay isn't super great against us, because they are trading a 2 mana card for one of our 1 or 2 mana guys - at least they aren't trading up if we had Knight of the Reliquary.

3) Sweepers aren't a big deal, because you don't spend a ton of mana to get a couple of dudes into play (unlike Maverick where you are basically required to play Mother of Runes + big guy or Noble Hierarch + big guy to be effective). Dark Confidant and Stoneforge Mystic are also excellent ways to recover from a sweeper.

4) Snapcaster Mage gets a bit worse against us because of Deathrite, which is a very good thing, since Snapcaster + STP is what started pushing Zoo out of the format.

Obviously there are a couple of weaknesses too.

1) The manabase isn't very good. It's pretty vulnerable to Wasteland, but then again, Deathrite Shaman can save you too.

2) The deck is pretty soft to Tarmogoyf, so that's why we added a Sword so you can make your guys big enough to fight Tarmogoyf. Deathrites can always keep Goyfs small too. Abrupt Decay can also solve the problem too.

3) Batterskull. Ancient Grudge needs to be in the SB to fight it, but hopefully the 10 removal spells & Grim Lavamancer can take care of the Mystic before Batterskull hits the table.

4) Combo - that's why Thoughtseizes & Inquisitions are in the SB. Also the deck seems very weak to Show and Tell, hence the Oblivion Rings in the SB (Also decent against Miracles too)

Any thoughts would be appreciated. I'm actually considering this deck for GP Denver since 1) I love Zoo and 2) I feel like it's actually decently positioned so I would definitely like some help.

Your maindeck is 59 cards. What is missing?

[Martin]

Your maindeck is 59 cards. What is missing?

I am guessing a Batterskull or something.

[Ziveeman]

Oops, should be the 4th Mystic and swapping Sword for Batterskull. I've replaced the Kird Apes with Bloodbraid Elf and have been liking it so far.

[feline]

This is one of the fun'er decks that I have pushed in my time in the format, when I started playing magic again after a long hiatus, I came back at the end of the summer of 2011 and I put together Zoo & dredge, & updated my belcher list to make it legal, since my older list of said deck, was a bunch of banned 4 of's like tinker, wheel of fortune, memory jar, etc.

In either case, every time I look at zoo now it just turns into some weird version of Maverick trying to play some burn, & now even Maverick is falling out of favor in comparison to it's performance's in the past. I may come back to zoo in the future but as of right now I've let the deck go for my own reasons, it's still fast, but against some decks it's just not fast enough, & against other decks it's not interactive enough, that is just my perspective though. So for those of you still pushing zoo, keep on zoo'ing because it's one of the fun'est aggro decks in my opinion, especially fast zoo with all those 1 drops! I believe I even heard it said one time back when it was more popular, that it is the most consistent deck that doesn't run any blue.

In defense of zoo I have found a decklist that had some success since Return to Ravnica Legacy, I suppose this is my last contribution as a "zoo player":

October-6th-2012: ~16th place - Chris Wynes - StarCityGames.com Legacy Open - St Louis Missouri USA - Players: 162

3 Grim Lavamancer
3 Kird Ape
2 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Wild Nacatl
1 Forest
1 Mountain
3 Arid Mesa
1 Horizon Canopy
3 Plateau
2 Savannah
2 Taiga
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Karakas
1 Sylvan Library
2 Fireblast
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Path to Exile
2 Price of Progress
4 Chain Lightning
[Sideboard]
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Knight of the Reliquary
2 Wheel of Sun and Moon
3 Krosan Grip
2 Mindbreak Trap
1 Ravenous Trap
3 Gaddock Teeg
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Tower of the Magistrate

[SpikeyMikey]

I don't think that Maverick with burn is where you want to be. The format has slowed down, in part because of decks like Maverick and in part because of the influence of RUG (for the combo decks, RUG forces them to play more disruption and therefore less dig/win). So you want to be as fast as you possibly can. I wouldn't be playing DRS or Thalia in Zoo right now. I would be playing more vanilla beaters. My Zoo is splashing blue for Delver of Secrets and it's packing Hidden Herd to give me 12 "Nacatls". Wait until you beat an ANT player because when he untaps for his third turn, he's already at 1. I run a bare minimum of interaction main and bring in specialized hate like Rest in Peace, Stony Silence and Spell Pierce out of board.

[blindspotxxx]

@Spikey

Care to share your list? I'm a lover of this deck problem is legacy doesn't allow fair decks with burn to be competitive :(

[Martin]

Quick Question: Why doesn't Zoo play Hidden Gibbons? I haven't seen a deck without instants yet.

[Vandalize]

Quick Question: Why doesn't Zoo play Hidden Gibbons? I haven't seen a deck without instants yet.

Goblins :D (that's a good matchup already)

I've been on the fast Zoo train for some weeks, and while the deck can't do shit against Miracles, it does offer some good punching in other decks.

This is my latest list:

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Windswepth Heath
2 Arid Mesa
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Plains
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage
3 Kird Ape
3 Loam Lion
3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Path to Exile
3 Price of Progress
2 Rancor
1 Fireblast

SB: 4 Mindbreak Trap
SB: 3 Red Elemental Blast
SB: 2 Ancient Grudge
SB: 2 Sulfuric Vortex
SB: 1 Krosan Grip
SB: 3 Relic of Progenitus

Just took out Sylvan Library, because while providing some good CA, it wasn't aggressive enough. Put 2 Rancor in its place, and it has been working nice so far. I don't miss Library yet, but I think I will soon.

[aluisiocsantos]

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Windswepth Heath
2 Arid Mesa
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Plains
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage
3 Kird Ape
3 Loam Lion
3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Path to Exile
3 Price of Progress
2 Rancor
1 Fireblast

SB: 4 Mindbreak Trap
SB: 3 Red Elemental Blast
SB: 2 Ancient Grudge
SB: 2 Sulfuric Vortex
SB: 1 Krosan Grip
SB: 3 Relic of Progenitus

Just took out Sylvan Library, because while providing some good CA, it wasn't aggressive enough. Put 2 Rancor in its place, and it has been working nice so far. I don't miss Library yet, but I think I will soon.
I like Rancor because of we having move tarmogoyfs to fight against now (due to BUG matchups) however the same deck also has many spot removals ready to fuck up your own tarmogoyf in response to Rancor. I really like the list, though I think that if one would use Thalia, they should use StP instead of Path, because that's sort of beating it's purpose.

Did you guys see this:
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=138698&stc=1&d=1357884481
Looks pretty great even in Legacy:
-4 direct damage
-The second hability prevent both Abrupt Decay and Maelstrom Pulse, or Pernicious Deed
-Or extra damage for that unblocked Tarmogoyf/Reliquary. Nice finisher!

[Martin]

I like Rancor because of we having move tarmogoyfs to fight against now (due to BUG matchups) however the same deck also has many spot removals ready to fuck up your own tarmogoyf in response to Rancor. I really like the list, though I think that if one would use Thalia, they should use StP instead of Path, because that's sort of beating it's purpose.

Did you guys see this:
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=138698&stc=1&d=1357884481
Looks pretty great even in Legacy:
-4 direct damage
-The second hability prevent both Abrupt Decay and Maelstrom Pulse, or Pernicious Deed
-Or extra damage for that unblocked Tarmogoyf/Reliquary. Nice finisher!
I totally agree with you that it could be good in Legacy, but not in Zoo. With Zoo you wanna get efficient creatures to provide early pressure and use your burn to kill blockers and as a finisher in lategame. A card that can only do one of those two purposes should at least do it good enough to kill your opponent, even if he is at 6 or more life. That's the reason why people play Price of Progress. But doing 4 damage for 2 and only to players is too bad for Zoo in my opinion.

[crow_mw]

The charm seems just slightly underpowered. 4 damage to player is a good star, but Zoo is a deck that would run Incinerate over Lava Spike. Without the ability to hit creatures other two abilities need to be very good. Early stages of the game you are unlikely to be holding two mana open to stop something like Decay or Pulse and when you are in topdeck mode you would rather draw another creature than this (especially since decks using those cards are also likely to be playing stp, so this is not even a guaranteed safe). Terminus and submerge don't give a damn about charm and you are not running critters that die 2 to 1 to Forked Bolt. The only sweeper this might save you from is Pernicious Deed, but that is very narrow. The best use for this ability would probably be an occasional alpha-strike. Double Strike still is a powerful ability, especially in lists packing Jitte. Most of the time however this falls into category of cute combat tricks, that sometimes are amazing, but most of the time are not worth it. Sometimes you will be able to deal 5-6 damage to a player with this ability, Sometimes you will get 4 Jitte counters, sometimes you will break a standoff, but there are too many 'sometimeses' about this card to my liking.

I might be mistaken, but I perceive this card as having a solid 4 damage to opponent, but slightly subpar other options, leading me to a question 'do I want to be running burn enemy for 4 for 2 mana' in Zoo.

[movingtonewao]

greetings. I personally feel that Boros Charm would be more suited to something like Goblins. A double-striking Piledriver can be really annoying, and saving creatures becomes relevant when you run token generators like SGC and Krenko.

I'm really hoping for a revival of the zoo archetype, and now might be a good time since the format is becoming so grindy and combo decks are being forced to slow down and play more disruption.

[thefringthing]

I'm told by my Zoo-expert teammate that Boros Charm could reasonably replace Price of Progress.

[angel882]

Hi, haven't played zoo for a wile but because the new meta decided to give it a try. I have two list on my mind.

Sligh Zoo

4 Nacatl
4 Tarmo
4 Lynx
4 Guide
3 Lavamancer
5 flex slotts
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 PoP
2 Sylvan Library
2 Fireblast
1 Rancor
20 Lands (12 fetches)

the flex slotts I'm concidering are Kird Apes, Vexing Devils, Loam Lions or Hidden Herd. Which would be the best chose?

Blue Zoo

4 Nacatl
4 Tarmo
4 Lynx
4 Delver
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Brainstorm
20 Lands

I don't know what I should be playing in rest of the deck. Any advice?

[Asthereal]

The Boros Charm can be used in creature combat to rescue your dude and finish off one of theirs. The indistructible thing is really narrow and will seldomly be used. Four damage for two mana is fine for a finisher.

I wouldn't play it in Zoo, but I will include it in my Boros Sligh list, which is a lot faster (Steppe Lynx, Vexing Devil, lots of burn spells), replacing Price of Progress as mentioned. It's more versatile, and four damage is usually enough to finish things up on turn four.

[crow_mw]

For those who don't follow Spoiler thread, a nice suggestion was posted there Kiln Fiend + Boros Charm. If opponent runs removal you can play it safe and burn them for mere 7 damage. But if you are racing combo, or some other deck that runs no MD removal, you can go all out and bolt, charm, swing for 14. With bolt damage and your t1 play this is a sure t3 kill.

[Capt4in]

I'm thefringthing's friend. I don't usually post on here because I tend to see a lot of godawful ideas in this thread. To the person above me, Kiln Fiend would be terrible in Zoo. You're playing an X/2 creature (I.e., one that trades with cards like Bob/Snapcaster/Goblin Guide/Every creature in Goblins, which every other creature in your deck successfully avoids) and requires you to play more than 2 spells in a single turn to be temporarily better than a Tarmogoyf. The rest of the time, it is far, far worse. Moreover, you're relying on hitting your first three land drops and having a perfect mix of Kiln Fiend and multiple spells in order to hit hard enough to land a turn 3 kill. I can offer you a better one. Turn 1 Wild Nacatl, Turn 2 Wild Nacatl + Kird Ape/Loam Lion, (opp at 17). Turn 3, 2 Bolts and a Fireblast. Does not require you play godawful situational cards like Kiln Fiend and is roughly as likely/unlikely as your scenario.

I think this card is certainly playable in the slot where I'm currently packing 2 Price of Progress. Price takes a lot of work to hit for more than 4 damage generally, and is either dead or extremely easy to play around in a lot of matchups. The convenience of 4 damage straight to the dome is, I would argue, worth the occasional loss of ~2-4 damage from Price. I find Price hits for 2-4 damage the vast majority of the time, and I've only ever hit for more than 6 when playing against Lands.

The second ability seems weak at first glance, but the fact that it saves permanents (not just creatures) gives you a tool that can occasionally protect you from a Wasteland (or, heaven forbid, an Armageddon or a Sinkhole) while also shielding your team from the likes of Damnation/Pernicious Deed/Supreme Verdict, as well saving a single creature from red or black removal in a race/topdecking situation. I agree that it's situational, but it has a number of reasonable uses. It can also be used to obliterate an opponent's profitable blocks in a board stall against decks like Goblins or Delver.

The third ability is, in my opinion, the weakest, but it's certainly a viable way to win a Tarmogoyf war, blow out someone who tries to double-block one of your creatures, or score some damage in the rare scenario when someone brings in a Leyline of Sanctity against you (If they're playing Leyline, they're probably bringing it in). If your Goyf gets bigger than 5/6, you can use it to score extra damage, though if you're getting in with a 5/6 Goyf, the game is probably over already.

Boros Charm's second two abilities, though, are icing on the cake. 2 mana for 4 to the dome is something that burn has been playing for years ( Flame Rift ), and that is symmetrical and sorcery-speed! While it may at first seem to be outdone by Price of Progress, Price's symmetrical and conditional 2-8 damage doesn't seem (to me) worth the trouble when you have access to a non-symmetrical 4-damage that provides a reasonable amount of (if narrow) utility.

I do agree that Boros Charm perhaps fits better into a more burn-heavy shell, like an aggressive Boros deck or a more traditional burn deck splashing white, but I think it has enough utility to see play as a 1- to 2-of in Zoo. I'm personally going to give it a try, and I'm definitely going to run it as a 4-of in my casual Legacy Landfall deck, where it can be used to double-strike up and/or protect your fragile landfall creatures from removal.

Edit: In response to crow_mw, I agree that the Charm probably isn't worth it if the card you're cutting is something that can hit creatures, like Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, Path to Exile, or Lightning Helix. I do, however, think the straight-up 4 damage combined with the utility is worth it over more conditional cards like Price of Progress or Fireblast (which you never want to point at a creature, at least in a build like mine with 19-20 lands) that are only used for going straight to the opponent.

[thefringthing]

blah blah blah Guize, let's play Vinelasher Kudzu!

[Capt4in]

Guize, let's play Vinelasher Kudzu!

This is an accurate representation of my impression of the average post in this thread. :p

[ironclad8690]

Just finished 66th at SCG San Diego.

4-4 was my final match record.

Here's the list I piloted:

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
4 Grim Lavamancer
4 Steppe Lynx
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Path To Exile
2 Fireblast
1 Price Of Progress
1 Sylvan Library

4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Arid Mesa
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Mountain
2 Taiga
2 Plateau
1 Savannah
SB:
4 Gaddock Teeg
4 Lightning Helix
1 Syvlan Library
2 Price Of Progress
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Red Elemental Blast
2 Pyroblast

Matches:

Round 1 - Storm
Win 2-0
Matches: 1-0

Round 2 - Jund
Win 2-1
Matches: 2-0

Round 3 - Show and Tell
Lose 0-2
Matches 2-1

Round 4 - Goblins
Win 2-1
Matches 3-1

Round 5 - Storm
Win 2-1
Matches 4-1

Round 6 - Feature Match that never got camera time vs MUD
Lose 0-2
Matches 4-2

Round 7 - Jund
Lose 0-2
Matches 4-3

Round 8 - Esper Stoneblade
Lose 0-2
Matches 4-4.

I can elaborate a bit if anyone wants me to.

[crow_mw]

Nice results versus Storm, bearing in mind you play Zoo. That was thanks to Thalia, or your opponents just failing?

[ironclad8690]

Nice results versus Storm, bearing in mind you play Zoo. That was thanks to Thalia, or your opponents just failing?

A healthy amount of both :D thalia gives just enough edge to get there, and 4 gaddock's after board is good too. I think that I could have done with 1 less thalia or teeg and made some room for qasali pridemages though. Esper is a popular matchup and without artifact hate it is too hard. Between the matchups I had, I felt like MUD was pretty much unwinnable with my decklist unless they got a crap draw, show and tell is next to impossible without knight/karakas, and Jund and esper just beat me in fair fights.

[zulander]

I played Zoo last night and was very pleased - went 3-0-1 (would have been 4-0 if I didn't go to time against goblins). Ranger of Eos is great imho. Played a 1 of in the board but think he belongs in the main, maybe even two. Here's the list I'm brewing:

Creatures: 20
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Kird Ape
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Qasali Pridemage
2 Ranger of Eos

Burn/Removal: 16
4 Bolt
4 Chain
4 Helix
4 Path

Other: 3
2 Library
1 Jitte

Lands: 21
3 Basics
11 Fetches
7 Duals

Board:
3 Sulfuric Vortex
3 Pyroblast
3 Gaddock Teeg or Thalia


I'm still debating other board slots but think these 9 should be in there. Here are other options: Chant, Grip/Grudge, Crypt, Jitte, Boros Charm (saves lands against sinkholes as well), Ooze, etc.

I really like Zoo in the current metagame as the burn just finishes people off. Might not be great against Miracles but library and Ranger are amazing in that matchup.

[Martin]

So, I recently created a Zoo list splashing Blue for Delver of Secrets and Brainstorm. The synergy between Brainstorm and Thunderous Wrath is obbious, so i decided to test Wrath as a 3-of and I am really happy with it. I know you can basically give up if someone plays a full set of Wastelands but I have been testing it for days against a friend of mine who plays 3 in a Boros DnT deck and it has been running pretty amazing. Here's my list:

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Hidden Herd
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Goblin Guide
4 Steppe Lynx
1 Loam Lion
1 Kird Ape

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Path to Exile
4 Brainstorm
3 Thunderous Wrath
2 Chain Lightning

3 Misty Rainforest
3 Arid Mesa
3 Wooded Foothills
3 Windswept Heath
1 Stomping Ground
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Temple Garden
1 Breeding Pool
1 Steam Vents
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Island

Shockduals suck, I know. But I have a fast clock(Goldfish T3, Usually T4-5€) and the lifeloss doesn't really matter against my meta(no Burn). Please give suggestions!

[groupcelebration]

So, I recently created a Zoo list splashing Blue for Delver of Secrets and Brainstorm. The synergy between Brainstorm and Thunderous Wrath is obbious, so i decided to test Wrath as a 3-of and I am really happy with it. I know you can basically give up if someone plays a full set of Wastelands but I have been testing it for days against a friend of mine who plays 3 in a Boros DnT deck and it has been running pretty amazing. Here's my list:

4 Hidden Herd
3 Thunderous Wrath

Hidden Herd seems interesting, but can you explain why this is main deck? If you don't draw it on the first two turns, it's completely a dead draw vs. RUG Delver. What match up is Hidden Herd better than loam lion?

I have the same question about Thunderous Wrath. Is the 2 extra damage, sorcery speed, and requirement of having brainstorm to set it up, actually better than just running more Chain Lightning or Lightning Helix? It's a dead draw if you don't have a brainstorm and if you miracle it, it forces you to decide between advancing your board or not.

It seems like both these cards just make you less consistent.

[ajfennewald]

So, I recently created a Zoo list splashing Blue for Delver of Secrets and Brainstorm. The synergy between Brainstorm and Thunderous Wrath is obbious, so i decided to test Wrath as a 3-of and I am really happy with it. I know you can basically give up if someone plays a full set of Wastelands but I have been testing it for days against a friend of mine who plays 3 in a Boros DnT deck and it has been running pretty amazing. Here's my list:

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Hidden Herd
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Goblin Guide
4 Steppe Lynx
1 Loam Lion
1 Kird Ape

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Path to Exile
4 Brainstorm
3 Thunderous Wrath
2 Chain Lightning

3 Misty Rainforest
3 Arid Mesa
3 Wooded Foothills
3 Windswept Heath
1 Stomping Ground
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Temple Garden
1 Breeding Pool
1 Steam Vents
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Island

Shockduals suck, I know. But I have a fast clock(Goldfish T3, Usually T4-5€) and the lifeloss doesn't really matter against my meta(no Burn). Please give suggestions!

I have been playing blue zoo for about a year and quater. I have a few comments. Yoou almost are forced to go into a thresh like shell for this to keep delver effective. Your deck only has 17 spells. That is not going to be very good for flipping delver. For reference here is my list
3 wooded foothills
4 scading tarn
2 misty rainforest
1 flooded stand
2 volcanic island
2 tropical island
1 taiga
1 tundra
1 savannah
1 badlands
1 plateau
4 force of will
3 daze
4 ponder
4 brainstorm
4 lightnign bolt
4 tribal flames
3 chain lightning
1 green sun zenith
2 grim lavamance
4 tarmogoyf
4 delver of secrets
4 wild nacatl

[Chatto]

@ Martin and ajfennewald: you should check the following link:

http://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=3650&d=221854

I think the list has been discussed before in this threat.

[movingtonewao]

@Capt4in

Greetings and thank you for the input. First I thought I should say its normal to have "godawful" ideas floating around. There are a mix of old and new players on these forums (read: more experienced vs less experienced) and hence its normal to have a "wtf" idea make an appearance when someone seems to get some deep discussion kick-started. However, look on the bright side, there might be ideas that make the oldies go "oh snap, why didn't I think of that". I can't personally quote any examples of that happening before, but hey who knows.

Alright onto the beef, I agree with everything you said about boros charm except the last bit. I think the 3rd ability can be relevant in situations that are narrow but crucial. It allows 5/6 goyfs to beat through a batterskull for example. The very knowledge that boros charm exists means opponents might have to respect it and adjust accordingly during creature combat. That itself can lead them to make suboptimal plays and is a subtle benefit we did not consider.

Your friend says youre a zoo expert :) I'm pretty new to the archetype having played with Lands and goblins for a long time (I had to finally abandon ship on lands after facing huge problems dealing with rest in peace and deathrite shaman - those are awful cards against any graveyard based deck trying to grind it out).

I would like to hear your thoughts on zoo's position in the current metagame and what you think is the way forward. A list of what you currently play would also be great. Have a good day.

[ironclad8690]

@Capt4in

Greetings and thank you for the input. First I thought I should say its normal to have "godawful" ideas floating around. There are a mix of old and new players on these forums (read: more experienced vs less experienced) and hence its normal to have a "wtf" idea make an appearance when someone seems to get some deep discussion kick-started. However, look on the bright side, there might be ideas that make the oldies go "oh snap, why didn't I think of that". I can't personally quote any examples of that happening before, but hey who knows.

Alright onto the beef, I agree with everything you said about boros charm except the last bit. I think the 3rd ability can be relevant in situations that are narrow but crucial. It allows 5/6 goyfs to beat through a batterskull for example. The very knowledge that boros charm exists means opponents might have to respect it and adjust accordingly during creature combat. That itself can lead them to make suboptimal plays and is a subtle benefit we did not consider.

Your friend says youre a zoo expert :) I'm pretty new to the archetype having played with Lands and goblins for a long time (I had to finally abandon ship on lands after facing huge problems dealing with rest in peace and deathrite shaman - those are awful cards against any graveyard based deck trying to grind it out).

I would like to hear your thoughts on zoo's position in the current metagame and what you think is the way forward. A list of what you currently play would also be great. Have a good day.

I can offer some input on this front after having played zoo at a couple recent big tournaments.

The position in the metagame can largely be determined by what version of zoo you play, and the maindeck choices that you have.

Big Zoo - Better vs Midrange decks, especially with bloodbraid elf for card advantage.

Small Zoo - Better vs combo (faster clock), sometimes can outrace control by playing through removal and going for burn kill.

Standard Zoo - A mix of the two, best vs an unknown field. No accelerators or planeswalkers like big zoo, and not as weak to chalice on 1.

Price Of Progress hits much of the format right now for at least 6 damage, so I would also include that in the 75, 2-3 is probably correct.

Let's look at what is popular now, based on this list (from Jan 24th):

http://screencast.com/t/DL0Fxsfz3

First,
Jund:

I have found this match to be about 50/50. They can gain an advantage if the game goes for too long, or they hit the good stuff in your hand with early discard. The strategy here is to keep liliana off the board as much as possible and keep their creature count low with removal; only burning their life when they are low. Don't keep a wasteland vulnerable hand (1-2 duals), and kill deathrite at first sight. Abrupt Decay is very good vs your knights/equipments, if you have them.

MvPs: Grim Lavamancer (hits everything but goyf), Price Of Progress, punishing fire + grove if you're into that, Bloodbraid Elves of your own, and possible pithing needle from board.

Esper Stoneblade:

This match is tough, you need a couple Qasali Pridemages main if you hope to win game 1. They can snap-removal everything you play, and heaven forbid jitte ever hits the board with spirit tokens in play. Batterskull is a problem (life gain really hurts us), so if they fetch it with stoneforge mystic kill her on sight. If you have Kgrips or Ancient Grudge in your sideboard this becomes easier, but still tough. Hope they aren't playing Academy Ruins, and if they are wasteland it ASAP if you have it. Just keep attacking and attempt to deal with the removal they dish out.

MvPs: Qasali Pridemage, Krosan Grip, Ancient Grudge, Scavenging Ooze (to remove lingering souls and swords to plowshares from yard), Gaddock teeg to block Jace. Price Of Progress can hit them real good if they don't play around it. REB/Pyroblast for Jace.

RUG Delver:

Finally a match that isn't that bad. Your creatures are better, you have removal for delver and goyf, and their counterspells are bad against you. Play around Daze with crucial creatures like goyf and KotR, and try not to walk into stifle/wasteland screw.

MvPs: Knight of the Reliquary, removal suite, Jitte if in your 75. Price Of Progress, again making a great appearance (notice the trend?).

Team America/BUG:

This deck isn't that great against us either. These decks are optimized for fighting control/combo decks, and often crumble to aggro; but it can depend on the build. They won't have enough removal for our deck. Kill all deathrites, don't waste creatures by attacking into untapped baleful strix. Kill planeswalkers ASAP.

MvPs: Burn (kills most creatures and planeswalkers), Gaddock, Price Of progress (yep, 4 of the best decks in the format are soft to this). REB/Pyroblast for Jace.

Reanimator:

This match is so/so, you have to hope for Karakas or Knight to fetch it out. This match is almost impossible for small zoo. They are usually only UB, so price is not as good as it is against the other decks. Just play early creatures, attack, and hope they don't get a shroud/hexproof creature out that you can't beat (Empyrial Archangel is really rough). Gets much better post board if you have 'yard hate.

MvPs: KotR, Karakas, Scavenging Ooze (of you have any), Path To Exile for fatties, Grafdiggers/Tormod's/Faerie Macabre/bojuka bog/rest in peace from sideboard.

Show and Tell:

Worst matchup by far. You can attack and hope for the best. Always pack Red Elemental Blasts/Pyroblasts in the board, maybe even oblivion ring to show into play. Fast zoo has a chance if they struggle, other variants can get knight in to play to tutor karakas asap. If they show emrakul: bounce asap with karakas. If they show griselbrand: Path/karakas asap. If they show sneak attack: kill asap with qasali. If they show omniscience, kill with qasali asap.


MvPs: KotR, Karakas, pithing needle (if sneak attack version), qasali pridemage, red elemental blast/pyroblast.

Tendrils:

This is why I play maindeck thalias. This matchup is tough, but still better than reanimator or show and tell. Your hatebears are the only defense that you can have maindeck. As with the other bad matchups, this gets better post board. thalia/Teeg/cannonist/mindbreak trap/pyrostatic pillar can all be used, but I recommend thalia and teeg split.

MvPs: Thalia, Teeg, Mindbreak Trap, Pyrostatic Pillar. Sideboard should contain at least 4 slots for this matchup, I play in the west coast so I have 8 slots (3 main 5 sideboard usually).

Miracles:

This matchup is pretty similar to Esper Stoneblade. They will snap removal you, and if they get counter-top you are likely screwed. Thanks to Jund/Abrupt Decay decks, this is not as prevalent in the metagame anymore, but still something to watch for. Attack like there is no tomorrow and hope they don't get terminus or entreat. Becomes better postboard with addition of Kgrip/REB/pyroblast/pithing needle. If the game goes long you will lose.

MvPs: Qasali Pridemage, REB/Pyroblast/Gaddock Teeg (shuts down major threats besides countertop; they have to swords him asap), pithing needle (if in side).

I can keep going with other popular decks, but I am off work now and need to go.

[movingtonewao]

Thank you for the in depth analysis ironclad. It seems that we're not very well positioned in the current meta game and won't be making a comeback anytime soon.

[Mr. Safety]

Maybe I missed something, but what are folks thinking about Boros Charm in zoo? I think it's an upgrade to Price of Progress and can make for blowouts with Goyf. I plan on working in 2x Boros Charm in my Sligh Zoo setup.

Wonder what other folks are thinking...

[movingtonewao]

Maybe I missed something, but what are folks thinking about Boros Charm in zoo? I think it's an upgrade to Price of Progress and can make for blowouts with Goyf. I plan on working in 2x Boros Charm in my Sligh Zoo setup.

Wonder what other folks are thinking...

Did you read the last few pages of the thread? We talked about it before.

[Capt4in]

@Capt4in

Greetings and thank you for the input. First I thought I should say its normal to have "godawful" ideas floating around. There are a mix of old and new players on these forums (read: more experienced vs less experienced) and hence its normal to have a "wtf" idea make an appearance when someone seems to get some deep discussion kick-started. However, look on the bright side, there might be ideas that make the oldies go "oh snap, why didn't I think of that". I can't personally quote any examples of that happening before, but hey who knows.

Alright onto the beef, I agree with everything you said about boros charm except the last bit. I think the 3rd ability can be relevant in situations that are narrow but crucial. It allows 5/6 goyfs to beat through a batterskull for example. The very knowledge that boros charm exists means opponents might have to respect it and adjust accordingly during creature combat. That itself can lead them to make suboptimal plays and is a subtle benefit we did not consider.

Your friend says youre a zoo expert :) I'm pretty new to the archetype having played with Lands and goblins for a long time (I had to finally abandon ship on lands after facing huge problems dealing with rest in peace and deathrite shaman - those are awful cards against any graveyard based deck trying to grind it out).

I would like to hear your thoughts on zoo's position in the current metagame and what you think is the way forward. A list of what you currently play would also be great. Have a good day.

I built my list based on Mary Jacobson's Top 16 list from GP Atlanta. [brags] It's currently all-foil and the duals are German FBB. The REBs are Beta. [/endbrags]


4 Arid Mesa
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Windswept Heath
2 Plateau
2 Taiga
1 Savannah
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Plains

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
4 Loam Lion
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Path to Exile
3 Lightning Helix
2 Price of Progress
1 Sylvan Library

Sideboard:
4 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Krosan Grip
1 Ancient Grudge
2 Pyroclasm/2 Sulfuric Vortex/1 Lightning Helix, 1 Price of Progress


The last sideboard slot changes based on what I'm expecting more of. Vortex for fields heavy on Stoneblade/other UW decks, Pyroclasm if I'm expecting a decent amount of Goblins/Affinity, an extra Helix and Price if I'm expecting a wider field or a lot of BUG/RUG.

As for the metagame position, I think we are favored vs RUG/BUG: these decks are the reason to play Zoo, our creatures outclass theirs and we have way more removal. You should win any game against these decks that you don't get Wastelanded out.

We are not favored vs combo of basically all flavors, though I think some matchups, like ANT, High Tide, Dredge, and Reanimator are a lot closer than people think. ANT and High Tide usually go off around turn 3-4, giving you plenty of time to race. ANT in particular needs life in order to go off, so if you can knock them down to 10-11 life fairly quickly, they have a hard time not killing themselves. Don't be afraid to sling bolts at the dome as early as you can. High Tide is very slow and easily disrupted with a single Red blast postboard. Dredge is actually a pretty grindy matchup, since they should never be able to get a token from Bridge from Below, since you can almost always kill one of your own guys to get rid of them. This leaves them trying to race you with Ichorids (which you can path or just race, seeing as your guys are faster and you have Helix) or setting up a Dread Return. Reanimator is a matchup I've personally had a lot of luck with lately, so maybe it's just a small sample size bias, but the fact that Reanimate often deals 9-10 damage to them will allow you to steal a lot of wins. One thing I like to do is to sandbag burn when I think they are about to go off and try to burn them out with Griselbrand's ability on the stack (after they are down 7 life but before they have a fresh hand full of counters). TES is very rough but you should be able to steal a few wins. Show and Tell and Belcher are pretty much unwinnable. Your goal is to dodge this deck.

We are fairly even vs Stoneblade/Miracles. Miracles in particular is really not set up to handle a decent amount of reach, especially when you have answers to Counterbalance postboard. I usually get them to 10-12 life with creatures before getting wrathed out, and then burn them out as the game goes long, since I have more Bolts than they have creatures. Stoneblade is usually well-equipped to play a grindy game with us, but as they don't usually have Wraths you can usually remove all of their threats while forcing through a couple of dudes. Batterskull is pretty rough, hence the two Krosan Grips in the board.

I actually think Goblins is much worse of a matchup than it used to be. Krenko in particular gives that deck a way to just crush most board states, and they are usually very well equipped to overload your removal and just chump block your guys forever.

Burn is basically a bye, especially with Leylines in the board. (Which are there primarily for storm, but I chose them over the other options because they provide splash hate for burn and they are resilient to duress/silence while buying you enough turns to win. You don't need to lock a Storm player out completely, you just need to slow him down by a turn or two, i.e. while they find a bounce spell)

Edit: Forgot to talk about Junk and Maverick. These decks are somewhat unfavorable, though not so bad as combo is. Jund has the removal to keep you on the back foot and the clock to stop you from closing out with burn. Maverick can usually shut you down on the ground fairly quickly and take over with a Knight. However, these matchups are basically the only reason to put garbage like Bloodbraid Elf and Knight into your Zoo deck, and I think this narrow section of the field isn't worth it. These decks are built to prey on fair decks like Zoo, and changing your deck to fight them is just going to cause you to become an awkward inbred fair deck that is giving up its only real edge.

As for some of the other lists floating around in this thread, I think Knight and Thalia are absolutely terrible in Zoo. The reasoning is the same that I often saw a few years ago (around the time of GP Providence) for playing stuff like Wasteland in Zoo. The problem is that when you're playing Zoo you really don't care about a lot of the things that normal decks care about. Knight of the Reliquary seems particularly bad to me right now because it eats it very hard to Abrupt Decay and a vanilla 5/5 or whatever just isn't where I want to be spending my mana. At least Woolly Thoctar isn't soft to Deathrite Shaman. Thalia might be slowing down your opponents, but there are often going to be times where you play a Thalia, your opponent plays a Deathrite Shaman and a Bob, and you have a fistful of removal and 2 lands and can't stop your opponent from getting ahead. Thalia hurts us often as much if not more than many opposing blue decks.

As for different versions of Zoo, the "Big Zoo" and "Standard Zoo" described by others, in my mind, are basically just "Bad Jund" and "Bad Maverick", and I subscribe to the "Prime Directive", which is "Never play a bad something else". The reason to play Zoo over another deck is because it's (in most cases) a better burn deck than burn. It's not a better midrange deck than Jund, and it's not a better creature deck than Maverick. You need to be clocking your opponent as hard as possible as consistently as possible and punishing every stumble that you can.

Overall, I agree that Zoo really isn't much of a deck right now, but it has some reasonable matchups, and certainly some amount of format/deck knowledge will often carry the day. I certainly do better playing Zoo than any other deck, just on the basis of how long I've spent playing it.

Re: Price hitting for 6+ damage, I actually have found that it takes a lot of effort to "get" someone with Price, and the times it sits wasted in your hand or your opponent plays around it (which is fairly frequent, if they are competent) are pretty brutal. I think hitting for a consistent 4 with Boros Charm, plus the added utility of that card, make it better. I plan on cutting my 2 Prices for Boros Charms as soon as my foil Charms arrive in the mail. :)

[Esper3k]

Speaking of Wooly Toctar, I just came a little bit when I just thought about that guy backed by a Pridemage then Boros Charming it.

Also probably too cute, but I want to try out that 1/1 Battlion goblin from Gatecrash in a fast Zoo sligh type list.

[Capt4in]

Speaking of Wooly Toctar, I just came a little bit when I just thought about that guy backed by a Pridemage then Boros Charming it.

Also probably too cute, but I want to try out that 1/1 Battlion goblin from Gatecrash in a fast Zoo sligh type list.

If you thought I was advocating Woolly Thoctar over Knight of the Reliquary, you are mistaken. I was using Thoctar as an argument to show how bad Knight is. Thoctar isn't good in Zoo either.

The battalion goblin is not playable. Raging Goblin is atrocious and this guy isn't much better - most lists are only slightly more than one-third creatures, and requiring this guy plus two more (and none of them having been removed) for a very marginal benefit is not worth it.

@movingtonewao: This is the kind of activity I was complaining about. People who think Zoo is the place to shove every mediocre aggressive card that gets printed.

[Arsenal]

This is the kind of activity I was complaining about. People who think Zoo is the place to shove every mediocre aggressive card that gets printed.

But Zoo is an aggressive-ish, albeit mediocre deck. What other cards would you expect people to suggest playing? Blue draw spells?

[Capt4in]

But Zoo is an aggressive-ish, albeit mediocre deck. What other cards would you expect people to suggest playing? Blue draw spells?

I would expect people to look at a card, compare it to a card that is already in the deck, realize that Raging Goblin probably isn't as good as Kird Ape, and not mention it.

Edit: But yes, I do realize that you are trolling. I certainly hope that Esper3k was.

[Esper3k]

Obviously, neither Wooly Thoctar nor the Legion Loyalist are cards for obvious serious consideration, but suggesting cards for consideration is how decks evolve. Bringing up cards may inspire someone to further develop an idea and make it work. For example, Legion Loyalist could conceivably have applications against decks like Esper Stoneblade, which runs Lingering Souls and Batterskull. Giving your 'Goyf and Nacatls trample as well as making them unblockable by Spirit or Germ tokens sounds pretty decent to me. Legion Loyalist is clearly going to be great in Goblins, but it may also have a home in a heavy aggressive creature deck.

Zoo hasn't been a serious Legacy consider for a long time now. Suggesting the same generic Zoo lists and refusing to even consider cards outside of what was played 2 years ago isn't going to make the deck any better.

I also find it somewhat amusing that someone who clearly hasn't contributed much yet is complaining about other people's posts in this OMG SRS BSNS thread.

[Capt4in]

Obviously, neither Wooly Thoctar nor the Legion Loyalist are cards for obvious serious consideration, but suggesting cards for consideration is how decks evolve. Bringing up cards may inspire someone to further develop an idea and make it work. For example, Legion Loyalist could conceivably have applications against decks like Esper Stoneblade, which runs Lingering Souls and Batterskull. Giving your 'Goyf and Nacatls trample as well as making them unblockable by Spirit or Germ tokens sounds pretty decent to me. Legion Loyalist is clearly going to be great in Goblins, but it may also have a home in a heavy aggressive creature deck.

Zoo hasn't been a serious Legacy consider for a long time now. Suggesting the same generic Zoo lists and refusing to even consider cards outside of what was played 2 years ago isn't going to make the deck any better.

I also find it somewhat amusing that someone who clearly hasn't contributed much yet is complaining about other people's posts in this OMG SRS BSNS thread.

Maybe you should take a look at Skyknight Legionnaire. It could certainly have applications coming down and attacking a planeswalker right away, or flying over enemy blockers. Another card to check out is Slaughterhorn. It gives you another do-nothing three-drop that will sometimes let your Wild Nacatl beat up on a Goyf.

See, I can come up with rationalizations for terrible cards, too. Doesn't change the fact that they are unplayable in Legacy. Anyways, this is basically the reason I never post in this thread/on these boards (endless streams of terrible ideas). Good luck with your Legion Loyalist/Woolly Thoctar/Isamaru/Vinelasher Kudzu/Gyre Sage/Boggart Ram-Gang/Goblin Legionnaire/Domri Rade build.

[Vandalize]

I've been running a similar list Capit4in, but I run 2 Sylvan Libraries maindeck, and no Lightning Helix at all. I used to run 3 Price of Progress and 1 Fireblast, but since Boros Charm was printed, I was willing to give it a try. And it's pretty good actually. All abilities are relevant and the casting cost is easy on the manabase.

My list is the following:

Lands [19]
4 Windswepth Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Arid Mesa
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Mountain

Creatures [23]
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Loam Lion
4 Kird Ape
4 Qasali Pridemage
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Grim Lavamancer

Spells [18]
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Path to Exile
2 Sylvan Library
2 Boros Charm
2 Price of Progress

Sideboard [15]
4 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Grafdigger's Cage
3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Ancient Grudge
2 Pithing Needle
1 Krosan Grip

I just can't play Relic of Progenitus as graveyard hate because is shrinks my goyf to an useless 0/1. Grafdigger's Cage is better against Dredge, as well. Sometimes I feel 23 creatures is a low number, but I can't see any other creatures that makes the cut (perhaps Goblin Guide). Pithing Needle is needed on the sideboard to screw Sensei's Divining Top, which is heavily played in a lot of DTBs.

About the matchups analysis:

RUG: favourable. Don't walk into Stifle and everything should be fine, our creatures are better than theirs, and we have more creatures. Path to Exile is awesome, as they don't run any basics.

BUG: favourable. Price of Progress just murder them. Use removal to clear the path, and swing hard. They usually have only 4 Abrupt Decays as removal, and we have a lot of must-kill creatures, such as Tarmogoyf and Grim Lavamancer.

Jund: even. Jund has plenty removal, usually 4 Bolts, 4 Abrupt Decays and some numbers of Edict effects, or even Punishing Fire. In this matchup, we have to kill Dark Confidant and Deathrite Shaman on sight, and swing fast. Otherwise, they'll Hymn our hand away and cast Bloodbraid Elf to win. Post-board gets better with Leylines of Sanctity.

Junk/Rock: even. This deck is deck also has a lot of removal. And they usually run Knight of the Reliquary or Stoneforge Mystic, which are really dangerous guys. Against this deck, a turn 1 Nacatl is very effective, and should swing for 6~9 damage before getting plowed of decayed. You usually get your board wiped and finish with burn.

Maverick: slightly unfavourable. This deck is really good in stalling the board. Mother of Runes and Knight are the biggest enemies, and Scavenging Ooze can also do some work. This game usually better when you cast Tarmogoyf or Grim Lavamancer early, and get rid of Mom ASAP.

Miracles: very unfavourable. Snapcaster Mage and Terminus just rain on your parade. You can't get in for much damage before they stabilize, and once they do, it's game. Counterbalance does an excelent job at keeping our burn at bay, and Jace is overwhelming after a sweeper. Post-board doesn't get much better, you can side in Krosan Grips, REBs, and Pithing Needles and hope for the best.

Esperblade: even. They have Stoneforge Mystic and Snapcaster Mage, which are really boring to deal with. Price of Progress is effective to some extent, and Path to Exile is horrible. Wild Nacatl and Qasali Pridemage are really good creatures to cast early. Post-board gets easier with Red Elemental Blasts and Ancient Grudge.

Show and Tell: very unfavourable. This combo is dumb, and too fast for Zoo. A good player won't activate Griselbrand before swinging/blocking with it, and we can't answer Emrakul. You can try to race them with REBs backup, but that usually doesn't work.

Goblins: very favourable. Every creature we play is better than theirs, and we have lots of burn to deal with the dangerous guys (like Lackey, Warchief and Piledriver). The game should be pretty straight-foward aggressive mode. Price of Progress suck, and is usually replaced by Pithing Needles, which can target Wasteland, Rishadan Port and AEther Vial.

Storm Combo: unfavourable. This deck can kill you really fast, but it usually needs life to combo. Be really aggressive and chump a lot of life can cause them to fizzle, but still, game 1 is as hard as it can be. Post-board Leylines + REBs help. Play REB aggressively on Brainstorms and Ponders, don't let them sculpt. Take out Path of Exile (obviously) and Sylvan Libraries/Grim Lavamancer.

[Esper3k]

Maybe you should take a look at Skyknight Legionnaire. It could certainly have applications coming down and attacking a planeswalker right away, or flying over enemy blockers. Another card to check out is Slaughterhorn. It gives you another do-nothing three-drop that will sometimes let your Wild Nacatl beat up on a Goyf.

See, I can come up with rationalizations for terrible cards, too. Doesn't change the fact that they are unplayable in Legacy. Anyways, this is basically the reason I never post in this thread/on these boards (endless streams of terrible ideas). Good luck with your Legion Loyalist/Woolly Thoctar/Isamaru/Vinelasher Kudzu/Gyre Sage/Boggart Ram-Gang/Goblin Legionnaire/Domri Rade build.

It's a good thing you bring so much to the thread. I mean lists of 2/3's for 1 are so innovative that the format clearly can't deal with it. Also using Relic of Progenitus when you're playing Tarmogoyfs and Grim Lavamancers is a combo I'm sure people haven't considered at all.

[movingtonewao]

@ Capt4in

thank you for that in-depth analysis of the matchups. I do want to point out that the metagame is evolving into something midrangey/grindy-ish, with the BG package as flavour of the month. I do agree with you that Knight is a horrible card to play in the deck. Not just right now because its soft to DRS and decays, but also in general because its way too slow and does a lot less in zoo than it does in decks like maverick. Zoo's goal is to aggressively clock an opponent, with every creature presenting an immediate threat. Knight just doesn't cut it.

as for thalia, I think she hurts us quite a lot, and we should be looking elsewhere for combo hate. I tested it back when it first came out and it felt really frustrating when i had to cast POPs/Lightning Helixes for 3. Hell i'd even consider gaddock teeg over thalia if there was a gun to my head, at least he screws with stuff like green sun's zenith (maverick was big back then if i recall properly).

@ tension between Capt4in and Esper3k

I can understand where both of you are coming from. To Capt4in, I do agree its not constructive to bring up bad cards (yeah I admit, I agree that they are bad) into the discussion, but with no disrespect to Esper3k's experience with the deck, sometimes people are actually sincerely clueless about specific cards. A little bit of patience could go a long way. I'm also a longtime player of the lands deck and we have newbies bring up bad cards all the time...trust me. It doesn't help discussion, but these guys are really clueless so theyre not at fault either. Usually we explain to them and they're on their way.

To Esper3k, its not very nice of you to troll either (yes you were trolling, with the whole blue cards thing). I don't know Capt4in personally, but I've read his posts and they make sense. It is somewhat true that some of the cards you mentioned (legion loyalist for example), aren't going to help it. The sensible thing to do is to actually try it out first and report your findings. Anyone can throw out ideas but you gotta back that up with results to show for. Remember that we are playing legacy here, and this format is pretty unforgiving. I know some players who tried to make the jump from modern to legacy and their sense of card evaluation made me raise my eyebrows quite a bit. Perhaps you want to post a decklist of what you're currently sitting on and justify your card choices like the chap here (Vandalize) did? That way we could understand your train of thought better, as opposed to just saying X or Y looks good, maybe we can use it.

To sum up, we already have so few people trying to make this work, its pretty sad if even the few of us here can't get along...

@Vandalize

thank you for the findings. This is a good discussion point.

Just wanted to point out that a good RUG player knows how to hold back his counters for POP. Their wastelands could cause problems, so don't feel too ashamed to keep land heavy hands.

I'm not too sure about the jund matchup, I would actually label it as unfavourable. they can rip our hand, kill our creatures, and have inevitability through CA. Considering everyone and his mom seems to have jund at the moment, verifying this through more playtesting is critical. I'll follow-up on this over the weekend when I head down to the shop and report my findings.

@cards in gatecrash
On a side note, I feel like none of the cards in gatecrash make the cut for zoo. Its a shame because I had high hopes for gruul. perhaps a teeny bit too high. Even Kird ape doesn't always make the cut.

I did cast a second glance at loxodon smiter bac in RTR, but decided he's not good enough. Most of the time he's just going to be a smaller goyf.

bad cards in GTC (imo): skyknight legionaire, domri rade, skaarg guildmage, sunhome guildmage, truefire paladin, boros reckoner, burning tree emissary, experiment one, slaughterhorn, frontline medic (great in standard though).

[Esper3k]

To Esper3k, its not very nice of you to troll either (yes you were trolling, with the whole blue cards thing). I don't know Capt4in personally, but I've read his posts and they make sense. It is somewhat true that some of the cards you mentioned (legion loyalist for example), aren't going to help it. The sensible thing to do is to actually try it out first and report your findings. Anyone can throw out ideas but you gotta back that up with results to show for. Remember that we are playing legacy here, and this format is pretty unforgiving. I know some players who tried to make the jump from modern to legacy and their sense of card evaluation made me raise my eyebrows quite a bit. Perhaps you want to post a decklist of what you're currently sitting on and justify your card choices like the chap here (Vandalize) did? That way we could understand your train of thought better, as opposed to just saying X or Y looks good, maybe we can use it.

Are you confusing me possibly with someone else? I've made no comment at all about blue cards...

I disagree with Capt4in's reasoning and of course, his attempt to come onto the thread having posted zero results of his own list and trying to denigrate the suggestions of others. As Vandalize pointed out, cards like Relic of Progenitus are tough for Zoo to play because you simply can't afford to shrink your 'Goyfs to 0/1's and eat your Lavamancer's food. An "experienced" Zoo player should know that.

What I'm saying is that Zoo has been a pretty dead deck for a long time in Legacy now. Putting up the same generic stock list and avoiding any discussion for anything new isn't going to push the deck forward at all.

[thefringthing]

Guys, guys. Simmer down. thefringthing's got the hot new tech fresh off WotC's presses.

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=366250&type=card

This thing is on-colour, makes your guy huge, and generates tempo by giving you that extra damage the same turn you cast it, unlike most of the creatures we could be running. This is a Lightning Bolt every turn for the rest of the game no matter what! That means it's better than Sulfuric Vortex, and hence maindeckable. Don't be surprised when Primal Zoo is making up six or seven of the top eight decks week in and week out on the SCG circuit in a few months. Accordingly, I expect Jace to drop to $10 or so.

[Capt4in]

@Vandalize: I like your list, and I admit that Lightning Helix is a bit of a personal weakness of mine. In Ontario, the Legacy community is less-developed, so most events will be roughly 70% old-school Legacy players (I regularly play against the guys who quite literally put the "Canadian" in "Canadian Threshold") and 30% newcomers playing decks like Burn and Affinity. Helix is my way of conceding the fact that a decent portion of the metagame is going to try to race me. I can't really fault any of your choices though.

@movingtonewao: Thanks for the reply. You're way more polite and constructive than I've learned to expect around here. I was going to abandon this thread for lost, but as long as there are at least a few reasonable contributors, I guess I'll stick around. I'll try to be more patient with people who propose bad ideas, but Esper is an example of a typical sort of internet poster who simply gets angry and doubles down on his bad ideas when told he's wrong.

I'm curious why you think Boros Charm isn't good enough. Did you talk about it a few pages back in the previous discussion? I was similarly disappointed with our Gruul options from Gatecrash, though there might be more in Dragon's Maze. Boros Charm, though, was the one card in the set I was excited about long before the spoilers even started, and it more than lived up to my expectations. I also think RW is a better mana cost than RG for a spell like this (so I'm happy it's Boros and not Gruul Charm that's good), since I typically fetch lands to produce as much Red and White mana as possible, with usually no more than a single green at a time, since I rarely play multiple green cards in a turn (barring a nut-draw that goes Nacatl > Nacatl + Nacatl), but often need to cast multiple removal/burn spells at a time.

I'd be interested in seeing your list. Is your current list posted somewhere in this thread or have you made any recent updates?

@esper3k: You're right in saying that Zoo isn't much of a deck right now. Cutting cards for worse cards is not the solution. If you want to propose a new archetype, that's what the other boards are for. We're here to talk about Wild Nacatl decks, which certainly don't want to be playing cards like Legion Loyalist (who I do think is worthy of consideration for a swarm deck like Goblins, but not a deck like Zoo). Please get some experience with the deck before jumping in and claiming every other aggressive card you see is playable. If you think a card is good and everyone else in the thread is dismissing it, maybe try testing it or playing it (successfully) in an event and get back to us with your results. Just claiming that a card looks good without explaining why it's better than the card it's replacing is worthless. Claiming that Zoo isn't a deck is not a very good justification for randomly changing cards. Belcher's not really a deck either, but you don't see people running to that thread telling them to change it up and run Battle Hymn. You need to justify every card that you add with a card that you plan on removing, and why you think that card needs to be removed. See Vandalize/Me/Mary for a good example of a stock list.

Also, I'm not saying that the stock list is perfect. It's not. It's at a bad place in the metagame right now, and could use some help, and I think there is certainly room to experiment. I thought the discussion of Hidden Herd on the last page was fairly interesting, and I picked up a few last weekend to test out. I'm not sure I like it more than Loam Lion, as it seems to lose value extremely quickly after turn 1, with a relatively small upside. That's a discussion I'd be interested in engaging in, though. There is certainly room to grow with Zoo, but you clearly have no idea of how the deck plays out and what it looks for in a card.

As for the Relic of Progenitus thing, I play 1 Relic because I regularly run into Lands and Aggro Loam players in Legacy events in my area, and Grafdigger's Cage doesn't offer a decent solution to Life from the Loam. I've played stuff like Tormod's Crypt in that slot before, but I find those matchups are more often won with burn spells than beats on the ground, so shrinking my 'Goyfs is less important than drawing an extra card. Mary Jacobson and I have discussed the choice of graveyard hate before, with her preference being Relic as well. See her list here: http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/eventcoverage/gpatl12/welcome#9 . Maybe you should tell her about the Relic/Tarmogoyf interaction? I'm sure she didn't notice it on her way to top 16 of the GP.

That said, I don't really think I need to be defending my card choices from someone who thinks Legion Loyalist is playable.

As for me "attempting to come into the thread" to denigrate your bad card choices, until you replied to me yesterday, you hadn't posted here since March of 2011. It's not like you're a regular contributor either. I'm guessing you just showed up to troll me by posting the exact sort of bad card choices I complained about. If so, troll successful. You can go now.

Edit: Esper3k take note. At least thefringthing is funny. :P

[Esper3k]

Ah, so the guy who's espousing playing the same lists that haven't done well in well, years, is not the guy who's doubling down on bad ideas?

I'm certain because one list did pretty well in a GP means that the entire list is awesome and can't be improved upon, right?

If she wants to post on here about Relic, I have no problems making the same arguments against it to her.

Please refresh my memory, but please direct me to the multitude of Zoo lists, fast, standard, or big that have been making such a big impact on the format that you feel your stock list is good enough?

Also while you're at it, please show us the results in large tournaments you've put up with your stock list to show us all how experienced you are.

========================================================

Given the current trend of decks right now to go towards the midrange (Jund being popular now, the grindy BUG decks, Esper Stoneblade as well), there are a lot of options Zoo can go.

I actually think either going faster in a sligh type build (now we have access to Boros Charm on top of PoP) is fine. Steppe Lynx, while of course a terrible topdeck, is probably the strongest way for a fast Zoo build to abuse Boros Charm's double strike. I personally don't like Steppe Lynx myself, but I can see a fast Zoo build heavy with burn, Nacatl, Tarmogoyf, Goblin Guide, Steppe Lynx as being fairly nasty.

My personal preference is to go the other direction and go with a Big Zoo build. Imo, Punishing Fires is very well positioned in the format right now due to the prevalence of X/2 creatures we're seeing all over the place (Deathrite Shaman, Delver, Dark Confidant, BBE, Shardless Agent, SFM). Of course, PF is also great at breaking Tarmogoyf stalemates (although Big Zoo generally doesn't have that problem since it has Hierarchs and Pridemages). With KoTR + Sylvan Library, you also typically won't have a problem getting your two pieces together.

Another plus to playing Big Zoo is that it also traditionally beats the stock and fast Zoo lists. Historically speaking, Zoo mirrors have been won by players going bigger.

In the day of the Delver, the time of Kird Apes and Loam Lions is simply over.

[Esper3k]

Guys, guys. Simmer down. thefringthing's got the hot new tech fresh off WotC's presses.

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=366250&type=card

This thing is on-colour, makes your guy huge, and generates tempo by giving you that extra damage the same turn you cast it, unlike most of the creatures we could be running. This is a Lightning Bolt every turn for the rest of the game no matter what! That means it's better than Sulfuric Vortex, and hence maindeckable. Don't be surprised when Primal Zoo is making up six or seven of the top eight decks week in and week out on the SCG circuit in a few months. Accordingly, I expect Jace to drop to $10 or so.

Dude, you should totally add Armadillo Cloak. Lifelink and Trample too! Plus, really - it's an Armadillo Cloak!

[Capt4in]

Esper, I'm done arguing with you. You're wrong. I promise. Go troll somewhere else.



In the day of the Delver, the time of Kird Apes and Loam Lions is simply over.

If this is how you feel, then maybe you should stop posting in the Zoo thread. Zoo is an aggressive deck characterized by its 2 and 3-power one-drops backed up with burn spells. If you want to suggest a new archetype playing different cards, that's what the developing decks board is for. Kindly leave this thread if you have nothing constructive to say about the deck.

If you want to talk about big zoo, kindly go talk about it in the big zoo thread: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?19052-Deck-Naya-Midrange-*-Big-Zoo-Naya-Horizons-*

[Esper3k]

Esper, I'm done arguing with you. You're wrong. I promise. Go troll somewhere else.

That's fine, it's not like anything you posted was advancing the deck anyways.




If this is how you feel, then maybe you should stop posting in the Zoo thread. Zoo is an aggressive deck characterized by its 2 and 3-power one-drops backed up with burn spells. If you want to suggest a new archetype playing different cards, that's what the developing decks board is for. Kindly leave this thread if you have nothing constructive to say about the deck.


Zoo has not always been only 1 drops - lists in the past running Knight of the Reliquary have done fine as well. Zoo lists also commonly play non-creature non-burn spells in the form of other powerful cards such as Sylvan Library or Umezawa's Jitte. Even on the 1 drop end, Steppe Lynxes and Goblin Guides have also seen play in successful Zoo lists of the past.

Zoo is an archetype that can be so much more flexible and powerful than your narrow vision of it.

=============================================================

@Those of you guys experimenting with Hidden Herd: Have you tried Hidden Gibbons instead? That's the more traditionally played of the "Hidden" cards (as far as any of them are really played) and that 4/4 body is significantly better than the 3/3 you get from Herd. While Herd will likely activate more consistently on T1, Gibbons is a better mid-late game draw as well as still being great on T1 (let's see your opponent try and deal with any of your guys without casting an instant).

[movingtonewao]

But Zoo is an aggressive-ish, albeit mediocre deck. What other cards would you expect people to suggest playing? Blue draw spells?

Sorry esper3k this was arsenal posting not you, my bad.

I'm at college sitting through a shitty lecture now, c4ptain il get back to you on why I think boros charm is bad and post a list later. As for esper3k's suggestion of hidden gibbons, it gives me a moment of pause. It could be good in the right meta and warrants testing. Hidden herd has been underwhelming for me if preliminary testing is anything to go by.

Will post again when it's more convenient.

[Martin]

Hidden Herd seems interesting, but can you explain why this is main deck? If you don't draw it on the first two turns, it's completely a dead draw vs. RUG Delver. What match up is Hidden Herd better than loam lion?

I have the same question about Thunderous Wrath. Is the 2 extra damage, sorcery speed, and requirement of having brainstorm to set it up, actually better than just running more Chain Lightning or Lightning Helix? It's a dead draw if you don't have a brainstorm and if you miracle it, it forces you to decide between advancing your board or not.

It seems like both these cards just make you less consistent.

I'm sorry about answering so late. I haven't been on here for a while. The Hidden Herd is a Nacatl on T1 but is a card sitting on the table doing nothing at T3 and on. That's why I decided to replace all of them with Hidden Gibbons for testing purposes(I test on Cockatrice and in my local shop). I played against numerous Decks with it and all I can say is that it's fantastic against RUG Thresh and only goes 4/4 against Combo in the turn they combo out. In my opinion, every deck playing Lightning Bolt(which probably is every deck playing red) hates gibbons since removing a Nacatl to get your opponent a 4/4 doesn't seem like a good choice.
Wrath is absolutely wrong in this deck. You never want to see it except for finishing your opponent. I decided to replace it with Chain Lightning and Helix as you said, and the deck is so mich more consistent now.
The CA and quality i get through Brainstorm is amazing and everyone and their mom plays Delver now and it is amazing for a deck like Zoo(especially Explosive Zoo variants).
Other changes I made: I removed the Steam Vents for hallowed fountain and bought 2 Scalding Tarns to get some more colorfix and cut a Guide for a Sylvan Library. I considered Spell Pierce, RIP, Crypt, Relic, Shushers, Gaddocks and Blasts for the SB.
Since the Tier 1 Decks atm are Miracle, Jund, Mav, Esper etc etc. I won't test the deck at my next local tournament but I'm looking forward to it. I'll probably test it when the Meta shifts to slower decks that don't have the need to run Wastelands.
In b4 shitty idea: I wanted to TEST something new and am currently pretty happy with it(It's pretty good at my local meta)

[ironclad8690]

I built my list based on Mary Jacobson's Top 16 list from GP Atlanta. [brags] It's currently all-foil and the duals are German FBB. The REBs are Beta. [/endbrags]


4 Arid Mesa
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Windswept Heath
2 Plateau
2 Taiga
1 Savannah
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Plains

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
4 Loam Lion
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Path to Exile
3 Lightning Helix
2 Price of Progress
1 Sylvan Library

Sideboard:
4 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Krosan Grip
1 Ancient Grudge
2 Pyroclasm/2 Sulfuric Vortex/1 Lightning Helix, 1 Price of Progress


The last sideboard slot changes based on what I'm expecting more of. Vortex for fields heavy on Stoneblade/other UW decks, Pyroclasm if I'm expecting a decent amount of Goblins/Affinity, an extra Helix and Price if I'm expecting a wider field or a lot of BUG/RUG.

As for the metagame position, I think we are favored vs RUG/BUG: these decks are the reason to play Zoo, our creatures outclass theirs and we have way more removal. You should win any game against these decks that you don't get Wastelanded out.

We are not favored vs combo of basically all flavors, though I think some matchups, like ANT, High Tide, Dredge, and Reanimator are a lot closer than people think. ANT and High Tide usually go off around turn 3-4, giving you plenty of time to race. ANT in particular needs life in order to go off, so if you can knock them down to 10-11 life fairly quickly, they have a hard time not killing themselves. Don't be afraid to sling bolts at the dome as early as you can. High Tide is very slow and easily disrupted with a single Red blast postboard. Dredge is actually a pretty grindy matchup, since they should never be able to get a token from Bridge from Below, since you can almost always kill one of your own guys to get rid of them. This leaves them trying to race you with Ichorids (which you can path or just race, seeing as your guys are faster and you have Helix) or setting up a Dread Return. Reanimator is a matchup I've personally had a lot of luck with lately, so maybe it's just a small sample size bias, but the fact that Reanimate often deals 9-10 damage to them will allow you to steal a lot of wins. One thing I like to do is to sandbag burn when I think they are about to go off and try to burn them out with Griselbrand's ability on the stack (after they are down 7 life but before they have a fresh hand full of counters). TES is very rough but you should be able to steal a few wins. Show and Tell and Belcher are pretty much unwinnable. Your goal is to dodge this deck.

We are fairly even vs Stoneblade/Miracles. Miracles in particular is really not set up to handle a decent amount of reach, especially when you have answers to Counterbalance postboard. I usually get them to 10-12 life with creatures before getting wrathed out, and then burn them out as the game goes long, since I have more Bolts than they have creatures. Stoneblade is usually well-equipped to play a grindy game with us, but as they don't usually have Wraths you can usually remove all of their threats while forcing through a couple of dudes. Batterskull is pretty rough, hence the two Krosan Grips in the board.

I actually think Goblins is much worse of a matchup than it used to be. Krenko in particular gives that deck a way to just crush most board states, and they are usually very well equipped to overload your removal and just chump block your guys forever.

Burn is basically a bye, especially with Leylines in the board. (Which are there primarily for storm, but I chose them over the other options because they provide splash hate for burn and they are resilient to duress/silence while buying you enough turns to win. You don't need to lock a Storm player out completely, you just need to slow him down by a turn or two, i.e. while they find a bounce spell)

Edit: Forgot to talk about Junk and Maverick. These decks are somewhat unfavorable, though not so bad as combo is. Jund has the removal to keep you on the back foot and the clock to stop you from closing out with burn. Maverick can usually shut you down on the ground fairly quickly and take over with a Knight. However, these matchups are basically the only reason to put garbage like Bloodbraid Elf and Knight into your Zoo deck, and I think this narrow section of the field isn't worth it. These decks are built to prey on fair decks like Zoo, and changing your deck to fight them is just going to cause you to become an awkward inbred fair deck that is giving up its only real edge.

As for some of the other lists floating around in this thread, I think Knight and Thalia are absolutely terrible in Zoo. The reasoning is the same that I often saw a few years ago (around the time of GP Providence) for playing stuff like Wasteland in Zoo. The problem is that when you're playing Zoo you really don't care about a lot of the things that normal decks care about. Knight of the Reliquary seems particularly bad to me right now because it eats it very hard to Abrupt Decay and a vanilla 5/5 or whatever just isn't where I want to be spending my mana. At least Woolly Thoctar isn't soft to Deathrite Shaman. Thalia might be slowing down your opponents, but there are often going to be times where you play a Thalia, your opponent plays a Deathrite Shaman and a Bob, and you have a fistful of removal and 2 lands and can't stop your opponent from getting ahead. Thalia hurts us often as much if not more than many opposing blue decks.

As for different versions of Zoo, the "Big Zoo" and "Standard Zoo" described by others, in my mind, are basically just "Bad Jund" and "Bad Maverick", and I subscribe to the "Prime Directive", which is "Never play a bad something else". The reason to play Zoo over another deck is because it's (in most cases) a better burn deck than burn. It's not a better midrange deck than Jund, and it's not a better creature deck than Maverick. You need to be clocking your opponent as hard as possible as consistently as possible and punishing every stumble that you can.

Overall, I agree that Zoo really isn't much of a deck right now, but it has some reasonable matchups, and certainly some amount of format/deck knowledge will often carry the day. I certainly do better playing Zoo than any other deck, just on the basis of how long I've spent playing it.

Re: Price hitting for 6+ damage, I actually have found that it takes a lot of effort to "get" someone with Price, and the times it sits wasted in your hand or your opponent plays around it (which is fairly frequent, if they are competent) are pretty brutal. I think hitting for a consistent 4 with Boros Charm, plus the added utility of that card, make it better. I plan on cutting my 2 Prices for Boros Charms as soon as my foil Charms arrive in the mail. :)

@ Capt4in,

I do like your list, and found your points of discussion as far as the metagame and matchups to be awesome, but can you enlighten me as to why you say that knight is garbage? If you do a search on any deck database site it seems that most if not all of the zoo lists that have done well at big tournaments lately have been running her. Yes, she has gotten worse with the rise of DRS, but I think it is a bit of a stretch to say that she is unplayable.

Edit: Also, can't we all just be cool like Fonzy and discuss cool Zoo stuff without dissing each other? I'm not blaming anybody, and as someone said before we zoo players are too far and few between to divide ourselves.

[Esper3k]

I'm sorry about answering so late. I haven't been on here for a while. The Hidden Herd is a Nacatl on T1 but is a card sitting on the table doing nothing at T3 and on. That's why I decided to replace all of them with Hidden Gibbons for testing purposes(I test on Cockatrice and in my local shop). I played against numerous Decks with it and all I can say is that it's fantastic against RUG Thresh and only goes 4/4 against Combo in the turn they combo out. In my opinion, every deck playing Lightning Bolt(which probably is every deck playing red) hates gibbons since removing a Nacatl to get your opponent a 4/4 doesn't seem like a good choice.
Wrath is absolutely wrong in this deck. You never want to see it except for finishing your opponent. I decided to replace it with Chain Lightning and Helix as you said, and the deck is so mich more consistent now.
The CA and quality i get through Brainstorm is amazing and everyone and their mom plays Delver now and it is amazing for a deck like Zoo(especially Explosive Zoo variants).
Other changes I made: I removed the Steam Vents for hallowed fountain and bought 2 Scalding Tarns to get some more colorfix and cut a Guide for a Sylvan Library. I considered Spell Pierce, RIP, Crypt, Relic, Shushers, Gaddocks and Blasts for the SB.
Since the Tier 1 Decks atm are Miracle, Jund, Mav, Esper etc etc. I won't test the deck at my next local tournament but I'm looking forward to it. I'll probably test it when the Meta shifts to slower decks that don't have the need to run Wastelands.
In b4 shitty idea: I wanted to TEST something new and am currently pretty happy with it(It's pretty good at my local meta)

My issue with the Hidden cards is as always, your opponent gets to choose when they activate. That being said, I think Gibbons is the most playable because of it's big body combined with the triggering condition typically being applicable during all points of the game.

If you can get blue Zoo to work with Delver, more power too you. I feel the deck needs 1-2 more serious 1-drop beaters (so we can finally get rid of Kird Ape / Loam Lion) to be a serious threat again. Delver is the best 1-drop creature available in Legacy right now, but that blue requirement is so rough on the manabase!

[ironclad8690]

My issue with the Hidden cards is as always, your opponent gets to choose when they activate. That being said, I think Gibbons is the most playable because of it's big body combined with the triggering condition typically being applicable during all points of the game.

If you can get blue Zoo to work with Delver, more power too you. I feel the deck needs 1-2 more serious 1-drop beaters (so we can finally get rid of Kird Ape / Loam Lion) to be a serious threat again. Delver is the best 1-drop creature available in Legacy right now, but that blue requirement is so rough on the manabase!

The thing about blue zoo is I feel like it will always be a weaker version of RUG Delver. To reliably flip delver you need lots of instants/sorceries, to do that may as well use nimble instead of nacatl, and then we are just playing rug delver.

[SpikeyMikey]

Contemporary Zoo operates like Type 1 Sligh did a dozen years ago. You're looking to maximize your early damage and then finish the game out with burn. Early, that burn can be used as removal to get your creatures through, but as the game progresses, your 1 drops will quickly be outclassed. Therefore, it's paramount that you squeeze as much damage out of your 1 drops as possible before the game hits a state where they're held back by Tarmogoyfs/KotRs/Tombstalkers or where you're simply blitzed by Tendrils of Agony/Griselbrand/Emrakul.

Why is Hidden Herd good and Hidden Gibbons is not, when traditionally it was the other way around? Well, in the past, counter-heavy control decks with very few win conditions and/or blockers were the norm. They represented a large portion of the field and Hidden Gibbons was very good against these decks, coming in before the counter wall came up and punishing your control opponent for using their card draw or counterspells. Now, however, Zoo is not a midrange deck. Midrange decks need to have disruption to survive in the current environment and Naya colors are poorly suited to disruption. Hidden Herd represents another Wild Nacatl. Is it dead after turn 5? Almost always. But if the game has hit turn 5 and you're relying on 1 drop critters to get there, you're already screwed. Something like Steppe Lynx isn't going to serve you any better at that point.

The most difficult Zoo hands for opponents to deal with are the triple Nacatl openings. However, because you're only running 4 Wild Nacatls, those hands are rare. Still, historically, triple Nacatl openings are as close to a "nut draw" as Zoo is going to get. Doubling your available 1 mana 3/3's is huge. The difference between a 3 power creature and a 2 power creature is only slightly smaller than the difference between a 2 power creature and a 1 power creature. That is to say, the difference is enormous.

The Zoo I've been running incorporates blue to really push the 3 power 1 drop theme to the max. It also doesn't hurt to have Brainstorm and Ponder to dig for burn in the mid-game to close things out.

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Hidden Herd
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Lightning Helix
2 Fire/Ice

4 Brainstorm
2 Ponder
1 Sylvan Library

4 Wooded Foothills
2 Arid Mesa
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Windswept Heath
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
2 Tropical Island
2 Savannah
1 Tundra
1 Volcanic Island

I've been playing this list (or a very close approximation of, depending on what month we're talking about) since September. It's very good and definitely competitive in the current Legacy format. It stomps a mudhole in the slower midrange-y decks and with a little help from the sideboard (hello, Spell Pierce!), your storm matchup is roughly even, a claim Zoo can't normally make. Show and Tell is still rough, but you can't beat everything.


My issue with the Hidden cards is as always, your opponent gets to choose when they activate. That being said, I think Gibbons is the most playable because of it's big body combined with the triggering condition typically being applicable during all points of the game.

If you can get blue Zoo to work with Delver, more power too you. I feel the deck needs 1-2 more serious 1-drop beaters (so we can finally get rid of Kird Ape / Loam Lion) to be a serious threat again. Delver is the best 1-drop creature available in Legacy right now, but that blue requirement is so rough on the manabase!

The point of Hidden Herd is that your opponent doesn't actually have a choice. You play turn 1 Hidden Herd, what are they going to do? Not play a land their first turn? People play very few basics these days, generally being content with being able to fetch for them in order to blank Wasteland. But while fetches will get around Wasteland, playing a fetch will still trigger Herd.

Gibbons does have a large body, and if it were as consistent as Herd, that would be a huge advantage. However, as you point out, it's relatively painless for an opponent to just not trigger the Gibbons for a few turns. So many of the relevant cards in the format are sorceries, cards like Ponder, Show and Tell, Hymn to Tourach, etc. If Gibbons were instants and sorceries, then it might be a worthwhile switch. As it stands, however, Hidden Herd is consistent damage. The fact that Gibbons is more relevant in the late game is actually irrelevant (irrelevant relevance, I like it). In the late game, your entire deck is irrelevant. Who are you playing against where you're planning on going late? You either win early or you lose. Topdecking Hidden Herd on turn 6 is only slightly worse than topdecking Turd Ape, but Hidden Herd in your opening has a far greater value. Based on the style of the deck, there's not even really a question about it.

Even if you don't want to delve into blue for another 1 drop, you should be running Hidden Herd over Ape or Lion.

[Esper3k]

The point of Hidden Herd is that your opponent doesn't actually have a choice. You play turn 1 Hidden Herd, what are they going to do? Not play a land their first turn? People play very few basics these days, generally being content with being able to fetch for them in order to blank Wasteland. But while fetches will get around Wasteland, playing a fetch will still trigger Herd.

Gibbons does have a large body, and if it were as consistent as Herd, that would be a huge advantage. However, as you point out, it's relatively painless for an opponent to just not trigger the Gibbons for a few turns. So many of the relevant cards in the format are sorceries, cards like Ponder, Show and Tell, Hymn to Tourach, etc. If Gibbons were instants and sorceries, then it might be a worthwhile switch. As it stands, however, Hidden Herd is consistent damage. The fact that Gibbons is more relevant in the late game is actually irrelevant (irrelevant relevance, I like it). In the late game, your entire deck is irrelevant. Who are you playing against where you're planning on going late? You either win early or you lose. Topdecking Hidden Herd on turn 6 is only slightly worse than topdecking Turd Ape, but Hidden Herd in your opening has a far greater value. Based on the style of the deck, there's not even really a question about it.

Even if you don't want to delve into blue for another 1 drop, you should be running Hidden Herd over Ape or Lion.

I do agree Herd is more consistent than Gibbons, but the argument for Gibbons is that if you drop it early, they're going to have to trigger it to deal with your (presumably) other attackers you'll be dropping. If they're avoiding playing instants to keep from triggering Gibbons, then that means that your guys will generally still be staying alive and so you should be ok with that situation anyways.

That being said... has anyone considered playing both?

[Richard Cheese]

Esper, I'm done arguing with you. You're wrong. I promise. Go troll somewhere else.



If this is how you feel, then maybe you should stop posting in the Zoo thread. Zoo is an aggressive deck characterized by its 2 and 3-power one-drops backed up with burn spells. If you want to suggest a new archetype playing different cards, that's what the developing decks board is for. Kindly leave this thread if you have nothing constructive to say about the deck.

If you want to talk about big zoo, kindly go talk about it in the big zoo thread: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?19052-Deck-Naya-Midrange-*-Big-Zoo-Naya-Horizons-*

Change or die, or just wait for the meta to come back around to suit your deck I guess.

Personally I agree that Big Zoo with P. Fires looks a lot more promising in this meta. Having access to much larger threats, GSZ, and a recurring damage engine means your day doesn't just end if Batterskull or Terminus hits the table. More mana also means you have access to things like Elspeth, Thrun, and Scooze. You still play a much higher threat count than Maverick, so Abrupt Decay on a Knight or Goyf isn't the end of the day. It also gives you a much more reasonable mid-game plan than turning into a burn deck with really terrible topdecks.

Really, if you're thinking of it as "(in most cases) a better burn deck than burn", why run Kird Ape over Goblin Guide?

[ironclad8690]

Contemporary Zoo operates like Type 1 Sligh did a dozen years ago. You're looking to maximize your early damage and then finish the game out with burn. Early, that burn can be used as removal to get your creatures through, but as the game progresses, your 1 drops will quickly be outclassed. Therefore, it's paramount that you squeeze as much damage out of your 1 drops as possible before the game hits a state where they're held back by Tarmogoyfs/KotRs/Tombstalkers or where you're simply blitzed by Tendrils of Agony/Griselbrand/Emrakul.

Why is Hidden Herd good and Hidden Gibbons is not, when traditionally it was the other way around? Well, in the past, counter-heavy control decks with very few win conditions and/or blockers were the norm. They represented a large portion of the field and Hidden Gibbons was very good against these decks, coming in before the counter wall came up and punishing your control opponent for using their card draw or counterspells. Now, however, Zoo is not a midrange deck. Midrange decks need to have disruption to survive in the current environment and Naya colors are poorly suited to disruption. Hidden Herd represents another Wild Nacatl. Is it dead after turn 5? Almost always. But if the game has hit turn 5 and you're relying on 1 drop critters to get there, you're already screwed. Something like Steppe Lynx isn't going to serve you any better at that point.

The most difficult Zoo hands for opponents to deal with are the triple Nacatl openings. However, because you're only running 4 Wild Nacatls, those hands are rare. Still, historically, triple Nacatl openings are as close to a "nut draw" as Zoo is going to get. Doubling your available 1 mana 3/3's is huge. The difference between a 3 power creature and a 2 power creature is only slightly smaller than the difference between a 2 power creature and a 1 power creature. That is to say, the difference is enormous.

The Zoo I've been running incorporates blue to really push the 3 power 1 drop theme to the max. It also doesn't hurt to have Brainstorm and Ponder to dig for burn in the mid-game to close things out.

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Hidden Herd
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Lightning Helix
2 Fire/Ice

4 Brainstorm
2 Ponder
1 Sylvan Library

4 Wooded Foothills
2 Arid Mesa
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Windswept Heath
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
2 Tropical Island
2 Savannah
1 Tundra
1 Volcanic Island

I've been playing this list (or a very close approximation of, depending on what month we're talking about) since September. It's very good and definitely competitive in the current Legacy format. It stomps a mudhole in the slower midrange-y decks and with a little help from the sideboard (hello, Spell Pierce!), your storm matchup is roughly even, a claim Zoo can't normally make. Show and Tell is still rough, but you can't beat everything.



The point of Hidden Herd is that your opponent doesn't actually have a choice. You play turn 1 Hidden Herd, what are they going to do? Not play a land their first turn? People play very few basics these days, generally being content with being able to fetch for them in order to blank Wasteland. But while fetches will get around Wasteland, playing a fetch will still trigger Herd.

Gibbons does have a large body, and if it were as consistent as Herd, that would be a huge advantage. However, as you point out, it's relatively painless for an opponent to just not trigger the Gibbons for a few turns. So many of the relevant cards in the format are sorceries, cards like Ponder, Show and Tell, Hymn to Tourach, etc. If Gibbons were instants and sorceries, then it might be a worthwhile switch. As it stands, however, Hidden Herd is consistent damage. The fact that Gibbons is more relevant in the late game is actually irrelevant (irrelevant relevance, I like it). In the late game, your entire deck is irrelevant. Who are you playing against where you're planning on going late? You either win early or you lose. Topdecking Hidden Herd on turn 6 is only slightly worse than topdecking Turd Ape, but Hidden Herd in your opening has a far greater value. Based on the style of the deck, there's not even really a question about it.

Even if you don't want to delve into blue for another 1 drop, you should be running Hidden Herd over Ape or Lion.

Hm, your list is pretty sweet; and it appears you've found a way to support flipping delver at least most of the time. I would love to see what a current sideboard would look like for that deck.

[Vandalize]

Hidden Herd also grows Tarmogoyf if answered. I think I'm in love. I'll definetely replace Loam Lion with it.

List:

Lands [19]
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Arid Mesa
2 Windswept Heath
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Plains
1 Forest
1 Mountain

Creatures [23]
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Hidden Herd
4 Kird Ape
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage
3 Grim Lavamancer

Spells [18]
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Path to Exile
3 Boros Charm
2 Sylvan Library
1 Umezawa's Jitte

Sideboard [15]
4 Leyline of Sanctity
3 Red Elemental Blast
3 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Pithing Needle
2 Ancient Grudge
1 Krosan Grip

[SpikeyMikey]

Hm, your list is pretty sweet; and it appears you've found a way to support flipping delver at least most of the time. I would love to see what a current sideboard would look like for that deck.


19 instants and sorceries isn't terrible for blind-flipping and when 6 of them dig, it makes it appreciably easier. Generally, unless the mana is somehow wonky (and that's rare with 21 lands and 0 Wastes), I go Hidden Herd --> Wild Nacatl --> Delver of Secrets for my play order. Herd obviously decreases in value rapidly, Nacatl is only slightly worse than Herd on turn 1 and Delver on turn 1 means you need an upkeep Brainstorm to reliably get 3 on turn 2 and that means best case, you're only dropping 1 more 1 drop on turn 2, which slows your clock. Sometimes, that's all you've got anyway, but I'd rather drop one of the other two and give myself a chance to rip a 3rd 1 drop; the flying isn't really relevant on turn 2 anyway as the most common blocker on turn 2 is DRS and people don't want to block with those.


In Denver, it was:

3 Spell Pierce
3 Rest in Peace
3 Krosan Grip
2 Red Elemental Blast
2 Stony Silence
2 Sulfuric Vortex

Of course, I had a miserable outing in Denver too, going 3-4 drop, but them's the breaks. I was expecting more Storm than Show and Tell and lost to a pair of Sneak and Shows, LED Dredge and a BUG deck (which is pretty rare) The side event on Sunday wasn't particularly great either, going 4-3, but in all fairness, there were 5 rounds vs. combo and only 2 vs. fair decks (BUG and Zombardment), both of which I stomped. Vortex was there for Stoneblade and Miracles, since they don't present an appreciable clock and it stops Batterskull shenanigans. I never saw a single Counterbalance the entire weekend, making K. Grip pretty terrible, but I don't think you can afford to cut it as CounterTop just locks you out cold. Anything not running Wasteland, I generally board out one of the Taigas. If I'm feeling really ballsy, I'll board out the 2nd Trop as well. 21 lands is a bit heavy for a deck with a curve that stops at 2, but since Stifle has been making a comeback and Wastelands are everywhere in the tempo decks (who will beat you if they can lock your mana out for a few turns and get 'goyfs on the board), it's safer for a G1 configuration.

Esper: I tried Gibbons very briefly last summer when I first designed the deck. Maybe things have changed a bit but at the time, it was where Vexing Devil is in Standard. When it would be useful as a 4 power creature, they'll sit a turn or two, which sets them back slightly, but most decks in this format can handle creatures by turn 3 or 4, so it sets you back immensely. Either they're killing you at that point, they've set up a juicy Terminus, they've got Energy Field, they're dropping Batterskull or some other such nonsense. I plan that by turn 3, I'm going to be on the "throw lightning at your face" plan. Unless I'm playing against combo, I play this deck as an all-in deck. Jam as much damage as I can as fast as I can. Against combo, obviously, it's helpful to leave REB/Pierce mana up after turn 2 (or turn 1 on the draw, but being on the draw vs. combo sucks!). Sometimes, I'll get mashed by the turn 2 SnT Emra, but just as often, they actually have to dig for it and leaving mana up early sets your clock back appreciably. If you've got 6 on the battlefield on turn 2, you're looking at a 5 turn clock (3 on 2, 9 on 3, 15 on 4 and 21 on 5); 9 on the field on turn 2 is a 4 turn clock (3/12/21). That's also why I don't run any 2 power creatures. Dropping 3 Kird Apes by turn 2 is the same as dropping 2 "Nacatls" and that full turn difference in speed is huge. Against Goblins, for example, if you can keep them on the back foot the entire time and blocking so they don't die, you'll win the game. Goblins are terrible on the defensive. On the other hand, if they can switch roles, you can't defend against their massive card advantage and finishers. A hand of 2 lands and 5 burn spells will buy you time, but eventually, if you don't have the creatures to put the pressure on, they'll refill with Ringleaders, drop an unanswered Krenko or SGC and maul you to death.

[Capt4in]

Change or die, or just wait for the meta to come back around to suit your deck I guess.

Personally I agree that Big Zoo with P. Fires looks a lot more promising in this meta. Having access to much larger threats, GSZ, and a recurring damage engine means your day doesn't just end if Batterskull or Terminus hits the table. More mana also means you have access to things like Elspeth, Thrun, and Scooze. You still play a much higher threat count than Maverick, so Abrupt Decay on a Knight or Goyf isn't the end of the day. It also gives you a much more reasonable mid-game plan than turning into a burn deck with really terrible topdecks.

Really, if you're thinking of it as "(in most cases) a better burn deck than burn", why run Kird Ape over Goblin Guide?

The reason to avoid Goblin Guide is that you want to play as few creatures as possible that trade with a 2/X like Snapcaster Mage or Bob. If you let Snapcaster Mage be a 2-for-1 out of an U/W deck, you're gonna have a bad time. Snapcaster Mage should always be a 1-for-1 and a chump block.

Knight is so bad because it takes so long to do anything. If you're only playing 19 lands, you certainly won't be consistently casting it on turn 3, especially against Wasteland decks (which is the main place it would be good anyway). It's not usually going to be much bigger than a 5/5, especially with opposing Deathrite Shamans, and a 5/5 that costs all your mana and doesn't have haste or evasion is not what you want to be doing in the later turns of the game. The reason Knight is much worse with Abrupt Decay running around is that Knight is the only card you can play that is giving up tempo to your opponent, and by the time you are giving up tempo in Zoo you're losing the game. Your opponent should always be the one on the back foot. I understand the desire to have another big guy (I would happily play another 4 Tarmogoyfs if I could), but Knight is too big, too slow, and too vulnerable. As I said on the last page, at least Woolly Thoctar doesn't get shrunk by Deathrite and is usually big enough to trade with a Goyf. I would honestly consider him for testing before Knight at this point, though I still think both of them are bad.

To everyone trying to strawman my complaints as "Zoo is perfect and can't be fixed" I hope you're having fun. My point was not that Zoo doesn't need help (it does) or that it can't be fixed (it can), but that suggestions to make it slower and go bigger are mistaken, as if you want to go slower, you should just play Jund, and if you want to go bigger, you should be playing Maverick. Wild Nacatl decks want to go fast, not big. I understand what the Big Zoo advocates are saying here (that slower, grindy, Punishing Fire decks are better-positioned than Zoo right now) and I totally agree. But this isn't the place for that discussion. Take it to the Big Zoo thread, or better yet give Jund (Punishing or otherwise) a try. It's going to do the slow, grindy, fair thing much better than any Wild Nacatl deck is. The "Blue Zoo" deck belongs in here more than the Big Zoo decks do, it's at least in line with the philosophy of Zoo. Big Zoo has its own thread and should be discussed there.

As for Hidden Herd, I think the card is strong, though perhaps not as much so in the matchups where we shine (BUG/RUG). If you think those matchups are strong enough to warrant adding 4 cards that are blanks if drawn after turn 2, then I think it's a good choice. I actually think Herd might be best in a list that features some number of Wastelands, so that you can force them to have to play extra lands and turn your Herds on as the game goes on. I'm sticking with Loam Lion for now, but I can't fault anybody for making the switch. It does seem quite powerful.

[crow_mw]

The "Blue Zoo" deck belongs in here more than the Big Zoo decks do, it's at least in line with the philosophy of Zoo. Big Zoo has its own thread and should be discussed there.

I do not think it does and at the very least this thread has always served as a base for discussion for both small and big zoo, since people often played lists which where somewhere in the grey area. Also many suggestions for big zoo can be applied for small zoo and vice versa. Even the OP list has cards like Woolly Thoctar .

[nedleeds]

In a world of Dark Confidants, Delvers, Cliques, Snapcasters, Lavamancers, Mothers of Runes, Noble Hierarchs, Thalias and Dryad Arbors I still can't believe you don't play Granger Guildmage.

[ceustice]

I personally like the idea of going under the meta right now like sighted in some articles a few weeks ago by Drew Levin and Karston Coetter. I've been playing what is really close to a 1 drop list and doing ~ok~ with it, though I haven't tried any of the "Hidden" cards. I like the P.Fire builds with Knight but to me your no longer playing Zoo its just Naya Aggro Loam or Punishing Maverick and not a hyper aggressive deck backed with burn.

[Esper3k]

In terms of Aggression, it's hard to find a 1 drop that's more aggro than Goblin Guide. It also increases your possibility of having super nut hands.

Instead of only being able to go T1 Nacatl, T2 Nacatl x 2, you can now go T1 Nacatl, T2 Nacatl + GG / swing for 5. Dropping a Kird Ape / Loam Lion instead of GG is so underwhelming.

Secondly, the haste of Goblin Guide is a huge difference especially when your opponent is holding back just enough blockers for your guys. It also makes it such a better top deck. How many times do we have our opponent just out of burn range and you draw... Kird Ape.

[SpikeyMikey]

In a world of Dark Confidants, Delvers, Cliques, Snapcasters, Lavamancers, Mothers of Runes, Noble Hierarchs, Thalias and Dryad Arbors I still can't believe you don't play Granger Guildmage.

Maverick is pretty dead. Not a lot of Thalias or Moms out there anymore. Only slightly more Hierarchs/Arbors.

The question here is, what are your positive matchups and your negative matchups and what can you do to bring your negative matchups to a more favorable position? As Zoo, your negative matchups tend to be Miracles (which is a heavily anti-aggro deck) and non-ANT combo (which you have a hard time racing). Granger Guildmage strikes me as a win more. It's good in the matchups that are already favorable and worse than a more aggressive 1-drop in matchups that are unfavorable.

Goblin Guide provides an initial burst of 2 damage over Wild Nacatl (haste, duh!). That means the turn it drops, you're up 2 points over where you would be with a 3 power creature. The turn after it drops, you're up 1 point (4 for 2 turns of GG swings vs. 1 turn of 3 beats). 2 turns after, you've reached parity and every turn after that, it becomes disadvantageous.

The key here is that what we're looking at (or at least, what I'm talking about) is maximizing the early damage to put people into burn range as quickly as possible. For pretty much any configuration of 3 beaters in the first 2 turns, Guides, Guides and Nacatls or Nacatls, the turn they go into burn range is turn 3. However, there is no configuration that will do 20 to them with pure beats on turn 3. The closest would be turn 1 Nacatl, turn 2 Nacatl, Guide, turn 3 Guide, Guide, Guide. You're looking at 5 on turn 2 and an additional 14 on turn 3, putting the opponent to 1 (lethal, for all intents and purposes in the era of fetchlands). Of course, that requires seeing all 4 Goblin Guides in your first 3 turns, which is fairly unrealistic.

GG/Nac, Nac 2 - 4 - 12 - 20
GG/Nac, GG 2 - 6 - 13 - 20
GG/GG, GG 2 - 8 - 14 - 20

Nac/Nac, Nac0 - 3 - 12 - 21
Nac/Nac, GG 0 - 5 - 13 - 21
Nac/GG, GG 0 - 7 - 14 - 21

Ape/Ape, Ape0 - 2 - 8 - 14 - 20

I threw the Ape/Lion path in there just as an example of how terrible those cards actually are. On turn 4, you're looking at similar damage potential to turn 3 with any of the stronger creatures.

There's no way to put a person into burn range on turn 2. That's fairly obvious; you don't even need a chart to show that. But it doesn't hurt to look at the damage output. no matter what configuration you use, your turn 3 damage is going to be pretty similar. The more Guides you have on turn 2, the more effective your turn 3 is going to be. But the degree of icnreased effectiveness, in comparison to the difference between Guide/Nacatl/Herd and Ape/Lion, is small. Even the lowest damage paths, dropping double Nacatl on turn 2 are still 33% more effective than the triple Ape/Lion path.

In any case, turn 3 is really where we're focused when we're talking goldfishing. We want the turn 3 because that's what allows us to be effective against the rest of the format. Because our creatures are outclassed on or after turn 3 (turn 2 'goyf is probably small enough that it can't profitably block a 3/3 yet) and because turn 2.5 is the FT for combo, turn 3 is our ideal killing turn. In theory, anyway. In practice, we can count on an opponent having a removal spell or some way to interact with us and push our FT back. Guide is effective in improving our turn 3 damage (but never enough to push our opponents from 2 burn spells out on turn 3 to 1 burn spell; we'd need to be able to hit 16 in beats on turn 3 to be able to consider 1 burn spell a turn 3 kill). It does make the turn 3 more likely, as triple Nacatl requires an opponent to use 2 fetches (or 1 Ancient Tomb use) in conjunction with 2 burn spells from us in order to get that turn 3 kill. However, you're also giving your opponent 1/3rd of a card every time it attacks, which I feel is a fairly significant disadvantage. It's also small enough that it can potentially become irrelevant on turn 2, where an opponent can trade a Confidant for it or profitably block with a Tarmogoyf.

I think there may be a slight edge to running Guide, but the creature worries me in general, as I'm never really that scared of it when I'm playing against it. I'll try testing with it, probably in place of either Tarmogoyf or QPM/Ooze/Sylvan in my listing. The first couple of turns are where we're at anyway, pushing that to the edge is worth trying.

Edit:

What about something along these lines:

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Hidden Herd
4 Goblin Guide
3 Steppe Lynx

4 Tarmogoyf
3 Qasali Pridemage

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Boros Charm
2 Reckless Charge
2 Flame Rift
2 Fireblast

1 Sylvan Library

12 fetches (Foothills, Mesa, Heath)
3 Taiga
3 Plateau
2 Savannah

You're about as aggressive as you could get. The Nacatl, Charge turn 2 is slightly better even than the double Guide turn 2, putting you to 15 on turn 3. Under some circumstances, that could be a 1 burn spell kill on turn 3. Boros Charm, Flame Rift and Fireblast give you that little bit of extra damage to push towards lethal and Steppe Lynx, while not a consistent beater, can be workable. In fact, if you've got 3 lands and 2 are fetches, you could pretty much hit lethal with 2 Lynxes and a Charge, no burn required (11 on turn 2, 8 more on turn 3 for 19 total). Of course, Reckless Charge is bad in the face of Swords to Plowshares and the flashback is almost never relevant for haste (if you've hit 4 mana, you're in deep shit). I went with a second Flame Rift over the 4th Boros Charm just because of color considerations. It may not be necessary, Charm might just be 100% better because of the additional modes, but I figured a couple of extra sorceries for Tarmogoyf wasn't going to hurt anything. We could also try it as 4 Boros Charm and 3 Fireblast and cut Flame Rift entirely.

It might be worth at least taking a look at this. It may be too glass cannon, but it captures the heart of contemporary Zoo pretty nicely. Fast beats, lots of lightning to the face.

[movingtonewao]

Things have been pretty hectic here. I promised a list but some of my cards are being loaned out to friends at the moment, so that will have to wait.

For now let me talk about Boros Charm since I realy should explain myself on why I'm not really amused by it.

First things first. The versatility on this card is a trap. I feel like the 4 damage mode is going to be the most useful out of the 3. It feels like a flame rift with no drawback, to give it credit. As for the double strike mode, those of you thinking it will help us be "aggressive" is wrong. Remember that none of our guys have trample. For it to out-damage the 4 damage-option when swinging through unblocked, you need to slap it on something that does 5 damage or more (goofy?) since we have nothing that has trample. Usually when we're swinging through unblocked with a 5/6 goyf we're already winning, so this point is moot.

Lets look at the last mode, indestructibility for permanents. What's the number one creature removal? Swords to Plowshares. Whats the number one mass removal in the metagame right now that blows us upside down? Terminus. We're still cold to these. Sure, occassionally Rootborn defenses is a good card when tangling in creature combat, but even when your opponents creatures are tangling with yours in the red zone, its likely they have some sort of trick too (usually removal). You don't tangle with a goyf for fun without removal. Unless you were hoping to chump, during which case, indestructibility doesn't help. Another relevant (but admittedly narrow) application is to blank your opponent's wasteland. But you have to have 2 mana up and wait for the right time to pounce. When you're playing zoo and you have 2 mana up and nothing happens and the turn is passed, you have lost a chance to do something relevant: apply more pressure on your opponent. We don't have the luxury of time to wait around for things to happen...and that's why I think Boros Charm is not great.

Yeah sure its great in a vacuum, but after thinking through the interactions with our other cards + cards from other decks...it just doesn't blow my mind away anymore. If you think RW for a flamerift that doesn't damage you is good, go ahead and play it. If you think you wanna hold up mana to try and get mileage from its other modes...then I think you should think twice.

This is my take.

[Vandalize]

Things have been pretty hectic here. I promised a list but some of my cards are being loaned out to friends at the moment, so that will have to wait.

For now let me talk about Boros Charm since I realy should explain myself on why I'm not really amused by it.

First things first. The versatility on this card is a trap. I feel like the 4 damage mode is going to be the most useful out of the 3. It feels like a flame rift with no drawback, to give it credit. As for the double strike mode, those of you thinking it will help us be "aggressive" is wrong. Remember that none of our guys have trample. For it to out-damage the 4 damage-option when swinging through unblocked, you need to slap it on something that does 5 damage or more (goofy?) since we have nothing that has trample. Usually when we're swinging through unblocked with a 5/6 goyf we're already winning, so this point is moot.

Lets look at the last mode, indestructibility for permanents. What's the number one creature removal? Swords to Plowshares. Whats the number one mass removal in the metagame right now that blows us upside down? Terminus. We're still cold to these. Sure, occassionally Rootborn defenses is a good card when tangling in creature combat, but even when your opponents creatures are tangling with yours in the red zone, its likely they have some sort of trick too (usually removal). You don't tangle with a goyf for fun without removal. Unless you were hoping to chump, during which case, indestructibility doesn't help. Another relevant (but admittedly narrow) application is to blank your opponent's wasteland. But you have to have 2 mana up and wait for the right time to pounce. When you're playing zoo and you have 2 mana up and nothing happens and the turn is passed, you have lost a chance to do something relevant: apply more pressure on your opponent. We don't have the luxury of time to wait around for things to happen...and that's why I think Boros Charm is not great.

Yeah sure its great in a vacuum, but after thinking through the interactions with our other cards + cards from other decks...it just doesn't blow my mind away anymore. If you think RW for a flamerift that doesn't damage you is good, go ahead and play it. If you think you wanna hold up mana to try and get mileage from its other modes...then I think you should think twice.

This is my take.

Miracles is being rocked by BGx decks, and Swords to Plowshares is closely followed by Abrupt Decay (Boros Charm can be helpful here). Don't forget you can use it to save your duals from Wasteland and some crap like Pernicious Deed. Of course the 4 damage to the dome is the most useful ability, but Boros Charm offers some interactions.

At least it's better than Price of Progress, which usually hits for 4~6, and it's symmetric (we also run a lot of non-basics). Double Strike could save some guy in combat, but it's by far the worse ability in Boros Charm.

[Esper3k]

The more I play Boros Charm the more I'm starting to feel like it's a trap (sadly). Needs more testing, but I've never gotten the "gotcha!" indestructible ability to work when I want to since I'm constantly tapping out to play more dudes or want a more damaging burn spell like PoP.

[SpikeyMikey]

I've done just a little testing with the Zoo deck I posted above, but I'm liking it. I'm ok with Boros Charm being a one-sided Flame Rift. When I open a hand with 2 lands, 2 creatures, 2 4 damage burn spells and a bolt, I feel pretty amazing. Having over half someone's life in burn means my creatures work that much less. I've never used the Charm for anything other than a Flame Rift, but that's ok. I also changed out Lynxes for Vexing Devil. It's feeling very burn like right now, but I'll need more testing to see if I feel that this is straight up better than burn.

[angel882]

I've done just a little testing with the Zoo deck I posted above, but I'm liking it. I'm ok with Boros Charm being a one-sided Flame Rift. When I open a hand with 2 lands, 2 creatures, 2 4 damage burn spells and a bolt, I feel pretty amazing. Having over half someone's life in burn means my creatures work that much less. I've never used the Charm for anything other than a Flame Rift, but that's ok. I also changed out Lynxes for Vexing Devil. It's feeling very burn like right now, but I'll need more testing to see if I feel that this is straight up better than burn.

Hi, nice looking list you have there. I have been thinking Vexing Devil a lot but I like Lynx more. In my testing Devil has been only 4 dmg to opp. when those 1cc creatures should beat atleast 6-8 dmg. Have you tested is PoP better than Flame Rift? I played zoo couple of weeks ago and PoP was almost always 6 dmg on both.

[Richard Cheese]

Would it be very wrong in this meta for Big Zoo to go back to Cursed Scroll over P. Fires? It makes for a better manabase, and essentially costs the same. In my meta at least, grave hate is just everywhere with Miracles running RiP main, Deathrite, etc.

[ironclad8690]

Would it be very wrong in this meta for Big Zoo to go back to Cursed Scroll over P. Fires? It makes for a better manabase, and essentially costs the same. In my meta at least, grave hate is just everywhere with Miracles running RiP main, Deathrite, etc.

It sounds like in your meta cursed scroll would be the better alternative. Of course, DRS should never stop you from running punishing fire, but rest in peace is bonkers vs it.

[SpikeyMikey]

Hi, nice looking list you have there. I have been thinking Vexing Devil a lot but I like Lynx more. In my testing Devil has been only 4 dmg to opp. when those 1cc creatures should beat atleast 6-8 dmg. Have you tested is PoP better than Flame Rift? I played zoo couple of weeks ago and PoP was almost always 6 dmg on both.

I'm ok with my opponent paying the 4 life for Vexing Devil. A supercharged Lava Spike is fine. It's never a card I'm going to drop on turn 1, but with Hidden Herd, Wild Nacatl and Goblin Guide, I should never have to. I look at it this way. Devil is damn near a guaranteed 4. With Steppe Lynx, I get 4 if I have a fetch. More if I have multiple lands and they don't come up with a blocker by turn 3. But Lynx is very hand dependent. On a 2 land hand, I may only be getting 2 points of out Lynx on turn 2 and then have it sit for 3 turns until I find another land. Devil is basically never going to be more than 4, but it's basically never going to be less either.

PoP is probably generally around the same amount of damage. It's around 4-6 at the time where it's relevant. But Rift is a sorcery, which isn't great as far as timing goes, but is nice as far as Tarmogoyf goes. I actually moved 1 Boros Charm to a Rift for that reason. I like that Charm doesn't hit me (keeps people from trying to race), but I'm currently at 8 instants and 9 sorceries. It's much easier to count on my opponent for the instant than the sorcery.

Keep in mind that I'm not saying that this is all correct. I have very limited testing into this as I've been busy with work. This is primarily changes based on theory craft and the feel I got from the deck in a few random games on MWS. I did really enjoy Reckless Charging a Wild Nacatl vs. OmniShow yesterday, however. Turn 1 Hidden Herd into turn 2 take 9 made for an easy turn 3 kill. He had the Misdirection for the Lightning Bolt, but Flame Rift and Fireblast got there.

[ceustice]

I've been trying out Steppe Lynx and I'm not sure how I feel about it. It's not as reliable as say Loam Lion or Gobliin Guide I was wondering how many of you would swear by it.

[Martin]

I've been trying out Steppe Lynx and I'm not sure how I feel about it. It's not as reliable as say Loam Lion or Gobliin Guide I was wondering how many of you would swear by it.

It's a personal decision. If you want to play Zoo for it's 4th turn kill, you should play it, or if you want the consistency until T5-7 and still be drawing good creatures, I would suggest cards like Ape n Lion. They aren't really a good topdeck on t5 but better than a lynx.

This is what I am playing at the moment:

4 wild nacatl
4 hidden herd
2 hidden gibbons
3 qasali pridemage
4 steppe lynx
4 goblin guide
3 grim lavamancer

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Path to exile
2 lightning helix
2 chain lightning
2 sulfulic vortex
2 sylvan library

4 arid mesa
3 wooded foothills
2 windswept heath
2 evolving wilds
1 mountain
1 forest
1 plains
2 stomping ground
2 sacred foundry
1 temple garden

Got any suggestions? Well, I play shock lands and 2 evolving wilds because i am short on cash. I wanna substitute them with Duals and foothills/heaths. In my meta, a T1 Hidden Herd is basically a Nacatl( lots of delver)
Libraries: They are for keeping up on T5+
Vortexes: They stop a Batterskulls ability to reproduce life and is the overkill against Blade Control
Hidden Gibbons: Good against control if you play it T1 or 2

[Dungaurd]

I've been trying out Steppe Lynx and I'm not sure how I feel about it. It's not as reliable as say Loam Lion or Gobliin Guide I was wondering how many of you would swear by it.

I really don't like Steppe Lynx. I have tested it not only in zoo, but I have tried playing it a lot in modern, and back in standard and extended too. IMO the problem with it is that it is only good if played on turn one, or maybe turn two. But quite often I found that they might wipe your board or something, and then you just need to topdeck anything to push through the last few points of damage and instead you draw a steppe lynx, which then does nothing.

Goblin Guide, Kird Ape, Loam Lion, etc don't get worse the longer the game goes on. So I personally would advise against ever playing Steppe Lynx, but I cannot recommend Goblin Guide enough, I can't imagine the deck without him.

[Demonic_Attorney]

I cannot recommend Goblin Guide enough, I can't imagine the deck without him.

Goblin Guide is horrible in the metagame right now! Giving card advantage, not a good thing! There are more viable and better options, whether that is Lynx or not.

[Dungaurd]

Goblin Guide is horrible in the metagame right now! Giving card advantage, not a good thing! There are more viable and better options, whether that is Lynx or not.

Well giving card advantage is never a good thing, but you say he is horrible right now? Is there a time you believe that he was good during? What has changed since then that has made him bad? What would you recommend instead of goblin guide and steppe lynx?

I guess I sould be clear that I am talking about little zoo, not big zoo here.

[Patrunkenphat7]

Why do dealers still sell Hidden Herd for 49 cents each? That Saga card is bound to jump... Starcity, CFB, and CoolStuffInc are sold out, and Troll and Toad has 3 copies. I just bought some copies for 49 cents each while they are still at that price.

[Asthereal]

I have been thinking Vexing Devil a lot but I like Lynx more. In my testing Devil has been only 4 dmg to opp. when those 1cc creatures should beat atleast 6-8 dmg.
That means no Kird Apes or Loam Lions for you. :tongue:
I think every card that deals 4 damage for that low mana cost is good enough. If every card does that, you'll only need four turns and five business cards per game. That'd be perfect for a Zoo deck.


Why do dealers still sell Hidden Herd for 49 cents each? That Saga card is bound to jump... Starcity, CFB, and CoolStuffInc are sold out, and Troll and Toad has 3 copies. I just bought some copies for 49 cents each while they are still at that price.
Because they are bad? :wink: At least I think they are. If the opponent can only delay their morphing one turn, they are already bad.

[SpikeyMikey]

That means no Kird Apes or Loam Lions for you. :tongue:
I think every card that deals 4 damage for that low mana cost is good enough. If every card does that, you'll only need four turns and five business cards per game. That'd be perfect for a Zoo deck.


Because they are bad? :wink: At least I think they are. If the opponent can only delay their morphing one turn, they are already bad.

Sure. Also, if you can play around Stifle with your fetches, you make that card a lot worse. Playing around Daze makes Daze a lot worse. Like playing around tempo cards, not triggering Hidden Herd is hard. Take a look at the most recent SCG Open in Edison. The T8 ran, in order, 4 basics, 1 basic, 4 basics, 1 basic, 2 basics, 0 basics, 2 basics and 4 basics. So for those decks running "heavy" on basics at 4 (2 Sneak and Shows and a Stoneblade), there's a 16% chance that you will have a non-zero number of Hidden Herds in hand at the same time that they have a non-zero number of basics. 1-in-6 games, once every other MATCH, that will happen. Assuming, of course, that you're talking about keepable hands. Because not every hand with a basic land is keepable, nor is every hand with a Hidden Herd. For a deck with only 2 basics? That chance drops to less than 9%. 1-in-11 games. For all intents and purposes, 1 in every 4 matches. Twice in a tournament.

Even if they have the basic, playing it on turn 1 may not be the best option. If the basic provides no action and they're time walking themselves to timewalk you, that's fine. The next turn, you drop 2 threats and now they HAVE to respond. They have to activate the Herd.

Thing is, Hidden Herd is good in Zoo. It's better than Wild Nacatl. You know, the gold standard of Zoo one-drops? This card is better. Why is it better? Because it's not vulnerable to early game Wastelands. When you go Taiga, Nacatl and your opponent Wastes, you're either fetching a Plateau the next turn (which doesn't cast any of your good threats) or you're beating for 2. Don' t have another land? You're clocking for 1. With Herd, if they Waste you, they're taking 3. Guaranteed. Which is a good way to discourage people from Wasting you. Yes, Herd is a worse topdeck. Not useless, but worse. People hit a point where they don't *need* to play any more lands to function, but I've seen people show me their hand at the end of a game to reveal a couple of Wastes or an Academy Ruins or even a couple of fetches that they didn't want to drop for fear of giving me a 3/3.

You said delaying it 1 turn makes it bad. Delaying it 1 turn makes it the same damage potential 2 turns later as Kird Ape/Loam Lion (2 turns of Herd beats is the same as 3 turns of Ape/Lion beats).

While the card isn't exactly tearing up the format, he's right, $0.50 is underpriced for the card. Seriously underpriced. Look at every other Legacy playable Saga rare. Fringe cards like Argothian Enchantress or Exploration go for $15-$25. Good rares like Sneak Attack and Show and tell go for $40-$60. Goblin Lackey is an UNCOMMON and it's $10. Those are TCG average prices. SCG prices are going to be another 10% premium over that. All it's going to take is 1 strong finish at an SCG or a GP and that card is going to spike to $10 overnight and that's being conservative. Back to back finishes? It'll hit $25+. For a card that's $0.50 now, that means anywhere from a 2000%-5000% RoI. Dealers are still selling it for that price because dealers make money dealing, not playing. So while they may be aware of some trends, mostly because they track tournament results and catch some twitter feeds from pros, they're not aware of everything and they don't evaluate Legacy cards. I mean, Hidden Herd has been viable in the format for what, a year and a half now since Goblins and Merfolk disappeared into the background? And the ones that do pop up now are generally running a splash color and Cavern of Souls, so they're not even heavily into basics anymore. The card is situationally good in this format. Look at the chart from last page and compare the Ape/Lion damage lion to ANY of the other lines and you'll realize just how big of a difference having Herd over Ape makes.

Edit: the other thing is that cards like Argothian and Exploration have been good for a while. Sneak Attack was always a card people kept track of because it was a casual favorite. How many Hidden Herds do you think became proxy fodder or were thrown away because the owner figured the card was shit? I don't see Zoo becoming 10% of the meta; it's just not that popular with Legacy players. But Herd has the potential to spike pretty high if Zoo becomes a regular part of the field.

[Asthereal]

Sure, most of your arguments are valid. And if many people start to use Herd, its value will surely spike.

Still, when you tell me it can have the same damage potential as the worst one-drops in Zoo, 2 turns later, you're exactly making my point instead of your own. I still think Herd is bad. Perhaps sometimes it'll even be better than Nacatl, but why do you think people are reluctant to play Steppe Lynx and Vexing Devil? They are sometimes brilliant, sometimes okay and sometimes very bad, and both are terrible topdecks most of the time. People don't want coinflips in their decks. They want consistency. That, and because no-one ever played them before, makes dealers and a player like myself believe Herd is bad. :wink:

But by all means prove me wrong. :smile:

[Mr. Safety]

How many copies of Boros Charm are people playing in their Zoo lists?

Zero is the wrong answer...

[Vandalize]

How many copies of Boros Charm are people playing in their Zoo lists?

Zero is the wrong answer...

It's usually the same amount of Price of Progress people use. For my list, it's 2.

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Arid Mesa
2 Windswepth Heath
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Forest
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Hidden Herd
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage
4 Kird Ape
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Path to Exile
2 Sylvan Library
2 Boros Charm
2 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 3 Pyroclasm
SB: 3 Pyroblast
SB: 3 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2 Sulfuric Vortex
SB: 2 Ancient Grudge
SB: 1 Krosan Grip
SB: 1 Path to Exile

Umezawa's Jitte maindeck is pretty good. I've been thinking what I should play for my two flex slots, and I thought: well, why not Jitte? It has been solid in Legacy since it was printed, and it can act like a backup plan when our Swarm doesn't work. Pyroclasm comes VERY handy in the sideboard, since Elves! is pretty strong, and it also kills everything in Jund (except Tarmogoyf, ofc).

I've also decided just to skip anti-Combo cards, because it's just pointless. If we want to improve those matchups in the slighetest, we need at least 6 sideboard cards for it.

[SpikeyMikey]

My poi t wasn't that the damage potential from a late triggered Herd was amazing. My point was that it's no worse than the BEST CASE scenario for a card you're already running. Why wouldn't you make that switch. In a corner case (and once every other match is corner case), it's merely as good as the current standard. Most of the time, it's better. That's pretty much the definition of "straight upgrade".

As far as lack of history, how long has Veteran Explorer been around? It's not that the Explorer was underrated; it simply wasn't any good until the last few years when curves came down. Same for Herd. Until Zendikar fetches completed the cycle and Merfolk went away, Herd was not good.

[Esper3k]

Again, I'm still a big fan of Goblin Guide in Zoo. 1) he doesn't always give card advantage, 2) who cares if they're dead?

The 2 power hasty body is just amazing for pushing that extra damage past blockers or for just getting in those early beats. The T1 Nacatl, T2 Goblin Guide opening is just absolutely brutal on a lot of decks. DRS just kind of "oops, I crapped my pants" against that.

[angel882]

It's usually the same amount of Price of Progress people use. For my list, it's 2.

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Arid Mesa
2 Windswepth Heath
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Forest
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Hidden Herd
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage
4 Kird Ape
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Path to Exile
2 Sylvan Library
2 Boros Charm
2 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 3 Pyroclasm
SB: 3 Pyroblast
SB: 3 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2 Sulfuric Vortex
SB: 2 Ancient Grudge
SB: 1 Krosan Grip
SB: 1 Path to Exile

Umezawa's Jitte maindeck is pretty good. I've been thinking what I should play for my two flex slots, and I thought: well, why not Jitte? It has been solid in Legacy since it was printed, and it can act like a backup plan when our Swarm doesn't work. Pyroclasm comes VERY handy in the sideboard, since Elves! is pretty strong, and it also kills everything in Jund (except Tarmogoyf, ofc).

I've also decided just to skip anti-Combo cards, because it's just pointless. If we want to improve those matchups in the slighetest, we need at least 6 sideboard cards for it.

Hei, if I counted correctly you are missing 1 card.

[lyracian]

How many copies of Boros Charm are people playing in their Zoo lists?
Zero is the wrong answer...
My playset just turned up in the post; going to replace my two Fireblasts and move on frm there...

[Martin]

Current List:

4 wild nacatl
4 hidden herd
3 bloodbraid elf
3 qasali pridemage
4 steppe lynx
3 goblin guide
3 grim lavamancer

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Path to exile
2 lightning helix
2 chain lightning
2 sulfulic vortex
2 sylvan library

4 arid mesa
3 wooded foothills
2 windswept heath
2 evolving wilds
1 mountain
1 forest
1 plains
2 stomping ground
2 sacred foundry
1 temple garden


Sideboard:
2 Vexing shusher
2 Ethersworn cannonist
1 Gaddock teeg
2 Volcanic fallout
1 Ancient grudge
2 Krosan grip
2 Tormod's crypt
1 Relic of progenitus
2 Aurelia's fury

No goyfs and duals because I am poor as fuck. Same reason for evolving wilds.
I currently like Hidden Herd a lot. It has been as reliable as Nacatl, maybe even better. Bloodbraid elf is a house and its recent banning in Modern only proved that. It is way better than KOTR or Goyf as a topdeck. Vortexes are in there since I have a lot of Cawblade guys running around in my meta. That's why I play 2 Libraries too. I have tried to adapt my sideboard to my meta(which is very versatile, but has a lot of miracles, jund, delver and a crapton of cawblade)

[JanoschEausH]

Current List:

No goyfs and duals because I am poor as fuck. Same reason for evolving wilds.
I currently like Hidden Herd a lot. It has been as reliable as Nacatl, maybe even better. Bloodbraid elf is a house and its recent banning in Modern only proved that. It is way better than KOTR or Goyf as a topdeck. Vortexes are in there since I have a lot of Cawblade guys running around in my meta. That's why I play 2 Libraries too. I have tried to adapt my sideboard to my meta(which is very versatile, but has a lot of miracles, jund, delver and a crapton of cawblade)

I would really really recommend you to swap your Evolving Wilds with Basics. You never ever want to play a tapped land in an aggro build. Never.

Did you experience problems with your life total during matches against midrange or other aggro decks?

[Martin]

I would really really recommend you to swap your Evolving Wilds with Basics. You never ever want to play a tapped land in an aggro build. Never.

Did you experience problems with your life total during matches against midrange or other aggro decks?

I removed the Evolving Wilds and put in a Mountain and a Grim Lavamancer since my curve is very low. Thanks for the advice on that. I never really had life problems against Junk, Jund, Delverdecks or Maverick except against a weird version of a Delver deck with 4 colors(everything except white). That guy really ripped me apart.

[aluisiocsantos]

It's usually the same amount of Price of Progress people use. For my list, it's 2.

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Arid Mesa
2 Windswepth Heath
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Mountain
1 Plains
1 Forest
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Hidden Herd
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage
4 Kird Ape
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Path to Exile
2 Sylvan Library
2 Boros Charm
2 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 3 Pyroclasm
SB: 3 Pyroblast
SB: 3 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2 Sulfuric Vortex
SB: 2 Ancient Grudge
SB: 1 Krosan Grip
SB: 1 Path to Exile


I really like this list. Are you using Path to Exile in case of matches with golfs and etc (reliquary, tombstalker) in mind? I had played recently a similar list but without the Charms and Herds and white removals, and with more Price of Progress (4) and Fireblasts to achieve a quicker win, though my results weren't very good in the tourney I ran with that list.

How'd it fare?

[ceustice]

The more I look at Experiment One the more I like it as another Wild Nacatl. Am I the only one? Has anyone tested it?
After all it does get pumped from Loam Lion, Kird Ape, Wild Nacatl, Goyf, Pridemage, Goblin guide, so it being a 3/3 for is quite reasonable.

[Martin]

The more I look at Experiment One the more I like it as another Wild Nacatl. Am I the only one? Has anyone tested it?
After all it does get pumped from Loam Lion, Kird Ape, Wild Nacatl, Goyf, Pridemage, Goblin guide, so it being a 3/3 for is quite reasonable.

It might be a good creature but it is not in a deck like Zoo. It is in best cases as good as Nacatl on T1, but only if your T2 plays are Guide and Nacatl. Normally it isn't even that good. It comes close to a GG affected by summoning sickness. EVERY other creature that has the same CMC is better. GG: Haste. Nacatl: 3/3(reliable). Herd: see Nacatl. Steppe Lynx: atleast 2/3 when attacking. Loam Lion, Kird Ape: 2/3. It simply doesn't cut it in Zoo, but if you wanna test it, go on and see for yourself.

[angel882]

The more I look at Experiment One the more I like it as another Wild Nacatl. Am I the only one? Has anyone tested it?
After all it does get pumped from Loam Lion, Kird Ape, Wild Nacatl, Goyf, Pridemage, Goblin guide, so it being a 3/3 for is quite reasonable.

Hi, Experiment One has been great in my naya zoo hilander so that's why I'm really interested how it would work in legacy zoo.

[ironclad8690]

What have people found to be the best options for this deck to stop:

Storm

Show And Tell

[aznepyon7]

What have people found to be the best options for this deck to stop:

Storm

Show And Tell

Canonist for Storm.

Dunno about SnT.

[datamonkey]

The more I look at Experiment One the more I like it as another Wild Nacatl. Am I the only one? Has anyone tested it?
After all it does get pumped from Loam Lion, Kird Ape, Wild Nacatl, Goyf, Pridemage, Goblin guide, so it being a 3/3 for is quite reasonable.

I agree with Martin, Experiment One doesn't seem to fit in with Zoo. If you are looking for a good addition to your list you should try Hidden Herd. It is very consistent and some others here on the forums have already made some good cases for it. I've been playing Hidden Herd in my list for a couple of weeks now and it looks to be very good.

[Mr. Safety]

What have people found to be the best options for this deck to stop:

Storm

Show And Tell

Storm = Ethersworn Canonist

Show and Tell = Oblivion Ring

[aluisiocsantos]

Also, Mindbreak Trap for both, though it won't be as good versus a Sneak Attack version of SnT, but is quite fun versus the Omniscience one.

[SpikeyMikey]

Also, Mindbreak Trap for both, though it won't be as good versus a Sneak Attack version of SnT, but is quite fun versus the Omniscience one.

You should have a reasonable matchup vs. OmniTell anyway. They're a half step slower and that's generally all you need. Sneak and Show, I consider unfavorable, OmniTell I consider around 50/50 both pre and post board.

[Martin]

You should have a reasonable matchup vs. OmniTell anyway. They're a half step slower and that's generally all you need. Sneak and Show, I consider unfavorable, OmniTell I consider around 50/50 both pre and post board.

I would consider the OmniTell matchup much worse. Around 30-70 or so since they can have nut hands with T2 Show and Tell into Omniscience into Emrakul which is auto win unless you have some kind of instant to get rid of Emrakul hich we don't have in Zoo. Same goes for the Sneak Attack versions. Those combos are the Nemesis of every kind of Zoo. Personally, I have 3 REB and 2 Oblivion Ring in the board only to fight Sneak and Tell. Omnitell is almost always a lost match in my opinion.

[Demonic_Attorney]

Storm = Ethersworn Canonist

Show and Tell = Oblivion Ring

With respect, I am of the view that REB is a faster and more efficient means of negating Show and Tell than Oblivion Ring in the context of a Zoo build.

[Esper3k]

With respect, I am of the view that REB is a faster and more efficient means of negating Show and Tell than Oblivion Ring in the context of a Zoo build.

REB is counterable and requires you to leave red mana open.

O-Ring neuters 2/3's of what they can drop (Emrakul, Omniscience) and mostly neuters Griselbrand (even if they draw cards off of it, being Zoo, you have a pretty good shot at just killing them on your return swing).

[Demonic_Attorney]

REB is counterable and requires you to leave red mana open.

O-Ring neuters 2/3's of what they can drop (Emrakul, Omniscience) and mostly neuters Griselbrand (even if they draw cards off of it, being Zoo, you have a pretty good shot at just killing them on your return swing).

O-Ring is 3 CC!! Enough said!

ps. Like O-Ring isn't counter-able!

[Leto]

If you drop O-Ring into Show 'n Tell he is not counter-able, and thats the reasoning.

Instant-kill for Emrakul and Griselbrand would be Tariff, did that a few times, worked quite well.

[Fatal]

Tariff is a sorcery speed.. its useless vs Sneak or Omni->Emrakul.

[Mr. Safety]

With respect, I am of the view that REB is a faster and more efficient means of negating Show and Tell than Oblivion Ring in the context of a Zoo build.

Let them resolve Show and Tell and you play Oblivion Ring for free. You just need it in hand, bro. Not sure how 'free' isn't better than :r:.

Besides it's not like Show and Tell decks play Force of Will or anything...oh wait, yes they do. Balls!

Oblivion Ring is also fantastic at several other jobs, being flexible and all that:

1) dealing with PW's, blue or not
2) robbing Pernicious Deed so you don't lose your dudes
3) taking care of Leyline of Sanctity, a popular sideboard choice in many decks
4) increasing your Goyf/fatty removal so you can break standoffs
5) Dealing with Chalice of the Void
6) It's outside of reliable CounterTop range (have fun trying to counter a spell with REB when they have the lock assembled)

That's a few. But really, Oblivion Ring is just too narrow to warrent use in zoo (sarcasm.)

[Mr. Safety]

Also, Mindbreak Trap for both, though it won't be as good versus a Sneak Attack version of SnT, but is quite fun versus the Omniscience one.

Gaddock Teeg fucks both Omni and Sneak Attack. Like a boss.

[trivial_matters]

5/384 Japan

Creatures [23]
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Loxodon Smiter
1 Mirran Crusader
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
2 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Tarmogoyf
3 Noble Hierarch
3 Qasali Pridemage
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Wild Nacatl

Instants [8]
4 Punishing Fire
4 Swords to Plowshares

Sorceries [2]
2 Green Sun's Zenith

Enchantments [2]
2 Sylvan Library

Artifacts [2]
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte

Lands [23]
1 Arid Mesa
1 Forest
1 Karakas
1 Mountain
1 Plains
2 Plateau
2 Savannah
2 Taiga
2 Wasteland
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
3 Wooded Foothills
4 Windswept Heath

2 Gaddock Teeg
2 Wilt-Leaf Liege
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Pithing Needle
2 Krosan Grip
1 Choke
1 Pyroblast
2 Red Elemental Blast
1 Life from the Loam

[SpikeyMikey]

I would consider the OmniTell matchup much worse. Around 30-70 or so since they can have nut hands with T2 Show and Tell into Omniscience into Emrakul which is auto win unless you have some kind of instant to get rid of Emrakul hich we don't have in Zoo. Same goes for the Sneak Attack versions. Those combos are the Nemesis of every kind of Zoo. Personally, I have 3 REB and 2 Oblivion Ring in the board only to fight Sneak and Tell. Omnitell is almost always a lost match in my opinion.

Nut draws are called nut draws for a reason. So they've got blue land, tomb, SnT and Omniscience in their opening. And they're on the play, where you can't reasonably be holding up REB (since it's your T1).

To be fair, the listing I've actually played vs. OmniTell (it not being high on my testing priority) had blue as well for Delver/Brainstorm/Ponder, so I had REB and Pierce out of board. However, I did not have O-Ring, so I think that's probably a wash or even a plus in favor of regular Zoo. O-Ring is a pretty good answer to a resolved SnT. But I'm 2-0 on it in tournaments and 4-1 in games. That's once at an SCG and once at a large Legacy side D2 of GP Denver, not like local results or anything.

In other news, that Punishing Zoo list looks terrible. Singleton Mirran Crusader. No way to tutor for it (not GSZable). No more in board. Just a random Crusader, tooling around. I don't think I need to comment on the Elesh Norn. Two Tarmogoyfs and no Scavenging Ooze. If you're going to play big Zoo, there's no reason not to run Ooze over 'goyf. Either this guy paid off all his opponents or this was at the Japanese Special Olympics.

[Esper3k]

O-Ring is 3 CC!! Enough said!

ps. Like O-Ring isn't counter-able!

Yeah, for the reasons others have stated, those points you listed are moot in the Show & Tell matchup.



In other news, that Punishing Zoo list looks terrible. Singleton Mirran Crusader. No way to tutor for it (not GSZable). No more in board. Just a random Crusader, tooling around. I don't think I need to comment on the Elesh Norn. Two Tarmogoyfs and no Scavenging Ooze. If you're going to play big Zoo, there's no reason not to run Ooze over 'goyf. Either this guy paid off all his opponents or this was at the Japanese Special Olympics.

Yeah I was like :really: when I saw that and kept looking at the list looking for some super secret tech I was missing...

[Demonic_Attorney]

Yeah, for the reasons others have stated, those points you listed are moot in the Show & Tell matchup.

Actually, they are not!

To the contrary, the speed that Show and Tell now plays at makes it very relevant and consequential; especially when spell pierce and daze are factored in which culminates in making this underlying factor even more paramount in assessing sideboard tech in this pivotal match up.

They have 8 monsters with 8+ cantrips and you have, maybe 2 o-rings in the board! You will not have it in hand consistently enough to flip with Show and Tell not to mention they have a voluminous amount of answers for o-ring.

[feline]

Unless anyone objects, I would like to take on making an updated Primer for Zoo, I played it for a while so I have actual experience with it, and if it helps I have recently compiled a primer for High Tide & Belcher that at the risk of promoting myself, I think looks rather well ^.^

Anyhow, I'll edit this post accordingly as I go along

-edit- 1:00 am Pacific time, Thread blueprint started.
-edit- 5:30 am Pacific time, links to almost 93 separate top 16 decklists since 2009 completed, though only 11 occurring in the past 15 months. (Interestingly enough, the "peak" of Zoo, was actually during the Reign of Mental Misstep, which helped knock combo decks back at that time.) Now working on card choices.
-edit 10:30 am Pacific time, Still sorting through the multiple decklists, making notes based on pre-during-post Mental Misstep to show trends.
-edit- Noon Pacific time, to be continued tomorrow, stuff done: playing zoo, big/fast. 93 separate top 16 decklists links 2009-2013, pre/during/post Mental Misstep notes, card choices, maindeck & sideboard - working on: explanation of cards in deck- stuff remaining: Price guide, Links, & Match ups.

-edit- 7:45 pm Pacific time, back on it again, adding images to blueprint & continuing with card choice explanations.
-edit- 11:45 pm Pacific time, now working on Price Guide for more commonly ran cards since 2012.
-edit- 12:45 am Pacific time, Price Guide completed, only 2 "to do's" left, -Awesome Links- & -Match ups-
-edit- 2:00 am Pacific time, FOOD BREAK Still pushing for articles, top 8 tournament reports, etc for 2012-13 in relation to zoo, found tons of articles from 2010-11 during height of Zoo.
-edit- http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?25707-Primer-Deck-Zoo

[lordofthepit]

Unless anyone objects, I would like to take on making an updated Primer for Zoo, I played it for a while so I have actual experience with it, and if it helps I have recently compiled a primer for High Tide & Belcher that at the risk of promoting myself, I think looks rather well ^.^

Anyhow, I'll edit this post accordingly as I go along

Yeah, an opening post that refers to including Watchwolf, Isamaru, and Goblin Legionnaire as elements of a "new R/G/W Zoo deck" is not one that I would read anymore.

[feline]

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?25707-Primer-Deck-Zoo Updated Zoo Primer/Deck here for your fancy. ^.^

[Mr. Safety]

Actually, they are not!

To the contrary, the speed that Show and Tell now plays at makes it very relevant and consequential; especially when spell pierce and daze are factored in which culminates in making this underlying factor even more paramount in assessing sideboard tech in this pivotal match up.

They have 8 monsters with 8+ cantrips and you have, maybe 2 o-rings in the board! You will not have it in hand consistently enough to flip with Show and Tell not to mention they have a voluminous amount of answers for o-ring.

So adjust: play 4x Oblivion Ring, or some mix of O-Ring/Ethersworn Canonist/Ensnaring Bridge. If you are losing to a bad matchup, and you can do something to fix it, then you deserve to lose if you don't adjust.

[thefringthing]

Legacy's never going to be the same.

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
3 Tarmogoyf
4 Signal Pest
4 Frogmite
3 Vault Skirge
2 Stoneforge Mystic

4 Cranial Plating
4 Galvanic Blast
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Dispatch

3 Springleaf Drum
3 Mox Opal
2 Plateau
2 Savannah
2 Taiga
2 Wooded Foothills
1 Arid Mesa
2 Windswept Heath
2 Great Furnace
2 Tree of Tales
1 Ancient Den
1 Blinkmoth Nexus

Don't you love it when your Goyf's huge because your opponent bins an artifact?

[Kich867]

Legacy's never going to be the same.

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
3 Tarmogoyf
4 Signal Pest
4 Frogmite
3 Vault Skirge
2 Stoneforge Mystic

4 Cranial Plating
4 Galvanic Blast
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Dispatch

3 Springleaf Drum
3 Mox Opal
2 Plateau
2 Savannah
2 Taiga
2 Wooded Foothills
1 Arid Mesa
2 Windswept Heath
2 Great Furnace
2 Tree of Tales
1 Ancient Den
1 Blinkmoth Nexus

Don't you love it when your Goyf's huge because your opponent bins an artifact?

Can you please call this list "Beast Wars: Transformers in Disguise"?

[SpikeyMikey]

That list looks... bad. Or rather, it looks like it's incredibly inconsistent and adds very little to your game even when the draws do work out.

Speaking of inconsistency, I fished out 20 hands on www.deckstats.net with my Zoo listing and had 11 mulligans, almost entirely for lands. I mulled 1 hand that was 2 lands, 2 QPMs, a Flame Rift and a Tarmogoyf. I felt like 5 was going to be better than that. Here's the breakdown:

T3: 8 (2 mulls)
T4: 11 (3 mulls, 2 double mulls)
T5: 1 (double mull)

None of those included Fireblast, sadly. Deckstats was not being generous to me on my fishing.

As I've said before, the key to playing Zoo in Legacy right now is speed. Speed is important because the combo decks are not going to give you more than 3 turns to beat them. Being a turn 4 aggro deck is simply not acceptable when we have little to no main board disruption. To this end, I've been working on streamlining the deck. While Tarmogoyf and Qasali Pridemage are necessary evils for dealing with midrange decks (where their Tarmogoyfs will otherwise brick you), I've changed the focus of the deck to maximizing the damage the deck does in the first 3 turns. These are the critical turns against combo. If you do enough damage to storm early, you take away the Ad Nauseam plan and force them to try and go off with IGG or split and rush a Tendrils just to gain a buffer for a second attempt. If you do enough damage against Show and Tell, you can ideally untap and simply finish them with burn. Since most Show and Tell listings are running Misdirection, you're generally hoping for Emrakul, rather than Griselbrand, so that you can swing through them if they have the turn 2 Emrakul; you have to count on at least 1 burn spell being sent back at you or countered. Against TinFins, there's little that you're going to do about a turn 1 combo, but again, on the slower combos, the early damage is massively important; if you can cut them off from 7 cards, that's good. Cutting them off from 14 cards is even better.

This streamlining makes the deck weaker against midrange and control; your threats are not as good, standing alone, as they would be in a more traditional build where you have access to value creatures like Grim Lavamancer and Scavenging Ooze. You're not a glass cannon, by any means, but the matchups skew away from you with this build. However, I still consider it to be the best Zoo build out there right now; by virtue of its speed, it seriously punishes greedy keeps by your opponents. Unlike combo, which will also punish slow keeps, Zoo does not rely on any single lynchpin to function. Against combo, a counterspell buys a turn or more. Against Zoo, a counterspell buys up to a turn. Also, the available board hate against us is far less devastating than the hate available against combo.

4 Hidden Herd
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Goblin Guide
3 Vexing Devil
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Qasali Pridemage

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Boros Charm
2 Reckless Charge
2 Flame Rift
2 Fireblast

4 Arid Mesa
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Taiga
3 Plateau
2 Savannah

Sideboard
3 Red Elemental Blast
3 Rest in Peace
2 Silence
2 Krosan Grip
2 Choke
2 Mindbreak Trap
1 Ravenous Trap

[aluisiocsantos]

Any thoughts on this beauty?
http://www.themagicland.com/img/VarchildWar-Riders.full.jpg

[Mr. Safety]

Just a worse Tarmogoyf, in my opinion.

In the event that you do really want to use the Raiders, try playing Kird Ape/Loam Lion and maindeck Pyroclasms. That deals with the 1/1's you're giving them while leaving your dudes alone. That still sounds bad though, like really bad.

A better direction would be to keep the low curve of traditional zoo, rather than going the mid-range Big Zoo/Maverick +Red route, but add in these beauties:

Kavu Predator
Punishing Fire
Grove of the Burnwillows
Swords to Plowshares (instead of Paths)

[Mr. Safety]

That list looks... bad. Or rather, it looks like it's incredibly inconsistent and adds very little to your game even when the draws do work out.

Speaking of inconsistency, I fished out 20 hands on www.deckstats.net with my Zoo listing and had 11 mulligans, almost entirely for lands. I mulled 1 hand that was 2 lands, 2 QPMs, a Flame Rift and a Tarmogoyf. I felt like 5 was going to be better than that. Here's the breakdown:

T3: 8 (2 mulls)
T4: 11 (3 mulls, 2 double mulls)
T5: 1 (double mull)

None of those included Fireblast, sadly. Deckstats was not being generous to me on my fishing.

As I've said before, the key to playing Zoo in Legacy right now is speed. Speed is important because the combo decks are not going to give you more than 3 turns to beat them. Being a turn 4 aggro deck is simply not acceptable when we have little to no main board disruption. To this end, I've been working on streamlining the deck. While Tarmogoyf and Qasali Pridemage are necessary evils for dealing with midrange decks (where their Tarmogoyfs will otherwise brick you), I've changed the focus of the deck to maximizing the damage the deck does in the first 3 turns. These are the critical turns against combo. If you do enough damage to storm early, you take away the Ad Nauseam plan and force them to try and go off with IGG or split and rush a Tendrils just to gain a buffer for a second attempt. If you do enough damage against Show and Tell, you can ideally untap and simply finish them with burn. Since most Show and Tell listings are running Misdirection, you're generally hoping for Emrakul, rather than Griselbrand, so that you can swing through them if they have the turn 2 Emrakul; you have to count on at least 1 burn spell being sent back at you or countered. Against TinFins, there's little that you're going to do about a turn 1 combo, but again, on the slower combos, the early damage is massively important; if you can cut them off from 7 cards, that's good. Cutting them off from 14 cards is even better.

This streamlining makes the deck weaker against midrange and control; your threats are not as good, standing alone, as they would be in a more traditional build where you have access to value creatures like Grim Lavamancer and Scavenging Ooze. You're not a glass cannon, by any means, but the matchups skew away from you with this build. However, I still consider it to be the best Zoo build out there right now; by virtue of its speed, it seriously punishes greedy keeps by your opponents. Unlike combo, which will also punish slow keeps, Zoo does not rely on any single lynchpin to function. Against combo, a counterspell buys a turn or more. Against Zoo, a counterspell buys up to a turn. Also, the available board hate against us is far less devastating than the hate available against combo.

4 Hidden Herd
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Goblin Guide
3 Vexing Devil
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Qasali Pridemage

4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
3 Boros Charm
2 Reckless Charge
2 Flame Rift
2 Fireblast

4 Arid Mesa
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Taiga
3 Plateau
2 Savannah

Sideboard
3 Red Elemental Blast
3 Rest in Peace
2 Silence
2 Krosan Grip
2 Choke
2 Mindbreak Trap
1 Ravenous Trap

Love this list, I might have to do something similar. It's a sligh approach, which I've always been a fan of. Plus, someone is finally recognizing the raw speed that Vexing Devil can bring...not to mention it beefs your Goyfs if they opt to sac it, which is relivant against combo decks.

No Path to Exile, even in the sideboard? The Reckless Charge addition is sexy for sure, I've always liked the option of playing a turn 1 Lynx, then going turn 2 fetchland into a Nacatl + Charge, swing for 10. It gives you enough raw speed to fight some of the slower combo decks.

I'm going to start digging into this deck again, after having some moderate success with my B/G/w Rock deck.

Starting point (realize I have a combo-heavy metagame, GSZ + Teeg is neccessary maindeck):

4x Wild Nacatl
4x Steppe Lynx
4x Vexing Devil
3x Tarmogoyf
3x Grim Lavamancer
1x Qasali Pridemage
1x Gaddock Teeg

2x Green Sun's Zenith
4x Path to Exile
4x Lightning Bolt
4x Lightning Helix
3x Chain Lightning
2x Boros Charm
2x Sylvan Library

19-20 lands (possibly going to 61 in the main)


Sideboard: some mix of Choke, Ethersworn Canonist, Surgical Extraction, Sulfuric Vortex, Oblivion Ring, Krosan Grip, etc. Combo hate, grave hate, some blue hate, and a way to break out of a Counterbalance lock.

[Capt4in]

I take back all the mean things I said about this thread a few pages ago. This is fantastic. I can always use a good laugh.


It is good to see you guys catching on to Boros Charm though, despite all the dismissal when I posted about it earlier.

[Mr. Safety]

I've been on the Boros Charm bandwagon since it was printed. I think it does nicely as a substitute for Price of Progress, especially against decks that don't use a lot of non-basics. Doubling up on Goyf can net you 5+ damage from it, too.

[Mr. Safety]

How many copies of Boros Charm are people playing in their Zoo lists?

Zero is the wrong answer...

That was me...

[zulander]

I know this is bad, but what would a goyf-less zoo deck look like? I still haven't been able to drop that much on them just yet :(

[lordofthepit]

I know this is bad, but what would a goyf-less zoo deck look like? I still haven't been able to drop that much on them just yet :(

Maverick.

Although here's a list that I ran pretty successfully for months at various tournaments before the metagame shifted. It's a Goyfless list, but not due to budget reasons.

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Windswept Heath
3 Taiga
2 Savannah
1 Plateau
4 Punishing Fire
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Karakas
1 Dryad Arbor
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Qasali Pridemage
1 Gaddock Teeg
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Punishing Fire
4 Green Sun's Zenith
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
(2 flex spots)

It had positive matchups against RUG, Stoneblade, Goblins, Merfolk, Counterbalance, and Grindstone decks. It was a slight favorite against Reanimator and Sneak Attack (pre-Griselbrand).

That being said, it would not be competitive in the current metagame:
- Control has the ability to easily sweep away your board with Terminus and to both disrupt Punishing Fire inevitability with Rest in Peace or simply by racing you with a bunch of Angels.
- Reanimator's creatures are no longer as vulnerable to Karakas (or Maze of Ith for the ones that you cared about). Griselbrand hitting the board early is enough to get the job done, plus you can't easily kill it like you could Jin (either in combat, with a REB, etc.).
- Sneak Attack is a lot more consistent for the same reason.
- Show and Tell decks which don't use Sneak Attack were always a terrible matchup and seem to be on the rise.
- Elves was a terrible matchup since you only have 12 relevant cards against them (besides a quick Wild Nacatl clock). Now the new lists are even faster because they could just Natural Order or Zenith for a Craterhoof.
- The black attrition decks that usually relied on fragile creatures gained Liliana of the Veil. That's not a problem by itself (such as in Deadguy Ale, with so many fragile creatures that you can easily destroy), but we're talking about Junk with Knight of the Reliquary, it's a different story altogether.

Even the "good" matchups (BUG control, Team America, Jund, Maverick, etc.) are not easy. I don't see any compelling reason to play Zoo at the moment.

[SpikeyMikey]

I know this is bad, but what would a goyf-less zoo deck look like? I still haven't been able to drop that much on them just yet :(

Do we know that going 'goyfless is bad? Sometimes, you have cards that are iconic in a given deck or even across many decks in a format. Cards become iconic by being really, really good. Sometimes, these cards fall out of favor because something better is printed. There was a time when Mask of Memory and Sword of Fire and Ice were the two most played equipment. Now, Umezawa's Jitte and Batterskull see 10 times as much play as Sword and Mask sees 0 play at all. Naturalize gave way to Krosan Grip.

Sometimes, iconic cards fall out of favor because of shifts in the metagame. Counterbalance was once everywhere. Now it's played in 1 deck and it's not even a full Countertop package there. Sometimes the fall of an iconic card is cataclysmic, usually in cases where the card is supplanted by an improved descendant, but sometimes because of metagame shifts (think Vengevine in the wake of the banning of Survival). Sometimes, the fall is something that happens slowly and takes months for people to recognize (think Kird Ape into Hidden Herd in this very thread).

Now, I'm not saying that Tarmogoyf has fallen. But what I am saying is that every card always deserves our evaluation. Sometimes, we don't evaluate cards because we don't have time. So we go by old evaluations. Generally, that's ok. If I looked at the role of Force of Will in a given style of deck 6 months ago, I am probably ok with running Force of Will in that style of deck today. However, that does not mean that there won't be times where Force of Will is wrong. We've seen that in lists that shave Forces in times when combo presence is down. Force is as iconic as a card can get, having been present in the format at all times since before Legacy was even its own format. But sometimes, a deck can support Force of Will but doesn't want to.

So lets examine what Zoo wants to do. Where does Zoo want to position itself in the field? Well, we're similar to a number of other archetypes. Maverick has a similar positioning. Cheap creatures that *do* stuff, backed with some utility and a relatively aggressive bent. They're definitely more controlling than we are, but at their heart, they're generally aggressive. Burn is similar as well, in the other direction. They have less permanent threats than we do, but they're very aggressive and even more reliant on turn 3 goldfishes for wins than we are; burn runs out of steam very quickly. Finally, Affinity is a more distant analogue than Maverick or Burn, but still a similar style of deck. Affinity runs lots of cheap on-board threats and a little utility, but they're more all-in on a couple of haymaker threats (MoE, Plating, Tezz). Imagine if you were still running Apes and Lions and really banking on 4xFireblast and 4x Price of Progress to push victories through and you've got a close approximation of Affinity.

Let's also look at what the big dogs are in the metagame, because that's what we're trying to position ourselves against. The decks that we really have to be aware of are Jund, BUG, Stoneblade, Miracles, Show and Tell (Sneak and Omni variants) and Storm. Those decks are more common and represent more T8's than other archetypes. That's not to say that you want to be dead in the water vs. Dredge or Elves or any other less-played archetype, but you're more concerned with the matchups against the big 6 than you are against the rest of the field.

Jund, BUG and Stoneblade are all midrange decks. Zoo's creatures are going to matchup poorly against these decks because our creatures generally don't *do* stuff. Wild Nacatl is just a vanilla beater, whereas Deathrite Shaman doesn't beat for as much, but has significant added utility. Because their creatures all do stuff, they're slower. Utility creatures cost more than vanilla beaters. This also means that they need to run disruption, whether it's discard, counters, or board interaction. They're going to seek to drag us into a long game where they can beat us with incremental advantage and superior card quality.

Miracles represents the formats only real control deck. It runs significantly more disruption than the midrange decks and wins with combos (whether it's the CB soft-lock, the RiPHelm instant win or just an EoT miracled Entreat into a lethal swing). While they run more disruption, less of their disruption comes in the way of blockers; they're not going to outclass our creatures because they barely run any. So they have to interact with us via non-creature spells.

Show and Tell and Storm are both factors in the format because they're stable iterations of combo. Belcher, SI, the Balustrad deck and TinFins are faster, but they're less resilient to disruptive pressure. In order to achieve that resilience, they make heavy use of cantrips and other draw smoothing effects. This allows them to find pieces that have been stripped from their hand or find their own disruption to counteract opposing counterspells, but it also means that they usually have to spend a turn or two setting up their combo; they're not structured to push for the T1 win every time. Generally, you've got until turn 3 to beat these decks, turn 4 with a piece of disruption.

Now the combo decks aren't going to interact with you much at all. It's simply not profitable for them to spend a turn trying to slow you down; they want to race you. If you hit critical mass before them, you win. If you don't, you lose. So beating combo is all about having that turn 3 goldfish as consistently as possible. Beating Miracles comes down to not letting them get you in a headlock. You need to either kill them before they can lock you out with CB/Top or RiP/Energy Field or you need to be able to disrupt those soft-locks. If they can drag the game out long enough, through the use of counters and Terminus, you reach a point where they can bring their big gun (Jace, TMS) to bear on you. At that point, you're going to be grasping at straws. So you either need to be really, really fast or relatively fast and relatively disruptive. The midrange decks push you to the other end of the spectrum. Being really, really fast can beat them as well, but often, because they can negate your creatures relatively early with a combination of removal and blockers, you're leaning heavily on your burn suite to get you there. And sometimes, when they have a less creature or removal heavy draw and a more disruptive draw, your burn is not as good and you're relying heavily on your creatures to get there. Beating removal heavy draws is about having removal of your own to disrupt their creatures and maintain tempo. Beating disruption heavy draws is about having 1 or two heavy hitters that can carry while they're playing with your hand.

To recap, combo forces you to play a faster game. Control forces you to either go faster or become better at interacting with non-creature spells. Midrange forces you to become better at interacting with creatures while playing more solid stand-alone threats and a solid burn suite.

Obviously, we can't do all of these things at once. So we pick and choose. We hedge our bets a little with flexible cards like Qasali Pridemage. It's not as good vs. artifacts and enchantments as Nature's Claim. It's not as good of a threat vs. combo as Wild Nacatl. It's somewhere in the middle and allows us game vs. everything. I see Tarmogoyf falling into this category. Tarmogoyf is a glue card. It holds the deck together on less-than-stellar draws. It gives you a real threat vs. the midrange decks. It still applies pressure to storm, although not as well as Nacatl. It lets you clock Miracles without overextending into Terminus. It's not the best card for any of those roles, but it's fair to excellent in them. To touch back to the first paragraph about analagous decks, Tarmogoyf is a Cranial Plating. Getting rid of Tarmogoyf doesn't mean that your deck becomes bad, it simply means that you can't build your deck around shitty enablers and a few key threats. You need to run more to the burn model and push for faster goldfishes. In fact, a Zoo deck without Tarmogoyf would arguably just be a burn deck... splash green. You improve on Hellspark Elemental and Keldon Mauraders with Wild Nacatl and Hidden Herd. You still run a heavy burn suite, all of which would be reasonable to run in an actual burn deck. The only difference between you and burn at that point is the swap from black to green.

So what would 'goyfless Zoo look like? It would look like a burn deck.



Mr. Safety: I'm not sure why combo-heavy meta means you have to run GSZ->Teeg. When you break that down into strategy terms, what you're saying is: "I like the idea of killing my opponent on turn 3. But because so many decks in my area will kill me on turn 3 unless I kill them, I'm going to spend slots in my deck on a way to tutor up a disruptive creature on turn 3. Then they can't win until they deal with it!" Well yeah, that's true. But GSZ into Teeg on turn 3, while reliable, seems less reliable than melting their face on turn 3. I would argue that a combo-heavy metagame is a reason not to run GSZ. A control heavy metagame is. Reckless Charge shines vs. combo and is mediocre to terrible vs. everything else. It's not great vs. combo because it disrupts their goldfish but because it represents 6-7 additional damage on your clock (for Wild Nacatl/Vexing Devil) in ideal circumstances and 3 (same as bolt) the rest of the time.

[Capt4in]

I put together a goyfless list on MTGO for a while. Replaced Goyfs with a mix of Thalia, Teeg, and Stoneforge Mystic for Sword of Body and Mind/Jitte. It seemed fine, though the MTGO meta is full of combo so I didn't put up a ton of finishes with it. Here's one that I did alright in, despite playing against combo all 4 rounds (Show and Tell, Elves, Reanimator, and Metalworker)

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Digital/MagicOnlineTourn.aspx?x=mtg/digital/magiconline/tourn/4965303
I'
This was before Boros Charm. I'd probably add 2-3 charms to this list in place of the Price of Progress and one or both Helixes.

If you're building the deck on MTGO, I'd add extra Thalias as well. In paper, 2 is plenty.

The lands are bad mostly for budget reasons. Savannah costs 4x as Plateau on MTGO, and the Bloodstained Mires were because I already owned them for a burn list and figured I could save on with minimal problems. Not many people play Wasteland decks on MTGO.

If you go this route, I would also seriously consider Sword of Light and Shadow over Body and Mind. I'd personally still prefer BaM, since it gets you past Goyfs and provides an immediate, guaranteed impact (SoLaS relies on you both having a dead creature and being able to cast it, but you get the Wolf right away), but I can see a strong argument for SoLaS, mostly because it stops you from getting brickwalled by Batterskull or Tombstalker, as well as giving you a little bit of extra time to try and beat a Griselbrand (you get one attack after he is in play). Also protection from Swords to Plowshares/Path to Exile is a pretty big game. I don't think Fire and Ice or Feast and Famine are viable options. War and Peace provides you with some pure aggression, but pro-red is pretty irrelevant (+2 toughness is basically protection from Bolt anyway) and in that situation you're probably just as well off with a Jitte.

All this said, I still think Goyf is the best option, but I don't think he's so incredibly good (especially in Zoo) that Stoneforge Mystic/Thalia aren't viable alternatives if you're operating on a budget. It's not like Zoo with Goyfs is a top tier deck these days, after all.

[bizdoin]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7YAFiVq8Pw

[woremak]

Hey I 4-0'd a Legacy event at my LGS last night with this list:

4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
4 Loam Lion
4 Burning-Tree Emissary
4 Experiment One
4 Goblin Guide
4 Dryad Militant
2 Firedrinker Satyr (I was going to play Vexing Devil but couldn't find them in time, I wouldn't play Satyr again)

4 Lightning Bolt
2 Boros Charm
4 Warrior's Lesson

4 Wooded Foothills
4 Windswept Heath
3 Arid Mesa
3 Taiga
2 Plateau
2 Savannah
1 Mountain
1 Forest

I beat High Tide, Maverick, UR Delver with Young Pyromancer and Reanimator. The only deck I felt like I shouldn't have beaten was Reanimator. Just some food for thought. When I drew Lesson against my non-combo opponents it was awesome.

[Megadeus]

Interesting list. Loses to Chalice, but I mean whatever right? haha. So lesson is really good then?

[zulander]

Please don't post in this thread anymore, the new Zoo primer is here: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?25707-Primer-Deck-Zoo