You ready for some 12 Post Mirror matches on MODO :)
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So at this point, I think I'm to the point of fine tuning my sideboard list for the GP. I had two sideboard slots that are open for debate. I want them to be dedicated for "agro" (Delver/D&T) & Burn. All opinions are welcomed!
Thragtusk
Pros: Immediate life and board impact. Opponents often lifetilt in frustration at the sight of it. Requires multiple removal spells to truly get rid of it. Synergy with chain of vapor & repeal.
Cons:Requires the "splash" color. Fails lightning bolt test.
Batterskull
Pros:Easy to cast. Can be easily returned & recasted if token dies. Passes lightning bolt test. Comedic value when attached to PrimeTime, Kozilek or Emrakul.
Cons: Takes 3 turns to surpass lifegain of thragtusk. Living weapon token can be stifled, leaving you with basically nothing. Dies to artifact removal, which opponents may bring in.
Engineered Explosives
Pros: Selectively kills all aggressive creatures. Can stretch to 3 colors via karakas/bog if needed.
Cons: Harder to cast if being wastelanded due to dual colors. Kills minimal targets in burn.
Chill
Pros: Slows down U/R delver and Burn by at least 2 turns. Great in multiples!
Cons: Dies to REB/Pyroblast, which they will have 3-4 of at least. Does not do anything against BUG delver, death and taxes, etc. Although it slows your opponent down, its not directly going to win you the game.
That's barely a con at all. EE is extremely good. If you're running U/G, you can get to four colors innately (albeit with some difficulty) and with an assist from an opponent you could theoretically get all five. Running EE alongside Trinket Mage is very reliable as well. Burn is largely about knowing when to Glacial Chasm and winning out of it.
What do you guys think about carpet of flowers vs all the delver decks?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHh0rf0ojEc
Zot's covered Explosives, but...
Chill needs testing because Red has (almost ironically) gotten much stronger with the addition of blue to most red strategies post-Khans.
Batterskull and Thragtusk are cute, but the rule of thumb I've read (I think Rock Lee said it) right now is that if your answer costs more than 3 mana, chances are the opponent has cast/beaten down for lethal by the time the mana's reached. My advise, if you are going to play one/both, make room in the main board. And I would consider it because life gain outside of Glimmerpost seems good right now because Glimmerpost also feeds their Price of Progress, which is really on the rise at the moment.
As an aside, Thragtusk passes the Bolt test in my book because if you're opponent bolts a Thragtusk, they are in for a bad surprise.
So, I recently picked this deck up and getting in some Practice with it. I'm normally a painter player but got a hold of a candelabra and a tabernacle and I really like where this deck is positioned right now. I put together a list very similar to the one Davek just posted although I run forces in the main and moment's peace in the Board. Also run two dig through time and ponders instead of tops to fuel the digs. Also curious about the dark depths combo in the Board. Which matchups don't you want it in? Anyway, mostly just wanted to tap into this thread and say hi.
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On paper, dig through time looks better but treasure cruise is infinitely easier to cast. Right now, in my latest build I have 8 permanents, 27 land and the remainder spells. There's been multiple times where I just tap out, eat a few cards and take an eldrazi cruise. If the counter it, that usually means your next threat will resolve.
I agree with you, wastelands are at an all time low. Miracles is on the rise. UR delver had pushed infect out of the metagame. It's a good time to hardcast emrakul and take all the turns.
Also a lot of people thus far have said. " I've heard rumors of this deck, but I have no idea how to sideboard against it."
After testing more, I've settled on a list for the grand prix. I cut the Green Sun package to streamline the deck and focused on Trinket Mage more. The list is much better in my eyes, which makes me a little sad because I though Courser of Kruphix and Green Sun's Zenith were really cool.
// Creatures
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
4 Primeval Titan
2 Trinket Mage
// Spells
4 Brainstorm
2 Ponder
1 Treasure Cruise
1 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Expedition Map
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Candelabra of Tawnos
3 Force of Will
2 Flusterstorm
3 Repeal
3 Crop Rotation
3 Show and Tell
// Spell Lands
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
1 Eye of Ugin
1 Glacial Chasm
// Mana-Producing Lands
4 Cloudpost
4 Glimmerpost
2 Vesuva
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Tropical Island
2 Island
1 Forest
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Karakas
// Sideboard
SB: 3 Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 1 Bojuka Bog
SB: 1 Cyclonic Rift
SB: 2 Flusterstorm
SB: 1 Grafdigger's Cage
SB: 1 Krosan Grip
SB: 2 Pithing Needle
SB: 1 Snapcaster Mage
SB: 1 Surgical Extraction
SB: 1 Titania, Protector of Argoth
SB: 1 Venser, Shaper Savant
The gist of this list is essentially beating UR Delver pre-board. Before I was slightly unfavored to even against a good player who also knew how post worked well. Now I'm 60-40 preboard and only slightly ahead post board. Green Sun's package was always too clunky or cute and didn't play to the game plan of just getting an unanswerable guy into play well enough when you need to. I still love Titania, and against Death and Taxes she has been pretty good as a board-in because of Cataclysm.
Is BG really that much better than mono-G?
Hi Drude, welcome to this thread! I usually enjoy reading different threads and i've seen you're quite a good one with Painter.
DD combo is in the sb because it basically kills BUG, Team America and Jund in a single shot. This deck may have a hard time dealing with multiple early hand disruption (i know, Tourach and friends are not on the rise at the moment, but i think they should since UR looks as a pretty easy matchup for them) and having an uncounterable two card combo reasonably easy to fetch seems a good thing. Remember that Stifle wont stop it, as your opponent stifles the now-Dark Depths Thespian's stage trigger beucase it will reiter again immediately. I found it as a good way to kill combo decks too, without having to wait an exaggerate number of turns before reaching Emrakul mana.
I didn't dare to put it in md because we already have a bunch of non mana lands, and adding another one to the mix didn't look too appealing to me. Also, UW miracles, UWR Delver and DnT are quite common to face here in Italy at the moment and autowastelanding for 2 lands only to see a Karakas- Stp nerf your efforts is pretty frustating.
You don't Stifle the Dark Depths trigger, you Stifle the copy ability of Thespian Stage, which buys another turn. You can however Wasteland the 0 counter Thespian-Depths once the trigger is on the stack for a neat tempo efficient 2-1.
What I love about the deck especially is that it isn't only fun to play, it also seems to lead to more ridiculous stories to tell than any other legacy deck I played before. Here are some of my highlights:Quote:
Originally Posted by PilotChick
Opponent opens on Tundra, Top. I play Glimmerpost, Top myself. He pauses, sighs, then asks if I had dinner yet. I reply with no, he concedes the match and we're off getting some burgers before the next round starts.
In general, their face when they Thoughtseize your 7 land hand is priceless.
Against U/R Omnitell I once Repealed their Show and Told Omniscience with Burning Wish on the stack and killed them with my free Primeval Titan the next turn.
Surprisingly, some Storm players don't seem to know that LED is a mana ability. I won a G1 once by playing Pithing Needle on LED, then some turns later when he cast a hellbent Infernal Tutor I repealed the LED he had to play to empty out his hand. He (unnecessarily) lost that game with two LEDs in hand. A similar thing happened on camera in one of the final rounds of the Legacy Champs just a few weeks ago, so while it technically does absolutely nothing within the rules of magic, playing your Pithing Needle on LED can punish players for not knowing their deck well, so might as well go for it.
I open Glimmerpost -> Top in the dark, my opponent is Charbelcher and combos me turn 1 for exactly 20 damage and then fails to reassemble in time.
Thanks to the power of Glimmerpost, I survive being hit in the face by Marit Lage twice in the same game.
And my absolute favorite: Playing a Friday evening Trial at GP Strasbourg last year, which are 32 man single elimination, meaning that there no match can end in a draw. This was when the list still contained O-Stone, and the first two games against Sneak and Show drag on forever and I end up taking game 2 in turn 3 of extra turns to tie the match. To resolve the winner of the match the rules now state that we start game 3 and the first change of life total determines the outcome of the game and match. Not only does this mean that we have to board out all of our fetchlands, ancient tombs, and force of wills as they literally do nothing, I also have 4 cards that win the game on turn 1. He mulligans to 3, passes the turn and I proceed to win the match by playing a Glimmerpost. Interestingly enough, he was still drawing live to City of Traitors, Lotus Petal, Magus of the Moon exactly, as that dodges the Mindbreak Trap in hand, stops my Glimmerpost and deals me damage before I can deal with it.
Amen to that. My top story would be when we were splashing red. An Affinity player was attacking me for lethal. I had already used Glacial Chasm and all of my Glimmerpost were on the board. I used Crop Rotation to grab another Cloudpost, looked at cards with Sensei's Divining Top, then drew a card...
...to deliver a 20-point Bonfire of the Damned straight to the dome. We still laugh about it today.
Hope to see some of you at New Jersey. It's snowy and crappy here in Cleveland, so I'm hoping the same isn't true there. Drive safely if you're going!
@davek: Thanks for the warm welcome:smile: Ok, that makes sense to me re: DD combo. I will say I've now played a lot of games where I just don't want to see dark depths.
On this topic, is there a general consensus on which lands are supposed to be main and which SB? For example, I've been playing tabernacle main and glacial chasm SB, but maybe it should be the other way around, or both main? Bojuka bog? without it main we really have no graveyard hate but most people seem to play it SB. How many basics? Just one of each? Do most people still play multiple expedition maps or just one to search for? When I first put this deck together I used an old list I had on MWS with 4 maps, 3 pithing needles and 3 tops. I knew I wanted FoW main so had to cut some of this for blue cards (eg Ponders) but still not quite sure about maps.
@LLCoolDave: my favorite story there was the guy who scooped to turn one post. Part of the reason I love painter so much is all the turn one scoops I get to blood moon. It also points to how good the deck could be right now with all the Miracles players out there. I've also noticed pretty easy wins against the tempo delver/stoneforge decks, which are insanely popular right now.
What are the terrible MUs for this deck? Sounds like infect and heavy discard are bad? Tribal decks probably bad? Is it still a good idea to have a few needles at least in the SB for Wasteland?
Lastly, is anyone still playing a copy of Cavern of Souls? And how about 1-2 copies of life from the loam in the board? Not necessary?
thanks