[Deck] Survival

When the inception of Legacy first came to be, Survival was immediately pinned as one of the top decks, if not the top deck in the format. It encompasses a repertoire of powerful creatures with arguably one of the strongest cards in the format, Survival of the Fittest. Survival reigned for over a year in Legacy until a series of events brought it down, including the printing of new cards, and the format shifting towards a faster environment. Now the metagame is in the process of shifting again, and Survival has emerged as a very strong contender in a variety of forms, boasting top8 appearances in nearly every recent event.

Optimized Decklists:

RGB Survival Advantage

Old RGSA Thread (reference only)

EATS

RGWU Survival (Molotov Cocktail)

GBW Survival (No MTGS thread)


Reports and Results:

TMLO 2 Day 1 RGBSA

TMLO 2 Day 2 RGBW Survival (no individual thread)

2nd Annual GAGG RGWU Survival (Molotov Cocktail) Also mention that both 9th and 10th place were taken by RGBSA and RGBW Survival.

Recent Articles:

Unlocking Legacy: Fit to Survive by Doug Linn



Food for Thought:

- Which Survival builds are the best? What are the advantages/disadvantages of playing them? Which ones are the most consistant? Which ones have the best game without a Survival?

- What colors are appropriate for Survival builds? The lists above feature mixes from the entire color wheel. What colors create the ideal list? Keep it simple with only two colors, such as RG or BG, or use all the resources you can with the three or four-color combinations? Are the additional colors worth it, or is sticking to a more grounded color combination the key to victory?

- What is the optimal manabase for a Survival deck? Consider the number of lands and mana-producing creatures. What type of acceleration is best? The fast, one-drops such as Birds of Paradise or Llanowar Elves, or the efficient searchers like Sakura-Tribe Elder? Also consider the colors that are run. How big of a risk is it to be running 3+ colors? Is the manabase at risk?

- What are the optimal number of singleton slots in the deck? Older Survival builds eventually lost power because they were too focused on using SotF, and had many weak draws without it. Today's lists feature more bombs and fewer bullets. What bullets are acceptable, and how many should you run?

- What is the most efficient sideboard strategy for Survival? Sideboarding is often very troublesome for a Survival player because at times it is difficult to remove cards from the deck. Some sideboard choices are obvious, such as siding out artifact removal against a deck with no artifacts, but what if you are to board in a high number of cards, for example seven, and only have two or three cards that are worth taking out? How do you decide out of the rest of the deck what gets removed?

I like the fact that you can pretty much look at most of the Survival builds. Nice to see Survival made it back somewhere on the radar. Question is will more people prepare for it?

Survival decks are decks that if you are unprepared or caught unawares as to what is accross the table from you you will loose. The main problem with most survival builds (mine encluded) is that without getting the survival in the first place it simply plays like a second rate aggro control; sometimes I will muck a decent hand w/o survival just because I need the explosiveness of an active survival for a speedy win. The new threats in our mea have made it very difficult to play any of my builds either (welder, ATS, grb advantage)... perhapes I can dedicate my SB to combo and anti-SB cards?

IDK... but I do know that it definitly is a force to be reconed with... I won a decent sized tourney (30-40 people) the first time I ever picked up ATS, so I guess that shows towards the decks' power.

Would be appreciative towards a generic SB for all of these varients...

As for combo hate and the SB it is dependent upon the pilot, build, and meta. My build has a bit of hate main (Glowrider and Therapies) and some more in the board. The great thing about survival is that both the MD and SB can be easily tuned. I know my deck changes at least 1-2 cards depending upon what I am expecting, my SB can change even more than that.

I personally have grown to like the non-toolbox SB and run the best spells for the spot. I don't even worry that I have survival, but instead just find the strongest spells for what I am worried about. Obviously a couple of spots will be tool-box creatures, because that is a great advantage that survival has, you just don't want to weaken the deck when you don't get survival.

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Originally Posted by Diablos

Food for Thought:

- Which Survival builds are the best? What are the advantages/disadvantages of playing them? Which ones are the most consistant? Which ones have the best game without a Survival?

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Nice writeup.

I'll try to spark some discussion here with the Survival build I consider to be "best" (Survival builds should be built according to the metagame, so this term might not be appropriate): GBW.
If the mods feel that this is not the right place for this topic, feel free to move it to the appropriate forum.


The advantage of going GBW is that you have access to the most potent control cards in Legacy and GBW has a very solid game-plan without Survival. For a three-color deck, it is also remarkably resilient to manabase hate.

My current list:

22 Lands:
6x Forest
1x Plains
1x Swamp
3x Savannah
3x Bayou
4x Wooded Foothills
4x Windswept Heath

19 Creatures:
4x Sakura Tribe Elder
4x Wall of Roots
3x Eternal Witness
3x Loxodon Hierarch
1x Withered Wretch
1x Harmonic Sliver
1x Krovikan Horror
1x Genesis
1x Yosei, the Morning Star

19 Spells:
4x Cabal Therapy
4x Swords to Plowshares
4x Pernicious Deed
3x Sensei’s Divining Top
3x Survival of the Fittest
1x Recurring Nightmare


The list is influenced by the builds on germagic.de and the terrific work of the Germans on this archetype.

The idea behind this build is: Survival is fundamentally a control card, hence you need to build a controllish shell around it. GBW offers the best cards for this, as Therapy, Swords and Deed make sure you have answers to almost everything.
Even without Survival, the deck operates quite well, since the power level of the other cards is quite high.
I think Survival is not an engine-card, but a reusable tutor. The change of this paradigm has huge influences on how you build Survival (e.g. the exclusion of Squee).


The goal is simple: Build up your manabase while keeping control and drop Survival afterwards, when you have ample mana to abuse it. The Yosei-Nightmare lock is very potent and should beat the endgame of most other strategies. Hierarch beatdown also occurs often when you got control over the game.


Some explanations might be in order:

- Tribe Elder and Wall of Roots were chosen over Birds or Werebear because they are far more resilient against removal and reliably get you the needed mana.
Wall of Roots is especially good with Survival, Krovikan and Top and allows you to pump out your threats faster. It was chosen over Wall of Blossoms because early-game acceleration is more important than the cantrip ability. You usually get card advantage with Survival, Deed and Witness anyway in the late-game.

- Krovikan Horror is a very versatile Squee replacement. In addition to recurring, it's also useful for pinging annoying one-toughness creatures, a searchable Sac-Outlet for Yosei and stopping Swords from removing crucial creatures.
Since you don't use Survival as often as in previous builds, the need for Squee is lessened, and KH is usually enough. This is one of the most difficult cards to play correctly, and you have to keep the interactions with STE, Nightmare, Survival, Witness and Wretch in mind.

- Sensei's Top makes sure that you have the right card at the right time. With Fetchlands, STE and Survival there are enough shuffle effects so that you can look at three fresh cards. It's also Deed-proof.


The deck is no fluke, as it has won or placed well in multiple tournaments (although all in Europe, since this deck is not very popular in the States).
I'm interested to hear your thoughts about this build!

Wow very cool build there. Between Swords, Deed, Walls and recurring Heirarchs seems like it would keep a very good handle on Goblins. Most Survival builds tend to do well versus Gro, having Therapy, Wretch, along with recursion and good early game blockers seems like you would have inevitability over their 10-12 win conditions.

Looking at the mainboard anyway Combo seems like its still the decks biggest shortcoming. Nice thing about your build is that it doesnt run tons of 1cc mana accellerants, so it seems viable to board out StP for Chalices, would hurt Tops and Therapys, but one could probably drop one of those two cards turn one and Chalice for 1 turn two is very solid follow up to either. Glowriders also fit the color scheme, could see them being a pretty good option as well.

Anyway like the list, seems more appealing to me then RGBSA, given the decks that seem to be doing well lately.

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Originally Posted by from Cairo

Looking at the mainboard anyway Combo seems like its still the decks biggest shortcoming.

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Thanks for the props!

Yeah, Combo is not good game 1, but the sideboard can at least help. My current SB is:


4 Engineered Plague
4 Duress
1 Glowrider
1 Mesmeric Fiend
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Harmonic Sliver
3 Krosan Grip

I think the Therapy/Duress & Witness is a better plan than Chalice, since most combo decks can play through it. Fiend and Glowrider are searchable answers that should help.
Plague is very useful against Goblins, Slivers and Fish.
Although Deed should take care of Affinity, I know how dangerous that deck can be, and a searchable answer in form of Kataki is needed.
The 2nd Harmonic can also be replaced by a Boneshredder if Angel Stompy is prevalent in your meta.
Krosan Grip is a very useful sideboard card that gets sided in quite often.

that BWG build looks very solid, defenitly gonna try it out.
how about a single e-tutor in there? 3 nasty enchantments to search and a top to draw it with seems nice to me

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I'll try to spark some discussion here with the Survival build I consider to be "best" (Survival builds should be built according to the metagame, so this term might not be appropriate): GBW.
If the mods feel that this is not the right place for this topic, feel free to move it to the appropriate forum.

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Yeah I didn't necessarily mean what deck is the "best" build, as I think it's nearly impossible for people to decide on that, but as you said, more like the most appropriate for the metagame.

It's nice to finally see you post the decklist on here, Bongo. Now, I'm not going to stretch this into a red/no red argument again, as we know how that went about last time, so I'll just offer some questions instead.

Seeing how Recurring Nightmare plays as a rather large part in your winning strategy considering the number of times you mentioned it, have you considered the possibility of running an Academy Rector? This is a debatable slot because she's 3W, but with a Survival in play it essentially allows you to tutor for recurring Nightmare. You also have a number of outlets to kill her by with Therapy, Pernicious Deed, and even Krovikan Horror.

I know you're in love with Top like none other, but has Sylvan Library been tested? I'm just curious if at all the fact that you need mana to be using Top might collide with using Survival, where Library is free and actually lets you draw the card. And considering you run multiple Heirarchs, it wouldn't always hurt you to draw the extra cards. The only issue I really see with it is it wouldn't be a turn 1 drop, but considering this is a late-game control deck, that shouldn't be an issue.

Also on your sideboard, I still see combo as a very hard matchup. Then again, combo is not as common on Europe as it is in America. However, the standard Survival build around here with black runs around 4 Cabal Therapy 3-4 Duress, 3-4 Mesmeric Fiend, and then maybe something else like Rule of Law, Pillar, etc. And despite all that, it still isn't posting a favorable matchup. I really think you're overestimating the deck's ability if you believe that only Duress and Therapy are going to get the job done along with singletons like Glowrider and Mesmeric Fiend. You're definately going to need another couple Glowriders or Mesmeric Fiends at the least if you want to be favored post-board.

I have a slightly different approach to combo with Survival as of lately.

In Price's RGBSA, Duress and Therapy find homes as 7-of main and 1-of in board, backed by 3 Mesmeric Fiends. The theory being that Survival can grab Mesmeric Fiend after Mesmeric Fiend after Mesmeric Fiend until you're Mesmeric Stompy, or you'll just randomly draw them as extra disruptors.

However, after a lot of games, I found Mesmeric Fiend a tad too slow against Epic Storm and Iggy Pop unless I opened with a Duress, and Solidarity either Echoing Truthed them or just shook off the hits. Solidarity can sometimes just be Mario with a Starman. I love to hum the "Invincible Mario" theme while comboing off. But I digress.

Most combo decks have ways of getting rid of Mesmeric to get their card back. And as a result, most of the games I'm winning against combo I'm winning as a result of a mega-powered Cabal Therapy.

So I'm wondering if there's not a better combo option somewhere for an RGB Build, without Mesmeric, and without using something like Chalice that compromises the Duress/Therapy engine unless you drop it for 0. Currently I'm running an army of Loaming Shamans in their place to walk over the Threshold and Loam-heavy metagame here. Is it safe to just dismiss combo as slightly unfavorable and try to randomly steal a match with Duress/Therapy/Beatdown? Or do we need some sort of silver bullet?

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However, after a lot of games, I found Mesmeric Fiend a tad too slow against Epic Storm and Iggy Pop unless I opened with a Duress, and Solidarity either Echoing Truthed them or just shook off the hits. Solidarity can sometimes just be Mario with a Starman. I love to hum the "Invincible Mario" theme while comboing off. But I digress.

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Most combo decks have ways of getting rid of Mesmeric to get their card back. And as a result, most of the games I'm winning against combo I'm winning as a result of a mega-powered Cabal Therapy.

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I find this rather surprising. How is 2 mana too slow, considering generally game 2 you will be on the play? TES does NOT have a reliable means of getting rid of it, so in most cases it will act as a Duress. Chances are they won't be wasting a Burning Wish to get Earthquake just to kill a Mesmeric Fiend. Iggy Pop does have some means to remove it, but it still most likely isn't worth their time. Because they run so few, they'd be relying on either Intuition or a hellbent Infernal Tutor just to bounce a Mesmeric Fiend. If that was the case, they should be able to win.

The only other option you have to something as solid as Fiend is either Blackmail, which is terrible, or Hymn to Tourach, which is almost impossible to cast on the first couple turns of the game unless you luck into BB.

Basically from what I found though is that the combination of Duress, Therapy, and Mesmeric Fiend generally aren't enough to put combo away. Every single combo deck can fight through discard rather well, and just win over your face. This is why you need something else in addition to the discard. Whether is be Pyrostatic Pillar, Rule of Law, Chalice of the Void, Glowrider, whatever, you need some sort of bomb that can swing the favor of the match. The only thing discard does is stall them so you can hopefully draw more of it while putting down a clock. However if you don't draw past that second discard spell, you're likely to lose. Instead, it's a lot better if you use those stall tactics in discard to give you more time to drop a bomb against them so they can't steal a win from under you.

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Is it safe to just dismiss combo as slightly unfavorable and try to randomly steal a match with Duress/Therapy/Beatdown? Or do we need some sort of silver bullet?

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Hell no it's not safe. Those combo matches that you would lose are the ones that will keep you out of the top8. I made this mistake before with some other decks, and lo' and behold, it cost me a top8. Twice. Considering combo matches are realistically the only hard matchups the deck has (you could count Goblins as well, but you're already heavily boarding for it) it's vital that you devote a lot of time into the deck to fight it. There's no point in making the deck better against good matchups while hoping you won't face the bad matchups.

I know this is random, but I would also like to clear this up...

All Survival builds are Midgame decks. They're creature based decks that act on using vitual/actual card advantage using Midgame creatures, creatures with strong stats creating vitual card advantage and board dominance, and a late game capibility. A deck like Survival and The Rock run Trolls, Witnesses, and Baloths/Hierarchs. Why do you their concept and design look the same?
In no way is this deck an aggro control deck, as aggro control decks were designed to beat Control (not board control, but a fun fact is that RGSA was designed to combat Board Control decks like Landstill) and and Combo. Sadly many of the of the aggro control decks do beat those decks, but have to take up a more "midgame" approach to combat the format. Look at MeatHooks, Fish, and Thresh. Anyways, I end my point. I just want to clear up that this is a board control deck.


As for my solution to fight combo, I remembered seeing an old list ObFreely won with on SCG. It had 4 Glowriders and 3 Sphere of Resistances in the SB. It look liked it got the Glowrider out consistently on turn 2-3. It looked awesome. I cant stress how much it goes to the theme of Survival, and yet has some game against Combo. I thought the synergy in this deck were awesome, and it plays a little like Vial Goblins' Board Control counterpart; like using marginal effects that are effective early game, but once somethine like Survival or Ringleader resolves it puts those marginal cards into good effect in conjunction of multiples, as the deck runs Mogg Fanatics, Mancer, and Sharpshooter and stuff. I thought it looked cool and I may get around to actually trying this deck out for the hell of it, but then again, it's really outdated....

http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckd...p?DeckID=11783

I've been playing with 4 Duress, 3 Therapy main, and a fourth in the Wishboard, and then 3-4 Pyrostatic Pillars in the sideboard of RGBSA instead of Mesmeric Fiend. Chalice for zero is strong against TES, but against Solidarity it needs to be set at one, making it a very suboptimal card from the sideboard against them.

Yeah, I hope we can have some productive discussion here. Thanks for discussing this in a neutral way.
I'll get straight to your points:

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Originally Posted by Diablos

Seeing how Recurring Nightmare plays as a rather large part in your winning strategy considering the number of times you mentioned it, have you considered the possibility of running an Academy Rector? This is a debatable slot because she's 3W, but with a Survival in play it essentially allows you to tutor for recurring Nightmare. You also have a number of outlets to kill her by with Therapy, Pernicious Deed, and even Krovikan Horror. .

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I tried a version with Academy Rector before, but it was a more combo-finish oriented version, similar to the old Wheaties. The problem is that once you start dabbling with Rector, you're tempted include more powerful enchantments like Decree of Silence or Debtors Knell, which takes the deck in a completely different direction.

I have found the Top in combination with the shuffle effects to be enough to find the Nightmare in time. However, there is the possibility of cutting 1 Top and another card for 2 Enlightened Tutor. That should also answer the question of Mr.D.
I played with ET before and cut it because it is not that good against counters and fast decks. This is a point I'm not entirely sure about and I might go back to the version with 2 ET.

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Originally Posted by Diablos

I know you're in love with Top like none other, but has Sylvan Library been tested? I'm just curious if at all the fact that you need mana to be using Top might collide with using Survival, where Library is free and actually lets you draw the card. And considering you run multiple Heirarchs, it wouldn't always hurt you to draw the extra cards. The only issue I really see with it is it wouldn't be a turn 1 drop, but considering this is a late-game control deck, that shouldn't be an issue.

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In my RGB version, I play with Sylvan Library. In GBW, SL doesn't have good synergy with Deed, hence the Top.

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About the combo match in general:

The SB answers depend on what kind of combo you predict to face. Tendrils-based? High Tide? Aluren? Salvagers?
Survival, as a control deck with creatures, is at a fundamental advantage against combo. I didn't say that I have a favorable matchup against combo, just that my sideboard helps somewhat.
This might be superflous, but if there is significant amount of combo in your meta, you should switch to something like BW Confidant.

In my experience, the Discard package + Witness was enough to carry me. This probably has to do with the skill level of my opponents, because you have to be a very good pilot to navigate your deck through disruption. The margin of error for your opponent is really small.


Right now, I'm tinkering on a transformational sideboard. 8-12 disruption cards are enough, what I need in the combo matchup is a quick clock so that I can pursue an aggro-control plan. Developments will follow (any ideas are greatly appreciated, of course).

I created that Gbw deck together with a friend (here Joe Eigo). I even posted the deck on MWS about 7 month ago with many Top 8 finishes in Germany and 2 won TheSource tourneys (with nearly the exact decklist) but moderators nevertheless removed it from the Open forums and so it disappered.

The deck is still good, but unfortunately in the last few month the very good matchups (Rifter, Landstill, Angel Stompy, Zilla Stompy, Threshold, Faerie Stompy) got fewer
and some mediocre matchups (Hanni Fish, Gbr/SA)
and bad matchups (TES, Terrageddon, Aluren)
appeared.

To Bongo's list: It is good, but I would play Wall of Blossoms over Wall of Roots. The cantrip is fundamental to create card advantage in combination with Cabal Therapy and it is also important to minimize the impact of Pernicious Deed on your own board.

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I tried a version with Academy Rector before, but it was a more combo-finish oriented version, similar to the old Wheaties. The problem is that once you start dabbling with Rector, you're tempted include more powerful enchantments like Decree of Silence or Debtors Knell, which takes the deck in a completely different direction.

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Of course the temptation would be there, but that's why you need to resist that. :) Between shufflers and Top you theoretically can find Nightmare, but using Rector allows you to hardlock the opponent much faster, giving them less time to find outs to beat you.

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In my RGB version, I play with Sylvan Library. In GBW, SL doesn't have good synergy with Deed, hence the Top.

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Point taken.

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This might be superflous, but if there is significant amount of combo in your meta, you should switch to something like BW Confidant.

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This was the same pitch Hi-val was chiming to when he released his Survival article. I can't help but disagree with this argument anything less than 100%. I mean, we're trying to make the deck better. That's the point of playing the deck in the first place. Switching to a different deck because it has a couple bad matchups as opposed to innovating to improve those matchups is fundamentally wrong. Those bad matchups (combo) are really the only things keeping Survival in check, and out of the tier 1.

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Right now, I'm tinkering on a transformational sideboard. 8-12 disruption cards are enough, what I need in the combo matchup is a quick clock so that I can pursue an aggro-control plan. Developments will follow (any ideas are greatly appreciated, of course).

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What kind of transformational sideboard are you talking? Honestly I really don't see how your deck could get that much faster given the design of it. You're based off of a pure control deck atm. It depends what you're looking for though. Something like Flesh Reaver would be ok as it's a great 2-drop that kills quickly. I would've recommended Negator as well, but the lack of a 1cc mana accelerant makes it infinately worse. Playing him turn 3 against combo is too slow imo.


Oh I also forgot to mention this the first time around, but have you GBW guys tried Dark Confidant? Sans the whole Pernicious Deed thing, it provides so much for the deck that other cards can't really offer. I personally put it way ahead on the power level compared to Sensei's Divining Top, as it also Considering the 3 Heirarch in the deck, the lifeloss should be a minimal issue.

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All Survival builds are Midgame decks. They're creature based decks that act on using vitual/actual card advantage using Midgame creatures, creatures with strong stats creating vitual card advantage and board dominance, and a late game capibility. A deck like Survival and The Rock run Trolls, Witnesses, and Baloths/Hierarchs. Why do you their concept and design look the same?
In no way is this deck an aggro control deck, as aggro control decks were designed to beat Control (not board control, but a fun fact is that RGSA was designed to combat Board Control decks like Landstill) and and Combo. Sadly many of the of the aggro control decks do beat those decks, but have to take up a more "midgame" approach to combat the format. Look at MeatHooks, Fish, and Thresh. Anyways, I end my point. I just want to clear up that this is a board control deck.

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While I don't entirely disagree with this statement, I can't help but ask you this: What do you call a Survival deck without Survival in play? It sure as hell isn't a control deck. In that position it more than likely takes the form of aggro. I think people misunderstand the complete meaning of "aggro-control," because the other decks listed as such are so different from Survival. This deck, by nature is aggressive control. It is a control deck at heart, but it's gameplan is incredibly aggressive, moreso than that of something like Threshold. People are claiming this deck isn't aggro-control because they don't start attacking until like turn 4 or so, but yet they claim a deck like Threshold is. Threshold typically won't drop a creature until it has Threshold, which might not be as late as turn 5-6, and then it starts attacking. How exactly is that aggro, and this deck isn't? They play their creatures and start attacking during the end of the midgame to lategame, when Survival will play a FTK on turn 3 and immediately start attacking the turn afterwards.

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Originally Posted by Diablos

While I don't entirely disagree with this statement, I can't help but ask you this: What do you call a Survival deck without Survival in play? It sure as hell isn't a control deck. In that position it more than likely takes the form of aggro.

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Even when I play RGSA, I still see it as a "Midgame" deck. I play Control in way too many of my match-ups to actually call it an Aggro deck. Maybe perhaps against a Board Control deck or Combo deck, then I'll probably play Beatdown, but outside of that, playing Control against other Creature decks isnt a bad idea, since I probably wont play Beatdown against a deck like Goblins or Threshold.

I'll be perfectly honest here; the only Survival decks I have ever played in my life are RGSA and ATS. I never had a good understanding of ATS, but I loved that deck to death. RGSA however is the deck I took most of my examples from. I dont expect RGSA to be a pure control deck, but it can drag it's way into late game if it needs to if theres a stalemate.

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I think people misunderstand the complete meaning of "aggro-control," because the other decks listed as such are so different from Survival. This deck, by nature is aggressive control.

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I tend to see Midgame decks as Control decks that apply pressure to the opponent in both forms of board dominanace and a deadly clock. Something like Angel Stompy would fit my discription.

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It is a control deck at heart, but it's gameplan is incredibly aggressive, moreso than that of something like Threshold. People are claiming this deck isn't aggro-control because they don't start attacking until like turn 4 or so, but yet they claim a deck like Threshold is. Threshold typically won't drop a creature until it has Threshold, which might not be as late as turn 5-6, and then it starts attacking. How exactly is that aggro, and this deck isn't? They play their creatures and start attacking during the end of the midgame to lategame, when Survival will play a FTK on turn 3 and immediately start attacking the turn afterwards.

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Well said. I didnt really say it was a complete control deck, but I guess what I said was interpreted as a pure control deck. I guess I should've put a Midgame deck's gameplan in context, since Midgame decks tend to just be aggressive control decks, but in a different sense from the average aggro-control deck.

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Originally Posted by Bongo

Survival, as a control deck with creatures, is at a fundamental advantage against combo. I didn't say that I have a favorable matchup against combo, just that my sideboard helps somewhat.

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I'm not sure I follow this. I could be wrong, but I feel like the midgame role that most survival take leaves them at a disadvantage against combo. Regular agro with any form of disruption (mana denial or discard seem most likely) applies a clock, so the combo player is put on the ropes early to find the pieces and combo off before they are dead. Well timed Duress/Therapy or Waste/Port can often buy the needed time for a win.

Straight control in a counters and board sweepers sense also seems like it might be in no worse a position then a Survival deck, something like Landstill, that has the ability to say no, through counters and stifles. Generally control is worse off then agro control, but GBW Survival doesn't really appear to have any better clock then say Landstill. The only disruption main board against combo is 4x Therapy, and with only 10 creatures with 2 power or greater and half of them costing 4+ mana there isn't really any clock to speak of.

I'm not trying to bash on the design though it seems really good for fighting Goblins and NQG. I would just still be worried with running only discard to disrupt TES and Solidarity. It seems like it has the ability to stall into the late game against whatever non-combo deck where it will inevitably win, through Genesis/Recurring Nightmare/Witness/Yosie, or just go agro with a few 2/1s and 4/4s.

I think 4 Glowriders are a step in the right direction for SB hate, they are very solid vs NQG and storm based combo. Maybe 3-4 Duress and 4 Glowriders along side the Therapies main would be a sufficient disruption package. The plus side to Glowriders and discard of coarse being that if you can either draw into a few of them or get Survival going, with Eternal Witness you can start mounting a bit of an agro plan with the 2/1s while recurring discard and restricting the combo players ability to cast their spells.

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Originally Posted by Diablos

Of course the temptation would be there, but that's why you need to resist that. :) Between shufflers and Top you theoretically can find Nightmare, but using Rector allows you to hardlock the opponent much faster, giving them less time to find outs to beat you.

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Rector is really bad in this deck. He is way too slow against Aggro and Combo and in the control mirrors, where he should be good, he will often get StoPed. Of course it can be nice to sac him into a Therapy, but usually you want to flashback the Therapy earlier with a Wall to keep your opponent from doing strong plays - or from countering your 4-drop.
I tested with Rector a long time ago and he just sucked. Always. When I had drawn him he sucked and I never wanted to Survival for him.

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Originally Posted by Diablos

This was the same pitch Hi-val was chiming to when he released his Survival article. I can't help but disagree with this argument anything less than 100%. I mean, we're trying to make the deck better. That's the point of playing the deck in the first place. Switching to a different deck because it has a couple bad matchups as opposed to innovating to improve those matchups is fundamentally wrong. Those bad matchups (combo) are really the only things keeping Survival in check, and out of the tier 1.

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Yes. I agree to 100%.

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Originally Posted by Diablos

I would've recommended Negator as well, but the lack of a 1cc mana accelerant makes it infinately worse. Playing him turn 3 against combo is too slow imo.

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The 3-drop of choice against Combo is Glowrider. It is quite strong and you can Survival for it. The problem is that the sideboard is really full. Krosan Grips are just way too strong to strong, you can never go under 2. And my fear of Goblins always makes me play 4 Engineered Plagues. I also like to have 2 Darkblast in my SB, because they are good against Hanni Fish, which is qquite popular here. That leaves only 7 slots to combat Combo decks.

However, in an American Meta my Sideboard would probably look like:

4 Engineered Plague
2 Krosan Grip

4 Duress
3 Extirpate (this card is actually very strong in the Control mirror (especially Landstill and Loam Control) and in some Combo matchups - (especially Aluren, Iggy Pop and Solidarity
1 Rule of Law (important E. Tutor target against Combo)
1 Glowrider

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Originally Posted by Diablos

Oh I also forgot to mention this the first time around, but have you GBW guys tried Dark Confidant? Sans the whole Pernicious Deed thing, it provides so much for the deck that other cards can't really offer. I personally put it way ahead on the power level compared to Sensei's Divining Top, as it also Considering the 3 Heirarch in the deck, the lifeloss should be a minimal issue.

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He dies too fast for this deck. The deck does not want to trade 1-1 with Mogg Fanatic, Lightning Bolt and Fire/Ice. It has the same problem like in the Gbr/SA, only worse because you are even more controllish.

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Originally Posted by from Cairo

I would just still be worried with running only discard to disrupt TES and Solidarity.

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Yes, that's why you need to have Glowrider, Extirpate and Rule of Law in your Sideboard. If you draw some discard you really don't have to worry about Solidarity going off. You can keep them with Witness-Therapy on 1-2 cards in hand. They won't win the game. Just play fast enough and scoop game 1 if nessecary.

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Originally Posted by from Cairo

I think 4 Glowriders are a step in the right direction for SB hate, they are very solid vs NQG and storm based combo. Maybe 3-4 Duress and 4 Glowriders along side the Therapies main would be a sufficient disruption package.

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If you can find room for more Glowriders they are the way to go. But I have a lot of experience with this deck and believe me - you want 4 Engineered Plagues and 2-3 Krosan Grips in your sideboard. And I was also very satisfied with Extirpate even though that would be the card you could cut for additional Glowriders.

Tao answered most questions, so I'll talk about my sideboard.

Currently, I'm tinkering with Worship as a solution against Goblins, which frees up sideboard space (I switched back to 2 Enlightened Tutors maindeck).

4 Duress
3 Glowrider
3 Mesmeric Fiend
3 Krosan Grip
1 Worship
1 Rule of Law

As you can see, the Goblin matchup is weaker, but STE and Wall of Roots should help to get the Worship down in time.
I tried a Jotun Grunt man-plan, but that wasn't very effective.
My plan is to apply pressure with turn 1 discard, turn 2 Mesmeric, turn 3 Glowrider, with Rule of Law as a tutor-target.

What do you think of this approach? Is the Extirpate plan here better?