[Deck] Merfolk

[Hof]

Just wondering, if an equipment heavy environment suddenly makes Reality Ripple borderline playable after 15 years, which I doubt but it is certainly an interesting thought, shouldn't other, potentially better 'phase out' cards be considered?

Teferi's Realm has several applications, it is actually a kind of catch-all solution to a wide range of problematic lock type cards: Maze of Ith, Humility, Ensnaring Bridge, for example.

Vodalian Illusionist should be able to remove Batterskull before they get a chance to equip anything other than the token. If arriving too late he can always phase out whatever creature happens to be carrying dangerous equipment during combat. Can also sometimes save your own creatures, etc., and is a Merfolk.

[Star|Scream]

Just wondering, if an equipment heavy environment suddenly makes Reality Ripple borderline playable after 15 years, which I doubt but it is certainly an interesting thought, shouldn't other, potentially better 'phase out' cards be considered?

Teferi's Realm has several applications, it is actually a kind of catch-all solution to a wide range of problematic lock type cards: Maze of Ith, Humility, Ensnaring Bridge, for example.


do your coralhelms, vials, and jittes come back with their counters?

[SlopeeJ]

Yes comes back in just like it was

Edit

Did you guys see that massacre gives all creatures -2? Is that good in a deck full of 2/2s, even with lords?

[reale]

Hello Taco. In your opinion, in a heavy aggro meta (Zoo, Affinity, WW, etc), with some Burn and almost inexistent combo decks, am I correct to say that Jitte is the best answer? If Yes, what would you replace in your last posted list? If not, what do you recommend? MD and SB. Thanks in advance.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

Did you guys see that massacre gives all creatures -2? Is that good in a deck full of 2/2s, even with lords?

To answer your rhetorical question: I'm pretty sure no, it's not gonna be. Massacre seems so wrong for this deck I actually assumed it was a mistype, but I'm not sure. Perish is, obv, a way better reason to splash black.

[Micki]

If you're thinking of splashing a color to have answers to Progenitus then wouldn't splashing white for Tariff be a good idea? White also of course gives you StoP, PtE, Serenity (quite nice against affinity) and many more SB options.
Though it doesn't destroy anything, wouldn't Hibernation slow your opponent down enough to be an option to Perish?

[Hopo]

If you're thinking of splashing a color to have answers to Progenitus then wouldn't splashing white for Tariff be a good idea? White also of course gives you StoP, PtE, Serenity (quite nice against affinity) and many more SB options.
Though it doesn't destroy anything, wouldn't Hibernation slow your opponent down enough to be an option to Perish?

What is wrong with Phyrexian Metamorph? It's fabulous as it kills the legendary monsters and Jitte and doubles as a lord or copies Batterskulls. No splash needed.

[Micki]

What is wrong with Phyrexian Metamorph? It's fabulous as it kills the legendary monsters and Jitte and doubles as a lord or copies Batterskulls. No splash needed.

Forgot that one, thanks Hopo! Metamorph might even be good enough to deserve MD slots, thoughts about that?

[Tacosnape]

Hello Taco. In your opinion, in a heavy aggro meta (Zoo, Affinity, WW, etc), with some Burn and almost inexistent combo decks, am I correct to say that Jitte is the best answer? If Yes, what would you replace in your last posted list? If not, what do you recommend? MD and SB. Thanks in advance.

If those three decks are what your metagame largely consists of, go pick up another deck if you can. That's your best option. Zoo's a very hard matchup, and I've played against a few WW builds that were pretty much 90-10 in their favor.

But, yes. Umezawa's Jitte seems pretty good right there. Squeeze one main for a Daze. With the two Dismembers and the single main Jitte, and the extras in sideboard, you should have a pretty decent shot.

If your metagame's just completely sellout nonblue aggro, then ditch all your Dazes to board for more Dismembers/Jittes, and consider dropping down to 2 Aether Vials.

[Sturtzilla]

What is wrong with Phyrexian Metamorph? It's fabulous as it kills the legendary monsters and Jitte and doubles as a lord or copies Batterskulls. No splash needed.

Honestly, I have been toying around with this idea. The best part is you dont have to worry about color at all. You can get a metamorph for three colorless and two life, which can be quite relevant due to our 8 colorless producing lands. I think the utility here is pretty awesome; yet, the problem that I have encountered was what do I cut. I want to keep my other lords and my permission package. Ultimately it comes down to a lack of space in the deck. I think it is good but I am inclined to believe that we have much better options. Bounce, phasing, dismember, and pithing needle all seem like they do a better job of answering our Batterskull problem. That is my opinion, but I am open to hearing what others think.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

Hello Taco. In your opinion, in a heavy aggro meta (Zoo, Affinity, WW, etc), with some Burn and almost inexistent combo decks, am I correct to say that Jitte is the best answer? If Yes, what would you replace in your last posted list? If not, what do you recommend? MD and SB. Thanks in advance.

If you just want to win, and that's your meta, I agree with Taco that you would be better off playing a different deck. Maybe it's just me, but from the description you give I think I would play some version of Storm Combo. Maybe even a fast version like Spanish Inquisition or Belcher, since it seems like there are hardly any counterspells in your meta.

Merfolk is a great deck, but from the sound of it, playing it in your meta-game is going to be an uphill climb.

[Purgatory]

Yeah. Echoing Truth is the best bounce for Merfolk (and Submerge in the sideboard). Waterfront Bouncer is really only good as a one-of in a deck that you can tutor for him. For example, some Survival builds would run him before their deck got banned. Merfolk doesn't have any good tutor effects and Bouncer is not so good in multiples because of the card disadvantage.

I'm not saying he's good in Merfolk, back when I tried him a year or so ago, he was mostly a 2/2 or a 3/3 beater, but back then the decks I played against were not nearly as aggressive as some decks now are. My main problem with Waterfront Bouncer is not that he makes for card disadvantage (because he can gain you tempo, and it's likely that you'll have excess Vials and Islands to toss to him), it's rather that he is a tad slow. At the very fastest, you can activate him on turn three, most often on turn four, and also the single blue mana required is perhaps best spent on Mutavault or Coralhelm Commander.

However, that said, he deals with stuff like Peacekeeper, Emrakul and Batterskull, and even though I don't think he should be included in all Merfolk decks, there might be some metagames where he warrants play. He can also save your own dudes from removal, though if your meta is full of that stuff, Kira is probably better.

As a side-note: I once won a game on MWS by bouncing my own LoA and turning off my opponent's Merfolk's Islandwalk. Good times.

[mooN_MTG]

Why people don't play anymore Merfolks with a splash of Black? At this moment I only see Mono U Merfolk....

Alex Majlatan does any report of GP Providence???

[John Cox]

Why people don't play anymore Merfolks with a splash of Black? At this moment I only see Mono U Merfolk....

Alex Majlatan does any report of GP Providence???

I would guess that the massive amounts of stoneforge control decks flooding the field have something to do with it. There really aren't the amount of tarmogoyfs out there that there have been the past.

[Tacosnape]

Tarmogoyf's weak in Legacy now anyway. Creatures in modern Legacy have to either be absolutely huge or do something really neat. Stoneforge is a way bigger threat, and arguably is pushing to become Legacy's signature creature, even beyond Dark Confidant and Knight of the Reliquary.

Also, Mental Misstep and Dismember got printed, which means Merfolk can do a lot more than it once could without splashing a color. Specifically in the removal department.

[videogamer99]

I played this last night, borrowing it from a friend. I hadn't really played it recently, but I played it in the past and enjoyed it. This was the list used was something like this:

Creatures
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Silvergil Adept
3 Cursecatcher
1 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
1 Merfolk Sovereign

Spells
4 Mental Misstep
3 Force of Will
3 Daze
3 Dismember

Artifacts
4 AEther Vial

Lands
13 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland
1 Mishra's Factory

Sideboard
3 Hydroblast
3 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
2 Energy Flux
2 Spell Pierce
2 Submerge
2 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Dismember

Round 1 vs Mirror
Dismember was a house
2-0 (1-0)

Round 2 vs Mirror
Dismember was still a house
2-0 (2-0)

Round 3 vs Show and Tell
So many lords and counterspells won it for me
2-1 (3-0)

Round 4 vs Bant
Dismember was not as good here, but I was able to slow him down a lot
2-0 (4-0)

Round 5 vs NO RUG w/ Bloodbraid Elf
I scoop him in. Im a nice guy, what can I say
0-2 (4-1)

So, Dismember was amazing. 3 Llawan helped a lot. Jitte is really good. May be better than Kira/Sovereign in the main right now. I enjoyed the deck a lot and hope to play it at an SCG 5K soon.

[Tacosnape]

Round 1 vs Mirror
Dismember was a house
2-0 (1-0)

Round 2 vs Mirror
Dismember was still a house
2-0 (2-0)

Take note of this, Merfolk players with an unnatural attachment to Submerge.

Went 4-0 in Locals tonight. Playing my same maindeck list as usual, with a weird SB full of a bunch of random 1-ofs to try out. I also tried 4 Spell Pierces, which is my new favorite SB card, but then got in three aggro matchups and only got to use them one time. Whatever.

Round 1 - Brian playing UGB Dredge/Madness/Weird hybrid something.

Game 1 I counter two Careful Studies. He plays Islands while I beat him to death. No idea what he's playing, so I bring in yard hate under the assumption that Careful Study means something's hitting the yard.

Game 2 I counter yet another Careful Study. He ramps up land and hardcasts Deep Analysis, while I make dudes. I still overwhelm him without seeing what he's playing. Might make it more difficult when I face him tomorrow night.

Round 2 - Jerath playing Modern D&T.

I win the die roll and lead with an Island, Cursecatcher. He plays Plains, Vial. I let it hit due to how fast my hand is, and this turns out to be a good move, as he has a second Vial a couple turns later. And lots of land. I Force the one thing he hardcasts (A Squadron Hawk), and Misstep his one STP, and my guys crash through.

Game 2 I Misstep an Aether Vial and he gets mana stuck. By the time he stabilizes, I have guys. Lots and lots of guys.

Round 3 - Larry playing Zoo

I mulligan to six and keep a two-lander with a Silvergill. Larry has two things. Lands and dudes. I have to Wasteland a Taiga to keep two Kird Apes, a Loam Lion, and a Nacatl from steamrolling me, then get stuck hunting another land and die being unable to drop my guys out fast enough to stabilize.

Game two, I mull to 6, he thinks a long time about going to 5, but stays at 6. I stick an Aether Vial, he gets stuck on one land with me having a wall of Mental Missteps and guys.

Game three we both end up mana flooded after decent starting hands. He keeps drawing land. I get a Silvergill with an active Jitte, but he topdecks a Krosan Grip like a champion and eats my four counters. Ugh. Fortunately he hits land after that, I Dismember his Tarmogoyf (So sexy) and topdeck two straight Reejereys to seize control. I manage to win with his top card being a much needed Path to Exile.

Round 4 - Chase playing UWB Doomsday Show

Game 1 I go Mutavault, Vial with an Island in hand. He Missteps. I Misstep. He Missteps. I don't get a Vial. He then Thoughtseizes me to make the situation worse. But I get beats in with my Mutavault, and a Reejerey finally joins the show, and by the time he gets Show and Tell, he's way too low on life for Emrakul to be scary.

Game 2 I try to Force a turn 3 Plague, he Forces back, and due to lack of air conditioning I somehow don't think to sacrifice my Cursecatcher. Gah. (I really don't earn my rating sometimes. Just ask Majikal.) I drop a Coralhelm and panic-level him to 2, then Chase gets to 5 lands and sticks Plague #2. Coralhelm goes big, a 1/1 Reejerey sticks, and I beat him with subpar-sized Lords and Mutavaults while he's still hunting for Show and Tell.

Thoughts for the evening:

-Going 4-0 on die rolls with Merfolk wins tournaments. I can't even think of the last time this happened. It's been at least a year.
-Dismember is amazing. It's also amazing at not appearing when I have an aggro matchup. But it's still amazing.
-Cursecatcher belongs on the top 5 creature in Legacy list. Every matchup I played, Cursecatcher influenced my opponent to ridiculous degrees.
-Bounce spells were weak. The one random Needle was weak. The one Null Rod I had, in post-match screwing around against D&T, was great at shutting off Sword of Fire and Ice, and made Batterskull just an annoying dude to deal with rather than a game-ending problem.
-Divert is earning strong sideboard consideration for me. Divert reflects STP. Divert reflects Hymn. Divert reflects Bolt. Divert makes Mental Misstep target Divert. It's seeming better the more matches I play.
-Stoneforge Mystic is a problem. The card is seriously everywhere in Legacy right now. Absolutely everywhere.

[SlopeeJ]

Dismember is awesome, until you play a deck with lightning bolt/zoo or can't kill the fatty beating you. Dismember awesome or can be bad. I play 3 kira so now when mirror boards in dismember I love blanking cards in their hand.

Divert is one of those cards (merfolk loves these type of cards) that really sucks or is just a total house. I'm sure everyone can decide when it sucks and when it doesn't. I don't think merfolk has the U mana open to justify using it, for me it's in the same boat as spell snare. So basically it is awesome early game, when merfolk "doesn't" really have U available and sucks late game. I had a lot of success running misdirection, hitting hymns/bolts etc Again game breaking when awesome even pitching a card or complete suckage.

Which bounce spells are you referring to as weak?

[lambert101]

congrats taco...dismember is getting better so much so that i have been playing 3md and cutting a cursecatcher or a wasteland for the 3rd...and with more creature based and stoneforge.dec running around in legacy dismember is becoming even better

[metamet]

I don't play Merfolk very often, but I thought I would pass a couple of articles along.

Scott Muir took 3rd place at the SCG Indianapolis event. He recently wrote a guide to sideboarding and I know he'd appreciate any feedback or thoughts. As he doesn't use this forum, leaving thoughts in the comments section of the article would be the easiest way to let him know your thoughts:

http://www.quietspeculation.com/2011/06/merfolk-versus-a-contemporary-guide-to-sideboarding/

And this is his (entertaining!) event report.

http://www.quietspeculation.com/2011/06/top-8-with-merfolk-scg-indianapolis/

Scott's been playing and tuning Merfolk in his meta for a couple of years now. Hope you enjoy and get something out of them!

[Kuma]

I played this last night, borrowing it from a friend. I hadn't really played it recently, but I played it in the past and enjoyed it. This was the list used was something like this:

Creatures
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Silvergil Adept
3 Cursecatcher
1 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
1 Merfolk Sovereign

Spells
4 Mental Misstep
3 Force of Will
3 Daze
3 Dismember

Artifacts
4 AEther Vial

Lands
13 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland
1 Mishra's Factory

Sideboard
3 Hydroblast
3 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
2 Energy Flux
2 Spell Pierce
2 Submerge
2 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Dismember

Round 1 vs Mirror
Dismember was a house
2-0 (1-0)

Round 2 vs Mirror
Dismember was still a house
2-0 (2-0)

Round 3 vs Show and Tell
So many lords and counterspells won it for me
2-1 (3-0)

Round 4 vs Bant
Dismember was not as good here, but I was able to slow him down a lot
2-0 (4-0)

Round 5 vs NO RUG w/ Bloodbraid Elf
I scoop him in. Im a nice guy, what can I say
0-2 (4-1)

So, Dismember was amazing. 3 Llawan helped a lot. Jitte is really good. May be better than Kira/Sovereign in the main right now. I enjoyed the deck a lot and hope to play it at an SCG 5K soon.

Close. There's four Daze and twelve Islands. Also, there's one Force of Will in the board and only two Hydroblast.

And yes, Dismember is an absolute house in the mirror and all our bad matchups. The week before, I beat Junk, Team Italia, and Affinity because of Dismember. Last time I checked, those are among our worst matchups. In fact, this list is 8-1-0 in matches not including IDs or videogamer99 scooping someone in since I added Dismember. If you're not running Dismember in the main, you're doing it wrong.

[SageShadows]

Hi everyone! I'm trying to tune my Merfolk list for a legacy tournament next week. I know my meta is really heavy GY based (Mostly dredge and a few UB Reanimator) and Stoneforge based decks, with one or two NO Elves and Painted Stone (Ironically I didn't see any Merfolk...). This is what I have right now.

4 Wasteland
4 Mutavault
12 Island

4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Cursecatcher
1 Sower of Temptation
2 Merfolk Sovereign

4 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Mental Misstep
2 Dismember

4 AEther Vial


SB: 2 Dismember
SB: 2 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
SB: 2 Energy Flux
SB: 2 Echoing Truth
SB: 2 Relic of Progenitus
SB: 1 Sower of Temptation
SB: 2 Umezawa's Jitte

Any idea on what I should do? I was thinking of cutting the two sovereigns and moving a third dismember and an extra island to the MD. As for the SB, any tips? I have a couple of concerns.

A) I didn't see Merfolk all tournament that I birded, but Llawan has some game against Progenitus. Should I cut it and shore up my other match ups or should I keep it on the off chance that I run into Merfolk?

B) Other SB cards I was considering were Propaganda, Pithing Needle, and Spell Pierce. Any thoughts as to how they help out in the meta I'm in? Needle especially seems to help against Stoneforge.

Thanks for everyone's help! I've been reading this thread and it's really helped me make my merfolk deck (rather, helped me decide on the flex spots).

[Sturtzilla]

Game 2 I try to Force a turn 3 Plague, he Forces back, and due to lack of air conditioning I somehow don't think to sacrifice my Cursecatcher. Gah.

I first just want to say that I really enjoyed reading your report. This quoted section above gave me a good chuckle.


-Divert is earning strong sideboard consideration for me. Divert reflects STP. Divert reflects Hymn. Divert reflects Bolt. Divert makes Mental Misstep target Divert. It's seeming better the more matches I play.

I had been toying around with Misdirection for this same purpose, when one of my friends who has more merfolk experience suggested Divert. I haven't tested it yet but it seems like it could really be worthwhile. I would wager 1 for 2ing people on removal/discard or 1 for 3ing on Hymn could prove to not only generate virtual card advantage, but also also in some instances just out rightly turn a game into a blowout.

I would also like to discuss the Stoneforge/Batterskull/SoFaI problem. You were exactly right in your post the SFM is everywhere right now. I honestly think that maindecking Dismembers and sideboarding pithing needles and or null rods are the way to go. Null Rods can really help shut down pesky equipment and also can help sure up affinity, painted stone, and mono artifact decks. Pithing Needles can do the same thing but are a bit more flexible. My testing has not be real intensive but that is what I have been working with at the moment.

[Tacosnape]

RE Stoneforge Mystic: I wonder if Stifle's worth eyeing in sideboard now. The applications are numerous, and the card is good in several ways against Stoneforge, depending on when you have the island open:

1. You can Stifle the search for equipment trigger (Permanent fix, but bad if they have one in hand).
2. You can Stifle the Stoneforge's activation (Seems weak).
3. You can Stifle the living weapon trigger of Batterskull (Seems amazing).
4. You can Stifle any equip cost (Seems fair in a pinch if they're counting on it to stabilize.)
5. You can Stifle the triggered abilities for Jitte and/or Sword of X and Y.


Hi everyone! I'm trying to tune my Merfolk list for a legacy tournament next week. I know my meta is really heavy GY based (Mostly dredge and a few UB Reanimator) and Stoneforge based decks, with one or two NO Elves and Painted Stone (Ironically I didn't see any Merfolk...). This is what I have right now.

4 Wasteland
4 Mutavault
12 Island

4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Cursecatcher
1 Sower of Temptation
2 Merfolk Sovereign

4 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Mental Misstep
2 Dismember

4 AEther Vial


SB: 2 Dismember
SB: 2 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
SB: 2 Energy Flux
SB: 2 Echoing Truth
SB: 2 Relic of Progenitus
SB: 1 Sower of Temptation
SB: 2 Umezawa's Jitte

Any idea on what I should do? I was thinking of cutting the two sovereigns and moving a third dismember and an extra island to the MD. As for the SB, any tips? I have a couple of concerns.

A) I didn't see Merfolk all tournament that I birded, but Llawan has some game against Progenitus. Should I cut it and shore up my other match ups or should I keep it on the off chance that I run into Merfolk?

B) Other SB cards I was considering were Propaganda, Pithing Needle, and Spell Pierce. Any thoughts as to how they help out in the meta I'm in? Needle especially seems to help against Stoneforge.

Thanks for everyone's help! I've been reading this thread and it's really helped me make my merfolk deck (rather, helped me decide on the flex spots).

Your maindeck list is identical to mine with a one card difference. Your Sower is my 13th Island. I can't recommend cutting the Sovereigns. You need a certain amount of Lords in there to win all your matchups where you just want to see nothing but land and dudes the whole time, which is quite a few of them.

A. If you aren't facing Merfolk, cut Llawan. Replace it with...

B. Spell Pierce. Oh my god Spell Pierce. It's absolutely amazing. It makes a lot of weird matchups like Enchantress and MUD and such a lot easier to deal with, and it makes your already decent matches a cakewalk. It's money against Hive Mind, it's money against TES/ANT, it's money against pretty much everything that has an alternate plan to turning dudes sideways to beat you.

Other things to note in your sideboard:

1. Consider cutting Relic of Progenitus for Surgical Extraction. Surgical improves a lot of random matchups, ranging from Hive Mind to Lands. Relic of Progenitus is a relatively weak card.

2. The fourth Daze is amazing every time you're going first post-board. I don't care what you're playing against. If you're going first, Daze is the best card in Legacy. To me, the fourth one warrants the spot in board.

[SlopeeJ]

2. The fourth Daze is amazing every time you're going first post-board. I don't care what you're playing against. If you're going first, Daze is the best card in Legacy. To me, the fourth one warrants the spot in board.

Is this really true? I am not sure I would agree, unless you said maybe if you drop vial then daze their play then wasteland etc. The key card is vial. But you are on the play go island go, you daze there play? That seems really bad, you would have no lands in play why they will have 2 the next turn. You lose the game.

Daze turn 2 is a little better, where you have 2 islands and can tap the mana or still play your 2 drops next turn when you replay your land.

Even then people are playing sower, leveling commander, more 3 drops. Going down a land drop is pretty bad unless you are countering a complete bomb, if played incorrectly you can tempo yourself out of the game.

[djeyjey]

Has anyone considered Phyrexian Metamorph main deck? Nice tool:
- Copies a lord or anything useful
- Kills opponents Emrakul or any nasty legendary stuff
- Answers to Llawan in mirrors
………

Thoughts ?

[djeyjey]

Has anyone considered Phyrexian Metamorph main deck? Nice tool:
- Copies a lord or anything useful
- Kills opponents Emrakul or any nasty legendary stuff
- Answers to Llawan in mirrors
………

Thoughts ?

[Sturtzilla]

@ Tacosnape

I know we once used to run 3-4 Stifles in this deck because of their widespread applications ranging from Fetchlands, to pesky creature and artifact triggers. I think that maybe some sideboard space for Stifles could be really useful at this juncture. It can help in numerous ways against the Stoneforge problem (you did a great job listing them and noting how good each would be). When complemented by Pithing Needle/Null Rod, and/or Dismember, it seems like we should have quite a few outs to take care of a Batterskull/SoFaI.

@ djeyjey

This has been discussed. Check back a page or two. The major problem would be what do you cut for the metamorph. Either you begin to lose threats and creature density (this would make the metamorph less valuable) or you start to cut parts of your permission package. I don't think either are particullarly great options. However the metamorph can be real useful so I am not sure what to tell you.

[Tacosnape]

Is this really true? I am not sure I would agree, unless you said maybe if you drop vial then daze their play then wasteland etc. The key card is vial. But you are on the play go island go, you daze there play? That seems really bad, you would have no lands in play why they will have 2 the next turn. You lose the game.

This analysis is why I think a lot more players don't steamroll opponents with Merfolk - Not knowing how to use the deck's counters. I think I'll write an article on it someday.

You don't Daze based on the time. You Daze based on what you see. Even with a Vial, I'm very hesitant to Daze turn one unless I see something that's going to cause me a huge problem if I let it hit. If I see a Grim Lavamancer? Sure, depending on my hand, I might Daze. If I see a Kird Ape? No way in hell do I Daze that.

Merfolk has to spend its counters right. Analyze every play you see and question whether or not you're still on the path to win if it resolves. Most turn one plays don't stop your plan of turning Lords sideways. Save your Daze until the absolute right moment. You'll get your chances to use it.

Let's take an example about spending counters. Let's say you're in a match. You win the die roll. You see an opening seven card hand of the following:

Island
Island
Cursecatcher
Lord of Atlantis
Lord of Atlantis
Merrow Reejerey
Daze

Which is keepable all day long on the play. Your opponent also keeps.

You lead, predictably, with Island, Cursecatcher.

Your opponent draws, plays a basic Swamp, and Thoughtseizes you. You don't know what he's playing. This gives you three options:

1. Let the Thoughtseize resolve.
2. Cursecatcher it.
3. Daze it.

I'd pick option one in this scenario. Here's why.

Using the Cursecatcher means he isn't going to lose 2 life and I'm not going to get to hit him for 2 after dropping Lord of Atlantis next turn. It means my next play is probably going to be Island, Lord, go, with him at 20.

Using the Daze means you're going to be a land drop behind. Your next turn will probably be to replay your land and swing for 1. He'll be at 19.

If you let the Thoughtseize resolve, however, you're probably either going to lose a Lord of Atlantis or a Daze. I'd be surprised if they picked the Reejerey. In either case, your next turn will result in you having two guys on the board and knocking your opponent to sixteen.

I guess what I'm saying is this: Know why you're countering something. Overspending your countermagic is the number one mistake blue players make. Merfolk is no exception. You have little room for error.

[djeyjey]

@ djeyjey

This has been discussed. Check back a page or two. The major problem would be what do you cut for the metamorph. Either you begin to lose threats and creature density (this would make the metamorph less valuable) or you start to cut parts of your permission package. I don't think either are particullarly great options. However the metamorph can be real useful so I am not sure what to tell you.

It is a matter of preference, but what i like is a 16 lords / no standstill version… I actually intend to replace the Sovereigns (a bit useless apart from the lord effect) by the Metamorphs…*To be tested yet… Thx for answering!

[Tacosnape]

The legend-killing ability probably isn't worth it on Metamorph to replace other Merfolk Lords. In exchange for this narrow but occasionally amazing ability, you get a guy who doesn't play nice with Aether Vial, hurts you in the damage race, doesn't play nice with Coralhelm Commander, and can't be Lord #1 if you don't have another one out there.

This said, the dude -does- copy Batterskull, making him an oddly nifty sideboard option, especially with a Vial at 4, where you can vial the guy in, copy Batterskull, and then bounce him to your hand and copy something else at will.

[SageShadows]

Your maindeck list is identical to mine with a one card difference. Your Sower is my 13th Island. I can't recommend cutting the Sovereigns. You need a certain amount of Lords in there to win all your matchups where you just want to see nothing but land and dudes the whole time, which is quite a few of them.

A. If you aren't facing Merfolk, cut Llawan. Replace it with...

B. Spell Pierce. Oh my god Spell Pierce. It's absolutely amazing. It makes a lot of weird matchups like Enchantress and MUD and such a lot easier to deal with, and it makes your already decent matches a cakewalk. It's money against Hive Mind, it's money against TES/ANT, it's money against pretty much everything that has an alternate plan to turning dudes sideways to beat you.

Other things to note in your sideboard:

1. Consider cutting Relic of Progenitus for Surgical Extraction. Surgical improves a lot of random matchups, ranging from Hive Mind to Lands. Relic of Progenitus is a relatively weak card.

2. The fourth Daze is amazing every time you're going first post-board. I don't care what you're playing against. If you're going first, Daze is the best card in Legacy. To me, the fourth one warrants the spot in board.

Thanks for the advice. Has that 13th island been helping you, or do you think a miser Sower is better in the MD in my meta?
I might go for the Surgical Extraction route because I was blown out by a Null Rod during testing, but I don't have any copies right now. As for the sideboard, how does a change of -1 Sower, -2 Llawan, +1 Daze, +2 Spell Pierce sound? Viable enough?

[Sturtzilla]

It is a matter of preference, but what i like is a 16 lords / no standstill version… I actually intend to replace the Sovereigns (a bit useless apart from the lord effect) by the Metamorphs…*To be tested yet… Thx for answering!

I am by no means saying that it is wrong to try out. I am just stating that I am pretty happy with where my build is at and due to that, I don't want to cut test pieces for what I feel is mainly subpar. I guess I could maybe see boarding it and seeing where that goes. If it comes down to a matter of preference and you like them, keep playing them. I just think currently they are boardable but not up for being in my main. Tacosnape make a solid point that it both kills legenday creatures and can double as a form of Batterskull defense. Even considering these, unless your meta is nearly completely comprised of reanimator, sneak and show, and SFM then I would sideboard them.

[Purgatory]

Take note of this, Merfolk players with an unnatural attachment to Submerge.

I still firmly believe in Submerge, even though I play Dismember, Submerge can be such a back-breaking tempo play from your side that the opp simply can't catch up to you. Granted, it can only "kill" a creature if your opponent plays a shuffle effect, so this won't happen often, but even early in a game, having them draw the same Noble Hierarch can be worth it. Most of the time, I save my Submerges for those "oops, I win" situations, when you out of nowhere win the damage race by removing one of his blockers/threats.

My generic Merfolk sideboard would probably be:

3-4 Spell Pierce
3 Submerge
3 GY hate (Crypt, Extraction)
2 Jitte (unless they are present in the MB)
3 Metagame slots (extra Dismembers, Kira, REB, Sower etc. etc.)

[MRmtg]

hey guys..i was thinking of playing this list at scg cincinnati...what do you guys think

22 LANDS
14 Island
4 Wasteland
4 Mutavault

24 CREATURES
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Silvergill Adept
2 Sower of Temptation
2 kira great glass spinner

10 INSTANTS and SORCERIES
4 Force of Will
4 Mental Misstep
2 Daze

4 OTHER SPELLS
4 Æther Vial

Sideboard
‎2 jitte,
3 llawan,
2 back to basics,
3 tormods crypts,
2 dismember,
3 spell pierce

i can expalin choices if you'd like..but i realy just wanted to know if you guys saw any weaknesses that stood out..i expect fish to be a huge percentage of the field..

[Tacosnape]

Seems pretty normal. Your manabase matches your higher curve by going the Sower/Kira route over MD Dismember and the low Daze count fits in with how high you need to ramp.

3 Llawan seems excessive to me, though, Merfolk anticipation or not. There's so little else it helps against. I'd at least make it two and pick up a third Dismember.

[Julian23]

Played a local tournament yesterday, 34 people attending (Munich). Went 5-1 overall.

13 Island
4 Mutavault
3 Wasteland

4 Silvergil Adept
4 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Merrow Reejery
2 Kira, Great Glass Spinner
1 Sower of Temptation

4 Aether Vial
4 Mental Misstep
3 Force of Will
3 Daze
2 Dismember
1 Spell Pierce

SB:

3 Cursed Totem
3 Null Rod
3 Pithing Needle
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Spell Pierce
1 Force of Will
1 Umezawa's Jitte

Since it's a rather small tournament, it was easier to make predictions and create an appropiate sideboard. I expected Affinity, Painter, Elves and Dredge to be big. Therefor I included Cursed Totem for Elves and GW Maverick, the bane of Merfolk's existance. Null Rod was for Affinity, Painter and Storm. Needle for Painter, BUG Landstill and GW Maverick. Didn't expect a lot of aggro (was right) therefor just 1 Jitte. Spell Pierce and Force for Combo and "big-boom" matchups where the game usually revolves around them resolving a single key spell.

Some thoughts: CURSED TOTEM IS GREAT AT WHAT IT DOES! Of course you gotta side out your second best creature (Commander; Silvergil being #1) but that's easily worth it. This card shuts down like 75% of GWs creatures (Mother,QPM,KotR,SFM,Untap of Scryb Ranger etc.) and completly crushed Elves if you can resolve it asap. Going into a major tournament, Elves shouldn't of course be something to specificly address in the the sb (especially if yoou got Byes) but I think it's still prominent enough to warrant mentioning.
The only thing I really missed was 3 Mind Harness and a 2nd Sower in the sideboard but I had to squeeze in those Relics and really didn't want to cut from my pseudo-Stax suit.

Round 1: Captain America (not Team America! UWR Fish)
Game1: I have no idea what he's playing. Mountain, Lightning Bolt, then Plains, Swords to Plowshares...followed by Island->Cloud of Faeries and using SQUELCH to counter my vial activation on my turn. I just do what's best: playing dudes and attacking. He doesn't, therefor he dies.
I board Jitte and Force because I don't know what he's actually trying to do, so I'd rather play it safe and have an additonal Force. I board out Sower and one Daze.
Game2: This game was just dominated by Jitte. I'm at 11 life and could swing for lethal by removing all 4 counters from Jitte but I prefer to keep them in case I might need them. But his deck just dies to Jitte anyways...

1-0

Round 2: "Sneak Show" (silly name for a deck btw)
Game1: He goes Mountain -> SDT, which I misstep and he stalls on 1 land until turn 4. Can't beat Merfolk that way.

I already knew from the beginning he was playing this deck, and board accordingly:
+2 Spell Pierce +1 FoW +3 Needle -2 Dismember -4 Coralhelm. I favor Reejery over Coralhelm in this matchup because he's better with Show and Tell and enables sick Alpha strikes even against Emrakul

Game2: He goes for turn three SnT which I could Daze or Force but I just let it resolve. He's quite surprised. He's even more surprised when I reveal Sower. Interesting fact: Had I countered that SnT I might very likely have lost since he drew Sneak Attack on the next turn and had a protection spell ready.

2-0

Round 3: UB ANT
Game1: I keep a super fast hand with Vial, Lords, Adepts but only MMS and Wasteland as disruption. When facing lethal on turn4, he goes for it: some Cantrips, <lots of Cabal Rituals>, drops LED but doesn't have to crack it since Infernal Tutor is his last card anyways. He grabs IGG and plays it.

This is were things get fucked up. He looks up at me for some seconds, then goes through his graveyard mumbling something about having made a mistake, looks at me again for some seconds. I tell him I don't wanna respond and he tries to crack the LED claiming that he never passed priority. Since he's a guy I know I try to sort things out and ask him whether he knew he had to announce he wanted to keep priority after playing IGG. His answer was that he didn't know it and that he thinks he made a mistake there. He still insists on cracking that LED since "c'mon, you know I would have actually done that". I call a judge over and he rules in my favor after interviewing both of us.
This felt so bad. Actually, I've been opposing runnning our local tournaments on REL Competitive. On REL Competitive I try to take advantage of each and every mistake my opponent makes. This is usually ok but not appropiate for local tournaments. Therefor I really argue for REL Regular on small events. We hardlly ever gather more than 20-30 people for an event.

+2 Spell Pierce +1 FoW +2 Relic +3 Null Rod -2 Reejery -2 Dismember -4 Vial

Game 2: I keep 2 Cursecatchers, Spell Pierce, Adept and something. Made a big mistake on turn 4. I have 2 Island, 1 just played Mutavault along with 2 Cursecatcher and 1 Silvergil in play with LoA and Relic in hand. Spell Pierce is in the graveyard. Playing LoA (which I did) enables a kill on the next turn but I really think I should have just played Relic and had the mana to activate it coz I don't see him winning off Ad Nauseam anyway. On his turn he plays Brainstorm into everything proceeds to chain Rituals then goes Infernal for IGG and plays it. I return Spell Pierce + 2 sacrificed Cursecatchers. He returns Infernal, LED and Cabal Ritual. I am tapped out and can't play Spell Pierce. He has perfect information. I am dead. I know I am dead.

Enter Jedi Mind Trick.

He keeps doing math then sighs "I can't win." I immediately catch on and tell him that I know he can't win and he should just scoop already. That's what he does. Nice.

3-0

Round 4: G/W Maverick
Game 1: Bad Karma? I run into the worst matchup I could wish for. Being on the draw game1 I just can't win. I stall for some turns hoping for him to show me as many cards as possible. At least I get to know he's playing two Scryb Ranger.

+3 Cursed Totem +1 Jitte +2 Spell Pierce +1 Pithing Needle
Spell Pierce on the play to counter Green Sun's Zenith which is close to Time Walk early on.

Game 2: I drop Vial, then MMS his turn1 GSZ for 0. I develop my board quickly while he slowly manages to almost stabilize. In the end he was 1 landdrop away from turning the game around.

Game 3: I MMS his turn1 Mother of Runes, drop a Vial and Force his SFM on turn2. He's flooded with lands while I keep getting in for some damage. I still lose a lot of my creatures to StP and P2E. Once we both run out of cards he's at 8 life facing an Adept while I'm on 22 against his 6/6 KotR. Basically whoever topdecks something first will win the game. Too bad, there's just too little something in Merfolk. So I lose.

3-1

Round 5: Affinity
Game 1: He has no turn 1 play, then drops some Frogmites, an Enforcer and Thoughtcasts. Master of Etherium meets Force but Tezzeret resolves. I dismember his Enforcer and take down Tezzeret by attacking with 4 creatures (2/2 and 3/3) against his two Frogmites. He doesn't block. If he topdecks another Master, Cranial Plating or Ravager, I lose to his counter-attack. He doesn't topdeck, I win.

+3 Null Rod +1 Jitte +1 FoW +2 Spell Pierce +2 Needle -4 Mental Misstep -1 Sower -4 Vial
I sided out MMS since he doesn't play Signal Pest. Spell Pierce to mainly combat Tezzeret and Plating. I sided in FoW since all your creatures are usually better than Affinity's and you will usually just have to deal with 2 key spells they need to resolve.

Game 2:
Turn1: Land, 2x Ornithopter, Vault Skirge. I Wasteland him.
Turn2: Land, Vault Skirge. I Wasteland him.
Turn3: Land, Vault Skirge, I play an Island. He doesn't do anything on his turn, while I drop another Island and play Coralhelm Commander. He still just keeps attacking while I level Commander up to 3/3 flying, then drop Lord of Atlantis, followed by Null Rod. Affinity can't ever beat Nul Rod.

4-1

Round 5: GBu Aluren (/wo Recruiter)
Round 1: I'm quite confident about this matchups since it evolves a three color deck trying to resolve a 4 mana enchantment. But..I mulligan to FOUR and keep 2x Island, MMS and LoA. He plays Therapy on turn1 and I'm 99% sure he was going to name Lord, so I MMS it. I draw into Silvergil (drawing Lord) and another Lord. Not bad for a mulligan to four. When he's facing lethal next turn (he's at about 12) he drops Aluren. He actualy has to go down to 2 life (by paying for Harpy) before completing the combo. Close one.

+3 Cursed Totem +3 Pithing Needle +2 Spell Pierce +1 FoW +1 Jitte -4 Coralhelm Commander -4 Reejery -1 Vial -1 Sower
SBing should be pretty self-explanantory. The only thing I was afraid of was not having enough blue/Merfolk to support FoW/Adept.

Game 2: Turn 1 Vial, he drops Verdant Catacombs. I play Needle, he says "ok" so I name Verdant Catacombs. Next turn I resolve Cursed Totem and he's in a world of hurt since basicly his only out at this point is a single Chain of Vapor. Aside from swarming me with little creatures. Not.gonna.happen.

Game 3: He does some SBing so I prepare to see 2-3 Krosan Grips. In fact he boarded Seeds of Innocence. I don't remember a lot about this game except for chaining FOUR Adepts while being protected by turn1 Needle on Cavern Harpy. Doesn't really matter since all he does is trading Intuitions for Dazes while also being hit by Wasteland. Oh, Cursed Totem and Jitte show up as well, just annihilating his deck.

5-1

In the end I take only 3rd place due to TieBreakers. Dredge won the tournament at 5-0-1....

Props:
- Cursed Totem: strong sb choice. My SB was generally awesome.
- Mutavault, actually. Never run less than 4. It's just huge.
- Coralhelm Commander and Silvergil Adept -> MVP creatures
- 20 Lands. I know Bryant even tried 19 which might be quite on the low end but 20 seems really fine for now.

Slops:
- not facing Dredge
- Cutting Mind Harness. This card just turns around games.
- REL Competitive and small, local events

Worth mentioning: I only cast Dismember 2 times throughout the tournament and it was always way worth the 4 life (killing Myr Enforcer and KotR). Will stay in the main while trying a 3rd in the board soon. Although I really <3'ed my sb this tournament, I'd definitely recommend a more general approach for bigger events.

gl&hf

[I am the brainwasher]

Recently I was thinking about trying to create a solid list of Folks with Phyrexian Dreadnought and Vision Charm to strengthen the horrible SFM-Hype which is going on for quite some time.
Vision Charm is able to "counter" opposing Mirage Tutors, with a good read important Top-activations, and can buy time by phasing out Swords/Skulls.
Its just a rough idea but it might be well placed atm.
Well, too bad that Merfolks isnt well known for its deckspace that can be filled with 2 card combos (and maybe even Cantrips/Standstill).

[Julian23]

Funny how it can also enable Islandwalk against non-blue decks. But I guess that's just the "danger of cool things".

[Micki]

Hello!

I'm still testing a Uw version of Merfolk and I will attend the first tournament with this deck next Saturday, here's where my list is right now;

4 Wasteland
4 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
3 Tundra
3 Mutavault
4 Island

4 Aether Vial

4 Silvergill Adept
3 Cursecatcher
2 Sejiri Merfolk
1 Phyrexian Metamorph
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Merrow Reejerey

4 Force of Will
4 Mental Misstep
3 Daze
3 Swords to Plowshares

Sideboard

1 Enlightened Tutor
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Seal of Cleansing
1 Energy Flux
2 Pithing Needle
1 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Divert
2 Dismember
2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
1 Llawan, Cephalid Empress

Some explanations; It feels like with the exception of a couple of BUG, MUC and Affinity decks, every deck in my meta runs either SFM/Batteskull or Progenitus or both, this is why I want to play a Phyrexian Metamorph MD. Sejiri Merfolk is just a card like, I don't know if Kira or something else would be better in that spot.
There's not that many Merfolk decks here right now, thus the single Llwan in my SB. I might be just stubborn when I want to splash white in this deck but I still feel that StoP, Seijiri and E Tutor is worth the splash. I also want to have more options for a sudden change in the meta without changing the core of my deck. Here's some questions;

1) Please suggest/comment on anything that might be horribly wrong or would make my deck stronger without removing the splash.

2) Cursed Totem seems like a card that could fit nicely in my meta, has anybody else (except Julian23) tested it?

3) Has anybody thought of/tried to play Stoneforge in a Merfolk deck? I'm thinking of trying -2x Seijiri, -1x Metamorph, -1x Cursecatcher for 2x SFM, 1x Jitte and 1x Batterskull. This would also give me the option to play a couple of swords in my sideboard. Does this seem like a crazy idea or something worth trying (it does cut the number of Merfolk and counterspells even more)?

I'm very grateful for every reply I get from all you experienced Merfolk pilots out there.

[Tacosnape]

RE Vision Charm: I'm pretty sure anything with the keyword Phasing on it falls under danger of cool things.

Re Micki:

1. Cursed Totem is amazing, neat, and shuts off Coralhelm Commander. It's still worth probably one slot in your board, given your one Enlightened Tutor.

2. Cut one Relic for a Crypt. No sense in not running at least one copy of the faster one, given that you have Enlightened Tutor.

[kiwi]

Now we can play dismember in main and I think that is unnecessary to splash white.

I think that its better to have a strong mana base before than the advantadge of white splash

[hyc8028]

I knew everyone was going to play landstill/stoneblade, but I don't want to play the same deck as 2/3 of people in the room and decided to play my merfolk list yesterday at a local 27 man tourney and finished 3-2.

Creature: 22
4x Silvergill Adept
4x Merrow Rejerry
4x Lord of Atlantis
4x Coralhelm Commander
4x Cursecatcher
2x Merfolk Sovereign

Spell: 17
4x Aether Vial
4x Force of Will
4x Mental Misstep
3x Daze
2x Dismember

Land: 21
13x Snow Covered Island
4x Wasteland
4x Mutavault

SB: 15
2x Submerge
2x Energy Flux
2x Echoing Truth
2x Llawan, Cephalid Empress
2x Umezawa’s Jitte
3x Spell Pierce
1x Dismember
1x Daze

Round 1: UWB Stoneblade 1-2
He mana flooded game 1. I had to mull down to 6 on game 2 and game 3 and get mana flooded both games. Dismember is again really good taking out SFM and Bob.

Round 2: UWR Stoneblade 2-0
My deck did what it is suppose to do. Dismember was great here taking out Lavamancer and Sower here.

Round 3: Goblin 0-2
He slowroll me with Ringleader and get god flip every time. It doesn't help when I draw no gas.

Round 4: Merfolk 2-0
I run Dismember and he doesn't. Game 2, I got triple vial opening hand and kept drawing adept.

Round 5: UB Drednought 2-0
My deck did what it suppose to do. Dismember again good here taking out Bob and Sower.

All my loses I was having medicore to bad draws. However, when the deck suppose to work, it feels like a well oiled machine. Mystic/Batterskull could be a problem, so Dismember could be a really useful tool here because they would have to use one of their 6 hard counter to address it. Dismember deserves to be a 4 of in the 75. That 4 life is a cheap price to handle any threats IMO.

My main is going to be the same since it work flawlessly when I don't get flooded. SB I am going to find room for 4th Dismember. Here is my SB going forward:

SB: 15
3x Spell Pierce
2x Energy Flux
2x Echoing Truth
2x Llawan, Cephalid Empress
2x Umezawa’s Jitte
2x Dismember
2x Tormod's Crypt

[MRmtg]

what is dismember good against...i just dont know what to bring em in for...i like them but against certain aggro decks they dont seem very good...but anyway heres my sb now
also im not sure about back to basics but some people swear by them...do you think they should be energy flux instead?
‎2 jitte, 2 llawan, 2 back to basics, 3 tormods crypts, 3 dismember, 2 spell pierce 1 phyrexian metamorph

[hyc8028]

Against aggro, you can take out FoW, Daze or some MM for Dismember. FoW you just 2 for 1 yourself while Dismember is just better.

Against Stoneblade, I would do -1 MM, -3 Daze for +2 Dismember, +2 Spell Pierce.

[MRmtg]

do you think 3 dismember is too many? against which decks do you bring all 3 in i suppose?..i was thinking maybe 2 dismember 1 echoing truth split to get rid of pesky ensaring brige effects etc....i'd like to hear some thoughts on this...also anyone else going to scg Cincinnati? and if you are what would your list look like?

[darkmuse]

Round 3: UB ANT
Game1: I keep a super fast hand with Vial, Lords, Adepts but only MMS and Wasteland as disruption. When facing lethal on turn4, he goes for it: some Cantrips, <lots of Cabal Rituals>, drops LED but doesn't have to crack it since Infernal Tutor is his last card anyways. He grabs IGG and plays it.

This is were things get fucked up. He looks up at me for some seconds, then goes through his graveyard mumbling something about having made a mistake, looks at me again for some seconds. I tell him I don't wanna respond and he tries to crack the LED claiming that he never passed priority. Since he's a guy I know I try to sort things out and ask him whether he knew he had to announce he wanted to keep priority after playing IGG. His answer was that he didn't know it and that he thinks he made a mistake there. He still insists on cracking that LED since "c'mon, you know I would have actually done that". I call a judge over and he rules in my favor after interviewing both of us.
This felt so bad. Actually, I've been opposing runnning our local tournaments on REL Competitive. On REL Competitive I try to take advantage of each and every mistake my opponent makes. This is usually ok but not appropiate for local tournaments. Therefor I really argue for REL Regular on small events. We hardlly ever gather more than 20-30 people for an event.

gl&hf

I just wanted to clear this one up so I don't get caught out. According to your write-up he never said he was passing priority. In which case surely he still has it anyway? Isn't the default that you keep priority unless you announce that you passed, not the other way round?

[bakofried]

In higher level tournaments, looking up at your opponent is seen as a shortcut to passing priority or checking for responses. Like when Flores tried to Daze his own Darkblast, but had already looked at Davis, signaling a check for responses. Essentially, he did, just not verbally.

[Sims]

I just wanted to clear this one up so I don't get caught out. According to your write-up he never said he was passing priority. In which case surely he still has it anyway? Isn't the default that you keep priority unless you announce that you passed, not the other way round?

Actually, as I recall, it's assumed that you are passing priority after casting a spell or activating an ability unless you specifically state that you intend to retain priority as a shortcut to speed up games and not have to verbally acknowledge the passing of priority every time it happens. Chuck would be able to go into better detail, but as far as I am aware, if you don't say you intend to keep priority, it passes after the casting of the IGG in this case.

[darkmuse]

In higher level tournaments, looking up at your opponent is seen as a shortcut to passing priority or checking for responses. Like when Flores tried to Daze his own Darkblast, but had already looked at Davis, signaling a check for responses. Essentially, he did, just not verbally.

I suppose if you could have been construed as fishing for your opponent to respond then you have passed priority. But in the case of someone playing an IGG with an LED on the table I'd assume they haven't passed, not without asking explicitly. Actually if he started hunting his graveyard that could also be taken that the IGG has resolved, even though you are allowed to search graveyards at any point. Messy

[Tacosnape]

I've always been under the impression that if you want to retain priority in this situation, you have to indicate it. I simply say "Retaining priority" after I do the action. So if you intend to crack the diamond, but want a moment to think for some reason, say "Infernal Tutor, retaining priority." Then crack your LED.

Then Merfolk gets to Force it and win.

[Julian23]

To be fair, I think I should have just asked him straight away whether he passes priority or not. But that would basically be equal to saying "I think you made a mistake but here's your last chance to correct it". Therefor I asked him specificly about whether he knew he he had to announce retaining priority.

Had his answer not contained "I made a mistake" I think he would have gotten away with it. When the judge questioned us, this statement was what tipped the scales in my favor.

[JJ_JKidd]

Can the new clone card in M12--Phantasmal Image--be playable? Is it gonna be better than Phyrexian Metamorph? With Kira in play, it should be nuts. :cool:

[Julian23]

Sorry to say, but Kira doesn't protect Phantasmal Image. She(?) only prevents the spell targeting PI from resolving but PI already triggers on being targeted.

That being said, I'm currently running 2 Phyrexian Metamorph maindeck in place of Sower and 1 Spell Pierce (see my list above for reference) and I really like it thus far. Sower is sometimes just bad or doesn't contribute a lot to the board while Metamorph is cheaper and more versatile.
Oh, and currently running 3-4 Reality Ripple in the sb. It's suuuuch a tempo boost against SFM decks:

Turn 2: SFM
Turn 3: nothing, eot activate Mythic
Turn 4: attack with Batterskull, Reality Ripple it and you've basically blanked 2,5 turns of theirs while only spending 2 mana instant speed.

It's like turning SFM into Squire with echo.

[Tacosnape]

Can the new clone card in M12--Phantasmal Image--be playable? Is it gonna be better than Phyrexian Metamorph? With Kira in play, it should be nuts. :cool:

Kira doesn't stop Phantasmal's ability from triggering. It'll still die the first time its targeted.

EDIT: Started testing Phyrexian Metamorph. Following thoughts so far:

1. I've lost at least 2 games where Phyrexian Metamorph sucked because he wasn't a lord and I needed Lord #1 on the board. Probably lost another two because I couldn't Vial him out at 3. Probably lost another two where I couldn't trigger Reejerey with him.

2. The top three things I copied with him were Lord of Atlantis, Cursecatcher, and my activated Mutavaults.

3. Killed one Emrakul with him, Killed one Jitte with him. Copied a Batterskull at one point, but still lost. Doesn't change the fact that the other guy has a Batterskull. Best copy so far was Vialing him in to duplicate a Blightsteel Colossus swinging at my head. Blightsteel Colossus makes an AMAZING Blightsteel Colossus blocker.

So far, I think he's less awful than I thought, but I'll personally stick with Merfolk Sovereign.

[JJ_JKidd]

Sorry I didnt know that.

Right now, this is what I run

12 Lords
2 Kira
1 Sower
4 Adept
4 Cursecatcher

2 Dismember
3 Daze
3 Force of Will
4 Mistep

the rest is pretty basic like 21 lands.

If Metamorph is suggested I do not know what to cut now :eek:

[Julian23]

I recommend -1 land -1 Sower +2 Metamorph. 13 Islands, 4 Mutavault, 3 Wasteland.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

...3 Wasteland.

Highly controversial?

[Julian23]

Which doesn't make it less of a correct choice.

It depends a lot on how you build Merfolk. Since dropping Standstill, I'd much rather develop my board early on than to lose tempo by wastelanding on on turn 2 or 3. I will always wasteland my opponent playing a nonbasic on turn 1 since that play indicates weakness. But overall, I'd much rather spent my early turns getting ahead and then maybe start wastelanding on turn 4 or 5 or even later. I don't consider Wasteland to be as important as it was in times of Standstill. For people who are able to tell the difference: Wasteland's role changed from a strategical to a tactical one.

[Tacosnape]

For people who are able to tell the difference: Wasteland's role changed from a strategical to a tactical one.

That doesn't even mean anything. You're just spouting off shit that sounds deep to make it sound like you know something we don't. That's like me saying that since the printing of Mental Misstep, in the Elves matchup Coralhelm Commander has gone from being a Brigadier General to a Fleet Commander. People are just going to blink at these statements incomprehendingly, and then find themselves with an urge they can't understand to go watch SNL's Best of Christopher Walken.

Running 3 Wastelands isn't incomprehensible, but I don't think it's recommended either. Wasteland's still one of the single best disruptive cards in the format, and while it's true that in some matchups you don't necessarily want to fire the Wasteland too early, there are times when you just win off the back of Wasteland with a Vial in play, and there are times when the land for land trade just benefits you far more than them. It's only really bad if you, as the aggro deck, have somehow managed not to come out quicker than your opponent. Which happens far less now that Mental Misstep exists.

In conclusion, run four.

[Julian23]

It's ok to not know the differencne between strategy and tactics but going out and accusing people of talking bullshit isn't the appropiate response. I actually assumed everyone could tell the difference.

Strategy = your overall gameplan. Best example would be Show and Tell in Sneak Show.
Tactics = not part of your overall gameplan, rather means that propel it. Like Cantrips in combo.

For Merfolk, its strategy used to be early mana denial + Daze/Force to set up Vial+Standstill. Wasteland was a key card for doing so. Without Standstill, Wasteland becomes less important because your sometimes just better off using your mana and then interrupting your opponent with Daze/Wasteland. This plus the fact, that you'll need UU early on quite often + running 20 lands to increase threat density, lead me to dropping 1 Wasteland, which I think is correct for the reasons stated.

Yeah, I might have sounded to "super deep" about it wo/ fully making my point clear.

[Tacosnape]

It's ok to not know the differencne between strategy and tactics but going out and accusing people of talking bullshit isn't the appropiate response. I actually assumed everyone could tell the difference.

Strategy = your overall gameplan. Best example would be Show and Tell in Sneak Show.
Tactics = not part of your overall gameplan, rather means that propel it. Like Cantrips in combo.

For Merfolk, its strategy used to be early mana denial + Daze/Force to set up Vial+Standstill. Wasteland was a key card for doing so. Without Standstill, Wasteland becomes less important because your sometimes just better off using your mana and then interrupting your opponent with Daze/Wasteland. This plus the fact, that you'll need UU early on quite often + running 20 lands to increase threat density, lead me to dropping 1 Wasteland, which I think is correct for the reasons stated.

Yeah, I might have sounded to "super deep" about it wo/ fully making my point clear.

I wasn't really trying to berate you. I was more just being comically snide. My apologies if I came across offensive.:)

I actually sort of got what you were saying. I just don't think that Wasteland has ever not been part of the deck's overall strategy, and I don't think the tactical applications of it have applied more or less at any point.

Merfolk's core strategy, for me, has always been this:

1. Play Dudes.
2. Play very mana-efficient, fast, and broad-ranged disruption at the right time.
3. Kill.

And I don't think that just because "Mana denial" is less of a focal point since people quit playing Stifle, that Wasteland still doesn't fit into the second part of the core strategy.

[GGoober]

Merfolk's core strategy, for me, has always been this:

1. Play Dudes.
2. Play very mana-efficient, fast, and broad-ranged disruption at the right time.
3. Kill.
4. Annoy




Fixed that for ya :P Any thoughts on the 1U-castingcost illusionist clone from m12? Aside from Lavamancer/Maze of Ith owning him, he is at worse a 1-1 when opponents spend an actual removal on him, and is at best another LoA/Commander/Goyf/Tombstalker/Progenituskiller/Emmykiller

[Koby]

Merfolk's core strategy, for me, has always been this:

1. Play Dudes.
2. Play very mana-efficient, fast, and broad-ranged disruption at the right time.
3. Kill.
"4. Annoy." - Metalwalker
5. Inhibit other blue decks.

Updated. I think it's important to keep in mind that Merfolk plays a valuable role in suppressing other blue strategies in the metagame, and thus allowing mid-range to compete. (altho this is negative feedback played over about 6-10 weeks of metagaming)

[Tacosnape]

Fixed that for ya :P Any thoughts on the 1U-castingcost illusionist clone from m12? Aside from Lavamancer/Maze of Ith owning him, he is at worse a 1-1 when opponents spend an actual removal on him, and is at best another LoA/Commander/Goyf/Tombstalker/Progenituskiller/Emmykiller

He might be a better option than Metamorph as a sideboard card given how easy he is to cast and how well he syncs with Vial. But death by targetability is kind of meh. You never know when a random Maze of Ith or Sejiri Steppe or whatever is going to be lurking. And again, same with Metamorph, he can't be Lord #1, and he doesn't trigger Reejerey stuff.

In the mirror, also, he runs the risk of getting killed by a Reejerey trigger.

[(nameless one)]

Hey guys,

About the non-island lands, it was mentioned above that Wastelands are a four-of. What about Mutavaults? Is it acceptable to only run 3?

[Tacosnape]

Again, probably, but why do it? Mutavault's absolutely incredible.

[Julian23]

I'd actually rather run no Wastelands at all before cutting a single Mutavault. It's THAT awesome!

[(nameless one)]

Again, probably, but why do it? Mutavault's absolutely incredible.

I'm currently running a 20/20/20 list. Sometimes, its quite dissapointing to not consistently cast a lord without an active Vial.

I guess just add more lands?

[ajfennewald]

Which doesn't make it less of a correct choice.

I will always wasteland my opponent playing a nonbasic on turn 1 since that play indicates weakness.
Not sure that a non basic land indicates weakness all the time, When i play zoo and start with a four land hand i sometimes try to bait wastelands in this way. Also since i don't need 3 mana for much i often go the all three duals route instead of basics.

[Jonathan Alexander]

But even then it's not bad to use Wasteland on your first turn. If your opponent did nothing on their first turn then you're definitely not losing tempo if you use Wasteland. You might not be as good as if you cast something, but if they don't have additional lands (or not enough additional lands to play around Daze or cast their stuff at all) you're fine.
Playing a nonbasic and then passing does not necessarily indicate weakness, depending from what kind of deck it comes. Decks like classic Team America or most Landstill variants usually don't have that much business on their own turn one; these are traditionally rather good matchups for Merfolk anyway though.

[Julian23]

Yeah, it's not always a sign of weakness. I was more referring to the decks were it actually means, most of the time, that they neither have a Fetch nor a Basic to play. Against Zoo, I think I wouldn't even Wasteland them if I had another play since Zoo runs about 24 lands and is VERY hard to actually color-screw.

[Tacosnape]

I personally think that neither 12 islands nor 20 lands has been enough since the printing of Coralhelm Commander. I think 13 and 21 are minimum, and 13/22 or 14/22 configurations are becoming increasingly prevalent.

Sometimes, the choice between a Wasteland or Mutavault and an actual blue spell clouds a deckbuilder's judgement. More times than you can count, that Kira or Sower or Jitte is going to serve you better by being a Wasteland or a Mutavault. Not always, of course, but more than you think.

So yeah. 20/20/20, while appealing to symmetry, isn't really optimal. I run a 21 land/22 guy/17 spell configuration and am usually fairly pleased with the results.

EDIT: Also, What Zoo list runs 24 lands?

[Purgatory]

I personally think that neither 12 islands nor 20 lands has been enough since the printing of Coralhelm Commander. I think 13 and 21 are minimum, and 13/22 or 14/22 configurations are becoming increasingly prevalent.

Sometimes, the choice between a Wasteland or Mutavault and an actual blue spell clouds a deckbuilder's judgement. More times than you can count, that Kira or Sower or Jitte is going to serve you better by being a Wasteland or a Mutavault. Not always, of course, but more than you think.

So yeah. 20/20/20, while appealing to symmetry, isn't really optimal. I run a 21 land/22 guy/17 spell configuration and am usually fairly pleased with the results.

EDIT: Also, What Zoo list runs 24 lands?

I agree with pretty much everything Taco says here. I only recently got my fourth Mutavault (lol student wallet), and before I ran a third Sovereign in the same slot, but the deck, and especially Coralhelm Commander, seems to run more smoothly on 21 lands over 20. Pure statistically, I guess the difference is negligable, but Mutavault is too awesome to not run as a 4-of. Back in the day when I splashed white, I only played three because the number of colorless lands was becoming an issue in testing, so I never got around to getting the fourth Muta, but now, with a manabase sans duals and fetches, I think anyone can and should make room for both the 4x Wasteland and 4x Mutavault.

On Wasteland: I agree that the role of it has changed somewhat lately, and I do play Wasteland in Merfolk a lot differently than I do in, say, Team America, but Wasteland is still an awesome card for tempo with Vial in play (not that uncommon) and it's also a solution to some of the issues the deck has with some problematic lands, i.e. shit like Maze of Ith, The Tabernacle and Pendrell Vale, Glacial Chasm etc. (basically anything found in Lands!, which is a difficult match-up IMO, but Maverick also runs 1x Maze of Ith in some lists).

EDIT: Also, I should state, that with the advent of Dismember, I find myself using excess Wastelands to actually cast spells, especially in the early game. With six or seven cards MD that can be cast off a single Wasteland, one can hardly see that it is only a disruption tool, it's these days more flexible than that.

[Mr. Safety]

Just a question for the Fishy community here: is anyone splashing other colors, or is mono-blue the best setup ATm?

[Jonathan Alexander]

You don't need splashes anymore; with New Phyrexia you have spotremoval you can play without splashing. It's awesome. Also there are a lot of Wastelands in the current meta and you can't rely on Æther Vial as much anymore. In metagames where you'd still want to splash a colour, run another deck. Mono Blue is really strong right now. You have Dismember and Surgical Extraction. The cards I splashed for when I was running UB or UBW were mostly removal (Perish and Swords To Plowshares) and Extirpate (this was back when Survival Of The Fittest was legal though). Anyway, I don't really see what you'd want to splash for right now.

[sadakiyo]

Hi guys, I have several noob questions regarding this deck.
1. why no fetches? I know most people would say that fetches should be combined with brainstorm. But my point is: at least fetches can thin your deck so that you would draw more spells instead of lands.
2.What SB strategy against deck that packs a lot of Removal with some utility creature (e.g team italia, deadguy).
I believe zoo does not belong to this category since its creatures are beatdown type instead of utility type.
Correct me if i'm wrong: against these decks, I always approach the strategy of "having one guy with a lot of disruption" instead of "having a lot of guys with less disruption". So I always side out reejerey in these type of matchups and side in spell pierces, kira and dismember.
3.My build is a standstill build (I use only 3 in this deck) and 20 creatures.
my land count is 12 island, 3 mutas, 4 wasteland.
Should I up the land count to 21? (ie adding the 4th muta). My meta is not aggro heavy.

Thats all for now and thanks for answering

[Purgatory]

1. Because the effect that the land thinning has without any other synergistic cards (like Brainstorm, Top, library etc.) is mostly negligable and using fetches opens up your manabase to hate, like Stifle, Needle, Blood Moon and so on. It's not needed, just Islands is fine.

2. I have little experience against that type of deck, but boarding in Kira, along with maybe Spell Pierce if you're on the draw would be my plan. Countering 3-mana Vindicates etc. with Spell Pierce is awesome. I would probably never side out Reejereys against any deck, ever, he's a lord who can act as makeshift removal, I'd sooner board out Standstills and Dazes than Reejerey, even if he competes in the same mana slot as Kira. If I was ever to side out a lord against these decks, my gut tells me to side out LoA before Reejerey, mostly because you have other, better, 2-mana drops in your deck (Commander and Adept), he's only a 2/2 lord of UU, and the double-blue can sometimes screw you over, and Islandwalk is irrelevant against those decks. That said, I probably wouldn't ever side him out either.

3. I assume you mean 13 Islands, 3 Mutas, 4 Waste, and if you do run Coralhelm Commander (which I assume you do, and if you don't, you should) then a 4th Mutavault would probably be good not only because the deck can be mana hungry in the early turns of the match, but also because Mutavault is amazing, especially if you run Standstill.

EDIT: I should state, I'm no expert on this deck, though I've had some success with it, most has been in smaller (25 people and under) tournaments.

[Julian23]

1. The thinning is close to completly irrelevant in most decks. If you're really interested in this, there should be an article on SCG from several years ago about this.


and 3. If you're still running Standstill you should definitely play 4 Mutavaults, maybe even 1 Mishra's Factory. A lot of are currently running Manlands or other means of operating under Standstill (SFM etc.) so if you actually do run Standstill try to maximize you ways of breaking its symmetry.

[Tacosnape]

Hi guys, I have several noob questions regarding this deck.
1. why no fetches? I know most people would say that fetches should be combined with brainstorm. But my point is: at least fetches can thin your deck so that you would draw more spells instead of lands.

The power of basic islands is immeasurable. Fetches hurt you in the damage race, open you up to randomness like Stifle or Needle or Leonin Arbiter, and "Deck thinning" is a minimal effect and not always a good one. In a hand where you got, say, Delta, Delta, Lord, Coralhelm, Reejerey, Misstep, Force, you really want to hit a third and possibly fourth land.


2.What SB strategy against deck that packs a lot of Removal with some utility creature (e.g team italia, deadguy).
I believe zoo does not belong to this category since its creatures are beatdown type instead of utility type.
Correct me if i'm wrong: against these decks, I always approach the strategy of "having one guy with a lot of disruption" instead of "having a lot of guys with less disruption". So I always side out reejerey in these type of matchups and side in spell pierces, kira and dismember.

Spell Pierce is not what you want in this matchup.

The three biggest cards you can't afford to let stick are Dark Confidant, Stoneforge Mystic, and Grim Lavamancer. Spell Pierce does nothing to counter these three. Pierce won't help you against Equipment if a Stoneforge sticks, and Pierce won't help against spot removal if the Confidant's giving them 2-for-1 each turn.

Matchups like this are why I recommend having a total of four Dismember between maindeck and board. There's no better card to have on your side here.

Divert and Standstill both shine in this matchup, as well. Being able to take out their guy with their removal spell, or have them Hymn themselves? Off the chain. Standstill gives you a chance to win the midgame war if you can't do it through sheer speed.



3.My build is a standstill build (I use only 3 in this deck) and 20 creatures.
my land count is 12 island, 3 mutas, 4 wasteland.
Should I up the land count to 21? (ie adding the 4th muta). My meta is not aggro heavy.


Yes. You want 21 lands.

[sadakiyo]

About fetches, I got your point guys. Thanks for enlightening me on that one.
@purgatory, Yes I meant 13 island, not 12. My bad....
@tacosnape. About going to 21 island... sounds like a good idea to me, but I don't know what to cut for the 21st land. I'm still sticking with the 20 lands and if playtest and tournament result prove it to be bad, I would consider your suggestion. So far, I seldom find myself mana-screwed with just 20 lands.
About dismember, I know it is THAT good. It saved my ass many times. I have 3 total in my SB. I would make it a 4 of.

So here is my SB look like
4 dismember
3 submerge
2 relic of progenitus
2 spell pierce
2 echoing truth
2 kira

Do you guys think 3 submerges and 4 dismember a little bit too much?
There aren't many zoo in my meta, but there are some gw maverick, team america and bant.
Should I just cut the 3rd submerge for the 4th dismember?

there are some affinity in my meta but not too many. I have the urge to have energy flux in my sb but I always thought that it is a narrow SB choice, just like llawan. Never test deck against affinity again, but can this match be won by having 4 dismember???

[Malakai]

Personally I went to 22 lands (14/4/4) and never looked back.

[kiwi]

One doubt againts reanimator, is a good idea sideboad in dismembers or to keep dismembers in maindeck if you have some copies ? With dismembers we can kill Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur but I dont know if its correct that decision

[Tacosnape]

One doubt againts reanimator, is a good idea sideboad in dismembers or to keep dismembers in maindeck if you have some copies ? With dismembers we can kill Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur but I dont know if its correct that decision

Depends on what you have to board in. I tend not to.

When I board, I'm bringing in usually 8 cards. 3 Spell Pierce, 1 Daze, 2 Surgical Extraction, 1 Tormod's Crypt, and either a second Crypt or a fourth Pierce. Then I'll eye two Dismembers in board (I have two main also).

My cuts are usually Merfolk Sovereign, Merrow Reejerey, and Dismember. Depending on the opponents' build, I might leave two Dismembers in and cut two Coralhelms. You only need one guy to go the distance here, and you're going to want open mana to handle their Dazes and cast your Spell Pierces.

The thing about Dismember is this. Jin-Gitaxias isn't the guy they want to go find against you, ever. They're always going to want either Iona, Elesh Norn, or Blazing Archon, depending on your board. Sometimes Jin-Gitaxias may BE the guy they find against you, but it's not who they want. So I tend to think having a Coralhelm who can either kill or pitch to Force is better than having the black spell that's only useful if the exact scenario of them sticking Jin-Gitaxias happens.

Also, keep in mind, your best strategy with Merfolk is just to not let them stick anything. And with Cursecatcher, Daze, Force of Will, Mental Misstep, Spell Pierce, and yard hate all pitching in, this isn't hard to make happen.

[charlyx]

hello!

i play a mono u merfolks deck and usually I have problems with side. I don't know which cards are better put or remove.

Which cards put and remove against zoo landstill, maverick etc.?

thanks

Welcome to The Source. It appears English isn't your first language, so your grammatical flaws are forgivable, but please make an effort to use proper capitalization in your posts. Thanks. - zilla

[SageShadows]

Played Merfolk to 12th (4-2) in a 49 person tournament (the Southern California Legacy Tournament @ MTG Deals in San Gabriel)

I ran the following list:
4 Wasteland
4 Mutavault
13 Island

4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Cursecatcher
1 Sower of Temptation
1 Merfolk Sovereign

4 AEther Vial

4 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Mental Misstep
2 Dismember

SB: 2 Dismember
SB: 2 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 2 Umezawa's Jitte
SB: 3 Spell Pierce
SB: 1 Sower of Temptation
SB: 2 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
SB: 2 Relic of Progenitus
SB: 1 Daze

I was anticipating heavy dredge, reanimator, and combo. Obviously, I hit none of those. Here's a mini tournament report, which won't be very detailed as I have horrible memory.

Round 1: UB Good Stuff (0-1)
Literally, it was a homebrew that made no sense. Game 1 I saw Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas. I win that game on the back of a Merfolk Sovereign and Coralhelm. Game 2 I lose to Vendilion Clique and Sower after I nuke his Academy Ruins and Crucible. Game 3, I actually don't remember wh-- Oh yeah, 2 Engineered Plagues.

Round 2: Aggro Loam (1-1)
Game 1, I think I stopped a Tarm at 1 life, then the vault went all the way. Sick. Game 2, I lose because he cast ANYTHING after I killed his Terravore. Game 3, I pick up a win with Coralhelm Commander. I think I came back from a Devastating Dreams this game, but it involved him bricking on lands.

Round 3: GWu Maverick (2-1)
I thought he was on Natural Order. Game 1, Lords eat his face. Game 2, an alpha strike takes out his 2 Pridemages that were giving lethal power to his Clique. Sided in incorrectly when I took out Dazes for Spell Pierces and Llawans.

Round 4: UW Landstill (3-1)
Game 1, I had 3 Lord of Atlantis. Game 2, my hand was full of lords, and he was landscrewed. Not very interactive.

Round 5: Zoo (3-2)
I actually win game 1 because he is land flooded. Game 2 isn't even close, as he gets a library onboard and his MD removal in addition to 6 red blasts make it easy for him. G3 he has a grim lavamancer online, which kills me.

Round 6: GBW Good Stuff (I saw KotR and Goyfs) (4-2)
Game 1, Mutavault chips away at life while he's landscrewed from mulling to 5. Game 2, the game is relatively close, but he pulls away with a KotR and some timely removal. Game 3, Dismember clears the way for Lord of Atlantis with a Jitte and his friends to beat down until he scoops.

Thoughts:

Dismember is a great MD card. I found myself being able to kill off bobs, clear the way for my merfolk army, and win out on combat math.
The Sower didn't really do much for me, but that's because I didn't draw into it.
Regret not having Submerges in the SB, but that's mainly because I didn't anticipate so many Zoo/Maverick/Goyf/KotR.
Spell Snare didn't really prove its worth even though I found myself siding it in a lot. This is due to the lack of combo decks I played, I suppose.
Really liked the 21 lands. Felt landscrewed even sometimes. I don't think 20 lands is a safe number, but I kind of felt the loss of the Merfolk Sovereign I cut for the land.


Questions:

I won basically every single Game 1 I played. I usually sided out my 3 Dazes on the draw, usually for pierces in relevant matchups or other SB cards. Is this right? Should I keep in a few? I feel like Dazes are terribly useless in matchups such as Zoo and are totally neutered on the draw. Also, I felt like I didn't have enough countermagic when I sided out the Dazes.
I never found myself cutting the Force of Wills. I know it's straight up Card Disadvantage, but I felt kind of safer being able to stem the zoo from overwhelming me and being able to represent Force helped out.
Is Llawan really that great of a SB card? I get that it's a bomb against the mirror, but it seems so, so narrow. At least Crypt helps out with Aggro loam and stuff.
On the same note, would Kira merit inclusion in the SB only? The Zoo matchup really left a bitter taste in my mouth, but it seems even narrower than Llawan.


Sorry the "report" wasn't that in-depth; I didn't take amazing notes because I was focused on the game. I just read off life totals and little markings to see what happened.

[Tacosnape]

Questions:

I won basically every single Game 1 I played. I usually sided out my 3 Dazes on the draw, usually for pierces in relevant matchups or other SB cards. Is this right? Should I keep in a few? I feel like Dazes are terribly useless in matchups such as Zoo and are totally neutered on the draw. Also, I felt like I didn't have enough countermagic when I sided out the Dazes.
I never found myself cutting the Force of Wills. I know it's straight up Card Disadvantage, but I felt kind of safer being able to stem the zoo from overwhelming me and being able to represent Force helped out.
Is Llawan really that great of a SB card? I get that it's a bomb against the mirror, but it seems so, so narrow. At least Crypt helps out with Aggro loam and stuff.
On the same note, would Kira merit inclusion in the SB only? The Zoo matchup really left a bitter taste in my mouth, but it seems even narrower than Llawan.



Good report. Neat list.

1. I almost never side out a Daze on the play. I will sometimes on the draw. It usually depends on what I have to board in, how bad missing a land drop could hurt me, and what I want my ratio of dudes to counters to be. I'd never board out a single Daze against any combo deck, for instance. But Zoo on the draw? Yeah. Get them out of there.

2. Zoo overwhelms you much more efficiently if it Hymns you. I cut Forces on the play in some matchups - Usually anything where the card count heavily matters (Zoo, any Confidant variant), but under no circumstances would I cut Force of Will on the draw, ever.

3. I personally don't think so, but the rest of the world disagrees with me. I don't really ever run it unless the metagame's just swarming with Merfolk and Natural Order, but I keep it in my box as a metagame call. I'd certainly never pick it over graveyard hate. Decks like Reanimator, Dredge, Aggro Loam, and Cephalid Breakfast thrive largely in part because players stubbornly refuse to pack enough yard hate in sideboards. I feel like 2 is the absolute minimum for a heavily disruptive deck like Merfolk or Deadguy and 3 for zomething like Zoo or Maverick, and I don't feel comfortable packing less than 3 and 4 respectively. My Maverick actually packs five, counting the maindecked Bojuka Bog.

4. Kira's less narrow than Llawan. Kira's solid against some other decks, as well (UW Landstill, Team Italia, etc.) Basically, if they pack as many removal spells as you pack Lords, Kira's pretty neat. That said, I don't maindeck Kira, because most of the time I'm only dealing with between 0 and 2 removal spells I can't counter, and I'd rather have another Lord.

[reale]

Hello again.

Taco, everyone: what about Turn to Frog (M12) instead of Dismember?

Pros:
- Synergy with FoW;
- Eliminates Dismember's life loss;
- Opponents will think twice if you send your lord to death;
- Better to kill big creatures (wo/ protection, but dismember won't help anyway);
- Other possible uses to stop abilities for one turn;
- Insta-One Shot-Humility? :rolleyes: (That means I can't think of anything else)


Cons
- The extra blue to cast (Dismember in perspective);
- Actually don't kill any creature;
- ... continue ...

Best regards,

[randomly.anonymous]

I'm guessing for similar reasons snakeform didn't cut it?
It is one mana less tho :-S

[Gui]

For similar reasons that Ovinize never made the cut?

[Sturtzilla]

I have to agree. I think that the ability to actually remove a creature is far more valuable than a possibility to remove the creature pending various combat and blocking scenarios. I am going to stick to Dismember.

[reale]

Thanks all. I didn't even know the existence of Ovinize. It really don't make te cut.

Best regards

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

Not digging Turn to Frog. But that squirrel is effing amazing!

[Sturtzilla]

Not digging Turn to Frog. But that squirrel is effing amazing!

That squirrel was pretty badass! I really enjoyed it.

[Finn]

It is also important to note here that Dismember is a 1-mana spell that can not be Misstepped.

Cake? check
Eat it too? check

[Julian23]

Creatures, Turn to Frog usually won't kill: Grim Lavamancer, Dark Confidant Stoneforge Mystic. Dismember also kills creatures equipped with Sword of Fire and Ice which is an important application from my experience.

[Tacosnape]

Are people seriously discussing Turn to Frog? What a terrible card. I wouldn't play this over Dismember if it cantripped.

Dismember kills. Period. One colorless to kill 90+% of the creatures in the format is incomparably good for Blue. Your miss list is very small: Mirran Crusader, Argothian Enchantress, Thrun the Last Troll, huge guys who get comboed into play, and guys who get bigger based on land in your graveyard. There's no blue card in existence that's even close to this level of efficiency and probably never will be. It'd take a :1::u: cantripping Unsummon to make me consider dropping Dismember, and even then I'd probably keep a couple Dismembers in board.

[bakofried]

Adaptive Automaton 3
Artifact Creature - Construct R
As ~ enters the battlefield, choose a creature type.
~ enters the battlefield as a creature of the chosen type.
Other creatures of the chosen type get +1/+1.
2/2

Huh. Don't know what to think of this. Maybe edge out Sovereign? I like her ability, but the casting cost on this is so much easier. Worse with Silvergill though, and doesn't trigger Reejerey. Anyway, thought I'd bring it up.

[Fortunae]

The only good thing that I can see in this card versus Sovereign is that it doesn't require double blue, and can block Goblin Piledriver.

Probably isn't nearly good enough. We already have an abundance of great lords to play, and our flex slots are too valuable to spend on a 3cc lord that is otherwise a vanilla creature.

[Julian23]

What Fortunane said + it sucks in the mirror.

[thecrav]

The only good thing that I can see in this card versus Sovereign is that it doesn't require double blue, and can block Goblin Piledriver.

Probably isn't nearly good enough. We already have an abundance of great lords to play, and our flex slots are too valuable to spend on a 3cc lord that is otherwise a vanilla creature.

Also gets around the opposing players Llwan. Perhaps a sideboard slot in case you think they're packing the Empress?

[Fortunae]

We have Dismember for Llawan (and Piledriver).

We just got HUGE boosts from the printing of Misstep and Dismember, compared to that, Adaptive Automaton is just another in a long line of almost good enough cards that people will try to shoehorn in anyway.

Just my 2 cents =)

[Fortunae]

.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

We have Dismember for Llawan (and Piledriver).

We just got HUGE boosts from the printing of Misstep and Dismember, compared to that, Adaptive Automaton is just another in a long line of almost good enough cards that people will try to shoehorn in anyway.

Just my 2 cents =)

Totally agreed, 'nuff said. Adaptive Automaton will help some decks; this is not one of them because we already have better stuff. But Automaton, I think, will show up in Legacy, and is gonna help some almost-there types of tribes like Soldiers and Vampires, etc.

IMO, what this deck needs in order to completely dominate is another awesome one-drop creature, ideally with some disruptive ability. (My super-duper 'never gonna happen' dream for this deck is a 1/1 for :u: who can sac to Stifle.) A better 'fourth lord' than Sovereign would be nice, but honestly she's good enough if you want extra +1/+1 effects.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

We have Dismember for Llawan (and Piledriver).

We just got HUGE boosts from the printing of Misstep and Dismember, compared to that, Adaptive Automaton is just another in a long line of almost good enough cards that people will try to shoehorn in anyway.

Just my 2 cents =)

Totally agreed, 'nuff said. Adaptive Automaton will help some decks; this is not one of them because we already have better stuff. But Automaton, I think, will show up in Legacy, and is gonna help some almost-there types of tribes like Soldiers and Vampires, etc.

IMO, what this deck needs in order to completely dominate is another awesome one-drop creature, ideally with some disruptive ability. (My super-duper 'never gonna happen' dream for this deck is a 1/1 for :u: who can sac to Stifle.) A better 'fourth lord' than Sovereign would be nice, but honestly she's good enough if you want extra +1/+1 effects.

[Tacosnape]

Adaptive Automaton is stupid to even be considered when we aren't packing 4 Sovereign anyway. Sovereign at least pitches to Force.

Won locals tonight. Managed to beat Affinity 2-1, Zoo 2-0, Death & Taxes 2-0, and Belcher 2-0. Too tired and hungry to do a full report, but here was the summary of it.

1. Energy Flux was amazing. After getting just massacred by Affinity game one, It won me both of the other two games and against solid hands. It also is pretty neat for taking down Chrome Moxes and LED's that Belcher likes to stick on the board.

2. I beat Zoo because of Wasteland and because at one point, I topdecked three straight Coralhelm Commanders. Also, I packed a pair of Submerges at random, and they helped seal the deal. I beat Death & Taxes because I countered Stoneforge Mystic both games. I beat Belcher because I drew Force of Will both games.

I didn't really have any absolutely amazing revelations. On a whim, I decided to board out Force against Zoo even on the draw and didn't regret it for a second. I never ever seem to want to see that card against Zoo. It's the match where the 2-for-1 hurts the most, and the only times I ever win are when I get Silvergills or lucky Wastelands, or the opponent gets mana flooded.

The only other thing I noted was how difficult I once again found Belcher. I barely got through it with godly opening hands on both games. I always seem to end up, win or lose, with an unused Mental Misstep in my hand, wondering how it can somehow never find a target. It's better postboard to take care of blasts and one day in theory will hit a Rite of Flame or a Tinder Wall, but it never seems to.

EDIT: @Dukedemon: I'd take a version of Cursecatcher that works like an Annul instead of a Disrupt. And for some reason I want it to be called Merfolk Orthodontist. I have no idea why.

[Justin]

I agree that Adaptive Automation isn't going to make the cut in Merfolk. There are just too many other lords that are better. I guess the advantage of Automation is that it is colorless, so it plays better against cards such as Mother of Runes, pro-blue swords, Goblin Piledriver, and Etched Champion. On the other hand, it's vulnerable to artifact removal and it's advantages seem weaker than that of other Merfolk lords. Plus, the meta in which it is good (Goblins, Affinity, Aggro Wx decks) is probably one that you don't want to be playing Merfolk anyway.

[sadakiyo]

@tacosnape : I am still confused on when to side out FOW completely. I still get the feeling that going out without FOW is like riding your bike without helmet.
Can you give some insight on this matter??
Congrats on your win.

[Justin]

I'm skeptical about ever siding out Force of Will as well, but I can see the argument for doing it against Zoo. Zoo is largely a redundant deck that plays lands, creatures and removal. I think that you can get away with boarding out Force of Will against a deck that does not have any "must-counter" spells. Merfolk players often hate to use Force against Zoo because of the card disadvantage, especially if the card that you pitched to it could have helped you win the game. Do you really want to save your lord from a removal spell with a Force when you have to pitch another lord in your hand to the Force? Is it really worth Forcing one of their creatures? Is it worth a 2 for 1 to keep a Nacatl or Goyf off the board? Sometimes the answer is yes, but often it will be no. I think you have to look at what the opponent is playing and ask yourself if there are some must-counter spells. For example, one could make the argument that Grim Lavamancer is a threat that you want to keep off the board. Sylvan Library is another card that might be up for debate.

[Malakai]

I tend to keep one or two forces in against Zoo, to ensure I have more ways to stop Grim Lavamancer than they have Lavamancers. However, with the printing of Dismember this probably isn't necessary...

[Justin]

I dunno. Dismember doesn't seem to be too good against zoo, especially fast zoo. They can kill you as much with direct damage to the dome as they do with creatures. Taking a self-inflicted Fireblast doesn't seem too good, even if it gets one of their guys off the table. I probably wouldn't run Dismember against fast zoo in games 2 and 3.

[Tacosnape]

Re Forces: I'll say this. Until you start trying siding out Force of Will, you won't realize the merit behind it. I'm pretty sure it hasn't even been a year since I argued against ever doing it. Now I find I do it almost constantly in Merfolk. Hey, at least I can admit half of what I say turns out to be wrong.

I almost never ever board out Forces on the draw. This is the conventional tempo logic. Interacting for zero mana when you're going second is almost always good.

On the play, I do it frequently, especially against decks like Zoo. You have to weigh how often you'll regret spending two cards for one, how much tempo you'll gain out of it, and how many things they run that just utterly beat you if they resolve. Grim Lavamancer doesn't frighten me as much as it probably should. On the play, I can Misstep, Dismember, Daze, Submerge, or Jitte it.

My latest thing, however, is that if I have Submerges in my board to go with Dismembers, I just don't want to see Force against Zoo. I want to see Silvergills, Missteps, and Submerges. This depends on the list, probably, but I feel like the deck's way too redundant to get a ton of use out of Force. If I saw Sylvan Libraries or Elspeths or Stoneforges, I might hang on to it.

And this still needs testing. I'm not firmly behind this theory yet. Just tried it once on a whim and felt like it worked well on a given instance.

For the most part, the conventional logic is still this: Force is sometimes expendable on the play, and Daze is often expendable on the draw.

[reale]

@ Taco/FoWs

Are we talking about removing the entire set on the play against Zoo (only? Other pure aggro included?).

In these slots, side in 2 Jittes and 3rd and 4th dismember over submerge? Both?

I'm asking that because i'll play my local national qualifier in a month and would like to try this strategy.

Thanks in advance.

[SlopeeJ]

I think you need force of will vs zoo, sure the 2/1 can be bad card disadvantage but the effect on the board state more then makes up for it (if played correctly). Examples would be you have 2 lords and then play a third, then bolt.. You force. Or leveling commander, you have 6 mana invested and they invest 1 mana for bolt/path.. Or double bolt on kira. The list goes on and there is just as many situations that are bad.

I usually want to force 1 time vs zoo, so sbing out 1 or 2 is always good. I would sb out daze play or draw, they play to many 1 drops.

People always talk about the card disadvantage, but no one ever talks about how the board state would be effected if that spell resolved. Clearly you want to counter that 10/10 knight and pitching a card is worth it. Using the card correctly is the key

[Star|Scream]

I think you need force of will vs zoo, sure the 2/1 can be bad card disadvantage but the effect on the board state more then makes up for it (if played correctly). Examples would be you have 2 lords and then play a third, then bolt.. You force. Or leveling commander, you have 6 mana invested and they invest 1 mana for bolt/path.. Or double bolt on kira. The list goes on and there is just as many situations that are bad.

This is why you have spell pierce, misstep, dismember, and daze.

[Tacosnape]

I am indeed tinkering with just keeping Force out against certain zoo builds. As for other aggro, depends on the aggro and I haven't tested this at all at this juncture. I can't think of another aggro deck where I don't have something that I just can't let stick, or that doesn't also 2-for-1 itself or run out of gas easily if you Force a single crucial spell. So right now I'm just tinkering around with this for Zoo.


This is why you have spell pierce, misstep, dismember, and daze.

Right. I don't always find I have a Force and a blue card to spare against Zoo if I've got three Lords on the board. And if I do, what Blue card would it be at that point that I wouldn't be better off having the Force as something different?

[Micki]

Hello,

My meta seems to be filled with Maverick and Show and Tell/Hive Mind decks these days. Since I splash white I have Angel's Grace in the board for Pact's and E Tutor+Cursed Totem against Maverick. If someone have found good ways to stop these decks and/or good sideboard cards against them, please let me know.

[Hopo]

Hello,

My meta seems to be filled with Maverick and Show and Tell/Hive Mind decks these days. Since I splash white I have Angel's Grace in the board for Pact's and E Tutor+Cursed Totem against Maverick. If someone have found good ways to stop these decks and/or good sideboard cards against them, please let me know.

The thing is that GW is a terrible matchup for you and in such meta merfolk is just plain bad choice. Merfolk thrives on blue control decks, which all the GW decks had pretty much eliminated last time if you compare to previous tournaments. If you still insist trying, it seems to me that Saito-style UB with sideboard Perish is the way to go. Perish can be complimented with Virtue's Ruin. So this is if you really want to play merfolk in GW meta. Even then, the presence of equipment makes even mass removal little less effective, as any topdecked creature can continue killing your fish with a Jitte or something.

GW is obviously not unwinnable, but I think you need to reserve quite a many slots to fight through Mother of Runes, Tarmogoyf, Knight of the Reliquary, Scryb Ranger, Stoneforge Mystic, Batterskull, other equipment, Wasteland, spot removal AND the sideboarded goodness like Choke, extra removal and Dueling Grounds. It's just not easy.

[FANAttIC]

Greetings.

Long time merfolk player here (if playing folk since Cursecatcher got printed is long).
Love the fishiez.
The deck got me to Worlds in Memphis where I got destroyed :wink: but that did not vanquish my eagerness to play it again in legacy. Since then, I managed to win/top8 some 50+ player tournaments. That payed for FoWs, Mutas and the rest. The last success was a week ago, split in finals (lucky because it was against maverick) got me sea and volcanic.

Latest list I am using:
1 Mishra's Factory
4 Wasteland
4 Mutavault
12 Island

4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Silvergill Adept
3 Cursecatcher
2 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner

4 AEther Vial

3 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Mental Misstep
2 Dismember

SB: 2 Pithing Needle (mystik, mother, jace, mancer, belcher, thopter foundry, elspeth)
SB: 2 Relic of Progenitus (lands, reanimator, goyf, knight)
SB: 2 Spell Pierce (order, aluren, spout, moat, jace, vindicate, hymn)
SB: 1 Dismember
SB: 1 Force of Will
SB: 3 Hydroblast (goblins, burn, can. thresh)
SB: 2 Vendillion Clique (Life ftl, batterskull, combo)
SB: 2 Echoing Truth (empty the warrens, ens. bridge, other annoying stuff)

3 catcher, 3 daze and 3 fow was for that particular tournament (no combo in sight, very hostile environment to fish).
Kira was great all day, I wish there was room in the sideboard for two more. I know its legendary but matchups where she shines demand full playset cause I had enough of those bolt, sword, vindicate, lavamancer, incinerator, maze of ith BS.
Metamorph, I don't know, I had to try it, it was ok, nothing spectacular. Those slots mitght be open again, but I didn't lose a match with them so :cool:
Dismembers and missteps are to cool, not debatable for me and greatest gains from NPH.

Some people told us what they would like to be printed. To me it would be turning kira into merfolk, losing flying or some other mechanism to be fair, or some draw a card card (standstill, black sygg or selkie are not "it" for me). Something like 2/1 for 1u, draw a card when dies. Simple and not broken.

[Tacosnape]

Hive Mind isn't that hard of a matchup. For a deck that trounces 80% of the format, Merfolk's in the 20% Hive Mind doesn't want to see in skilled hands. Spell Pierces in sideboard help a ton. Just take your time and don't make mistakes with your counters, or you get punished. I can't imagine with Angel's Grace on top of everything else that you'll do that poorly.

GW Maverick is all about spending your counters and removal at the right time. They've got all the right tools to beat you, but you have free counters and the ability to kill them before they can quite get everything together. It's not a good matchup, but practicing against it a lot can make more of a difference than any specific card you board. And you don't have a ton of great options to board here. Even if you run Hibernation or a black splash for Perish, you can die to Mother of Runes/Stoneforge Mystic if you don't have the cards to deal with it.

[SlopeeJ]

If you have cursecatcher out, hive mind can't win unless they have multiple pacts or even daze with 1 mana open. You cursecatcher/daze your copy of pact and then pay 1 mana for their copy of daze or simple don't pay for cursecatcher and your copy doesn't resolve. Then you pass the turn and they lose because they can't pay for all their shitty pacts.

[Tacosnape]

If you have cursecatcher out, hive mind can't win unless they have multiple pacts or even daze with 1 mana open. You cursecatcher/daze your copy of pact and then pay 1 mana for their copy of daze or simple don't pay for cursecatcher and your copy doesn't resolve. Then you pass the turn and they lose because they can't pay for all their shitty pacts.

Daze with one mana open doesn't actually "kill" Hive Mind. The opponent can just aim their Daze copy at their own Pact in an absolute worst case scenario.

[SlopeeJ]

I'm not sure why you are saying this? Who cares about hive mind if you counter your own pact. The whole point was you don't lose the game because your pact is countered (their copied pact)

If you didn't have 1 mana open they would get a copy of daze that would counter your daze on your pact.


Daze with one mana open doesn't actually "kill" Hive Mind
If your pact is countered then how good is hive mind?

[SageShadows]

I know we had a conversation about this earlier this thread, but it came up largely inconclusive.
Phyrexian Metamorph: Valid SB material? I know Tacosnipe's tested it in the MD. Here's what happened at my local tournament today (10 people).

Ran 3 Dazes, 21 Lands, 2 Sovereign, 2 Dismember in the MD (the core was in place). The SB was:
2 Jitte, 2 Submerge, 2 Llawan, 2 Dismember, 1 Sower, 2 Relic, 2 Surgical Extraction, 2 Spell Pierce

Round 1, I lost horribly to Elves both times. Is this match up even winnable? Even when I brought in Jitte's, their cutesy block bounce trick just nullifies its effectiveness. I'm starting to lose faith in Jitte as a good SB card- it just never seems to pull its weight. Mortarpod is also a surprising annoyance.

Round 2, I lost to a BW deck. Stoneforge both games effectively ended it for me.

Round 3, I won against the turbofog deck. Wasn't that rewarding of a win- it just durdles around with lands and does nothing of note, at least from the two games I played. >_>

Round 4, beat Cephalid. Game 1, some solid Silvergill and Lord beatdowns won the game. Game 2, Turn 2 combo was sick. Game 3, I won handily with Force and 2 Daze backup.

First, regarding the Phyrexian Metamorph discussion. I'm not sure if my analysis is apt, but doesn't it solve for all the problems that Llawan or Sower would solve for except the mirror? The meta I'm in seems to be favoring combo (Hive Mind, Painter's Servant, Breakfast), BW decks, and a few NO RUG decks with the boogeyman of dredge looming around, but never really peeking its head out until no one prepares for it. Phyrexian Metamorph takes care of Emrakul and Progenitus. I haven't tested it in the SB yet, but I've found Sowers and Llawans totally underwhelming. Is it an OK move to cut both Sowers and Llawans for Phyrexian Metamorphs to save SB spots?

Second, I think Julian had a good idea with the Cursed Totem. It just stops Cephalid, helps a lot versus Maverick and BW decks. Any other opinions?

If I were to play in a tournament in my meta tomorrow, I'd probably run the same mainboard and the following SB:
1 Jitte, 2 Cursed Totem, 2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner (It didn't come in time for this tournament), 2 Dismember, 2 Phyrexian Metamorph, 2 Relic, 2 Surgical Extraction, 2 Spell Pierce.

Jitte's a house when it works; it just never seems like it does. Any thoughts? Spell Pierces are nice, but they're not super amazing thus far. I might go -2 Spell Pierce +1 Jitte +1 Daze.

[FANAttIC]

I used to run jitte mainly to legend ruled them, so far it doesn't have a place in 75 for me.
Now metamorph kills jitte. Also, there is just no enough space for llawans and sowers, sideboard is such a tight place.
Next to take a test (Saw style) will be a couple of cursed totems

[NathanS2k]

Second, I think Julian had a good idea with the Cursed Totem. It just stops Cephalid, helps a lot versus Maverick and BW decks. Any other opinions?


Hmmm....IIRC, you're David? I was the guy who played BW discard. I strongly agree with using Cursed Totem. It shuts down my Stoneforges making the card I fetched (usually Batterskull) useless. By the time I have enough mana to hard cast it, I should be dead. It stops pretty much all creatures that we see play in our meta (KotR, Lavamancer, Qasali Pridemage, and the list just kept going) and even mana producing creatures like that Elve deck you lost to. The only drawback is stopping your Coralhelm Commander from leveling, but who cares.....it's worth it!

My buddies and I playtest on Fridays there at the shop, should join us.

[SageShadows]

Hmmm....IIRC, you're David? I was the guy who played BW discard. I strongly agree with using Cursed Totem. It shuts down my Stoneforges making the card I fetched (usually Batterskull) useless. By the time I have enough mana to hard cast it, I should be dead. It stops pretty much all creatures that we see play in our meta (KotR, Lavamancer, Qasali Pridemage, and the list just kept going) and even mana producing creatures like that Elve deck you lost to. The only drawback is stopping your Coralhelm Commander from leveling, but who cares.....it's worth it!

My buddies and I playtest on Fridays there at the shop, should join us.

Yeah, I'm David. Nice of you to remember! :D
In regards to the Cursed Totem conversation, that's what I was reasoning. I had Pithing Needle in that mystery slot, but when I thought about it, 99% of my problems were fancy creatures. I'd probably side out the Coralhelms if I DID side them in anyways, so it's not that big.
I actually don't have a ride to the shop on Fridays, but I'll see if I can get one one day and hang out. Thanks for the invite!

[reale]

@SageShadows

Cursed Totem may turn the Elves match better for us, or am I wrong? Post SB they have Krosan Grip, but, at this time, with a lot of Stoneforge everywhere, I'm sideboarding 3 (maybe 4 if the field is infested). Affinity (Energy flux in first place if you can find slots avaliable, but Totem helps against Ravager), Maverick, even Zoo.

It's a good time to talk about this card and the matches it help us.

[FANAttIC]

After Saito won with black splash, I tried to copy it for few tournaments. Managed to lose against 2 elves and one goblins, with sideboard that contained 4 perish, 4 plague, 2 darkblast, on the same day. That was a sign not to splash anything (or that I am awful, one of those). Thankfully, misstep was printed since then, and now maybe life gets easier with totem against pointy eared treehuggers and maverick.

[unemployer]

I first piloted Merfolk 2 weeks ago and below are the details of my game. The only things I need to learn is to how board properly and which hand to keep.

Round 1 - Lost (1-2) Dredge. -3Standstill -1Merfolk Lord +2Relic +2Echoing
Made some misplays on the 3rd game and costed me the game. I should've mulled for Relic.
Round 2 - Won (2-1) Counterthopter/Sword -3Standstill -2Coralhelm +3Spell pierce +2P.Revoker
I automatically won game 1 since the player had a decklist error. By game 2, he controlled me and game 3, I killed him with creatures
Round 3 - Won (2-0) Bant Control. +1Submerge +1Mind harness -1Coralhelm -1Standstill
I controlled his first turns and stalled everything he threw at me. Game 2, same story
Round 4 - Won (2-1) MBC +3Spellpierce +2P.Revoker -3Standstill -2 Coralhelm I dont know how to board so on G3, I returned Standstill and placed Dismember for Pierce
I controlled him on the first part of the game matches. By g2, he placed a E. Plague which stalled me. Game 3, I controlled his board by Dismember, Standstill and jitte.
Round 5 - Draw (1-1-1) TES -3Coralhelm +3Spellpierce
G1 gave me time to win since I stalled all his Mana producers by Cursecatcher and Daze (NOW! Do your math). G2 I thought I had the game in game 2 but the guy was really lucky. He already casted Ill-Gotten Gains and imprinted ETW in Chrome Mox. He is down to 6 and casted Ad Nauseaum, Top cards were the remaining cards to win the game (Petal, LED, Land, Infernal, BS, Dark Ritual)... How un/lucky can you get. On the third game, we didn't have enough time and the game ended in a draw.
Round 6 - Won (2-1) BWG Junk.
G1, i destroyed his only White mana producing land and won the game. I don't know what hit me but by G2, he had a D.confidant in play and I just played standstill (3 cards in hand). He was 16 and I was still 20 (is it bad to assume that he would die by Confidant? Oh yes). After a few turn of plain stupidity from my part, he is down to 9 and I was down to 11. He played a spell and then I lost all the way there. By G3, it took us a lot of turns before I won. I topdecked Submerged and he doesn't have any creatures to block my 2 counters on Jitte with LoA.

Ended at 4-1-1. Turns out, my friends and I were all 4-1-1. I had the lowest tiebreak thus I'm 10th :|. My friend is 9th, my 2 other friends are 6th and 8th. Almost, but not quite...

4 Wasteland
4 Mutavault
12 Island
3 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Merrow Reejery
4 Coralhelm Commander
2 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Standstill
4 Aether Vial
4 Mental Misstep
4 Force of Will
4 Daze
SB
1 Submerge
1 Mind Harness
2 Echoing Truth
2 Dismember
1 Llawan
2 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Spell Pierce
2 Relic of Progenitus


I know my SB looks messed up but these are the only cards I had and can borrow at that time :)
I'm thinking of placing 2 Cursed Totem (removing Revoker), probably removing submerge and harness and have 3 Dismembers. Any thoughts?

[Sturtzilla]

Thanks for the report. Sounds like you did pretty decent. I like what you are thinking for the sideboard changes. Not that it is right or wrong, but your proposed board is nearly identical to mine. I run Pithing Needle over Cursed Totem. I have been considering the Totem recently though.

I have a question for you, how do you think Standstill performed for you? I am kind of on the fence about Standstill. I own them but don't really like the way the deck plays some of the time with them in. One of the guys in my playgroup plays Merfolk with Standstill and seems to post great results quite often (he has far more experience with the deck than I do). I guess I am looking for some advice from other Merfolk players on the topic.

[unemployer]

@Sturtzilla
Standstill helps and at the same time provides problems mid-game. The perfect way to play this is turn 1 A.Vial then Standstill next turn. Mid-game, it doesn't help the deck much but still worth casting. Most of the lists I see do not run standstills but adds the 2 sovereigns and making 4 Cursecatchers. Sovereigns helps a lot if you have a lot of tempo and creature based decks. The popular decks running now are SFM builds. Having unblockable 3/3 to 5/5 creatures really helps for evasion (that pesky batterskull!)
My only stand for not including standstill is that you have lesser cards for drawing and if you have Force of Will, that makes you hand lesser; thus, I run standstill. I am still looking at changing the standstills but I would need serious testing. This is the first time I'm using it but had a lot of experience fighting it.
Now it is just a matter of meta prediction and a bit of luck :)
Also, one friend asked me if its better to have Ancestral Vision rather than Standstill... got me curious and will test

[Sturtzilla]

Yea, I am perfectly aware of the how great playing turn one Aether Vial followed by a turn two Standstill can be. But, I have to agree, if you don't stick a Standstill on turn 2 or 3, you probably lose a good bit of the advantage that it can give you. Also if you wait longer that turn 3 your opponent will probably have established some amount of board presence, which diminishes Standstill's worth. So, in my mind, if you don't land it in the first three turns, it is not exactly great. However on the other hand, if you can chain Standstills together while countering your opponent's plays, it can be amazing. I have watched matches that go like this:
Turn 1: Aether Vial
Turn 2: Standstill (opponent breaks standstill and gets the spell countered.)
Turn 3: Standstill (wash rinse repeat)
While of course playing merfolk off of the vial and chipping away at the opponent's life total. So I guess my question "Is Standstill worth playing?" still stands. What do others in the forum think?

[Tacosnape]

Standstill might be getting better in the current metagame, which has gotten pretty good at stopping the "Guys, well-timed disruption, win" plan. Enough so that I've backed off Merfolk as my top deck of choice for Deadguy and Maverick. Sometimes you need the card advantage, and I find myself wanting it more and more recently. It's amazing against Ancestral Visions and anything packing it, and there aren't many decks that have a better chance of being superior under a Standstill. I've been contemplating a revisit of the card for awhile now and may give it a whirl this week.

I've also started wondering if Standstill's a sideboard card. There aren't really very many fundamental differences in most lists running Standstill and not running Standstill except for, surprise, Standstill. And I can't help but wonder how many matchups the card advantage capacity could swing in your favor.

[bakofried]

Dismember would help keep the board clear, which in turn would make standstill stronger. If we're looking for slots to fit it in, I don't think Dismember should be on the chopping block.

[marcin]

Standstill is terrible against Merfolk - against mirror, deck with Standstills have 4 more often dead cards, in addition to Lords of Atlantis already being almost dead cards. So with field so full of Merfolks, Standstill often isn't a good idea.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

I think the one main problem with Standstill as a sideboard card is that you want 4 copies if you're using it, IMO. This is because in games where it's good, you basically want to drop it as soon as you are ahead on board presence/ game development. So you want the best chances to see it as early as possible. So if I was going to run it in the side, I'd probably use 4 or none. And this is honestly the main thing that has kept me running zero in the sideboard (although tbh I haven't made it to anything sanctioned in a while now.)

I don't know, it could be good. But this conversation seems a little symptomatic of the fact that there is so rarely anything new to talk about regarding Merfolk, since about 95% of the cards in the main deck are already determined to be optimal for their slots.

[Tacosnape]

That's ridiculous logic. Why not just 2 or 3? The 4 or 0 logic never really applies to things. What if you could play 20 Standstills? Does it become 20 or 0?

Any Standstills improve matchups where Standstill's good. I've got two sitting in board currently to try out.

[Star|Scream]

That's ridiculous logic. Why not just 2 or 3? The 4 or 0 logic never really applies to things. What if you could play 20 Standstills? Does it become 20 or 0?

Any Standstills improve matchups where Standstill's good. I've got two sitting in board currently to try out.

Because the card loses its efficacy the later you get it in your hand. So you want to have the highest chance to have it as soon as possible. It's blue so it pitches to force, and it's not the worst top-deck in the world, so having 4 in your deck is not a draw-back. Playing all or none of a card is a valid argument if you need to see the card as early as possible throughout the course of a tournament.

[Tacosnape]

Playing all or none is never and has never been a valid argument for any card except for weird ones that depend on having multiple copies in your deck, like Rite of Flame or maybe something with Ripple. It's not true with Standstill. It's not true with Leyline of the Void. It's not true with Serum Powder. It's never been true, ever, period. Again, if you can run 20 of a card, all or none is not a valid argument. Nor should it be with four. There's absolutely no logical or mathematical basis for this argument.

If you don't want to see the card late in the match, but only want to see it in your opening hand? Tough. You're increasing your chances of topdecking it by running four, just like you're increasing your chances of seeing it in your opening hand.

Also, your argument only defends why four should be run, not why running three is less correct than running zero.

[chuck2657]

Because the card loses its efficacy the later you get it in your hand. So you want to have the highest chance to have it as soon as possible. It's blue so it pitches to force, and it's not the worst top-deck in the world, so having 4 in your deck is not a draw-back. Playing all or none of a card is a valid argument if you need to see the card as early as possible throughout the course of a tournament.

You have to look at each card individually. The number of standstills you play will not affect the odds of getting each individual standstill earlier or later. It simply means that you have more standstills to potentially draw early, and to draw late.

The only case where the '4 or nothing' strategy applies is the self-synergy examples listed above. Muscle sliver in a MG stompy deck is another case - each muscle sliver you see in a game improves the effectiveness of the prior muscle slivers. Wastelands and other denial strategies can also follow this path.

A good question to test the '4 or nothing' strategy is "does each subsequent card improve on the prior cards I have drawn or in play?" In the case of standstill, this is a no.

Therefor, each standstill becomes 'less good' than the previous one. 1 copy is the most efficient, and 4 copies is the least. As stated, you also want to leave yourself freedom to board out bad/dead cards in a MU - this is easier to do with a smaller multiple.

So why isn't every list full of 1-ofs? In all honesty this is partially due to the fact that the human brain deals poorly with statistics and probabilities. More importantly, however, is that the opportunity cost of running 4 copies is less than the opportunity cost of using an inferior card.

[Tacosnape]

Anybody else actually sat down and tried Phantasmal Image? I'm trying it in place of Sovereign and kind of liking it. There are less things than you think that target-kill the guy when the thing targeting him wouldn't kill him anyway (Among the few I've hit included Maze, Lavamancer pings when everything had toughness 3 or more, mirror match Reejerey triggers, and my own Jitte postboard.) It also sucks when he's the first Merfolk you have to drop.

The plus side for this is a very efficient guy who puts your entire deck's curve at 2 or less except for Merrow Reejerey. He's a neat Silvergill copier, he's a Lord, or he's just your opponent's best creature. I've made him Confidant a lot, a Terravore once, and he's a weird Stoneforge Mystic - He gets your Jitte, but he can't carry it. He plays very nice with Aether Vial, unlike Phyrexian Metamorph, and on more than one occasion I've used him to spam copy Cursecatchers against combo decks. I can't stress enough how good this is against certain matchups like Reanimator and Storm Combo.

Being removal for Legendary guys hasn't been terribly relevant outside of a couple random Progeniti, Emrakuls, and Vendilion Cliques. Had a chance to use it against a Jin-Gitaxias one time, but I just Dismembered it instead and used Image as another Cursecatcher.

I'mma keep messing around with it and see where it gets.

[unemployer]

Just played earlier today in our place and made lots of mistakes. I knew I should have removed the standstill and made them in Kira. Fought 3 U/W/x variants of Stone-blade (SFM) and found out that they do run Standstill as well. I will post a few insights on the next days, I'm tired "/

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

Therefor, each standstill becomes 'less good' than the previous one. 1 copy is the most efficient, and 4 copies is the least. As stated, you also want to leave yourself freedom to board out bad/dead cards in a MU - this is easier to do with a smaller multiple.

So why isn't every list full of 1-ofs? In all honesty this is partially due to the fact that the human brain deals poorly with statistics and probabilities. More importantly, however, is that the opportunity cost of running 4 copies is less than the opportunity cost of using an inferior card.

This makes no sense. Go play some Magic and stop talking out your ass.

[chuck2657]

This makes no sense. Go play some Magic and stop talking out your ass.

I fail to see how your post counters the stated logic; the multiple you are running of a card does not affect the odds of you drawing the individual cards earlier or later, and Standstill lacks self-synergy. You can fling insults at me all you would like - it does nothing to change the math.

[DragoFireheart]

I fail to see how your post counters the stated logic; the multiple you are running of a card does not affect the odds of you drawing the individual cards earlier or later, and Standstill lacks self-synergy. You can fling insults at me all you would like - it does nothing to change the math.

4 Standstills out of 60 cards = 6.67% part of the deck contains that card.

1 Standstill out of 60 cards = 1.67% part of the deck contains that card.

If I have more standstills, I am more likely to draw them since there are more. If that math is too complicated for you, perhaps I can get some building blocks I used as a child to show you...

[Angelfire]

Chuck is right. You rarely want to follow up Standstill with another Standstill. This absolutely wrecks your tempo at the moment you want to come back into the game by dropping fish men. I cannot argue with logic. I am going to run 1 Standstill.

[bakofried]

List that top 16ed at Cincinnati had 2 metamorph, 2 Kira in the flex slots. Thoughts?

[unemployer]

List that top 16ed at Cincinnati had 2 metamorph, 2 Kira in the flex slots. Thoughts?
Kira looks really good but I'm not really sure with the Metamorph MD. Care to share why metamorph works MD?

[SageShadows]

Regarding Standstill: I know you can play less than 4, but Standstill into a counter into another Standstill is absolutely one of the sickest plays you can make. The danger of cool things. I think in a BW heavy environment (kind of like the one I'm in), Standstill has a role, but it's just not as good as being able to kill something with dismember or have that 13th and 14th lord or even Kira.

Regarding Kira and Phyrexian Metamorph: I guess he really thought it was going to be a heavy Zoo/Emrakul meta...
And that singleton Squire is badass.

[chuck2657]

4 Standstills out of 60 cards = 6.67% part of the deck contains that card.

1 Standstill out of 60 cards = 1.67% part of the deck contains that card.

If I have more standstills, I am more likely to draw them since there are more. If that math is too complicated for you, perhaps I can get some building blocks I used as a child to show you...

You either misread or misinterpreted my post. As noted, I am referring to the odds of drawing an individual standstill (ie odds of drawing SS1, SS2, SS3, SS4) earlier or later in the game. Running 4 copies simply increases the odds of seeing a standstill in any stage of the game; including SS2 does not mean you will see SS1 earlier.

[lordofthepit]

A new poster (chuck) writes an intelligent analysis with factual statements to support his opinion (that Standstill isn't necessarily a 0-of or 4-of, and possibly shouldn't be included in the deck). You can disagree with his opinion, as some certainly have, but misinterpreting what he wrote, insulting him, and making inane statements is not the way to do so.

[obituary 95]

I keep hearing that merfolk is " dieing" becuase of batterskull, is this true?

[pocari79]

Went to a local tournament this saturday. Had 20 players. This is the 3rd time I played this deck in a tournament so any suggestions would be appreciated!

The decklist:

13 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland
4 Aether Vial
4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Lord of Atlantis
1 Kira, Great Glass Spinner
1 Sower of Temptation
3 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Mental Misstep
3 Dismember

Sideboard:
1 Threads of Disloyalty
2 Mind Harness
3 Pithing Needle
3 Spell Pierce
3 Echoing Truth
3 Submerge

The sideboard's a mess and I thought there was going to be a lot of green aggro for some reason so that's why there's the submerges and the control magics. The Sower also should have been another Kira or Soverign.

Round 1 - Christopher (U/W Landstill)

Game 1: I land a turn 1 cursecatcher and he decides to play turn 2 standstill with a factory in play. I waste the factory the next turn and just start swinging with the cursecatcher until he's at 12 life. For some reason, he decides to plow the cursecatcher during his main phase so I draw 3 cards off standstill and my notes say that he went from 12-7-3 and died.

Sideboard: -1 Sower of Temptation, -1 Kira, -3 Dismember, +3 Spell Pierce, +2 Echoing Truth. I never saw any stoneforge mystics so I removed all my creature kill conditions.

Game 2: I really don't remember this game as all he did early was needle naming vial and I never drew a vial the entire game. I think he attacked me with factories early on because he didn't have any color mana and I took advantage of that and just played a bunch of merfolk and wasted any duallands he drew immediately. His life totals went from 20-18-15-9-6-0 so i figured that must have been a chump block with a factory from 9-6.

1-0 (2-0)

Round 2 - Lyle (Merfolk)

He was playing with maindeck phantasmal images and they didn't look very impressive but maybe that's only because it's the merfolk mirror? I've also never played this matchup ever so my sideboarding was really, really bad.

Game 1: I didn't take any damage and it looks like I just got more lords than him as he kept on losing life in chunks of 4s and 5s.

Sideboard: -1 Sower of Temptation, -4 Lord of Atlantis, -1 Kira, -3 Daze, +3 Spell Pierce, +3 Pithing Needle, +3 Echoing Truth. Like I said, I totally didn't know how to sideboard for this matchup and thought the lords would be bad.

Game 2: I had an opening hand of a couple of counters and a commander and 2 reejereys but only 2 islands. I figured I would be able to draw into some islands but that didn't happen and he landed an early Jitte and I didn't have a counter for it. I tried to stop the jitte from gaining counters with echoing truths but it just wasn't enough and he ended up having a jitte with 4 counters and I didn't have any lords in play so he's able to kill all my guys no matter how i vial them in.

Sideboard: +4 Lord of Atlantis, +3 Daze, -3 Echoing Truth, -4 Mental Misstep. Again, I figured missteps is bad in this matchup as there's only 8 one drops. Pretty sure this was a bad idea but with my sideboard, I don't know how else to side.

Game 3: I had an opening hand of 4 lands and 3 creatures and I just kept on drawing islands while he played turn 1 vial and the game just grew out of hand as he dismembered one of my guys and then just overwhelmed me with lords while I kept on drawing lands. ugh.

1-1 (3-2)

Round 3 - Mark (TES)

Game 1: This was just a slaughterfest. I missteped his turn 2 dark ritual and managed to play some creatures on turn 3 and he was able to resolve a xantid swarm. I had 2 cursecatchers, a lord and an adept in play so I was able to attack for 9 to drop him down to 6. He had two lands in play, one being a city of brass and on his next turn, he attacked with swarm and then tried casting rite of flame and I sacced a cursecatcher. He paid with city to go down to 5 and I sacced my other cursecatcher and he had no other mana sources and I had lethal on board next turn.

Sideboard: -1 kira, -1 Sower, -4 Aether Vial, +3 Spell Pierce, +3 Echoing Truth.

Game 2: I missteped an early duress so I can protect my hand. I got a relatively slow start and he did a turn 2 ponder and didn't play another land so on my turn I wasted his land. He drew and didn't play another land and I just started playing lord after lord and he couldn't do anything as he played a chrome mox but that was his only mana source and I had a spell pierce in hand for any ritual effects.

2-1 (5-2)

Round 4 - Pierre (RUG Goblins)

Game 1: Both of us had vials at 2 and were building up our armies. I had a reejerey and adept in play with 4 lands and he had a piledriver, warchief in play as well. I was winning on the damage race and wanted to press the tempo and had a commander in my hand and was debating if I should hardcast the commander and use the reejerey to tap the vial to prevent combat tricks or if i should just vial in the commander and lvl up to 4 and hope he doesn't have something devestating at vial for 2. I decide to risk it and vialed the commander in, lvled up to 4 and attacked. He vialed in a Stingscourger, bounced my commander, blocked the reejerey with stingscourger and adept with piledriver. Wow. I didn't think he would have the stingscourger in hand. So I ended up losing all my dudes while he kept his board clean and it was just a downward spiral from there as he just kept playing dudes and I kept drawing lands. *sigh*.

Sideboard: -4 Aether Vial, -1 sower, +3 Pithing Needle, +2 Mind Harness. Not sure what else I can side in for this matchup with my sideboard. I felt like it was going to be dreadful no matter what I tried anyways.

Game 2: He had turn 1 lackey but I had turn 2 commander so I could block. I saw that he only had 3 lands and started to fetch his duallands so I wasted both of his duallands to keep him down at 1 land, needled naming vial and his board was only the lackey, piledriver and a useless vial while I had a level 4 commander and a couple of lords on blocking duty. I just swung with the commander and he couldn't play any of his high casting goblins.

Game 3: I kept a hand with some creatures and 4 lands but no counters. I probably should have mulled but I thought being able to cast all my creatures now that I have no vial would be important so I kept. He had turn 1 lackey and I had turn 1 cursecatcher. Then he cast pyrokenesis in his main phase to kill my cursecatcher. I didn't have a force and he was able to lackey in a siege gang commander and cast a piledriver. I had a mind harness in hand so I stole the comander during my turn and he attacked with everybody during his turn. I blocked the piledriver with commander and then with the lackey trigger he played ringleader into 2 more goblins and hardcast another piledriver and that was it. there was going to be around 8 goblins in play next turn and I had nothing to deal with lackey and piledriver. I guess I should have mulled into a misstep or force against goblins?

2-2 (6-4)

Round 5 - Daniel (Mystic Zoo)

Round 1: I got slaughtered as I didn't have any creatures but only had dismemebers. I took 8 to kill 2 nacatls and went down to 2 and hoped he didn't have the 3rd bolt in hand (he had used 2 bolts to kill my guys earlier) and he did have another bolt. next game..

Sideboard: -3 Force of Will, -3 Daze, -1 Sower, -3 Aether Vial, +3 Submerge, +3 Spell Pierce, +2 Mind Harness, +2 Pithing Needle

Round 2: This was a real grind as I managed to misstep all of his early nacatls and was able to cast a bunch of creatures to get him to lower life but he was managed to cast lightning helix twice to gain 6 life. He was able to get a batterskull in play via mystic but I was able to submerge to token away. I thought I was close to winning when I had a lvl 4 commander plus a lord and and adept but he was able to kill all my creatures except the commander and he had a thrun and goyf in play. He was at 7 and I was at 9. I was getting really frustrated as he had 4 lands in play so he can almost equip thrun and i just attacked with my commander and two 3/3 mutavaults and the mutavaults just died needlessly to the thrun and goyf as they both has more than 3 toughness. He was at 3 though so if he didn't draw a plow or a land, I would win next turn as the goyf was only a 3/4. He drew for his turn and we went to the next game as it wasn't a plow or a land.

Round 3: This game I actually dealt 12 damage to myself as I missteped twice and dismembered twice to put myself at 8 and he was able to attack with an exalted batterskull once to put me down to 3. Thankfully, I was able to amass a bunch of lords + lvl 4 commander and was able to submerge the ooze token again and attacked for 12 damage when he was at 11.

3-2 (8-5)

So after all that, I ended up coming into 9th place. *sigh*

I'll probably change the Mind Harness and Threads to 2 Jittes and something else and maybe the submerges as well as it wasn't relevant at all other than against the zoo matchup. any suggestions on what to do against the mirror and goblins??

[Star|Scream]

You either misread or misinterpreted my post. As noted, I am referring to the odds of drawing an individual standstill (ie odds of drawing SS1, SS2, SS3, SS4) earlier or later in the game. Running 4 copies simply increases the odds of seeing a standstill in any stage of the game; including SS2 does not mean you will see SS1 earlier. However, including SS2 means that you WILL see SS2 _or_ SS1 earlier than you would with just SS1

When you have a card you want to see within your opening 9-10 cards, you want as many in there as legally possible.

I believe you are trying to refute the gambler's fallacy, where the last dice roll has no bearing on the next dice roll, but it doesn't really apply here. Once you draw the first 7 cards the deck is no longer random. Each card has a finite position, and the odds that you will draw a given card does in fact change based on which card you drew last, obviously.

Please read and take in before responding:

You want the highest chance of seeing this card early. Putting 4 in your deck gives you that chance.

[Sturtzilla]

Chuck is right. You rarely want to follow up Standstill with another Standstill. This absolutely wrecks your tempo at the moment you want to come back into the game by dropping fish men. I cannot argue with logic. I am going to run 1 Standstill.

This is not entirely true. Chaining Standstills can be a very powerful way to control the tempo of the game and/or slant it in your favor. For example you go turn one vial, turn two standstill, then you can at your discretion vial in merfolk to gain board presence. Once you opponent breaks your turn two standstill, you, more than likely, can counter their spell. This should leave them with a still empty or near empty board. In you subsequent turn, you can use your extra mana (X-1U) to cast a dude or two and still keep your opponent on lock down by playing a second standstill. I have seen this strategy keep opponents completely off the board. In games where you don't hit counter magic off of standstill, you should be hitting more lords. This allows you to develop a stronger board presence faster. I would have to disagree and say that chaining standstills can be very powerful. But ultimately, I think it is a bit of a personal choice.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

You either misread or misinterpreted my post. As noted, I am referring to the odds of drawing an individual standstill (ie odds of drawing SS1, SS2, SS3, SS4) earlier or later in the game. Running 4 copies simply increases the odds of seeing a standstill in any stage of the game; including SS2 does not mean you will see SS1 earlier.


When you have a card you want to see within your opening 9-10 cards, you want as many in there as legally possible.

I believe you are trying to refute the gambler's fallacy, where the last dice roll has no bearing on the next dice roll, but it doesn't really apply here. Once you draw the first 7 cards the deck is no longer random. Each card has a finite position, and the odds that you will draw a given card does in fact change based on which card you drew last, obviously.

I guess I was a bit impolite earlier; my bad...

However, what Chuck is saying still doesn't make sense. This is because each copy of Standstill is functionally identical in your deck-- "SS1" and "SS2" do exactly the same thing (IE they represent one more copy of the card Standstill. Each copy you add occupies another 1/60 of the individual cards of your deck.) Assuming you want to play Standstill early in the game, in order to further increase the advantage of having a better board presence than your opponent (this is generally how this deck uses this card most effectively) then you would want to have as high a probability of having Standstill in your opening hand as possible. If you want to have as high a probability of having Standstill in your opening hand as possible, then you want to run more copies of the same card, so each card you draw will have a greater probability of being a copy of Standstill.

Anyways, that's about all I have to say about it. Chuck, please don't argue with me about this any more. You're entitled to your opinion, except when it's just mathematically wrong (because then it's no longer an opinion, it's a fallacy.)

If you really want to philosophically stick to your guns on this issue though, I suppose you could always go down to one copy each of Force of Will, Silvergill Adept, Coralhelm Commander, Aether Vial, Wasteland, Mutavault, Mental Misstep, etc, etc. Then you can really go crazy "optimizing" the deck with all your "opportunity costs" because all of a sudden you would have a bunch of slots to tech out the deck-list with some super-sweet one-of's. :rolleyes:

[chuck2657]

Typically, I have not wanted to see multiples of standstill in a game unless I had a turn 1 vial. In truth, however, I normally play a version without standstill. If standstill is a card with self-synergy (at least up to 4 copies), then the '4 or nothing' argument is valid - and one I certainly will not argue against.

It is also true that the more cards you draw, the earlier 'average' turn you will see a given card in your deck. If a card is 20/60, obviously drawing 3 cards will let you see that card 3 turns earlier. It gets a bit more complicated, as when the standstills are broken is important to the degree the rest of your deck gets slanted forward, or even possibly backwards. When they are broken is dependent on the deck you are playing against; a mathematical analysis would be different for each deck. I thought mentioning all of this would muddle the waters since we were referring to the odds of seeing it in your opening 7. In attempting to being succinct I omitted this, but in longer games it can have a noticeable effect. To clarify belatedly, my argument applied to the statement "then you would want to have as high a probability of having Standstill in your opening hand as possible".



If you really want to philosophically stick to your guns on this issue though, I suppose you could always go down to one copy each of Force of Will, Silvergill Adept, Coralhelm Commander, Aether Vial, Wasteland, Mutavault, Mental Misstep, etc, etc. Then you can really go crazy "optimizing" the deck with all your "opportunity costs" because all of a sudden you would have a bunch of slots to tech out the deck-list with some super-sweet one-of's. :rolleyes:

I feel like this is beating a dead horse, but I'll give it another whack.

Assume there is no limit of 4 for a given card in merfolk. You wouldn't play 30 Aether Vial, or 50 Force of Will. This is because most cards lack self-synergy, and become less efficient beyond the first. There is also a cost of running an inferior card in its place. The reason I would never run singletons of the above cards, is because the cost of running an inferior card is greater than the lost efficiency from running another multiple. For each of those cards there would be a sweet spot (where the lines intersect) of the proper number to run. In the cards you listed, the intersection would be above 4.

For some reason - if you blame my inability to convey my point or poor communication skills I won't argue - you seem to be misinterpreting what I have been saying.

There is a ~40% chance you will see at least one card with 4 multiples in your opening, and ~11% chance with a singleton. It is linear, not exponential. You are giving yourself more chances to draw a standstill; you are increasing the chance to see *a* copy, not *all* copies in your opening hand.

[SageShadows]

Typically, I have not wanted to see multiples of standstill in a game unless I had a turn 1 vial. In truth, however, I normally play a version without standstill. If standstill is a card with self-synergy (at least up to 4 copies), then the '4 or nothing' argument is valid - and one I certainly will not argue against.

It is also true that the more cards you draw, the earlier 'average' turn you will see a given card in your deck. If a card is 20/60, obviously drawing 3 cards will let you see that card 3 turns earlier. It gets a bit more complicated, as when the standstills are broken is important to the degree the rest of your deck gets slanted forward, or even possibly backwards. When they are broken is dependent on the deck you are playing against; a mathematical analysis would be different for each deck. I thought mentioning all of this would muddle the waters since we were referring to the odds of seeing it in your opening 7. In attempting to being succinct I omitted this, but in longer games it can have a noticeable effect. To clarify belatedly, my argument applied to the statement "then you would want to have as high a probability of having Standstill in your opening hand as possible".



I feel like this is beating a dead horse, but I'll give it another whack.

Assume there is no limit of 4 for a given card in merfolk. You wouldn't play 30 Aether Vial, or 50 Force of Will. This is because most cards lack self-synergy, and become less efficient beyond the first. There is also a cost of running an inferior card in its place. The reason I would never run singletons of the above cards, is because the cost of running an inferior card is greater than the lost efficiency from running another multiple. For each of those cards there would be a sweet spot (where the lines intersect) of the proper number to run. In the cards you listed, the intersection would be above 4.

For some reason - if you blame my inability to convey my point or poor communication skills I won't argue - you seem to be misinterpreting what I have been saying.

There is a ~40% chance you will see at least one card with 4 multiples in your opening, and ~11% chance with a singleton. It is linear, not exponential. You are giving yourself more chances to draw a standstill; you are increasing the chance to see *a* copy, not *all* copies in your opening hand.

Chuck, with all due respect, it's like you and everyone else are arguing two different things.
We get that the subsequent standstills you draw in like T6 or T7 won't be as effective as a T2 standstill. But to maximize the odds of getting to that T2 standstill, you want as many legal copies as possible. That's why people are saying it's all or nothing with standstill - the optimal turn to stick it is turn 2, when there's hardly any board presence. I will concede that the following standstills will be more awkward (unless you're chaining them - that's hot), but you'll be drawing 3 cards off of Standstill number 1, so that should cover you nicely. I know we're giving us more chances to draw a standstill -that's precisely what standstill advocates are talking about.

At any rate, I think having those 4 slots open for Dismembers/Kiras/Other meta calls is far more valuable. Deadguy Ale hurts a lot, and standstill just isn't as effective when they have their own mini-vial. I don't know what other matchups that start off slow enough for a Standstill to be amazing that don't have some way of operating under the standstill or just bashing through regardless.

[sdefreit8]

What happened to the simple logic of:

1 of = tech card that can be tutored for or acts as a 5th card (ex path)
2 of = you like the card and would like to see it but not mandatory. You never really want to see two.
3 of = you want to see it but not multiples necessarily
4 of = you want the card every game and you want multiples

I remember learning something along these lines for card choices. Its bland and not very descriptive but it's a general guidline. Can we drop the whole standstill is a 4 or nothing card? Standstill has been bickered about for a long time and everything that has been said about it has been said. Instead of making a new silly argument about the same old card can we talk more about new stuff. Like the illusion dude.

Talking about standstill is not progressive or productive anymore.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

@ Chuck:
My bad... I thought you were one of those people who refute conventional statistical analysis with straw-man type of arguments like "You aren't more likely to draw 'Card X' on any given draw just because there are more copies of them in your deck than 'Card Y.'" ...You'd be surprised some of the types of things people on this site try to argue.

Also, most of these comments were made while a little stoney, which probably made me more likely to jump to conclusions on what you were trying to say. Hope I didn't leave you with a bad taste in your mouth concerning the level of debate that goes on in these forums, I don't want to be that guy who berates new Sourcers for not much reason.

EDIT (for Merfolk-related content):

This is kind of a freaky-deaky suggestion as a sideboard card, but has anyone tried Tower of the Magistrate? Off the top of my head, it hits Affinity, MUD, and basically anything that plays equipment, with or without Stoneforge Mystic. Anyone see some potential there? It at least has more applications than my previous joke-suggestion of Manriki-Gusari as far as Stoneforge.deck hosers go.

[Star|Scream]

@ Chuck:

This is kind of a freaky-deaky suggestion as a sideboard card, but has anyone tried Tower of the Magistrate? Off the top of my head, it hits Affinity, MUD, and basically anything that plays equipment, with or without Stoneforge Mystic. Anyone see some potential there? It at least has more applications than my previous joke-suggestion of Manriki-Gusari as far as Stoneforge.deck hosers go.

It's a good card, but you need to run 4 of them for it to matter.

[crovakiet]

Kira looks really good but I'm not really sure with the Metamorph MD. Care to share why metamorph works MD?

This is pretty obvious if you look at the break down of the SCG Cin top 16. Only 1 merfolk in the top 16 and how do you suppose he got there? Probably with the main deck kira(s) and metamorph(s) seeing as how 4 of the top 16 were NO RUG and having great targets to copy in almost all the decklists of the top 16.

[lordofthepit]

Also, most of these comments were made while a little stoney, which probably made me more likely to jump to conclusions on what you were trying to say.

Awesome! :laugh:

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

This is pretty obvious if you look at the break down of the SCG Cin top 16. Only 1 merfolk in the top 16 and how do you suppose he got there? Probably with the main deck kira(s) and metamorph(s) seeing as how 4 of the top 16 were NO RUG and having great targets to copy in almost all the decklists of the top 16.

I guess the question is, wouldn't Phantasmal Image usually be better than the Phyrexian Metamorph, even with all the Grim Lavamancers running around these days? I feel like having a cheaper overall casting cost, playing better with Aether Vial, and not potentially costing life to play are pretty good advantages that make up for the fragility and the inability to clone artifacts. Especially when you consider that since Metamorph is an artifact, there are a few things that will kill 'Morph that can't target Image legally...

[crovakiet]

I guess the question is, wouldn't Phantasmal Image usually be better than the Phyrexian Metamorph, even with all the Grim Lavamancers running around these days? I feel like having a cheaper overall casting cost, playing better with Aether Vial, and not potentially costing life to play are pretty good advantages that make up for the fragility and the inability to clone artifacts. Especially when you consider that since Metamorph is an artifact, there are a few things that will kill 'Morph that can't target Image legally...

You may just have to ask the guy why he chose metamorph(s) instead of phantasmal image(s) and piloted that particular merfolk list to 9th place in a top 16 field of pretty much aggro packing more removal maindeck (bolts and/or helix and/or plows) than other aggro control decks such as stoneblade (4 swords). I would think its because if its a competent merfolk player he would need to counter any spells that would lessen his board presence and/or tempo. Decreased board presence and/or tempo loss usually comes in the form of the opponent's removal spells. If you daze/misstep a removal spell on your illusion, it still dies so obviously you wouldn't bother countering but you still lost your illusion. Metamorph lives and beats of course if you had the counter. Can't jitte an illusion either. An illusion still dies from the first targetted spell/ability under Kira as well. Does that sound as if Kira maindeck and the illusion play nice with each other? So basically, you are only using image then for Progenitus/Emrakul other legends because doing anything else with the illusion against decks like NO RUG and zoo etc means its a dead card otherwise, an easy 1 for 1 whereas at least metamorph can do the whole legends kill thing and elsewhere can possibly live if copying a tarmogoyf, Knight of the reliquary with lands in the gy from the opponent's abuse, or just some 'growing' fatty due to the power creep these days in magic.

I don't know but I think it was a brilliant idea for that merfolk pilot to use metamorph instead of image in a field such as the one at SCG Cinn. Illusion definitely plays better with vial, no life loss, and costs 1 less mana to hardcast than metamorph, but I like the metamorph in merfolk and I guess the SCG Cinn pilot probably did too.

But hey what do I know? SCG Cinn also had a burn deck place 15th...so maybe the meta was just underdeveloped?

Let's see what SCG seattle has to offer.

[Sturtzilla]

But hey what do I know? SCG Cinn also had a burn deck place 15th...so maybe the meta was just underdeveloped?

I know this is a bit off topic... but here it goes. I really found this interesting as well. I think that it might not be completely accurate to say a burn deck placing makes a meta underdeveloped. Counterbalance is seeing little or no play these days, for those of you that don't know, that was Burn/RDW's worse match up. This would make a Red Deck Wins or Burn build fairly competitive, or at least better to play now, as opposed to this time last year. However, generally more mature and/or better players like to actually play the game. Burn is not really a challenging deck to play, so generally, I would say that it doesn't have the best pilots. Just my two cents on the issue.

Back on topic, I think that both Metamorph and the Illusion both have their specific areas where they shine. I think this come down to a meta call and/or a personal preference call.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

I think that both Metamorph and the Illusion both have their specific areas where they shine. I think this come down to a meta call and/or a personal preference call.

This. Basically, Illusion provides raw speed, while Metamorph gives you flexibility and a little more resiliency (I would argue it's less resilient than it looks compared to Illusion though, since Metamorph still eats Grip, Pridemage, Grudge, etc.) Also, if there were ever two cards I could see doing a 1-1 split on, it would be these ones, since they essentially do the same thing, but with different strengths and weaknesses.

Side note: For anyone running Surgical Extractions in the sideboard, how have you been liking them? I feel like Faerie Macabre still has game these days, alongside Tormod's Crypt, plus I'm a little nervous about overloading the deck with Phyrexian mana symbols. But if someone out there is loving the hell out of Extractions, I'm definitely willing to listen.

[SageShadows]

This. Basically, Illusion provides raw speed, while Metamorph gives you flexibility and a little more resiliency (I would argue it's less resilient than it looks compared to Illusion though, since Metamorph still eats Grip, Pridemage, Grudge, etc.) Also, if there were ever two cards I could see doing a 1-1 split on, it would be these ones, since they essentially do the same thing, but with different strengths and weaknesses.

Side note: For anyone running Surgical Extractions in the sideboard, how have you been liking them? I feel like Faerie Macabre still has game these days, alongside Tormod's Crypt, plus I'm a little nervous about overloading the deck with Phyrexian mana symbols. But if someone out there is loving the hell out of Extractions, I'm definitely willing to listen.

I'm running Surgical Extractions, and I feel like it has more game than Faerie Macabre. I know this is yet again a danger of cool things, but an extraction after someone's intuition really sucks for them. I currently run a 2 Extraction/2 Relic split because my meta is heavy graveyard based.

[Tacosnape]

I'm actually contemplating shipping my Surgical/Tormod's split for Leyline of the Void. And yes, for the love of God, I know it's terrible if you topdeck it. Here's my reasoning for trying it, however.

1. The majority of the decks I want my yard hate against eat it to Leyline worse than any other yard hate: Manaless Dredge, Regular Dredge, Cephalid Breakfast, Reanimator, and Loam-based decks do not want to see this card on the board, ever. Surgical's admittedly better against Loam probably, but there you go.

2. Merfolk is very well equipped to deal with all of these decks' means of removing Leyline of the Void. (Well, except for Krosan Grip.)

3. All of the deck's premier yard hate decks are strong against many other types of yard hate. Cephalid Breakfast runs Force of Will and has picked up Grand Abolisher. Manaless Dredge can be pretty solid at outracing one Crypt/Extraction/Macabre. Reanimator has Force and sometimes Thoughtseize, and Surgical Extraction is utter assballs against Careful Study/Exhume sometimes.

4. Leyline has the "Oops, I win" factor. It's uncounterable, it's uncircumventable, and it has to be removed or they just have to do without. All you have to do is draw it and, occasionally but not always, protect it.

[Gui]

I'm actually contemplating shipping my Surgical/Tormod's split for Leyline of the Void. And yes, for the love of God, I know it's terrible if you topdeck it. Here's my reasoning for trying it, however.

1. The majority of the decks I want my yard hate against eat it to Leyline worse than any other yard hate: Manaless Dredge, Regular Dredge, Cephalid Breakfast, Reanimator, and Loam-based decks do not want to see this card on the board, ever. Surgical's admittedly better against Loam probably, but there you go.

2. Merfolk is very well equipped to deal with all of these decks' means of removing Leyline of the Void. (Well, except for Krosan Grip.)

3. All of the deck's premier yard hate decks are strong against many other types of yard hate. Cephalid Breakfast runs Force of Will and has picked up Grand Abolisher. Manaless Dredge can be pretty solid at outracing one Crypt/Extraction/Macabre. Reanimator has Force and sometimes Thoughtseize, and Surgical Extraction is utter assballs against Careful Study/Exhume sometimes.

4. Leyline has the "Oops, I win" factor. It's uncounterable, it's uncircumventable, and it has to be removed or they just have to do without. All you have to do is draw it and, occasionally but not always, protect it.

Interesting... I've seen the aforementioned split working a few times already, and in the middle of the game.
Is the risk of not starting with them worth it? Do you intend to mull a few times in order to search for it?

Also, did you test against manaless dredge? How did it go?

[Kuma]

I'm actually contemplating shipping my Surgical/Tormod's split for Leyline of the Void. And yes, for the love of God, I know it's terrible if you topdeck it. Here's my reasoning for trying it, however.

1. The majority of the decks I want my yard hate against eat it to Leyline worse than any other yard hate: Manaless Dredge, Regular Dredge, Cephalid Breakfast, Reanimator, and Loam-based decks do not want to see this card on the board, ever. Surgical's admittedly better against Loam probably, but there you go.

2. Merfolk is very well equipped to deal with all of these decks' means of removing Leyline of the Void. (Well, except for Krosan Grip.)

3. All of the deck's premier yard hate decks are strong against many other types of yard hate. Cephalid Breakfast runs Force of Will and has picked up Grand Abolisher. Manaless Dredge can be pretty solid at outracing one Crypt/Extraction/Macabre. Reanimator has Force and sometimes Thoughtseize, and Surgical Extraction is utter assballs against Careful Study/Exhume sometimes.

4. Leyline has the "Oops, I win" factor. It's uncounterable, it's uncircumventable, and it has to be removed or they just have to do without. All you have to do is draw it and, occasionally but not always, protect it.

If you're going to do that, you might consider doing the black splash. Makes the Leylines a little better, saves you some life on Dismember, and gives you a few more sideboard options like Perish and Engineered Plague.

[Floi]

What do you think about this list played by DARKING to a 4-1 finish in the magic-league.com Legacy trial last wednesday?


// Main Deck
12 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Cursecatcher
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Merfolk Sovereign
3 Inkfathom Infiltrator
2 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 AEther Vial
4 Mental Misstep

// Sideboard
2 Echoing Truth
2 Faerie Macabre
2 Psionic Blast
2 Coast Watcher
2 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
2 Nix
3 Back to Basics


The matchups were:
Round 1: 2-1 Merfolk
Round 2: 2-1 The Rack
Round 3: 2-0 Rw Burn
Round 4: 2-1 UB Reanimate
Round 5: 1-2 Blue Zoo

Inkfathom Infiltrator + Umezawa's Jitte MD looks like a nice tech.

How do you adapt to the current metagame in general? People are saying that with the amount of Red Blasts and green decks, it's not the best time to be playing merfolk. Would you agree?

Floi

[Julian23]

4 Merfolk Sovereign
3 Inkfathom Infiltrator

Looks really strange to me. Coralhelm Command is the second best Merfolk you have and should really be in there. Also, comboing with just 2 Jitte in your deck without a reliable way to draw it doesn't work very well. Not to mention godaweful sb choices like 2 Coast Watcher. If you really want a pro green guy against Maverick play four.

btw, no Dismember? This list keeps looking worse and worse.

[nyoro]

That merfolk list looks absolutely terrible. Why play the infiltrator when you have lord and sovereign which give your merfolks unblockable most of the time? Coralhelm is way better as it can act as an additional lord when fully leveled, and it has flying which is just as good as unblockable in this format.

If you want to be fancy, i would rather run Cold-Eyed Selkie and draw bunch of cards.

And that sideboard is horrendous.

[Tacosnape]

If you're going to do that, you might consider doing the black splash. Makes the Leylines a little better, saves you some life on Dismember, and gives you a few more sideboard options like Perish and Engineered Plague.

Here's why I'm not.

1. I wouldn't play Perish or Engineered Plague. They're too narrow and/or slow compared to other options.
2. Because of point 1, vulnerability to Wasteland knocking me off an already iffy double blue manabase isn't worth saving the life on Dismember and being able to play a Leyline of the Void on turn four, which is generally going to be too late anyway.


Interesting... I've seen the aforementioned split working a few times already, and in the middle of the game.
Is the risk of not starting with them worth it? Do you intend to mull a few times in order to search for it?

It's a question of sheer power versus versatility. Right now, I want power. If I want anything other than sheer graveyard annihilation at maximum power, I'm probably going to just rely on counters and guys to get me there.

As for keeping, it'd depend on my hand and the matchup. Against Reanimator, if I see a Cursecatcher, a Force, a Pierce, a few lands, and a Lord? Sure. I'll keep that all day long and just try to outresource my opponent that game. If I'm up against Manaless Dredge, however, and I lost that first game? Absolutely. I'll aggro mulligan like a fiend for it.


Also, did you test against manaless dredge? How did it go?

Bad. Normal Dredge is so easy to beat for my build that I underestimated a competent Manaless list. Manaless Dredge requires you have a turn one Catcher and nothing but Lords and guys for the rest of the game to win game one, and even then it depends on their dredges. In capable hands, it's an absolutely horrible matchup. And if something happens in Innistrad to replace a couple bad cards, it's going to hit DTB status almost instantly.

[chuck2657]

That merfolk list looks absolutely terrible. Why play the infiltrator when you have lord and sovereign which give your merfolks unblockable most of the time? Coralhelm is way better as it can act as an additional lord when fully leveled, and it has flying which is just as good as unblockable in this format.

If you want to be fancy, i would rather run Cold-Eyed Selkie and draw bunch of cards.

And that sideboard is horrendous.

Agreed.

Psionic Blast over dismember just does not compute. I think a case can be made for MB jitte in certain metas (I personally run 3 dismember, 2 jitte -1 daze in my 4 flex spots). Yet the card does not feel required, or a replacement for MB removal.

The main benefit I see in jitte on an unblockable creature is finishing off an opponent a turn earlier. Playing and equipping jitte will slow your kill down by a turn - annulling any advantage. In most cases, it is not game-changing if your jitte equipped creature is blocked or not - the counters on jitte are the real concern. Sacrificing creatures prior to damage could be a concern, but outside goblin decks playing prospectors (such as dirty kitty) I do not see many decks that could heavily abuse that mechanic.

Perhaps I am not glimpsing the larger picture, but jitte on an unblockable creature does not seem all that impressive.

[Shax]

Here's why I'm not.



Bad. Normal Dredge is so easy to beat for my build that I underestimated a competent Manaless list. Manaless Dredge requires you have a turn one Catcher and nothing but Lords and guys for the rest of the game to win game one, and even then it depends on their dredges. In capable hands, it's an absolutely horrible matchup. And if something happens in Innistrad to replace a couple bad cards, it's going to hit DTB status almost instantly.

I don't hinge on future set speculation to make or break whether the deck is going to be DTB. I seen post talking about cards in Future sight being from a theme of greece or ancient cultures on a respected MTG board. Merfolk is a good deck and has been from when it was a New and Developmental deck until now.

I think not playing with Standstills in the deck is a wrong direction since any card that lets you draw 3 for playing your deck is very good.

[Tammit67]

I think not playing with Standstills in the deck is a wrong direction since any card that lets you draw 3 for playing your deck is very good.

But that is just considering your deck in a vacuum as opposed to evaluating the card in the meta. Are there better cards right now?

[Julian23]

I think not playing with Standstills in the deck is a wrong direction since any card that lets you draw 3 for playing your deck is very good.

Agreed. But we're talking about Standstill here which is at an all-time low in today's metagame where everyone and his mother has ways around it.

[Purgatory]

T16 Legacy decklists Seattle (http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/deckshow.php?&t[C1]=3&start_date=2011-07-24&end_date=2011-07-24&city=Seattle).

Not a single Merfolk deck in T16 and Hive Mind at the top? What is wrong with this world?

[Koby]

Not a single Merfolk deck in T16 and Hive Mind at the top? What is wrong with this world?

I'm pretty sure most people have forgotten what the card Spell Pierce does. That should change.

[SageShadows]

I think it's because the format's shifted towards Zoo, which in turn, fuels easy wins for Hive Mind and the like.

[chuck2657]

The aggro/combo/control trinity still seems in effect. If the field becomes Hive Mind to beat zoo and stoneforge decks, then merfolk and blue decks with control elements will beat Hive Mind. Granted, the MU could be better considering it is a combo deck, but it is still favorable. Especially if you dedicate SB slots for pierce and the like.

Also, different regions have drastically different meta-games (just look at the US vs Europe). I don't think a tournament report or two is worth sounding the alarm too loudly.

[Purgatory]

The aggro/combo/control trinity still seems in effect. If the field becomes Hive Mind to beat zoo and stoneforge decks, then merfolk and blue decks with control elements will beat Hive Mind. Granted, the MU could be better considering it is a combo deck, but it is still favorable. Especially if you dedicate SB slots for pierce and the like.

Also, different regions have drastically different meta-games (just look at the US vs Europe). I don't think a tournament report or two is worth sounding the alarm too loudly.

I agree, but it was just strange to not see the deck represented at all in the top. I can't remember the last time I saw that in an SCG open, but I'm sure there are more examples.

[DukeDemonKn1ght]

So, I was wondering the usual "can I get some feedback on my sideboard" question that seems to pop up every page or so on this thread. I'm playing a conventional list with no Standstill, and my free slots in the main are 2 Kira, 2 Dismember. Here's the sideboard-in-progress as it stands these days:

3 Spell Pierce
2 Propaganda
2 Dismember
1 Tower of the Magistrate
1 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Energy Flux
2 Tormod's Crypt
2 Faerie Macabre

I don't really go to many events these days, since there's not much Legacy in my area... So this is basically for an unknown meta. The Macabres should maybe be Surgical Extractions, and I'm not entirely sure how well the one-of's add up as a strategic sum total. I would sorta like to have at least one Echoing Truth in there also (possibly also 2-3 Pithing Needles/ Phyrexian Revokers), but I can't really find the space for it. Anyhow, I'd be glad if anyone has some advice.

EDIT: I think one question is if Tower of the Magistrate is a valid maindeck inclusion in order to free up a sideboard slot (probably as the ninth non-basic, going down to 12 Islands)... Something tells me it would fuck up my :u: count to cut the Island though.

[Purgatory]

I think your sideboard looks good overall, basing it on an unknown meta, but I do have some comments anyway. Overall, I find having random one-offs in the sideboard is not that awesome in Merfolk (for example, one Llawan, one Energy Flux etc.). Other decks may get away with this, I play several 2-ofs in my Team America and Dark Thresh sideboards, however, in both those decks I play nine cantrips, along with a bunch of fetchlands, which allows me to effectively find the answers I board in.

I suggest that you streamline your sideboard a bit more, Energy Flux, for example, is awesome against Affinity, but it's not-so-awesome against many other decks. To show you what I mean, here is my own Merfolk sideboard that I bring to unknown metas:


3 Spell Pierce
1 Daze
2 Echoing Truth
3 Submerge
1 Dismember
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Tormod's Crypt
2 Umezawa’s Jitte

It looks sort of convoluted, but the cards can easily be separated into neat piles of Anti-aggro, Anto-combo and graveyard hate. Echoing Truth is the black sheep that stands out as a versatile failsafe against many decks where I might have dead cards (Mental Misstep against Stax, for example), along with the lone Daze which completes the 3 in the MD. The same is true for Dismember.

Overall, I highly value versatility in my SB, instead of maybe the more powerful pinpointed hate. Spell Pierce may not be as good against some decks as Energy Flux, but it can certainly come in against more decks. All in all, the only thing that can make for a good sideboard is testing and predicting the metagame. Find what works best for you.

[bakofried]

This is more for fun than anything else, but how would you guys suggest modifying this for two-headed giant? I figure an obvious inclusion is Standstill, but that's about all I know.

Also, how is everyone doing against various Stoneblade decks?

[unemployer]

I fought 2 UW and the advantage you have is LOA since they have Islandwalk. Their removal is STP and most of the time counters your creatures. Just protect the LOA's and you'll be fine.

[Pyronick]

Last StarCityGames Legacy Open had 3 Merfolk decks in the top 16. Would love to hear from anybody that piloted those decks and what they experienced.

Good job Merfolk community!

[chuck2657]

Last StarCityGames Legacy Open had 3 Merfolk decks in the top 16. Would love to hear from anybody that piloted those decks and what they experienced.

Good job Merfolk community!

It is starting to look like 2 dismembers (and 3 daze) are close to being part of the 'standard' build, with a lonely 2 flex spots for jitte/sovereign/kira/more dismembers/Phyrexian Metamorph/etc.

I'd love to hear what the metagame looks like as well. That and how SB cards are fairing.

[Mr.Josh!]

Hi guys, long time stalker first time poster, and I guess I owe this forum a big thanks for helping me pilot to a 7th place finish this weekend! From what I saw the top tables were made up of fish,zoo,WUG control, as well as stoneblade control, with a good bit of cephalid breakfast (mimeoplasm kill) and abit of hivemind. I don't think I'd change anything maindeck or side, I never sided in the Llawans or relics, but I was also never wishing they were anything else. The dismembers and Sovereigns were HOUSE, dismember in one instance killed a game one (via living wish) Llawan against DarkHex BUG ftw, and fixed that problem post side all day, with Sovereign allowing me to push Coralhelm Plus another creature past a batterskull to allow a progressive clock in a circumstance in which you're usually locked into place.
I didn't see alot of hivemind, but I did a feature match against it (actually against the guy who got the decktech, can't remember his name) where I went down game 1 on a bad draw (3vial 2 dismember over the course of the game) and then sided in the pierces and walked the match. I'm not sure I understand that deck's success recently, in games two and three I just simply had 15 relevant counterspells to his 8 relevant threats and got there, tight play and awareness of the deck's interactions should just be enough for any deck with permission to beat it.
Either way, half my matches had stoneforge/batterskull and 8 swords affects available, along with Llawans in the side, which given the success of fish this weekend should show that tight play and the raw power of the deck is enough to beat the haters.

[Mr.Josh!]

It is starting to look like 2 dismembers (and 3 daze) are close to being part of the 'standard' build, with a lonely 2 flex spots for jitte/sovereign/kira/more dismembers/Phyrexian Metamorph/etc.

I'd love to hear what the metagame looks like as well. That and how SB cards are fairing.

My Sideboard:
3 Relic of Progenitus
1 Dismember
3 Spell Pierce
2 Submerge
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
2 Llawan, Cephalid Empress

Relic- I think I lied abit in my last post, relic DID come in once, against breakfast, but I never drew them and I felt dumb as soon as I presented my deck, (he has access to grip, he could just grip and go off) otherwise it sat in side. That being said I wouldn't take it out, it's a big safety blanket incase of the dredge match and I'd rather not be without it.

Dismember- Came in alot, there are just abunch of matchups you want a third

Spell Pierce- Pierce is great in combo matchups, or against decks that, when on the draw, you can't afford to lose tempo and the noncreature clause isn't too restrictive Vs daze. I sided out daze for pierce on the draw alot.

Submerge- Submerge is awesome, it buys tempos and eats knights with activations, fetch lands, or other stuff on stack. I would've been okay with a 3rd submerge in my side, but I don't think I have space for all those submerges and dismembers and dismember is less narrow.

Jitte- Never used them once, don't believe I even considered them once. That being said, I didn't play zoo, the mirror or elves in swiss rounds.

Kira- I don't really know how I felt about kira this weekend, it would have came in Vs zoo, but in all the matchups that I knew my opp would have 8 swords I just didn't have any space to bring her in. As good as she is, and as much as I REALLY like her, she was sided in alot less than I would have anticipated and was generally kind of underwhelming.

Llawan- Sat in the sideboard waiting for a mirrormatch that never came.

[Sturtzilla]

I didn't see alot of hivemind, but I did a feature match against it (actually against the guy who got the decktech, can't remember his name) where I went down game 1 on a bad draw (3vial 2 dismember over the course of the game) and then sided in the pierces and walked the match. I'm not sure I understand that deck's success recently, in games two and three I just simply had 15 relevant counterspells to his 8 relevant threats and got there, tight play and awareness of the deck's interactions should just be enough for any deck with permission to beat it.

I would have to agree with this statement. I didn't pilot Merfolk at SCG: Pitt, but I instead ran U/B Reanimator. It is probably one of my favorite decks. I also had a lot more playtesting experience with it. That coupled with the lack of graveyard hate in the top 8-16 decks at the last few events pushed me towards Reanimator over Merfolk. I got off to a rocky start, but managed to go 6-2 and ended 15th. If anyone is interested here is the report: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?8639-Deck-B-U-Reanimator/page134. I know it is a completely different deck, but Merfolk and Reanimator run nearly the same, if not identical, counter packages.

I played agaisnt AJ Sacher and Chris VanMeter (the guy who was interviewed for the decktech article) both were playing Hive Mind combo. Honestly, going into each of these games, I was a little nervous and didn't think I would be able to win them. However, playing tight with Mental Missteps (for the Brainstorms and Ponders), Dazes, and saving FoWs for either Show and Tell or Hive Mind got me 2-0 victories against both of them. I think that now that people understand the interactions in the deck, if you play tight and safe with your counterspells you shouldn't have a problem.

[Finn]

I played agaisnt AJ Sacher and Chris VanMeter (the guy who was interviewed for the decktech article) both were playing Hive Mind combo. Honestly, going into each of these games, I was a little nervous and didn't think I would be able to win them. However, playing tight with Mental Missteps (for the Brainstorms and Ponders), Dazes, and saving FoWs for either Show and Tell or Hive Mind got me 2-0 victories against both of them. I think that now that people understand the interactions in the deck, if you play tight and safe with your counterspells you shouldn't have a problem.

QFT

It is a 3-card combo with an insufficient number of search spells. I have never had trouble with it using Merfolk as long as I keep Pierces in my SB.

[KobeBryan]

How does my list look?


Creatures
2x Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
4x Coralhelm Commander
1x Cursecatcher
4x Lord of Atlantis
4x Merrow Reejerey
4x Silvergill Adept

Instants
3x Daze
4x Force of Will
4x Mental Misstep
2x dismember

Artifacts/Enchantment
4x Aether Vial
3x standstill

Lands
4x Mutavault
4x Wasteland
13x Island

Sideboard
1x Dismember
3x Spell Pierce
2x Tormod's crypt
3x cursecatcher
3x phyrexian metamorph
3x surgical extraction


Should I actually ditch the standstills and use the cursecatcher MD. Then I would have 3 slots for 1 more dismember, 1 more daze, and 2 echoing truths, minus 1 phyrexian metamorph.

or

3 pithing needles 1 daze

[kingtk3]

I think that the main problem is that if you cut the Cursecatcher from the MD you're running too few creatures (and Merfolk in particular).
I know that this can be mitigated by the cards you should draw with Standstill, but in this way you loose speed and consistency. Moreover you are exposing yourself to decks that can run under standstill (zoo for his speed, goblin and DnT for playing vials themselves).
Last but not least, cursecathcer is one of your two answers to T1 lackey when on the draw (the other being dismember).

I would use the 3 slots in the side for 1 dismember and 2 Echoing truth.

Greetings.

[Tacosnape]

Won locals last night, though managing to play a lot of the same decks. Beat Hive Mind 2-0, BUG Landstill 2-0, some amazing crazy Protean Hulk deck with Footsteps of the Goryo and Through the Breach and a ton of protection 2-1, then in top 4 BUG Landstill 2-1 by the skin of my teeth and Hive Mind 2-1 similarly.

I came to the following conclusions:

1. It's getting harder and harder in today's Legacy to get the time necessary to level up Coralhelm Commander and make him truly amazing. Even against BUG Landstill, he didn't pull his weight, and he was certainly the last Lord I ever wanted to see in any of the combo games where all I cared about was speed. Not that I'm recommending doing anything with his spot just yet, but I became aware that I'm losing a little faith in him in a lot of matchups and I keep just wanting guys who immediately grant the Lord effect.

2. Hive Mind is still a huge threat. Me and Nick (The HM player) played a few extra games just to mess around and I'm pretty sure he got more of them than he lost. I felt like I lucked out to beat a so-called good matchup.

3. Merfolk feels weaker every time I pilot it. But I somehow still win with it.

[ajfennewald]

I was watching merfolk playing TES yesterday and saw him keep this hand on the play. 2xWasteland, Aether vial, 1 mishra's factory, 2 silvergill adept, coralhelm commander. I though that the keep was fine because the wasteland should slow TES down enough that you have a good shot of drawing into disruption. Also i think the average 6 card hand is going to be worse. Two other good players there thought it was an easy mulligan. As far as I know he plays a 14 lord variant with no standstills and all 12 free counters.

[Tacosnape]

I'd mull it regardless of whether I knew that I was playing TES. Your chances of a better six are much higher than your chances of drawing into enough disruption quick enough to stop them. And in the world of Mental Misstep, you can't count on that resolving against a blind deck.

[Sansian]

I know I'm likely to get crap for this, but I ran 3x Adaptive Automatons and a Jitte rather than Coralhelms at SCG Pitt. I went 4-1 and then made some heinous play mistakes in the next two matches that came from not playing magic seriously for 10 years. The only time that day when I felt as if I had made a mistake was facing down a resolved Moat with no answers (I played it out in the interest of capitalizing on my 1-0 lead.) Aside from that I won games that Coralhelm wouldn't have on the back of an immediate lord boost. Again, I'm not so sure that Adaptive is a good idea, but I don't think Coralhelm is as much of a stable choice as it once was.

[Tacosnape]

You won't catch crap from me about it. I'm also contemplating cutting Coralhelm Commander. I'm finding he's just too slow. I keep wanting anything with an instant Lord boost unless I'm mana flooded or in the way lategame trying to just get a guy to go the distance. I'm about to start testing the matchups where I think I would want Coralhelm without him and see where it goes.

[KobeBryan]

You won't catch crap from me about it. I'm also contemplating cutting Coralhelm Commander. I'm finding he's just too slow. I keep wanting anything with an instant Lord boost unless I'm mana flooded or in the way lategame trying to just get a guy to go the distance. I'm about to start testing the matchups where I think I would want Coralhelm without him and see where it goes.

what about a two two split. Have u tried that

[SageShadows]

I know I'm likely to get crap for this, but I ran 3x Adaptive Automatons and a Jitte rather than Coralhelms at SCG Pitt. I went 4-1 and then made some heinous play mistakes in the next two matches that came from not playing magic seriously for 10 years. The only time that day when I felt as if I had made a mistake was facing down a resolved Moat with no answers (I played it out in the interest of capitalizing on my 1-0 lead.) Aside from that I won games that Coralhelm wouldn't have on the back of an immediate lord boost. Again, I'm not so sure that Adaptive is a good idea, but I don't think Coralhelm is as much of a stable choice as it once was.

Why the Adaptive over say, Soverign?

[Tacosnape]

Why the Adaptive over say, Soverign?

Agreed. Pretty sure the occasional double blue screw doesn't near outweigh an inferior Lord who can't pitch to Force.


what about a two two split. Have u tried that

That's actually what I used to run. Or a 3/3 split, rather, as I generally still run 22 guys, though I'm contemplating dropping to 21.

[KobeBryan]

Agreed. Pretty sure the occasional double blue screw doesn't near outweigh an inferior Lord who can't pitch to Force.



That's actually what I used to run. Or a 3/3 split, rather, as I generally still run 22 guys, though I'm contemplating dropping to 21.

I'm thinking of buidling this deck, but how does this deck fare against NO decks, hivemind, and the sword decks.

I am running eva green currently, it beats merfolk, but loses badly to the other abovementioned decks.

[ajfennewald]

I'd mull it regardless of whether I knew that I was playing TES. Your chances of a better six are much higher than your chances of drawing into enough disruption quick enough to stop them. And in the world of Mental Misstep, you can't count on that resolving against a blind deck.

Yeah i think i would mull it blind. I would also mull it vs ANT. But my thought is vs TES 2x wasteland is just enough disruption to make it marginally keepable. You can count on seeing 3-5 cards most of the time before they attempt to go off with 8 relevant counters left out of 53 cards that is 15% chance per card drawn plus the chance you draw island plus daze. Also if they keep a bad hand two wastelands might be enough disruption to win.

[SageShadows]

I'm thinking of buidling this deck, but how does this deck fare against NO decks, hivemind, and the sword decks.

I am running eva green currently, it beats merfolk, but loses badly to the other abovementioned decks.

The deck rolls over to Stoneforge decks, from my experience. Stoneforge -> Batterskull is ridiculous, and SoFI just seals the game (if Jitte doesn't do it).
Hive Mind is a winnable match up, and one that I wished I hit more often. Cursecatchers and Dazes are your best bet in trying to beat a resolved Hive Mind and the pacts; counter your own copy with a cursecatcher or a daze (only if you have 1 mana open). Some spell pierces in the SB help as well.
I have no idea about the NO decks, but I would assume that it is bad if they get the T3/T4 Proggy. It's basically a racing game, and NO RUG hurts more because of Grim Lavamancers.

[KobeBryan]

The deck rolls over to Stoneforge decks, from my experience. Stoneforge -> Batterskull is ridiculous, and SoFI just seals the game (if Jitte doesn't do it).
Hive Mind is a winnable match up, and one that I wished I hit more often. Cursecatchers and Dazes are your best bet in trying to beat a resolved Hive Mind and the pacts; counter your own copy with a cursecatcher or a daze (only if you have 1 mana open). Some spell pierces in the SB help as well.
I have no idea about the NO decks, but I would assume that it is bad if they get the T3/T4 Proggy. It's basically a racing game, and NO RUG hurts more because of Grim Lavamancers.

so playing fish right now is not very good then huh?

[KobeBryan]

The deck rolls over to Stoneforge decks, from my experience. Stoneforge -> Batterskull is ridiculous, and SoFI just seals the game (if Jitte doesn't do it).
Hive Mind is a winnable match up, and one that I wished I hit more often. Cursecatchers and Dazes are your best bet in trying to beat a resolved Hive Mind and the pacts; counter your own copy with a cursecatcher or a daze (only if you have 1 mana open). Some spell pierces in the SB help as well.
I have no idea about the NO decks, but I would assume that it is bad if they get the T3/T4 Proggy. It's basically a racing game, and NO RUG hurts more because of Grim Lavamancers.

so playing fish right now is not very good then huh?

[Qweerios]

Has anybody tried the red splash yet? Call it blasphemy but I honestly think that without Islandwalk, merfolk is just a bad deck. I rarely play blue based competitive decks when I attend tournaments and one thing is for sure, I absolutely love playing against merfolk with any of my aggro-control decks. How about these changes:

-4 Cursecatcher
-4 Standstill
-1 FoW
+3 Grim Lavamancer
+4 Lightning Bolt
+2 Fire//Ice
Lose all the Mutavaults for Wastelands, Duals, and Fetches.

[Sansian]

Sorry I had Sovereigns in there as well... It lacked Kira and Dismember. Not having Kira hurt, but I rarely seem to come across them in games anyway. I've pondered upping Kira to 3.

The deck as ran was as follows:
4 Fow
4 Mistep
3 Daze
1 Jitte

4 Curse Catcher
4 Silvergil Adept

3 Sovereign
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Reejerey
4 Automaton

4 Aether Vial

13 Island
4 Wasteland
4 Mutavault

Sideboard:
3 Relic of Progenitus
3 Spell Pierce
2 Submerge
2 Echoing Truth
2 Jitte
3 Back to Basics (Best card in the deck, and it's not even in the deck. This card won basically any game where I saw it.)

As for what I faced that day.
URW Good stuff with Mystic, Grim Lavamancer, and the other sorts of things you'd assume in those colors. I lost this matchup 2-1 Lavamancer was no good to me. I played poorly, it's a recurring theme throughout the day, I missed triggers and even forgot to attack a few times. I was excited since this was my first major Legacy tournament since they changed the name from 1.5. Fortunately, I spent the next day at work running through all of my blatantly stupid mistakes in my head and I feel much better about it now.
R2 was another Stone forge deck in Bant colors. I put him off mana and smashed face in both games.
R3 was a tezz-still deck. I went 2-1 in this match, it's where the moat came out and I punished his slow clock. The final game was a wash because I dropped B2B on him and he never recovered around 3x automatons.
R4 was reanimator. I was slightly nervous about this match up, but I ended up going 2-1. I managed to counter all of his relevant spells in the first game. Lost of a Blazing Archon in the next. Third I put him off black and kept him off of it long enough to find a Relic and put what amounted to a hardlock in play.
r5 was another standstill deck. I don't remember much, but Back to Basics was house again.
R6 was a deck that I don't remember, but that I think was Team America. I started the match and mulled to 6 on the draw...but picked up seven accidentally so I was forced to a very questionable 5 card. I nearly pulled it out but he stabilized at 3 life. The next round he forced a stifled dreadnought through my countermagic and I didn't see any cards that could save me.
R7 I was completely on tilt and played probably the worst game of my life against Chris Kronenberger piloting NO RUG... Which meant that I got punished, badly. The crowning moment was when I got up after shaking his hand and my friend asked how I lost... The moment he said that I realized that I should have sacrifice-attacked with a jitte'd creature to gain the counter I needed to kill his Vendi-Clique. I laughed and then did some quick trades for EDH cards before embarking on the ride home.

All-in-all, I had a great time and met some cool people. Honestly, I wish I had ran Kira as a 2-3x. It would have changed several of the matches where I lost. I chose to focus on lords because I assumed that I would be the aggressive deck in most of my match ups on the day. I was correct, so that was a bit of luck. Sorry for the threadbare report, but I'm solely off of week old memories from a day where I basically had 5 rounds go to time.

[Sansian]

Doubled up. (Inflating my post count by 50%!)

Re-edit: The main issue with the red splash as you posited it, Qweerios, is that you're giving up your hivemind/combo matchup. Which isn't a big deal because it's not a massive percentage of the meta, but it sorta has the effect of placing you in a position of not playing to the strengths which make merfolk viable against its good matchups while not truly solving the most problematic ones. I might be wildly off base, but that's just what pops into my mind. Please do give it a try and report what your results are like. : )

[Tacosnape]

Trying a weird version out. Cut Coralhelm and moved Dismember to board for a land, 2 Sovereigns, and 3 Jace, the Mind Sculptors. I'll let you guys know how this works out.

[randomly.anonymous]

Has anybody tried the red splash yet? Call it blasphemy but I honestly think that without Islandwalk, merfolk is just a bad deck. I rarely play blue based competitive decks when I attend tournaments and one thing is for sure, I absolutely love playing against merfolk with any of my aggro-control decks. How about these changes:

-4 Cursecatcher
-4 Standstill
-1 FoW
+3 Grim Lavamancer
+4 Lightning Bolt
+2 Fire//Ice
Lose all the Mutavaults for Wastelands, Duals, and Fetches.

I played a red splash before like this:
4 island
4 volcanic island
1 misty
1 scalding
1 flooded
1 polluted
4 mutavault
4 waste

4 Loa, rejeery, silvergill, coralhelm, cursecatcher

3 daze
4 mms
4 fow
4 vial
4 bolts
1 chain lightning

Basically I traded the dismembers and flex spots for the burn package. Lavamancer looks good a paper but I found I never had enough graveyard stuff to feed him. I ran fire/ice in the board and it was a beating against some decks (gw, affinity to some extent, gobs, bob, sfm, and tapping down random stuff). I didnt want it maindeck because there's a lot of stuff you want to cast for two mana, and its possible to play a lord and keep mana up for lord but far less possible to fire/ice and lord in the same turn.


It was nice having some removal, but the best was bolting heirarchs and following up with a wasteland for the blowout. It also gives this deck some reach to push through those final points of damage, so you have a slightly easier time in the endgame.

[SageShadows]

so playing fish right now is not very good then huh?

Not necessarily. I think Fish's strengths is that even if it has a losing record, it's not that terrible and eminently winnable. Fish is still a solid choice to pilot in an unknown meta, and skill can push those weak match-ups into wins.
Specifically for Stoneforge based decks, I've yet to test my new additions, but I believe Dismember backed up by Cursed Totem (for Elves, GW Maverick, and Stoneforge based decks) will help. Maybe Pithing needle would work in that situation. I'll let you all know when I actually play this revamped deck next week.


Trying a weird version out. Cut Coralhelm and moved Dismember to board for a land, 2 Sovereigns, and 3 Jace, the Mind Sculptors. I'll let you guys know how this works out.

I'm interested. I don't like the Jaces because they're too high up in curve and the BS is pretty much useless without fetches. I might playtest -1 CC +1 Sovereign with 2 Phyrexian Metamorphs, 2 Dismember, and 1 Island as my flex (3 Dazes).

[chinitoz30]

Does anyone here knows the decklist of Jared Kohler who's playing merfolk in 2011 U.S. National, Thanks

[unemployer]

@chinitoz30: Looks like he MD 2 Sower of Temptation, placed 1 Mishra's Factory and SBed Back to Basics, Pithing Needle and Submerge.
ayos ba?

[cheerios]

Hi guys,

any tips on the Maverick matchup? I need some input on how to play against them and what cards to bring in and out post board. thanks!

[Julian23]

Merfolk, by Jared Kohler – 1st place
Business (38)
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Silvergill Adept
2 Sower of Temptation
4 Aether Vial
3 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Mental Misstep
1 Umezawa’s Jitte

Mana Sources (22)
13 Island
1 Mishra’s Factory
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland

Sideboard (15)
2 Back to Basics
1 Dismember
2 Energy Flux
2 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
1 Pithing Needle
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Spell Pierce
3 Submerge
1 Tormod’s Crypt


Regarding the Maverick matchup, it's one of the worst in Legacy right now. You have to Mental Misstep or even Force of Will Mother of Runes, Dismember Scryb Ranger or kill a guy they try to equip Jitte to in order to generate tempo. I have only won this matchup when I'm on the play anyways. After boarding I bring in Spell Pierce on the play to hit GSZ. Mind Harness is also ok in providing tempo.

You can't really "grind" this matchup out, you just have to win by tempo. Which is pretty hard on it's own against them.

[Star|Scream]

Looks like this deck is finished. The core is solid. Then you just add kira, sower, or jitte, and the usual SB culprits, and you have a deck.

[KobeBryan]

what does he have to deal with prog and emrukal?

[Star|Scream]

what does he have to deal with prog and emrukal?

11 main deck counters, 1 in the sb, 4 counter creatures, 2 mb creature thieves, 2 llawan in the sb to bounce prog, plus 2 back to basics to shut down 12 post and NO rug.

Can't tell if trolling or...

[Julian23]

Phyrexian Metamorph
Sower of Temptation

And especially against Progenitus: alpha strikes. The hydra is usually too slow to actually kill you. After it comes down you have 2 swings to deal the remaining damage which - in my experience - is often enough to finish then. However, with NO RUG playing 12 spot removal + Lavamancer after boarding this might change. Thus far though, I wouldn't be afraid of Progenitus or Emrakul with this deck.


/edit: sorry missread "what do we have to deal with..."

[KobeBryan]

11 main deck counters, 1 in the sb, 4 counter creatures, 2 mb creature thieves, 2 llawan in the sb to bounce prog, plus 2 back to basics to shut down 12 post and NO rug.

Can't tell if trolling or...

i'm actually a noob with this deck.

What I don't understand is why he doesn't have dismember in the MD, and only 1 in the SB

[Star|Scream]

i'm actually a noob with this deck.

What I don't understand is why he doesn't have dismember in the MD, and only 1 in the SB

I dunno. I'm not a fan of sower myself. But what I was trying to illustrate is that the land, core creatures and the 11-12 free counterspells are flushed out. All that really changes are sowers, jitte, mishra's factory, dismember, and sideboard.

Instead of true removal maybe he preferred virtual removal (i.e. stealing). Some like copying. Others like dismember. Others like protection (kira). It's all a preference thing and I really don't think those 3-4 flex slots really change the deck at all.

[KobeBryan]

Everyone knows there are 3 flex slots in this deck. has anyone used 3 jaces in those?

[Julian23]

Isn't Dismember just flat out better than Jace, at least in the maindeck? You don't wanna use Brainstorm, you don't wanna Fateseal and Dismember seems way better than -1 bounce to me.

[Syaoran]

Has anyone experimented with Flusterstorm in the sideboard?

It seems like it's strictly better than Spellpeirce

[Sturtzilla]

Has anyone experimented with Flusterstorm in the sideboard?

I ran it in my board at SCG Pittsburgh. Although I was running a different deck, Reanimator, and I opted for Flusterstorms over both Spell Pierce and Dispel. I also play Merfolk and both decks run virtually the exact same counter package (Merfolk gets the added bonus of Cursecatcher). Flusterstorm beats unprotected storm, just generally helps win counter wars, and gets under the Hive Mind players Chalice of the Void set at 1 (they also don't get the Storm trigger off of the Hive Mind). That is why I ran it and it seemed to work well for me. I have stepped away from the fishies at the moment and have been rocking Reanimator. All of the NO RUG and Maverick have been slanting me that direction. I would suggest trying it out. I really liked having it.

[chuck2657]

Isn't Dismember just flat out better than Jace, at least in the maindeck? You don't wanna use Brainstorm, you don't wanna Fateseal and Dismember seems way better than -1 bounce to me.

I think most people (including me) would agree dismember is a better slot, since merfolk tries to build and ride temp most matches, and not control a long end-game via card advantage. That being said, everything is worth trying. It is a bit slow for legacy, but a JTMS that sticks can really dominate games.

[JBlaze]

I want to talk about sideboarding and general tactics for the mirror match Im in a small but fierce local meta where you can usually count on at least 2-3 merfolk players at any event I have gone 1-2 in matches the mirror seem kinda swingy any body have any pointers I have a pretty stock no standstill list

I am also wondering what peoples feeling on llawan are she can be great but with the addition of dismember she seems worse also vendillion clique out of the sideboard has been very effective for me I swear clique should be named an honorary merfolk it does everything we want disruptive evasive good power I know this is a bold statement but if Im running a 3cc non-merfolk legend in my main deck i would run clique over kira

this actually happened on the play game three vs B/W stoneforge
he goes turn two stoneforge grabs sword of body/mind I pass with three mana up planning to clique in response to stoneforge and take sword on his turn three he drops engineered plague on merfolk so of course I go clique taking sword then drop jitte equip swing kill stoneforge and roll him

oh yeah and the last card I want to bring up is spreading seas for the non blue midrange decks its a two mana cantriping stone rain that sometimes makes our guy unblockable just throwing it out there

[JBlaze]

I want to talk about sideboarding and general tactics for the mirror match Im in a small but fierce local meta where you can usually count on at least 2-3 merfolk players at any event I have gone 1-2 in matches the mirror seem kinda swingy any body have any pointers I have a pretty stock no standstill list

I am also wondering what peoples feeling on llawan are she can be great but with the addition of dismember she seems worse also vendillion clique out of the sideboard has been very effective for me I swear clique should be named an honorary merfolk it does everything we want disruptive evasive good power I know this is a bold statement but if Im running a 3cc non-merfolk legend in my main deck i would run clique over kira

this actually happened on the play game three vs B/W stoneforge
he goes turn two stoneforge grabs sword of body/mind I pass with three mana up planning to clique in response to stoneforge and take sword on his turn three he drops engineered plague on merfolk so of course I go clique taking sword then drop jitte equip swing kill stoneforge and roll him

oh yeah and the last card I want to bring up is spreading seas for the non blue midrange decks its a two mana cantriping stone rain that sometimes makes our guy unblockable just throwing it out there

[bakofried]

It's not a Stone Rain, it just turns it into an off-color land. The Cantripping is nice, but it seems to swallow up tempo (and slots in the deck) for very little reward.

[chuck2657]

I want to talk about sideboarding and general tactics for the mirror match Im in a small but fierce local meta where you can usually count on at least 2-3 merfolk players at any event I have gone 1-2 in matches the mirror seem kinda swingy any body have any pointers I have a pretty stock no standstill list

I am also wondering what peoples feeling on llawan are she can be great but with the addition of dismember she seems worse also vendillion clique out of the sideboard has been very effective for me I swear clique should be named an honorary merfolk it does everything we want disruptive evasive good power I know this is a bold statement but if Im running a 3cc non-merfolk legend in my main deck i would run clique over kira

this actually happened on the play game three vs B/W stoneforge
he goes turn two stoneforge grabs sword of body/mind I pass with three mana up planning to clique in response to stoneforge and take sword on his turn three he drops engineered plague on merfolk so of course I go clique taking sword then drop jitte equip swing kill stoneforge and roll him

oh yeah and the last card I want to bring up is spreading seas for the non blue midrange decks its a two mana cantriping stone rain that sometimes makes our guy unblockable just throwing it out there

Jitte and the empress are the two 'traditional' SB answers in the mirror. Although the opponent can still vial in creatures, a resolved empress can really swing the game. Yes, there are dismembers, but your opponent is down 4 life and has all his creatures bounced at this point...even if dismember resolves. In a merfolk-heavy meta she is a very powerful (if narrow) card. Sower can also be strong since merfolk normally only runs 2-3 dismembers for kills - assuming you're running sower for other reasons in your board.

A friend tried a version running stifles, spreading seas, etc. It does hit mana greedy decks hard, but it was horrid in the mirror and other decks that weren't 3 colors. Also, there may be less blue than before...but there is still a lot of blue in the meta. Turning a nonbasic into an island may not hurt the opponent all that much. Also, Back to Basics in some ways seems like a more powerful card for 1 CC more - and it receives limited SB space. Another issue with SS is your opponent still can play a land/fetch and land a spell with that mana.

[KobeBryan]

Do you guys find 3 surgical extractions and 1 tormod's crypt enough gravehate? of course i have two echoing truths in the board as well. So technically there are 6 cards.

[SageShadows]

Do you guys find 3 surgical extractions and 1 tormod's crypt enough gravehate? of course i have two echoing truths in the board as well. So technically there are 6 cards.
Yes, but I'd move that to 2 Surgical Extractions, 2 Crypt (or Relics). Surgical Extraction just doesn't help as effectively against decks that use the graveyard somewhat fairly.

[Tacosnape]

Graveyard hate really depends on what decks are prominent. If you're expecting Manaless Dredge, your Crypts and Surgicals won't be enough, because you more likely than not lost game one. You'll want 6+ pieces, or Leyline. If you're dealing more with Reanimator, you want Crypt more than Surgical, but you've got a fighting shot either way because your counters are all useful. Loam decks or anything packing Intuition, you want Surgical Extraction.

[angel882]

Hi, has anyone else tried out Phantasmal Image in folk? I played this list in a local turnament

12 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland

4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Cursecatcher
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
3 Phantasmal Image

4 Force of Will
4 AEther Vial
3 Daze
4 Mental Misstep
2 Dismember

SB:
2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
3 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
4 Submerge
2 Spell Pierce
3 Tormod's Crypt
1 Sower of Temptation

where I faced

Landstill UBG 2-0: My opponent mull to 5 in both games and that's about it. One time I tried play Phantasmal Image, but it got countered.

Grim Caw-Blade 0-2: I think this is a hard MU. I can't anything land on the table or I'm dead. Grim is bad, Mystic is bad and all swords and Batterskull are bad. I sided Image out only against Grim-Blade.

TES 0-2: Both games I started t1 Cursecatcher, t2 copy Cursecatcher by Image. Didn't get any counters so that's why I lost.

Merfolk 2-1: Usually it was a cheap lord. Once I had to copy my own Llawan to stop my opponent's attack.

Dredge 2-0: Once I didn't copy anything and removed Bridges from graveyard. Also a cheap lord and helped me race.

in these games Image was great and it fits perfect in the curve.

Some cons are that it's not great with my own Kira and Jitte. Ofcourse opponent's Jitte is also bad. In legacy any removal spell usually kills my creatures anyway so that's why the "becomes target" -ability isn't so weak. So what do you think about PImage?

I also played first time maindeck Dismember and didn't like it so much. In a mirror I think it helped more my opponent than me to remove one of his creatures and lose 4. Of course I didn't play against creature heavy decks so it's hard to say is it good or not, but I think next time I try Echoing Truth or Sower of Temptation in main.

[Einherjer]

Hey guys, normally Im a midrange player but I think Ill start playing Fish.
So would you guys mind to explain to me, why Merfolk isnt in the top8 any more?
And what do you think of my list?

12 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland

4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Cursecatcher
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
2 Merfolk Sovereign

4 Aether Vial
2 Dismember

4 Force of Will
4 Daze
4 Mental Misstep

Soo, remember im kinda new to Fish, but not new to magic (some might know me from the Deadguy Ale thread) So tell me what ya guys think about this list and Merfolks current and futurionary place in the metagame. Thank you.

[Philipp2293]

So would you guys mind to explain to me, why Merfolk isnt in the top8 any more?


Zoo is on the uprise again. NO Rug is widely played, which I believe ain't exactly a great MU. In Europe, GW Maverick is widely played, which is definitely a bad MU.

[kingtk3]

Hey guys, normally Im a midrange player but I think Ill start playing Fish.
So would you guys mind to explain to me, why Merfolk isnt in the top8 any more?
And what do you think of my list?

12 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland

4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Cursecatcher
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
2 Merfolk Sovereign

4 Aether Vial
2 Dismember

4 Force of Will
4 Daze
4 Mental Misstep

Soo, remember im kinda new to Fish, but not new to magic (some might know me from the Deadguy Ale thread) So tell me what ya guys think about this list and Merfolks current and futurionary place in the metagame. Thank you.

Hi,
as for the top8 I don't know what to say, I can only suppose that you are referring to SCG open (maybe?). I'm Italian and SCG league don't matter much to me (no offence intended) since here the meta is different. I agree with Maverick being an harsh matchup and that is popular in Europe, but it is still winnable.
Also during summer people usually go to the beach or on vacation, so I wouldn't take too seriously the current top8s.

As for your deck, I think it's quite scholar: you have the "core" (20 merfolks, 4 FoW, 4 Vial, 4 Misstep, 3 Daze) and 2 Sovereing, 2 Dismember and 1 Daze in your flex slots. Given that your meta leans on creatures, the only change I would made is -1 Daze +1 Dismember since I'm not a fun of 2x in this deck (kira and sovereing apart, the former being a legend, the latter being "another lord") because it doesn't have tutors or deck manipulation. If you feel you need Dismember (or standstill, if your meta calls), play at least 3.

Greetings.

[_Paradox_]

@ angel882 - I have been thinking about that guy too, I am playing a power event this saturday and I am gonna play 2 of him. I'll let you guys know how it goes.

[KobeBryan]

how does this board look to you.

The flex slots in the MD are 2x phantasmal image and 2x echoing truths

here's my side

3x dismember
2x kira
2x llawan
2x energy flux
3x chalice of the void
2x spell pierce
1x ratchet bomb

how do you guys feel about this board? I took out all the grave yard hate, thinking that I have enough to counter and stop dredge as well as reanimator. Chalice helps deal with zoo's paths, chain lightning, lightning bolt, red elemental blasts, his 8-10 1 drops. Chalice would also help fight reanimator with the reanimate, careful study, brainstorm, entomb and such.

i know it seems ratchet bomb is out of place, but i can use it to fight dredge. or should i just replace it with another echoing truth. That would be 3 cards to fight dredge.

[chuck2657]

how does this board look to you.

The flex slots in the MD are 2x phantasmal image and 2x echoing truths

here's my side

3x dismember
2x kira
2x llawan
2x energy flux
3x chalice of the void
2x spell pierce
1x ratchet bomb

how do you guys feel about this board? I took out all the grave yard hate, thinking that I have enough to counter and stop dredge as well as reanimator. Chalice helps deal with zoo's paths, chain lightning, lightning bolt, red elemental blasts, his 8-10 1 drops. Chalice would also help fight reanimator with the reanimate, careful study, brainstorm, entomb and such.

i know it seems ratchet bomb is out of place, but i can use it to fight dredge. or should i just replace it with another echoing truth. That would be 3 cards to fight dredge.

Leyline of the void kills mana-less dredge outright, and reanimator and normal dredge have a very difficult time removing it against merfolk. Crypt and relic both make it a favorable MU. If you're looking to shore up your matches against the aforementioned decks, I think you would be better off running straight graveyard hate. Echoing truth and ratchet deal with the tokens nicely (and ET has many uses from counterbalance to llawans) but they do not help against an iona in play.

[KobeBryan]

How good is jitte in merfolk? i tried using him and it seems like a mana sink to me. I need mana for the coralhelm commanders and to cast additional merfolks each time. When i have it in my opening hand, i rarely ever want to cast it over the merfolks I keep drawing.

[SageShadows]

I don't like Jitte in merfolk. Anti-synergistic with Kira, match ups that they actually stick on a folk is just win more (and you're wasting mana in the meanwhile), and match ups where you need the -1/-1 (like in Elves) or the life (maybe burn), removal/combat tricks invalidates it. You have no idea how frustrated I was (trying to) play Jitte vs. Combo Elves.

[Justin]

Actually Jitte works fine in Merfolk. The problem is that its competing against so many other good cards in those flex spots. Jitte is fine in those flex spots if you are expecting a lot of aggro. Then again, if you are expecting a lot of aggro, you should probably pick up a different deck than Merfolk.

[chuck2657]

I don't like Jitte in merfolk. Anti-synergistic with Kira, match ups that they actually stick on a folk is just win more (and you're wasting mana in the meanwhile), and match ups where you need the -1/-1 (like in Elves) or the life (maybe burn), removal/combat tricks invalidates it. You have no idea how frustrated I was (trying to) play Jitte vs. Combo Elves.

Kira and jitte don't work well together; if you're MBing Kira then jitte probably won't work well in the SB.

Also, combo elves is well...a combo deck and not an aggro deck (yes, it can often pack an aggro backup plan via archdruid, but that tends to be a poor avenue against merfolk). Personally, I find that combo elves has a difficult time winning without resolving a glimpse. Jitte does provide a bit quicker of a clock, but it is still a matchup that seems to revolve around glimpse, or around them assembling the 3 elf combo.

I do agree with Justin though, the decks jitte (except perhaps the mirror) excels against tend to be poor match-ups. At some level, if don't expect to see much aggro, you shouldn't play jitte. If you expect to see lots of aggro you shouldn't play merfolk.

[Justin]

Since the printing of Mental Misstep, I largely see mono-blue Merfolk like this:

Lands (20/21): Generally 12/13 island, 4 wasteland, and 4 mutavault, although some like to fit in a Mishra's Factory. I prefer 21 lands, personally.

Creatures (20): A set of Cursecatcher, Silvergill, LoA, Coralhelm, and Reejerey.

Non-Creature spells (15/16): Vial, FoW, Daze, and Mental Misstep, although you can probably get away with cutting a counterspell of your choice.

This puts Merfolk at 56/57 core cards and leaves only 3 or 4 flex spots.

Top candidates for flex spots: Standstill, Spell Pierce, Kira, Sower, Dismember, Jitte, or more "lords" (Merfolk Sovereign, Phyrexian Metamorph, Phantasmal Image).

Weaker candidates for flex spots: Echoing Truth, Stifle, Brainstorm (with fetches), Jace TMS.

Upon further reflection, it might not be a bad idea to use those flex spots to give some maindeck help against those tough aggro matches. The deck should still have a positive matchup against combo and control. It's not clear to me what is the best way to go about this against an unknown meta.