wcm8
02-03-2012, 10:45 AM
The name is in reference to this player's unconventional approach to playing a sideboard consisting entirely/mostly of singletons.
There are a few things about this approach that I think lend it merit:
1. You diversify your answers/options against the field. In a field as wide-open as Legacy, having at least a few cards to side in against any given matchup gives you a better chance of winning than not having any.
2. You can throw off your opponent. Suppose you blow them out game 2 with Pernicious Deed. Your opponent might decide to either play around it or try bringing in stuff like Pithing Needle/Phyrexian Revoker.
3. A lesser strength, but something to consider: you don't open yourself up as much to being destroyed by a well-timed Surgical Extraction/Extirpate. Or something like Meddling Mage, although that card rarely sees play anymore.
4. With the tutor-centric nature that Legacy is moving towards, not to mention the high density of card filter/draw, it is also possible to expect to see your one-of at some point in a match when it matters.
5. You can more easily justify playing a very narrow hate card without burdening the rest of your SB with something you won't SB in against any other matchup.
Now there are some obvious problems with the approach as well:
1. Some cards are just such blow-outs against a popular deck that it makes sense to run them in multiples since you can reasonably expect to see that deck multiple times in a tournament.
2. The colors in your deck don't actually provide that many useful options aside from the accepted norms. For example, if you are playing white and want more creature removal, you will probably just run Path to Exile/Wrath of God and call it a day. Compare that to playing black as your removal color, where you may consider singletons like Darkblast, Ghastly Demise, Go for the Throat, etc.
3. There may not be any cards that have the same functional overlap. Suppose you want something like Krosan Grip. You could consider Nature's Claim, Seal of Primordium, or some other form of green artifact/enchantment removal. However, none of these cards are as effective at dealing with Countertop and/or Batterskull as Grip is.
4. You are playing a deck that is incredibly weak to a certain strategy and need to overload on a card to have a chance at beating that matchup. In these instances, you might not have the luxury of having multiple selections.
5. One-ofs *are* random, and you can't expect to always see them in time when it matters.
There are some instances where there are cards that function essentially the same and if you are running multiples of that effect, it makes some sense to do a split. For example:
Red Elemental Blast/Pyroblast
Perish/Nature's Ruin
Here is an experimental sideboard of mine for a Team America deck:
1 Spell Pierce
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Darkblast
1 Ghastly Demise
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Diabolic Edict
1 Massacre
1 Life from the Loam
1 Krosan Grip
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Pernicious Deed
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Nihil Spell Bomb
The main deck is relatively tight, so in some matchups I might only be siding out a few cards. At first glance it looks completely random, but when you break it up into what archetype the cards are attacking it begins to make sense.
Vs. Aggro:
Darkblast, Ghastly Demise, Massacre, Diabolic Edict, Pernicious Deed, Engineered Explosives, (sometimes Jace)
Vs. Control:
Spell Pierce, Vendilion Clique, Jace TMS, Life from the Loam, Krosan Grip, Thrun
Vs. Combo:
Spell Pierce, Vendilion Clique, Surgical Extraction, possibly some others depending on the matchup
Vs. Graveyard Decks
Tormod's Crypt, Nihil Spell Bomb, Surgical Extraction, (Spell Pierce, Deed, Explosives, Darkblast, maybe even Clique vs. Dredge), (Spell Pierce, Diabolic Edict, Jace, Clique vs. Reanimator)
Look at that last one. Against reanimator, I can potentially be bringing in 7~ cards that are reasonably good in the matchup. I *could* blow them out by playing 4 Tormod's Crypt, 3 Spell Pierce instead, but a lot of those cards serve utility in plenty of other games.
Anyways, just something to think about.
There are a few things about this approach that I think lend it merit:
1. You diversify your answers/options against the field. In a field as wide-open as Legacy, having at least a few cards to side in against any given matchup gives you a better chance of winning than not having any.
2. You can throw off your opponent. Suppose you blow them out game 2 with Pernicious Deed. Your opponent might decide to either play around it or try bringing in stuff like Pithing Needle/Phyrexian Revoker.
3. A lesser strength, but something to consider: you don't open yourself up as much to being destroyed by a well-timed Surgical Extraction/Extirpate. Or something like Meddling Mage, although that card rarely sees play anymore.
4. With the tutor-centric nature that Legacy is moving towards, not to mention the high density of card filter/draw, it is also possible to expect to see your one-of at some point in a match when it matters.
5. You can more easily justify playing a very narrow hate card without burdening the rest of your SB with something you won't SB in against any other matchup.
Now there are some obvious problems with the approach as well:
1. Some cards are just such blow-outs against a popular deck that it makes sense to run them in multiples since you can reasonably expect to see that deck multiple times in a tournament.
2. The colors in your deck don't actually provide that many useful options aside from the accepted norms. For example, if you are playing white and want more creature removal, you will probably just run Path to Exile/Wrath of God and call it a day. Compare that to playing black as your removal color, where you may consider singletons like Darkblast, Ghastly Demise, Go for the Throat, etc.
3. There may not be any cards that have the same functional overlap. Suppose you want something like Krosan Grip. You could consider Nature's Claim, Seal of Primordium, or some other form of green artifact/enchantment removal. However, none of these cards are as effective at dealing with Countertop and/or Batterskull as Grip is.
4. You are playing a deck that is incredibly weak to a certain strategy and need to overload on a card to have a chance at beating that matchup. In these instances, you might not have the luxury of having multiple selections.
5. One-ofs *are* random, and you can't expect to always see them in time when it matters.
There are some instances where there are cards that function essentially the same and if you are running multiples of that effect, it makes some sense to do a split. For example:
Red Elemental Blast/Pyroblast
Perish/Nature's Ruin
Here is an experimental sideboard of mine for a Team America deck:
1 Spell Pierce
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Darkblast
1 Ghastly Demise
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Diabolic Edict
1 Massacre
1 Life from the Loam
1 Krosan Grip
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Pernicious Deed
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Nihil Spell Bomb
The main deck is relatively tight, so in some matchups I might only be siding out a few cards. At first glance it looks completely random, but when you break it up into what archetype the cards are attacking it begins to make sense.
Vs. Aggro:
Darkblast, Ghastly Demise, Massacre, Diabolic Edict, Pernicious Deed, Engineered Explosives, (sometimes Jace)
Vs. Control:
Spell Pierce, Vendilion Clique, Jace TMS, Life from the Loam, Krosan Grip, Thrun
Vs. Combo:
Spell Pierce, Vendilion Clique, Surgical Extraction, possibly some others depending on the matchup
Vs. Graveyard Decks
Tormod's Crypt, Nihil Spell Bomb, Surgical Extraction, (Spell Pierce, Deed, Explosives, Darkblast, maybe even Clique vs. Dredge), (Spell Pierce, Diabolic Edict, Jace, Clique vs. Reanimator)
Look at that last one. Against reanimator, I can potentially be bringing in 7~ cards that are reasonably good in the matchup. I *could* blow them out by playing 4 Tormod's Crypt, 3 Spell Pierce instead, but a lot of those cards serve utility in plenty of other games.
Anyways, just something to think about.