[Deck] Nic Fit (GBx Explorer Zenith Control)

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

Okay, time for some updates.

Deadeye

Here's what I came up with. As you can see, I ended up de-cute-ing it a lot.

4 Veteran Explorer
4 Spellstutter Sprite
3 Coiling Oracle
2 Eternal Witness
1 Fierce Empath
2 Venser, Shaper Savant
2 Master Biomancer
1 Thragtusk
1 Acidic Slime
1 Deadeye Navigator
1 Prime Speaker Zegana
1 Primeval Titan

4 Cabal Therapy
4 Green Sun's Zenith

2 Force of Will

3 Sensei's Divining Top

3 Pernicious Deed

3 Tropical Island
3 Bayou
1 Underground Sea
3 Forest
3 Island
1 Swamp
3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Misty Rainforest
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Volrath's Stronghold

SB:
2 Force of Will
2 Mindbreak Trap
2 Blue Elemental Blast
4 Leyline of the Void
1 Dinrova Horror
2 Sower of Temptation
2 Jace Beleren

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I proxied up your (61 card) dead eye list you posted for some quick games against BUG tempo. It seems to do what I would want against control/combo just fine, but I wasn't impressed by spellstutter outside of those areas. Delvers were particularly troublesome when landed early and backed with permission. I changed the sprites for baleful strix and it ran better in the delver matchups, despite often pumping goyfs even higher. Have you found tempo variants to be an issue with Deadeye?

Zegana similarly wasn't very impressive for me, rarely being above a 4/4 draw three unless I had biomancer out (master biomancer being a very good reason to run this deck for the record). Venser was decent, but he definitely shines better in matchups other than the ones I was playing.

Overall, the deck ran rather well until I had to try to close the game out. I'd consider recurring nightmare as another potent engine (in addition) over maybe a witness? Thoughts on any of this?

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Originally Posted by Tammit67

I proxied up your (61 card) dead eye list you posted for some quick games against BUG tempo. It seems to do what I would want against control/combo just fine, but I wasn't impressed by spellstutter outside of those areas. Delvers were particularly troublesome when landed early and backed with permission. I changed the sprites for baleful strix and it ran better in the delver matchups, despite often pumping goyfs even higher. Have you found tempo variants to be an issue with Deadeye?

Zegana similarly wasn't very impressive for me, rarely being above a 4/4 draw three unless I had biomancer out (master biomancer being a very good reason to run this deck for the record). Venser was decent, but he definitely shines better in matchups other than the ones I was playing.

Overall, the deck ran rather well until I had to try to close the game out. I'd consider recurring nightmare as another potent engine (in addition) over maybe a witness? Thoughts on any of this?

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BUG delver tempo in particular actually does pretty good against most forms of nic fit, except GBW, and this list is no exception. Other tempo decks (RUG, UR, etc), and other BUG lists (shardless or landstill) are pretty hard to lose to. Id recommend testing it against some other decks besides BUG delver as well to get a good scope of the deck. Although, I dont/wouldnt play the deadeye list so I cant help you too much there.

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Originally Posted by Tammit67

I proxied up your (61 card) dead eye list you posted for some quick games against BUG tempo. It seems to do what I would want against control/combo just fine, but I wasn't impressed by spellstutter outside of those areas. Delvers were particularly troublesome when landed early and backed with permission. I changed the sprites for baleful strix and it ran better in the delver matchups, despite often pumping goyfs even higher. Have you found tempo variants to be an issue with Deadeye?

Zegana similarly wasn't very impressive for me, rarely being above a 4/4 draw three unless I had biomancer out (master biomancer being a very good reason to run this deck for the record). Venser was decent, but he definitely shines better in matchups other than the ones I was playing.

Overall, the deck ran rather well until I had to try to close the game out. I'd consider recurring nightmare as another potent engine (in addition) over maybe a witness? Thoughts on any of this?

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Yeah. Your overall read of the deck seems accurate -- it's specifically designed to fight control/combo, because if there's a high enough aggro presence (I consider tempo to be a form of aggro, personally), you want either Rector or Scapewish instead. Like, in my testing so far, I've found Sprites to be lacking outside of control/combo. If you run into anything even slightly aggressive, they aren't good anymore (looking at you, Jund -- although Delver is a good example too). However, I'm not sure that cutting them for Strix is the correct call, since the Sprites are your second line of defense against combo (after Therapy in the first seed).

At the point at which I feel that we're in a transient metagame, with the aggro/tempo decks making a reappearance, then I would consider having 4x of something in the sideboard, to switch out 1-for-1 with the Sprites. I'm not sure what the best option would be there, but it seems reasonable to be able to trade the Sprites up, as it were, when their unique talents are not required.

How is Zegana a 4/4 Draw 3? Wouldn't she be a 4/4 Draw 4, in that instance? Or am I misunderstanding how she works?

How was Biomancer for you, in more specifics? Obviously you liked him -- but go into more detail.

I've definitely considered Nightmare, and I can agree that it feels like the deck needs an additional way to end the game. I still say that I would kill to have Vendilion Clique in the deck, since you can drop her turn 2 after Therapy/Explorer shenanigans, she's a potent clock and additional disruption -- who also happens to play very nicely with Spellstutter, Deadeye, and Biomancer (flying flash 5/3 anyone?). I've also been missing Frost Titan in testing, since he was the deck's primary "warrior" type card. When the time comes to bring the hurt, Frosty was usually the gentleman in charge.

I'm definitely not convinced that the 6-drop package of Deadeye/Primeval/Zegana is where we want to be. Not sure what we do want, though.

Deranged Hermit looks sexy with Biomancer and blinks.
But then you want Recurring Nightmare even more.
Also, Kozilek's Predator and other eldrazi drones.

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Originally Posted by eq.firemind

Deranged Hermit looks sexy with Biomancer and blinks.
But then you want Recurring Nightmare even more.
Also, Kozilek's Predator and other eldrazi drones.

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I've actually considered Hermit a few times for this specific list. It's a bit of a corner case, but if you manage to get Hermit paired with Deadeye, you can flicker the Hermit in response to the Echo trigger and end up not paying anything for it. That makes Hermit's drawback substantially lessened, IMO -- and the list does currently run Two Towers, so worst case you can just sac him, Stronghold him, and replay him. Spitting out 4/4 squirrels with a Biomancer out seems decent.

The issue with Recurring Nightmare in this list IMO is that you don't have a way to find it. You just have to stick it in there and hope to hit it the hard way. You could run Diabolic Intent, but you want the board cluttered with dudes...not sacrificing them. You could also run Long-term Plans, but that becomes a question of space.

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

How is Zegana a 4/4 Draw 3? Wouldn't she be a 4/4 Draw 4, in that instance? Or am I misunderstanding how she works?

How was Biomancer for you, in more specifics? Obviously you liked him -- but go into more detail.

I've definitely considered Nightmare, and I can agree that it feels like the deck needs an additional way to end the game. I still say that I would kill to have Vendilion Clique in the deck, since you can drop her turn 2 after Therapy/Explorer shenanigans, she's a potent clock and additional disruption -- who also happens to play very nicely with Spellstutter, Deadeye, and Biomancer (flying flash 5/3 anyone?). I've also been missing Frost Titan in testing, since he was the deck's primary "warrior" type card. When the time comes to bring the hurt, Frosty was usually the gentleman in charge.

I'm definitely not convinced that the 6-drop package of Deadeye/Primeval/Zegana is where we want to be. Not sure what we do want, though.

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Yeah, completely a typo on Zegana draw. Obviously she is really good should you get thragtusk/primeval tiatan/deadeye to stick, but then she feels win more. Landing her on a board of 1/1s or 2/2s is underwhelming. A second thragtusk or a U/B different titan might be preferred (or deranged hermit as suggested)?

Biomancer I have a not-so-secret crush on, but he was able to turn the normally weaker top decks late game of coiling oracle/explorer into more than just value creatures. Being able to double block a goyf to trade either of them for it is rather nice, as is venser being a 4/4. there are certainly hands that don't let you do much with him, as you rely on the top of your deck to find creatures after you play him. I often found myself GSZ a turn later to just get thragtusk or acidic slime. Certainly more can be done to maximize his impact.

Clique would be very strong here, I think, and would certainly boost Zegana's potential by having reasonably sized creatures in the 3-4 drop slot. The list feels very tight though, I wouldn't know what to drop to make room. Even the cards I have mentioned to not entirely be impressed with curve well and have functions outside of the brief run through I gave the list.

I'm not really worried about not being able to find nightmare, just having another bomb will probably put the density of them where I feel more comfortable.

3 sensei's divining top

1 eternal witness
1 wolfir silverheart
4 spellstutter sprite
2 vendilion clique
2 venser, shaper savant
1 glen elendra archmage
3 veteran explorer

3 pernicious deed

4 brainstorm
3 force of will

4 cabal therapy
2 green sun's zenith
3 living wish

2 Jace, the mind sculptor

1 bayou
3 forest
3 island
4 misty rainforest
3 polluted delta
1 swamp
2 tropical island
1 underground sea
4 verdant catacombs

SB:
1 deadeye navigator
1 eternal witness
1 thragtusk
1 veteran explorer
1 vampire hexmage
1 scavenging ooze

1 pernicious deed

3 counterbalance
1 force of will
2 surgical extraction

1 bojuka bog
1 karakas

This is my take on this intresting path of nic fit! So far it's been working out greatly ;) Right now the list obv has its issues vs tempo/aggro. Imo that must be the whole point of developing a new nic fit list, IE making it much stronger in the anti combo department while still maintaining its inherit strength vs tempo/manadenial. And currently it seems that the reduction of greenzun/veteran making it lack consistancy has made it perhaps to weak vs aggro/tempo. Therefore it could still use more tuning however i find it exceptionally hard to modify currently without removing the forces (blue count) which i feel is somehow the point of playing this version of nic fit.

I would really like to test more with the forces since i feel that nic fit's weakest link is its game1 vs unknown deck. Cabal therapy is just so much better g2, and if you somehow manage to wait until you fire off ur first cabals ur in so much better shape vs the unknown decks. Force + spellstrutter partially allows you to wait. With all the bounce (venser/jace) and just general opponent revealing cards (mystic/delvers/ringleader etc) together with Vindilion revealing, cabals is also very much live even in the later stages of the game.

The different take of this deck is that it whats to have enough early game disruption that it dosnt necesessarily have to fire off explorers into the unknown which i feel is also is potentially very strong.

Considering its lategame bombs i feel that deadeye is more than enough, and no matter what you pair it with it should pretty much always seal you the deal. I cannot understand why you would like to include pieces like zegana/palinchron, biomancer, for me all those are just winmore and very slow combo pieces. I mean in what situations do you really want a biomancer? The way i see this deck is that early game you want disruption or ramp, from which u must assume that vs most decks in order to regain the loss of tempo you have to deed. After deed you wanna lay down ur threats or control elements depending on what style you wish to proceed to end the game. Biomancer imo falls into the vacuum category in between IE neither do you wanna play him before deed nor do you wanna play him after deed, since by then ur essentially out of cards, and you need to topdeck a fellow in order to get value from the fellaw. I mean i dont see many scenarios where he can help you stabilize board predeed.

I did however try to play wolfir for the slot just for some testing since hes very much a superfast clock post deed and hes a very nice combat trick with all ur flashing dudes, hes espcially nice since most ur dudes are also flying :). What he also might do although rather unlikely is that he might help you stabilize predeed. Although im not entirely sold on him as of yet. I also felt to try out glen elendra which has been okish, although i feel shes also a superstrong postdeed drop and might fill wholes vs things like scapewish where you pretty much need ur reusable counterspell, since shes very strong with bounce. Shes also helps to stabilize predeed since shes got persist and flyes, so she can buy you a turn, she also triggers ur spellstrutter and is exceptional vs some combo if you manage to disrupt early game, shes also a bluecard for force which is essential :).

I'm actually thinking however of including rapid hybridization since its pitchable to force, it can ramp you with exlorer and add token. And it can remove annoying creatures predeed or postdeed like deathrites/confidant etc while the token easily dies to deed, or bounce :). This since atm the deck is still weak vs tempo, but still wants to remain blueheavy for forces.

And i love your work on this archetype aHood! Although you are really optimistic about your control into combo deck, vintage style, (although miracle rip/helm essentially is) I'm still doubtful since i believe for these control archetypes you need all your cards to be good on their own. It's exceptionally refreshing though with some1 who really is putting lots of work into develping NEW THINGS instead of sticking to this same old.

What say you ? ;)

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Originally Posted by drfontaine

3 sensei's divining top

1 eternal witness
1 wolfir silverheart
4 spellstutter sprite
2 vendilion clique
2 venser, shaper savant
1 glen elendra archmage
3 veteran explorer

3 pernicious deed

4 brainstorm
3 force of will

4 cabal therapy
2 green sun's zenith
3 living wish

2 Jace, the mind sculptor

1 bayou
3 forest
3 island
4 misty rainforest
3 polluted delta
1 swamp
2 tropical island
1 underground sea
4 verdant catacombs

SB:
1 deadeye navigator
1 eternal witness
1 thragtusk
1 veteran explorer
1 vampire hexmage
1 scavenging ooze

1 pernicious deed

3 counterbalance
1 force of will
2 surgical extraction

1 bojuka bog
1 karakas

This is my take on this intresting path of nic fit! So far it's been working out greatly ;) Right now the list obv has its issues vs tempo/aggro. Imo that must be the whole point of developing a new nic fit list, IE making it much stronger in the anti combo department while still maintaining its inherit strength vs tempo/manadenial. And currently it seems that the reduction of greenzun/veteran making it lack consistancy has made it perhaps to weak vs aggro/tempo. Therefore it could still use more tuning however i find it exceptionally hard to modify currently without removing the forces (blue count) which i feel is somehow the point of playing this version of nic fit.

I would really like to test more with the forces since i feel that nic fit's weakest link is its game1 vs unknown deck. Cabal therapy is just so much better g2, and if you somehow manage to wait until you fire off ur first cabals ur in so much better shape vs the unknown decks. Force + spellstrutter partially allows you to wait. With all the bounce (venser/jace) and just general opponent revealing cards (mystic/delvers/ringleader etc) together with Vindilion revealing, cabals is also very much live even in the later stages of the game.

The different take of this deck is that it whats to have enough early game disruption that it dosnt necesessarily have to fire off explorers into the unknown which i feel is also is potentially very strong.

Considering its lategame bombs i feel that deadeye is more than enough, and no matter what you pair it with it should pretty much always seal you the deal. I cannot understand why you would like to include pieces like zegana/palinchron, biomancer, for me all those are just winmore and very slow combo pieces. I mean in what situations do you really want a biomancer? The way i see this deck is that early game you want disruption or ramp, from which u must assume that vs most decks in order to regain the loss of tempo you have to deed. After deed you wanna lay down ur threats or control elements depending on what style you wish to proceed to end the game. Biomancer imo falls into the vacuum category in between IE neither do you wanna play him before deed nor do you wanna play him after deed, since by then ur essentially out of cards, and you need to topdeck a fellow in order to get value from the fellaw. I mean i dont see many scenarios where he can help you stabilize board predeed.

I did however try to play wolfir for the slot just for some testing since hes very much a superfast clock post deed and hes a very nice combat trick with all ur flashing dudes, hes espcially nice since most ur dudes are also flying :). What he also might do although rather unlikely is that he might help you stabilize predeed. Although im not entirely sold on him as of yet. I also felt to try out glen elendra which has been okish, although i feel shes also a superstrong postdeed drop and might fill wholes vs things like scapewish where you pretty much need ur reusable counterspell, since shes very strong with bounce. Shes also helps to stabilize predeed since shes got persist and flyes, so she can buy you a turn, she also triggers ur spellstrutter and is exceptional vs some combo if you manage to disrupt early game, shes also a bluecard for force which is essential :).

I'm actually thinking however of including rapid hybridization since its pitchable to force, it can ramp you with exlorer and add token. And it can remove annoying creatures predeed or postdeed like deathrites/confidant etc while the token easily dies to deed, or bounce :). This since atm the deck is still weak vs tempo, but still wants to remain blueheavy for forces.

And i love your work on this archetype aHood! Although you are really optimistic about your control into combo deck, vintage style, (although miracle rip/helm essentially is) I'm still doubtful since i believe for these control archetypes you need all your cards to be good on their own. It's exceptionally refreshing though with some1 who really is putting lots of work into develping NEW THINGS instead of sticking to this same old.

What say you ? ;)

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I think there's a lot of good ideas here, but that you're probably unnecessarily hobbling yourself by playing The Good Cards.

Things I like:

Glen Elendra -- I have a not-so-secret crush on this card, and I have had since the days of Bant Survival. It plays well with Spellstutter, it's a hard-counter for any non-creature thing (which is usually the category that Nic Fit hates: see Jace TMS, Liliana/Veil, anything from storm, Show and Tell, etc), and it forms a nice pseudo-lock with Deadeye (flickering gets rid of the persist counter). At the same time, I don't know what Glen Elendra is actively good enough. She's really expensive, and she occupies much the same space as Venser does. She's probably fine as a 1-of to test with and see how she works.

Wolfir Silverheart -- This makes all the sense in the world with our higher number of flash creatures, and fulfills the "3rd 4-drop" slot despite not being a 4-drop. I regard Biomancer as the best chance that BUG has at replicating the Power 4-drop slot from the other lists (Rector and Huntmaster), but I don't think Biomancer is good enough / pushed enough to actually warrant a 3rd copy. Wolfir does what we want Biomancer to do....arguably better. I don't think that we're to the point where we can afford to cut Biomancer, though.

Room for V. Clique -- I wanttttttttttt it.

Things I don't like:

The Good Cards. Brainstorm and Jace are a deckbuilding disease. Jace will never be as good here as he is in something like Tao's Jace Fit, let alone a "real" Jace deck like BUGstill or Esperblade. Brainstorm is a powerful 1-shot, but it's actively worse than Top, because you can do Top as many times as you want.

The Wishes. I tried them, and didn't like them. I'd rather have the dudes maindeck and have an actual sideboard. One of the strengths of running blue, aside from Force of Will, is that you get to run more stack-based interaction in the sideboard.

If you cut Brainstorm, Jace, and Wish, you get 9 slots. That can be the 4th Explorer, the 3rd Green Sun, Thragtusk, Empath, Deadeye, and any other 4 creatures you want, which seems way better to me.

The strength of Biomancer, to me, is that he provides you a legitimate way to win the game, by making all of your utility 1/1s into sizable threats.

What are everyone's thoughts on Fathom Mage as a backup draw engine, perhaps instead of Zegana? Mage is cheaper and relies less on having big dudes in play already. The primary issue with Mage is that she might be a little harder to evolve. Witness evolves her, as does Venser and Clique, Biomancer is silly with her, and then the obvious 6-drops. Something else that might serve to help evolve her while not being bad for the deck would be Wall of Blossoms. I think that she's good enough to be worthy of discussing, but I'm not sure that I think she's good enough to actually test.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

I think there's a lot of good ideas here, but that you're probably unnecessarily hobbling yourself by playing The Good Cards.

Things I like:

Glen Elendra -- I have a not-so-secret crush on this card, and I have had since the days of Bant Survival. It plays well with Spellstutter, it's a hard-counter for any non-creature thing (which is usually the category that Nic Fit hates: see Jace TMS, Liliana/Veil, anything from storm, Show and Tell, etc), and it forms a nice pseudo-lock with Deadeye (flickering gets rid of the persist counter). At the same time, I don't know what Glen Elendra is actively good enough. She's really expensive, and she occupies much the same space as Venser does. She's probably fine as a 1-of to test with and see how she works.

Wolfir Silverheart -- This makes all the sense in the world with our higher number of flash creatures, and fulfills the "3rd 4-drop" slot despite not being a 4-drop. I regard Biomancer as the best chance that BUG has at replicating the Power 4-drop slot from the other lists (Rector and Huntmaster), but I don't think Biomancer is good enough / pushed enough to actually warrant a 3rd copy. Wolfir does what we want Biomancer to do....arguably better. I don't think that we're to the point where we can afford to cut Biomancer, though.

Room for V. Clique -- I wanttttttttttt it.

Things I don't like:

The Good Cards. Brainstorm and Jace are a deckbuilding disease. Jace will never be as good here as he is in something like Tao's Jace Fit, let alone a "real" Jace deck like BUGstill or Esperblade. Brainstorm is a powerful 1-shot, but it's actively worse than Top, because you can do Top as many times as you want.

The Wishes. I tried them, and didn't like them. I'd rather have the dudes maindeck and have an actual sideboard. One of the strengths of running blue, aside from Force of Will, is that you get to run more stack-based interaction in the sideboard.

If you cut Brainstorm, Jace, and Wish, you get 9 slots. That can be the 4th Explorer, the 3rd Green Sun, Thragtusk, Empath, Deadeye, and any other 4 creatures you want, which seems way better to me.

The strength of Biomancer, to me, is that he provides you a legitimate way to win the game, by making all of your utility 1/1s into sizable threats.

What are everyone's thoughts on Fathom Mage as a backup draw engine, perhaps instead of Zegana? Mage is cheaper and relies less on having big dudes in play already. The primary issue with Mage is that she might be a little harder to evolve. Witness evolves her, as does Venser and Clique, Biomancer is silly with her, and then the obvious 6-drops. Something else that might serve to help evolve her while not being bad for the deck would be Wall of Blossoms. I think that she's good enough to be worthy of discussing, but I'm not sure that I think she's good enough to actually test.

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Thanks alot for your input as always ahod!

Considering the disease include i completly agree that jace will never be half as good as in other decks, that dosnt mean i didnt put alot of thought into including him nor brainstorm. Thing is you need the bluecount, which is the same reason i like the wish package, it saves slots. You lose tempo but add flex, and saves you from clogged hands. Brainstorm is also super with the counterbalance SB. Which for me makes perfect sense for BUG fit, since its exactly the card you want in matchups where deed is bad, which is really the only anti synergistic card with cb in main.

Im def open to suggestions concerning jace slots, however i need b count, want something that survives deed and helps predeed, and dosnt clog. Therefore jace makes somewhat sense. I dont consider biomancer nor fathom mage no matter hos much i like the beautiful cards. They wont help me when im behind.

Flash btw i think is very nice with veteran since when times he chumps cause opp decides they wanna attack him you can use the mana and respond with ur flash creatures :).

http://sales.starcitygames.com/cardd...product=299990

Korean Explorer at 16 (on sale) at SCG. Go nuts, people.

With all those slots, and the desire for card advantage and blue count, why not do something like 3 coiling oracle, 3 baleful strix? They dont draw you 6 cards like Zengra will do on rare occasion, but They net you a card every time, help ramp and stop creatures respectively, can be FoW pitched, and drawing them later in the game with a biomancer out is obviously awesome. Strix also does well with Wolfir Silverheart.

I can see the argument for no Jace as valid, he does much better in reactive decks that pack tons of permission (UWx, BUGstill, etc). But Brainstorm is still really good. At its worst it's a blue card that replaces itself eot, at its best it's ancestral visions or discard protection. I still think 4of is good idea.


I also tried your scapeshift modifications. Regardless of the Pneedles in the SB, I really liked swapping decays for more ramp doods. Avenger of zendikar won me some games that I probably* would have lost of otherwise. However, I never needed him because valakuts were not an option, I just saw GSZ before shifts/BWs those games. I dont think Ill be running him (cutting to 60 cards), but if not being able to valakut becomes a common problem I can see his justification. When he was good, he was good. Im not sure about my exact SB, but Ill be playing something very similar to that list tomorrow.

Are you going to be playing deadeye at mythic tomorrow? In the state that it is at now, it looks much better.

Glen Elendra does play pretty well with Biomancer for a soft lock of sorts unless I'm missing something, though that seems really win-more.

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Originally Posted by Undomian

Glen Elendra does play pretty well with Biomancer for a soft lock of sorts unless I'm missing something, though that seems really win-more.

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I didn't even think of that. Corner-case, to be sure -- but it's at least a half a point in Glen Elendra's favor.

Although, I will note that this gets me wondering yet again why we've never tried to port Melira Pod from Modern into a Nic Fit shell. I've wondered this like eight times, thought about it for half a sec, gave it a "huh," and moved on with my life. One of these days I should probably put more thought into that lol.

I think if any color of nic fit should be playing Pod, its BUG. With BS and instant speed permission, blue is the only color that can really defend the pod engine (and the graveyard) even if white or red have "better" creatures to be pod'd into.

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Originally Posted by TheArchitect

With all those slots, and the desire for card advantage and blue count, why not do something like 3 coiling oracle, 3 baleful strix? They dont draw you 6 cards like Zengra will do on rare occasion, but They net you a card every time, help ramp and stop creatures respectively, can be FoW pitched, and drawing them later in the game with a biomancer out is obviously awesome. Strix also does well with Wolfir Silverheart.

I can see the argument for no Jace as valid, he does much better in reactive decks that pack tons of permission (UWx, BUGstill, etc). But Brainstorm is still really good. At its worst it's a blue card that replaces itself eot, at its best it's ancestral visions or discard protection. I still think 4of is good idea.

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Strixes are probably useful, however they are at their best when protecting pws which is not really plan a. They are also cantrip for annoying mana in some matchups, and in moar cases id prefer not to tap out, representing sprite or counter or just save mana for top, they ofc also die to deed. Oracle i feel is only ok when it ramps, but alot of time he wont even be able to chump cause flying and unless i aint got no cabal in gy, he feels lacking but perhaps i should test more.

Right now im actually considering remand as a strong contender to improve the midrange matchups. Hard matchups atm include jund and bug tempo etc, vs those i can remand Lily, confidant, hymn etc and it would be great! I like the synergy with cabal and considering nic fits very strong topdeckmode i dont mind to reduce its power a bit. I feel the card should be ok in all mu, while beeing strong vs midrange where the deck really needs help! And i would just love to remand fow ;)!

I also really wanna test cryptic command since its synergy with the deck is strong.

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

http://sales.starcitygames.com/cardd...product=299990

Korean Explorer at 16 (on sale) at SCG. Go nuts, people.

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Snapped that right up along with a bunch of foreign stuff because it's ALL ON SALE. Thanks!

@TheArchitect and Arianrhod

Pod is an engine that requires a lot of fuel. You need to have a lot of creatures available that are both good on their own and grant enough value to be worth podding out. In modern, this works great because the format is extremely combo light (quasi non-existent) and/or the combos aren't fast enough/easy to protect which makes ramp and permanent based approaches much more reliable strategies. It also works because exile removal is more scarce and usually comes at a hefty price (PtE) making Persist and Undying great value mechanics. Cards like Kitchen Finks are extremely good on their own because of all the above + the fact that it gains life, which is highly relevant in a shockland format. While Legacy holds the bigger card pool, it doesn't however, allow you to play 3-4 colors safely unlike modern where your creature pool is most limited by the time of their release rather than their mana cost. When creatures aren't running the format, Pod's uses become very limited. Trying to squeeze in a permission/disruption/removal suite not in creature form is a great way to poke holes at your gas tank before a long trip.

On the topic of Brainstorm and Jace being deck-building diseases. I couldn't disagree more. Brainstorm and Jace are cards that Nic Fit needs more so than most decks playing them in the first place. Asserting that they don't belong in this deck only shows how misunderstood their application is. A deck-building disease would be something along the lines of desperately trying to make a card that goes against the fundamental principles of your deck strategy because it can be potentially game-breaking in the advent that your opponent has none of the conventional answers or that you can keep them in check via other cards (YAWN: You.Are.Winning.Now). I have been reading this forum lately with my forehead stuck to my palms and felt like some things needed to be reminded. I will try to use more colors because the trend seems to be towards cute things.

What makes Nic Fit good:

-Asymmetrical ramp of two basic lands or more. When this effect is symmetrical, it becomes tempo for card disadvantage and Nic Fit's core strategy loses value. Asymmetrical has two meanings here:
1) Your opponent does not have 2 basics to fetch;
2) Your opponent does not have cards that abuse a higher land count.

-The presence of decks affected by board wipes in your metagame, namely Deed. There is no equivalent to Pernicious Deed against decks that don't use permanents to win (Mind Twist is banned). Nic Fit being green and black at its core only offers limited disruption against combo decks. If you find yourself siding them out often, play another deck!

-The presence and availability of game-breaking spells (bombs). Usually the higher the mana cost, the greater the effect. Inversely, the greater the mana cost, the higher the chances of it being a dead card. This is mostly avoided by packing the least copies possible but having a reliable way to find them. Currently, our best tools to accomplish that purpose are Green Sun's Zenith, Brainstorm, and Jace. The latter is often both a tool and an agent which leads to a loop that constantly brings you more means of winning a game.

Take Caleb D. for example, he built Nic Fit when the metagame was ripe for a Deed.dec (AKA: Maverick/RUG era), he tried to make it a better deck by including what it lacked compared to the other competitive control decks (Brainstorm and Jace), and he finally moved on to something else when combo and control re-emerged and FoW was too much of a stretch for Nic Fit (SnT/Miracle era).

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Originally Posted by TheArchitect

Are you going to be playing deadeye at mythic tomorrow? In the state that it is at now, it looks much better.

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On a related note, anyone going to Indy? I do believe I will be playing Rector on Sunday.

I agree with Qweerios. I'd even say Jace is fantastic in any version of Nic Fit with Blue - whether it's Chrono, BUG, Future Sight, Deadeye. The bombs in Nic Fit are there either to provide huge card advantage (Future Sight, for example), win conditions (fat creatures, for example), or lock components (like Moat) or planeswalkers. Is there any other card that fits all these criteria for 4 mana? Some will fit 2 or even 3, but not for just 4 mana. (I consider Jace's +2 a soft lock because of the insane difficulty of an opponent actually winning once you start ticking him up.) Jace is the Burning Wish/Scapewish for blue. Lots of versatility, card advantage, stalling, kills enemy Jaces, soft lock component, win-condition, can replay comes-into-play triggers if necessary, can return your creature before popping a Deed, etc. Of course, once you've got Jace, Strix looks like a really good idea. Jace just does a lot, even if he is cliche.

I agree with everything qweerios said.

- the claim that Brainstorm is bad in Nic Fit is ludicrous. Early on it finds you Therapies, Lands and Explorers, in the late game it shuffles them away. In the late game it finds you bombs, in the early game it shuffles them away. Against Combo it finds you disruption and shuffles away Abrupt Decay, against a Tempo deck that spits out its hand it finds you Abrupt Decay and shuffles away Discard. Post board it increases the number of SB cards you draw. Brainstorm is the best card ever and does everything you want. At the absolutely worst it cycles for one mana.

- Jace is awesome. Clear 4-off. Who needs synergy when you have Jace? Isochron Scepter with Brainstorm imprinted, that is Jace's synergy.

- Pod is extremely difficult to get to work properly. The only way I see it getting used is a a 1-of or a 2-of in a deck that naturally plays a solid creature curve (for example with Huntmaster or Rector on CMC 4). I won't say it is impossible to make a dedicated Pod list with 3 or 4 Pods, but it is hard because it puts so much restraints on the deck building. I tried but have given up on it.

It's not better to play a normal BUG nic fit list with deadeye instead the grave or primeval titan?

the deadeye list looks a bit inconsistent playing only 1 deadeye.

My thoughts:
-Brainstorm is an auto 4-of in any blue list and JMS is at least an auto 2-of, just because of their potential to manipulate both your hand and your library. Whereas Top has more longevity and thus allows for more activations, Brainstorm and JMS provide significantly more power with one activation.

-The goal of the Deadeye list is to run a minimal number of 6+ CMC drops then use Fierce Empath with Deadeye to pull them out. Basically, if you get to untap once or twice with Deadeye and something with a strong etb effect, you win.

I've been tinkering with my BuG Gift list of late again. Last week I brought the deck to a local tournament and it was again fun to play, but had the feeling something was still missing from the deck. With a result of 2-2-1 my two losses were to Canadian Thresh and Affinity and both crushed me in the early game. Though this might have been also due to (bad) luck/bad plays I felt that my early game was too weak to face such very aggressive decks. I also noticed that I boarded out Recurring Nightmare and Consecrated Sphinx almost every game 2 (and 3), so I decided to cut these and make some room for brainstorm, a card I had already for some time in my mind but couldn't figure out what to cut. I've tested the list a couple of times yesterday, but still had that little 'meh' feeling now and then. Tomorrow is another small tournament to which I will bring this list, because I don't have the opportunity to change a lot before tomorrow. Anyway, the list:

4 Veteran Explorer
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Snapcaster mage
2 Eternal Witness
1 Huntmaster of the Fells
1 Thragtusk
1 Wolvir Silverheart

2 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Pernicious Deed

4 Cabal Therapy
4 Green Sun's Zenith
2 Innocent Blood
1 Unearth
1 Maelstrom Pulse

4 Brainstorm
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Gifts Ungiven

1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Forest
3 Island
2 Swamp
1 Mountain
2 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
1 Underground Sea
2 Phyrexian Tower

// SB
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Duress
3 Daze
4 Negate
3 Extirpate
1 Surgical Extraction

The sideboard used to contain a Kitchen Finks and 2 Pithing needle, but those were underperforming. I moved Thrun from main to SB as it is outclassed by Huntmaster in almost every matchup and I have pondered on more discard for some time, so decided to test 2 duress in the SB versus combo/(blue) control.

For the MB I've been thinking if the brainstorms are worth the slots, yes they might be good, but was not too satisfied with the effect. One alternative I was concidering is -4 brainstorm, +1 Top, +1 Abrupt (they are so good!), +1 Jace and +1 something. On the other hand, I already have lots of creature removal so a fourth decay might not be worth it. More discard is also an option. Do people have experience with Hymn to Tourach in the MB? I don't like thoughtseize due to the life loss, which I already have a hard time with sometimes (I'd rather search for Wolvir than Thragtusk as finisher, only when I really need the life I look for Thragtusk). Any tips/comments? Cutting Gifts is not an option, I love it and suits my playstyle very well. Main reason to play blue as splash ;). Daze is a similar personal decision, I like to have some interaction early on vs combo and stuff like that, but those can be changed if I get some good suggestions. Fire away!

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Originally Posted by Nils Gutiérrez

It's not better to play a normal BUG nic fit list with deadeye instead the grave or primeval titan?

the deadeye list looks a bit inconsistent playing only 1 deadeye.

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I would not recommend playing Deadeye at all, in any version. I think the card is bad. It was not good enough for Block Constructed, Standard or Modern.

- You do not need 6-drops to beat combo, that matchup is usually decided by preventing them from killing you and you win with Witness or Thrun beatdown.
-You also don't need special 6-drops against Midrange, Aggro or Tempo. Those matchups are decided by overcoming their disruption, controlling the board and harvesting real card advantage (Jace, Liliana, Deed, Witness, Punishing Fire) or virtual card advantage (Rector, Huntmaster, Cabal Therapy) while doing so. After that any 6-drop will be sufficient.
- 6-drops are important against other control decks though to break a stall, because the games go longer and they might be able to answer all weaker drops. But those decks are currently almost exclusively UW/x and so they run 4 Swords to Plowshares and 3 Snapcaster Mages. That means that the same second a targetable threat hits the board it gets exiled, (almost) no exceptions. Deadeye gives you nothing in that situation (even IF you manage to play it with 8 mana in play they should easily be able to play around the soulbound) while Primeval leaves you with 2 unblockable lands.

I got 8th at Mythic today out of like 36 people. I used this Scapewish list:

4 Veteran Explorer
3 Sakura-Tribe Elder
2 Wood Elves
1 Eternal Witness
3 Huntmaster of the Fells
2 Thragtusk
1 Primeval Titan

4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Burning Wish
2 Scapeshift

3 Pernicious Deed
4 Cabal Therapy

4 Forest
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
4 Taiga
3 Badlands
2 Bayou
1 Phyrexian Tower
2 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
2 Verdant Catacombs
1 Volrath's Stronghold


SB: 2 Relic of Progenitus
SB: 2 Mindbreak Trap
SB: 2 Red Elemental Blast
SB: 1 Slaughter Games
SB: 1 Pyroclasm
SB: 1 Reanimate
SB: 1 Thoughtseize
SB: 1 Scapeshift
SB: 1 Maelstrom Pulse
SB: 1 Innocent Blood
SB: 1 Virtue's Ruin
SB: 1 Ruination


R1: A nice guy who unfortunately the only casual player in the room - Green creatures

1-0

R2: Bryant Cook - TES
The Storm master kept a slow G1 hand that had like the nuts against a blue deck (triple silence/probe). I had top, the right lands, BW and no therapies. He discarded my burning wish target (thoughtseize) after silencing me. I had plenty of time and was able to strip his hand around turn 5 and then win (with valakuts i think?).

Game 2 I hit his hand pretty hard, and he knows I have mindbreak trap in hand so has to find a way around it. He recovers his hand while I get to 30 with 2 thrags, and have him at 1. I manage to therapy for 3 Rite of flames and then flashback to hit his past in flames. At this point, i have REB, MTB in hand and MTB on top. Lands are not an issue, he silences me, does some rituals, cantrips and LEDs, flashes back the PiF and tendrils me for exactly 30 :/

G3, I think i went t1 therapy and hit and LED. I dont remember exactly what happened, I think he top decked another LED. Probed me and saw (among other things) Vet, tower, BW, and then made 16 goblins. He missed the play I had though. Cause then I played explorer, tower, made 2 black and got 2 mountain and BW for pyroclasm. I won sometime later.

2-0, I was pretty happy pumped here, I beat a bad matchup and piloted by the decks progenitor itself.

R3: Eli Kassis with 4c RIP helm control.
G1, I wreck his hand, he misses a critical land drop he needed for JTMS, and scapeshift him a while later after dealing with his energy field.
G2/3, He has FoW for just the right things and kills me very quickly both games with his combo. I think he killed me turn 4 or 5 both games. He was running felwar stone like a champ!

2-1, This matchup made me sad I dropped the Abrupt Decays and wish I had room for reverent silence or hullbreach in my SB.

R4: Theo - Goblins
Finally I good match (so I thought). I dont remember G1/2. But G3, after a few deeds, many dead vets, and a pyroclasm, I thought I had him totally out of the game. I had deed in play, and deed in hand. I was at 7, but he had zero creatures or cards in hand. He topdecks his 1 Siege gang commander, throws goblins at me to put me at 1. I HAVE to dead, or he can untap and throw the commander itself at me. I deed for 5, and drop the other deed. He topdecks a ringleader and gets me with haste.

2-2, Losing to goblins shouldnt happen with this deck :/

R5: Andrew - Fish
Dont remember many details for this one either. He had a MD clique and jitte which caught me off guard and wrecked me G1. G2 and 3 the angry mountains did their thing. G3 was VERY close, I missed my only therapy of the day this match and it made things a lot harder. For future reference when blind theraping against fish, ALWAYS NAME SILVERGILL.

3-2, I can still make it if I 4-2.

R6: Ed Demicco - Monoblack Smallpox
Ed 2-0'd me last month with pox, so I was pretty bummed to have to play that again. G1 I keep a very risky hand with 2 non-basics, tribe elder, therapy and some other stuff. I therapy a bob away, and see 2 Nights whisper and a bloodgast. I play the tribe elder, and make what I later realized was definitely the right play and saced elder to therapy his 2 Nights whisper. He doesnt see lily, but beats me down with 2 bloodgasts, and a bob he draws eventually. I play 2 Huntmasters, but he deals with both them with a cursed scroll. I note the that only card hes keeping in his hand for scroll is 1 dark ritual. I joke about how nasty a turn 1 lily would be. He has leathal on board, but with a fetch, I am able to top into a scapeshift for 36 damage!

G2 he does it. Turn 1 lily. Turn 2 hymn. GOD. Ive lost at this point, but play it out anyways.

G3 He small poxes me a few times, but is landscrewed enough himself that he doesnt even use his wasteland. I discard a primetime to one of the early poxes keeping lands and tribe elder in favor of him. He plays 2 cursed scrolls while I ramp. He draws a land and gets back 3 blood gasts that he had discarded to his small poxes. Reanimate earns its keep as I get back that prime titan and scapeshift a couple turns later, while I get dangerously close to dead.

4-2 Yay top 8, just barely. Top 8 is 2 TES, 1 Hermit Druid combo, 1 Omnicence (I think with dream halls and enter the infinite?), Mav, goblins and elves.

T8, R1 - Cook again - TES
G1, I have to mull to 4 and keep top, 2 land, and something irrelevant. He Gets me turn 2 with grapeshot for 7 and a tendrils for for 16.
G2, I therapy his LED and he cant win immediately with the rest of his hand. He mainphase BS into LED, tutor, something good. NIIIICE. He probes me and sees I have deed, bw, and valakut as my only land (with just my bayou in play). He makes 14 goblins and passes. Now In my head Im thinking, all I need is 1 land I got this. Just need to draw a land. I draw a forest and instaslam it down. YES! WAIT, SHIT. Now I need to draw ANOTHER land, cause valakuts the only other one in my hand. I go down to 6 and draw not-a-land. and I need either red for BW, or 3 mana for Deed.

Like usual, I get a solid punt in but whatever. I probably would have lost G3. It's still a overall bad matchup.




There might might be a game I am forgetting, but I dont think I won a SINGLE game by attacking with creatures today. They obviously helped me get there, but valakuts ended it every time.

I really liked dropping the Decays for more ramp guys. It sucked against the RIP combo, but was better in every other matchup.

I never NEEDED Avenger of Zendikar, however, there might have been a chance to play it against pox where it would have been good. I dont remember if I ever had 8 lands and GSZ though. While not bad, I dont think the card is needed unless the meta is full of a lot more midrangy decks (SSG open maybe?).

Relic of progenitus, I only brought in against TES and pox, I mainly wanted it there for drs/goyf/tombostalker/mongoose decks. I still think Id run these If i was expecting these decks. BUG and Junk can be pretty tough for me sometimes. In those matches, I usually go -1 ewit, -1 thrag, +2 Relic.

I think I might drop ruination. It really isnt worth the slot unless Im expected 2-4 turbo eldrazi decks. Thats really the only thing its good/needed against and I might just have to accept the loss if I see glacial chasms. Id like to squeeze in reverent silence for RIP, random enchantress, and mostly leylines.

Overall I'm still pretty happy with the deck. I know its far from the best deck in my Meta right now but its fun and Ive been consistently top 8 or top 16 with it.

ScapeWish is still viable. Yesterday I played a GPT (32 players). I switched over to Jund but one of my friends ran ScapeWish (he copied the list I used card for card) We both made top8. Since neither of us was interested in the byes we scooped to our opponents but still played for fun. We both won and would have been paired against eachother.

So it's still possible to make top8 finishes with ScapeWish eventhough it might not be the best build right now.
The changes in the meta is bad for almost all NicFit builds (there's lots of combo and BUG out there right now) so I'm not sure what build to run right now.
I've been testing the BUG list Ariarhrod posted earlier but found it lacking. The Master Biomancer is really good and fun but I doubt its better than a build with Jace and Liliana tbh.

I still think scapewish is the best Nic Fit variant in most metas. But I think right now nic fit isn't too good. Do you guys remember right around, and about 3 months before, DRS and abrupt decay came out the top 16s at big events had like 1-2 combo decks in them? Well now they have like 6-10 combo decks in them because everyone started play GBx midrangey decks, and everyone else cut back on countermagic to react to that change.

The meta has swayed pretty far towards being combo heavy. It will bounce back soon once people realize that RUG and UWx Miracles are still really good decks. And then then jund and junk will rise again to fight those, and then combo (like we have now) will be in power. It is the cyclical nature of legacy. Nic fit does best in the RUG/UW and GBx meta, but right now, poorly in the combo meta.

I still think Scapeshift is about the same, possibly better, against combo than other nic fit variants. Lets face it, except for a BUG list with 12+ ways to discard or counter stuff on turn 1 and something like Lily or Jace to lock up the game once it gets to turn 3-4, nic fit is always going to be pretty bad against combo. Even rector or disruption heavy GB, statistically SHOULD lose to combo most of the time.

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Originally Posted by XdeckX

ScapeWish is still viable. Yesterday I played a GPT (32 players). I switched over to Jund but one of my friends ran ScapeWish (he copied the list I used card for card) We both made top8. Since neither of us was interested in the byes we scooped to our opponents but still played for fun. We both won and would have been paired against eachother.

So it's still possible to make top8 finishes with ScapeWish eventhough it might not be the best build right now.
The changes in the meta is bad for almost all NicFit builds (there's lots of combo and BUG out there right now) so I'm not sure what build to run right now.
I've been testing the BUG list Ariarhrod posted earlier but found it lacking. The Master Biomancer is really good and fun but I doubt its better than a build with Jace and Liliana tbh.

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Pretty much agreed on all counts.

The thing with Scapewish is that it's largely a 50/50 game. You're playing the odds of getting paired up against combo vs against fair.dec. If you hit a fair deck, you almost always win. If you hit a combo deck, you almost always lose. I'm not saying that Scapewish can't beat unfair decks. Evan beat Bryant Cook this weekend, and a few months ago, I took Scapewish to the top 4 by beating Ning's TES as well. It can certainly be done. But, beating combo is like losing to fair.dec. It's not "supposed" to happen. That's what makes Scapewish a worse choice in the current meta, IMO -- the prevalence of combo decks makes the odds of hitting one as opposed to a fair deck something like 70/30 or maybe 65/35.

As far as the meta is concerned, I do believe that the cyclical nature of the format is going to kick in soon and chase the combo out of town. RUG had a strong showing at SCG Indy this weekend, and it's only a matter of time before people realize that all of the it-girls from a few months ago are golden again -- Maverick and RUG in particular are solid choices, and I am firmly convinced that a window of 2-3 weeks is coming up fast where Miracles will be the actual best deck in the format...right when Maverick and RUG return, but combo is still prevalent.

So....for now, I would say just hang on a few more weeks. Change is definitely coming. I do think, though, that I'll be wielding Force of Wills in April, mostly because I have a sick brew with a friend of mine that I want to test out (no Explorers involved).

On that note, I got to do a few games for fun with Deadeye after the event finished, against U/R Delver. Not a great matchup, and I acknowledge that, but Deadeye's performance was somewhat lackluster. Biomancer was amazing -- making 3/3 Sprites that can trade with Delvers while countering Brainstorms or Ponders for value (to say nothing of Chains or Bolts) was fantastic. There was also a 7/5 Thragtusk at one point, and I got to live the dream with a Biomancer+Zegana interaction. I still definitely lost more than I won, though, and I'm despairing of it working at all. As much as I would like to have a Nic Fit viable for each meta combination (aggro/combo, combo/control, aggro/control), I feel like there's just something missing from BUG that would make it "click." Like, I look at Deadeye, and after trying for three works of aggressively trying to make it work, I can't come up with any reason why I would rather play it over BUGStill or Team America other than Nic Fit for the sake of Nic Fit.

Deadeye was substantially closer than any of the blue iterations I've tried in the past have been, however, and I do think a day will come in the future that WotC will print something that will enable a blue list. Maybe we'll get something exciting in Dragon's Maze. Who knows. I'm hanging up my hat on Deadeye, though. It was frustratingly close, but it's just not quite there.

As for Mythic, I took top 16 with Rector....I think I ended in like 12th place or so. I believe that 90% of this can be tied to the fact that I drew in round 1 with my frequent-carmate and frequent-round-1-pairing Tony's "big deadguy." If I'd had a bit more time I would have been able to wrap it up, but as it was we just couldn't quite finish it out. Starting in the draw bracket was miserable, especially when I got paired down against an 0-1 Dream Halls / Omnitell deck that shit all over me, because I'd removed the Cranial twins and Carpet of Flowers as a meta call. I then got to feel like a bad person as I devastated the same mono-green casual player that Evan beat round 1, then I scooped BFS's Elves in (we were going to draw, and I decided that he had a better matchup vs the top tables than I did), then I beat BUGStill convincingly, and beat Doug McKay's U/R Storm deck.

Aggravating sidenote RE Elves matchup: game one he Zenithed for Arbor and passed. I Therapied Glimpse, knowing that he was playing Elves. I hit one. He draws another Glimpse off the top of his deck, and kills me on turn 2. So fucking irritating when you lose like that, knowing you did everything right that you could have possibly done. My hand was fantastic, I had a Therapy and hit blind, everything. Just didn't matter. Then game two I slammed Moat and he didn't think to board his Sliver in, because he didn't know what I was on exactly. He resorted to having to Deathrite me out, and he did manage to get me to 1 before I stabilized. Sigarda eventually locked up game 2, but, as I noted, I scooped him in.

I ran the 75 in my sig with one exception. I decided before the event that I wasn't happy looking at the Engineered Explosives. There are two cornercases for Explosives: ET->EE on t1, crack on t2 to sweep Goblin tokens (better than Deed by a turn); and ET->EE to kill Revokers naming Deed. I felt that #2 was vastly too unlikely to worry about, and #1 was probably a needless concern since most games I'm going to have an Explorer or a Therapy or am just dead anyway.

In the EE's place, I put in a Sorin, Lord of Innistrad. I've been wanting to test out Sorin for the longest time, and while I was considering making him a 2nd copy of Elspeth, I felt that a 1-1 split was probably a little better.

And good lord, did Sorin perform.

He specifically shined in the Deadguy and BUGStill matchups....which were the only two I boarded him in for. Vs Deadguy he provided a ton of pressure, even through my own repeated board sweeps. At one point I was racing to ultimate him against a growing Elspeth on the other side of the table, and forced Tony to use a Revoker naming Sorin....which then eventually got Deeded away, while I Vindicated his Elspeth in the meantime. Vs BUGStill he didn't do as much -- he provided a swarm of tokens to pressure / defend vs Factories with. But, what he did do there, was act as basically a nuclear deterrent to Jace TMS. My opponent actually couldn't play Jace, because Sorin was hanging out on-field.

Batterskull was surprisingly fine, and did a lot of work for me throughout the day. Sorin, Elspeth, Batterskull, 2x ET was my "fair deck" package, and it worked admirably. I do think that the combo hate side needs a bit of work, though. Basically the other 10 cards in the sideboard should be varying forms of combo hate, with the 2x ET playing into that side as well. I'm just not sure what all I want right now.

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Originally Posted by TheArchitect

I still think scapewish is the best Nic Fit variant in most metas. But I think right now nic fit isn't too good. Do you guys remember right around, and about 3 months before, DRS and abrupt decay came out the top 16s at big events had like 1-2 combo decks in them? Well now they have like 6-10 combo decks in them because everyone started play GBx midrangey decks, and everyone else cut back on countermagic to react to that change.

The meta has swayed pretty far towards being combo heavy. It will bounce back soon once people realize that RUG and UWx Miracles are still really good decks. And then then jund and junk will rise again to fight those, and then combo (like we have now) will be in power. It is the cyclical nature of legacy. Nic fit does best in the RUG/UW and GBx meta, but right now, poorly in the combo meta.

I still think Scapeshift is about the same, possibly better, against combo than other nic fit variants. Lets face it, except for a BUG list with 12+ ways to discard or counter stuff on turn 1 and something like Lily or Jace to lock up the game once it gets to turn 3-4, nic fit is always going to be pretty bad against combo. Even rector or disruption heavy GB, statistically SHOULD lose to combo most of the time.

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Quoted for truth man, quoted for truth.

I took Rector to Indy. I'll spare you all the gory details, but here's my matchups:
Round 1: Sneak & Show
Round 2: Death & Taxes
Round 3: Mono-red Sneak Attack
Round 4: UG Enchantress
Round 5: High Tide
Round 6: UB Delver
Round 7: Sneak & Show
Round 8: 12 Post
Round 9: RUG

My record was exactly what you'd expect from those matchups. One of my friends (on Tin Fins) played against Show & Tell in 4 rounds. Another on RUG ran into a ton of combo too. There was a game I played in R3 on the play where I opened w/ Thoughtseize (my concession to expecting a fair bit of combo), Therapy, Therapy and still lost on his turn 2! If you're planning on playing in DC this weekend, you better be prepared for a lot of combo.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by slikwilly

Quoted for truth man, quoted for truth.

I took Rector to Indy. I'll spare you all the gory details, but here's my matchups:
Round 1: Sneak & Show
Round 2: Death & Taxes
Round 3: Mono-red Sneak Attack
Round 4: UG Enchantress
Round 5: High Tide
Round 6: UB Delver
Round 7: Sneak & Show
Round 8: 12 Post
Round 9: RUG

My record was exactly what you'd expect from those matchups. One of my friends (on Tin Fins) played against Show & Tell in 4 rounds. Another on RUG ran into a ton of combo too. There was a game I played in R3 on the play where I opened w/ Thoughtseize (my concession to expecting a fair bit of combo), Therapy, Therapy and still lost on his turn 2! If you're planning on playing in DC this weekend, you better be prepared for a lot of combo.

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Ouch. I'm gonna guess 5-4? Sneak/Show is beatable, as is UG and High Tide. DnT can be harder than one should expect, Mono-red is just plain strange. 12post is unwinnable, RUG and UB should be good matchups.

So like, if you beat RUG and UB, then one of the Sneaks, UG, and Mono-red imploded on itself; then that would be 5-4, and I could realistically see that happening.

What do you have in mind with combo? Because imo there is actually a great difference between S&T, Reanimator combo and TES, ANT.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Iron Buddha

What do you have in mind with combo? Because imo there is actually a great difference between S&T, Reanimator combo and TES, ANT.

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The trick is finding efficient bullets. The Big Two are as close to a universal answer as we're going to get: Nether Void and Humility. Void kills storm-combo, Humility kills cheaty-creature-combo.

The problem isn't those combos. The problem is the more obscure shit like OmniTell and Elves. Humility is both too slow vs Elves and doesn't do enough -- they still have a deck with 35 1/1s that cost G. Nether Void also doesn't do enough, because they have Gaea's Cradle.

Blind Obedience was a thought to try to contain Elves while slowing down other decks like TES...but I don't think it does enough. Nettle Sentinel still untaps, and at best BO buys you a turn.

Chalice of the Void seems fairly legit vs Elves if they don't bring in Abrupt Decay -- also has benefits vs TES/ANT/Spy by hitting their artifact mana. I'm not sure why they WOULD bring in Abrupt Decay unless they kill you too quickly to know what you're on and assume you're just some kind of Junk deck.

Ideally, I would like my board setup to be the following:

5-card attrition package (Junk/Jund): Planeswalker x2 + Batterskull + ET x2
Generic aggro package: ET x2
Blue aggro package (tempo): ET x2 + Carpet of Flowers x2-3
Blue control package (Esperblade): Carpet of Flowers x2-3 + Batterskull + Planeswalker x2
Blue combo/control package (Miracles): Carpet of Flowers x2-3 + Batterskull + Planeswalker x2 + ET x2 + [hate card] x1-2
Blue combo package (OmniTell): Carpet of Flowers x2-3 + ET x2 + Humility + [hate card] x2-3
Sneak and Show: Carpet of Flowers x2-3 + ET x2 + Humility + [hate card] x4-5
TES/ANT: ET x2 + Nether Void + [hate card] x5-7
Reanimator/Spy: ET x2 + Humility + Nether Void + [hate card] x5-7

The issue is figuring out the [hate card] brackets.

Sneak Attack probably doesn't need 4-5 hate slots, because we're actually better against them than I really like to admit. I just furious detest that deck and I hate losing to it, so I probably over-board a bit.

OmniTell is the specific combo deck that I'm okay with having an Achilles heel to. It's an atrocious matchup in the first place, and then they usually run Leyline of Sanctity in the board on top of it.

The highest priorities in terms of combo decks I'd like to beat are TES/ANT -> Reanimator/Spy -> Sneak/Show. I'd like to also not be just screwed vs Elves, but a lot of that comes down to the individual games, I think. Like g1, if we survive to Moat g1, we just win. On the spot. They can't answer it. Then we have to get lucky with Deeds/Moat/Therapies/etc in either game 2 or game 3. That's fine.

Belcher is actually less terrible than a lot of us give it credit for, because usually they're on the Goblins plan, which we're actually surprisingly well-equipped to deal with, because Deed deck. Sometimes they drop Belcher and pass the turn, and we have a chance to Fetters it, Pulse it, Vindicate it, or Deed it. Sometimes they just kill us.

Leyline of Sanctity, I believe, is crucial. Leyline forces Belcher, TES, and ANT to run the Goblins plan. TES/ANT can bounce the Leyline and then go off, but they aren't Duressing/Therapying us in the meantime, which should buy us time to establish more hate.

Leyline of the Void is the best shot against Reanimator/Spy. They run a few bounce spells, but they usually have to dig a few turns to find it. The question is whether we can afford the space for Leyline of the Void as well:

If we go with the following:

2 ET
1 Batterskull
2 Planeswalker
2 Carpet of Flowers
3 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Nether Void
1 Humility

That leaves us with a whopping THREE slots left. 3 Leyline of the Void would shore up Reanimator/Spy, but do basically nothing else for us, which is rough. This is also before adding Chalice of the Void. We could shave back to 2 Leyline of Sanctity on behalf of the Chalice, which would leave us 3 slots left to play with. That's still not a lot.

Anyway, that's my thought process and where I'm at, at the moment. Haven't made any final decisions yet.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

Ouch. I'm gonna guess 5-4? Sneak/Show is beatable, as is UG and High Tide. DnT can be harder than one should expect, Mono-red is just plain strange. 12post is unwinnable, RUG and UB should be good matchups.

So like, if you beat RUG and UB, then one of the Sneaks, UG, and Mono-red imploded on itself; then that would be 5-4, and I could realistically see that happening.

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You give me too much credit I'm afraid.

R1 was against a guy in my group who made T16. I knew he was on S&S so I mull for disruption. T1 therapy him (on the draw) naming S&T and see Tarn, Pierce, Grisel, Emy, Sneak, Brainstorm x2. He's able to get Sneak on the board on T3. G2 he takes out S&T and goes on the hard cast Sneak plan. So we're going Land/Go and he gets it down before I can get Humilty down. Draws a bunch of cards, Forces my last ditch Humility the following turn, then Emy.
0-1

R2 I actually took. Don't recall much of G1 but I think I got there on Sigarda (exile this buddy). G2 I stuck a Moat and a Humility then dropped Recycle so I could dig for Elspeth or Diabolic Intent. Eventually found Intent finding Elspeth and then beat face w/ that. Took a long time and a whole lot of cards to get there. And active Recycle once again draws a crowd.
1-1

R3 I get game 1. Don't recall how but I think Thoughtseize and Therapy were involved. G2 he mulls to five, I keep some disruption, but he still topdecks the Seething Song he needs. G3 I mull to five, looking for some interaction, but he goes off T2 regardless.
1-2

R4 frustrates me. My crew all thinks that Nic Fit should wreck enchantress. I have never been able to beat this deck. Don't recall much of it other than Words of Wind continues its reign of terror against me. I am also badly in need of sugar and caffeine at this point, which I'm sure didn't help. Still, this deck just seems insanely resilient to Deed every time I play it, which drives me nuts.
1-3

R5 G1 don't recall. G2 I Extirpate his T1 Ponder. I Extirepate his first High Tide when he starts trying to go off. But he's on the Candle version and gets all the Turnabouts. Took him a while to make it, but he eventually gets there.
1-4

R6 is the most frustrating by far because, um, Delver vs Deed? But he's got a steady stream of Daze/Pierce/Force and early delvers flipping and Inquisition tearing my hand apart. Both games by the time I am able to get an answer down he's dropping Tombstalker. I like the deck, kinda wonder why it doesn't seem more play.
1-5

R7 Don't recall anything, but we went to 3 games.
1-6

R8 was pretty insane. He goes T1 Cloudpost. I Therapy for Prime Time and hit. Durdle for a while, he eventually lands a Prime Time. I stick a Moat on my turn so he can't swing. He uses Eye of Ugin to go find some eldrazi while he's waiting to draw into enough posts to play them. I've got a Rector out and finally draw a Therapy. Therapy for Emy to get it out of his hand. Flashback w/ Rector to get Ulamog and put Faiths Fetters on Eye. Eventually land Elspeth and start doing some work, but he gets a Repeal to bounce the Moat and swing at Elspeth with Prime Time. Gets himself some more posts, we durdle a couple more turns before he gets another Repeal on the Fetters which he then uses to go get Emy which he casts and then bashes. G2 wasn't nearly so interesting.
1-7

R9 did what we do against RUG. More Recycle shenanigans.
2-7

I woulda dropped many rounds earlier to get on the road home, but one of our group made T16 and was in the hunt for T8 and a couple more were in the cash hunt, so we stuck it out.

I think I played pretty well for the most part. The only mistakes that I can think of all day were against D&T and I got that one. Friends hawking my games didn't have any observations about misplays. It was just one long, frustrating day.

My list, for posterity. I think I'm taking a break from Nic Fit for a while.
Lands
1 Marsh Flats
1 Scrubland
2 Windswept Heath
2 Savannah
3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Bayou
3 Forest
2 Swamp
2 Plains
1 Karakas
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Volrath's Stronghold


Creatures
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Thragtusk
1 Starved Rusalka
1 Scavaging Ooze
1 Priveval Titan
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
2 Eternal Witness
3 Academy Rector
4 Veteran Explorer


Spells
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Vindicate
1 Diabolic Intent
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2 Thoughtseize
2 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Cabal Therapy


Enchantments
1 Faith's Fetters
1 Recycle
1 Nether Void
1 Moat
3 Pernicious Deed


Sideboard
1 Kitchen Finks
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Humility
1 Cranial Extraction
2 Extirpate
1 Angel of Despair
1 Harmonic Sliver
3 Mindbreak Trap
3 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Enlightened Tutor

This is what I would currently recommend for this Meta:


3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Polluted Delta
2 Bayou
2 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
2 Forest
2 Swamp
2 Island
2 Phyrexian Tower

4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Veteran Explorer
2 Eternal Witness
1 Thragtusk
1 Thrun, the Last Troll

2 Wurmcoil Engine
4 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Liliana of the Veil

4 Brainstorm
3 Pernicious Deed
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Cabal Therapy

//Sideboard
SB: 3 Surgical Extraction
SB: 2 Damnation
SB: 4 Force of Will
SB: 3 Negate
SB: 2 Mindbreak Trap
SB: 1 Abrupt Decay

A few notes:

- I am convinced that 4 Brainstorm is the only right choice

- the deck also wants 4 Jace and 3 Liliana; both Planeswalkers perform very well and do what the deck needs. Jace is imba and Liliana's Edict ability works very well to balance out the removal suit of Decay and Deed. And combined the two are almost unbeatable

- Abrupt Decay is awesome. You could play 2 MD and 2 SB or 3/1 or 4/0 but do not make the mistake and play less total. Whenever I had only three and played against anything with either (Delver of Secrets, Lord of Atlantis, Tarmogoyf, Goblin Warchief, Wild Nacatl) or (Chalice of the Void, Counterbalance, Enchantress Presence, Rest in Piece, Trinisphere) I felt silly for not having the fourth. It is the most versatile card ever and all around awesome.

- A SB with 4 FoW, 3 Negate, 2 Mindbreak Traps and 3 Surgicals combined with 7 MD Discard spells (+ Liliana) is a good way to stand your ground against Combo. I am very glad this idea came up in the recent discussion about Deadeye, props to whoever made it.

- Wurmcoil Engine is a great kill condition atm; both Jund and BUG have problems dealing with it. Compared to my last list I took out Primeval Titan, both Garruks and the 2 Creeping Tar Pits for 2 Wurmcoils, 1 Underground Sea, a 3rd Inquisition and a 3rd Liliana. The deck is a bit weaker now against Stoneblade and Miracles. But in this Meta I think this is the right call thoughI am not sure if it was right to remove Primeval Titan. Titan for 2 Tar Pits was a strong move.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Tao

This is what I would currently recommend for this Meta:


3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Polluted Delta
2 Bayou
2 Underground Sea
2 Tropical Island
2 Forest
2 Swamp
2 Island
2 Phyrexian Tower

4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Veteran Explorer
2 Eternal Witness
1 Thragtusk
1 Thrun, the Last Troll

2 Wurmcoil Engine
4 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
3 Liliana of the Veil

4 Brainstorm
3 Pernicious Deed
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Cabal Therapy

//Sideboard
SB: 3 Surgical Extraction
SB: 2 Damnation
SB: 4 Force of Will
SB: 3 Negate
SB: 2 Mindbreak Trap
SB: 1 Abrupt Decay

A few notes:

- I am convinced that 4 Brainstorm is the only right choice

- the deck also wants 4 Jace and 3 Liliana; both Planeswalkers perform very well and do what the deck needs. Jace is imba and Liliana's Edict ability works very well to balance out the removal suit of Decay and Deed. And combined the two are almost unbeatable

- Abrupt Decay is awesome. You could play 2 MD and 2 SB or 3/1 or 4/0 but do not make the mistake and play less total. Whenever I had only three and played against anything with either (Delver of Secrets, Lord of Atlantis, Tarmogoyf, Goblin Warchief, Wild Nacatl) or (Chalice of the Void, Counterbalance, Enchantress Presence, Rest in Piece, Trinisphere) I felt silly for not having the fourth. It is the most versatile card ever and all around awesome.

- A SB with 4 FoW, 3 Negate, 2 Mindbreak Traps and 3 Surgicals combined with 7 MD Discard spells (+ Liliana) is a good way to stand your ground against Combo. I am very glad this idea came up in the recent discussion about Deadeye, props to whoever made it.

- Wurmcoil Engine is a great kill condition atm; both Jund and BUG have problems dealing with it. Compared to my last list I took out Primeval Titan, both Garruks and the 2 Creeping Tar Pits for 2 Wurmcoils, 1 Underground Sea, a 3rd Inquisition and a 3rd Liliana. The deck is a bit weaker now against Stoneblade and Miracles. But in this Meta I think this is the right call thoughI am not sure if it was right to remove Primeval Titan. Titan for 2 Tar Pits was a strong move.

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I'm loving this list. I'm still stuck on playing the GB list as I do not have the blue lands yet but will most probably transition to some BUG list soon. Regarding the 2 Damnations in your SB, is it better than 2 Engineered Plague? I think Plague may already solve our swarm aggro problems as they're usually the tribal lists anyway. Plus, I find myself wanting the removal sometimes even after playing Thragtusk, I know he leaves a body, but I'd rather my opponent get 2-for-1'd in trying to deal with him that playing a card like Damnation. Just my 2 cents :)

Also, not too convinced with Liliana yet, but I do get why playing it in BUG is better than playing it in the other color splashes. But I really like holding as close to a full-grip as possible, and I really feel like Garruk should take her place. Will try this list out though :)

- Exchanging Plague and Damnation is fair. Damnation is good against Jund, Aggro BUG and RUG which is why I chose it. Plague is good vs. Goblins, Elves, Enchantress, Dredge and Balustrade Spy decks. Both are great against Maverick/Death and Taxes. That is your call, you could also run both and cut something else.

- When you test the list, tell me how often you wished to be able to GSZ for Primeval Titan (finding 2 Creeping Tar Pits). I am very unsure if cutting Primeval was the right choice or if the deck lacks gas now.

@Tao,

Why is there no Volrath's Stronghold in your BUG deck playing Primeval Titan? This confuses me, especially when I see 2 Phyrexian Towers in there. BUG Nic Fit decks are very threat light and being able to Thrag/Wurm/Witness loop should be your Prime Time priority. Maybe I am a little outdated there but when I came out with that tech a year ago, fetching the two towers occurred much more often than the two Treetops.

Also, you might want to look into Academy Ruins. It works great with EE, Wurmcoil, Nihil Spellbomb, Intuition/Loam, and even your favorite magi. LftL is also preeeettty good with Brainstorm/Jace/Lily.

Anyone know how to record their MTGO videos? I want to start a stream for Rector Fit.

Hi

I'm interested in getting started with a BG Nic Fit deck. I'm typically a UW Miracles and a Storm player but have been recently playing Rock. Unfortunately I am terrible with it and suck at midrange in general. I am looking for a deck which would run differently to Storm and UW Miracles and would do well against the bad matchups of Storm/Miracles should my metagame shift. My metagame is pretty well developed with a large proportion of Blue. Decks typically seen are Canadian Thresh, Rock, Imperial Painter, Omnitell, Stoneblade (quite a few) and various BUG elements.

I have been looking at Qweerios' BG deck as a good starting point and want to go in that direction. I already have most of the pieces from my Rock deck and have been following this thread every now and then.

I have a few questions for NicFit players
1) Should I get into this deck given the information above?
2) What are the good and bad matchups of this deck?
3) Are there any suggested amendments to be made to Qweerios' BG deck of December 2012?
4) Why is everyone else splashing in BG? What benefits do the splashes provide?
5) Any other tips for getting into BG NicFit?

Thanks!

Holy shit. Quite a lot has happened in my absence. Random report time!

Finished 5-0 at my local Legacy tourney last night using the Punishing Fire list in my signature. Here's the run-down:

R1 vs U/W/R Miracle Blade 2-0
R2 vs RUG Delver 2-0
R3 vs Dredge 2-1
R4 vs Elves 2-0
R5 vs Goblins 2-0

Pretty diverse range of decks. Punishing Fire is still performing very well. Planning on running something very similar at SCG KC next weekend.