[Primer] Elves!

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Originally Posted by MD.Ghost

Until you are trapped between sensei + counterbalance :wink:

@Sweeper:
Elves works fine as an engine, maybe we can tweak some slots for our own metas (Maindeck: Ooze, Viridian, 2nd Craterhoof vs Ruric etc / Sideboard: P.Needle, and a wide range of Combohate). You also can use some weird stuff like Archdruid, Wilt-Leaf or Planeswalker like Garruk.

Maybe we get some new stuff from the next set, but elves works still fine and if you can't beat the hate, try another deck and wait till the dust has settled.

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I joke all the time about maybe Elves will get something to help it out, knowing of course that just a year ago we got Deathrite Shaman as a machine gun and hate tool, as well as a legend rule change giving Cradle a big boost.

I agree I think Elves works fine as an engine, but right now its about identifying what you need in the meta. I think in any case, dropping the Glimpse is bad. In fact, going to that pure aggro plan is likely and still accomplishes nothing versus sweepers. I actually put my Ruric back in the board in favor of Ooze coming maindeck due to the amount of RUG Delver / Jund / and Gyard orientated plans in my meta. I'm still on the 61 card kick though, but thinking of dropping it back to 60.

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Originally Posted by MD.Ghost

Until you are trapped between sensei + counterbalance :wink:

@Sweeper:
Elves works fine as an engine, maybe we can tweak some slots for our own metas (Maindeck: Ooze, Viridian, 2nd Craterhoof vs Ruric etc / Sideboard: P.Needle, and a wide range of Combohate). You also can use some weird stuff like Archdruid, Wilt-Leaf or Planeswalker like Garruk.

Maybe we get some new stuff from the next set, but elves works still fine and if you can't beat the hate, try another deck and wait till the dust has settled.

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Heared there's a card named Abrupt Decay ;)

I T2 with a glimpse chain yesterday against Miracle G2.
It was pretty hilarious.

with Abrupt Decay and TNN Miracle has become a tier2 deck at best. And I really feel it because UW control is definitly my pet deck

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Originally Posted by Poron

with Abrupt Decay and TNN Miracle has become a tier2 deck at best. And I really feel it because UW control is definitly my pet deck

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TNN didn't weak Miracle. Wait a little, the TNN hype is over here. Am sure it's one of the best non-combo deck to fight TNN but here is not the right topic.

However, u re right, Decay weakened miracle and is really the best weapon we can have. To strenghten this match up,one of my contacts run 2 null rod instead of needles : and I agree totally. I feel them more versatile in many match up like Storm, Esper and random Artifact deck. (MUD,Painter,Affinity)

TNN is not a single card. is the best beater of a stoneblade deck. Terminus doesn't stop any Equipment and Stoneblade just needed an hexproof stick to dig miracle the grave. and it's a 3 power one too.. not sure we'll see many more miracles in next months' top 8s.

anyway yes, wrong place. and yes, Null Rod + Abrupt Decay are helpless threaths

Null Rod :O
...holy shit. It kills half the format :D

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Originally Posted by Zombie

Null Rod :O
...holy shit. It kills half the format :D

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If that's the case, then I'd say running a Bane of Progress mainboard in one of the four custom-slots could actually become an option, depending on the meta. It rids the board of all artifact and enchantments and leaves you with a nice beater to boot (even if most of the time it'll only be a 4/4 or 5/5, it's still a nice clock against an opponent who just lost a couple of important cards). It even circumvents cases where a Spellskite would prevent your Viridian Shaman/Pridemage/Sliver from hitting the right target.

By the way, I'm wholy against removing Glimpses from the maindeck (even though I was the one who brought it up), simply because, well, it's the Glimpse. Need I say more?

Meh, if people start to play large amounts of sweepers we could always fall back to the Wirewood Herald + Caller of the Claw combo. Too bad it doesn't work against Terminus though.

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Originally Posted by Echelon

If that's the case, then I'd say running a Bane of Progress mainboard in one of the four custom-slots could actually become an option, depending on the meta. It rids the board of all artifact and enchantments and leaves you with a nice beater to boot (even if most of the time it'll only be a 4/4 or 5/5, it's still a nice clock against an opponent who just lost a couple of important cards). It even circumvents cases where a Spellskite would prevent your Viridian Shaman/Pridemage/Sliver from hitting the right target.

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Not nearly the same. Null Rod/Needle/Revoker work pre-emptively. Right now, and in the future. Bane doesn't.

And I happily play 3 Peedle and a Bane in my sideboard. Peedle stops whatever nasty thing your opponent has, Bane kills a large number of those things. It's all good. Your opponent drops an annoying equipment, you Natural Order for Bane. Problem solved.

Besides, Bane stops the Energy Field + Rest in Peace combo and eats Counterbalance/Chalice of the Void/Engineered Plague/Ethersworn Cannonist for breakfast, Peedle doesn't.

And continueing on that premise - once your opponent kills your Peedle/Revoker/Null Rod, all his/her threats become live again, whereas killing the Bane doesn't get them their stuff back, keeping them on their disadvantage.

If you can just freely NO vs equipment then it would probably be better to go for the win with Hoof. I've been testing Pithing Needle and its versatility is great. Over the last two weekly events I have turned off a Jitte, Phantasmagorian, and Griselbrand. And being able to side it in vs Grim Lavamancer, Goblin Sharpshooter, and Aether Vial takes a lot of pressure off of my Abrupt Decays. Null Rod has merit vs equipment and Divining Top, but I wouldn't use the argument that Null Rod is good (it can be) to support the idea that Bane of Progress is just a small leap away.

Bane should only be played in situations where it can completely turn the game around, like vs Enchantress or MUD or Affinity. Using NO to Bane for marginal value seems less than ideal. I'd rather GSZ for Viridian Shaman. That said, I own a Bane just in case I will ever need it. But in this meta, it doesn't seem like the most powerful or efficient answer to disenchantable threats.

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Originally Posted by danyul

If you can just freely NO vs equipment then it would probably be better to go for the win with Hoof.

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The Bane should be used when part of your board has been cleared by say a Jitte and you only have like 2 elves and 2 lands in play and you barely manage to get to that 4 mana. In those cases, the Bane (depending on the board state) might manage to turn the game around completely - ridding you of said nasty artifact(s) whilst leaving you with a nice clock on your opponent in the progress.

The Hoof is mostly viable when having a rather safe board position or when it lets you steal a game from your opponent. Doing so requires you to have 4 creatures or so on the battlefield and able to attack though. The Bane is there to let you break out of a bad board position, allowing you to improve upon it, whilst the Hoof is there to exploit any halfway decent board position.

I might be biased though, I run a Viridian Shaman in the mainboard so am used to having acces to that any time anyway, making the Bane the icing on my cake. And I just like saying "The Bane".

That being said, the 3 Peedles are probably the most highly valued cards in my sideboard. The Bane should not ever be used to try and replace a Peedle with, but should be used in conjunction with it.

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Originally Posted by Echelon

The Bane should be used when part of your board has been cleared by say a Jitte and you only have like 2 elves and 2 lands in play and you barely manage to get to that 4 mana. In those cases, the Bane (depending on the board state) might manage to turn the game around completely - ridding you of said nasty artifact(s) whilst leaving you with a nice clock on your opponent in the progress.

In this scenario, GSZing for a Viridian Shaman has the same effect and doesn't burn a NO+elf. And that Bane would be a 3/3. Not the greatest clock.

The Hoof is mostly viable when having a rather safe board position or when it lets you steal a game from your opponent. Doing so requires you to have 4 creatures or so on the battlefield and able to attack though. The Bane is there to let you break out of a bad board position, allowing you to improve upon it, whilst the Hoof is there to exploit any halfway decent board position.

We are saying similar things here. But I don't think killing a single equipment is so dreadfully important that we need to burn precious resources on a Bane. Our definition of "bad board position" differs here. Staring down 3+ enchantments or a field full of artifacts is a bad board position. Staring at a single Jitte is not (usually).

I might be biased though, I run a Viridian Shaman in the mainboard so am used to having acces to that any time anyway, making the Bane the icing on my cake. And I just like saying "The Bane".

I also run a Shaman main. I think you are suffering from the The Danger of Cool Things IRT Bane.

That being said, the 3 Peedles are probably the most highly valued cards in my sideboard. The Bane should not ever be used to try and replace a Peedle with, but should be used in conjunction with it.

Word.

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So the elves treated me well this past weekend... went 3-1 with them in the invi (woulda been 4-0 but I'm too nice to new legacy players and allow takebacks to teach people how fun legacy is). Too bad I suck in standard or it woulda been an easy day 2 run.

Then in the open, I started out 4-0 before punting a game to deathblade (big misplay, but one I can learn from) then I lost to DnT TWICE. TWICE. One of our best matchups, TWICE. Wanna know how? I got a simple math question for you theorycrafters out there...

What is the rough percentage that I see Progenitus or Ruric Thar or both in my opening hand, on a mull to 6, mull to 5, and mull to 4?

SPOILER ALERT:
apparently it is like 90%. At least it was for me this weekend...not even exaggerating! I ended up keeping hands with them in it just because the remaining 3-5 cards were "ok." Has anyone else experienced this?? I can't be the only one who draws my tutor targets like its my job... sigh it sucks but I mean thats part of the problem of playing such threats. Just sucks it happened when I was in such good position to make top 8 of this event.

That is rough, man.

I also have horrible luck when it comes to Progenitus making me mulligan over and over. Just yesterday I had to mull to 2 because I saw Prog 3 times. Still won that game though because I'm a lucksack.

I have no idea what the percentages are. We should get one of those mathy dudes in here to crunch the numbers. But sometimes I'll leave the Prog in the board, even when I should be bringing it in, simply because I'm feeling unlucky that day and don't want to risk seeing him in my opening hands.

Variance is a bitch.

Man it really sucks you had such aweful draws in those matches. But the only way to go about is, is to just swallow it. It's not like you're more (un)lucky than anyone else and nobody will give you credit for something like that. I mean, I see a lot of people at tournaments lament about how they always get unlucky when in reality, it's just the same for everybody.

Don't take this too personally. I just played someone on MODO who actually played _each_ of his cantrips wrong (Play a Land, Brainstorm; Play a Land, Ponder; turn1 Brainstorm with UWr Delver etc.) so I got really pissed when he later complained about being unlucky. Pretty sure you're definitely not such a kind of guy, but everytime I see people complain about being unlucky, I feel it's pointless.

Instead you should always focus on what you can do ever better the next time. Maybe it's still not going to be enough but at least you played your very best game. When you still have Ruric Thar in your maindeck in g2 and g3 against D&T, you didn't.

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Originally Posted by danyul

That is rough, man.

I also have horrible luck when it comes to Progenitus making me mulligan over and over. Just yesterday I had to mull to 2 because I saw Prog 3 times. Still won that game though because I'm a lucksack.

I have no idea what the percentages are. We should get one of those mathy dudes in here to crunch the numbers. But sometimes I'll leave the Prog in the board, even when I should be bringing it in, simply because I'm feeling unlucky that day and don't want to risk seeing him in my opening hands.

Variance is a bitch.

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Originally Posted by Shagstaman

So the elves treated me well this past weekend... went 3-1 with them in the invi (woulda been 4-0 but I'm too nice to new legacy players and allow takebacks to teach people how fun legacy is). Too bad I suck in standard or it woulda been an easy day 2 run.

Then in the open, I started out 4-0 before punting a game to deathblade (big misplay, but one I can learn from) then I lost to DnT TWICE. TWICE. One of our best matchups, TWICE. Wanna know how? I got a simple math question for you theorycrafters out there...

What is the rough percentage that I see Progenitus or Ruric Thar or both in my opening hand, on a mull to 6, mull to 5, and mull to 4?

SPOILER ALERT:
apparently it is like 90%. At least it was for me this weekend...not even exaggerating! I ended up keeping hands with them in it just because the remaining 3-5 cards were "ok." Has anyone else experienced this?? I can't be the only one who draws my tutor targets like its my job... sigh it sucks but I mean thats part of the problem of playing such threats. Just sucks it happened when I was in such good position to make top 8 of this event.

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Originally Posted by Julian23

Man it really sucks you had such aweful draws in those matches. But the only way to go about is, is to just swallow it. It's not like you're more (un)lucky than anyone else and nobody will give you credit for something like that. I mean, I see a lot of people at tournaments lament about how they always get unlucky when in reality, it's just the same for everybody.

Don't take this too personally. I just played someone on MODO who actually played _each_ of his cantrips wrong (Play a Land, Brainstorm; Play a Land, Ponder; turn1 Brainstorm with UWr Delver etc.) so I got really pissed when he later complained about being unlucky. Pretty sure you're definitely not such a kind of guy, but everytime I see people complain about being unlucky, I feel it's pointless.

Instead you should always focus on what you can do ever better the next time. Maybe it's still not going to be enough but at least you played your very best game. When you still have Ruric Thar in your maindeck in g2 and g3 against D&T, you didn't.

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Well, at least I'm not the only one that has a very high % at drawing Progenitus early or having it in my opening hand. It feels like its very common for me, I actually have a friend that laughs at me. I willingly show him during testing MU's just to mark the consistency lol. I think Julian sums it up here, its just really tough to swallow when you feel like it happens most of the time. In an online daily I kept a 7 card hand with Prog. I wanted to mulligan it honestly, but the other 6 were solid; and ended up winning T3 after T2 Glimpse. Guess what I'm saying here is try not to get blinded by the Prog like I have in the past. Sometimes those other 6 are just fine. I know its still miserable keeping 1 completely dead card, but maybe you'll get lucky and at 1 card left get Thoughtseized or something.

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Originally Posted by Shagstaman

So the elves treated me well this past weekend... went 3-1 with them in the invi (woulda been 4-0 but I'm too nice to new legacy players and allow takebacks to teach people how fun legacy is). Too bad I suck in standard or it woulda been an easy day 2 run.

Then in the open, I started out 4-0 before punting a game to deathblade (big misplay, but one I can learn from) then I lost to DnT TWICE. TWICE. One of our best matchups, TWICE. Wanna know how? I got a simple math question for you theorycrafters out there...

What is the rough percentage that I see Progenitus or Ruric Thar or both in my opening hand, on a mull to 6, mull to 5, and mull to 4?

SPOILER ALERT:
apparently it is like 90%. At least it was for me this weekend...not even exaggerating! I ended up keeping hands with them in it just because the remaining 3-5 cards were "ok." Has anyone else experienced this?? I can't be the only one who draws my tutor targets like its my job... sigh it sucks but I mean thats part of the problem of playing such threats. Just sucks it happened when I was in such good position to make top 8 of this event.

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Hmm Ive never brought in prog against death and taxes. Ive always had enough creatures on the board to kill them with craterhoof. Regardless, I would still keep a 7 card hand with prog if the other 6 are above average.

Also what was the misplay against deathblade so I can make a mental note and make sure I don't make the same mistake.

11.67% is the unlucky number you're looking for. Roughly 1 in 9 games will have a 1-of in your opening 7 card hand. This number is pretty large for what appears to be a small quantity out of 60.

The easiest solution is to play 61 cards, so you reduce that percentage!

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Originally Posted by Koby

The easiest solution is to play 61 cards, so you reduce that percentage!

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<3