Clark Kant
04-25-2007, 11:32 PM
This is the deck I've been developing and testing in my playgroup for the past week and a half. Preliminary testings seems to suggest that it's exceptionally strong against virtually everything.
Since the testing is still in it's early stages, I can't yet put up specific matchup percentages yet.
But I have to say, based on what I've seen this deck do so far, I can't help but be convinced that this or some very close derivitive of this is maybe poised to be the next big aggro deck in legacy. Plus it's honestly the funnest aggro deck I've ever played.
I strongly recommend people proxy up the build below before criticizing it as I can pretty much guarentee that you will completely misunderstand how the deck functions or plays out if you don't play atleast a few games with it. I also don't recommend trusting the MWS Shuffler to get valid testing percentages (I absolutely refuse to play on MWS for this reason, and because it's no where near as fun imho) but if you don't have the cards and can't proxy them in your playgroup, that's an alternative too.
Your threatbase + Heartwood Storyteller + Magus of the Moon + Chalice of the Void are all downright broken and the perfect combination of creatures to severely impede virtually every other deck in the format.
Vaka Beatz 04/30/07
2 Taiga
9 Forest - Ancient Tomb
4 Mountain
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Chrome Mox - Possibly Llanowar Elves
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
3 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Umezawe's Jitte
4 Magma Jet
4 Magus of the Moon
4 Call of the Herd
4 Troll Ascetic
4 Burning Tree Shaman
3 Iwamori of Open Fist
Sideboard:
2 Metagame Slot
2 Trinisphere
2 Pyroclasm
2 Rough/Tumble
3 Pyrostatic Pillar
4 Krosan Grip
I'm now running 2 Rough/Tumble in place of 2 Pyroclasm, as both cards are very similar but Tumble can sometimes be helpful versus Fairie Stompy, Decree of Justicle and Exalted Angel. Most of the time though, it just acts as another Pyroclasm effect versus goblins and affinity as you don't like siding in the card into matchups that are already favorable just to have one more way to deal with a specific threat. Atleast with Pyroclasm, when you attack with what is always a larger number of threats, when they attempt to block with their beefier flyers, a Pyroclasm or Magma Jet can kill the flyers much faster than having to wait till you reach six mana, while simultanously killing Cloud of Fairies too. Thank you aisman for the idea regardless.
The two metagame slots can be occupied by an additonal Pyrostatic Pillar and Trinisphere or some of the many other very solid anticombo cards available including Red Elemental Blast (to protect your artifacts from getting bounced back if you can't set a Chalice at two), Ground Seal, Root Maze among many many others if you expect lots of combo, Flametoungue Kavu if you expect Fairie Stompy or nongoblins aggro, or additional Pyroclasm if Goblins is such a large part of your meta that you don't mind dedicating a few more slots to an already very favorable matchup.
The deck isn't 100% optimal yet imo, the most prominent example of which is that the manabase may support a few Ancient Tombs (acceleration) or Wastelands, and this has yet to be tested, but even at this stage of it's development, the build proves to be extremely competitive having favorable matchups against a huge number of top tier decks, all sorts of random jank, and no real horrible matchups that I have run across.
Recently, I've come to the conclusion that Heartwood Storyteller's bonus verus combo (letting you get Pyroclasm versus Warren tokens, letting you get the spirit guides and magma jet needs for you to win in response to their tendrils, provided they already took damage during thier combo to pyrostatic pillar etc.) don't occur often enough and testing shows that Call of the Herd has a significant advantage against both control and aggro (initially, I thought both cards would be about equally good vs. control). So I opted to switch over to Call of the Herd. The initial reasons for running Heartwood Storyteller/Ohran Viper are explained on the second page.
Krosan Grip is absolutely key in letting you be able to slaugther deed, disk/keg, equipment, pithing needle on your jitte, survival, ghostly prison, confinement, crucible, shackles, lion's eye diamond and so much other randomness. So now, I'm up to 4 as opposed to 3, and am seriously considering maindecking it.
I know some of you commented on replacing Iwamori. In a related matter, do you guys have any suggestions on with what? How do you feel about Rumbling Slum? Losing trample is too big a loss imho. But Slum does have an ability that wins games preboard against Ghostly Prison and other randomness. Stax is not a deck I've ever had a problem with as they're not nearly as effective at attacking my mana base in my experience, but Vaka Pox has occasionally managed to stablize against this deck at a low life with Ghostly Prison combined with 22 assymetric land destruction effects. And while ESGs have occasionally saved my butt in this situation, you don't always draw enough. I am not at the point of actually wanting to try it. But if I get enough input saying that I should run it, I will.
I am running Pyrostatic Pillar over Red Elemental Blast because Pillar has, to my surprise actually, been absolutely astounding versus storm based combo decks.
The criticism below that the original build was lacking in removal did have merit, which has since been fixed. It helps to have some removal as a nice combat trick. The main problem with removal was that Chalice was so often set to 1 which is counterproductive with Lightning Bolt. That's why I ended up replacing all the Ohran Vipers/Wild Mongrels, along with an Iwamori, with Magma Jet, which aren't hurt by chalice and do give this deck some nice card selection.
Chrome Mox has an advantage over Llanowar Elves in that it lets you cast Chalice turn one without making cards in your hand dead. But the advantage of Elf being able to come down turn one and carry Jitte can't be ignored.
However, the number of combo decks where a Chalice at 0 is actually a superior play to Chalice at 1, seems to be on the rise and if the trend continues, it will cause me to reconsider my initial stance on Llnowar Elves.
The Sprit Guides are awesome in that they counter Daze, let you play Chalice or Pyrostatic Pillar turn one, can be equipped to chrome mox etc. All while doubling down as additonal threats versus control decks.
That said, if later on, I come to run Llanowar Elves over Chrome Mox despite it's poor interaction with Chalice as a way to abuse Jitte more (a serious change I"m considering), I would also cut 2 Shimian Spirit Guides (since you no longer imprint them to Chrome Mox and you have Elves to abuse Jitte with) for better threats (probably Ohran Viper or maybe Tarmogoyf over Wild Mongrel, because Elves trade with Lackey in a pinch, and without Chrome Mox, that's one less card for Mongrel to eat mid game), or run maindeck Krosan Grips or something.
What I really needed was a good 2cc card to round the curve a bit. It was Wild Mongrel, but now, it's Magma Jet. And it may later on end up being Tarmogoyf.
The additional blood moon in the sideboard were really popular with me because loam decks were so popular in my local playgroup. Something that has rapidly come to change over the past week thanks to this deck . So I had come to replace them with additional Krosan Grip and more Pyroclasm, as Grip is astoundingly good at taking out so much randomness... Standstill, Disk, Ghostly Prison, Confinement, Jitte, Survival etc etc. And Pyroclasm slaugters goblins esp given that almost all your threats are bigger than them. Plus it gives an exceptionally strong bomb versus Warrens tokens (which seem to be the kill card of choice nowadays for some odd reason) I just updated the build with my current sideboard.
You're not supposed to overstretch with Spirit Guides versus everything. If you use up spirit Guides to cast a threat a turn earlier every single game, you are playing the deck wrong and you really hurt your odds versus decks heavy on countermagic and removal (decks that are otherwise very favorable).
You use Spirit Guides up to cast a bomb; Magus turn one vs. 43 lands and other counterless loam variants; Trinisphere, Chalice, Pillar etc turn one versus iggy pop, tes; magma jet or chalice versus goblins, burn etc. Or occasionally can even use them to cast Iwamori turn two (using Chrome Mox) against decks that have no countermagic at all, and whose only game plan is to race you (burn, combo etc). This is assuming that you mulled into a turn one chalice or trinisphere or atleast pillar versus combo like you should have.
Against decks that play lots of countermagic and removal, you're usually (not always depending on your opening hand) better off playing these out as threats turn three and on.
That way they can only kill and counter so many of your threats, and now have to counter Jitte too. And eventually will have to deal with them when they start eating away at their life total, and you WILL be able to resolve a relevent chalice at 2, or Heartwood, or Troll Ascetic or Burning Tree Shaman, or Iwamori, or Magus or something as a result. Against landstill, you have very good odds, but you have to play it like a battle of attrition.
Strategically, think of it as a mix of Zilla Stompy and Fairie Stompy, though it looks nothing like either. Instead of using Ancient Tombs and City of Traitors to get to 3 mana turn one or two, this deck uses ESGs and Llanowar Elves to get to 3 mana on turn 2. And thus, the deck gets away with a curve that lets you abuse Chalice. Against aggro, burn, thresh etc, you can easily lay down Chalice first turn. Against control, you can very often very easily lay down Magus of the Moon turn one before most of your opponent's countermagic comes online. If they have a FoW, that's fine, you have many other creatures that they also almost autolose to.
It has a slightly unfavorable matchup versus combo game one unless it has a Chalice in the opening hand but it gets very favorable postboard. If you actually know that you're facing combo game one, you have no problem mulliganing into a Chalice and laying it down turn one.
Aluren to abuse Ohran Viper and Heartwood Storyteller was tested and just made the deck too swingy. Some games, you do cast Aluren turn two or turn three and lay down 3-4 creatures along with it, draw more cards each turn with Viper and Heartwood and just overwhelm your opponent. But just as many times, Aluren doesn't do much of anything for you. So it seemed like you were better off with a 5/5 trampler instead.
Aether Vial too seemed like it had potential. But it forcing the number of dead draws with a Chalice at 1 and eating up critical creature slots got the card booted from the list.
When I was running threats in place of Magma Jet, Ohran Viper was superior to Wild Mongrel except that it pulled your 3cc curve up too high imo. Mongrel is better against fast decks, and Tarmogoyf was better against slow/control deck sexcept for one distinct situation. A first turn Chrome Mox, Land, Mongrel opening will convince most people that you're playing madness, and many good players will use up their removal on the Mongrel before your next main phase (or if you're really lucky, use up their FoW on it) in hopes of cutting you off from your only madness outlet. This leaves you free and clear to cast that Magus of the Moon or Chalice of the Void (if they used up their Force).
Matchups
The point of the deck is to eat bad mana bases and good mana curves for breakfast all while sometimes drawing tons of cards. And both fortunately happen to be extremely prevalent in the current meta. There honestly aren't many unfavorable matchups.
Fairie Stompy - The main difficulty versus this deck is that this is the one deck (excluding Prison which is a great matchups), that Chalice at one or two doesn't really impact. Magus slows them down by a turn sometimes but never color screws them. And they can play 4/3 flyers on the first turn or 3/4 flyers on the second turn that fly over your creatures, and get equipped to deal lots of damage. Their clock is a turn or faster than yours esp if they FoW your biggest threat, which usually lets them ignore whatever you're doing. Regardless, F. Stompy is a very inconsistent deck that derives a huge chunk of it's power by abusing Chalice (something you don't care about), FTK and Grip is great against them postboard and they'll get plenty of slow or mana light hands that you will win. It's probably about even or slightly to your favor but I would have to play more matchups to be sure.
Goblins - This matchup seems to be to your favor. On the one hand, their curve is varied enough that Chalice doesn't win games by itself. And Magus does nothing really. You also won't be drawing too many cards as they play more creatures than you do. Nevertheless, all your creatures are plenty fat, pyroclasm is an absolute massive bomb versus them postboard, your manabase is almost completely invulnerable to Wastelands and unless they get a lightning fast opening or you're aren't able to answer lackey, your threats usually just overpower their threats. With so much acceleration you have absoutely no problem casting Magma Jet or Burning Tree Shaman or any your high toughness creatures on your first turn and that alone is enough to stop goblins from attacking with any of their creatures for fear of losing them. Postboard, this fact will alone win you the game as it buys you enough time to find Pyroclasm or Jitte.
Those were literally the only two decks I've come across so far that aren't severely impeded by Chalice and your very extensive utility threatbase.
Walking Blood Moon + Drawing Tons of Cards Versus Control + Untargetable Regenerators + Chalice at 2 + Jitte. There's just too many threats for slower/control decks to counter/remove. Most loam decks, Threshold decks, 3c/4c landstill and a whole bunch of other decks that compose probably 40% of the field are built upon hideous manabases that collapse under resolved Magus of the Moon, especially if's resolved turn one or two. All your Spirit Guides function as additional threats that eat away at their life total. In addition, few control decks are equiped to deal with a resolved Troll Ascetic.
Chalice is what finally pushed the deck over the top, giving you an exceptional matchup against decks such as Burn and Tendrils Combo that were uneffected by Blood Moon and before just ignored your threats and outright won faster than you. Chalice + Trini + Pillar give you a favorable matchup versus combo postboard (and a very winnable one preboard due to the frequency of the first turn Chalice play). These decks were the bane of traditional RG beats, and Chalice along with the sideboard give this deck a favorable matchup versus all of them. If it wasn't for combo, Chalice would be cut and the deck would replace a whole lot cards and end up with a build similar to Zilla Stompy. But Chalice proved itself again and again not just as anticombo tool, but on average a 4 for 1 trade versus many matchups if it resolves early.
You have a great matchup versus pretty much every variations of aggro because all your creatures are fatter than most aggro decks, a Chalice at one or two really screws a lot of aggro decks over, Grip gives you the answer you need versus 4 Jitte + 4 SOFI.decs and Pyroclasm, Jitte and FTK to a much lesser extent are exceptional gamewinning bombs versus goblins too.
Prison too is a matchup that you can look forward to as its very winnable preboard and becomes very favorable postboard thanks to Krosan Grip, your large number of mana sources and your huge permanent count. Plus Heartwood draws you boatloads of cards. And you do have a very fast clock compared to them.
Since the testing is still in it's early stages, I can't yet put up specific matchup percentages yet.
But I have to say, based on what I've seen this deck do so far, I can't help but be convinced that this or some very close derivitive of this is maybe poised to be the next big aggro deck in legacy. Plus it's honestly the funnest aggro deck I've ever played.
I strongly recommend people proxy up the build below before criticizing it as I can pretty much guarentee that you will completely misunderstand how the deck functions or plays out if you don't play atleast a few games with it. I also don't recommend trusting the MWS Shuffler to get valid testing percentages (I absolutely refuse to play on MWS for this reason, and because it's no where near as fun imho) but if you don't have the cards and can't proxy them in your playgroup, that's an alternative too.
Your threatbase + Heartwood Storyteller + Magus of the Moon + Chalice of the Void are all downright broken and the perfect combination of creatures to severely impede virtually every other deck in the format.
Vaka Beatz 04/30/07
2 Taiga
9 Forest - Ancient Tomb
4 Mountain
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Chrome Mox - Possibly Llanowar Elves
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
3 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Umezawe's Jitte
4 Magma Jet
4 Magus of the Moon
4 Call of the Herd
4 Troll Ascetic
4 Burning Tree Shaman
3 Iwamori of Open Fist
Sideboard:
2 Metagame Slot
2 Trinisphere
2 Pyroclasm
2 Rough/Tumble
3 Pyrostatic Pillar
4 Krosan Grip
I'm now running 2 Rough/Tumble in place of 2 Pyroclasm, as both cards are very similar but Tumble can sometimes be helpful versus Fairie Stompy, Decree of Justicle and Exalted Angel. Most of the time though, it just acts as another Pyroclasm effect versus goblins and affinity as you don't like siding in the card into matchups that are already favorable just to have one more way to deal with a specific threat. Atleast with Pyroclasm, when you attack with what is always a larger number of threats, when they attempt to block with their beefier flyers, a Pyroclasm or Magma Jet can kill the flyers much faster than having to wait till you reach six mana, while simultanously killing Cloud of Fairies too. Thank you aisman for the idea regardless.
The two metagame slots can be occupied by an additonal Pyrostatic Pillar and Trinisphere or some of the many other very solid anticombo cards available including Red Elemental Blast (to protect your artifacts from getting bounced back if you can't set a Chalice at two), Ground Seal, Root Maze among many many others if you expect lots of combo, Flametoungue Kavu if you expect Fairie Stompy or nongoblins aggro, or additional Pyroclasm if Goblins is such a large part of your meta that you don't mind dedicating a few more slots to an already very favorable matchup.
The deck isn't 100% optimal yet imo, the most prominent example of which is that the manabase may support a few Ancient Tombs (acceleration) or Wastelands, and this has yet to be tested, but even at this stage of it's development, the build proves to be extremely competitive having favorable matchups against a huge number of top tier decks, all sorts of random jank, and no real horrible matchups that I have run across.
Recently, I've come to the conclusion that Heartwood Storyteller's bonus verus combo (letting you get Pyroclasm versus Warren tokens, letting you get the spirit guides and magma jet needs for you to win in response to their tendrils, provided they already took damage during thier combo to pyrostatic pillar etc.) don't occur often enough and testing shows that Call of the Herd has a significant advantage against both control and aggro (initially, I thought both cards would be about equally good vs. control). So I opted to switch over to Call of the Herd. The initial reasons for running Heartwood Storyteller/Ohran Viper are explained on the second page.
Krosan Grip is absolutely key in letting you be able to slaugther deed, disk/keg, equipment, pithing needle on your jitte, survival, ghostly prison, confinement, crucible, shackles, lion's eye diamond and so much other randomness. So now, I'm up to 4 as opposed to 3, and am seriously considering maindecking it.
I know some of you commented on replacing Iwamori. In a related matter, do you guys have any suggestions on with what? How do you feel about Rumbling Slum? Losing trample is too big a loss imho. But Slum does have an ability that wins games preboard against Ghostly Prison and other randomness. Stax is not a deck I've ever had a problem with as they're not nearly as effective at attacking my mana base in my experience, but Vaka Pox has occasionally managed to stablize against this deck at a low life with Ghostly Prison combined with 22 assymetric land destruction effects. And while ESGs have occasionally saved my butt in this situation, you don't always draw enough. I am not at the point of actually wanting to try it. But if I get enough input saying that I should run it, I will.
I am running Pyrostatic Pillar over Red Elemental Blast because Pillar has, to my surprise actually, been absolutely astounding versus storm based combo decks.
The criticism below that the original build was lacking in removal did have merit, which has since been fixed. It helps to have some removal as a nice combat trick. The main problem with removal was that Chalice was so often set to 1 which is counterproductive with Lightning Bolt. That's why I ended up replacing all the Ohran Vipers/Wild Mongrels, along with an Iwamori, with Magma Jet, which aren't hurt by chalice and do give this deck some nice card selection.
Chrome Mox has an advantage over Llanowar Elves in that it lets you cast Chalice turn one without making cards in your hand dead. But the advantage of Elf being able to come down turn one and carry Jitte can't be ignored.
However, the number of combo decks where a Chalice at 0 is actually a superior play to Chalice at 1, seems to be on the rise and if the trend continues, it will cause me to reconsider my initial stance on Llnowar Elves.
The Sprit Guides are awesome in that they counter Daze, let you play Chalice or Pyrostatic Pillar turn one, can be equipped to chrome mox etc. All while doubling down as additonal threats versus control decks.
That said, if later on, I come to run Llanowar Elves over Chrome Mox despite it's poor interaction with Chalice as a way to abuse Jitte more (a serious change I"m considering), I would also cut 2 Shimian Spirit Guides (since you no longer imprint them to Chrome Mox and you have Elves to abuse Jitte with) for better threats (probably Ohran Viper or maybe Tarmogoyf over Wild Mongrel, because Elves trade with Lackey in a pinch, and without Chrome Mox, that's one less card for Mongrel to eat mid game), or run maindeck Krosan Grips or something.
What I really needed was a good 2cc card to round the curve a bit. It was Wild Mongrel, but now, it's Magma Jet. And it may later on end up being Tarmogoyf.
The additional blood moon in the sideboard were really popular with me because loam decks were so popular in my local playgroup. Something that has rapidly come to change over the past week thanks to this deck . So I had come to replace them with additional Krosan Grip and more Pyroclasm, as Grip is astoundingly good at taking out so much randomness... Standstill, Disk, Ghostly Prison, Confinement, Jitte, Survival etc etc. And Pyroclasm slaugters goblins esp given that almost all your threats are bigger than them. Plus it gives an exceptionally strong bomb versus Warrens tokens (which seem to be the kill card of choice nowadays for some odd reason) I just updated the build with my current sideboard.
You're not supposed to overstretch with Spirit Guides versus everything. If you use up spirit Guides to cast a threat a turn earlier every single game, you are playing the deck wrong and you really hurt your odds versus decks heavy on countermagic and removal (decks that are otherwise very favorable).
You use Spirit Guides up to cast a bomb; Magus turn one vs. 43 lands and other counterless loam variants; Trinisphere, Chalice, Pillar etc turn one versus iggy pop, tes; magma jet or chalice versus goblins, burn etc. Or occasionally can even use them to cast Iwamori turn two (using Chrome Mox) against decks that have no countermagic at all, and whose only game plan is to race you (burn, combo etc). This is assuming that you mulled into a turn one chalice or trinisphere or atleast pillar versus combo like you should have.
Against decks that play lots of countermagic and removal, you're usually (not always depending on your opening hand) better off playing these out as threats turn three and on.
That way they can only kill and counter so many of your threats, and now have to counter Jitte too. And eventually will have to deal with them when they start eating away at their life total, and you WILL be able to resolve a relevent chalice at 2, or Heartwood, or Troll Ascetic or Burning Tree Shaman, or Iwamori, or Magus or something as a result. Against landstill, you have very good odds, but you have to play it like a battle of attrition.
Strategically, think of it as a mix of Zilla Stompy and Fairie Stompy, though it looks nothing like either. Instead of using Ancient Tombs and City of Traitors to get to 3 mana turn one or two, this deck uses ESGs and Llanowar Elves to get to 3 mana on turn 2. And thus, the deck gets away with a curve that lets you abuse Chalice. Against aggro, burn, thresh etc, you can easily lay down Chalice first turn. Against control, you can very often very easily lay down Magus of the Moon turn one before most of your opponent's countermagic comes online. If they have a FoW, that's fine, you have many other creatures that they also almost autolose to.
It has a slightly unfavorable matchup versus combo game one unless it has a Chalice in the opening hand but it gets very favorable postboard. If you actually know that you're facing combo game one, you have no problem mulliganing into a Chalice and laying it down turn one.
Aluren to abuse Ohran Viper and Heartwood Storyteller was tested and just made the deck too swingy. Some games, you do cast Aluren turn two or turn three and lay down 3-4 creatures along with it, draw more cards each turn with Viper and Heartwood and just overwhelm your opponent. But just as many times, Aluren doesn't do much of anything for you. So it seemed like you were better off with a 5/5 trampler instead.
Aether Vial too seemed like it had potential. But it forcing the number of dead draws with a Chalice at 1 and eating up critical creature slots got the card booted from the list.
When I was running threats in place of Magma Jet, Ohran Viper was superior to Wild Mongrel except that it pulled your 3cc curve up too high imo. Mongrel is better against fast decks, and Tarmogoyf was better against slow/control deck sexcept for one distinct situation. A first turn Chrome Mox, Land, Mongrel opening will convince most people that you're playing madness, and many good players will use up their removal on the Mongrel before your next main phase (or if you're really lucky, use up their FoW on it) in hopes of cutting you off from your only madness outlet. This leaves you free and clear to cast that Magus of the Moon or Chalice of the Void (if they used up their Force).
Matchups
The point of the deck is to eat bad mana bases and good mana curves for breakfast all while sometimes drawing tons of cards. And both fortunately happen to be extremely prevalent in the current meta. There honestly aren't many unfavorable matchups.
Fairie Stompy - The main difficulty versus this deck is that this is the one deck (excluding Prison which is a great matchups), that Chalice at one or two doesn't really impact. Magus slows them down by a turn sometimes but never color screws them. And they can play 4/3 flyers on the first turn or 3/4 flyers on the second turn that fly over your creatures, and get equipped to deal lots of damage. Their clock is a turn or faster than yours esp if they FoW your biggest threat, which usually lets them ignore whatever you're doing. Regardless, F. Stompy is a very inconsistent deck that derives a huge chunk of it's power by abusing Chalice (something you don't care about), FTK and Grip is great against them postboard and they'll get plenty of slow or mana light hands that you will win. It's probably about even or slightly to your favor but I would have to play more matchups to be sure.
Goblins - This matchup seems to be to your favor. On the one hand, their curve is varied enough that Chalice doesn't win games by itself. And Magus does nothing really. You also won't be drawing too many cards as they play more creatures than you do. Nevertheless, all your creatures are plenty fat, pyroclasm is an absolute massive bomb versus them postboard, your manabase is almost completely invulnerable to Wastelands and unless they get a lightning fast opening or you're aren't able to answer lackey, your threats usually just overpower their threats. With so much acceleration you have absoutely no problem casting Magma Jet or Burning Tree Shaman or any your high toughness creatures on your first turn and that alone is enough to stop goblins from attacking with any of their creatures for fear of losing them. Postboard, this fact will alone win you the game as it buys you enough time to find Pyroclasm or Jitte.
Those were literally the only two decks I've come across so far that aren't severely impeded by Chalice and your very extensive utility threatbase.
Walking Blood Moon + Drawing Tons of Cards Versus Control + Untargetable Regenerators + Chalice at 2 + Jitte. There's just too many threats for slower/control decks to counter/remove. Most loam decks, Threshold decks, 3c/4c landstill and a whole bunch of other decks that compose probably 40% of the field are built upon hideous manabases that collapse under resolved Magus of the Moon, especially if's resolved turn one or two. All your Spirit Guides function as additional threats that eat away at their life total. In addition, few control decks are equiped to deal with a resolved Troll Ascetic.
Chalice is what finally pushed the deck over the top, giving you an exceptional matchup against decks such as Burn and Tendrils Combo that were uneffected by Blood Moon and before just ignored your threats and outright won faster than you. Chalice + Trini + Pillar give you a favorable matchup versus combo postboard (and a very winnable one preboard due to the frequency of the first turn Chalice play). These decks were the bane of traditional RG beats, and Chalice along with the sideboard give this deck a favorable matchup versus all of them. If it wasn't for combo, Chalice would be cut and the deck would replace a whole lot cards and end up with a build similar to Zilla Stompy. But Chalice proved itself again and again not just as anticombo tool, but on average a 4 for 1 trade versus many matchups if it resolves early.
You have a great matchup versus pretty much every variations of aggro because all your creatures are fatter than most aggro decks, a Chalice at one or two really screws a lot of aggro decks over, Grip gives you the answer you need versus 4 Jitte + 4 SOFI.decs and Pyroclasm, Jitte and FTK to a much lesser extent are exceptional gamewinning bombs versus goblins too.
Prison too is a matchup that you can look forward to as its very winnable preboard and becomes very favorable postboard thanks to Krosan Grip, your large number of mana sources and your huge permanent count. Plus Heartwood draws you boatloads of cards. And you do have a very fast clock compared to them.