[Deck] Nic Fit (GBx Explorer Zenith Control)

In the mana base issue with scapeshift, I've very heavily considered trying out Crop Rotation main board, adding in Boseiju and Karakas tech.

I don't expect Hypergenesis to keep seeing a lot of play up at Jupiter, but since someone in my group is the one that CAUSE that influx, I still have to deal with it regularly.

Do I have to explain Boseiju? I don't think I need to explain Boseiju.

Anyway, the crop rotation idea lets us to faster "mini shifts" that often get described for fixing our mana. Could also put a use to double phy tower shenanigans.

My personal manabase for Scapeshift...

4 Taiga
2 Stomping Grounds
3 Badlands
2 Bayou
4 Forest
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
2 Phy Tower
2 Valakut

I find the deck goes through "fits" where the mana will suck for quite a few games. Obviously I know it's just bad shuffling / bad luck with the actual statistics, but I can still pretend this deck has a personality. My copy did this from round 4 last jupiter up until the middle of play testing with friends Tuesday night.

Although crop rot doesn't act as a fetch land, I often find I'd rather have exactly the land I need, rather than a better color. At that point I could easily justify bringing out a phy tower since I'll have a new method to bring it onto the battlefield.

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Originally Posted by Siiig

In the mana base issue with scapeshift, I've very heavily considered trying out Crop Rotation main board, adding in Boseiju and Karakas tech.

I don't expect Hypergenesis to keep seeing a lot of play up at Jupiter, but since someone in my group is the one that CAUSE that influx, I still have to deal with it regularly.

Do I have to explain Boseiju? I don't think I need to explain Boseiju.

Anyway, the crop rotation idea lets us to faster "mini shifts" that often get described for fixing our mana. Could also put a use to double phy tower shenanigans.

My personal manabase for Scapeshift...

4 Taiga
2 Stomping Grounds
3 Badlands
2 Bayou
4 Forest
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
2 Phy Tower
2 Valakut

I find the deck goes through "fits" where the mana will suck for quite a few games. Obviously I know it's just bad shuffling / bad luck with the actual statistics, but I can still pretend this deck has a personality. My copy did this from round 4 last jupiter up until the middle of play testing with friends Tuesday night.

Although crop rot doesn't act as a fetch land, I often find I'd rather have exactly the land I need, rather than a better color. At that point I could easily justify bringing out a phy tower since I'll have a new method to bring it onto the battlefield.

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Have you ever seen footage of Kenny Mayer shuffling, especially when he's on Battle of Wits? If you haven't, I highly recommend it. Usually when I'm playing Scapewish I try to emulate that style as much as I can, and that seems to help with the pockets of mana that are formed just by Scapewish being Scapewish.

Why do you have the 2nd Phy Tower over the 3rd Bayou? Tower is legendary and requires a critter in play to make it powerful. Scapewish doesn't need the extra sac outlet as badly as Rector does.

Mini-shift is only vs certain decks, or as an act of desperation. Unless I'm in a really dire place, I never shift just to fix my mana (or vs certain decks, ie shifting for basics vs stax, or shifting for valakuts + mountains vs miracles). It's a really shitty mana fixer.

Crop Rot in general seems fine....but you'd be choosing it over the other options for the 3x slots (assuming 61), which some opt for Decay in, or Olivia/Blitz. Those are your Crop Rot slots. If you're okay with that, then go nuts. Of course, finding room for the specialty lands is another story.

While we're on the topic of specialty lands, consider trying this guy if you go Crop Rot: Lavaclaw Reaches. That thing could put down a -world- of hurt in the right situation.

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Originally Posted by waSP

Has the Ancestral Visions tech made its way to the regular BUG decks yet? If you're running running a consistent removal/discard package, it's the best card in the deck.

With Jace and Eternal Witness and Cryptic Command (and Time Warps!?) it's pretty easy to Time Walk 5-8 times in a row without ever using Panoptic Mirror. It'd be interesting to run a heavily blue Nic Fit that just meant to take lots of turns and maybe attack with some little dudes, but mostly just to take lots of turns. I'm working on a mod that doesn't need to go infinite turns (just squeaks out wins anyway).

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I'm in agreement. Mirror might be better as a 1-of rather than basing the deck around it. At the same time, Mirror + Visions is one of the most straight-up busted things you can do in Chrono Fit right now, so I dunno. Mirror is both clunky and amazing at the same time, and it's annoying.

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Originally Posted by sherko7

Its actually "Sher" as well :) Yours?



Honestly Recurring Nightmare has been a bit meh for me as well. Haven't used it much though, so I might let it stick around. The ramp is for G1 against decks you don't want to be ramping too much (i.e. Miracles, Elves Combo, SnT too perhaps). But its a flex spot. I don't like Liliana too much in this deck but I might try playing 1 in the MD. As for Garruk PH, don't have them yet, but will most likely do -1 Wall -1 Sakura for 2 Garruks.

I'm also thinking about getting +1 Skeletal Scrying in somehow...

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Scrying is atrocious now, don't bother. Half the format is munching your yard with Deathrite and the other half is whoring Rest in Peace.

You're on a junk-ish/good-stuff style right now, Sherko, so Nightmare is definitely not where you want to be. Nightmare is good in Gifts versions and Rector versions, and that's about it. I mean, it's REALLLLLY good there, but you can't just jam it in whatever version of Nic Fit in general and call it good. I would 100% cut Nightmare. If you want a long-term recursion engine, put in Primeval Titan and go for Volrath's Stronghold + Phy Tower. Nightmare is more powerful than Stronghold, but it requires more specifics built around it.

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Originally Posted by Cire_dk

@TheArchitect: I also noted that a third Bayou goes a long way to improve the chance of being able to play therapy and explorer. It also improves your opening hand. Shuffle effects are usefull but not necessary in this list in my opinion. The extra mountains are not only there for scapewish but also to go on a valakut plan if necessary.

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/barn

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Originally Posted by Qweerios

I tweaked my SB for a tournament I will attend this saturday (I am not sure about Nic Fit or Esperblade yet) and it looks like this:


1 Abrupt Decay
2 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Extirpate
2 Duress
1 Thoughtseize
1 Memoricide
1 Tsunami
1 Tormod's Crypt
2 Oblivion Ring


I went for additional Surgical effects and Crypt over Nihil Spellbombs because of the new Balustrad Spy deck (I am pretty sure it scoops to extracted Moebas or poped Crypt in resp to library mill). I also took out a Memoricide for a Tsunami. The SB is calculated to replace the worthless mainboard cards for every unfair matchup. Decay and Pulses are my main Thoughtseize/Teeg replacements for fair matchups but I am seriously considering Lilies again somewhere now. Removal in the form of permanents is definitely where you want to be with Nic Fit.

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Keep in mind that Spy often boards into Belcher postboard. The only hate that is both fast enough and truly effective vs both the Belcher and Spy plans, is Mindbreak Trap. Whether you want to go to that extreme or not depends entirely on how much storm presence/Spy presence you expect there to be. I've been liking the Traps so far, just because Nic Fit's one major achilles heel is t0/t1 combo, and Trap at least helps that problem. But, again, meta presence and all.

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

Have you ever seen footage of Kenny Mayer shuffling, especially when he's on Battle of Wits? If you haven't, I highly recommend it. Usually when I'm playing Scapewish I try to emulate that style as much as I can, and that seems to help with the pockets of mana that are formed just by Scapewish being Scapewish.

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No, I haven't. But I'm about to google it.

My choice for double Phy tower is just to increase the likelyhood of seeing it, but at the same time it's far from necessary. Bayou #3 doesn't exist simply because I only have two Bayous.

I mentioned using crop rot as a means of fixing/fetching, and I think this could warrant taking the fetch slots displayed in Architect's land base.

Sadly, taking that mana base means wasteland taiga -> surgical taiga is suddenly devastating to my alternate plan. The friends of mine who have realized that's a good play do serious work against me.


Lavaclaw Reaches...may be the card I've been searching for as a sick mana dump. Thanks for the suggestion, I'll be getting one tonight + crop rots if I can find them.

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

You're on a junk-ish/good-stuff style right now, Sherko, so Nightmare is definitely not where you want to be. Nightmare is good in Gifts versions and Rector versions, and that's about it. I mean, it's REALLLLLY good there, but you can't just jam it in whatever version of Nic Fit in general and call it good. I would 100% cut Nightmare. If you want a long-term recursion engine, put in Primeval Titan and go for Volrath's Stronghold + Phy Tower. Nightmare is more powerful than Stronghold, but it requires more specifics built around it.

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Yeah, I kinda figured that out after play testing with the other lists. Nightmare just doesn't fit in the pure GB Rock list. Guess its time to smash in the Walkers :)

Also currently added in 1 Obstinate Baloth in my SB. Seems to work great against a lot of decks in our meta (Burn, Jund, U/R).

For PWers in the GB Rock list, I'm thinking 2 Garruk PH 1 Lili 1 Vraska. Can anyone justify playing more than 2 Lili? Seems it is a bit antisynergistic with how the deck operates, no?:eek:

As for Vraska, I'm sorry I know she's not as good as the other 2 but damn I just wanna swing with that Ulti! :laugh:

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Originally Posted by Siiig

Sadly, taking that mana base means wasteland taiga -> surgical taiga is suddenly devastating to my alternate plan. The friends of mine who have realized that's a good play do serious work against me.

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This is EXACTLY why I don't like Evan's mana base. By cutting mountains for fetches, you improve your initial mana, but at the cost of stability and redundancy. It becomes very, very easy to shut off Scapeshift with a well-placed Sowing Salt / Waste+Surgical.

If you have 4 Taiga + 3 Badlands + 3 Mountains, let's say, and Taiga gets Sowing Salted/Surgicaled/whatever, you have 6 mountains left in your deck, which is the minimum allowed to Scapeshift. That means that you literally cannot draw a mountain or search for a mountain the entire game, if you want to Scapeshift, which also turns off all of your red cards. That's just wayyyyyyyyy too dangerous. I haven't been specifically coming out and pointing out that weakness because I know people from the Mythic playgroup read this thread, so I didn't want to give them ideas that could hurt Evan, but since you brought it up, I'll expound on it now.

So is there a way to get reliable early access to black while maintaining enough mountains to support scapeshift?

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Originally Posted by Star|Scream

So is there a way to get reliable early access to black while maintaining enough mountains to support scapeshift?

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3rd Bayou.

On a marginally more serious note, green is the critical color, because from green, all other colors stem. Green gives you Explorer, which gets you to other colors vs an aggressive deck. It gives you Zenith-> Tribe Elder, which gets you a basic swamp. If you're really heavy on non-black sources, you have Wood Elves as well, which can fetch Bayou.

You have 3 Bayou, 3 Badlands, and 2 Swamps, which gives you 8 black sources. Add on to that a Sakura-Tribe and the 2 Wood Elves, as well as 4 Zeniths, you get 15 "black" sources. + 4 Explorers is 19. Add in the tower as a half a black source.

That means you have a full 20 cards, or 1/3 of your deck, which either is directly a black source or can fetch a black source.

Well our Legacy event didn't fire yesterday but I did play one match against UR Painter's Combo.

G1: Triple Cabal Therapy followed by beats and deeds wins me the game

-3 Vet -1 Damn -4 Troll/JMS/Skull +5 Extraction +3 Carpet

Misboarded most likely

G2: First legit win with my list encourages me to keep a no disruption hand. Die to Grindstone.

G3: This goes on forever, with me extracting both Servant and Grindstone. Unfortunately, a ton of misplays on my part (including said extraction of Servant and not Wurmcoil) I die to Wurmcoil + Transmute Artifact

So many punts . . . Didn't help that I was treating it as a friendly game and he wasn't. Good thing one of the guys who top 16 at Indy was there to give advice on my plays.

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

Have you ever seen footage of Kenny Mayer shuffling, especially when he's on Battle of Wits?

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Just watched him on SCG open at edison. Looks like he does multiple piles + a lot of chopping? It seemed silly to me at the time, but doing a double pile shuffle with some chops inbetween really seemed to help the feel of my deck last tuesday. It felt good enough where it will become my standard shuffle method between games.

Hey guys! tomorow i go to play Scapewish in a Legacy Open in Buenos Aires (im from Argentina) with this list:


4 Veteran Explorer
2 Thragtusk
2 Huntmaster of the Fells
1 Primeval Titan
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Eternal Witness
2 Wood Elves
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Dragon Broodmother/Blitz Hellion/Master of the Wild Hunt


4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Pernicious Deed
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Burning Wish
2 Scapeshift


2 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
2 Stomping Ground
3 Forest
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
1 Phyrexian Tower
4 Taiga
3 Bayou
3 Badlands
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Blood Crypt


SB: 3 Slaughter Games
SB: 1 Reanimate
SB: 1 Scapeshift
SB: 4 Thoughtseize
SB: 1 Damnation
SB: 1 Maelstrom Pulse
SB: 1 Pyroclasm
SB: 1 Cave-In
SB: 1 Hull Breach
SB: 1 Innocent Blood


Thoughts? i have a doubt in 2 slots,idk if better play 2 more creatures,like 1 ooze,and 1 dragon/blitz/master of the wild hunt,or just play 2 Abrupt decay in that slots..i feel i dont have instants responses early game,and abrupt decay is a beast,but in other hand,im feel a little safe playing 1 cementery hate maindeck(ooze) and another threat like Dragon Broodmother.

sorry for my english,and comments please! thank you!

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Originally Posted by sherko7

Yeah, I kinda figured that out after play testing with the other lists. Nightmare just doesn't fit in the pure GB Rock list. Guess its time to smash in the Walkers :)

Also currently added in 1 Obstinate Baloth in my SB. Seems to work great against a lot of decks in our meta (Burn, Jund, U/R).

For PWers in the GB Rock list, I'm thinking 2 Garruk PH 1 Lili 1 Vraska. Can anyone justify playing more than 2 Lili? Seems it is a bit antisynergistic with how the deck operates, no?:eek:

As for Vraska, I'm sorry I know she's not as good as the other 2 but damn I just wanna swing with that Ulti! :laugh:

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In GB, I personally really like Liliana, I run 3 of them. There is no reason to run her as less than a 3 of. You either want AT LEAST one of her every game, or none of her. Shes not like jace, where you play her and protect her till you win. You just play her and always get a 2 for 1, and if your lucky you can get a like a 5 for 1. Shes just a controlling 3 drop. Also, dont play vraska, she isnt very good. Karn however, is awesome in GB. Personally, I run 3 lily, 2 prime hunters, 1 karn. However if your not a fan of lily, just run 0.

Baloth seems pretty good in that meta!

For reference, here is my current GB, that I haven't used in anything more than a 5$ tourny in a while, but Ive tested it a lot and really happy with it:

3 Bayou
4 Forest
1 Phyrexian Tower
3 Swamp
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Volrath's Stronghold
2 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills

4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Sensei's Divining Top

4 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Pernicious Deed

3 Liliana of the Veil
2 Garruk, Primal Hunter
1 Karn Liberated

4 Veteran Explorer
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Sakura-Tribe Elder
2 Eternal Witness
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
2 Thragtusk
1 Primeval Titan

SB:
3 Carpet of Flowers
3 Extirpate
1 Ichneumon Druid*
1 Cranial Extraction
1 Memoricide
1 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Damnation*
3 Mindbreak Trap*

The SB is kinda meta dependent, the cards marked with * are just reflecting that I see a lot of storm based combo and random tribal/aggro decks that I dont want to lose to.



@ Surgicaling my taigas :(

I luckily never had that happen to me, but I think that is a risk I am willing to accept to improve my consistency. Adding 2 more Stomping grounds (To have 2 SG, 3 Mnt, 3 Badlands after losing tiagas is still only 7 lands, so you cant really play more than a few). However, dont forget that even if you have only 2 mountains left in your deck, if you have 4 in play, and 8 lands total you can still scapeshift for 2 valakuts, 2 mnts and just leave you 4 mnts unsacrificed. 12 Dmg is still alot after a grindy game of huntmasters, surgical extractions, thoughtseizes and fetchlands. Also note, I do normally run 4 basic mountains (which I suppose one could be a stomping ground) so I still have 7 non-taiga mountains. Most of the kind of decks that would be using surgical/extirpate we don't even need scapeshift against since deed, thragtusk and huntmaster are better than their whole deck (UR delver burn, jund, RUG, etc.). BUG control and esperblade, run those cards occasionally, but esperblade cant kill our taigas easily, and BUG doesnt use surgical nearly as often as the other mentioned decks.

I will be at mythic tomorrow btw, Im not 100% sure what list Im going to be playing though. Its definitely going to have veteran explorers in it though. I let you all know how it goes!

Hi all,

Been loving this thread. Not quite all the way through it yet, but I'm getn there.

I have a few questions about this deck archetype.
Considering the popular variants of Nic Fit - GBw, GBr or simple GB;
What are the differences with respect to speed, flexibility, alternate win-con's etc.?

I'm a GB player mostly (competitively anyway) and already have quite a few of the NicFit staples, but just not sure which way I should go.
If you were starting out again in NicFit, which build would you persue?

Ta.:smile:

btw, is ANT how much of a problem? Every time I play with the damn thing I'm so conscious of the fact that my deck has literally 3 cards that can win the game, max, if even that (G1 I literally lose to Extract) and that I'm packing Grim Tutors instead of Burning Wishes. That is to say, Sadistic Sacrament sounds sexy. Sadly it doesn't phase TES and it's ilk much.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slave

Hi all,

Been loving this thread. Not quite all the way through it yet, but I'm getn there.

I have a few questions about this deck archetype.
Considering the popular variants of Nic Fit - GBw, GBr or simple GB;
What are the differences with respect to speed, flexibility, alternate win-con's etc.?

I'm a GB player mostly (competitively anyway) and already have quite a few of the NicFit staples, but just not sure which way I should go.
If you were starting out again in NicFit, which build would you persue?

Ta.:smile:

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Rector is fun. Though these people here don't follow the Righteous Path Of Eldrazi Conscription FTW, it can perhaps be forgiven because they're playing Rector ^^

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slave

Hi all,

Been loving this thread. Not quite all the way through it yet, but I'm getn there.

I have a few questions about this deck archetype.
Considering the popular variants of Nic Fit - GBw, GBr or simple GB;
What are the differences with respect to speed, flexibility, alternate win-con's etc.?

I'm a GB player mostly (competitively anyway) and already have quite a few of the NicFit staples, but just not sure which way I should go.
If you were starting out again in NicFit, which build would you persue?

Ta.:smile:

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I would prefer Arianhood answering this because he's basically got this down lol

but IMO... GBW is the most flexible version, you can add and mix shit all over the place.... It's slower though, doesn't mean it's bad, it just means you play
board control and win late game. There's a crap load of win con.

GBR or if your talking about scapewish.... This deck is not flexible at all, it's very strict and as you can see from the previous posts that there's s
serious mana issue (but that can be said about nic fit in general). This deck is the fastest because it has scapewish combo, turn 3 or 4
is possible. And basically speaking it's your other win condition.

GBu i cannot speak behalf of bc i believe its still in development and I have never played it.

GB.... All I can say is why? It's simple but the tri color is much more powerful, the alternate color let's you decide to be aggressive or control base.


I used to play GBW style, not rector, and i will admit that the deck is very very powerful and even when you feel that you've ran out of shit to do, you can still do some random broken shit lol... I'm currently on scapewish and its da bomb. But it's like I said play according to and who you are or else you'll never know.... and you have to lose in order to learn how to win...

My thoughts on Jace Fit and Scapewish;

Both are very similar in that both improve our topdeck game and provide alt win cons. But whereas Scapewish will Miracle wins with Wish or Shift, Jace Fit can both keep them in topdeck mode and keep us out of topdeck mode, all while building up to our alt win con.

EDIT: Also be forewarned that if you choose Jace Fit, games will grind out, and people will get annoyed with how long the games go.

EDIT: On an unrelated note, anyone going to SCG Cincy have 3 Thoughtseizes they can loan me for the event? I'm not sold on either Duress or Inquisition now that Elves is a DtB and ANT has such a heavy presence.

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Originally Posted by EpicLevelCommoner

My thoughts on Jace Fit and Scapewish;

Both are very similar in that both improve our topdeck game and provide alt win cons. But whereas Scapewish will Miracle wins with Wish or Shift, Jace Fit can both keep them in topdeck mode and keep us out of topdeck mode, all while building up to our alt win con.

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I'm tinkering around with BUG lists (no Gifts/Intuition/Time Warps) as I move into this deck and had a few "general" questions for non-sneaky-combo builds:
1. How many Green sources should one be running for potential T1 Explorer? (minimum and/or optimal?)
2. How many Sac outlets? (minimum and/or optimal?)
3. How does playing no ramp dudes/spells besides Explorer/GSZ (4-of-each) work out?
4. I'm planning on Primeval Titan and the 2 Towers, potentially with man lands as alternative late game plays. I've seen 2 Treetop Villages, EpicLevelCommoner has 2 Factories, and I've seen Titan with no man lands. I would have access to Creeping Tar Pit. Is running more lands a good enough fit with the Titan to overcome the CIP tapped drawback (of Treetop/Tar Pit)? Experiences with 1/22 tapped lands? 2/22? 1 or 2/ 23 lands?

For reference, here's where I'm starting:

3 Forest
2 Island
2 Swamp
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacomb
2 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
1 U Sea
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Treetop Village?
=22 Lands (14-15G, 12U, 12-13B)

4 Explorer
2 Strix
2 Eternal Witness
1 Ooze
1 Thrun
1 Thragtusk
1 Primeval Titan
1 Grave Titan
1 Simic Sky Swallower (or Hornet Queen or Deathrite Shaman)
2 JTMS
1 Lily (or 3rd JTMS)
=17 "Dudes"

3 Pernicious Deed
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Maelstrom Pulse
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
=12 Removal/Disruption

4 Brainstorm
4 GSZ
1 Fact or Fiction
=9 Selection

Sideboard is thoroughly unfinished.

ok,thaaaaank you for your counsels and thoughts on my post.... ¬¬....

well,i made a nice top 8 of 87 peoples with Scapeshift winning vs elfball,affinity,Rug,BUG Agent,Spanish Inquisition,lost to RUG,id last round,and lose to Eldrazi UG in top 8.

Peace.

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Originally Posted by Wincheee

ok,thaaaaank you for your counsels and thoughts on my post.... ¬¬....

well,i made a nice top 8 of 87 peoples with Scapeshift winning vs elfball,affinity,Rug,BUG Agent,Spanish Inquisition,lost to RUG,id last round,and lose to Eldrazi UG in top 8.

Peace.

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Nice! goodjob.

Nothing to brag about, but I got top 16 at Mythic.

Dredge 2-1
Turbo Eldrazi 1-0-1
UR Omintell 2-1
Monoblack Pox 1-2
NO Bant 0-2
GW elves 2-0

Turbo eldrazi and omintell matches were incredibly fun and interactive compared to the usual way those matches play. One mistake I made, and learned from was I didn't scapeshift for nonleathal, when my turbo eldrazi opponent had glacial chasm in hand. I only had one turn to get the 18 damage in (putting him to 1) and I passed it up and then never dealt dmg to him for the rest of the game. This is price I paid for not having sowing salts in my SB that day. Against omintell, i survived an Emrakul attack and a hardcasted omnitell (lol!) and still won. The omnitell opponent was on MUD last month and beat me after I scapeshifted him for 52 and he DIDNT DIE cause he was at 56, so this was my revenge.

The other matches were all pretty boring/typical. Against bant my deck just crapped on me and I missed critical therapies both games.

My SB for the day was below. Wouldn't always look like this but at least 30% of the room was on combo and probably 15% of storm. And it was just that one guy on Turbo Eldrazi, and no one on MUD, so I didn't play sowing salts/pulverize. I wanted extipates in there, but mindbreak traps took priority.

3 Pyroblast
3 Mindbreak trap
1 Thoughtseize
1 Slaughter games
1 Pyroclasm
1 Perish
1 Damnation
1 Innocent blood
1 Maelstorm pulse
1 Scapeshift
1 Reanimate

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Originally Posted by anwei

I'm tinkering around with BUG lists (no Gifts/Intuition/Time Warps) as I move into this deck and had a few "general" questions for non-sneaky-combo builds:
1. How many Green sources should one be running for potential T1 Explorer? (minimum and/or optimal?)
2. How many Sac outlets? (minimum and/or optimal?)
3. How does playing no ramp dudes/spells besides Explorer/GSZ (4-of-each) work out?
4. I'm planning on Primeval Titan and the 2 Towers, potentially with man lands as alternative late game plays. I've seen 2 Treetop Villages, EpicLevelCommoner has 2 Factories, and I've seen Titan with no man lands. I would have access to Creeping Tar Pit. Is running more lands a good enough fit with the Titan to overcome the CIP tapped drawback (of Treetop/Tar Pit)? Experiences with 1/22 tapped lands? 2/22? 1 or 2/ 23 lands?

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1. 8 Fetches Minimum. 3 Duals Minimum. A Basic for each colored mana symbol you need (example: Garruk Primal Hunter = 3 Forest, JMS = 2 Island) plus more to taste. Personally, I run 8 Fetches that get green sources, 1 Bayou/1 Tropical Island, and 3 Forest. This makes for a grand total of 15 Green Sources, which is a very good number for such a green intensive deck.

2. 4 Cabal Therapy + 1 Phyrexian Tower + 1 Diabolic Intent is the bare minimum imo.

3. Depends on if you're against aggro, combo, or control. Aggro will trigger Vets just by swinging, whereas Control and Combo require some sac-effect to trigger Vet. I prefer Dryad Arbor, as while you're durdling you can always yank it out via GSZ or Forest-Fetch, and Deathrite Shaman, which can harass them.

4. Treetop Villages give you the most power for your mana, Mishra's Factories give you the convenience of coming into play untapped at the cost of producing colorless mana, and Creeping Tar Pit is awesome at killing Jace w/ blockers and acts as another dual land. Actually . . . might make an audible here: -1 Underground Sea +1 Creeping Tar Pit. It really depends on how much durdling you expect to do over the course of your games: a few top deck taplands won't hurt if you spend most of your time passing turns anyway.

I had so much fun playing Scapewish,,but i love playing with Brainstorms,daze,fow so i dont go to play this decck anymore,but i go to tell u this,test Master of the wild hunt,is fucking insane,and have crazy sinergy with Huntmaster of the fells,cause both are hunters,and have wolfs,u know XD

Peace!

Went 1 3 0 Drop at SCG Cincy today (had other business come up abruptly)

Match 1 v Andrew on Spanish Inquisition. Aka the great punt
G1: He mulled to 6 and keeps. Nothing really happens: he bricks on mana and I beat on the ground.
G2: He mulled to 5 and I keep. Unfortunately I misboarded and couldn't save myself
G3: I reboard, but opt not to mulligan for MBT. Death by Tendrils Turn 1

Match 2 v Trevor on BG Pox
G1 & G2: Holy hell this was a nightmare! I could never get enough resources to do anything! The is the one game where I wish I had Decay over Damnation. . . Triple Lili ult is rough.

Match 3 v Collin on BW Superfriends
G1 & G2: A very fun, very grindy match. He runs no fetches or duals, but my two sided ramp get him Entreat and Grave Titan. Removal is wasted on Walkers, so I die a very Nic death. Side note: I suggest he try out Nic Fit itself since it works well with all of his high cost stuff.

Match 4 v Kyle on Combo Elves
G1: Craterhoof kills me. The end. . . . ?
G2 & G3: Rip his hand apart and strip his win cons out. He scoops G3.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by EpicLevelCommoner

Went 1 3 0 Drop at SCG Cincy today (had other business come up abruptly)

Match 1 v Andrew on Spanish Inquisition. Aka the great punt
G1: He mulled to 6 and keeps. Nothing really happens: he bricks on mana and I beat on the ground.
G2: He mulled to 5 and I keep. Unfortunately I misboarded and couldn't save myself
G3: I reboard, but opt not to mulligan for MBT. Death by Tendrils Turn 1

Match 2 v Trevor on BG Pox
G1 & G2: Holy hell this was a nightmare! I could never get enough resources to do anything! The is the one game where I wish I had Decay over Damnation. . . Triple Lili ult is rough.

Match 3 v Collin on BW Superfriends
G1 & G2: A very fun, very grindy match. He runs no fetches or duals, but my two sided ramp get him Entreat and Grave Titan. Removal is wasted on Walkers, so I die a very Nic death. Side note: I suggest he try out Nic Fit itself since it works well with all of his high cost stuff.

Match 4 v Kyle on Combo Elves
G1: Craterhoof kills me. The end. . . . ?
G2 & G3: Rip his hand apart and strip his win cons out. He scoops G3.

---

Those are three very odd matchups.

Also, there was someone playing Nic Fit who got a round 3 feature (meaning he was 3-0). Any idea if he was one of ours, or a wild one?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

Those are three very odd matchups.

Also, there was someone playing Nic Fit who got a round 3 feature (meaning he was 3-0). Any idea if he was one of ours, or a wild one?

---

The only other Nic Fit guy I saw (sat across from him before Matches started) said he dropped and was on straight GB. But glad he did well: what was he running?

EDIT: The list I ran:

4 Vet
2 DRS
1 Ooze
2 Witness
1 Thrun
2 Thragtusk
1 PrimeTime
4 Therapy
4 Deed
2 Pulse
2 Damnation
4 GSZ
4 Brainstorm
1 Intent
2 JMS
1 Batterskull
2 Factories
1 Tar Pit
1 Tower
1 Stronghold
1 Bayou
1 Tropical Island
4 Verdant
4 Misty
3 Forest
2 Swamp
2 Island
1 Arbor

3 Carpet
3 Surgical
3 Thoughtseize
2 MBT
1 Empath
1 Horror
1 Cranial
1 Memoricide

EDIT: Thoughts:

Underground Sea for Creeping Tar Pit was indeed a good audible. Many a walker died to 3 unblockable power.

Thoughtseize is awesome.

Once I find my other Extirpates, I'm using them over the Cranial Twins. Reason being that I already pack a ton of removal, so something hitting the bin isn't unreasonable. Plus ick @ 4 mana.

I don't know -- I didn't see it.

I think it might have been CRich3: he said he was gonna be running Rector Version, right? And based on the footage, it looks like a GBw deck, and the commentators kept mentioning Rector so *shrug*.

Also, I need to ask a question: how do you play JMS correctly?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by EpicLevelCommoner

I think it might have been CRich3: he said he was gonna be running Rector Version, right? And based on the footage, it looks like a GBw deck, and the commentators kept mentioning Rector so *shrug*.

Also, I need to ask a question: how do you play JMS correctly?

---

When your opponent has no field and no hand, you fateseal them. When they have either of those, you brainstorm until you've whittled them out of resources. If they only have one critter in play, bounce it to buy a little time to deploy a blocker / removal spell. When they have a top or a Sylvan out but are otherwise out of resources, fateseal yourself.

There's a few other corner cases, but that's a good general way of putting it.

Found the coverage. It's definitely not CRich -- looks like a wilder. He played against Hypergen, and he was running an old Birthing Pod version. I'm watching it through now.

Okay, that took like five minutes. The guy kept a really loose hand g3 and got punished by it. Also, the Hypergen player had Leyline of Sanctity g2 and g3, which hurt Justin a lot. The commentators said that he had like Birthing Pod, Reveillark, Sun Titan, Recurring Nightmare, O-Ring, Rector, and I saw Innocent Blood, Abrupt Decay, and Liliana of the Veil. So....just an updated Pod list from some wild player, I guess. That's disappointing -- I was hoping it was going to be CRich =(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by EpicLevelCommoner

Also, I need to ask a question: how do you play JMS correctly?

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(0):
- whenever you can. If nothing threatens you, you can just Brainstorm every turn.
- usually the right choice when in doubt. Even if you lose the Jace you still got at least even on cards.


(- 1):

- When you have to catch up on tempo. A common line is to tap out to play Jace, bounce their Tarmogoyf, let them replay it, then Brainstorm to find a Removal spell or a blocker that protects Jace.

- to survive: for example when you are against U/R Burn Delver you can bounce a Delver to gain some life and give you another land drop, even if you lose the Jace the next turn.

- if they have a giant Emrakul or Tombstalker out, bouncing it is probably a good choice

- you can "kill" creatures by combining Jace's bounce and Cabal Therapy


(+2):
- to ensure victory against Combo decks if you have managed to get rid of their win conditions. Easy examples would be against a Sneak and Tell deck that has Sneak Attack in play but no big creature in hand. Or a Belcher deck with 10+ Mana in hand/board but no win condition. Now you can fateseal them and put on the botttom their win conditions (and their Brainstoms and Ponders in case of Sneak and Tell) to make it less likely that they kill you.

- when you want Jace to survive 3 or 4 points of damage. FOr example against Jund if they can't attack you on the ground but could very likely have a Lightning Bolt in hand. You can use the +2 to get Jace out of Bolt Range.

- when a control mirror gets really grindy and you need him as another win condition.

Played the Legacy part of a team trio event. We didn't get very far, our standard player lost all of his matches and our modern and legacy wins did not coincide and a few too many draws. Anyways, here's how it went on my side:

R1: 2-1 vs. OmniTell

G1: I keep a top an explorer a therapy a forest and a plains in hand. My opponent uses a personal tutor for SnT and I dig for a black source.... for 5 turns where I had to GSZ@0 for the shuffle effect once. Luckily, my opponent was in the same boat as he brainstormed, pondered, preordained, and even wished for Petals of Insight to dig for a win-con. I eventualy found a Tower and used a thoughtseize and 3 therapies during the same turn. I beat him down with a beast token while holding an Angel of Despair.

-4 Deed, -2 Vindicate, -2 AD, -1 Ooze, -1 Thragtusk, +2 O-Ring, +2 TS, +2 Extirpate, +2 Extraction, +1 Tsunami, +1 Memoricide

G2: T2 Combo win
G3: T1 thoughtseize and T2 Teeg gets me enough time to play witness, thoughtseize again, find and pop a therapy. I attempt to cast a Tsunami but I realize Teeg is still on the table, luckily for me he didn't notice so I won from there with Teeg and Witness beats.

R2: 0-2 vs. Reanimator

G1: I see an untaped UDG Sea and call reanimate.. My opener had 2 Deeds and a Vindicate which is pretty bad against Reanimator. He drew into Entomb and Animate Dead and found a FoW with Grissel, I lost.

-4 Deed, -2 Decay, -2 Vindicate, -1 Sun Titan, -1 Teeg, +2 Surgical, +2 Extirpate, +1 Spellbomb, +1 Memoricide, +2 TS, +2 O-Ring

G2: I kept a Therapy, Explorer, Memoricide hand. My opponent kept a 2 land, FoW, 3 Fatties hand. First therapy whiffs, second Therapy gets Forced (go figure?). Griselbrand gets Reanimated so I cast O-ring on it, -7 life, no FoW found (down to 3 life). I memoricide Exhume so he has 3 Reanimate left in his deck that he cannot use and 2 Animate Dead. I drew into 3 lands and he found Animate Dead on Angel of Despair to pop ORing. I kept drawing lands and died.

Our modern player had won his round 2 match and lost his round 1 match so with standard going 0-2 we were out of contention with a 0-2 start, so we start not caring anymore.

R3: 1-1-1 vs. Miracle

G1: Long game, some really retarded therapies, and a lot of Jacing later I die to 6 angel tokens in 2 turns (43 life).

-2 TS, -1 Teeg, -1 Ooze, +1 Tsunami, +1 Memoricide, +2 Abrupt Decay

G2: Nuts start that ends with Sigarda, Sun Titan + Deed

G3: Good start again (T1 Top) and I eventualy resolve a Tsunami destroying every land except a Glacial Fortress. My opponent fails to find lands, time is called. I Vindicate the lonely land, play Empath, find a Sun Titan. My opponent is holding a FoW so I can't race him in time (I had Volrath Stronghold in play as well).

R4: 2-1 vs. Spy combo

G1: I play Forest + Top, he combos off T1

-2 Deed, -2 Vindicate, -2 Decay, -1 Sigarda, -1 Empath, -1 Angel, -1 Titan, +2, Minbreak Trap, +2 TS, +2 Extirpate, +2 Surgical, +1 Memoricide, +1 Spellbomb,

G2: I keep a hand with Mindbreak Trap and Memoricide on Cabal Therapy + GSZ into Ooze, he never found a way around

G3: He opens up with a Shelldock Isle into Petal + Spirit Guide + Recross the Paths then proceeds to explain to me how it lets him rearrange his deck as he pleases because he has no lands in his deck. Then we clash and he reveals a Gitaxian Probe, so he plays a LED and passes the turn. I play a Bayou and pass. He draws, plays Probe and cracks LED in response, I Extirpate his LED and shuffle his deck, he scooped.

R5 is where I am pretty dissapointed with Standard (0-4) and just fling my cards into play... We decide to drop after this one since our team score is something like 1-2-1. So I end up playing against UR Burn, play some Thragtusks and Oozes, then go home to eat something...


Creatures (15)
4 Veteran Explorer
2 Wall of Blossoms
2 Eternal Witness
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Fierce Empath
1 Thragtusk
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Sun Titan
1 Angel of Despair

Spells (23)
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Vindicate
2 Liliana of the Veil
4 Pernicious Deed
3 Sensei's Divining Top

Lands (22)
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Phyrexian Tower
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath
3 Bayou
2 Savannah
1 Scrubland
2 Forest
2 Swamp
2 Plains

Sideboard (15)
2 Mindbreak Trap
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Extirpate
2 Thoughtseize
1 Memoricide
1 Tsunami
1 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Oblivion Ring


Overall I am pleased with the deck's performance. I was paired up with most of the decks I didn't want to face and the preparation paid off, except against reanimator where I was honestly just a bit short on the draws (4 GSZ, 1 Ooze, 4 Extractors, 1 Spellbomb, 3 Tops and drew into 4 consec lands and a Therapy).

Yeah, 2-1-1 vs those decks is not bad at all -- especially since you would have been 3-1 if you'd had a bit more time vs Miracles. There's little doubt in my mind that our sideboard needs to be heavily anti-combo considering the current metagame is a combo player's paradise.

What does Teeg do vs OmniTell? Just to stop him from hardcasting Omni? I guess it stops Petals? Were there any other times where Teeg dicked you out of your other hate cards, other than the Tsunami?

Also, rough beats vs Reanimator in g2. No guarantee that g3 would have gone more to your liking, of course, but even having the chance would have been nice. I'm legitimately thinking that the format is almost ready for Leyline of the Void again. Reanimator's making something of a comeback (at least in my area), and Leyline is also useful against Spy. Most of the Spy decks up here don't board into Belcher -- they're loading up on additional anti-hate options like Nature's Claims and Chancellor of the Annex (barf). Chancellor and the fact that they're running 4x maindeck Pact of Negation is kind of scaring me off of Mindbreak Trap a little, although I -like- having the Traps. They're solid vs TES/High Tide/Belcher as well as Spy, and I want a Leyline of Sanctity out in all of those games anyway, so they can't really mess with my Mindbreak Trap. They usually either board Silence out in the matchup, or else use it aggressivley as a Time Walk for my Therapies.

At this point, it seems like most of the fair decks have boiled down into Esperblade, RUG/BUG Delver, and Jund. Esperblade we don't especially care about. It's an attrition war, and as long as we can keep their equipment in check, we win that fight. The plan vs Esperblade is much the same as vs Miracles: win game one. If you can win game one, odds are slim that they'll be able to win game two in time to draw it. Keep in mind, though, that most will bring in Geist of St. Douchebag and Sword of Feast/Famine in an attempt to close the match out quickly.

RUG/BUG....not sure anything needs to be said there. Carpet of Flowers is still strictly better than these decks, or an Explorer that goes off. Pretty much any ramp means we win. BUG is slightly scarier because they have 4 Sinkholes in the board to bring in, which can represent a problem. At the same time, though, BUG doesn't have burn with which to increase their clock. So....I guess it probably evens out in the long run?

My experience with the Jund matchup is that it all comes down to Liliana of the Veil. If they see Liliana within the first 2-4 turns, they're favored. If they don't, we're going to tear them a new asshole. Sigarda is literally better than their 75. Just a matter of getting to her relatively intact.

The combo decks comprise three categories: Graveyard, Storm, and Show/Tell-based. Graveyard includes Reanimator, Dredge, and Spy; Storm features Belcher, TES, ANT, and High Tide; Show/Tell includes Sneak/Show, OmniTell, and HyperGen. Note that I count 12post as a brother in arms to Nic Fit, and not as a combo deck (some consider it combo, I don't).

Graveyard is not being held down by Deathrite Shaman as much as people thought that it would. Spy's faster than it, Dredge overloads it, and Reanimator has tricks for days. Reanimator is probably the scariest of these decks. Spy is still fairly inconsistent, although it's more so than Belcher. Spy seems like it's also a fairly challenging deck to pilot correctly. Dredge entirely depends on their hand. Sometimes they hit you with the FoW tax, and just go nutso with LED...sometimes they have a slower hand and Nic Fit does what Nic Fit does. The fact that our deck is built around sacrificing creatures as a core mechanic is really bad for them.

Storm is a lot more resilient to blue than it used to be -- or at least it seems that way. Belcher is still a very random deck. If they go Goblins, you actually have a good shot of winning because of Pernicious Deed. Competent pilots will try to mulligan for Belcher hands, but Belcher as a deck is a lot more likely to end up going Goblins than Belcher, it seems. Also, if they're mulling for Belcher, that gives us a much better shot since they'll be down cards. High Tide ends up coming down to how many Therapies/Carpets you see. Red versions tend to ignore High Tide as a deck because they have REB and Slaughter Games. That's basically a bye post-board. TES/ANT largely depends on hands. Sometimes they'll win, sometimes you'll win.

Show/Tell is the most dangerous category IMO, for one reason and one reason only: they very, very often sport Leyline of Sanctity. Rector can slam Humility, Sigarda vs Emmy, and Baneslayers vs Griselbrand, and white versions overall have access Angel of Despair, but a lot of these are dependent on what plan the Show player is on. Oftentimes, competent Sneak players will Show a Sneak, and if you Show Angel, they'll activate Sneak in response to the Angel trigger and just kill you. Red versions are usually just screwed, unless Scapewish drops like Primeval Titan and then proceeds to just enter the win the game phase. Note: if Show/Tell decks DON'T have Leyline, it's usually not that horrible of a matchup. They really, really hate discard, and Memoricide/Slaughter Games/Cranial are like, the bane of their existence.

So, what can we take away from this snapshot of the metagame?

Leyline of Sanctity is really good for us while being really bad for us. Leyline has utility vs Jund in the fair category, as well as the entire Storm family. It's even still at least marginally useful vs High Tide, because it turns off their Intuition and Gitaxian Probes (relevant if we're on Mindbreak Trap). Shutting down Intuition kills one of their main ways of grabbing Time Spiral (Merchant Scroll -> Intuition for triple Spiral). As stated previously, Leyline is one of the cards that we never want to see played against us. We don't have room for cheap enchantment destruction, and really our only effective out to it is to Pulse/Vindicate/Deed it. This tells me that we want to move more of our disruption away from being discard/target-player-based.

Spy, as it's being built in the northeast, is a very scary deck. It often runs Leylines, but it is also running 4 maindeck Pact of Negation and possibly sideboarding Chancellor of the Annex, which, when revealed from opening hand, Dazes our first spell. These 8 cards mean that we cannot rely on Mindbreak Trap's effectiveness in this matchup, and Leyline shuts down Therapy. The ONLY effective hate for this deck is Leyline of the Void. They do run usually a playset of Nature's Claims, but they often won't have boarded them in for g2. Leyline of the Void is also effective vs Dredge and Reanimator, obviously, while having applications vs Jund, Esperblade, and RUG.

Show and Tell needs to be fought, again, with non-targeted hate. Removal doesn't seem as optimal here given that Griselbrand will just draw a million cards. Rector seems okay in the Sneak matchup still, although it's a close and scary set of games every time. OmniTell and HyperGen are much, much scarier. HyperGen can be stopped effectively by Chalice of the Void on 0, which is an option that is highly effective against Spy and most Storm decks, as well. At that point, HyperGen is basically all-in on Show and Tell, which should slow them down a lot / we're already fairly prepared for.

So, I'm considering something like the following as a sideboard:

2 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Leyline of the Void
2 Mindbreak Trap
2 Chalice of the Void
2 Carpet of Flowers
1 Tsunami
1 Cranial Extraction
1 Angel of Despair
1 Nether Void
1 Humility

Things I don't like this about this sideboard: only 2 Traps and only 2 Carpets (I would rather have 3 of each). Things I do like: the 2/2/2 split of Leyline/Leyline/Chalice.

i have to say I've really like my E Tutor side board. It has worked very well in a variety of matchups.

Sideboard:

3 Enlightened Tutor
1 Choke
2 Engineered Plague
1 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Extirpate
1 Surgical extraction
1 Kitchen Finks
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Ethersworn Canonist


I can't for the life of me remember what the 15 card is lol! it might be a Maelstrom Pulse but I'm not sure.
Plague is for the Tribal decks and while 1 works well agains elves. Goblins has a lot of x/2's so a second is necessary.
Canonist and Teeg double team the storm decks. Teeg is also good against the blue decks
O-Ring is an answer to S&T
Choke shuts off blue decks and Wheel and Spellbomb are for dredge.
Kitchen Finks is for added life gain agaisnt the aggressive decks.
I've been less and less impressed with Surgical effects and find myself almost never boarding them in. those may be replaced with other cards.

I know I don't have any credibility to my name, but Leyline of the Void is bad for our Veteran Explorers. Is that worth the benefit, especially against SnT Reanimator?

Surgical Extraction seems like the better choice here, even if it isn't as strong.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by EpicLevelCommoner

I know I don't have any credibility to my name, but Leyline of the Void is bad for our Veteran Explorers. Is that worth the benefit, especially against SnT Reanimator?

Surgical Extraction seems like the better choice here, even if it isn't as strong.

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Wut. Leyline is oppnents only.

Uh ... my bad ... just remember the Loam Pox player using it against me :/ In that case it's very good.

I know of at least one other BGw NicFit player at Cinci, because I beat him round 5 or 6. Have no idea how he did after that, but he mentioned it was his first real legacy tournament.

Has anyone tested Natural Order? I've been back to using it now (after destroying tons of maverick back in the day).
I'm also playing Hymn to Tourach as well. Against sneak and show with nic fit, I found the deck to be too slow at finishing the opponent after you strip his hand. So what I do now is hope to land some good therapies/hymns with witness helping to cast them again then natural order for terastodon destroying 3 of my lands and attacking for 18 next turn. Working quite nicely so far actually.

Hi, fellow NicFitters,

I am on ScapeWish for a few months now and my quick question for you is: how much weight is pulling Tsunami in the wishboard for you? Most of the times i think about wishing for Tsunami, Scapeshift seems like the better wish target since then I have enough (or nearly enough) lands in play anyway.

best

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

What does Teeg do vs OmniTell? Just to stop him from hardcasting Omni?

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@ Arianrhod: Omniciense says you can cast without paying the manacost. Does that mean that Teeg stops them from casting spell with cmc 4 or higher? That world make sense, right?

Of course I could be misinterpretating Omnisience...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Chatto

@ Arianrhod: Omniciense says you can cast without paying the manacost. Does that mean that Teeg stops them from casting spell with cmc 4 or higher? That world make sense, right?

Of course I could be misinterpretating Omnisience...

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It shuts off exactly hardcasting Omniscience and the Petals of Insight combo. Thats it. They're left with just Emrakuling/Griselbranding you. Poor bastards.