[Primer/Deck] Nic Fit

So here is a proposed list. Very open to ideas.


3 Bayou
1 Savannah
1 Scrubland
3 Forest
3 Swamp
1 Plains
2 Windswept Heath
2 Marsh Flats
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Phyrexian Tower

4 Thoughtseize
3 Cabal Therapy
3 Swords to Plowshares
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Pernicious Deed

4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Veteran Explorer
1 Deathrite Shaman
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Eternal Witness
1 Tireless Tracker
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons

1 Garruk Apex Predator
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Sorin, Grim Nemesis

SB: 4 Dark Confidant
SB: 2 Spirit of the Labyrinth
SB: 3 Duress
SB: 2 Gaddock Teeg
SB: 1 Surgical Extraction
SB: 1 Liliana of the Veil
SB: 1 Swords to Plowshares
SB: 1 Golgari Charm


I think the right color to splash at the moment is White because of the removal options. Punishing Fire is too slow while Sword/Path are both amazing. The goal of this deck is to have a better Miracles and Combo matchup without sacrificing too much against other matchups when compared to other current versions.

- Sorin, Grim Nemesis is the best 6-drop in the game for Nic Fit, by far, and everyone should try him and he rocks.
- I chose Top over Truths because a) this deck is a bit slower in game 1 so your life total matters a lot and b) because Truths don’t work so well with the SB plan of Confidant and SotL
- I think a more control oriented version of the deck should not play Siege Rhino or Path to Exile. Don’t get me wrong, Rhino and Path are the right choice in the Rhino version but they work better together.

This version can do quite well against Combo. Post board you have 10 Discard spells, 2 SotL to stop their cantrips, 3 Lilianas, GSZ on Teeg or graveyard hate plus 4 Confidants to keep the disruption coming. Spirit of the Labyrinth is really good against most Combo decks because usually they are really good at recovering from discard with their cantrips. Put Lilia and/or yard hate on top and you have the game on lockdown.

Against Miracles the plan is a somewhat transformational sideboard: (- 3 Explorer, - 3 Therapy, -3 Swords, -1 Phyrexian Tower, - 1 Deed, -1 GSZ; + 3 Duress, + 2 SotL, +4 Dark Confidant, + 1 Liliana, +2 Teeg; depending on Mentor count might need to keep more removal). Explorer and Therapy are both extremely bad against them. Explorer just accelerates their Jace. Therapy completely sucks because the first one is blind, and then you don’t want to sacrifice Explorer and also they have Brainstorm and Counterbalance to shut it down. Just Duressing them on turn one is much more effective. With less mana from Explorer you should reduce your curve a bit and SotL and Confidant do that. Even though they will die to Swords, they at least force a reaction, and if you are lucky one might stick.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Brael

What did you cut for the Trackers? I was leaning towards cutting my Painful Truths for one. Sadly, I won't get much actual Legacy playtime for a while to test outside of xmage games. In theory I really like Tracker, the only question left in my mind isn't if it should be run but rather how many should be run.

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It's not exactly nic fit, doesn't feel like sylvan plug either. Replace Vet/Therapy/Deed/Top with extra couple lands/Chalice/Deluge/Libraries for the most part, with 3 SFM, 2-3 eqiups, and full Rhino suite + Sigarda. I plan to do more testing/tweaking and perhaps open a thread with it - basically Abzan Stompy since I've also tried Trinispheres in it (to some success). I've had 2 KotR's in it for awhile but they always seem lackluster and using them for land tutoring just feels clunky - they were replaced with Trackers.

I keep checking the discussion here because it seems really valuable. One day I'm sure I'll try actual Nic Fit (just need Vet Explorers for the most part), but for now I'm taking a lot of this advice and applying it to my stompy lists. If I want to jam Chalice/Trinisphere (which I very much do love jamming), then I have to incorporate ways to make the deck consistent. You simply can't have a "draw the wrong side of your deck" problem and hope to do well at large events. Or league after league online. Consistency starts with GSZ and Sylvan Library but extends to the manabase, creature, and removal selections as well.

Very thankful to glean insight from everyone here.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by uncletiggy

@arianrhod- spore frog is a cheaper fog effect for less investment it can recur with meren but the timing is poor. Aside from fighting creatures and death touchers green is lacking in a zenithable kill creature for anything that doeant fly.

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These 2 are able to stop one big threat or kill small creatures such pyromancer. But they die almost to everything

Thornscape Apprentice
Creature — Human Wizard 1/1, G (1)
{R}, {T}: Target creature gains first strike until end of turn.
{W}, {T}: Tap target creature.

Granger Guildmage
Creature — Human Wizard 1/1, G (1)
{R}, {T}: Granger Guildmage deals 1 damage to target creature or player and 1 damage to you.
{W}, {T}: Target creature gains first strike until end of turn.

@arianrhod- im not liking the lack of scooze in the thune list, dromoka seems extraneous way up at the top of the curve you have three nice bodied flyers already. He also +1 to your interaction category in a lot of key matchups.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Tao

So here is a proposed list. Very open to ideas.

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Trying out Bob in my list after seeing it here, my basic strategy being to bring it in when I take Explorer out. So far it's ok but not great. The list I'm using right now has a total CMC of 77 so that's an average of 1.28 damage/turn when Top can't manipulate things (yours is 76 for comparison, but you have more lifegain overall). On the other hand, it gives away much less information.

I'll keep trying it though. The interaction between Bob/Top is similar to Courser/Top except you don't get the lifegain and have a weaker body.

Ill try Sorin.

Just finished a small set against Maverick, we were going to do best of 5 but 4 hours later we were just going into game 4 as Xmage was about to time out on us, I took it 2-1 but lost on time, two very grindy games I split and one which was super easy.

It was a small sample size but Tireless Tracker is absolutely nuts and it was readily apparent the first time it hit the board. It's rather trivial to generate 2 clues on your first turn it's down (and sometimes more), especially with a Courser and/or SDT to assist. At one point with a fetchland in hand going into turn 3 in the easy game I even found myself GSZ'ing (helped by a DRS) for a Tracker only to follow it up with a fetchland, make 2 clues, then play an Explorer, flashback Therapy to sac, get 2 more lands, 2 more clues, and then pop one right away for a card. Tracker almost feels like getting an Ancestral Vision attached to a 4-5 power body.

Verdict is still out on Bob but it wasn't terrible. Hitting Meren/Sigarda/Tracker hurts, hitting Rhino/Courser doesn't. I liked that it was another strong Top interaction.

Wow you're making me want to consider Tracker.
Just the lone copy is sufficient? Were you afraid of his P/T (seems underwhelming for a 3 drop).

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Warden

Wow you're making me want to consider Tracker.
Just the lone copy is sufficient? Were you afraid of his P/T (seems underwhelming for a 3 drop).

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I don't know if I want the lone copy or if I want more. Fitting in the first was a pretty easy cut for me because I swapped it with Painful Truths, the second copy is a bit tougher. What I like about the card though is that with a bit of setup you can front load getting several clues, and then gain the advantage incrementally. One play I found myself making a lot without a top was using 1-2 clues per turn with a Courser out in order to increase the land drops I could make, which would then feed back into more life and more card draw.

Edit: The P/T was fine. I wasn't playing against a bolt deck, I think it's a bigger liability there. The power side of it though easily grows large enough to trade off with a Goyf after a turn or two which is nice.

Worth noting, I was running 3 Deeds and the situation never came up where I found myself deeding away my clues but I can see where that might be an issue at times.

Edit 2: On further reflection, the cut for another Tracker if it's worth doing is probably Sylvan Library.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Brael

Edit 2: On further reflection, the cut for another Tracker if it's worth doing is probably Sylvan Library.

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Heresy!

Courser + Library is a positive feedback loop, and Courser + Clues is also great. Wht's stopping us from being more lean on the curve to play more Courser/Tracker synergies with Library and Top to help continue filtering?

Nothing!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Koby

Heresy!

Courser + Library is a positive feedback loop, and Courser + Clues is also great. Wht's stopping us from being more lean on the curve to play more Courser/Tracker synergies with Library and Top to help continue filtering?

Nothing!

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With more draw we need less recursion, I could see an argument to turn Meren into a Tracker.

Edit: Just because I found it sweet, I was able to Volrath's Stronghold a Dryad Arbor to the top of my library, play it from the top with Courser, make a clue, double Therapy to kill the Arbor, and put it on top to play with Courser again for another clue on the following turn. Tracker is what made that line really work.

Hi all, relatively new to the nic fit life and new to this thread. I'm enjoying the discussion around the breakdown of slots/roles for the deck, but had a question regarding discard. I'm interested in Tireless Tracker and supportive of the idea of a robust CA/deck manipulation package (at least 5 SDT/PTruths/courser etc) but am having a hard time letting go of the idea of hymn/TS/IoK. Ripping apart hands in the early game especially feels so good, and my feeling is that in combo matchups (one of our weak points) it represents a compelling hope for a better MU over CA engines that really start paying off usually turn 3+ by which time we may have been Tendrils'd/SnT'd, etc.

My other concern with a lot of ideas for CA (1 of Tracker, etc) is that 1 ofs inherently decrease consistency which has been another concern discussed recently.

Just what I see from where I'm sitting. YMMV always with local meta and things like that of course, but I'm just here to get some thoughts and be part of the conversation.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by emesyu

Hi all, relatively new to the nic fit life and new to this thread. I'm enjoying the discussion around the breakdown of slots/roles for the deck, but had a question regarding discard. I'm interested in Tireless Tracker and supportive of the idea of a robust CA/deck manipulation package (at least 5 SDT/PTruths/courser etc) but am having a hard time letting go of the idea of hymn/TS/IoK. Ripping apart hands in the early game especially feels so good, and my feeling is that in combo matchups (one of our weak points) it represents a compelling hope for a better MU over CA engines that really start paying off usually turn 3+ by which time we may have been Tendrils'd/SnT'd, etc.

My other concern with a lot of ideas for CA (1 of Tracker, etc) is that 1 ofs inherently decrease consistency which has been another concern discussed recently.

Just what I see from where I'm sitting. YMMV always with local meta and things like that of course, but I'm just here to get some thoughts and be part of the conversation.

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1 of's don't always decrease consistency. When you have a bunch of similar 1 of's they all do roughly the same thing at the consistency of running 4 of's, but they interact slightly different in multiples or against the opponent. To give a classic example you would much rather have 1 Go for the Throat, 1 Doom Blade, 1 Ultimate Price, 1 Victim of Night than 4 Doom Blade. By using the 1 of's you minimize the chance of an entire section of your deck being dead against the opponent, and you get slightly different effects which makes it harder for the opponent to play around a precise card. To bring this back around to Nic Fit, 4 Courser is too many but 2 Courser/2 Tracker despite filling similar roles works very well because not only do they still fill the CA role, but they stack and they make the opponent worry about different things.

If you go this route, your combo matchups are going to get worse. CA only matters when you live long enough to use those cards. Tracker probably isn't the card you want against combo decks, but it's solid against anything fair.

That's a fair assessment re: redundancy/consistency. I agree that CA matters in the longer game, my original point though was the relationship between discard effects and our MU against combo. Since those games can be over so fast, is it worth erring towards that, MD or even just SB. (IoK, Seize, Hymn, Liliana, etc) and if so, do the cuts come from the CA component of the deck or elsewhere? My feeling is that there is something there, but I wanted to get people's thoughts.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by emesyu

That's a fair assessment re: redundancy/consistency. I agree that CA matters in the longer game, my original point though was the relationship between discard effects and our MU against combo. Since those games can be over so fast, is it worth erring towards that, MD or even just SB. (IoK, Seize, Hymn, Liliana, etc) and if so, do the cuts come from the CA component of the deck or elsewhere? My feeling is that there is something there, but I wanted to get people's thoughts.

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I do use my SB for some anti combo cards, I'm partial to Hymn but it stretches the mana enough that I don't think it's optimal though I sure do love the Hymn+Therapy hands. To be honest though, I just don't worry very much about combo. Playing a fair non blue deck isn't where you want to be in the format if that bothers you. The deck feels to me like it either beats combo or it beats everything else.

Then again, I have the luxury of playing in an area where combo is pretty fringe and people stick to things like Delver, Miracles, Grixis Tempo, and Burn.

OMG people, I love this thread.

To answer Jain: We seem to have a general consensus on the numbers of each category we want to run. The next step'd be to compile lists of cards for each defined category that fit within our framework (I'll repost our list of requirements) and see what crazy cards we can come up with. Let's start with what we know and add to that.

I also agree with Arianrhod as far as counting certain cards as half a CA etc. whenever they need something else to function as such. That probably makes Courser of Kruphix 0,5 CA as well.

Requirements:
- Must be able to go over the top of most opponents
- Must be able to handle/mitigate mana denial strategies
- Must be able to break through lock pieces
- Must be able to handle opposing threats on the board
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce green mana on turn 1
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce black mana on turn 1
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce white mana on turn 2
- No card may cost >5 mana
- No card may have triple mana of any 1 colour in its manacost
- GSZ'able cards must have intrinsic value
- Creatures must either provide mandatory utility effects, be very hard to kill or have a very high power/mana ratio

Format your lists accordingly:
Lands (We might just as well, maybe we find some awesome utility lands we've missed up until now)
Swamp
Forest
Plains
Verdant Catacombs
Windswept Heath
Marsh Flats
Bayou
Scrubland
Savanah
Phyrexian Tower
Volrath's Stronghold
Removal/interaction
Path to Exile
Cabal Therapy
Swords to Plowshares
Thoughtseize
Putrefy
Mortify
Maelstrom Pulse
Vindicate
Go For The Throat
Murderous Cut
Ghastly Demise
Abrupt Decay
Inquisition of Kozilek
Library Manipulation/CA
Veteran Explorer
Sylvan Library
Sensei's Divining Top
Tireless Tracker
Mirri's Guile
Courser of Kruphix
Ajani, Mentor of Heroes
Painful Truths
Skeletal Scrying
Hymn to Tourach
Pernicious Deed
Toxic Deluge
Damnation
Wood Elves
Nissa, Vastwood Seer
Fierce Empath
Tasigur, the Golden Fang
Eternal Witness
Gitrog Monster
Finishers
Green Sun's Zenith
Siege Rhino
Sigarda, Host of Herons
Thragtusk
Thrun, the Last Troll
Deathrite Shaman
Gurmag Angler
Baneslayer Angel
Diabolic Intent

It's fine to put up the same cards as others but if you're sure you've seen one of your cards on anothers' list, try to leave it out. That saves me some work when compiling a complete list. If you see a card you think belongs in another category, please do repost it under the category you believe it should be in.

One last question: Should we or should we not change the not >5 mana requirement to not >6 mana. Let's have a vote on this one. Tempting as it may be, I vote to stick @5.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Echelon

It's fine to put up the same cards as others but if you're sure you've seen one of your cards on anothers' list, try to leave it out. That saves me some work when compiling a complete list. If you see a card you think belongs in another category, please do repost it under the category you believe it should be in.

One last question: Should we or should we not change the not >5 mana requirement to not >6 mana. Let's have a vote on this one. Tempting as it may be, I vote to stick @5.

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Meren is part CA part finisher
Eternal Witness is CA

Is Bob worth considering as CA? I tried some out today and they were ok but not great after seeing them in Tao's list up above. Found them to be a pretty good substitute for Veteran Explorers when I didn't want to ramp my opponent though.

Deed and Deluge can be removal just as much as being CA. Golgari Charm can be CA out of the board (or sometimes removal or just interaction).

I think 5 or less mana works better, unless the 6 is extremely powerful. For a 6 to be worthwhile it needs to be better than Sigarda the Unkillable. I know Sorin is pretty popular these days but for as good as he is it still doesn't seem worth 6 mana, particularly for something you can't tutor. Maybe I'm wrong there. In some builds though, Primeval Titan probably makes the cut as a valid 6.

On the CA debate, it's because there's different types of cards. I'm going to sum it up by paraphrasing Chapin in his deck building book. There's Baneslayer Angel type cards that generate value by remaining on the battlefield and there's Mulldrifter type cards that generate value by being cast. Decks of Baneslayers typically get better when you play other Baneslayers because your opponent likely can't answer them all. Decks of Mulldrifters on the other hand typically need less tuning but also have less room to outmaneuver the opponent. The catch is that just playing a few Baneslayers with your Mulldrifters causes all of your Baneslayers to die, but putting a few Mulldrifters with your Baneslayers works fine. Decks of all Mulldrifters are also the most reliant on having a steady stream of cards because they generate little to no residual value, but with higher per card impact they can make for potent bombs.

Putting that in Nic Fit terms, our Baneslayers are things like Tireless Tracker, Courser of Kruphix, Sensei's Divining Top, Meren, Deathrte Shaman, and Sylvan Library. There is little to no instant value in casting any of these, but if they remain on the battlefield you generate a lot of value over time. Our Mulldrifters on the other hand are cards where a large part of the value is realized on cast. That includes cards like Veteran Explorer, Painful Truths, Abrupt Decay, Path to Exile, Cabal Therapy, Stoneforge Mystic, and Siege Rhino.

I don't think counting them as .5 is quite accurate even though that is about the amount they generate per turn. If your only creature is 1 Courser it's almost always going to die before generating any value, but if several of your opponents removal spells have already been discarded to trade with your creatures your Courser is going to stick around and generate value. At 22 lands without Top Courser is worth around .33 cards/turn, with Top it's worth about .8. It's too soon to properly evaluate Tracker but mathematically with 22 lands/9 fetches it's just over .5 cards/turn. Technically SDT isn't worth any cards, but the selection in removing dead draws is worth some amount.

It's probably best, for now at least to just look at cards and consider them as being worth any advantage at all rather than try to evaluate exactly how much. I think of cards like Library, Courser, Tracker, and so on as being a variable amount of advantage, but something like Truths is (almost) always 3 cards. Even when you can evaluate the average number of cards per turn of the variable advantage, it's still contingent on it remaining on the board, which goes back to why if you're going to play a few Baneslayers, it's best to play a lot of them.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Brael

Just finished a small set against Maverick, we were going to do best of 5 but 4 hours later we were just going into game 4 as Xmage was about to time out on us, I took it 2-1 but lost on time, two very grindy games I split and one which was super easy.

It was a small sample size but Tireless Tracker is absolutely nuts and it was readily apparent the first time it hit the board. It's rather trivial to generate 2 clues on your first turn it's down (and sometimes more), especially with a Courser and/or SDT to assist. At one point with a fetchland in hand going into turn 3 in the easy game I even found myself GSZ'ing (helped by a DRS) for a Tracker only to follow it up with a fetchland, make 2 clues, then play an Explorer, flashback Therapy to sac, get 2 more lands, 2 more clues, and then pop one right away for a card. Tracker almost feels like getting an Ancestral Vision attached to a 4-5 power body.
.

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I was thining "Hm, maybe Tireless is a cool card in nic-fit" and then I saw this post. Nice to hear the results from a real game. Tireless dies on all removel but it can at least replace itself. We can manaflood sometime so manasinker as clues is nice. I want to try him out.

@echelon-

When we start considering optimizing a list of slots and ratios with the intent on cutting cute card choices things like putrefy, mortify, and ghastly demise don't belong being given the time of day.

Going too deep into the cardpool gets tedious. If we start listing cards like deathmark, tragic slip, and all the edict clones we wont get anywhere quickly. We dont play these cards normally for a reason, we're going to end up back testing tasigurs and sidisis based on the "umbrella-catch all-utility" mentality to no avail. An excercise in finding proper ratios should not bring sub par choices in the mix. Unless a card is pulling triple duty(ie abzan charm) the obscure cards should be left out and even the charms are hardly maindeck material, we should strive to stay realistic.

I also don't believe sweepers should be considered in the card advantage/selection category. By that logic any card conditionally worth a force of will could be counted. These cards should produce value upon cast or through accumulated abuse of basic game mechanics (ie courser/tracker)

I'm also not ok with counting a card like intent as a finisher. Casting zenith applies the threat immediatly upon resolution, intent requires a set up card as well as resolving a follow up card to actually act as a finisher. By this logic top is also a finisher as well as a number of other cards that cant actually end a game.

As far as viable card choices go zenith should be left off all lists for simplicity sake. It should always be capabale of ramp/interaction/selection/ca/finishing if its not the entire deck is built wrong.

I think in general we need to be less liberal on our comprehensive list and more focused on how the subtle difference in card selection adds up ie:
-pulse/vindicate/anguished umaking/councils judgement
-deathrite/ste/courser/nissa

I'm more realistically looking at:

Ramp:
Dryad arbor
Explorer
Deathrite
Sakura tribe elder
Nissa
Courser
E witness

Selection/advantage/shuffle:
Top
Zenith
Explorer
STE
Stoneforge*
Sylvan library
Intent
Painful truths
Skelatal scrying
Abzan charm
Recurring nightmare
E witness
Tireless tracker
Nissa
Courser
Meren

Interaction:
Therapy
Thoughtseize
Hymm
Lilly
Deathrite
Path
Plow
Innocent blood
Abrupt decay
G charm
Shriekmaw
Gaddock teeg
Scooze
Qpm
Jitte
Sofi
Rec sage
E witness
Pulse
Vindicate
Councils judgement
Anguished umaking
Dismember
Abzan charm
Deed
Deluge

Finishers:
Deathrite
Scooze
Nissa
E witness
Rhino
Garruk
Elspeth
Thrun
Abbyssal persecutor*
Baneslayer
Tusk
Sigarda
Thune*
Batterskull
Nahiri*


Swiss army "allstars" on paper:
Explorer
Deathrite
Gsz
Scooze
Stoneforge*
Courser
Nissa
E witness
Abzan charm (this disgusts me being here)


*denotes requiring 5+ slots




Sideboard gets way more shakey but generally I'd consider these playable:

Ts
Hymm
Lilly
Surgical
Extirpate
Memoricide
Cannonist
Teeg
Glissa
Rec sage
Qpm
Needle
E bridge
3sphere
G charm
Deluge
E plague
Choke
Pulse
Grip
Leyline of sanctity
Leyline of the void
Sorin
I'm sure I'm missing some...

Whoa !!

You guys are amazing, I know why this thread is the best there is :smile:

Unfortunately, you're too fast for me. I hardly can read everything written here, work on a stonefit list with Jain mor by PM, and contribute to the thread as I would like to. (real life don't help those days)

So quick response to the things I saw during this week :

Uncletiggy streamlining the decklist (removing the fat, the cute) is a great idea and I think one of the way to achieve a "best deck list" if it is ever possible (because of meta, play preference, religious convictions)

Trying to work with categories instead of specific cards : great idea

Trying to adapt the delver model : nice mental exercise but the decks work differently so we cannot copy paste their numbers.

Our kor artificier getting more traction, I like very much (kuddo to Bobmans who crammed rhinos and stoneforge in the same list) :smile:


One aspect of the deck we should question is : what is our game plan ? (ok it sounds dumb, but there is no wrong questions )

For me our plan boils down to : ramp with explorer, drop sigarda (OK we can play other threats in the meanwhile but the finality is a quick evasive unkillable 5/5 )

One other question is when do we loose ?

For me I loose :

- Against quick combo.
- Against god's hand (this is SPARTA , herr I mean legacy).
- Our threats get dealt with (looking at you miracle).
- When the opponent goes bigger.
- When the opponent disrupt my explorer plan (stifle, swords, counterspell, discard...) so that I play a slow deck that die to daze.

For the combo problem, Jain mor and I decided that 2 maindeck thoughtseize should help.
As for the god's hand, that happens but I guess the others feel the same VS triple therapy into turn 3 sigarda.

It left us with three problems that need addressing. So we think that the deck should play a plan B, that is effective without the ramp from explorer but should also benefit from the ramping should all things go as planned, helps us to go bigger in conjunction with plan A and makes us more resilient against sweepers (that are the one thing that kill Sigarda) .

and our conclusion is that stoneforge is the plan B we need : it's good we you're curving like a muggle, the equips become better we you got the mana rolling.
It also does two important things :
- try to to go bigger than a sigarda wearing a batterskull, a jitte and a SOFI (well it never happened to me, the max I've got was sigarda plus batterskull plus jitte, but that was enough :laugh: )
- an equipment on the board transforms any fetch into a 4 turn clock thanks to arbor, drastically upping our threats count in the late game.


Sorry for the unstructured post, like I said too much things to think about, not enough time (and the thread going 2 pages a day doesn't incite me to go digging for the exact terms used, but no offence meant to anyone )

@uncletiggy: You're right about card choices, I agree.

I also like the idea of grouping together similar cards, like Vindicate and Maelstrom Pulse.

I'll start compiling in the morning. Everyone feel free to chime in.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Plm

crammed rhinos and stoneforge in the same list

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After a few games with that list i can conclude that
* the raw power output is insane. No time for bullshit, slamming Rhino and Batterskull ASAP.
* there was a gap in the green creature curve at 2 and 3 mana. It was pretty awkward.
- but i wasnt missing stuff like Witness and Courser..
* all of the nr's felt exaclty right. 21 lands and 60 cards total.
* wiggleroom is probably 1 Abrupt Decay, 1 SFM and/or 1 Rhino.
* Unglytiggy set a good base with his list. Going forward i am interested in the data that Echolon is compiling.

Working on towards Frankfurt's Perfect 75 Rhinofestival.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by sdematt

Ill try Sorin.

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Good thing about him is that he is good whenever you need help.

1 life, Gurmag Angler in play and Bolt on top of opponent's library? Sorin is what you need.
Low on cards in an attrition war? Sorin is what you need.

Also he kills Jace EtB. The life loss could also be very nice with Rhinos.

So I'm currently looking at something like this:

21 lands (8-10 fetches)

4 GSZ

15 Interaction:
4 Therapy
4 Path
3 Deed
2 Decay
1 Vindicate
1 Jitte

15 Finisher:
(4 GSZ)
3 SFM
3 Rhino
3 Deathrite
1 Sigarda
1 Batterskull

10 Ramp:
(4 GSZ)
(3 Deathrite)
3 Veteran Explorer

13 Filter / Tutor / Draw:
(4 GSZ)
(3 SFM)
3 Top
1 Painful Truths
1 Tireless Tracker
1 Eternal Witness

39 Nonland cards
21 lands
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60

Sideboard:

2-4 Thoughtseize
2-3 Pithing Needle
3 Surgical Extraction
1 Sorin
1 Teeg
1 QPM
0-3 Golgari Charm
0-5 other meta cards

Things to note:
Second Painful Truths -> Tireless Tracker.
No Dryad Arbor, makes equipment a bit worse. Do we want to try to jam in Meren + Arbor somewhere?
Do we want a SoFI in the main / what does it replace?
We only have one recursion spell (witness) since no Meren. Volrath's Stronghold in the land slots?
If we want more interaction or draw we could swap out some of the other one for Abzan Charm e.g. -1 Path -1 Truths +2 Abzan Charm

Does this look like a reasonable starting point to you guys?

After testing abzan charm doesn't cut the mustard.

The removal mode is useless because either : it is the only spell you can play this turn due to those horrible color requirement, or you don't get to play it because your mana is under duress (looking at marit lage and the delver company ) without talking about an conditional removal (sorry I'm a removal but I don't do jackshit against elves :frown: )

The card draw could be interesting but we are trading instant speed for a card (hint, it suck since we are a tap out deck) witness gives you the same amount of CA but is a zenith target.

If some one successfully used the +1+1 mode let him speak henceforth or remain silent thereafter (the only times I tried it I got punished with a removal)

So in summary I've been there, "you can't get there from here, well, you can but it won't be fun"

@nasvi : if you take the stoneforge road you should have arbor in your list. It's a mistake not to play it, turning your late game fetch into an hasty 4 turns clock (like you know after a terminus) is one of the main appeal of the stoneforge package. Also Meren is a nice CA engine that doesn't die to bolt and decay and synergise well with Meren.

For a non stonforge build I'm looking at this breakdown:

4 vet
3 drs
1 scooze
1 qpm
1 ewitness
4 rhino
1 sigarda
1 tusk

2 top
4 zenith
2 truths
1 nightmare

4 therapy
3 decay
3 path
3 deed
1 pulse

22 lands

3 bayou
1 scrub
2 savanna
2 forest
2 swamp
2 plains
2 tower
4 catacombs
4 windswept heath

Sideboard:
2 ts
3 surgical
2 grip
1 teeg
2 needle
1 pulse
1 sorin
1 e plaque
2 bridge

Mana:
15g(7) 14b(6) 13w(5)

Distribution:
11 ramp
20 interaction
12 Manipulation(16 shuffle)
14 finisher

Curve:
1-16
2-9
3-15
4-8
5-6

Its worth noting nightmare is the weakest card md but plays a vital role in providing extra reach with the sorin ebridge sideboard plan.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tao

Good thing about him is that he is good whenever you need help.

1 life, Gurmag Angler in play and Bolt on top of opponent's library? Sorin is what you need.
Low on cards in an attrition war? Sorin is what you need.

Also he kills Jace EtB. The life loss could also be very nice with Rhinos.

---

I'm just wondering how kills Jace. Do you mean resetting him? Since Jace obviously Gets up to, say, 7 if he's fatesealed twice. I guess you're getting him in range? Just wondering, since I keep seeing that he "kills" Jace. I guess you're hoping they haven't ticked him up a bunch?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by uncletiggy

For a non stonforge build I'm looking at this breakdown:

4 vet
3 drs
1 scooze
1 qpm
1 ewitness
4 rhino
1 sigarda
1 tusk

2 top
4 zenith
2 truths
1 nightmare

4 therapy
3 decay
3 path
3 deed
1 pulse

22 lands

3 bayou
1 scrub
2 savanna
2 forest
2 swamp
2 plains
2 tower
4 catacombs
4 windswept heath

Sideboard:
2 ts
3 surgical
2 grip
1 teeg
2 needle
1 pulse
1 sorin
1 e plaque
2 bridge

Mana:
15g(7) 14b(6) 13w(5)

Distribution:
11 ramp
20 interaction
12 Manipulation(16 shuffle)
14 finisher

Curve:
1-16
2-9
3-15
4-8
5-6

Its worth noting nightmare is the weakest card md but plays a vital role in providing extra reach with the sorin ebridge sideboard plan.

---

I definitely don't mind Recurring Nightmare, I just know I would see it more if you ran Intent. I know slots are tight, of course.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Plm

After testing abzan charm doesn't cut the mustard.

---

I mostly agree. It looks great on paper but it's not good enough in practice.

Has anyone ever really tried Dromoka's Command? It can generate a 2 for 1 filling the CA role, but it's also just solid as removal or sometimes even stopping the opponents removal.

Edit: Stealth edit opposed to double post

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Navsi

Things to note:
Second Painful Truths -> Tireless Tracker.
No Dryad Arbor, makes equipment a bit worse. Do we want to try to jam in Meren + Arbor somewhere?
Do we want a SoFI in the main / what does it replace?
We only have one recursion spell (witness) since no Meren. Volrath's Stronghold in the land slots?
If we want more interaction or draw we could swap out some of the other one for Abzan Charm e.g. -1 Path -1 Truths +2 Abzan Charm

Does this look like a reasonable starting point to you guys?

---

Here's what I've been playing with for the past couple days now:

Land 22
4 Windswept Heath
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Marsh Flats
3 Forest
2 Swamp
1 Plains
2 Bayou
1 Scrubland
1 Savanah
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Horizon Canopy

Creatures 16
4 Veteran Explorer
2 Deathrite Shaman
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Qasali Pridemage
2 Courser of Kruphix
1 Tireless Tracker
1 Meren of Clan Nel Toth
3 Siege Rhino
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons

Spells 22
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Pernicious Deed
1 Sylvan Library
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Path to Exile
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Abzan Charm

Sideboard
1 Pithing Needle
3 Dark Confidant
3 Faerie Macabre
1 Carpet of Flowers
1 Krosan Grip
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Path to Exile
1 Abrupt Decay
2 Choke

Still undecided on the 2nd Tracker, the local store is sold out of them though so I've got a bit to decide.

Have been using Meren+Arbor very little. Usually I would rather recur something of greater value, and I find I GSZ for Meren only in a small number of circumstances. On the other hand I have been using Volrath's a Dryad Arbor, then replay the Arbor with Courser quite a bit. It's a nice little trick. In a couple cases I've also used it to guarantee a 0 for Bob to hit, or in other cases combined with Courser foreknowledge to put another random creature on top to reduce damage, it's always nice to recur DRS since he's a threat and only costs you 1. I'm rethinking Meren for this reason, the slot might just be better as a 4th Siege Rhino or maybe even a 3 drop, I think I floated the idea yesterday of turning Meren into Tracker #2.

Can't comment on the SFM specific things though, I've never tried it in the build since I don't own any. It does seem to me though that having a way to tutor an equipment holder off of fetchlands is powerful. I know Arbor is pretty controversial though but it has always been my experience that for every opening hand it screws up, it enables you in 10 other games.

Also, on the Horizon Canopy in my list. It's awful. It costs way too much life, the goal was to try and work in some other mana sink/card advantage but I don't think Canopy is what we're looking for. The lack of a pain free way to tap it is a deal breaker because we're ideally tapping all of our mana every turn. An early Canopy translates into 5-6 life lost by the time you're ready to be rid of it.

More detailed thoughts tomorrow or Monday. Went 3-0 into 0-3 at Mythic, and ended up 1 spot out of prize. Started off beating DnT, Hollywood on Painter, and BUG Delver, then lost to Miracles, Grixis Delver, and Miracles again.

Delver was mostly my keeping a bad hand in g3 and getting punished for it. Miracles, I feel, is unwinnable without Slaughter Games. There is simply no other good way to deal with Jace, and he just takes over the game to the point where we literally just lose as soon as he hits play. Shardless and other decks we can pressure it enough to kill it. I made the decision to cut the Taiga and the slaughters and just be Abzan for the day, and I paid for that pretty severely. Delver I mostly attribute my loss to the fact that I got 2 hours of sleep last night and was waning pretty heavily at that point, because my keep was definitely a trap, and I fell into it.

Tireless Tracker overperformed on the day. Consider me in on that, although Courser was still pretty underwhelming. I think Tracker does what Courser wants to do, just better and is a better use for that slot. Carpets also overperformed out of the board. Teeg was super questionable and may have in fact cost me a game against Miracles. Making GSZ into interaction is powerful, certainly, but considering it costs us the use of GSZ, which is probably our best card, I don't think that it's worth it.

Again, I'll post again in greater detail soon.

Alrighty. Compilation time for SE Fit so far. I'll be taking it from the top, so this'll be a long post.

Requirements:
- Must be able to go over the top of most opponents
- Must be able to handle/mitigate mana denial strategies
- Must be able to break through lock pieces
- Must be able to handle opposing threats on the board
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce green mana on turn 1
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce black mana on turn 1
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce white mana on turn 2
- No card may cost >5 mana
- No card may have triple mana of any 1 colour in its manacost
- GSZ'able cards must have intrinsic value
- Creatures must either provide mandatory utility effects, be very hard to kill or have a very high power/mana ratio

I didn't see any pro >6 mana posts, so I'm sticking with >5 for that particular requirement.

We lose:
- Against quick combo.
- When our threats get dealt with (looking at you miracle).
- When the opponent goes bigger.
- When the opponent disrupt the explorer plan so that we play a slow deck that dies to Daze

Slot distribution:
21-22 land
16 removal/interaction
13 CA/library manipulation
11-12 finishers
2-3 CA/library manipulation AND (removal/interaction OR finisher)

Suggested mana curve:
17 CMC 1 cards
10 CMC 2 cards
5 CMC 3 cards
4 CMC 4 cards
3 CMC 5 cards

Bear in mind that this curve is mostly a guideline. Feel free to shuffle around with the distribution.

Viable cards per category:
Lands
Swamp
Forest
Plains
Verdant Catacombs
Windswept Heath
Marsh Flats
Bayou
Scrubland
Savanah
Phyrexian Tower
Volrath's Stronghold
Removal/interaction
Path to Exile/Swords to Plowshares
Cabal Therapy
Thoughtseize/Inquisition of Kozilek
Maelstrom Pulse/Vindicate/Anguished Unmaking/Council's Judgment
Innocent Blood
Abrupt Decay
Gaddock Teeg
Scavenging Ooze
Innocent Blood
Golgari Charm
Shriekmaw/Dismember
Qasali Pridemage/Reclamation Sage
Umezawa's Jitte
Sword of Fire and Ice
Abzan Charm
Lilliana of the Veil
Eternal Witness
Deathrite Shaman
Library Manipulation/CA
Veteran Explorer
Sakura-Tribe Elder
Sylvan Library
Sensei's Divining Top
Tireless Tracker
Mirri's Guile
Courser of Kruphix
Ajani, Mentor of Heroes
Painful Truths
Skeletal Scrying
Hymn to Tourach
Pernicious Deed
Toxic Deluge
Wood Elves
Nissa, Vastwood Seer
Eternal Witness
Gitrog Monster
Dark Confidant
Diabolic Intent
Stoneforge Mystic
Abzan Charm
Recurring Nightmare
Finishers
Green Sun's Zenith
Siege Rhino
Sigarda, Host of Herons
Thragtusk
Thrun, the Last Troll
Deathrite Shaman
Baneslayer Angel
Meren of Clan Nel Toth
Dryad Arbor
Elspeth, Knight Errant
Archangel of Thune
Batterskull
Nahiri, the Lithomancer
Abyssal Persecutor

Next step: filling categories. First category: Finishers. This kinda dictates how we plan to finish a game, so that lets us build the rest of our deck around it.

Finishers, 12 of them + 3 that also perfom a CA or interaction/removal role, so 15 cards total.

Here's mine to start with

Finisher/CA:
1 Tireless Tracker
1 Courser of Kruphix
1 Meren of Clan Nel Toth (Meren + Tracker + Dryad Arbor seem like a nice little loop)

Finisher
4 Siege Rhino
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
3 Deathrite Shaman
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Dryad Arbor (due to Meren)
2 Green Sun's Zenith

Seems I'm bending my curve a bit. I like to have a big piece of meat to go with my potatoes.

Even though some cards in this list may have double roles, I'm appointing them to these for now. We're probably going to iterate through this process a few times.

We've now arrived at the hard part of the process. I think we need to keep in mind that we won't end up with something drastically different from what we're used to and that's fine. It's also perfectly fine for people to come up with different sets for each category. The main goal of this project should be to see if looking at deckbuilding this way enables us to come up with configurations we wouldn't normally think of.

Keep giving eachother the space to come up with ideas and stay respectful toward one another. We've done a great job so far, but this is the part where we start butting heads. That's a normal thing to do and a natural part of the process. Keep an open mind and try not to offend others or be offended too easily. If someone critiques something, it's probably your idea being critiqued and not you as a person. Please remember that.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Echelon

Seems I'm bending my curve a bit. I like to have a big piece of meat to go with my potatoes.

---

Think I'm going to play with the Bob idea and see if I can work in 1-2 MB opposed to the SB them for Explorer plan. Studying other Legacy decks which use him, it looks like you want a curve of no more than 70 CMC in your deck, after adding it all up and removing one activation/hit worth of lifegain (DRS activation, Batterskull hit, etc). So I think we can count 2 Coursers as 5 in this case (.5 life from each), each DRS as -1, Ooze as 1, and Siege Rhinos as 1. Plus there's top which is a whole other benefit I'm not even accouting for. Provided we can stay above 8 life against a Bolt deck or above 5 against someone else, that should work. That leads me to believe a Bob build wants the 4th Rhino over Meren while a non Bob build wants Meren. It may be the 2 we're looking for to up that slot on the curve.

Do Courser/Bob compete with each other for slots? One wants you to use Top to put lands on top while the other wants you to put lands 2nd from the top. It seems to me like one cancels the other.

You're probably not at the list point yet but I'm working a bit ahead and putting stuff together. I think this meets all requirements, though a few card choices are questionable. This is probably what I'll be testing at my next opportunity to do so, which could be tomorrow, or it could be in 2 weeks... no way to tell.
Land 22
4 Windswept Heath
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Marsh Flats
3 Forest
2 Swamp
1 Plains
2 Bayou
1 Scrubland
1 Savanah
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Blighted Fen

Creatures 19
4 Veteran Explorer
2 Deathrite Shaman
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Dark Confidant
2 Courser of Kruphix
2 Tireless Tracker
1 Eternal Witness
4 Siege Rhino
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons

Spells 20
4 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Green Sun's Zenith
2 Pernicious Deed
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Path to Exile
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Dromoka's Command

Edit: The elusive search for a mana sink land continues. I'm wondering if Blighted Fen is powerful enough with our ability to ramp, Karakas is a possibility as well even if it's not that great of a mana sink. Maybe Mishra's Factory?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Echelon

Alrighty. Compilation time for SE Fit so far. I'll be taking it from the top, so this'll be a long post.

Slot distribution:
21-22 land
16 removal/interaction
13 CA/library manipulation
11-12 finishers
2-3 CA/library manipulation AND (removal/interaction OR finisher)

Suggested mana curve:
17 CMC 1 cards
10 CMC 2 cards
5 CMC 3 cards
4 CMC 4 cards
3 CMC 5 cards

---

I've made (yet another) spreadsheet that calculates the above based on an input decklist. If you want the original file please PM me.
The file also checks total output mana colors and requirements. Adding/removing cards is also fairly easy.

What the list cannot do is take 1 card with multiple slot distribution types. For it will be hard to distinguish the totals and where it makes the difference.

Couple questions regaring somedetails:
What is the CMC for Dismember? Since you often cast it for 1c + 4 life, but we can actually pay it's CMC in mana.
What color's do fetchlands produce? Either all 3 colors or the 2 printed colors?
Should GSZ be taking into account when calculating the mana curve AT ALL? It's CMC will be flexible, the CMC will be based in the total average CMC of the list plus 1. But this is not true if you are using it for ramp CMC1/2, or as a finisher CMC 5-6.

Edit: added % to the color requirement and production for easier comparison.

Edit2: Fixed Bayou to make GB instead of GW. Added KotR. Added some rows in the calculate sheet.

- Confidant is a bad main deck card in Nic Fit. He is best against decks that put no creature pressure on the board or on your life total, like Combo or Miracles. Against stuff like Grixis, D&T or Eldrazis he is terrible.
- Tireless Tracker is a great card as a 1-off. Now you can use GSZ to refill your hand when you flood. I would not recommend playing more because when you are light on mana he is only a Gorilla Warrior.
- If you search for flexible Mana Sinks, just play more copies of Eternal Witness. She is about 25 times better than all alternatives that were posted so far.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Arianrhod

More detailed thoughts tomorrow or Monday. Went 3-0 into 0-3 at Mythic, and ended up 1 spot out of prize. Started off beating DnT, Hollywood on Painter, and BUG Delver, then lost to Miracles, Grixis Delver, and Miracles again.

Delver was mostly my keeping a bad hand in g3 and getting punished for it. Miracles, I feel, is unwinnable without Slaughter Games. There is simply no other good way to deal with Jace, and he just takes over the game to the point where we literally just lose as soon as he hits play. Shardless and other decks we can pressure it enough to kill it. I made the decision to cut the Taiga and the slaughters and just be Abzan for the day, and I paid for that pretty severely. Delver I mostly attribute my loss to the fact that I got 2 hours of sleep last night and was waning pretty heavily at that point, because my keep was definitely a trap, and I fell into it.

Tireless Tracker overperformed on the day. Consider me in on that, although Courser was still pretty underwhelming. I think Tracker does what Courser wants to do, just better and is a better use for that slot. Carpets also overperformed out of the board. Teeg was super questionable and may have in fact cost me a game against Miracles. Making GSZ into interaction is powerful, certainly, but considering it costs us the use of GSZ, which is probably our best card, I don't think that it's worth it.

Again, I'll post again in greater detail soon.

---

NO! Oh dude I was hoping to read you took it down after I left.
I went R1 loss to DnT (unbelievable how he got through 2 deeds while I draw into nothing), and game-loss violation R2 for a mis-registered deck. Paolo on Grixis wins in 3 turns. I name therapy turn 1 on delver. See 3 bstorms. He untaps for his turn 1 and drops the top-decked delver. fml. 0-2 drop.

The list sucked. I made too many last-minute changes.
I'm not salty. I think it's Karma making corrections + bringing me back down to earth with the law of averages lol.

Small sample size comments
-1 Tracker is all I'd run.
-KotR is good in the deck (I tested 2 in the SB and they were solid threats/can filter)
-I acquired poppa Sorin. But he should be a SB card
-Why did I bail on Sakura? Never again! Plus he synergizes with everything (incl. Tracker)
-Watching ultimate NicFit lose to Miracles was eye opening. Obviously he had misplays, but Kev is spot on. You cannot possibly contend with Miracles without Slaughter Games. I'd make it a point to run 3x with the red source in the side.

Moving forward
I've switched sides on SFM. Next month I'm giving it a try unless someone presents something better.
*3 Rhino, 3 SFM (Jitte, Batter, 1 sword of X/Y) is a nice starting point.
*I want 1 Sakura, 1 Tracker, 1 KotR, 1 Witness to compliment

My friend won GPT Prague on Saturday with BUG:

4 Veterna Explorer
2 Deathrite Shaman
2 Scavenging Ooze
3 Baleful Strix
1 Eternal Witness
1 Meren
1 Tragtusk
1 Grave Titan

4 Brainstorm
4 Cabal Therapy
2 SDT
1 GSZ
1 Diabolic Intent
1 Innocent Blood
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Force of Will

2 Pernicious Deed
2 Jace
1 Garruk Relentless

3 Forest
2 Swamp
2 Island
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Creeping Tar Pit
2 Tropical I.
2 Bayou
1 Underground Sea
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Misty Rainforest

Side:
2 Back to Basics
2 P. Needle
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Force of Will
2 Thoughtseize
1 Invasive Surgery
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Swan Song
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Maelstorm Pulse
1 Golgari Charm


We worked on the deck together. Its a blast to plays. Brainstorm helps against clunky draws and Deed+Jace is a "nice fit". Back to Basics makes some unwinnable match-ups almost easy.
Invasive Surgery is a wonderful spell with Strix.

His report:
R1: Infect 2:1 - in the third he conceded to my BtB+Deed
R2: UR Delver 2:0 - in one game he had only creatures - I had 2vets+2therapies+bayou - I opened with Therapy on Daze and the resto of the game was formality
R3: Burn 2:0 - very difficult with this list (my opponent was played under mindslaver - you know the things that happen on Friday night)
R4: ID
R5: ID

T8: Lands 2:0 - he couldnt find DD in time - my ooze ate him. In the second I kept this - fetch, needle, surgical, BtB, SDT, Therapy, Fow - I drew lands in the next rounds. I knew he brought in Grips so I waited with my BtB - named Grip and won. Funny moment was when I attacked with Strix and he "mazed" it with BtB in play...
T4: UWR stone-mentor 2:0 - he never had an answer for my Deed, I played carefuly around StP and after Jace hit play he never came back.
T2: My frind already had byes so he conceded. It only cost me a kidney.

See you during GP Prague!

A scapefit player just took Ovinospring in Milano.

http://www.ovinotournament.com/legac...t-ovinospring/

Anyone knows if he is around ?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tao

- Confidant is a bad main deck card in Nic Fit. He is best against decks that put no creature pressure on the board or on your life total, like Combo or Miracles. Against stuff like Grixis, D&T or Eldrazis he is terrible.
- Tireless Tracker is a great card as a 1-off. Now you can use GSZ to refill your hand when you flood. I would not recommend playing more because when you are light on mana he is only a Gorilla Warrior.
- If you search for flexible Mana Sinks, just play more copies of Eternal Witness. She is about 25 times better than all alternatives that were posted so far.

---

Tried Bob against Grixis Delver specifically because of this a little earlier. I found I was overloading their removal and not losing very much life to him. My opponent was prioritizing killing him though so he never stuck around for long, usually just 0-1 cards. That could have been wrong on my opponents part against us. Since you have more experience with Confidant I wouldn't mind some feedback there. Was my opponent playing poorly by killing Bob over some of my other cards here? Such as using Terminate on Bob leaving him soft to an eventual Rhino.

Really liked Tracker, I was overloading my opponents removal enough that it wasn't reliably dying, but even if it dies right away assuming you pick your moment you're going to get a 2 for 1 out of it. In one of my games I had a moment where my opponent was tapped out and I was at 3 mana. I played tracker, played/cracked a fetch, made 2 clues, then even used my GSZ for Arbor for a third clue. Tracker died to a Terminate the instant my opponent untapped but the damage was already done and I ended up with a four for 1 once the clues were cashed in.

All games were without a SB. Lost the first 3 to some pretty awful opening hands and mulligans (talking, going to 4-5 every time) but I think that's just variance, though the Blighted Fen screwed me in one and never helped me. Won the other 3, usually being up 5-6 cards by the end of things and always at a healthy life total (12+).

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Echelon

Alrighty. Compilation time for SE Fit so far. I'll be taking it from the top, so this'll be a long post.

Requirements:
- Must be able to go over the top of most opponents
- Must be able to handle/mitigate mana denial strategies
- Must be able to break through lock pieces
- Must be able to handle opposing threats on the board
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce green mana on turn 1
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce black mana on turn 1
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce white mana on turn 2
- No card may cost >5 mana
- No card may have triple mana of any 1 colour in its manacost
- GSZ'able cards must have intrinsic value
- Creatures must either provide mandatory utility effects, be very hard to kill or have a very high power/mana ratio


We lose:
- Against quick combo.
- When our threats get dealt with (looking at you miracle).
- When the opponent goes bigger.
- When the opponent disrupt the explorer plan so that we play a slow deck that dies to Daze

Slot distribution:
21-22 land
16 removal/interaction
13 CA/library manipulation
11-12 finishers
2-3 CA/library manipulation AND (removal/interaction OR finisher)

---

Sorry I'm a day late, but I really must reorganise this list and change a few things before we move on.
- I'll define the categories more clearly according to the roles we want them to fill when we put them in your decks.
- Cards will be moved around, sideboard cards will be cut
- I'll then relist everything in turn relevance order, which isn't always the same as CMC (courser and tracker aren't card advantage until you hit 4 mana despite being 3 cmc for example).

Viable cards per category:

Lands
Verdant Catacombs
Windswept Heath
Marsh Flats
Bayou
Scrubland
Savanah
Swamp
Forest
Plains
Karakas
Phyrexian Tower
Volrath's Stronghold
Man Lands

Ramp
(cards that accelerate your mana)

Deathrite Shaman
Dryad Abor
Veteran Explorer
Sakura Tribe Elder
Phyrexian Tower
Knight of the Reliquary

Answers
(cards that are used to trade/answer opponents cards/strategies; cards in parenthesis answer narrow cards/strategies and shouldn't really count towards maindeck counts to be honest)

(Karakas)
Cabal Therapy
Thoughtseize/Inquisition of Kozilek
(Deathrite Shaman)
Hymn to Tourach
Path to Exile/Swords to Plowshares
Dismember
Innocent Blood
Abrupt Decay
Shriekmaw
(Gaddock Teeg)
(Scavenging Ooze)
(Qasali Pridemage)
(Reclamation Sage)
Maelstrom Pulse/Vindicate/Anguished Unmaking/Council's Judgment
Abzan Charm
Liliana of the Veil
Toxic Deluge
Pernicious Deed
Umezawa's Jitte
(Sword of Fire and Ice)

Card Selection
(cards that decrease variance, this is where gsun belongs..)

Mirri's Guile (not with deed.. so never?)
Sensei's Divining Top
Gsun Zenith
Sylvan Library (Pay 8 life and it's card advantage or 4 if they decay it..)
Diabolic Intent
Volrath's Stronghold

Card Advantage
(cards that get you ahead on cards whether your opponent has permanents or not, some of these also decrease variance)

SFM*
Hymn to Tourach
Dark Confidant
Painful Truths
Abzan Charm
Eternal Witness
Wood Elves
Nissa
Recurring Nightmare
Meren
Tireless Tracker
Courser of Kruphix
Skeletal Scrying
Sword of Fire and Ice
Sword of Light and Shadow
The Gitrog Monster
Planeswalkers

Resilient Threats
(Not going to list every creature in the deck -.- just the ones we play because they are hard to answer and can reliably end the game)

Man lands
SFM/Equipment*
Siege Rhino
Thrun
Abyssal Persecutor*
Sigarda, Host of Herons
Thragtusk
Batterskull
Baneslayer Angel
Archangel of Thune*
Planeswalkers

*denotes cards requiring 4+ slots

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Next step: filling categories. First category: Finishers. This kinda dictates how we plan to finish a game, so that lets us build the rest of our deck around it.

Finishers, 12 of them + 3 that also perform a CA or interaction/removal role, so 15 cards total.

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I'm not so sure this is best place to start, or the best way to think about it. What finishers we play doesn't dictate how we plan to finish the game, our game plan dictates how we finish the game.

Our Plan A is to force the game out of the early turns that Legacy decks usually revolve around using ramp, or survive it using efficient answers, so that we can dominate the mid-late game our deck is designed to win, that most other decks aren't comfortable with, using card advantage and threats resilient to typical answers in the format (bolt/decay/stp/terminus/counter spells)

As long as your deck plays enough resilient threats (4 or more?) and enough card selection / card advantage to reliably find them, you shouldn't have a problem closing out the game with them and any other random bodies that are left lying around (DRS, eternal witness etc). People have used all sorts of resilient threats to win with this deck, which is part of the fun of it, but is also kind of a distraction right? The most important part is creating the right combination of ramp / answers / card selection that most consistently forces a legacy match into the late game that allows our deck to deploy those resilient threats and card advantage.

So that being said, it seems to be the main complaints in the forum that our decks aren't consistent enough, our combo matchup could be better and our miracles matchup is rough.

We all already run 2/3 tops and 4 Gsun's as consistency slots. We can either run more slots for this, supplement them with efficient card advantage (not looking at you courser/meren), run more versatile answers to make the game to run longer or a combination of the three (my preference). How many people here have tried running 4 tops? I know I haven't. We should have enough shuffle effects to ship them back when we draw two?

4 top + 4 gsun mimics the ponder/brainstorm nonsense we see in the world.

15+ Answers does sound like a reasonable number, keeping in mind our goals and our issues I'm going to push for the inclusion of more discard again. It's just an efficient, curve filling, catch all answer that we have access to that ups our game against our problem matchups without being useless against other (looking at you teeg..)

4 Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
6-8 Spot removal
2-4 Sweepers
1 made up from counting the pennies among the multiple cards I put in parenthesis (DRS, Scooze etc)

I think I've written enough for now, hope this all makes sense and feels like valued addition to the process.


TL;DR
- Ordered lists by their turn relevance and put more concrete definitions on categories based on why we put cards in our deck
- We should focus on how we can more consistently implement our game plan not on the end game

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Plm

A scapefit player just took Ovinospring in Milano.

http://www.ovinotournament.com/legac...t-ovinospring/

Anyone knows if he is around ?

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ScapeFireWish?

Is that what we should call it?

That list is pretty sweet looking.