[Deck] Trinity Green

[Jak]

Now noobs across the land start out loving green. I did too. But realizing now that it is such a weak color, it is kind of sad. So why shouldn't there be a mono green deck.

With that poacher deck doing so well, it got me thinking that trinity green might do alright if it was tuned and tested. So what does this deck need? It needs a way to control the game in some way. 2 artifacts come to mind quick. Chalice and Trini. Now I love Plow Under, so that would probably go in too :tongue:.

So since these need to come out quick, we need mana. I think a set of Ancient Tombs would be efficient and then add a set of Fyndhorn Elves (way pimper than Llanowar) probably Llanowar too. I also think 2 Rofellos would do some good.

Well the deck has some good, fast mana, so why not have some good beaters. 2 Masticores because they will pick off gobs, 4 Tarmogoyf, and some Deranged Hermits.

Well I think the deck is off to a good start, so putting these pieces together, my deck looks like this.

Trinity 07

Lands
4 Ancient Tomb
4 Wooded Foothills
14 Forest
2 Pendlehaven

Mana
4 Mox Diamond
4 Fyndhorn Elves
2 Llanowar Elves
2 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary

Control
4 Trinisphere
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Plow Under

Beaters
4 Deranged Hermit
2 Masticore
4 Tarmogoyf

Pump
3 Umezawa's Jitte

Sideboard
3 Krosan Grip
1 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Ravenous Baloth
4 Call of the Herd
3 Sword of Fire and Ice

So the sideboard plan for gobbos is to just try to outnumber them by Jitte, Swords, and bigger guys. Now, the weakest card in the deck is probably Plow Under, but it is such a fun card. Do you think it would be better as 3 Call of the Herd? I think this deck has some potential, it just needs to be tuned. So since I have so much free time this summer, I will test it out on MWS tonight. Thoughts?

[MattH]

Why are you using fetchlands?

[hugh1130]

for goyf i assume

[Jak]

Yeah for Goyf. I don't know if he belongs, but I wanted something to drop turn 2. I have been trying to use him in a lot of decks, so I wanted to put him here. I don't know if it is best though. When I get home tonight I will definitely test on MWS.

[Jak]

Okay, I did some testing a Goyf was not great at all. I was relying too much on my opponents having stuff in their yard. When they did have good stuff, it was a winning MU. Gobs has nothing to pump him. I decided to take out jittes and just put them in the board because they didn't help that well when they were just a lone out there. So I put in 4 Call of the Herd. I really like them and they are great against discard and countermagic. So this is a newer list.

Lands
4 Ancient Tomb
16 Forest
2 Pendlehaven

Mana
4 Mox Diamond
4 Fyndhorn Elves
2 Llanowar Elves
2 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary

Control
4 Trinisphere
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Plow Under

Beaters
4 Deranged Hermit
2 Masticore
4 Call of the Herd
4 Ernham Djinn

Sideboard
3 Krosan Grip
4 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Ravenous Baloth
4 Sword of Fire and Ice

I really like the added threats. Now the list is only 59 cards. I want to still add a 3 cc creature, but I don't know which. I have searched, but not found one. SHould I just add something else? What should I fill with the open slot?

[raudo]

Why don't you use Iwamori instead of Erhnam?

[Jak]

I totally forgot about him. I will probably do a 3-2 split between them. Probably 3 Djinn's because Iwamori is Legendary and Djinn's art is so tight. Does anyone know of any good 3 cc beaters?

[Nihil Credo]

Engineered Explosives in the SB are a must. 4 Jitte are too much, they're legendary.

I'd love to see room for Stunted Growth in this list, but I don't see anything worth cutting for it.

A good card to run as a 1- or 2-of could be Harmonize.

Edit: for good 3cc beaters, why, it's hard to do better than our old friend the Troll Ascetic.

[Jak]

Well I didn't really want the 1GG in the cost because I can't cast it turn one off tomb. I was also going to add 2 City of traitors, because I wanted to be able to cast Chalices or trinis turn one more often. Plus if I add another 3 cc guy, he would help coming out turn one.

I really like harmonize because I wanted some draw, but what would I cut? I have really been liking Plow Under Because it just is really good against solidarity. And I like having all the beaters since I added Djinn, Iwamori, and Herd. Here is the list with Iwamori to avoid confusion.

Lands
4 Ancient Tomb
2 City of Traitors
14 Forest
2 Pendlehaven

Mana
4 Mox Diamond
4 Fyndhorn Elves
2 Llanowar Elves
2 Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary

Control
4 Trinisphere
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Plow Under

Beaters
4 Deranged Hermit
2 Masticore
4 Call of the Herd
3 Ernham Djinn
2 Iwamori

Sideboard
3 Krosan Grip
4 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Ravenous Baloth
4 Sword of Fire and Ice

Thoughts?

[insertnamehere]

An early E.Plague could really hurt you.

What about the 5/5 for GG2 or even some withesses

[Jak]

The 5/5 for 4 cc is in the deck. Iwamori. Witnesses are not really needed. There are really only 3 cards that it affects, Plow, but by the time you cast Plow, you should be winning or controlling the game by then.

Engineered plague on elves doesn't really hurt that bad. I still have other accel in the deck to get out the fatties and control.

[Jak]

So I played a few games against Goblins today. I feel really good because I won the match 2-1.

The first game, I kept a controlling hand with trini and lands/mana. It was bad because he layed Lackey, then hit into Siege, so I lost with an Elephant token on the field. But I was glad to board.

So I board in a lot. Here is what my board looked like. It is a work in progress.

3 Jitte
3 SoFI
3 Ravenous Baloth
3 Krosan Grip
3 EE

So in went the Jittes, SoFIs, Baloths, and 2 Grips. I took out Trinis, Chalice, and Plow. So in the second game, I get a good hand with a Jitte, an elf and Iwamori. Turn one Elf, then turn two Iwamori, turn 3 Jitte + equip and that was game after I gripped his vial.

Game three was not as great, but still pulled in the win. I layed just a forest turn 1. Turn 2 Rofellos, and turn 3 Hermit. He probably had a bad hand so he said gg. I still had 2 Baloths and a Hermit left in hand.

I think the deck has potential. I would like help on the board though. The cards I am sure of though are

3 Jittes
3 Krosan Grip

Probably SoFI will go in too, but as a 3 or 4 of I do not know. How many EE. I know they do well against combo, but should I have 4 in the board? I think my Board so far is great though. I just need to keep working with the numbers. Thoughts?

[4eak]

I guess I'll start by saying I love Trinity Green. The deck concept is clearly one of accelerating your tempo and halting your opponents tempo in terms of board and mana advantage, much like stax. Generally, at least from my testing, trinity (and its variants) has three problems, not always the same ones depending on your build:

1.) It doesn't control the game early enough
2.) It lacks a good clock
3.) Cards quality and relevance can be significantly lower on the average draw, specifically that you'll find more dead-cards per hand than other decks might find. Mulligans obviously help, but this still remains an issue.

You've certainly adjusted the deck from the older versions, the most notable inclusions being 3Sphere and CoTV, both of which are amazing cards in the right deck. Additionally, you've opted for fewer control/tempo components for more aggressive cards--this is certainly a trade-off that should be analyzed.

The aim of this particular deck is to run acceleration, as much as possible that isn't affected by your own lock components, and drop 3sphere or CoTV very early. This 1-2 piece tempo disruption buys you enough time to drop a threat or two, and you attempt to win before your opponent can recover.

What I like: You've got lots of beats, and a clock is usually very relevant. And, as you've chosen to use 3sphere and CoTV, you've built a deck that is less reliant upon the elf-ball mana-acceleration mentality, meaning CoTVs for 1 and 2 doesn't eliminate 12-14 cards (accelerants at that), but only 8 cards for you. You've also kept your average CC higher to play around 3sphere, so the effect is asymmetrically in your favor against the decks with very low mana curves (most of the metagame?).

The problem with both the CoTV and and 3sphere in Trinity Green is that both of the lock components can still hinder your deck as well in significant ways. If you build your deck around these lock-components, you really want to be almost entirely unaffected by their disruption. Trinity doesn't abuse these cards asymmetrically enough, and that can be very problematic. In the end, I can't help but wonder if both of these lock-components aren't better to suited to decks that already exist, such as stax. So, my first question is, why play this instead of stax-variants?

Trinity performs much better in slower metagames. I don't know if trinity can be made viable in the legacy metagame, even if it is a blast to play. This deck can hose itself unless it asymmetrically abuses lock components, this deck can hose itself due to dyssynergistic cards that can make card relevance lower on average, and this deck just might not be fast enough (regardless of our focus on either aggro or control) to deal with combo and aggro. If the metagame shifts to include more and more control decks (of which there are already a few, but not enough), then I think trinity could become viable again.

Trinity Green is at its best when it goes for mana denial strategies while dropping permanents that accelerate your mana base. Rishadan Port, Winter Orb, Tanglewire, and green LD really made this deck amazing from my experience. Additionally, the elf-ball strategy gives you even more consistent tempo advantage, and it enables things like crop rotation->Gaea's Cradle. In reality, I think you need to drop a turn 2 piece of disruption that doesn't hose or significantly hinder you nearly every single game, followed by an excellent bomb on either turn 3 or 4 in order to have a viable trinity deck.

The deck has potential, but I think a stax-variant may perform the tempo-control role better than this deck, and a major barrier to trinity's viability might be the average critical turn in legacy, which keeps dropping lower and lower as the metagame becomes tuned.

peace,
4eak

[Jak]

This deck is not trying to be stax. I don't want to lockdown the game, just take control of it early, so then I can lay down some beasts. Trinis and chalices don't hurt. If I lay down a chalice for 1 turn one, it definitely hurts combo and thresh way more. All I get is minus 6 elves. The thing I wanted to do is make it so I didn't rely too much on the mana elves. This is why I included Tomb, City, and Diamond. It allows me to cut myself off from the mana elves, but still be able to cast the controlling pieces and my threats. When I do drop one of these controlling pieces, I will do it so the opponent hurts more. The deck is all about tempo, so I am fine cutting off from some elves.

On why not to play stax. I thought it would be obvious. Stax is Lockdown, that tries to just flat out control or lock the game out, until they can cast there win condition. I think this deck is like a green Faerie Stompy. Where it wants to get out fast threats or "tempo" pieces, until they can win. This is what this deck tries to do. It is a completely different deck then stax and IMO is more fun.

I think the old Trinity had problems of being to slow, but I have added a lot of accel, to hopefully fix the problems. Now, I really want a 3 cc beater to cast threats turn 1 more efficiently, but I have not found one yet to my liking. I can still cast turn one Chalices, Trinispheres, and Herds, which are big threats. The deck is a lot faster than the old, which relied on the mana elves, which can't do anything turn one, so it was turn 2 when you could cast anything at 2cc. This deck IMO is a much improved version.

The cards you listed were good, but I think they would hurt this deck just as much. When I drop a turn 1 Trini. I am in a great spot, even if it cuts off some mana elves. Tangle Wire is not that great, combo can combo off with ease after it leaves play and I just would rather have more threats. Now the LD I just didn't feel that great. I would rather be dropping relevant stuff, than tapping 2 of my lands to tap one of theirs. I just would not be able to do it as well as Gobs without vial. I think this strategy is a lot better, because once you drop a Chalice or Trini, you can focus on aggro, and drop threats.

So I have a few questions. What do you guys think I should do with the sideboard? And I really feel I need a 3cc threat, so I have narroed it down to this list. None of them are spectacular, but I want more wats to stop Goblin Lackey. So...

Coiling Woodwurm (meh)
Albino Troll (better)
Gorrila Pack (could be good, but green goblins...)
Hunting Moa (4/3 for 3. Echo isn't that bad.)

Those are really the only 2G creatures I liked. The ones I am leaning towards are Moa and the Troll. I like them both. Troll has regeneration and costs less, so I like that more. Thoghts?

[Nydaeli]

Some 3cc creatures you might want to consider:

Nessian Courser (2G vanilla 3/3)
Phyrexian War Beast (probably too much of a liability)
Steel Golem
Loaming Shaman

Of these, I'd recommend Shaman since it has a relevant ability.

[Jak]

I thought about shaman, but then decided he would not be that great. For the slot, I wanted a sufficent beater to get out there early.

1) he is smaller than most
2) his ability is great, but turn 1 will have no use.

I like Golem a lot, but then that means no masticore. Masticore is huge in the Gobos MU, so I don't want dead draws. Plus multiples suck. I have been trying out Albino Troll, and so far he is great. He comes down early and survives the late game blocking and regenerating. The echo isn't bad at all because usually next turn I can lay down some elves or something, so it's not like he is a time walk for the opponent. The only trouble is knowing what to take out. And how many to put in. I will have to do some testing and see how many times I need to get a turn one play. I might cut the Djinns. I don't know. Thoughts?

Edit- I did not see the War Beast in that list. I totally forgot about him. He would do well in the deck. The liability would not hurt too much either. So I lose a land, but he will have hit a few times and I should already have plenty of mana by then. The question is though, if I want him or Troll. Troll can come down without a 2 mana land out which is nice, but echo still sucks when I can play Iwamori turn 2 or something. I am leaning towards War Beast.

[Barook]

It's probably not what you're looking for, but I still think it's an interesting critter with its :2::g: cost:

Hunting Cheetah (http://magiccards.info/p3k/en/138.html)

[Jak]

I do like it because it thins out the deck, but it's p/t is weak. I like Troll and War Beast because they can trade with mongeese and other random x/3s. I will try it out though.

[aisman132000]

I feel like masticore should be an automatic 4 of in this deck. How can goyf be a 4 of and not masticore?

[Jak]

I have cut Goyf. In testing he was just bad. Masticore is not a 4 of because he is only great against goblins. He is no monster being a 4/4 for 4, so I would rather have Djinns in there who are better in other MUs (i.e. blocking werebears, goyfs, and mongeese) without the liability of discarding a card. Preboard the goblin MU is pretty bad. Two more Masticores would not help this (I dropped jittes for the same reason). I would rather focus beating goblins in the board. Plus they run Hooligan and that just makes him worse. He is great though against random aggro and stuff, so he is great as a 2 of. There are just better threats.

Edit- I plan to do quite a bit of testing tonight, so I will post how things go and a new list if it changes.

[aisman132000]

wait...your going to play Ernahm Djinn over Masticore? There are several green 4 drops that are better than djinn namely phantom centaur and Iwamori. Also cutting jitte imo is a bad choice. You play 8 elves that are terrible top decks late in the game. Jitte makes all of your guys threats and is capable of handling threshold/fish and random aggro decks almost singlehandedly.

[Jak]

I play Iwamori as a 2 of already. He is a legend and I do not want to draw multiples. Hes is slightly better than Djinn. Phantom Centaur is alright and should be tested because he is a beast. I was just worried about him lasting the longer game. I want guys who can block and live to the midgame.

I explained to you why masticore is a 2 of. Multiples are not that great and I would rather run 5/5s and 4/5s instead of 4/4s.

The elves are not that bad top decks with Pendelhaven. But they are not great either. So I would probably pitch them to Masticore. Remember I still run 2.

Jitte is okay and all, but he isn't as powerful with Tin Street around. I have a good random aggro MU because it is not as explosive is as goblins and I can easily match their threats. Goblins has too many and kills my blockers when I block Driver. I would rather focus on other MUs and have a good Goblin one postboard.

Edit- I have been experimenting with another list. I did some testing and did not like, at all, how the deck was running. I was drawing too many elves, or mana and not enough threats or control elements. So I just cut all the elf crap. This is the list I came up with.

Mana 29
4 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
16 Forest
4 Mox Diamond
2 Rofellos

Draw 3
3 Harmonize

Control 11
4 Trinisphere
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Plow Under

Beaters 17
4 Deranged Hermit
3 Iwamori
4 Call of the Herd
4 Phyrexian War Beast (or another 2cc or 3cc guy)
2 Masticore

Sideboard
3 Krosan Grip
3 Ravenous Baloth
4 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Sword of Fire and Ice
2 EE

Strengths of this list would be the draw and more threats and lands. I just didn't like the idea of just going elf go. They were too weak and just excessive. War Beasts are not final and still need to see some testing. But I doubt their liability should hurt that much with Diamonds, the 2 Elfs, and the 2 mana lands. Thoughts?

[4eak]

I do like your trinity build, as I said before, it has a more aggressive gameplan. I certainly think you have moved the deck in the right direction given the metagame. But, the problem is that this shift in the deck doesn't allow trinity to do what it does best (that isn't your fault, it is simply a metagame that doesn't allow it).


On why not to play stax. I thought it would be obvious. Stax is Lockdown, that tries to just flat out control or lock the game out, until they can cast there win condition. I think this deck is like a green Faerie Stompy. Where it wants to get out fast threats or "tempo" pieces, until they can win. This is what this deck tries to do. It is a completely different deck then stax and IMO is more fun.

I can see your point. You've reiterated what I already said about the lock components and the aims of the deck (I can't tell from your post if you actually read that part of my post). And, from your explanation here, I can definitely see how you want this to be that 1-2 piece of disruption (hopefully 1st turn) into heavy aggro. I suppose I wasn't clear enough. I knew you didn't mean to have a "hard-lock" like Stack@1+Crucible, but I think the lock components you have chosen force you into a gameplan much closer to Stax's mindset than Faerie Stompy's.

Chalice is the only piece of disruption that Faerie Stompy and this Trinity deck have in common, and of course, this card is a bomb. But, even with similar mana bases, your deck looks to have a much different purpose and gameplan than faerie stompy. FS runs a much lower CC threat base backed up by more board control, better draw, and FoW. Your deck runs two other pieces of disruption, Plow and 3Sphere, while running a much higher CC threat base (which is supported by only slightly more mana accel than faerie stompy). FS is way more weenie style with cheap disruption, while your deck appears to want to drop bomb after bomb--just look at the CC and Upkeep cost differences between the two decks. FS can play like fish, without absolute control, but short-term disruption, while trinity cannot, as trinity must have control in the first couple turns, then dropping bomb beaters, or it is going to lose (this is much closer to the stax mentality).

The important difference in disruption between Faerie Stompy and Trinity is the use of 3sphere. This is why your deck reminds me of stax more than Faerie stompy. Trinisphere has more consequences to the game state and Chalice will ever have, and trinisphere is hardly a card that I would call a short-term disruption card that we would find in a very quick-beats fishy deck like faerie stompy. You might say that your deck is somewhere in between FS and Stax because you choose to run Trinisphere, but you also have such a aggressive game-plan. The main difference between stax and this deck is that you've chosen to up your threat count, playing more like stax-aggro than stax-control. In any case, you're deck doesn't look to want to open hands with weenies and light disruption, it looks to drop a bomb and major beats every turn (which is much closer to stax-aggro than faerie stompy).

Trinity has an uphill battle, and it needs to win the permanent and mana advantage now or never, and it earns the label of a tempo deck (in terms what its gameplan emphasizes) much more than faerie stompy from what I can see. The permanent and mana advantage requirements, and the use of Trinisphere make this much more similar to a stax-aggro concept, and I think you should work from that mindset rather than the faerie stompy mindset when choosing cards to fit the purpose of this deck.


I think the old Trinity had problems of being to slow, but I have added a lot of accel, to hopefully fix the problems.

You only accelerated in terms of the 'possible' mana available 1st and maybe 2nd turn, otherwise the elf-ball trinity decks certainly outpace your mana acceleration. But, I agree, you are able to drop bombs turn 1, and the old trinity could never do such a thing.

Your build is lovely, of course. And, as I stated at the beginning of this post, I think you are making the right metagame calls for this deck so far, mainly by speeding it up, even at the cost of late game consistency and better disruption. But, that doesn't mean that this deck is viable, only "more" viable than before. This is why I was questioning whether trinity (or mono-green for that matter) could really make it. The fundamental turn may just be too fast in legacy for a mono-green deck.

By the way, do you have any more matches you could post so that we can better understand your deck's strengths and weaknesses against the basic playing field?

Additionally, you may want to consider Root maze and Sphere of Resistance. Root maze is a fairly interesting card, and the odd staple in green-tempo disruption decks-- it certainly should be considered and tested as it is in color. As for SoR, it is especially good against combo in my experience (and I think mono-green needs every bit of help it can get against combo).

peace,
4eak

[mmatney]

your decklist looks alot like 5/3 with a green splash, which im unsure as to whether that makes the deck any better, maybe look at some 5/3 decklists and play it some, you might like it.

[Jak]

Well I have seen a few Faerie Stompy builds running Chalice and Trini. It actually T8ed. Trinisphere is a great card, but by itself it is not a lock. All it really does is slow the opponent down. Sure, it totally owns belcher and TES, but soon they will bounce it. In conjunction with Stax it is a lock and a good one, but I chose to leave it out. My newer list has tried to cut out the G mana elves. I thought I had enough accel and I wanted room for more draw and beaters. I don't know if it is better, but hopefully it will help me out lategame.

The accel actually is better IMO because it does allow the deck to be speeded up. Before, the deck tried to go forest, elf, go. That allows a good deal of mana in the long run, but I wanted the deck to be more explosive.

You make good points of how the meta is not right, but I still think it is a posibility. More combo is coming and aggro-control is the right call for it. Goblins is a good MU postboard. I will gladly do more testing.

Do you have any suggestions for the deck, like what the optimal creature count would be? Elves or not? And what 2cc or 3cc beater? Thanks.

[Jak]

I did some testing. It was terrible. I don't know if it was the shuffler or the deck is just crap. I lost to the following: a false cure deck, a sligh deck, and a 9 land stompy deck. God, it was awful. I drew chalice in 1 game out of like 9. Never drew Pull Under, Rofellos, or Masticore. And in the stompy and false cure deck, I got slaughtered by Kavu Predator. This deck needs creature removal. Against the False Cure deck, I actually was doing well. First turn Chalice for 1, second turn Trini, third turn Call of the Herd. Then I got mana screwed and was stuck on 4 lands. The deck ran out of gas way too often. I could never cast Harmonize. I had great hands, but got mana screwed or I had bad hands with too much mana. I really think this deck could do well. With the testing, I think I need to make changes. If these don't work I'll probably scrap the deck. So I want to test this tomorrow.

Mana 25
4 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
13 Forest
4 Chrome Mox
2 Rofellos

Draw 4
4 Harmonize

Control 8
4 Trinisphere
4 Chalice of the Void

Beaters 17
3 Deranged Hermit
3 Iwamori
4 Call of the Herd
4 Troll Ascetic
2 Masticore

Pump 6
3 Sword of Fire and Ice
3 Umezawa's Jitte

Sideboard
3 Krosan Grip
4 Ravenous Baloth
4 Plow Under
4 Rancor

Thoughts? Suggestions? Advice?