Oracle Opposition

[Sibelius]

Hi, my friend Pierre came Top8 at Bazaar of Moxen Strasbourg with this SWEET GUb Opposition deck.


Main
2 Bayou
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Forest
3 Gaea’s Cradle
3 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs

4 Coiling Oracle
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Deathrite Shaman
3 Shardless Agent
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Wirewood Symbiote

3 Garruk Wildspeaker
3 Opposition

3 Abrupt Decay
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Green Sun’s Zentih


Side
2 Dismember
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Pithing Needle
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Spellskite
1 Surgical Extraction
3 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Thoughtseize
3 Winter Orb


He wrote about it for me here. Matchups and sideboard etc

https://thelibraryatpendrellvale.com/oracle-opposition/

CFB and SCG have featured it on their main pages as well if you want a different take.

http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/legacy-sultai-opposition-deck-guide/
http://www.starcitygames.com/article/33270_Daily-Digest-Anyone-Who-Opposes-Me-Will-Be-Destroyed.html



Hope you enjoy it!

Sib

[HSCK]

I think this deck is super interesting. I was already trying out CloudVine when this deck showed up. Still going CloudVine route but with Oppositions, but might try this deck straight if it doesn't work out.

[Fatal]

One word why this deck doesn't get decent results: Terminus :/

[dte]

Why should this deck care about it?

Otherwise to me the deck looks so sweet. I would just look at a way to improve combo MUs.

[Echelon]

With that many Elves, I could see a singleton Birchlore Rangers add some value. An extra mana here or there can be crucial at times. Same goes for a Quirion Ranger.

[mistercakes]

I have played the deck in two local events here in NY.

went 4-0 the first night, against
eldrazi
eldrazi
merfolk
infect
(i had – 1 trop +1 Cradle for that night)

last night I played it again, but cut 1 visionary for a 2nd symbiote
made some sb changes this time as well (had played an extra surgical and a Marsh casualties… I can’t recall if I had the 4th abrupt decay in the sb this time. will have to look at the physical cards.

went 4-0 again
burn
aggro loam
miracles
eldrazi

i have been sideboarding differently in the eldrazi match-ups and miracles match-up than what Pierre has suggested in his library post.

i had noticed that the deck is pretty mana hungry and the deck sometimes can fail on itself of you don't get 2 lands in play (and they hit a removal spell)

edit : went through match history on modo.

modo league 1: (2-3)

list was pierre's 75 list exact

0-2 elves (he trounced me)
0-2 storm (he trounced me)
0-2 infect (his draws were above average but he got there)
2-1 standstill (i think his draws were okay, and i just cantripped too many times)
2-1 reanimator (i had good draws)

modo league 2: (2-3)

i changed a few cards here.

-1 visionary, -4 probe, -2 therapy
+1 symbiote, +1 deathrite shaman, +2 winter orb, +2 thorn of amethyst
sb had added a marsh casualties and a 4th abrupt decay (cutting 1 dismember and something else)

1-2 infect (marsh casualties was an autowin during game 2. game 3 he brainstormed into invigorate when i was at 5 counters turn before opposition prison lock)
2-0 ur delver (kept him off price of progress and abrupt decayed some guys)
2-1 eldrazi (this matchup seems pretty favorable overall)
1-2 bug nic fit (he had multiple deeds and wrecked me with cabal therapies. he also was the reanimator player i beat in the previous league so his blind therapies were good.)
1-2 miracles (i think i made a few misplays here as i had thorn out game 3 and didn't sequence things properly with shardless agents.)

-rob

[Sibelius]

I think like any new deck there needs to be alot of practice with it before we decide what 'Tier' it is. That categorisation can often be a limiting factor on people picking it up so I think it would be best to shift away from such thoughts.
The deck is obviously powerful as Pierre did so well. He is also kinda good at magic ....

Here are some Videos from the tournament. He was on camera ALOT.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1pM_nbcISg - top8 vs Elves

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5M1P7aNHgo - Round 7 vs Lands :(

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QyU4FlirAxc - Round 4 vs Julian Knab Elves

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4n8x4L1_yQ0 - Round 2 vs Lands

Hope this helps

Sib

[mistercakes]

I am 8-0 in local events so I'm very happy with the deck's performance. I didn't mean to focus on the tier comment, it was more of a push to play a deck because it's enjoyable.

[Alexeezay]

As an old Elves player, I got really excited about Opposition.

Took the 'stock list' and cut 3 Garruk, 1 Underground Sea, 1 Dryad Arbor 3 Shardless Agent for: 2 Tamiyo, Field Resarcher 1 Fetch 2 Savannah 1 Quirion Ranger 1 Scavenging Ooze 1 Reclamation Sage. Because of this I change I cut the 3rd Cradle for 2nd Wirewood Symbiote.
And my SB looks like this:
4 Force of Will
4 Meddling Mage
3 Winter Orb
2 Dismember
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Garruk Relentless

I think this configuration gives me a nice edge vs combo (high blue count and t0 interaction) & also Lands, Meddling Mage on Fire/Loam is huge while using Winter Orb or other effects to hinder them. Mage is also usable vs Miracles.

I am just starting to test this, so let's see if Tamiyo is worth it! I might go back to Shardless Agents for the blue count and CA but I really like these bullets in the maindeck.

[mistercakes]

As an old Elves player, I got really excited about Opposition.

Took the 'stock list' and cut 3 Garruk, 1 Underground Sea, 1 Dryad Arbor 3 Shardless Agent for: 2 Tamiyo, Field Resarcher 1 Fetch 2 Savannah 1 Quirion Ranger 1 Scavenging Ooze 1 Reclamation Sage. Because of this I change I cut the 3rd Cradle for 2nd Wirewood Symbiote.
And my SB looks like this:
4 Force of Will
4 Meddling Mage
3 Winter Orb
2 Dismember
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Garruk Relentless

I think this configuration gives me a nice edge vs combo (high blue count and t0 interaction) & also Lands, Meddling Mage on Fire/Loam is huge while using Winter Orb or other effects to hinder them. Mage is also usable vs Miracles.

I am just starting to test this, so let's see if Tamiyo is worth it! I might go back to Shardless Agents for the blue count and CA but I really like these bullets in the maindeck.

sounds rather fun. i would argue that cutting the land is probably not correct. cut 1 of the cantrip guys over cutting the land. i do like the idea of a tamiyo or two. definitely worth trying out!

also try running garruk wildspeaker at least as a 1 of if you haven't so far. out of my wins with this deck many of them were because of garruk. anyway, best of luck with testing.

[mistercakes]

modo league 3:

went back to original list -1 visionary +1 symbiote
sb is
pierre's -1 spellbomb, -1 dismember, +1 marsh casualties, +1 surgical extraction

2-0 reanimator
0-2 storm (game 2 i surgicaled his infernal tutors on turn 1, but i just stumbled around after that and he was able to find his past in flames and tendrils without any tutors)
0-0 was winning game 1 of miracles then server crashed
0-2 omni show (game 1 he rips show and tell with only emrakul left in hand, game 2 my hand wasn't disruptive enough)
0-2 sneak and show (game 1 he beats me, game 2 i surgical his show and tell. he has a turn 1 top and is able to find a sneak attack + grisel into emrakul off. not much i can do there)
2-0 eldrazi (i had pretty decent draws, game 1 he had a fast start but i got a cabal therapy on 2 reality smasher...then i stabilized b/c he didn't want to attack. game 2 i got an early opposition and was able to kill his jitte)

really disappointed in magic online. i've played vs clashed in each of my leagues. while he is a good player, i would welcome more delver decks (he tends to play unfair blue decks).

matchups over 3 leagues + 1 server crash game

2 show and tell decks
2 miracles
2 storm
2 infect
2 reanimator
1 eldrazi
1 elves
1 ur delver
1 bug nic fit
1 ur standstill

i thought delver was supposed to be popular.

would still like to figure out which matches are favorable or not with this list, so including paper games as well.

5 eldrazi (5-0)
3 infect (1-2)
3 miracles (1-1 + server crash)
2 show and tell decks (0-2)
2 storm (0-2)
2 reanimator (2-0)
1 elves (0-1)
1 ur delver (1-0)
1 bug nic fit (0-1)
1 ur standstill (1-0)
1 merfolk (1-0)
1 burn (1-0)
1 aggro loam (1-0)

23 matches, still not a sign of rug/bug/4c/grixis delver, shardless, lands, death and taxes, mud, 12 post, dredge
lots of eldrazi though. i guess keep them coming.

thoughts? comments?

[.Ix]

This deck looks like a TON of fun! Unfortunately for me my meta is 50% combo so it's not a good idea to play it stock.

Why does this deck not run Brainstorm? And why 8 cantrip creatures? Seems way too redundant. I think cutting all 3 Shardless Agents and 1 Visionary for 4 Brainstorm could be a good call. I've goldfished it a few times and already cascaded into blank zeniths (already found both dryads).

[mistercakes]

using both dryads isn't very common, but it's not the best when it does. i have gone down to 2 shardless agents, and have considered brainstorm a lot for this deck.

the deck functions very well without brainstorm (sometimes blue mana isn't the easiest to come by)

also - just because you want to try brainstorm doesn't mean you need to run a full playset.

my current list is:

2 Bayou
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Forest
4 Gaea’s Cradle
3 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs

4 Coiling Oracle
3 Elvish Visionary
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Deathrite Shaman
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
2 Wirewood Symbiote

3 Garruk Wildspeaker
3 Opposition

3 Abrupt Decay
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Green Sun’s Zentih

i'm not sure what you could cut, i guess you could cut a land from this list to start...possibly a 2nd visionary, and maybe the 2nd symbiote.

current sb is:

Side
1 Dismember
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Pithing Needle
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Spellskite
1 Surgical Extraction
3 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Thoughtseize
3 Winter Orb
1 Umezawa's Jitte

[Mr. Headshot]

How about Equilibrium or Cloudstone Curio?

[mistercakes]

what problem are those cards trying to solve? i'd recommend trying the deck a bunch before changing it. that should always be the first step. can you outline some of the difficulties the deck has?

so far my losses have been to faster combo decks, i'm okay with that. it's not meant to beat everything. you still can due to having good cabal therapies sometimes, and post sb you have access to some cards they may find difficult.

[.Ix]

I have goldfished the stock list and it is really fun and functions very well, but yeah it definitely looks soft to combo. I think you could cut the 4th cradle, 3rd visionary, 4th GSZ, 2nd Arbor or 4th hierarch/deathrite. There's not much of a toolbox in the deck anyway so I think the 4th gsz can go. Brainstorm helps find stuff anyway.


Edit: I have tried with -3 shardless - 1 visionary +4 brainstorm and it seems great. Just having ways to improve clunky hands is fantastic. I don't want those 4 cards against my meta anyway, so I might as well replace them with ways to find therapy.

[mistercakes]

again I'd recommend actually playing the games with the deck. the snake is easily the 2nd best card in the deck besides the Cradle and maybe garruk.

[.Ix]

I agree with you, I never mentioned cutting Oracle because I know it's one of the best cards. I will play some games with it soon, but I will start with 0 Shardless and 3 Visionary for 4 Brainstorm.

[Sibelius]

I agree with you, I never mentioned cutting Oracle because I know it's one of the best cards. I will play some games with it soon, but I will start with 0 Shardless and 3 Visionary for 4 Brainstorm.

So cut actual card advantage for pseudo card advantage, seems bad. As does removing 4 creatures which is the entire point of the deck. You can't tap them out with Brainstorms. You can't overrun them with Brainstorms ...

[.Ix]

I'm in a 50% combo meta. The turn I tap 3 for a creature, I'm dead as a dodo. Maybe this is just not a good deck to play where I live, but whatever, I'll try it anyway.

[DireLemming]

1-of Deranged Hermit (in place of 1 Garruk) is hilarious and surprisingly good in testing as it does both power up Opposition and close games quickly if need be.

Other changes I've been liking is adding Quirion Ranger & Scryb Sprites. I'm still on the fence about BS (would probably come in for the Probes but the deck is mana hungry as is).

Reminder for the storm matchup: all their mana sources besides LED need tapping and they are very sequence dependent, getting Oppo online asap is a big part in winning against storm (that and accepting a good part of SB will have to be dedicated to combo hate. BUG Nic Fit is a good place to start scavenging for ideas).

[Echelon]

Other changes I've been liking is adding Quirion Ranger

Called it a week ago!

[mistercakes]

I'm not sure there's enough mana guys to support Ranger. it'll never be a terrible card, but I think it's a lot worse in this deck than in a deck playing nettle sentinel.

[Echelon]

Are you confusing Quirion Ranger for Birchlore Rangers, by any chance..? Quirion works wonders with any mana dork, Birchlore cares specifically about Elves.

[square_two]

If I can get the Oppositions in the mail this week (seems no one around locally has any) then I'll take the deck to a couple of small legacy events this weekend.

Quirion is a good addition - I've always been impressed that Forest + Dryad Arbor + Quirion produces 4 mana by itself. And I do like that Deranged Hermit is sort of a Zenithable Garruk. Seems worse in the Miracles matchup though, which makes me hesitant.

[mistercakes]

well when you are ramping with Quirion it's to power out a massive amount of guys, this deck hasn't been so explosive. I'm not against trying it. also brainstorm could be great to ramp snake into Cradle.

[Alexeezay]

Quirion Ranger also works well with the 3 Winter Orbs from the sideboard.

Btw I played an Edric last FNM, drew me 4 cards once and 3 cards the other time (it always got killed by removal after one attack). And sadly, he got Pyroblasted vs Miracles. Glorious!

[square_two]

Quirion Ranger also works well with the 3 Winter Orbs from the sideboard.

Btw I played an Edric last FNM, drew me 4 cards once and 3 cards the other time (it always got killed by removal after one attack). And sadly, he got Pyroblasted vs Miracles. Glorious!

Nice!

I plan to test an Edric as well, in place of one of the Agents, I think. I have played a version of Nic Fit BUG and fondly remember landing Edric against a slowrolling 12Post player. Swing in with team, draw 2 cards, play some Vets and small guys. Next turn swing, draw 4 cards, play more small guys. Next turn swing, draw 6 cards...

[mistercakes]

i do agree that shardless is the weakest link in this deck. this was also the recommended cut by canali. the winter orb + ranger is a good interaction. might make more sense to run orbs in the maindeck in that case, but again this deck is quite good vs most of the fair decks (miracles included although orb would improve it more)

haven't tried edric yet, seems like it could be great. i'd rather run that over the brainstorms and it seems like it would be a fantastic gsz tutor target. the other option is to run a gaddock teeg somewhere in the 75, even though it's horrible with 10 cards in the deck, it shuts storm out until they have an answer...and you do have therapy to sacrifice or abrupt decay if you want to play them if the time is right.

alex: what part of germany are you in?

[hartigan]

1-of Deranged Hermit (in place of 1 Garruk) is hilarious and surprisingly good in testing as it does both power up Opposition and close games quickly if need be.

As soon as I saw that someone had Top 8'd a Legacy tournament with an Opposition deck I started picking up the cards I needed for it, I have played Opposition in Legacy in the past, but never has it looked so powerful (and fun) to me.

Interestingly enough I drafted a friends Legacy Cube yesterday and after first picking an Opposition I ended up drafting this:

http://i.imgur.com/3a3mleN.png

I was pretty excited to basically play the cube version of the deck I have been playtesting. Games went very smoothly, Opposition is broken in cube especially with a lot of token enablers and ramp.

My point here is, this draft got me thinking about playing Deranged Hermit in Pierre's list. Every time I put him into play I won, very easily. He either closes the game out very quickly, or forces the hard lock with Opposition.

I have started to test him in place of 1 Garruk as well and have so far been very impressed, also nothing beats the look on people's faces when you put a Deranged Hermit into play in Legacy!

[mistercakes]

would love to try to fit a skyshroud poacher somehow. he can tutor up the squirrel man, snake, or visionary, or the EtB disenchant guy. living the dream...

[Echelon]

well when you are ramping with Quirion it's to power out a massive amount of guys, this deck hasn't been so explosive. I'm not against trying it. also brainstorm could be great to ramp snake into Cradle.

You could also use it to power out an Opposition, after which you use Quirion for extra Opposition activations. If you don't have any lands to drop, you can use Quirion Ranger to untap both a Dryad Arbor (by returning it to your hand) and another creature. That's 2 extra Opposition activations @ zero cost.

[Sibelius]

Another 3rd part 'Deck Tech'

http://www.gatheringmagic.com/carlosgutierrez-07272016-opposing-forces/

Ill add it to the op :smile:

Sib

[Echelon]

One comment on the article:


"This may seem like a deck that’s weak against Terminus and can’t reasonably deal with decks like Show and Tell. However, you can tap down your opponent’s White sources in response to miracle triggers or during their upkeep."

Tap the white source in response to the miracle trigger? Seriously. You can't expect your opponent to be that stupid.

[dte]

One comment on the article:



Tap the white source in response to the miracle trigger? Seriously. You can't expect your opponent to be that stupid.

Agree 100%. Tapping manasources as an answer to a trigger?
And "this may seem weak to show and tell"? Seriously? Sneak and show is the only combo deck against which opposition is obviously great.

I do not think this article add anything or should be linked in the OP. It's a poor piece of work.

[Sibelius]

Agree 100%. Tapping manasources as an answer to a trigger?
And "this may seem weak to show and tell"? Seriously? Sneak and show is the only combo deck against which opposition is obviously great.

I do not think this article add anything or should be linked in the OP. It's a poor piece of work.

Ok. Deleted

:wink:

Sib

[Alexeezay]

I don't think you really read all of it. He said that someone new to this deck/card may assume that it is bad vs miracles/SnT but then he says it is definitely good to tap Grisel/Emrakul & I think he meant it's obviously better to tap white mana in the ukpeep.

[Darklingske]

I tested the original list yesterday against Grixis Delver and Lands. Maybe it's just me, but against Lands it was horrible. Even after side with me bringing in Ooze, Surgical, Orb, PNeedle and Spellskite, it was not enough. PFire cleans up our whole board, Wasteland eradicates our mana and they have a fast clock in Marit. I never felt in a winning mood, even when I was winning (that lone game I mean).
Against Grixis it was a bit better, but definitely not a good MU. I was really planning on playing the deck this weekend, but after such a testsession, I'm not courageous enough to do it. Back to the old Elves build I guess...

[square_two]

I tested the original list yesterday against Grixis Delver and Lands. Maybe it's just me, but against Lands it was horrible. Even after side with me bringing in Ooze, Surgical, Orb, PNeedle and Spellskite, it was not enough. PFire cleans up our whole board, Wasteland eradicates our mana and they have a fast clock in Marit. I never felt in a winning mood, even when I was winning (that lone game I mean).
Against Grixis it was a bit better, but definitely not a good MU. I was really planning on playing the deck this weekend, but after such a testsession, I'm not courageous enough to do it. Back to the old Elves build I guess...

Do you think that multiple Spellskite would be the key against Lands? More graveyard hate? I don't own even a Spellskite, wondering if I really need to pick a couple up before going to two tournaments this weekend. The lack of much card selection in here makes me want to try for a sideboard of mainly 2 of's, but that is tough.

Think my sideboard is going to be:
1 Dismember
3 Winter Orb
3 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Pithing Needle
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Thoughtseize
1 Marsh Casualties
1 Null Rod

I've been impressed with goldfishing - several times having Opposition + 5 creatures on turn 4. Of course, everything looks swell without any resistance. Will have to get some practice reps in with some buddies tonight. I've opted for -1 Agent +1 Edric but if testing tonight seems iffy with him, I'll go back to 3 Agents, they do seem sweet when you simply need more bodies. And I've made room for a Quirion Ranger who seems easier to activate if you have only managed to get Hierarchs or Dryad Arbors or Agents in play.

[Darklingske]

To improve the lands MU, I think we need more GY-hate. The spellskite could be another spellbomb or even a Relic of Progenitus.

[mistercakes]

just as a heads up, pierre said he beat 4 lands players in that BoM tourney. also i think the shardless agent is useful for the shardless and miracles matchups, if you don't expect a lot of either of them maybe pack something a bit stronger. i'm even going to try a jitte in the deck to help with the grixis matchup.

-Rob

[Darklingske]

just as a heads up, pierre said he beat 4 lands players in that BoM tourney.

Yeah, maybe it's just variance or me keeping bad hands, but I never felt I was playing magic against Lands. The Grixis MU was better, but still not good. I will try a Jitte in one slot.

[mistercakes]

still been rather busy moving around. might be a few weeks before i get a tourney or two in with the deck.

[mistercakes]

local weekly in Copenhagen, 6 rounds! had a lot of fun.

list was

4 hierarch
4 oracle
3 visionary
3 deathrite shaman
2 symbiote
1 craterhoof
4 gsz
4 therapy
4 probe
3 opposition
3 garruk wildspeaker
3 abrupt decay
1 winter orb
2 forest
4 misty
3 verdant
2 dread arbor
4 cradle
2 trop
1 sea
2 bayou

sb
1 null rod
1 pitching needle
1 marsh casualties
1 spellskite
1 reclamation sage
1 scavenging ooze
1 dismember
1 thoughtseize
2 surgical extraction
2 winter orb
3 thorn of amethyst


storm (2-1)
game 1
opponent a little rusty and a turn 1 deathrite shaman + cabal therapy puts him in a bad position
game 2 hand was too slow
game 3 cabal therapy on a good hand, but the 2nd therapy + flashback was too much.

miracles (1-1)
very long game 1 can't remember much but my hand couldn't beat the first terminus + stp + snapcaster

game 2, also long but I was able to get in a bunch of damage and deathrite shaman finished him off as his draw wasn't so good and was topdecking. I recall playing around containment priest. (his draw had mostly creatures and not spells)

then we drew


esper stoneblade (1-2)
game 1 i had a good draw game 1 and he was overwhelmed
game 2 he had a pretty good draw + jitte and tasigur. then he got back his jitte with tasigur.


bug Delver (2-1)

Game 1 he beat me with DRS and double goyfs. he had a turn 1 DRS + daze and it was hard to recover

game 2 opposition locked him down
game 3 his draw was not that great and didn't have many spells. I marsh casualties 2 flipped delver and he never really recovered.

deaths shadow (2-0)
game 1 had removal and his draw was just ok. cabal therapy was good here as well.

game 2 he thoughtseized and saw a clear path, but I drew another one the turn after. also had spellskite which prevented him from pumping his guy

miracles (1-2)

game 1 I blind cabal therapy 3 brainstorm and he never recovers

game 2 I sided out 1 decay as most miracles players tend to side them out for more removal, he played a counterbalance and blind flipped me a few times. then he got an entreat for 3 (i had the game stalled a bit with a thorn)

game 3 counterbalance + top lock and I never drew an abrupt decay. had 2 winter orbs out which were great but he had an engineered explosives and had a 2nd cbalance in hand.


thoughts on deck, maybe would want a 3rd symbiote, cut birds, want possibly 2 cavern of souls in sb.

i could see dropping the misers maindeck* winter orb and 1 garruk, 1 opposition.

with the birds and those 3 there are 4 more slots.

swap forest #2 for possibly a cavern of souls.

4 cards left
open to suggestions. brainstorm is prob worth a shot. was fun overall.


17-10 including modo
11-2-1 for paper tourneys only

5 eldrazi (5-0)
3 infect (1-2)
5 miracles (1-2-1)
2 show and tell decks (0-2)
3 storm (1-2)
2 reanimator (2-0)
1 elves (0-1)
1 ur delver (1-0)
1 bug nic fit (0-1)
1 bug delver (1-0)
1 death's shadow aggro (1-0)
1 esper stoneblade (0-1)
1 ur standstill (1-0)
1 merfolk (1-0)
1 burn (1-0)
1 aggro loam (1-0)

[dte]

Hello,

Was nice meeting you there!

I would try to fit in 2 more symbiotes, 1 birchlore, 2 BS into the 5 slots (4 you mention + 1 noble).
Your 2 defeats and draw of yesterday were versus grindy MUs, WS + coiling/visionnary (or even DRS) does wonders there.

I would also like to have a more midrange, high impact GSZ-able creature. Either WRP or deranged hermit. First one is resilient to -1/-1 effects, second one seems incredible with either oppo, WS or garruck and is 9 power on his own.

Otherwise, a question: is the spellskitse good? You cannot find it, and it does not seem that you want him in that many MUs? Maybe burn and infect, but what else?

[mistercakes]

-1 hierach, -1 birds of paradise, -1 garruk wildspeaker -1 opposition, -3 abrupt decay, -1 gaea's cradle


I'm more inclined to try the WRP as hermit feels a bit more clunky if you draw it naturally.

regarding the spellskite: the card has done really well the few matches i sided it in, even with no card drawing (now 2 brainstorms) it is well worth it in the matchups that you need it. (it can also eat up jitte -1-1 counters)

The sb needs to be revised.



last night:
sb
1 null rod
1 pitching needle
1 marsh casualties
1 spellskite
1 reclamation sage
1 scavenging ooze
1 dismember
1 thoughtseize
2 surgical extraction
2 winter orb
3 thorn of amethyst


proposed with your recommendations:

maindeck:

guys (22)

1 birchlore ranger
3 hierarch
4 oracle
3 visionary
4 deathrite shaman
4 symbiote
1 wren's run packmaster
1 reclamation sage
1 craterhoof

spells (20)

4 gsz
4 therapy
4 probe
2 opposition
2 garruk wildspeaker
1 abrupt decay
2 brainstorm

lands (19)

1 forest
1 cavern of souls
4 misty
3 verdant
2 dryad arbor
3 cradle
2 trop
1 sea
2 bayou

proposed sb:
1 pithing needle
1 marsh casualties
1 spellskite
1 scavenging ooze
1 thoughtseize
2 winter orb
2 surgical extraction
3 chalice of the void
2 abrupt decay
1 cavern of souls

[James718]

How necessary are the 4 cradles?

[dte]

How necessary are the 4 cradles?

the forth one is maybe not crucial.
but 3 at the very least are essential. It is a crazy mana acceleration, and one of the reason that Garruck is good, that winter orb can be good, that GSZ is really good, and that hoof is even remotely playable.
To sum it up, they are really important.

[mistercakes]

I've played with 4 the whole time, except in some of the modo leagues, but am willing to run a brainstorm over one of them. testing will let me know if this is advantageous.

[Scott]

Check out this (different) Oracle Opposition Deck (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/457412) that 5-0ed on MTGO today.


// Creatures
4 Coiling Oracle
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Shardless Agent
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Deathrite Shaman

// Enchantments
3 Opposition
1 Sylvan Library

// Planeswalkers
3 Tamiyo, Field Researcher

// Instants
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will

// Artifacts
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte

// Lands
4 Flooded Strand
3 Tropical Island
3 Tundra
3 Wasteland
2 Polluted Delta
2 Windswept Heath
1 Bayou
1 Scrubland
1 Underground Sea


// Sideboard
SB: 3 Abrupt Decay
SB: 3 Thorn of Amethyst
SB: 2 Meddling Mage
SB: 2 Rest in Peace
SB: 2 Swords to Plowshares
SB: 2 Winter Orb
SB: 1 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben

[mistercakes]

no arguing with those results. if that person is on the source, could they list match-ups?

i would probably like to see 2 of those goyfs as true name, as you can get it down in turn 2 and adds to force of will blue count.

[James718]

I just ordered 4 Cradles and will play the list on page 1? Any other things I should know?

Im ready to join you brothers.

Back in the old Type 2 I played a squirrel/opposition deck which was my favorite deck of all time. I can't wait to jam this.

[mistercakes]

check the most recent list with 2 brainstorms, i think that's where we're at. the other versions are also just fine!

i used to play that deck too. skyshroud poacher? he might even be okay as a 1 of in this list if we can include a hermit in the 60 as well.

[dte]

I believe hermit may be included (and I will definitely try it) with its incredible synergy with cradle, garruck, symbiote and opposition. Plus the flavour!
I definitely want one midrange GSZ target, be it him or WRP. Mistercakes convinced me that WRP is probably the right one, but I will try both (most probably Tuesday).

However, I a am more than convince that poacher is nowhere good enough: dies to bolt, disfigure and P.Fire, needs to untap to do anything, Cost 4+3 to do anything, and there is absolutely 0 other elf cards than hermit worth tutoring in that way.

[DireLemming]

WRP is significantly worse than Hermit. It doesn't work on an empty board, it's slower, doubly so if you can't spit out a wolf immediately (and if you have enough mana for that you are [almost] at Craterhoof mana). Squirrels have pseudo evasion. One nice thing about WRP is that leaves a body behind when terminused and it can stop Goyf/Angler (but in my testing that was almost never relevant. I do play with Quirion Ranger though which makes Arbor an all star blocker).

[mistercakes]

I'm not sure if you've played the deck enough.... 5 mana is a lot for this deck without an active cradle. having a Quinton Ranger does help that a lot though.

hermit is also susceptible to - 1-1 effects as something like a zealous persecution will still clobber you.

I'm not against hermit, but I don't think that wrp should be dismissed so easily.

[dte]

Have to agree with mistercakes here. Admittedly I haven't played the list yet, but I have years of experience with WRP in various elves build, and the card is much much better than what it looks like.
It is almost a game ending threat against half of the field, being extremely good vs almost every aggro or control MU.

The comment about empty board is irrelevant, as hermit cannot be realistically cast out of an empty board either.

On itself, WRP is miles better than hermit. The thing that want me to test hermit is that he has incredible synergies with the deck (WS, oppo, cradle, garruck).
And admittedly, the flavour, I loved the card since it got printed (gosh, 17 years ago), it is one of my favorite card ever, and winning games with it will most certainly make me smile.

[square_two]

Think I may try something like this for my weekly legacy night this evening. It's a very small group of us (barely made 8 last week) and some of the players are pretty inexperienced, but still might be fun just to get some time in.

Basically a more Elves-centric smashup. Opposition replacing NO, with tweaked creature base. Might be better suited for the Elves thread but should be fun to test regardless.

Creatures: 29
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Quirion Ranger
2 Heritage Druid
2 Birchlore Rangers
4 Elvish Visionary
2 Coiling Oracle
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Wren's Run Packmaster
1 Craterhoof Behemoth

Spells: 11
4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Glimpse of Nature
3 Opposition
1 Winter Orb

Lands: 20
2 Dryad Arbor
2 Forest
1 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
2 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills
2 Verdant Catacombs
2 Misty Rainforest
1 Cavern of Souls
4 Gaea's Cradle

I'm not sure of the side yet but it'll probably have some number of Abrupt Decay, Cabal Therapy, Surgical, and maybe another Winter Orb or two. Couple Jitte's as well.

I think Garruk Wildspeaker could really shine somewhere in the 75, just not sure where to put him. With more creatures, his -1 isn't as needed here. But the Overrun could be more deadly. WRP might just be more consistent with having more elves available.

If anything seems obviously out of place/odd, let me know and I'll consider it before tonight.

[mistercakes]

maybe drop 1 nettle for 1 garruk.

garruk also makes 3/3/s for opposition!

[kalkhasse]

I tired the original list in a small event and in 4 rounds I only Opposition-locked my opponent once. In my opinion the best thing about the deck is the card advantage you get with Symbiote and Visionary/Oracle together with having Abrupt Decay and Cabal Therapy. Garruk was also an MVP, it was good every time I played it. And in the same way Shardless Agent always felt week.

So in my limited testing the deck felt almost like a more midrange Elves deck, which is all nice since I like that aspect of Elves. But I also felt that except for Garruk the deck is very sensitive to the same hate as regular Elves but slow enough that you always have to play through it since you rarely have the option to combo off before hate comes online.

What I missed was some way to get more explosive mana, like 1 Heritage Druid or a Birchlore Rager. I'm also thinking about adding the 4th Abrupt Decay since I loved it in the games I played. I'm also not sure I love the Gitaxian Probes as a 4-of. I'm thinking 2 or something. Also at least 2 Symbiotes feels mandatory.
WRP seems like a good complement to Garruk. I would really like having them out at the same time. :)

[square_two]

maybe drop 1 nettle for 1 garruk.

garruk also makes 3/3/s for opposition!

I tried this, really enjoyed the Garruk. I only saw it against Miracles though. Winter Orb gave me enough time to get multiple 3/3 beasts onto the field and have a ton of pressure.

I went undefeated and split finals with a 4c Delver list, who ran me over in two friendly games. I beat 12Post, NO Rug, and Miracles. 12Post I was able to get Opposition out early and then completely lock him down, then barely got a Hoof out in time in game 3 to win before he did shenanigans. NO Rug I had quick Hoof game 1, then in game 2 he punted and got Elderscale Wurm instead of Progenitus when I didn't have much of a board. I had time to get Opposition out and take over the game, and eventually find a DRS to drain him below 7. Think I had up to 25 wolf tokens thanks to WRP. Miracles I saw the power of Winter Orb, albeit my opponent had some poor hands in games 2 and 3.

My side was:
1 Garruk Wildspeaker
2 Winter Orb
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Pithing Needle
1 Thoughtseize
3 Cabal Therapy
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Flusterstorm

I'd echo @kalkhasse:


So in my limited testing the deck felt almost like a more midrange Elves deck, which is all nice since I like that aspect of Elves. But I also felt that except for Garruk the deck is very sensitive to the same hate as regular Elves but slow enough that you always have to play through it since you rarely have the option to combo off before hate comes online.

I really like that getting Opposition into play even while you have only 1 or 2 creatures can really help stabilize and then completely take over the game. Enjoyed it more than Natural Order in this aspect. Yet we can be a tad slower and thus our creatures are more sensitive to early wraths and such. Not sure if hand disruption from the side should come in against red decks, or stuff like Flusterstorm.

The manabase is really difficult - I am going to go down to possibly 1 or 0 Coiling Oracles since they seem clunky. I do really like them as sort of classy Visionaries...maybe 1 to GSZ for once I have Symbiote engine going. I will try to add another Nettle Sentinel and Birchlore Rangers. The rangers' ability to add mana of any color seemed very key to being able to get down Opposition. Garruk I think I'll leave just to the side.

So something even closer to traditional Elves, albeit with more focus on Birchlore. Not sure if Winter Orb is worth the mainboard, there are many decks that won't care that much.

Same list as before, but -1 Oracle, -1 Winter Orb, +1 Birchlore Rangers, +1 Glimpse of Nature. I'll probably go to 7 fetches and add another Bayou, since I had trouble casting Decays from the side.

[James718]

How do you guys like the new Legendary BUG elf?

[EunB]

How do you guys like the new Legendary BUG elf?

I think he deserves a sideboard slot at least and a maindeck possibility for GSZ. I like that he helps us stay up on creature count in face of removal and also helps out vs Wastelands.

[dte]

I played the deck yesterday to an awful 3-3 record.
The deck felt like it had an unbeatable endgame (I played 4 WS and they were by far the best performing cards of the evening), but very soft to very fast strategy.

Played 2 cavern of souls, and they were underwhelming.

Got beaten by reanimator (G1 Entomb T1, rea Elesh T2; G2 win with discard, ooze and drs; G3 loss despite a 2 DRS, discard and ooze hand), Death shadow (way to fast to be handled) and storm (mulled hands in G1 and G2 that would have been perfect if CoS was a fetchland or bayou).

The deck was fun to play, but felt softer to fast strategies than I thought (I ran the 4 GP - 4 CT 1 daze MD alongside 3 seize, 1 SE, 1 CotV, 1 daze, 1 flusterstorm SB).
It is of course to small a sample to draw conclusions from it, but that was how it felt.

[mistercakes]

i think maybe you just got a bit unlucky. i had good hands vs a storm player and likely the same shadow deck while i was over there and managed to squeak out some wins. they were almost exclusively due to well timed therapies and some abrupt decays...i do agree though that is part of the deck's weakness and it might just be worth it as sometimes you'll get lucky and not play vs the fast decks. can't beat everything, but you can have fun and win sometimes :)

-rob

[James718]

I tried playing this yesterday (the BUG version) and board wipes are blowouts. I may try the bant version next.

[mistercakes]

I feel like this deck holds up to sweepers decently but you'll need to play more symbiotes. the 8 cantrip guys are pretty effective at ensuring you always have some extras post sweep. it's possible you didn't have good draws.

[James718]

I only played 2 symbiotes. My version had 3 visionaries , 4 oracles and 2 brainstorms. I cut all Shardless agents

[James718]

Has anyone tried Alluren in here?

[HSCK]

I really liked the Bant version, has anyone tried out Leovold?

[mistercakes]

i don't think anyone has tried the new guy yet, i haven't been able to make it out to a tourney in a few weeks now (other than a starcity, where i played a different deck). i will do some testing over the next few weeks.

-Rob

[James718]

Leovold is awesome. I use him as a one of because we can green Suns for him. Everytime I don't gsz for him asap I regret it.

Some changes that I have been trying.

Arachnogenesis and Ishkana
After losing to flipped delvers really quickly I'm trying these as a way to stop the flyer attack. Both also add fuel to an eventual opposition. A Winters Blast may be worthwhile as well.

[James718]

The new Nissa looks like it can fit in here. So much card advantage!

[HSCK]

Another top 8 with the original list.

[James718]

I have added 2 Arachnogenesis and an Ishkana to the board. Those additions have helped dramatically vs fliers

[mistercakes]

it's pretty close to the original list. for note:

-4 probe
+3 baleful strix
+1 fetch

[James718]

it's pretty close to the original list. for note:

-4 probe
+3 baleful strix
+1 fetch

Funny you mention these changes. I have been thinking for a while about cutting the 4 probes. But if I did that I thought I'd be better off with thoughtseizes instead of cabal therapy. Although we do have the ability to get more value out of the cabal therapy.

The strips would greatly improve our matchup vs fliers.

I thought the deck could use one more land as well. Wasn't sure though if I wanted another basic land though instead of another fetch

[mistercakes]

yea i think we'll have to hear back from him. generally therapy is going to be better than thoughtseize anyway. there will be times when you blind naming cards will prevent them from reactively casting brainstorm. there will be the few times when you don't hit the card you want, but understanding what cards are good against this deck will allow your cabal therapies to be more on target.

i've been running a 4th cradle over the 3rd trop, but i suppose with strix you can't really get away with that.

really interested in his matchups. pierre said that this was the guy who originally gave him in the list, so this guy probably has the most hours with the deck.

[kLu]

hi everyone, I'm proud to be one of the designer of this list and i was very surprised when i discovered this topic and all the work you have been doing around my original build ! On every french forum no one seemed to care...

I would have liked to see all this before the BOM tournament has occurred but i won't complain, i went to a nice top8 last saturday with it.

So... Here is the story of the deck :
I don't know why i was looking this (i don't play the format) but i saw a standard deck (or maybe T2) with evolutionary leap. Just thought : wow if i got a lot of cantrip guys to sacrifice for it i'll make some insane card advantage ! So i packed visionary and wall of flowers with evolutionary leaps, some gaea's cradle and some tockens producers : Nissa, Gideon (Ally of Zendikar, not the one in the list), and lingering souls. Used to play some oath of Nissa to find a cradle/a creature/or a plainswalker. They were my green brainstorms.
Gbw Alpha version 0.1.0 (http://magic-ville.fr/fr/decks/showdeck?ref=470532&decklanglocal=eng)
The mecanic was INSANE, drawing all the time producing a huge amount of mana but... Killing was very slow. But i had that feeling i had to continue to dig this way.

At this time i wanted to play brainstorms so i changed a lot of things to make the deck a lot more blue to have force of will but i had to finally remove the Gaea's Craddle... Unsuccessful try.

I came back to the previous version and add green sun's zenith and 2 dryad which happened to be golden in the pack. I removed the white and black to get more blue and found out the coiling oracle :
Gu Alpha Version 0.1.1 (http://magic-ville.fr/fr/decks/showdeck?ref=470639)

During a whole night testing and a brillant idea, Opposition made it's show ! Evolutionary Leap was discarded, GSZ was taken out and the deck was powerful but never ending any games (if not Garruck).
Gub Beta version 0.9.0 (http://magic-ville.fr/fr/decks/showdeck?ref=470751)

Finaly i ended up to the BoM Strasbourg Trial on friday with this list : Gub Beta 0.9.1 (http://www.magic-ville.com/fr/decks/showdeck?ref=480725) (I don't remember my exact sideboard so i've put mountains instead..)
What i remember, is that i had no winter orbs in the sideboard and i went 4-2 with easy wins and 2 tight loss to miracles... During that day, my friend Pierre Canali followed me through my matchs and was amazed with the deck. He told me : I'd love to play it tomorrow. At this time point, the deck was not 10 days old and i was still not very confident with it. So i played another deck and Pierre brought it to the main event with a few modifications.

You can Find his article in the first post of this topic or HERE (https://thelibraryatpendrellvale.com/2016/07/18/oracle-opposition/).
The list : Gub Opposition Finale 1.0.0 (http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=12908&d=275113&f=LE)

I'll share with you all my feelings about saturday BoM Paris Main Event Asap.
I hope you enjoyed the reading

kLu
ps : sry for my approximative english.

[mistercakes]

kLu,

thanks for posting. i think there's some small things to hit on when we can go back and forth with decklists. would love to hear the tourney update first though. also have you seen the list that went 5-0 on modo?

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?30866-Oracle-Opposition&p=964489&viewfull=1#post964489

[James718]

Thanks for the update! Im sure with more people working on this we can get to a more optimal version.

I find it hard to only have one symbiote. The Symbiote/oracle interaction is amazing. Also having a Leovold and symbiote makes spot removal almost useless. I found that when I only had one and it was killed, I was wishing for more. I am now up to three.

[mistercakes]

played last night with a list close to the BoM one.

i'll get the exact list a bit later, but it was fun.

lost to storm 0-2
beat sylvan plug 2-1
beat d&t 2-1

i hoped for gaea's cradle a lot, i may go back to running 4. i also tried 2 natural order in the sb to help race the storm matchup. i think it would have been fine game 2 vs storm, but i missed a land drop and natural order couldn't lethal that turn. (any land would have been lethal)

[James718]

I am hesitant to try the 4th cradle now that strix is in the deck.

Also, cradle leads to some very awkward situations, sometimes a. Forked bolt can essentially 3 for one us.

Combo seems impossible for this deck to beat. That's the next challenge to face. How to improve the combo match up? Hymns? FoW?

[mistercakes]

i think the best way to beat combo is to possibly race it. consider running 2 natural order in the sb, and bringing it more discard (maybe have 2-3 thoughtseize + the therapies. you could also play thorn of amethyst.

[Ulysse95]

Hi!
Have you think about Spellstutter Sprite (http://www.magic-ville.com/fr/carte.php?ref=mma064)?
I will try a list from the Bant one, with it and some Scryb Ranger too.

[Qweerios]

Is this thread only for the Cradle/GSZ Opposition deck or any deck that utilizes Opposition? I've been working on an Opposition Fish deck with lots of cool features and synergy but I am afraid it has nothing to do with ramping into Behemoth and playing Garruk Overruns. Should I start a new thread or post it here?

Thanks

[mistercakes]

i think for now we can keep everything on this thread. it's not really gaining a ton of traction so it's not a big deal as long as they are opposition themed.

[square_two]

i think for now we can keep everything on this thread. it's not really gaining a ton of traction so it's not a big deal as long as they are opposition themed.

So you'd say that no one is...opposed? :tongue:

I think the "main" list that we have is still pretty fluid. Cheap creatures that provide CA is really the main foundation. Therapy comes alongside that just because it makes sense, but I could envision a more Fish-flavored dish.

Edit: Personally I wonder if there is some Opposition shell that could include Deathrite, Monastery Mentor, Baleful Strix, Snapcaster, Therapy, and Unearth. Particularly like that Opposition could give Snapcaster and Strix some additional value apart from their ETB triggers.

[mistercakes]

i wouldn't mind a red blue one using pyromancer and dack fayden. dunno if it's necessary with other options in r/u though. cradle is one of the reasons the deck works so well. i'd say try to find other ways to exploit that card in the context of opposition and the deck could become stronger.

we should also try to see how that aluren deck is playing, and maybe fitting 2 opposition in there? could be rather fun. dunno if it's any good though!

[James718]

Losing decay and discard would make our combo and miracles matchups terrible

[Qweerios]

So I've got this experimental list and I am halfway through a primer at the moment. I'll just post what I have here for now so you can comment on it.


4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Baleful Strix
4 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Edric, Spymaster of Trest

4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
1 Quiet Speculation

3 Gitaxian Probe
3 Cabal Therapy
4 Lingering Souls

1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Batterskull

1 Sylvan Library
2 Opposition

4 Flooded Strand
3 Polluted Delta
2 Marsh Flats
2 Underground Sea
1 Tundra
1 Tropical Island
1 Savannah
1 Scrubland
1 Swamp
1 Plains
1 Island

1 Containment Priest
2 True-Name Nemesis
2 Meddling Mage
2 Flusterstorm
2 Zealous Persecution
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Pithing Needle
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
2 Rest in Peace


Lots of synergy in this little deck. Edric is fabulous with Strix and Souls, Therapy works great with Probe, Strix, SFM, and Souls, Probe is fantastic with Therapy, Meddling Mage and Needle, Opposition is amazing with Souls, Stoneforge and equipments always have bodies, and Speculation is one cool piece of tech.

The manabase used to be all duals but fitting basics was essential and ended up to virtually no color cost. At first I had a blue centric manabase but it turns out only 13 of the 20 blue spells require blue mana. Scrubland being the ideal T1 land and black and white mana being the actual meat and potatoes pf the deck made Swamp and Plains easy inclusions. Blood Moon and Loam/Waste stopped being a problem and PoP is easy to ignore now.

I've put lots of thought in the SB as well in order to be able to play against Punishing Fire and have a good Lands matchup despite playing zero Wastelands and being deathly afraid of PFire. In theory, I belive Jund is the worst matchup I can face. I will post some results in the upcoming weeks.

[HdH_Cthulhu]

I think you try to do to much in this deck. 4 sfm and only 2 equipments (i know it can work but meh). Why not cut green? you only loos 3 cards....

[Qweerios]

I think you try to do to much in this deck. 4 sfm and only 2 equipments (i know it can work but meh). Why not cut green? you only loos 3 cards....

4 SFM and 2 equipments is quite standard... I also play SoFaI in the SB. I could see lowering to 2-3 copies, moving SoFaI main and losing the Batterskull plan altogether. SFM into BSkull is still an important play to be able to make, especially against Eldrazi and Belcher. What I really need in that slot though is a body that grabs me Jitte and can be sacrificed to Therapy so maybe Batterskull is not the way to go. Also you have to ask yourself what would be good instead for the slot. There aren't many cards I would rather have for 2 mana in this deck than SFM... Perhaps Bitterblossom could be a contender? I can imagine Blossom with Edric or Opposition would cause some serious trauma!

Why lose green is what you ought to be asking instead. Deathrite already asks for a single green dual land and Decay is a great SB tool against Miracles and many other decks. By adding a second green source you get to play Edric and Sylvan Library which are extremely powerful effects to have at such a little cost.

[James718]

I think you try to do to much in this deck.

I agree. You are mixing different strategies up. Have you checked out maverick or 4c loam?

[EunB]

Since people are bringing up the idea of YP, Opposition, Quiet Spec and Ling Souls I'll leave this list here that caught my attention from last year.

http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=16606&iddeck=124308

I eventually abandoned playtesting because of manabase troubles and CotV difficulties but it's definitely a sweet angle. Intangible Virtue is MVP.

[klaus]

So I've got this experimental list...
I like where you're going with this, though LS seem a bit too mana hungry. YP indeed fills that slot better imo. Another option would be Bitterblossom (stellar VS. Miracles), which makes Spellstutter Sprite appealing (remember that the enchantment itself is a Faerie, too). Also, Therapy and FoW alone leave you too soft to Combo.

Here's an interation based on your list (which has 63 cards btw..):


4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Baleful Strix
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Spellstutter Sprite
1 Edric

3 Swords to Plowshares
4 Brainstorm
3 Force of Will

3 Gitaxian Probe
3 Cabal Therapy

1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Fire and Ice (much better than BSkull with all those fliers)

3 Bitterblossom
2 Opposition

4 Flooded Strand
3 Polluted Delta
2 Marsh Flats
2 Underground Sea
1 Tundra
1 Tropical Island
1 Savannah
1 Swamp
1 Plains
1 Island

[Qweerios]

How is Lingering Souls too mana intensive in a deck that wants to play Opposition? Playing 6 three-drops is perfectly reasonable and even more so with Deathrite Shaman. I admit the card can be clunky in some matchups when you see multiples in your opener but you can always shave a copy. Lingering Souls is the whole reason to play white... Just replace Souls with Young Pyro if you think it's better. Also, having experienced playing both Souls and Blossoms in legacy, Blossom pales in comparison to Souls. The only matchup I would give a slight advantage to Blossom over Souls is Miracles, and even that's debatable.

FoW and Therapy are some of the most disruptive combo hate cards to have mainboard. This deck has one of the best disruption suite to handle any combo deck G1... Cutting down on FoW and Speculation in favor of Sprite is in fact weakening the deck to those matchups. If anything, try squeezing a 4th Therapy before adding janky Mental Missteps.

Can someone explain this whole "trying to do too much" thing? I understand that the deck I put forth inherently "can" and "does" a lot of things but in what way is it "trying too much"?

[CptHaddock]

How is Lingering Souls too mana intensive in a deck that wants to play Opposition? Playing 6 three-drops is perfectly reasonable and even more so with Deathrite Shaman. I admit the card can be clunky in some matchups when you see multiples in your opener but you can always shave a copy. Lingering Souls is the whole reason to play white... Just replace Souls with Young Pyro if you think it's better. Also, having experienced playing both Souls and Blossoms in legacy, Blossom pales in comparison to Souls. The only matchup I would give a slight advantage to Blossom over Souls is Miracles, and even that's debatable.

FoW and Therapy are some of the most disruptive combo hate cards to have mainboard. This deck has one of the best disruption suite to handle any combo deck G1... Cutting down on FoW and Speculation in favor of Sprite is in fact weakening the deck to those matchups. If anything, try squeezing a 4th Therapy before adding janky Mental Missteps.

Can someone explain this whole "trying to do too much" thing? I understand that the deck I put forth inherently "can" and "does" a lot of things but in what way is it "trying too much"?

I don't think you are trying to do too much, I just think that you aren't really playing a deck that is suited to abuse opposition like what how the deck in the OP does. I think opposition is probably worse than playing planeswalkers like JTMS, Elspeth, etc in your list.

[Qweerios]

I don't think you are trying to do too much, I just think that you aren't really playing a deck that is suited to abuse opposition like what how the deck in the OP does. I think opposition is probably worse than playing planeswalkers like JTMS, Elspeth, etc in your list.


I am not convinced Jace or Elspeth would be better. Opposition effectively gives new abilities to an army of tokens while Jace and Elspeth give you more cards or make more tokens. Testing will tell...

[mistercakes]

saw this:

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=107881

pretty cool.

[James718]

That's the list that a lot of us are gravitating towards. I just feel that it needs at least 2 symbiotes and 1 Leovold

[mistercakes]

That's the list that a lot of us are gravitating towards. I just feel that it needs at least 2 symbiotes and 1 Leovold

no i'm familiar with the list, it's the BoM list. i was just pointing out that it t8'd somewhere else.

-Rob

[dte]

That's the list that a lot of us are gravitating towards. I just feel that it needs at least 2 symbiotes and 1 Leovold

I actually asked the guy which ran the list in Paris, who turned out to be the one building the list for the Annecy bom too exactly about that: if he didn't want a second symbiote, as it is the thing i would put in first.
(it is the one that posted with the Klu pseudonym a bit earlier)

He told me that one is enough as it is easy to fetch for with the 4 GSZ when needed, and more is unwise as it is often quite a bad topdeck. That as long as you can chain cantrip guys into a win condition, it is better than bouncing a cantrip guy without increasing board presence.

[mistercakes]

i've been pretty happy with two, as people who are used to playing vs elves fear that card and it will be a lightning rod. it is pretty effective in giving you another tap effect for opposition on some turns.

[James718]

i've been pretty happy with two, as people who are used to playing vs elves fear that card and it will be a lightning rod. it is pretty effective in giving you another tap effect for opposition on some turns.

That's exactly how i feel. Once they see the interaction between symbiote and oracle it's primed for removal ASAP. The interaction is strong enough to warrant at least 2.

[.Ix]

How does this deck beat burn? Seems like it's just slow enough to get raced every time. Thorn of Amethyst / Winter Orb prison should help G2 but is Game 1 just free for Burn?

[mistercakes]

I've beaten burn only once (but only played vs it once in a tournament) and won 2-0. This was due to some very lucky cabal therapies and some mistakes on his behalf.

I'd recommend if you are having trouble with it to run 1 thragtusk in the main somewhere. at least you can green sun for it and it won't be terrible in other matchups + can flashback therapy as well.

Other than this, it will be a bad matchup. Can't win em all!

[.Ix]

I haven't actually played this deck yet, but it looks like it's a TON of fun. Unfortunately, there's been an increase in the number of local burn decks so I guess I won't be playing this deck for a while.

[Sibelius]

I haven't actually played this deck yet, but it looks like it's a TON of fun. Unfortunately, there's been an increase in the number of local burn decks so I guess I won't be playing this deck for a while.

Just put a couple of Chill to supplement the Winterorbs, Thorns and Spellskite in the board :wink: You also have enough guys to block their creatures for ever. And every burn spell that kills a guy rather than going to your face puts you closer to winning.

Sib

[.Ix]

Chill does make sense. I will see if it can fit in my sideboard without messing up other matchups.

[lavafrogg]

Can anyone explain the advantages/disadvantages this would have against other BUG decks like BUG Nic Fit or Aluren?

They are all BUG decks that use deathrite shaman, abrupt decay and cabal therapy in addition to little dumb creatures and after that they branch into their own little worlds. I really want to play a non-shardless BUG deck that uses Decay and Cabal and am trying to settle on a list.

[mistercakes]

I think there's two reasons to play this:

1) nostalgia, if you played when squirrel opposition was in standard it was fun then. This deck is similarly fun.

2) it's like an elf deck, but you get to have a lot more interaction with the opponent. (bad vs combo, good Vs others)

I don't think this deck is better than NO elves, but if you enjoy winning with creatures that aren't delver or tarmogoyf then this will be a fun deck to play. Lots of little decisions add up to a really messy board, which you will control most of it the longer it goes on.

[lavafrogg]

I will be putting this together this weekend as it looks fun and a nice way to play sole fun magic games as opposed to playing lands/miracles all the time.

I am starting with the Original oracle list and am immediately unhappy with the Green Suns Zenith. They are the worst card to cascade into in that it gives you a free dryad arbor.

I think the decks needs to move off of one of the two cards and wire wood symbiotic #2-4 seem like a good replacement.

I haven't decided which way the deck should go but I am going to try removing both cards and seeing which one has more use in the list.

Also, Leovold is a house and we need to be running at least 1. He shuts down cantrips and rishidan ports and also replaces himself and any other permanent when they are targeted/destroyed. Also, we can play him on turn 2.

Currently:
-4 Green Suns Zenith
-1 coiling oracle
-1 craterhoof behemoth
+3 wirewod symbiot
+3 leovold, emissary of trest

-1 dryad arbor
+1 bayou

EDIT:
Leovold is exactly what the deck needed. Along with Opposition, Leovold adds another annoying piece of the prison/lock similar in how Death and Taxes just piles on hate cards that attack from different angles.

Leovold becomes the first card that the opponents have to deal with, which becomes even more annoying when Wirewood Symbiote is in the mix. The list of cards he affects is much larger than I first thought and he has relevance in almost all games.

Eldrazi: Wasteland, Jitte, Thought-Knot Seer, Warping Wail, Endbringer
Lands: Wasteland, Port, Punishing fire, Maze of Ith,
Death and Taxes: Flickerwisp, Jittte, Sword of Fire and Ice, Banisher Priest, Swords to Plowshares, Karakas
Miracles: Brainstorm, Ponder, Sensei's Divining Top, Jace, Swords to Plowshares
Shardless BUG: Hymn, Thoughtseize, Lilliana, Jace, Abrupt Decay
Grixis Delver: Cabal Therapy, Gitaxian Probe, Lighting Bolt, Brainstorm, Ponder, Forked Bolt, Dismember

Against Combo decks he disables the blue suite of cantrips as well as proactive discard.

I know I am missing examples of him being helpful but this is a rough list of what he does.

I am still on the fence between Shardless Agent and Green Sun's Zenith at this point...

[lavafrogg]

Been testing all week and I am still torn on several "packages", I am playing in a local tonight to get a few non-online reps.

Tonight I will be trying this Aluren/Opposition hybrid, as I noticed the decks share many of the same cards.


Main
Lands(20)
3 Bayou
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Forest
2 Gaea’s Cradle
3 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs

Creatures(20)
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Coiling Oracle
4 Baleful Strix
3 Shardless Agent
3 Cavern Harpy
2 Parasitic Strix

Enchantments(5)
2 Aluren
3 Opposition

Planeswalker(2)
2 Garruk Relentless/Garruk Primal Hunter

Spells(13)
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Gitaxian Probe
4 Brainstorm

While is does lose Wirewood Symbiote, it can play a similar grindy style with Cavern Harpy.
The Garruk has been upgraded because the Cradles are no longer powering out huge GSZ.

The list runs enough blue cards for force of will if deemed needed or in the side against combo.
If i was putting the forces main I would go -4 Cabal Therapy, -2 Gitaxian Probe, +4 Force of Will, +1 Sylvan Library, +1 Garruk.

Proposed Sideboard
4 force of will
3 winter orb
1 nihil spellbomb
1 krosan grip
1 thoughtsieze
2 pithing needle
1 surgical extraction
2 dismember

A similar list with Living Wish...

Main
Lands(20)
3 Bayou
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Forest
2 Gaea’s Cradle
3 Tropical Island
2 Underground Sea
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs

Creatures(20)
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Coiling Oracle
4 Baleful Strix
3 Shardless Agent
3 Cavern Harpy
3 Leovold, Emissary of Trest

Enchantments(5)
2 Aluren
3 Opposition

Spells(17)
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Brainstorm
3 Living Wish

Adding Living Wish is also an option to keep the deck moving without wasting main deck space. Living wish also plays great with shardless and gaea's cradle.

So much testing and so many options!

[Captain Hammer]

Instead of Aluren, why not play Natural Order? It wins the game very quickly and synergies with the rest of the deck

[Sidneyious]

I find aluren a stronger card.and does more than tutoring up 1 and losing 1.

[Captain Hammer]

I was confused by your list but now realize you meant to have 2 Parasitic Strix instead of 2 Baleful Strix.

With that change, yes it makes sense why Aluren is better.

[lavafrogg]

Instead of Aluren, why not play Natural Order? It wins the game very quickly and synergies with the rest of the deck

I am trying to lessen the amount of "dead" draws in the list. I really like the original list but I hate the shardless into GSZ play and I feel like baleful strix is a huge upgrade to elvish visionary and helps greatly in goyf/eldrazi fights. Natural Order is open to the 2 for 1 when countered and Aluren should cost the same, but win the game on the spot.

I do like the thought/option of Natural Order and it could have merit at the end of the day especially since you can fetch Progenitus to race or Runic Thar against combo decks.

Hypothetical Wish Board

1 Parasitic Strix
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Acidic Slime
3 Thorn of Amethyst
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
4 Force of Will
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Dismember
1 Pithing Needle

[lavafrogg]

Went 3-1 at my local with the original list. Still trying to get a feel for the deck so I can make changes. Lost a close match to RUG Delver 2-1, beat enchantress 2-0, then beat 2 storm decks 2-1. List feels really strong!

I am loving the power of BUG value creatures with an over the top win condition, either opposition or BUG aluren.... just not sure which is better currently.

[mistercakes]

try to squeeze in a 4th cradle or check out some of the variants i tried out. they weren't so bad! also i liked the natural order in the sb.

[lavafrogg]

try to squeeze in a 4th cradle or check out some of the variants i tried out. they weren't so bad! also i liked the natural order in the sb.

What benefit does the 4th cradle provide? I only really wanted a cradle as my 3rd or 4th land.

[mistercakes]

I always felt like I wanted a cradle. It's broke with garruk, GSZ, and Oracle. It also allows you to play two to GSZ for behemoth.

[lavafrogg]

I always felt like I wanted a cradle. It's broke with garruk, GSZ, and Oracle. It also allows you to play two to GSZ for behemoth.

I think the decks mana requirements are too varied for the fourth cradle. Green for mana forks, black for discard, and blue for opposition, visionary and shardless. I just never wanted the cradle early.

When I am behind I felt like I needed more blue mana to cycle creatures as opposed to mass green mana.

[mistercakes]

If you check out my list though, I never cut lands for the 4th cradle.

Anyway, it's just a suggestion to test it.

[lavafrogg]

If you check out my list though, I never cut lands for the 4th cradle.

Anyway, it's just a suggestion to test it.

You cut 3 shardless for 1 symbiote, 1 winter orb and 1 cradle, I agree that the shardless agent is the worst card in the list as I have not been happy with the Shardless/GSZ interaction but I will say I liked the shardless/sideboard tech interaction as he filtered through lands to business.

I'm currently looking at -3 shardless, +2 wirewood symbiotes(to increase the draw/ramp engine and deathrite activations) I don't know what the last slot is for yet but I am currently going with my previous thought of the Leovold as he gives us mainboard interaction against a lot of decks.

Other options:
Reclamation sage
Regal force
Wire wood symbiote #4
Land #20

I like your list from a few pages ago, but I think you get a little off message with your changes.

Today I cut the noble hierarchs for 2 wirewood 1 bayou and the 4th deathrite.
With the 3 shardless slots I am experimenting with Imperious Perfect for that mid range option that also helps with our late game options.

[lowpass]

Any thoughts on Glissa, the Traitor? She's a great blocker, and can recur artifacts. Replace some of the cantrip creatures with Baleful Strix and you've got a recurring airborne deathtouch draw engine. And since a lot of the SB hate are artifacts, being able to get them back after removal is a plus.

[lavafrogg]

While Glissa herself is a strong card, she does not develop our board in a constructive manner. With an Opposition in play, any one of our creatures can hold down a creature from our opponent without the need for combat. We also do not have removal besides 3 Abrupt Decay, which are overtaxed anyways.

The "perfect world scenario" involves having a Glissa and a Baleful Strix in play, while your opponent repeatedly attacks with a single creature allowing you to draw cards.... this seems highly unlikely.

That being said if we get away from Green Sun's Zenith and the elf theme than Baleful Strix will be an auto include, but currently the green creature + Gaea's Cradle plan is extremely strong and is worth further exploring before we shelve it completely.

Edit: I will agree that Glissa is a great option to wall Eldrazi that is GSZ-able if you are having trouble with that matchup.

[lavafrogg]

Another 3-1 tonight.

Beating RUG Delver 2-0
Manaless Dredge 2-1
Nic Fit 2-0

And losing 0-2 to Dragon Stompy, which is a terrible matchup.

I didn't miss the Noble Heirarchs and Prefect won a few games where Shardless would have been a cascade and a prayer.

Against RUG I brought in removal and discard to remove their creatures. After that I developed my mana base and just chipped them down. Gitaxian probe + Cabal Therapy is huge.

I had too many ways to win against Rhino Fit and never felt that I cared abbout anything they did.

Against manaless I had deathrite into ooze to steal 2 games.

Bumping the Deathrites to 4 was the right call as that card is a house.

I don't think Dragon Stimpy is a winnable matchup as they have main deck red sweepers in addition to everything else they do. I mean... I could add more basics and main deck the Reclaimation Shaman, but after that I am lost.

Current list:

Main
3 Bayou
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Forest
3 Gaea’s Cradle
3 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs

4 Coiling Oracle
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Deathrite Shaman
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
3 Wirewood Symbiote
3 Imperious Prefect----slot in question

3 Garruk Wildspeaker
3 Opposition

3 Abrupt Decay
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Green Sun’s Zentih

So far I have just been not 100% happy with the last 3 cards in the list. Prefect and Shardless Agent have both just been okay. I am looking through gatherer to find something that really fits into the rest of the deck.

Right now I am looking at Nissa, Vastwood Seer... why does she say basic forest....

Would anyone have a problem with just running trips reclamation sage? I feel like every deck has targets, he taps for opposition, he is an elf, and he gets pumped by craterhoof/garruk!

[Diogo37]

Hey guys
one question

Nissa, Vital Force coulb be better than Garruk in this deck?

[lavafrogg]

Hey guys
one question

Nissa, Vital Force coulb be better than Garruk in this deck?

Garruk is most likely the most inpressive card in the deck. The untap ability is amazing either to just cast more cantrip guys, untapping arbors for opposition triggers or holy shit untapping gaeas cradle. The fact that he suspends 1 to overrun is super relevant when you need to win "fast" and the 3/3's are always relevant.

[mistercakes]

Agreed with all the garruk comments. Should also find 1 spot for a Nissa, if only to improve the miracle matchup more.

[Diogo37]

thanks for the rep guys

[mistercakes]

Main
2 Bayou
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Cavern of Souls
2 Forest
4 Gaea’s Cradle
2 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs

4 Coiling Oracle
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Deathrite Shaman
2 Noble Hierarch
1 Quirion Ranger
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
3 Wirewood Symbiote
2 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Nissa, Vital Force
2 Winter Orb
3 Garruk Wildspeaker
3 Opposition
3 Abrupt Decay
4 Green Sun’s Zentih

I would likely run something like this as a current list. I know it's weaker to combo game 1, but I prefer to have a stronger matchups vs fair decks game 1. (could easily make a case for the 4th abrupt decay)

SB would include:

1 leovold, emissary of trest
1 abrupt decay
2 surgical extraction
2 faerie macabre
3 thoughtseize
2 thragtusk
1 nissa, vital force
1 reclamation sage
2 lost legacy

[lavafrogg]

After a few bad outings I am super torn on this deck currently. I find that the Opposition wins are few and far between and the BG core being the reason for most of the wins.

[hobart]

Here is the list I've been running on Cockatrice with a lot of success:

Creatures: 28

3x Deathrite Shaman
4x Noble Hierarch
3x Baleful Strix
4x Coiling Oracle
3x Elvish Visionary
3x Shardless Agent
3x Leovold, Emissary of Trest
1x Meren of Clan Nel Toth
1x Deranged Hermit
1x Craterhoof Behemoth
2x Wirewood Symbiote

Spells: 9

2x Cabal Therapy
4x Green Sun’s Zenith
3x Abrupt Decay

Enchantments: 3

3x Opposition

Lands: 20

4x Verdant Catacombs
4x Misty Rainforest
2x Bayou
1x Underground Sea
3x Tropical Island
1x Forest
2x Dryad Arbor
3x Gaea’s Cradle


Sideboard: 15

4x Thorn of Amethyst
2x Thoughtseize
2x Surgical Extraction
1x Marsh Casualties
1x Reclamation sage
2x Winter Orb
1x Null Rod
1x Sylvan Library
1x Scavenging ooze


I had 2 copies of Garruk originally but I dropped them for the Meren and the Deranged Hermit. I'm not in love with either card here, but I just didn't feel like the planeswalker was doing enough, especially the turn you played him. I really wanted some midrange green sun targets that I can play to an empty board to gain some real board presense. Even though Hermit has won pretty much every game he hits the board in, both creatures represent slots I'm still not sure what to do with. Leovold is king in this deck, he's the reason the deck is viable IMO so I run 3 main. Blood moon decks are a problem, just gotta be sure to fetch up that forest quick and green sun for rec sage. Spell combo decks are a problem, board in all the Thorns and discard and pray. The rest of the matchups I'm lovin. We absolutely shrek delver and midrange decks. My sideboard is all pretty much a work in progress. I'm pretty sure it's correct to do the 4 thorns, everything else is still up in the air.

[mistercakes]

how has your miracles matchups been? i felt like i always needed the planeswalkers for this matchup. (i know opposition and winter orb are both crazy good, but planeswalkers added that little extra pressure for me.)

[hobart]

how has your miracles matchups been? i felt like i always needed the planeswalkers for this matchup. (i know opposition and winter orb are both crazy good, but planeswalkers added that little extra pressure for me.)

Miracles has been tough for me.

[mistercakes]

might be able to take another stab at this deck with the new cards. will wait until the set is fully spoiled, but at least the new cantrip elf can see some play. it's possible it might not need it as our weak matchups tend to be combo anyway.

[kLu]

hey, i've been toying around with my pet deck again.

I had some trouble with all those black cards i've been running lately and the fact Deathrite shaman doesn't have as many fetch in the yard as we'd like and noble doesn't produce black mana...
Leovold is golden : it makes us leovold proof with opposition, wins against most U decks and is OP against wastelands and all those hatefull stuff !
So the idea was to cut the therapy but to keep a decent amount of early disruption.
Fow is the one letting us play without interfering with the deck's speed

In my metagame, there is not that much miracle so i dropped the garruck account to 2 then 0 (since i sided them out everygame).

the 2 brainstorm are there for testing.

// Deck file for Magic Workstation (http://www.magicworkstation.com)
// NAME : gub oppo U
// CREATOR : bedjy (magic-ville.com)
// FORMAT : Legacy
1 [UNH] Forest
1 [R] Underground Sea
2 [R] Bayou
2 [FUT] Dryad Arbor
3 [US] Gaea's Cradle
3 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
3 [R] Tropical Island
4 [ZEN] Verdant Catacombs
1 [AVR] Craterhoof Behemoth
2 [] Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 [SC] Wirewood Symbiote
3 [] Baleful Strix
3 [RTR] Deathrite Shaman
3 [] Elvish Visionary
3 [] Shardless Agent
4 [] Coiling Oracle
4 [CFX] Noble Hierarch
3 [7E] Opposition
2 [] Brainstorm
3 [RTR] Abrupt Decay
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [MBS] Green Sun's Zenith
SB: 2 [] Kiora, Master of the Depths
SB: 3 [SHM] Faerie Macabre
SB: 1 [] Scavenging Ooze
SB: 1 [WL] Null Rod
SB: 3 [] Fatal Push
SB: 1 [] Reclamation Sage
SB: 2 [ZEN] Marsh Casualties
SB: 2 [LRW] Thorn of Amethyst

[lavafrogg]

hey, i've been toying around with my pet deck again.

I had some trouble with all those black cards i've been running lately and the fact Deathrite shaman doesn't have as many fetch in the yard as we'd like and noble doesn't produce black mana...
Leovold is golden : it makes us leovold proof with opposition, wins against most U decks and is OP against wastelands and all those hatefull stuff !
So the idea was to cut the therapy but to keep a decent amount of early disruption.
Fow is the one letting us play without interfering with the deck's speed

In my metagame, there is not that much miracle so i dropped the garruck account to 2 then 0 (since i sided them out everygame).

the 2 brainstorm are there for testing.

// Deck file for Magic Workstation (http://www.magicworkstation.com)
// NAME : gub oppo U
// CREATOR : bedjy (magic-ville.com)
// FORMAT : Legacy
1 [UNH] Forest
1 [R] Underground Sea
2 [R] Bayou
2 [FUT] Dryad Arbor
3 [US] Gaea's Cradle
3 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
3 [R] Tropical Island
4 [ZEN] Verdant Catacombs
1 [AVR] Craterhoof Behemoth
2 [] Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 [SC] Wirewood Symbiote
3 [] Baleful Strix
3 [RTR] Deathrite Shaman
3 [] Elvish Visionary
3 [] Shardless Agent
4 [] Coiling Oracle
4 [CFX] Noble Hierarch
3 [7E] Opposition
2 [] Brainstorm
3 [RTR] Abrupt Decay
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [MBS] Green Sun's Zenith
SB: 2 [] Kiora, Master of the Depths
SB: 3 [SHM] Faerie Macabre
SB: 1 [] Scavenging Ooze
SB: 1 [WL] Null Rod
SB: 3 [] Fatal Push
SB: 1 [] Reclamation Sage
SB: 2 [ZEN] Marsh Casualties
SB: 2 [LRW] Thorn of Amethyst

The power of the Opposition list lied in the elf shell that it was based on. Running quad Gaea's Cradles and the Garruk's allowed you to out pace most decks on mana development and Garruk was a house in all of the fair matchups, as well as a Suspend 1- Overrun.

In my opinion you took out every reason to actually play the deck and turned it into a worse Shardless BUG list. With GSZ, I don't think you need to do much to incorporate Leovold, especially when you can GSZ for large amounts very early in the game.

To add Leo-

Creatures (18)
4 Coiling Oracle
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Deathrite Shaman
2 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
3 Wirewood Symbiote

Planeswalkers (3)
3 Garruk Wildspeaker

Spells (19)
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Green Sun's Zentih
4 Abrupt Decay
3 Opposition

Lands (20)
1 Forest
1 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
2 Dryad Arbor
3 Gaea's Cradle
3 Tropical Island
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Misty Rainforest

Also, if the opponent has a Leovold Opposition is pretty awkward

[kLu]

In fact, Garruck is not my main concern, it's cabal therapy.
I found it quite strong, but...
but it's too slow or clumsy against fast combo or reanimator decks. But it can't do anything with top/terminus and when the game slow down, it can't deal with opponent's topdecks...
Testing force of will is a fresh air and freed the manabase from that early black mana.

But that comes with a price : you have to run a fairly high blue card account.
In my tests against the metagame, a lot of players got some delvers, creeping tar pit or TNN and garruck was a pretty poor play in those situations.
I've won another tournament yesterday with the list i posted and i never missed the fat man.
In fact, I never feel like i have to win fast since i got a few tempo trix and force of will to back up

You should try it.

[Sibelius]

I'm glad this deck is still on some peoples radars.
I will be getting the parts fro it I'm missing online so ill report back after some testing!

Sib

[lavafrogg]

I'm glad this deck is still on some peoples radars.
I will be getting the parts fro it I'm missing online so ill report back after some testing!

Sib

With the rise of Leovold, opposition is pretty bad, as they draw a card with every activation...:/

[mistercakes]

I'm excited about this deck again. Without the risk of Counterbalance I think we can run some more blue cards including force of will. Maybe even a Tradewind rider.

The other option is cutting some other cards in favor of maindeck thorn or some other prison card. Elves was almost an impossible matchup so I think force of will or some other kind of interaction will be preferred.

[kLu]

I top8'ed yesterday in a 73 persons tournament in Geneva with the deck.
the list : // FORMAT : Legacy
1 [UNH] Forest
1 [] Underground Sea
2 [] Bayou
2 [FUT] Dryad Arbor
3 [US] Gaea's Cradle
3 [ZEN] Misty Rainforest
3 [] Tropical Island
4 [ZEN] Verdant Catacombs
1 [AVR] Craterhoof Behemoth
1 [] Vizier of the Menagerie
2 [] Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 [SC] Wirewood Symbiote
3 [] Baleful Strix
3 [RTR] Deathrite Shaman
3 [] Elvish Visionary
3 [] Shardless Agent
4 [] Coiling Oracle
4 [CFX] Noble Hierarch
3 [7E] Opposition
1 [] Brainstorm
3 [RTR] Abrupt Decay
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [MBS] Green Sun's Zenith
SB: 1 [UNH] Swamp
SB: 3 [SHM] Faerie Macabre
SB: 1 [THS] Thoughtseize
SB: 1 [] Scavenging Ooze
SB: 3 [] Fatal Push
SB: 1 [] Reclamation Sage
SB: 3 [ZEN] Marsh Casualties
SB: 2 [LRW] Thorn of Amethyst

I lost to add nauseum, draw against a grixis (very good match up) and won : elves!, UR delver, grixis, sneak & show and ichorid.
The game against combo was a joke for the both of us and he won because of a mystake i did.
Elves! is a pretty though match up but force of will helped a lot against the first natural order (he finaly passed one for 17 dmg, i was 18 so i blocked 3 and i finaly won after dealing with his deathrite shaman). The second game i've let him tutor his visionary, with which he drew 3 cards and then tutored leovold. I've set my engine up and accumulated some force of will against any threat he could oppose. A marsh casualties ended the game.
Against sneak & show, he won the first after setting up a fast S&T (i had no opposition in hand). The second i've let him resolve S&T to let an opposition come into play which won me the game. The third was easy, he drew nothing but lands (no fetchlands after brainstorm due to blood moon...).
UR delver, i had enough hate for his threat, and went through pillars and harsh mentors without too much troube. Even nemesis can be dealt with due to marsh casualties.
Ichorid was very very hard and brainconsuming. Both game, i've got down to just a few hp but some good decisions maintained me alive just enough time to get to deal with the zombies or the big grave-troll

1/4 final against Eldrazi, i started a bit mana short and got some trouble getting some more lands/mana and finaly lost both game lacking just a few little thing to win the game...

So this is my 3rd time playing this deck in some major events.
Paris, september 2016 at BoM (195 players) top 8 :
http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=13462&d=279098&f=LE
Paris, April 2017 at Eternal Week end (448 players) : 6-3
Geneva, April 2017 (73 players) top 8

And a few more in my local store.

I have to say i'm quite happy with the ban of top. Miracle was not impossible to win, but always hard.
Vizier is quite good against the mass removals or leovold.

I'll appreciate any feedback or questions.

[mistercakes]

Glad to see you're still playing the deck! I haven't touched it in a while due to the bad elves matchups and my local store playing a lot of combo.

Interesting to see you cut therapy probe and garruk. I really liked garruk in the list and he won me a lot of matches when I played the deck. Did you run into any opposing Leo's?

[kLu]

I've faced many leovold but we have several answers.
coiling oracle can keep us drawing into some win conditions or decays.
Decays can directly deal with it without being countered.
Leovold can let us use opposition while our opponent got his.

I'm not saying we don't care, leovold is one of our main concern, but we got some ways to deal with it. I've not lost against Leo being the only threat but he can buy enough time against us to let them draw the toxic deluge, golgari charm or the food chain combo.


I haven't touched it in a while due to the bad elves matchups
With force of will, Leovold, 3 fatal push and the 3 marsh casualties, i've not lost my 3 last match against elves. It's not what i'd say a good match up anyway.

But the only metagame in which i don't want to take this deck is in a combo-heavy metagame (storm, reanimator, painter, elves ... ?)

[mistercakes]

thanks for the update. i completely had not considered having out our own leo would deny them the card drawing. that's pretty great.

what would you say is the worst non-blue card in the deck? i think next time i play this i would still like to have 1 garruk in the main :D

[kLu]

I'd say the slot for the Garruck would be the one i've removed my 4th decay for : the vizier. This slot, for me is there to come back from a wrath effect so i think they'll do the same.
I really liked garruck but in fact, I think he was at his best against miracle and that it is quite a poor choice against nemesis/bolt/delver.

[tescrin]

Looking at the first list, this is somewhat similar to a NO GUx list I was looking at possibly doing. I'd consider NO and Prog in the list instead of a couple probes/whatever, maybe in place of a GSZ or two.

[toletole]

Quick report:

3 Gaea's Cradle
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Forest
2 Bayou
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Tropical Island
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Underground Sea

20

4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Coiling Oracle
3 Baleful Strix
3 Elvish Visionary
1 Dwynen's Elite
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Deranged Hermit
1 Craterhoof Behemoth

27

3 Abrupt Decay
3 Cabal Therapy
4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Opposition

13

Side

3 Faerie Macabre
3 Fatal Push
2 Marsh Casualties
1 Spellskite
1 Mindbreak Trap
1 Flusterstorm
1 Cabal Therapy
3 Thoughtseize

Played the weekly yestarday (~30 people):
G1 vs UB Reanimator
I ramp, but cannot find Ooze or DRS before he reanimates Griselbrand. Couldn't find Therapy either :(
+3 FM +1 FS +1 CT +3 TS
-3 AD -1 Behemoth -3 Opp -1 Symbiote
Have FM in opening hand which saves me from exhume t2. I manage to get Ooze with tons of mana and very good presure but he finds Pithing Needle for it and goes for Elesh. GG!
0-1

G2 vs Zombardment
Quick Ooze takes the game easily.
+2 Fatal Push +1 Marsh Casualties
-3 Cabal Therapy
Get stuck with Dryad Arbor and Tropical for the entire game. Draw at least +3 cards with Symbiote+Oracle. Happens!
Game 3 he starts early beats, I develop my board and Opposition takes the game.

1-1

G3 vs 4c Aggro Loam
T3 Opposition under his Dark Confidant that I cannot respond. He draws a lot of cards but Leovold+random 1/1 lock the game while attacking for 5 a turn (hierarchs)
-3 Baleful Strix -3 CT
+1 Spellskite +3 Fatal Push +2 Macabre
T1 Confidant from his side reveals Fire Covenant (!). Kills my Dryad Arbor and Hierarch+Wasteland game 3 it is!
Lots of cheap creatures and Opposition take the game quickly.

2-1

G4 vs Esper Stoneblade (with Thopter/Meek combo added)
I clear the path for Opposition with Therapy while taking 3 from a TNN. Dwynen's+Symbiote flood the board and take the game from there.
-3 Baleful Strix -3 Cabal Therapy
+1 Spellskite +3 Thoughtseize +2 Marsh Casualties
I overextend a little with creatures and run into Perish (my opponent was stuck on lands, I tried to capitalize and fail horribly). Visionary+Symbiote recover the advantage and a timely Behemot seals the deal.

3-1

G5 vs Esper Stoneblade

The only relevant spell he plays is Ponder. I have a fast aggresive hand and win quickly.
-2 Baleful Strix -3 Cabal Therapy
+1 Spellskite +3 Thoughtseize +1 Flusterstorm (he is on heavy spot removal list)
I took a Supreme Veredict with TS but couldn't resolve Opposition. He kills tons of creatures and lands Jace (he's at 9. I have Hierarch and Dryad but he has a couple of blockers. I manage to find Behemoth the last
turn before he -12 me but he double swords my creatures (Hierarch was tapped). Almost is never enough!
Game 3 I keep a very bad hand and got punished for it.

From my annotations... I think the 4th Opposition is a must. It is the card that makes this pile of value into a real threat. Also the manabase sometimes is very annoying to cast spells on time, specially Strix and Opposition.
I played this deck a couple of times in the past and always thought that Elves is much better (still think it is), but hell it is a blast to play indeed.

[kLu]

Hello guys,
I made another top8 last sunday with my oppo deck in a 30 persons tournament.
I played almost the same list as my previous one.

For people that think this is just a bad version of elves, it's wrong.

The match ups are very different.

Aggro :
[++]Grixis & Bug aggro match are excellent.
[-] UR delver depends only on price of progress
[+]Death & Taxes match is good
[+]I've not played Eldrazi Aggro much but all the later tests were in my favor.
[.]Infect can be though, we have only few options to deal with his creatures.
[--]burn is hard

Control :
[+]Uwx doesn't have counterbalance and easy access to terminus. It must be easier than it used to be
[+]BUG Midrange can do a fast Nemesis with eventualy jitte on it. It must do it otherwise it can't win.
[.]Stoneblade : same as above
[+]Grixis & Bug Control can't deal with all our value
[.]Loam & Lands can have a wasteland on our cradle with tabernacle on board. In addition, marit lage can be hard to deal with, mostly because of krosan grip.

Combo :
[+]Show & Tell : we got many options but the fact we can put an opposition in play face down when they put an emrakul is golden. Won me many match.
[-]Storm : we are a bit slow, leovold & force of will help anyway.
[--]Elves : very hard game one. Balanced game 2..
[.]Reanimator : we got many weapons to win the game. Beside that, Rea is very fast and can prevent disruption.

[mistercakes]

sounds great that you're still using it. congrats.

[oblivionz]

mtggoldfish just posted this video about this slightly different take on BUG Opposition, what do you guys think?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvRGJ62AJ-k

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/instant-deck-tech-bug-opposition-legacy-17bd02b1-275d-4500-847c-309580a9b4c2

[Qweerios]

mtggoldfish just posted this video about this slightly different take on BUG Opposition, what do you guys think?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvRGJ62AJ-k

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/instant-deck-tech-bug-opposition-legacy-17bd02b1-275d-4500-847c-309580a9b4c2

The list looks really good. What I like about it is that there is enough chaff to fit removal and discard and still keep a solid core! I think a single Veteran Explorer and 3-4 Therapies would be pretty good.

I could see Avenger and Sidisi become something like Master of the Wild Hunt and/or Deranged Hermit.

[mistercakes]

It was either a mtgo list or a Japanese player. I saw it on hareruya.

[kombatkiwi]

I could see Avenger and Sidisi become something like Master of the Wild Hunt and/or Deranged Hermit.
I'm not an expert on the deck but I tried a couple of games with a similar deck using Chasm Skulker and I think that card is also okay (although that was a different build with Pyromancer/Therapy so there were more ways to sacrifice it).

[ashent]

Hey guys, shameless plug here for my channel, just thought some people here might enjoy watching this deck. A friend of mine has been working on it recently and is playing a BUG Opposition list that closely mirrors a lot of the builds in here, but I don't think he actually reads this forum. I caught some footage of it recently and despite not getting a very common matchup for him to play against, I think the games are decent and a good showing for the deck.

Let me know if you guys have any questions or want the list, I can probably get him to provide it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SPBj5aPfxA

[oblivionz]

Hey guys, shameless plug here for my channel, just thought some people here might enjoy watching this deck. A friend of mine has been working on it recently and is playing a BUG Opposition list that closely mirrors a lot of the builds in here, but I don't think he actually reads this forum. I caught some footage of it recently and despite not getting a very common matchup for him to play against, I think the games are decent and a good showing for the deck.

Let me know if you guys have any questions or want the list, I can probably get him to provide it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SPBj5aPfxA

Nice video, will love to see the list. Is Edric, Spymaster of Trest a sideboard card for him?

[a-hand]

Is anyone still playing this deck post Deathrite ban? I'm no quite sure where to go with the deck, or if should still even be BUG or Bant, but this is the list I'm currently testing. Would love to hear any feedback and ideas!

4 Noble Hierarch
3 Birds of Paradise
2 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Coiling Oracle
3 Baleful Strix
4 Elvish Visionary
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest

4 Brainstorm
3 Green Sun's Zenith
2 Abrupt Decay
4 Force of Will

2 Bitterblossom
3 Opposition

1 Dryad Arbor
1 Forest
2 Bayou
1 Underground Sea
3 Gaea's Cradle
3 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Windswept Heath

[lavafrogg]

Is anyone still playing this deck post Deathrite ban? I'm no quite sure where to go with the deck, or if should still even be BUG or Bant, but this is the list I'm currently testing. Would love to hear any feedback and ideas!

4 Noble Hierarch
3 Birds of Paradise
2 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Coiling Oracle
3 Baleful Strix
4 Elvish Visionary
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest

4 Brainstorm
3 Green Sun's Zenith
2 Abrupt Decay
4 Force of Will

2 Bitterblossom
3 Opposition

1 Dryad Arbor
1 Forest
2 Bayou
1 Underground Sea
3 Gaea's Cradle
3 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Windswept Heath

Sadly this little piece of tier 3 was hurt really badly by the DRS nerf as DRS plus Symbiote was a huge engine in the deck. Birds/noble just can’t compare in that aspect.

I’m not sure how you can compensate for that loss.... maybe Arbor Elf?

[a-hand]

Sadly this little piece of tier 3 was hurt really badly by the DRS nerf as DRS plus Symbiote was a huge engine in the deck. Birds/noble just can’t compare in that aspect.

I’m not sure how you can compensate for that loss.... maybe Arbor Elf?

It's definitely a huge loss. I don't expect this to be tier by any means, just want to find the best build since it's my favorite pet deck.

I'm not sure if Arbor Elf is that great. I feel like I would rather have a Noble or Bird in any situation. Then again I haven't tested it at all so who knows.

I've been thinking about playing Bant with Thalia and Stoneforge. Although losing access to Cabal Therapy kinda sucks.

[mistercakes]

// 60 Maindeck
// 24 Creature
4 Gilded Goose
4 Coiling Oracle
2 Elvish Visionary
2 Wirewood Symbiote
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
4 Birds of Paradise
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Collector Ouphe
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Quirion Ranger
1 Vizier of the Menagerie

// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition

// 10 Instant
2 Abrupt Decay
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will

// 17 Land
3 Gaea’s Cradle
3 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Forest
1 Bayou

// 3 Planeswalker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns

// 3 Sorcery
3 Green Sun’s Zenith


// 15 Sideboard
// 1 Artifact
SB: 1 Winter Orb

// 5 Creature
SB: 3 Plague Engineer
SB: 1 Reclamation Sage
SB: 1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest

// 5 Instant
SB: 2 Abrupt Decay
SB: 1 Mindbreak Trap
SB: 2 Force of Negation

// 4 Sorcery
SB: 4 Cabal Therapy

[FTW]

Needs more Coiling Oracle. Where's Ice Fang Coatl/Baleful Strix?

[H]

Needs more Coiling Oracle. Where's Ice Fang Coatl/Baleful Strix?
The second card in the list is a playset of Oracle. Although, yeah, maybe it could use the other two, although considering the lands, especially Strix is harder to cast than Visionary.

[FTW]

The second card in the list is a playset of Oracle. Although, yeah, maybe it could use the other two, although considering the lands, especially Strix is harder to cast than Visionary.

Only 4 copies of Oracle. Needs more. Like the flying ones.

Now that W6 is banned I see no reason not to push the 1/1 value dorks to support Opposition. They even pitch to FoW and chump Marit Lage.

I get that Elvish Visionary is easier on the mana and combos with Wirewood Symbiote, but the flying deathtouch ones are miles better in most situations.

Gilded Goose seems bad. This isn't Standard. This is a format that can Force/Daze/Pierce/Decay the turn 2 Oko and leave a useless 0/2.

[mistercakes]

Going to take a look into some options here.

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2487004#paper

Just throwing this out here that the goose isn't objectively bad. I've seen these bant lists show up a few times now.

[FTW]

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2487004#paper

Just throwing this out here that the goose isn't objectively bad. I've seen these bant lists show up a few times now.

You're kidding, Bant Stoneblade plays Goose over Noble Hierarch? Because perfect mana fixing and exalted Batterskulls and TNNs are bad?

This must have been before the W6 ban when X/1 was a liability.

[mistercakes]

Alright I'm done with this thread. No point if you're the only feedback.

[mistercakes]

https://i.imgur.com/TOccR6W.jpg

i'm not a very good notetaker.

Friday: I arrive late afternoon and decide to play in a GP trial.

I started with a list that was more reactive.

// 21 Creature
4 Coiling Oracle
2 Elvish Visionary
2 Wirewood Symbiote
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Shardless Agent
1 Ice-Fang Coatl
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Gilded Goose

// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition

// 8 Instant
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm

// 18 Land
4 Gaea's Cradle
3 Tropical Island
3 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Bayou
1 Snow-Covered Forest
1 Snow-Covered Island
1 Underground Sea

// 6 Planeswalker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns
3 Garruk Wildspeaker

// 4 Sorcery
4 Green Sun's Zenith


// 15 Sideboard
// 1 Artifact
SB: 1 Winter Orb

// 4 Creature
SB: 2 Plague Engineer
SB: 1 Reclamation Sage
SB: 1 Collector Ouphe

// 3 Enchantment
SB: 3 Leyline of the Void

// 5 Instant
SB: 4 Abrupt Decay
SB: 1 Force of Negation

// 2 Sorcery
SB: 2 Cabal Therapy

R1: Bant Miracles (0-2, and it was single elim)
G1: I don't remember much of game 1, but I think I lost.
G2: I started w/ trop hierarch. (i kept a 1 land hand, but it was pretty strong). He went astrolabe, I forced it in case my hand was too slow. Then on my turn I drew a cradle. Tapped hierarch for symbiote, tapped cradle and trop for oko. he FoW'd. i don't remember much else of the game.

in between: I added an edric in there and a scryb ranger. still had 4 hierarch, 4 oracle, 3 goose, 2 symbiote, 2 visionary.

R1 again: Bant Miracles again (1-2)
I honestly don't remember the details of this.

I was pretty discouraged at this point. Fortunately I found there was a legacy 3 round even (swiss) and I felt that I could make some improvements for the deck.


/ 60 Maindeck
// 22 Creature
4 Coiling Oracle
3 Elvish Visionary
3 Wirewood Symbiote
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Gilded Goose
1 Scryb Ranger
// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition
// 8 Instant
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
// 18 Land
4 Gaea’s Cradle
3 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
1 Bayou
1 Snow-Covered Forest
1 Snow-Covered Island
1 Underground Sea
// 5 Planeswalker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns
2 Garruk Wildspeaker
// 4 Sorcery
4 Green Sun’s Zenith
// 15 Sideboard
// 4 Artifact
SB: 3 Winter Orb
SB: 1 Cloudstone Curio
// 4 Creature
SB: 2 Plague Engineer
SB: 1 Reclamation Sage
SB: 1 Collector Ouphe
// 7 Instant
SB: 3 Abrupt Decay
SB: 1 Force of Negation
SB: 3 Veil of Summer


with this list i won: (so 3-0 in matches)

4c grixis (2-0 or 2-1)
Urza Stompy (with thopter foundry) (2-0 or 2-1)
Big Eldrazi (2-1)

I felt like the force of will just was dead a lot of the time. I wanted to be the one applying the pressure and just come as close to goldfishing as possible. + with all the tropical islands in the deck, people would play around force of will anyway. Instead I ran 2 orb, 1 rec sage and 1 quirion ranger. (ranger was really useful in old winter orb decks, so why not now?)

The next day I spoke a lot with some buddies and they helped me update the SB. I also swapped 2 goose for 2 bop. Thankfully my friend Daniel convinced me to play thoughtseize in the sb. They really helped. I was also convinced I would just lose to graveyard strategies, I took my chances and played a singleton ooze in the sb. Ouphe also has a lot of application in these matchups.


2 Birds of Paradise
4 Coiling Oracle
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
3 Elvish Visionary
1 Gilded Goose
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Quirion Ranger
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Scryb Ranger
3 Wirewood Symbiote
2 Garruk Wildspeaker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns
4 Brainstorm
4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Opposition
2 Winter Orb
1 Bayou
2 Dryad Arbor
4 Gaea's Cradle
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Snow-Covered Forest
1 Snow-Covered Island
3 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
3 Verdant Catacombs

SB:
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Carpet of Flowers
1 Collector Ouphe
1 Force of Vigor
1 Plague Engineer
1 Scavenging Ooze
3 Thoughtseize
3 Veil of Summer
1 Vendilion Clique


R1: (miracles urw) (2-1)
G1: he had 2 fow for my 2 winter orbs. Opposition landed, but I drew only 3 creatures during the game. Both dryad arbors were killed at this point. He has out narset and a mentor, snapcaster and a token. I have to end step brainstorm and put away 2 lands. I kept a behemoth and shuffled. Drew another land unfortunately. I cast behemoth but he had enough blockers to go to 1.
G2: lots of back and forth. Containment priest. Palace jailer. Winter orb started the nail. (he forced. Following turn I hoofed.
G3: hierarch symbiote cralde oko. He forced. I landed an opposition a few turns later. He scooped.

R2 omnisneak. (2-1)
G1: I had some outs but sneak attack emrakul.
G2: I had 2 thoughtseize. Resolved a Leovold and an oko. He sneak attacked a griselbrand, but couldn't draw. I thoughtseized the other one and stabilized.
G3: I had a thoughtseize to take his show and tell. Then made hierarch and arbor. Next turn I played qurioirn Ranger and soon Leovold. I was holding opposition. Cast it, he eventually cunning wish for Pyroblast to kill it. I draw a card. Play a 2nd opposition and lock up the game.

2-1 Tim on sneak and show (2-1)
G1: he keeps a 5 card hand on the play. I more or less goldfish without revealing too much. I have no idea what he's on except for daze and cantrips and islands.
G2: he wins with that blue looter. I don't have an opposition so I die.
G3: he has artisan again but is afraid to tap it bc I'm holding up mana (I had a clique in hand + veil of summer).
After a few turns I play opposition with veil against his force. He makes an emrakul token, but it doesn't matter.


R4 grixis delver (2-0)
G1: delver + angler almost got there, but scryb ranger + dryad arbor stabilized until oko showed up.
G2: he mulled to 5 and I had a pretty strong opening followed by oko and opposition.


R5: dnt (1-1) (draw)
G1: played out winter orb + mana dorks. he wasn’t really able to do too much. not very eventful.
G2: very long and drawn out. he actually stablized due to an active mother of runes and a revoker on hierarch. i had a lot of outs but never got there.
G3: i had a plague engineer for his double mother of runes draw, and the winter orb again. unfortunately i needed 2 more turns to win the game. resulted in a draw.


R6: hex depths (2-0)
G1: he didn’t have too much. he played the hex mage on the first time with mox diamond, but wasn’t really able to follow much of it up. i cast craterhoof after a few turns.
G2: he had the combo after a few turns, but I resolved an opposition. there really wasn’t too much he could do.


R7: Bug BridgeVine (2-0)
G1: he tries to combo off, but whiffs on a bunch of dredges (with altar out). i play an oko and elk the altar. at one point he attacks with 3 vengevine to take out my garruk. i luckily rip a GSZ with enough mana for hoof b/c cradle in hand and cradle in play.
G2: he mulled to 4 and i had a pretty decent hand. he had some dredges but they weren’t strong enough.


R8: Bug Food Chain (2-0)
G1: opposition got him. i thought he was on aluren, b/c all i saw were cantrips and some mana dorks and the hideaway guy.
G2: he had food chain, which i thoughtseized. then he played a manipulate fate, followed by another food chain. fortunately while casting the guy was on the stack, i force of vigored his food chain. (i had to sequence it this way b/c he had a venser in hand and could save his food chain)


R9: Bug BridgeVine (0-2)
G1: he mulled to 5 and killed me on turn 2 or 3 (he was on the play)
G2: he mulled to 4 and killed me on turn 3. i planned on losing to graveyard decks because i didnt want to waste 20% of my sb on leyline of the void.

R10: Omnisneak (2-0)
G1: i landed an early leovold. he died a while later to opposition and friends.
G2: same thing i think.

R11: Bant (2-0)
G1: he played 2 goyfs. i mostly just cast a bunch of oracles until he couldn't do anything. i think oko was good here.
G2: can't recall, but i won pretty quick.

R12: Grixis delver (1-1-1)
G1: won game 1 b/c oko saved me
G2: i stupidly misplayed b/c i didn't put an elk token over his brazen borrower. i had lethal with a garruk to untap cradle and hoof him, but i lost focus. instead i got a scryb ranger, survived a few more turns, then got blown out by plague engineer. this game took a very long time.
G3: oppo had a pretty good draw with plague engineer, but we ran out of time.

R13: Ant (1-1-1)
G1: he durdled a lot and i needed an opposition or leovold to win. never got either and he stormed.
G2: i drew a bunch of sb cards. he tendrils me for 20, but i had a leovold in my graveyard and an ooze. (after this game we had 10 minutes)
G3: i again drew a bunch of sb cards. on his turn 4 he was looking at lethal from me. he tendrils me for 14 so i needed to draw a hoof or gsz. i drew neither so we timed out.

R14: Omnisneak (2-0)
G1: opposition tapped him down, and i garruked him with overrun.
G2: he cast show and tell, but i had out leovold and i played rec sage from my hand. he played omni and had a bunch of emrakuls in my hand. better lucky than good.

R15: Bug delver (2-0)
G1: delver really didn't have a chance b/c i was on the play and i just had too much tempo.
G2: garruk + oko + opposition was enough

remarks:

i would consider cutting the basic island and a rec sage for another opposition and another winter orb. brazen borrower could also be okay, or a 2nd leovold would also be very good.

sb:

the plague engineer isn't really needed, but it's clearly very good. i didn't have much use for it this weekend. the other card was the clique, never used it. carpet of flowers was very good and could recommend a 2nd one.

[FTW]

Congrats on only taking 1 loss in 15 rounds! And you expected to lose to GY combo anyway.

MD Winter Orb seems like a great addition for mana dorks + Rangers + Opposition, especially when your 1 land can be Cradle. Like any Winter Orb deck you risk going to time, and you saw that, though Hoof must help close out most games.

I know you don't like my feedback but it does look like adding Hierarchs and cutting Goose was good in this meta...

Ice-Fang Coatl seems really bad with that manabase (2 snow lands), impossible for it to ever have deathtouch, so I see why you cut it. If it can't ambush a Sneaky Griselbrand/Emrakul, it loses a lot of value.

[mistercakes]

Congrats on only taking 1 loss in 15 rounds! And you expected to lose to GY combo anyway.

MD Winter Orb seems like a great addition for mana dorks + Rangers + Opposition, especially when your 1 land can be Cradle. Like any Winter Orb deck you risk going to time, and you saw that, though Hoof must help close out most games.

I know you don't like my feedback but it does look like adding Hierarchs and cutting Goose was good in this meta...

Ice-Fang Coatl seems really bad with that manabase (2 snow lands), impossible for it to ever have deathtouch, so I see why you cut it. If it can't ambush a Sneaky Griselbrand/Emrakul, it loses a lot of value.

thanks. orb was good, and it might justify a 2nd quirion ranger. the deck can also do some really explosive draws that are enabled by quirion ranger.

eg:
turn 1 trop -> hierarch
turn 2 tap trop -> quirion ranger -> tap hierarch -> symbiote -> cradle (GGG) -> use ranger, tap hierarch -> GGGU -> oracle/garruk/gsz/oko etc.

you were right about hierarch being required. the goose is pretty good too, but after running a lot more games in practice, it just wanted mana every turn and the deck isn't a control deck like tristan's. i want multiple activations each turn. 1 goose is nice to fetch if the life gain is needed. it's also nice to have with an untap effect to make 2 food at eot with cradle.

coatl wasn't very good, and it felt clunky so i cut it.

on the discord one of the guys mentioned deep forest hermit and it feels like a big miss. i'm a little sad i overlooked this one. i would also like to try 1 tradewind rider. given that the deck can bounce 2 permanents per turn, it is a must answer for decks even though it just seems like many times you still are dependent on passing the turn. it's also a maindeck answer to planeswalkers assuming you get him down first.

i'll have to dig through gatherer to see if i'm overlooking anything else. happy to test cards, i've always been a big fan of nicfit and this is a very similar kind of deckbuilding approach.

edit: after digging through, i have some ideas worth testing in addition to the previous 2.



frilled mystic
can be a consistent way to provide counter magic. maybe a little tough on mana.

kaysa
not great, but can help close out games. also worth noting that it improves the power of elk and beasts. noting it because it is good vs plague engineer regardless of the type they name.

elvish champion
not perfect as we aren't exclusively elves, but another workaround for plague engineer

imperious perfect
another workaround for plague engineer, but also makes tokens for opposition and can act as a win condition by itself.

elvish archdruid
another workaround for plague engineer, can also set up for some very unfair turns following your untap

masked admirers
kind of janky, but just thought i'd mention it

nissa, vastwood seer
making the land drops wasn't that difficult in this deck. i think this could merit testing

gilt leaf archdruid
kind of goofy, not sure when it would be better than other cards. it does at least draw cards when you cast druids, but 5cc is a lot for this effect.

oracle of mul daya
card seems good, but not sure it's good enough.

prime speaker vannifar
card feels pretty good overall, would need testing. not great with the blue in the cost.

quirion druid
this lets you oko their lands.

rofellos, llanowar emissary
kind of a must kill for the opponent

rishkar, preema renegade
this card could help close out the game


sages of the anima
just mentioning for reference

shaman of the pack
i did go to time 3 rounds due to the complexity of this deck and the fact that it can't really close out games quickly. this could be a compromise.


sumala woodshaper
could help find opposition or a creature you need. white mana is awkward, so probably not.

wilt-leaf liege
this guy is pretty good. not sure if he's good enough for legacy now.

wirewood hivemaster
token maker, pretty decent.

wren's run packmaster
i think this card is pretty solid. it sees a lot of play in elves, and you can do some nice champion tricks with oracles and visionaries. definitely worth testing.

zameck guildmage
weird card, seems awkward.

squirrel nest
hard to remove token maker. used to see play in old squirrel prison decks.

skyshroud poacher
this guy is actually really good in this deck. he's a human, but he can tutor up a leovold into play at instant speed. he can also tutor up the squirrel guy (which you need to play if you run him)

fauna shaman
this card is probably very good in this deck. additionally the MOST deck is designed around him, so this guy likely merits testing at least with 1 in the deck. obviously can fetch you a win condition almost whenever you want. what's really crazy is with quirion ranger, you can put the dryad arbor back and hand and tutor. he also survives through plague engineer. he might warrant 2 copies.

vizier of the managerie
this card was used by canali (i think). worth trying out. probably can run away with games if you are a little lucky off the top. also using cradle mana to cast oracles seems rather unfair.

elvish reclaimer
being able to find the cradle and protect you from wasteland is invaluable. hellonewton plays 4x in his elves lists and i tried it a few times. it's very good.


for now i think the recommendation is find room for 1 deep forest hermit and 1 more leovold, emissary of trest

i would run this now in testing:

// 60 Maindeck
// 2 Artifact
2 Winter Orb

// 24 Creature
4 Coiling Oracle
2 Elvish Visionary
3 Wirewood Symbiote
2 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Gilded Goose
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Quirion Ranger
2 Birds of Paradise
1 Deep Forest Hermit


// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition

// 4 Instant
4 Brainstorm

// 18 Land
4 Gaea's Cradle
4 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
2 Bayou
1 Snow-Covered Forest

// 5 Planeswalker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns
2 Garruk Wildspeaker

// 4 Sorcery
4 Green Sun's Zenith


// 15 Sideboard
// 4 Creature
SB: 1 Collector Ouphe
SB: 1 Scavenging Ooze
SB: 1 Reclamation Sage
SB: 1 Imperious Perfect

// 2 Enchantment
SB: 2 Carpet of Flowers

// 6 Instant
SB: 3 Abrupt Decay
SB: 3 Veil of Summer

// 3 Sorcery
SB: 3 Thoughtseize

[FTW]

on the discord one of the guys mentioned deep forest hermit and it feels like a big miss. i'm a little sad i overlooked this one.

Wow, yeah me too. I even used to play Squirrel Opposition back in the day... Deranged Hermit was a big piece of that deck.


i would also like to try 1 tradewind rider. given that the deck can bounce 2 permanents per turn,

You do have some similarities to MOST. Check out their thread. But you don't have any way to tutor a 1-of Rider for when you have the board to abuse it (it's bad as a random topdeck). You'd need something like multiple Fauna Shaman or Pod.



kaysa


I tried this in a janky Druids deck. It's... OK. It beats Plague and Bolt, that's really it. Any other lord effect is better. Wilt-Leaf Liege SB could be good if Grixis 2-for-1 takes over the post-W6 meta again.

Leyline of Abundance any good for you? It's free, it ramps your 7 mana dorks, then when you have degenerate mana it doubles as Plague defense / win condition.



imperious perfect

Of the Elf lords, this is probably the best for your deck.


prime speaker vannifar

Only advantage over Birthing Pod is that you can GSZ it and untap it. Does your deck want Pod?


squirrel nest
hard to remove token maker. used to see play in old squirrel prison decks.

Is Earthcraft unbanned yet? If any deck could abuse that combo, yours is well-positioned..

[Memories of the Time]

Congrats for the results, from a Most player i know how hard is to tune and adjust a list as close as possibile to the perfect one =)
It's a bit sad that we can't play 4 Coatl, and i would really fear engineer playing so many 1/1 elves: beside the gp, where you have found just one of them, in other testing has it been a big problem?

Another question, is there a Discord or have i read badly?

[mistercakes]

Depends if the meta will change a lot. I have some more ideas to deal with them, but need to do some testing sessions.

[Prdgychild]

Depends if the meta will change a lot. I have some more ideas to deal with them, but need to do some testing sessions.

Indeed, I think fauna shawman with shawman of the pack is the way to go. I am going to be testing that! Will report back.

[mistercakes]

I thought about shaman a lot. If you end up adding a 2nd Leovold, I would recommend cutting the basic island and then you could easily play the shaman. You can definitely cut the underground sea. I like a trop over it, but a bayou might be fine as well.

https://discord.gg/C9k7Ja

[mistercakes]

Wow, yeah me too. I even used to play Squirrel Opposition back in the day... Deranged Hermit was a big piece of that deck.



You do have some similarities to MOST. Check out their thread. But you don't have any way to tutor a 1-of Rider for when you have the board to abuse it (it's bad as a random topdeck). You'd need something like multiple Fauna Shaman or Pod.

Yea I thought about the pod guy, but I don't have many 3 drops. However the courser that came in 2nd place could be a great addition to this deck, play a cradle off the top with brainstorm. (similar to oracle. I will definitely try a singleton of this card.)


I tried this in a janky Druids deck. It's... OK. It beats Plague and Bolt, that's really it. Any other lord effect is better. Wilt-Leaf Liege SB could be good if Grixis 2-for-1 takes over the post-W6 meta again.

Leyline of Abundance any good for you? It's free, it ramps your 7 mana dorks, then when you have degenerate mana it doubles as Plague defense / win condition.

It's maybe a little too cute. If I ran one, it would likely be the +0+1 and soul warden effect. (prob just a singleton)


Of the Elf lords, this is probably the best for your deck.



Only advantage over Birthing Pod is that you can GSZ it and untap it. Does your deck want Pod?



Is Earthcraft unbanned yet? If any deck could abuse that combo, yours is well-positioned..

Comments in line.

[mistercakes]

have some ideas for the deck:

current version:


// 60 Maindeck
// 2 Artifact
2 Winter Orb

// 24 Creature
4 Coiling Oracle
3 Elvish Visionary
3 Wirewood Symbiote
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Gilded Goose
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Quirion Ranger
2 Birds of Paradise
1 Scavenging Ooze

// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition

// 4 Instant
4 Brainstorm

// 18 Land
4 Gaea's Cradle
3 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
2 Bayou
2 Snow-Covered Forest

// 5 Planeswalker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns
2 Garruk Wildspeaker

// 4 Sorcery
4 Green Sun's Zenith


// 15 Sideboard
// 3 Creature
SB: 1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
SB: 1 Tolsimir, Friend to Wolves
SB: 1 Collector Ouphe

// 3 Enchantment
SB: 2 Carpet of Flowers
SB: 1 Leyline of the Void

// 6 Instant
SB: 3 Abrupt Decay
SB: 3 Veil of Summer

// 3 Sorcery
SB: 3 Thoughtseize


new ideas:


// 60 Maindeck
// 27 Creature
4 Vengevine
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Coiling Oracle
2 Wirewood Symbiote
3 Birds of Paradise
1 Quirion Ranger
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
3 Cloud of Faeries
1 Collector Ouphe
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 Elvish Visionary

// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition

// 7 Instant
3 Intuition
4 Brainstorm

// 17 Land
3 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Bayou
1 Forest
4 Gaea's Cradle

// 2 Planeswalker
2 Oko, Thief of Crowns

// 4 Sorcery
4 Green Sun's Zenith


this one honestly could even run 2 craterhoofs, it's so busted with cloud of faeries + cradle.

[kinda]

Very impressive, list looks sweet too!

[mistercakes]

was thinking more about a Bant build:

// 60 Maindeck
// 2 Artifact
2 Winter Orb

// 24 Creature
4 Coiling Oracle
3 Elvish Visionary
3 Wirewood Symbiote
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Gilded Goose
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Quirion Ranger
3 Birds of Paradise
1 Archon of Valor's Reach

// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition

// 4 Instant
4 Brainstorm

// 18 Land
4 Gaea's Cradle
3 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
2 Snow-Covered Forest
2 Savannah

// 5 Planeswalker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns
1 Garruk Wildspeaker
1 Teferi, Time Raveler

// 4 Sorcery
4 Green Sun's Zenith


// 15 Sideboard
// 3 Creature
SB: 1 Scavenging Ooze
SB: 1 Collector Ouphe
SB: 1 Reclamation Sage

// 4 Enchantment
SB: 2 Carpet of Flowers
SB: 2 Rest in Peace

// 8 Instant
SB: 4 Veil of Summer
SB: 2 Force of Vigor
SB: 2 Swords to Plowshares


and in BUG:

// 60 Maindeck
// 2 Artifact
2 Winter Orb

// 24 Creature
4 Coiling Oracle
3 Elvish Visionary
2 Wirewood Symbiote
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Gilded Goose
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Quirion Ranger
2 Birds of Paradise
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Reclamation Sage

// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition

// 4 Instant
4 Brainstorm

// 18 Land
4 Gaea's Cradle
3 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
2 Bayou
2 Snow-Covered Forest

// 5 Planeswalker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns
2 Garruk Wildspeaker

// 4 Sorcery
4 Green Sun's Zenith


// 15 Sideboard
// 3 Creature
SB: 1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
SB: 1 Tolsimir, Friend to Wolves
SB: 1 Collector Ouphe

// 3 Enchantment
SB: 2 Carpet of Flowers
SB: 1 Leyline of the Void

// 6 Instant
SB: 3 Abrupt Decay
SB: 3 Veil of Summer

// 3 Sorcery
SB: 3 Thoughtseize

[H]

Thinking I might give this a go tonight. I don't have a Tolsimir though. Maybe a Thragtusk? Or a Master of the Wild Hunt?

[mistercakes]

You don't need him at all. :) run a force of will or two in the sb in case of combo matchups if you want.

We've also been tinkering around a lot with once upon a time builds on the discord.

I went 2-2 in my weekly

[H]

You don't need him at all. :) run a force of will or two in the sb in case of combo matchups if you want.
That probably is the best idea. I kind of wish I there was a Plague Engineer, but since you can't GSZ it (obviously) it's not real good here.

[mistercakes]

so the build i went with on tuesday went 2-2

1-2 to ANT

game 1 i landed an opposition pretty early
game 2 i went for ooze instead of leovold, and he natural tendrils'd me
game 3 i landed leovold. he tendrils me and despite 3 veil of summer in the deck and 15 cards to draw, i didn't find one and died.

2-0, or 2-1 (can't remember) to DNT

games were pretty grindy and both finished with a craterhoof

0-2 to sneak and show

g1 he mulled to 5 and turn 2'd me
g2 he killed me on turn 3. i never saw an opposition, but he was also on the release the ants kill, so not nearly as favorable.

2-0 to UG show and tell

g1 he had a show and tell and i had opposition (his emrakul)
g2 he had eureka and i had opposition


// 60 Maindeck
// 2 Artifact
2 Winter Orb
// 22 Creature
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Coiling Oracle
3 Wirewood Symbiote
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
1 Quirion Ranger
1 Scryb Ranger
2 Elvish Visionary
1 Birds of Paradise
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Scavenging Ooze
// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition
// 8 Instant
4 Brainstorm
4 Once Upon a Time
// 16 Land
3 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacombs
1 Bayou
1 Forest
4 Gaea's Cradle
// 5 Planeswalker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns
2 Garruk Wildspeaker
// 4 Sorcery
4 Green Sun's Zenith


i know canali is playing a once upon a time build that is a bit more stable and less greedy. he's more in favor of the cantrip guys and not so crazy about the planeswalkers. he mentioned on the discord he went 4-0-1 at the eternal weekend trial.

this deck does seem like it should be likely the best once upon a time deck (along with maverick).

[H]

I didn't have OuaT to try out, so went with your BUG list from above.

Went 4-1. I beat:
Death and Taxes 2-0 (Game 1, he has one land, double Vial. My mana is a bit awkward, I make a copuple sequencing errors with getting Rec Sage, but in the end, I get Opposition with ~8 creatures and he scoops. Game 2, he has double Vial and Jitte, but I Rec Sage it, and then am able to Hoof.)
Big Red Wildfire 2-1 (This was literally Kai's 1999 World Champion deck (https://mtg.gamepedia.com/World_Championship_Decks#1999_World_Championship_Decks.2C_Yokohama) Game 1 is grindy, but I dodge a Temporal Apature activation twice then get to Oko it and win. Game 2 I have the win if she doesn't have a turn 4 Wildfire, but he does. Game 3, Opposition locks things out.)
Mono-Blue Counterbalance-Standstill (Really not sure what this deck was, but game 1 I win with Opposition lock. Game 2 I get a turn one Carpet and ride that to an Oko and Hoof win.)
Hogaak 2-1 (He gets a good start, but I manage to ford the early Hogaak by holding things off with Opposition, then Hoof for the win. Game 2 he again has a decent start, but I manage to get to Ooze, then Hoof for near exactsies (because of Garruk's +1 on Cradle).)
Bant SnOko (Miracles) 0-2 (Neither games was at all close. I mull, he had double Force for both my Oppositions, then literally all the Planeswalkers, oh, and double Terminus. Game 2, again, a mull, he just has the nuts and I draw triple Cradle and no action post-Terminus.)

Not bad. Oko seemed either super good, or literally useless. All and all, the deck was pretty fun, I'd probably play it again, it definitely is sometimes tricky with sequencing, I made a bunch of mistakes, but none that really cost me much.

[mistercakes]

Nice! Glad you had fun with it. I think I shouldn't modify the deck too much without getting enough reps in with it. Did you keep the underground sea in the deck?

[H]

Nice! Glad you had fun with it. I think I shouldn't modify the deck too much without getting enough reps in with it. Did you keep the underground sea in the deck?
No, I used your BUG list from post 181, with 3 Trops and 2 Bayou. There was one time where I was held back by not having U/B from one land, but being able to bounce any of my lands was nice vs Wastelands.

[mistercakes]

Cool, how was Gilded goose for you?

[mistercakes]

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/650969095445151787/658250507932008459/20191222_111214.jpg
2 astrolabe, 2 teferi

Sb was:


1 stp, 3 Veil, 1 submerge, 2 carpet, 1 ouphe, 2 rest in peace, 1 faerie macabre, 1 karakas, 1 natural order, 1 trinisphere, and 1 unknown


Hopefully they will post about their matchups and thoughts on their list.

At first glance it looks like a slightly different take on the 2nd place GP bug deck.

Congrats on the finish!

[H]

Cool, how was Gilded goose for you?

It was decent when it showed up. Got Swords once, made Mana twice, made some Food to pair up with Oko in one game.

I'd think one is certainly worth it, it was a good Mana sink and gives you another Flying option when you Hoof.

[mistercakes]

Thanks. I'm still torn if it should be another BoP or not.

[H]

Thanks. I'm still torn if it should be another BoP or not.

Well, if we think of the 3 slots, I think BoP was "better" about 2/3rd of the time, so a 2-1 split with Goose would seem to make sense. But of course, I am estimating and I only played a small amount of games.

[DominiqueTutor]

Hi everybody!

I read since a few year the topics of new and experimental decks on the source but haven't posted yet because of my bad english (it's sometimes difficult for me to understand already...)

So I built something when mistercakes raised the topic about 2 months ago and it worked nicely so I decided to take the deck for eternal w-end and that was awesome. I made a little report and some explanations of the deck here in french http://www.legacy-france.org/index.php?showtopic=16476#entry290730

Here is the complete decklist

// 60 Deck principal (Okosition)
// 2 Artifact
2 Arcum's Astrolabe

// 19 Creature
1 Courser of Kruphix
1 Questing Beast
1 Archon of Valor's Reach
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Knight of Autumn
1 Brazen Borrower
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
2 Gilded Goose
4 Ice-Fang Coatl
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Dryad Arbor

// 2 Enchantment
2 Opposition

// 8 Instant
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will

// 18 Land
1 Snow-Covered Island
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Savannah
2 Verdant Catacombs
2 Gaea's Cradle
2 Windswept Heath
2 Tropical Island
3 Snow-Covered Forest
4 Misty Rainforest

// 5 Planeswalker
2 Teferi, Time Raveler
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns

// 6 Sorcery
2 Natural Order
4 Green Sun's Zenith


// 15 Réserve
// 1 Artifact
SB: 1 Trinisphere

// 2 Creature
SB: 1 Collector Ouphe
SB: 1 Faerie Macabre

// 4 Enchantment
SB: 2 Carpet of Flowers
SB: 2 Rest in Peace

// 6 Instant
SB: 3 Veil of Summer
SB: 2 Swords to Plowshares
SB: 1 Submerge

// 1 Land
SB: 1 Karakas

// 1 Sorcery
SB: 1 Natural Order

It's not a combo deck, neither an elfball, but a midrange with one plan NO and one plan opposition

I finished on 2nd place despite of many mistakes (9 rounds+ top8 is very long in one day) and I thnk the dck is very good but the list can maybe even improve...

I'm not sure about 4 coatl + 2 astrolabe, it was very difficult to give deathtouch but flash flying cantrip is already fair enough. Not sure as well for th 2 goose, courser and brazen borrower but none was useless...

I can debate with you and I want to thank you for making this thread alive!!

[mistercakes]

Very entertaining report!

I found it so amusing that you played against opposition two times in the tournament. Were there really two opposition decks in the t8?

I think you came across some really interesting insights crossing the opposition and Tristan's deck together. I would recommend 1 bop over a goose and I also came to the same conclusion about the Coatl rarely having deathtouch.

I would prefer the visionary in most cases here, as getting multiple green is much easier than UG.

The questing beast was an oversight for me. With hierarch it is the most powerful gsz target at 4cc in the format.

I found it interesting that you played 4 fow. Would you consider cutting it down to 3 or 2, or did you see yourself as always the control deck?

I didn't run any as I wanted to play more of a tap out control style.

The symbiote + oracle + visionary is very strong, did you get to test it much?

Thanks again for posting!

[DominiqueTutor]

Very entertaining report!

Thank you!

I found it so amusing that you played against opposition two times in the tournament. Were there really two opposition decks in the t8?

Oops! I played twice against bug oko but not opposition

I think you came across some really interesting insights crossing the opposition and Tristan's deck together. I would recommend 1 bop over a goose and I also came to the same conclusion about the Coatl rarely having deathtouch.

My list was not so far when Tristan perfed in Bologna, I just copied coatl+ 2 astrolabe and he convinced me in his report that courser is fine with GSZ and brainstorm. I copied one half of the sideboard as well.

I would prefer the visionary in most cases here, as getting multiple green is much easier than UG.

Yes you're right but coatl is blue and fly which is important for me. Flash is fine but not necessary.

The questing beast was an oversight for me. With hierarch it is the most powerful gsz target at 4cc in the format.

Yeah it was devastating! And vigilance + opposition worked nicely

I found it interesting that you played 4 fow. Would you consider cutting it down to 3 or 2, or did you see yourself as always the control deck?

Lol I didn't notice that you didn'tplay them, I thought it was auto include for having a chance against combo but I'm maybe wrong. I sided them out on all but 3 matches (on 11 matches)

I didn't run any as I wanted to play more of a tap out control style.

The symbiote + oracle + visionary is very strong, did you get to test it much?

Yeah! I played a 4c version of the deck a few years ago with them (UGwb) it was very powerful but I needed space in the deck and more blue cards. Why not if I don't play FoW anymore. And the 1-of quirion ranger convinced me as well but I wanted to play only 60 cards :) and playing too many elves lead some devastating plague engineerered...

Thanks again for posting!

thx for your answer!

[DominiqueTutor]

Oops sorry for the readability!

[H]

Oops sorry for the readability!

Fixed it for you below:


Very entertaining report!

Thank you!



I found it so amusing that you played against opposition two times in the tournament. Were there really two opposition decks in the t8?


Oops! I played twice against bug oko but not opposition



I think you came across some really interesting insights crossing the opposition and Tristan's deck together. I would recommend 1 bop over a goose and I also came to the same conclusion about the Coatl rarely having deathtouch.


My list was not so far when Tristan perfed in Bologna, I just copied coatl+ 2 astrolabe and he convinced me in his report that courser is fine with GSZ and brainstorm. I copied one half of the sideboard as well.



I would prefer the visionary in most cases here, as getting multiple green is much easier than UG.


Yes you're right but coatl is blue and fly which is important for me. Flash is fine but not necessary.



The questing beast was an oversight for me. With hierarch it is the most powerful gsz target at 4cc in the format.


Yeah it was devastating! And vigilance + opposition worked nicely



I found it interesting that you played 4 fow. Would you consider cutting it down to 3 or 2, or did you see yourself as always the control deck?


Lol I didn't notice that you didn'tplay them, I thought it was auto include for having a chance against combo but I'm maybe wrong. I sided them out on all but 3 matches (on 11 matches)



I didn't run any as I wanted to play more of a tap out control style.


The symbiote + oracle + visionary is very strong, did you get to test it much?


Yeah! I played a 4c version of the deck a few years ago with them (UGwb) it was very powerful but I needed space in the deck and more blue cards. Why not if I don't play FoW anymore. And the 1-of quirion ranger convinced me as well but I wanted to play only 60 cards :) and playing too many elves lead some devastating plague engineerered...



Thanks again for posting!

thx for your answer!

[DominiqueTutor]

Thank you! I'll try to do better next time!

[mistercakes]

There's a chance that some nonzero number of force of will is still okay in the maindeck.

I'll still focus on the elves variant.


60 Deck principal (Okosition)


// 22 Creature
1 Courser of Kruphix
1 Questing Beast
1 Archon of Valor's Reach
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Knight of Autumn
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Gilded Goose
2 Birds of Paradise
1 Wirewood Symbiote
1 Quirion Ranger
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
4 Coiling Oracle
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Dryad Arbor

// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition

// 6 Instant
4 Brainstorm
2 Force of Will

// 18 Land
1 Snow-Covered Island
1 Savannah
1 Bayou
2 Verdant Catacombs
2 Gaea's Cradle
2 Windswept Heath
3 Tropical Island
2 Snow-Covered Forest
4 Misty Rainforest

// 5 Planeswalker
2 Teferi, Time Raveler
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns

// 6 Sorcery
2 Natural Order
4 Green Sun's Zenith

I would consider testing this. Fow is quite strong with teferi. I really like garruk in the deck, but if you choose to play teferi over it, it makes more sense to run some number of Fow. Maybe 2 is also fine and frees up a spot for something tricky. (it should be uw UG or bant)

I do miss a Leovold in this list and it might make sense to run a bayou over the 3rd cradle and fit Leo into the list. (will just edit it for this)

Knight of autumn could be worse than rec sage with a symbiote in the deck, but it's very narrow and this helps dodge plague engineer.

[DominiqueTutor]

I really like this list but i find awkward to play 2 FoW. To keep an decent amount of blue cards (19-20) in the list MD and post side is a real pain, especially because we don't have blue cards anymore like flusterstorm or FoN to side in and we have bue cards which we want to side out.

Without coatls playing a black splash is reasonnable and we can play some discards in SB (like 2 thoughtseize 3-4cabal) I dream to make a flash zenith with tef to bring leovold in response of a brainstorm at least once in my life ;)

You play more creatures so one more oppo and i like that, without FoW we can now play OuaT with 22 creatures 18 lands it's fantastic in opening hand and with brainstorm we can shuffle them after unless we have a large amount of mana.

Without FoW I think visionnary is better than oracle, easier to cast and it's not a druid for plague (noble hierarch is also druid)

And maybe the island is not necessary in 4c, and the second forest as well, we can add a 9th fetch which is important for dryad and NO.

[mistercakes]

Yea that's true. I did play once upon a time last time with the deck at my weekly and went 2-2 losing to fast combo (storm was close, snt was not).

19 blue I think is enough to support 2 fow. If you have a Leovold you're also likely to draw something.

I like oracle a lot lore than visionary despite the U mana requirement. It's also really good with brainstorm and courser.

I'm not completely sold on the FoW, so it could be almost anything. I'd even consider running a collector ouphe and probably another symbiote over th two FoW, but let's see how it goes first.

[FTW]

The new list looks pretty strong.

How do you find 2 FoW though? Since Force is a turn 0 card, it seems like something you either want to see all the time or never. Some decks do play only 3 copies, but in most cases either 0 or 4 seems optimal.

If you don't like FoW, what about a 3rd Natural Order? That's a card I usually see played with 3 copies, otherwise you don't have it available often enough.

[mistercakes]

that's a good question, i don't really see this deck is a deck i really care to beat the turn 0 combo decks with preboard. i'd prefer to have more proactive cards than reactive, which may be wrong to play 2 FoW instead of 4. i haven't been able to test either.

will need to test, but don't have the time now. hopefully over the next few months i can attend my weeklies more often. (to give an idea i played 13 weeklies + the GP in 2019, and i don't play online)

[mistercakes]

sb is still up in the air, but wouldn't deviate too much from what you'd normally include in a bug shell:


// 60 Maindeck
// 1 Artifact
1 Winter Orb

// 25 Creature
2 Dryad Arbor
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
2 Birds of Paradise
1 Quirion Ranger
1 Reclamation Sage
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Coiling Oracle
2 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
2 Questing Beast
2 Elvish Visionary
1 Gilded Goose

// 3 Enchantment
3 Opposition

// 4 Instant
4 Brainstorm

// 19 Land
1 Snow-Covered Forest
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
2 Bayou
4 Gaea's Cradle

// 4 Planeswalker
3 Oko, Thief of Crowns
1 Garruk Wildspeaker

// 4 Sorcery
4 Green Sun's Zenith


i really like this kind of build, and have grown a bit fond of questing beast. (however you could fit a scavenging ooze over the 2nd one)

[FTW]

Questing Beast looks strong.

With 4 Cradles and 4 GSZ, do you want a 1-of Deep Forest Hermit?

It has obvious synergy with Opposition, but it even combos with Wirewood Symbiote too. Tap Cradle for 6+ green mana. Return Hermit to your hand to untap something. Pay 5 green to cast Hermit again, making 4 more Squirrels.

[mistercakes]

i think the squirrel card is pretty nuts, but it's weaker than what's already in the deck. it can probably do some major damage in some very specific matchups, but across the board it's weaker than most of the other cards. for nostaglia it's pretty sweet, and agreed it's bonkers with oppo and/or symbiote.

[mistercakes]

Dryad of Ilysian Grove
2G
Enchantment Creature - Nymph
You may play an additional land on each of your turns.

Lands you control have all basic land types in addition to other types.

this is pretty interesting. i like that with a ranger you can bounce gaea's cradle and replay it.

[FTW]

Bant Stoneblade is back on Hierarchs, like you.
https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=24207&d=368923&f=LE

Goose must have been to play around W6.

[mistercakes]

Very likely, it's still a good card overall. However, the only major benefit for goose is to produce any color. I still opt for bop since I play a lot of untap effects.

https://www.hareruyamtg.com/en/deck/266059/show/