You could have just said "odd sentence structure." :p
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You could have just said "odd sentence structure." :p
So I played at my weekly tournament yesterday and went 3/1 with a fairly unconventional list. A while back there was conversation about Caleb Durward suggesting something like a 62 card deck with 4 probes (in his banned series tolarian academy and gush). I tried a list with the following
62 cards
53 core - 1 goyf + 1 sylvan
4 chain lightning
4 probe
Round 1 Esper Life Loss Tempo 2/1 | 1/0
So for starters let me explain his deck a bit since it's very off the wall. There had been a UB life loss tempo build that made top 8 at an SCG a while back running death's shadow a few shocks and the other usual tempo package. He took that list splashed white and added deathrite. This allowed him to have access to stuff like swing 7 with shadow pass mid combat swords shadow gain life back. It also allowed him to have better sideboard options in RIP and Meddling Mage. It's a really cool deck with a lot of potential I think.
Game 1 he wins with me not being able to find an answer for his delver... with my 8 bolt list go figure. Key note he had presented trop into delver and swamps that game which led me to think he was on bug (I sided in submerges and immediately sided them out after game 2).
Game 2 Here he leads on deathrite off of scrubland. I get a solid goose hand and bolt all the necessary creatures while keeping him off lands with stifles and wastes.
Game 3 I probe and see Sea, Scrub, Delver, and BS (he mulled to 5). Now this is where probe had value it allowed me to know to immediately waste his sea and not worry about taking care of delver first. The rest of the game involved with me having a flipped delver and that was it.
Round 2 Enchantress 1/2 | 1/1
Game 1 Delver beats him down to 7 before he stabilizes.
Game 2 This one was weird I kept a single trop hand with 2 goose, goyf, probe, stifle, stifle. He's on a mull to 5 with Taiga, words of war, RIP, Miri's Guile, Elephant Grass. Goose 1 starts beating him down mean while I stifle back to back guile triggers while I don't draw any lands. Then I play out another goose continue to beat him down. Eventually I get some bolts going and that's that.
Game 3 I get a few geese going and a goyf then he plays out an elephant grass. I beat him over the head a few more times. He then plays out moat which gets forced followed by RIP and Solitary Confinement which is game with him at 5 so close.
Round 3 Affinity 2/0 | 2/1
Game 1 I get a probe off and see Etched champion Cranial and Vault. A few bolts mop up his early critters while his first cranial gets forced. I get a threat going while he plays out another cranial and ornithopter bashes in for 5. At this point I know to keep 2 dazes incase he draws a 4th land to play out champ around daze. Eventually my threat gets there.
Game 2 He takes a mulligan to 6 I think and this was made real easy with information from probe.
***So this is where the downside of running 62 cards / 4 probe hit me. You can't board out probe EVER. Even in matches where it's bad like affinity ***
Round 4 Nic Fit BUG 2/0 | 3/1
Game 1 I get 2 geese going while having perfect disruption with stifle daze and a wasteland.
Game 2 Here I have probe which reveals Finks, Therapy x 2, island, AD, forest, PDeed. This allowed me to know my delvers were dead which I brainstormed away while playing out a goose. I also knew I needed to dig as fast as I could for stifle because he had deed. My Goose got there with the addition of 4 bolts hahaha.
Overall it was a really good learning experience. The core rug build has answers to deal with just about anything if you have perfect information. Now if you add the consistency of 4 probes for information and an additional 4 bolts the deck becomes blazing fast and consistent. You can utilize your cantrips more effectively all the while bolting when you have free mana. The downside is your sideboard choices become really weird because siding out bolts seems always wrong unless you're playing against combo. In addition you can never side out probes even when you want too against decks like D&T, Affinity, Burn, etc.
I think this might be worth testing out more in a Young Pyromancer list, but overall it limits your sideboarding options too much I think for a list with Goyf.
I still don't understand why is it so important to not sb out the Probes. I thought that they are meant to give you info in the g1 when you don't know what you stand against, and then for the post-sb games you may cut (some numbers of) them to make some room for more necessary spells; the disadvantage of an info lost should be outweighted by the fact that you bring "live" cards instead of GPs. What am I missing? Is the info that much necessary so that you simply cannot cut the Probes?
Thanks.
It may be. Back when I played a ton of ANT I noticed my ability to evaluate a gamestate went down a lot because I used the crapton of free information as a crutch. Took a good while of playing Elves to get that skill back to where it used to be.
Normally yes it's an easy card to side out and just really helps you in the early turns or knowing what to dig for etc. The issue with what I was playing was I was jamming 4 probes and bumped the card count up to 62. This effectively doesn't make the deck any less consistent or if only by a very small margin. The problem is you can't side out any of them without just turning into a 62 card deck with 2 probes which is just bad. Then you're just paying 4 life for 2 extra cards in your deck and some information. You need to keep all 4 in to maintain any advantage of running the play set of them with a 62 card deck. Normally you would side out 2 or 3 and it turns back to a 60 card deck, but with 4 probes in the main at 62 cards siding any out turns it into a regular old 62 card deck which is just bad. Maybe I was incorrect and siding out 2 is ok even though it makes it less consistent and makes the whole plan worse. Needless to say the deck felt really weird when I was playing against affinity feeling like I needed them in even though they were bad.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer
You definitely want to leave in the Probes in against decks with blue, where it tells what kind of countermagic they have and what the follow up to Deathrite Shaman will be, that's usually where they are the best (I would board them out against U/R Delver though). Running 4 against Death and Taxes wouldn't be the end of the world, but Thalia and Spirit of the Labyrinth are things, I usually have 1 Probe left in the deck after sideboarding against D'n'T. The current Burn decks are definitely too good to be wasting life against.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer
Granted I haven't actually tried a 62 card, 4 Probe build. I think it is an interesting premise, Gitaxian Probe is at it's worst when you are on hand that is something like 2 Lands, Waste, Probe, Mongoose, Bolt, Spell Pierce and your Probe draws you a 4th Land. Minimizing the chances of that happening would certainly up the power level Gitaxian Probe. I think there may be some problems with this strategy, the amount of times I get mana screwed versus mana flooded seems to be in balance with things as they are and 62 card build obviously would mess with that. Also, seeing a bunch of Probes off of Ponder and Brainstorm isn't always great when you need action.
What do you guys usually board out against DNT where the list is 2 spell snare, 2 spell pierce and 2 forked bolt. The rest of the deck is conventional. Also under match-ups we need to add Elves and DNT to it. These decks do see a high amount of tournament play, also maybe burn since it's on the rise
-4 force, -2 spell pierce // +2 rough, +2 artifact hate, +1 sulfur elemental, +1 Vendilion clique. Most are obvious clique is really good here because it can be played in response to Vial and Stoneforge. OTD you might want to keep 2 force in and side 2 daze out to help dodge Swords and counter vial, but force is still really bad here. It's a bad match up to begin with.Quote:
Originally Posted by ShiftyKapree
+1Quote:
Originally Posted by Contract Killer
i have needles in the sb too..so itll be a lot use here together with what contractkiller has mentioned..with that..ill cut off number of fows..snares are auto include vs this matchup..
Yeah needle is pretty good here too. It hits there vial, SFM, equipment, etc.Quote:
Originally Posted by poxy14
What do you guys think about running a list with something like 3 probe and 3 pithing needle in the flex spots? I haven't tried it yet, but Needle hits a lot of prime targets our deck has problems with. Having the added information of probe can also lead to using it offensively naming fetch lands as well. I was thinking about the virtual card advantage it provides and seems worth testing. Land it after the opponent has played out a deathrite and blank that one and another 3 cards in their deck. Pithing Needle can also conserve resources like naming Liliana and saving daze and stifle for other problem cards. Just a thought I haven't actually tested it, but seems worth trying at least. There's also the added bonus of Abrupt Decay bait if it's really problematic and I'm ok if they have to spend their prime removal spell to deal with one needle hahaha.
Six slots. Those are six slots and I'm not sure if it's powerful enough. Remeber you got only so much free space in your 60 and it's already pretty tight. After you throw in the usual 53-54 cards (and no, I don't think that except for maybe Goyf, there's a single card you may easily cut from the core), there's not much room for cute tricks.Quote:
Originally Posted by Contract Killer
But test that! I'd be really interested in how it will work. The ability to hit fetches seems like the most powerful, casue with Stifle and Waste, this may become our :0: to :1: cmc LD package that prevents the opponent to play the game of MtG.
I've tried the 1 or 2 needle in the sideboard plan before with probes main. After sideboard if I kept probes in there were some sweet interactions. I had one game where miracles mulligained to 6 I probed saw double flooded strand played out needle and that was more or less the start and end of that game. There are enough staples in legacy that it hits that we care about so I think it's worth at least exploring. Or you know just playing against something like lands and proceeding to name wasteland/maze/thespian stage and just win.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer
The other thing is it can act like a persistent counterspell against all their Liliana's, or a persistent lightning bolt against deathrite shaman. BG/x is a big part of any meta and having some main deck cards that hose them and hit 99% of the other meta seems pretty good.
im not a probe fan in rug...but i use them main in my uginfect...wherein i have 3 needles too in the sb slot..but probe and needle really goes well together...one time vs snt where i am on berserk stompy..i probed seeing 2mistys...just like u ck..it was game from there on..as i managed to needle his tarn also....unfortunately, the 75 we have are so tight...that i already cut 1 essential spell by the name of submerge to accomodate two needles in the side..do update us with ur test results..
The main 60 is pretty tight I'll give you that, but the sideboard has really opened up if you ask me. That aside while our main 60 is really tight that almost makes needle more appealing because it's so versatile. People have had success with varying combinations of the last 6 cards ranging anything from 3x probe 2x extra removal 1x extra counterspell to something like 2x snare 2x extra removal 2x pierce and even 4x probe 2x pierce. Now what I take from that is so long as you play tight with the main 54 those extra 6 cards can literally be anything each with their own advantages and disadvantages. With that taken into consideration why not play something that has a bit of play against nearly every deck in the format.Quote:
Originally Posted by poxy14
The two main creatures we care about dealing with on the spot are deathrite shaman and stoneforge mystic. Now we can needle deathrite shaman and not care about a squire after that. Against stoneblade we can hold neelde and then name stoneforge mystic after they have gotten batterskull or name jitte/sofi which is even better. Another option would be to name batterskull after stifling the living weapon which then becomes a hard counter more or less.
After that what are some other non creature problem cards for rug? Liliana, sensei's diving top (not really a problem card, but it keeps miracles on their turn and cuts down the filter which seems worthwhile), Aether vial (makes our counters live), Mother (yes now stuff will actually die), Wirewood (cuts off best friend team again like top not critical that we stop, but is worth it), Jace, Sneak attack, EE etc. Like the only deck that I can actually think of that has few to no targets is storm and even they have fetchlands most of which will be scalding tarn and/or polluted delta. Everything is so cookie cutter that you even know a good chance of what fetches an opponent will be running. All in all needle can attack from varying angles and does everything RUG wants: tempos out the opponent by creating virtual card advantage after blanking 3 - 4 cards in their deck (same theory behind our land destruction).
Edit: I guess one slight flaw in my argument here is while people have won with different cards in those flex spots all those cards did one thing. Needle on the other hand is like stifle that it does everything, but can range from meh to good to blow out gg move to sideboard hahaha. Will see I'm going to do some casual testing today and tomorrow I'll probably post some update Tuesday or Wednesday.
So I tried the 3 needle 3 probe build some and surprisingly not bad. Just some casual games with friends, but still worthwhile testing.
Jund
So this is already a bad match up, but needle did work.
Game 1 I run out a delver he follows with deathrite. Delver quickly dies to bolt. A turn later after I counter a hymn I find a goyf, but once again he meets an untimely death by abrupt decay. Finally I brainstorm find a needle and goose and go into the tank for 3mins or so. Eventually I decide that the only card he could still be holding right now after I wasteland/stifled him a bit is Liliana (which after the game we talked and I was spot on:cool:). I play out needle on lili and my goose... of course he top decks the single diabolic edict the only other card in his deck that can remove goose :rolleyes:. Despite me losing this match up what else would a forked bolt/pierce/whatever have done better there? Nothing the outcome would be the same. On top of that Needle acted like a hard counter against Lili where as a spell pierce he could have played around at that point.
BUG Delver
Game 1 This was actually really good for testing. He's on the play and leads fetch deathrite pass. I have bolt in hand, but also needle and lead needle out on deathrite pass. We both start to play out delvers, but I have 2 and he has one also mine flip sooner. He plays out some goyfs and deathrite is getting in on the squire beats :laugh:. In the end I barely pull it out at 1 life with 2 flipped delvers and double bolt to the dome for the win.
Game 2 This game didn't involve probe or needle, but I had delver + goyf which got me there.
RUG Delver
This is probably the worst match up to test this build on because oh look needle does nothing lol.
Game 1 he wins with perfect info off of probe and me being on the draw... and having my threats quickly daze/bolted.
Game 2 Here needle actually did work I got wasteland and stifle followed by a needle naming misty the fetch he still had 3 of (3/4misty / 2/4tarn at that point) after that goyf landed and that was that.
These were all inbetween rounds of the tournament so they were all mainboard and only a few games, but worth while. Overall these preliminary games are showing promise the only match up where I would have preferred something over needle was rug and that's because needle kind of blanks there.
can u please share the maindeck list...Quote:
Originally Posted by Contract Killer
and of course the sideboard..2 weeks from now will be another major tourney here..so this will help me further tweak my 60/15..thanks CK!
and since there was a rise in burn lately, i think this is the very right time i include 2 snares already...
is it also right to cut the 3rd submerge already, since non are using that much goyfs, kotrs. scooze...elves..thanks for ur help!
If you'll split your fetches you may easily avoid the needle just like the old "avoid the needle" argument was back in days
/tautology
That's when the proposed idea may work even in the RUG matchup, as people tend to play mostly U/G and U/R fetches, as they bought them for cheap when ZEN was new, and like how they fit to the duals. At least that!s my impression, becasue when I see the lists, I mostly never see the Strand/Foothills split, or 2/2/2/2 split or w/e, but in more than 2/3 of cases, its Tarns+Rainforests.
Just saying. It's not like this is the most important reason, the fact that one Needle may work as a hard counter against any number of Lilis/DRS/Jittes is the more important.
How do you guys board for shardless bug and what have your current boards have been looking like?
Yeah if this gets off the ground I would run 4 foot hills/ 1 of each U fetch. Blue decks would be more common and the decks that can run foot hills (elves, Jund, Imperial Painter, Goblins, Burn, etc) have more important targets than fetches. I did play test it a lot tonight so here's a bit of an update on RUG Needle:Quote:
Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer
Core 54 RUG
3x gitaxian probe
3x pithing needle
Sideboard:
3x pyroblast
2x submerge
2x rough
2x flusterstorm
2x grafdigger's cage
1x vendilion clique
1x sulfur elemental
1x destructive revelry
1x ancient grudge
Kind of an irrelevant sideboard since I've only boarded 5 total games against BUG with this build so far. Overall though it's a well rounded board and it's probably what I would run into any tournament.
Young Frankenstein 3/5 main deck
So for starters since this isn't a very common deck it's essentially a cross between reanimator and grixis tempo. It has a really good young pyro package with probe, cabal therapy, daze and force. After that it has reanimate, exhume, entomb, and dread return (singleton) for the reanimation package with Elesh Norn and Griselbrand as fatties. It also has a really cute singleton quiet speculation. This card alone won him at least one game against me Quiet Speculation with young pyromancer in play... dread return therapy therapy GG :eek:.
Introductions aside this was essentially what I thought the combo match up would be with this build. We already have a good match and I won 3/5 games (all main deck he had just finished building it so no sideboard). Needle is pretty lack luster here you can name fetches which does help more than extra burn would I think. By hitting fetches you can ruin their can trips (probably more noticeable against something like SnT we can also name sneak attack their). Needle can name Griselbrand, but unless they are with in bolt range or we have some stupid board state like goyf goyf delver goose it probably won't change anything.
BUG Delver 3/7 main deck | 2/3 sideboard
Their build: An actual tempo BUG build with deathrite, delver, goyf, tombstalker, TNN (not sure on the split something like 14 threats I think). All the good tempo toppings with daze, stifle, and hymn. I think he didn't have lili mainboard and opted for more fairly unbeatable threats for most decks because I only saw her after board.
Overall after playing something like a dozen games against BUG midrange/delver builds this main deck configuration has about the same win scenario with something like 55 - 60% in their favor. I will say this Needle is an all star here. Unless you have perfect info off of probe or from counting their fetches games 1/2 (I haven't done this but in a tournament I would) just name deathrite. We don't care about a squire and it significantly increases our mid to late game against them. When they don't have deathrite to tip the life scales in their favor it becomes a lot easier when it gets down to the top deck board situations :smile:.
Before if deathrite ever lived the chance of winning went down tremendously with them either shocking us or gaining life. When this is taken out of the equation and we deal with any subsequent deathrites with one card the game becomes a lot easier :tongue:. With needle we can save bolts for the dome/goyf wars/other threats. I also haven't asked my opponents this, but there has to be some percentage of bricks gained by blanking an additional 3 or 4 cards in their deck. This is one of the prime advantages of needle that makes it slightly better in the creature removal department over forked bolt or compared to other counters. By blanking their utility creatures we gain virtual card advantage. Which whether you didn't know or think about is part of what RUG thrives on.
Our deck loves to wasteland / stifle and make those 3 mana or more cards harder to cast. Needle while it doesn't counter/ kill the card it names we now no longer consider it a threat including the other copies we haven't even seen yet. In addition naming deathrite makes our mana denial plan so much better. Now we can actually wasteland / stifle them off a color without deathrite coming to their rescue.
The other card needle effects in this match up is Liliana. Oddly enough I haven't gotten to name needle on her yet. To be perfectly honest after my current testing I almost think just naming deathrite is always right. People even more noticeably after playing this build lean on that card way too much :rolleyes:. It keeps us in the early game where we thrive and makes all their other higher cmc cards harder to cast. On the other hand I have put thought into this and needle does have more advantages than something like pierce does against Liliana. For instance when I played against jund I was able to name her when at that point they could have played around pierce. There are some disadvantages with needle being a ticking time bomb for when/if they decide to abrupt decay it.
Now here's the really cool part about needle. If they do decide to decay needle think about what they've committed to do. At least for a few turns needle has tripped them up. Now a few turns later they're spending one of their best removal spells on our needle... and probably not getting the effect from whatever card it was naming on that turn anyways. If everything is going right at this point we've beaten them over the head 3 turns or so with a threat while they... well dealt with our needle. If that's not tempo I don't know what is :laugh:.
Miracles 2/0 | no sideboard games yet
So I played against miracles, but only twice so far and one of the games I actually didn't draw any of the probes/needles and just beat them the old fashion way: beat with threat, stifle miracle, counter counterbalance, keep threat alive lol. The other game though I did get to name top turn 2... it was awesome :cool:. Not only did they lose a lot of potential card advantage, but it makes counterbalance lock irrelevant hahaha :laugh:. Now that isn't completely true if they have Jace, brainstorm or just lady luck on their side then counterbalance can still be a problem. On the other hand being able to play out one spell test the waters see what the top card is then know if our other spells are in the clear is amazing. They also probably don't have many main deck outs to this and if they do it's the singletons in council's judgment and venser.
I will probably be testing this match up more, but it was one of the favorite aspects of running needle main deck. Like Deathrite Miracles if you ask me lives and dies with top and leans on it + counterbalance a lot. Having an out to this main deck seems great and they won't see it come. Show me a miracles player who is prepared to play a game with the chance of all their tops becoming bricks :tongue:.
Deathblade 1/1 | no sideboard games
So let me just say this was one of the most brutal games I have played a while. That's probably why I took such good notes on it hahaha. I get turn one probe and see: ponder, force, scrubland, strand, delta, deathrite. I pass and bolt deathrite EOT. My turn I play out needle naming strand pass holding up stifle. He attempts to fetch I stifle he forces and I force back. On my turn I wasteland him... Oh hey it's turn 3 and he has zero permanents to my 3 :laugh:. I cantrip find another needle... well I guess I'm doing this play needle on their second main fetch (strand/delta) and pass. After this there was some draw go, I found a threat and he well... lets just say he wasn't doing much of anything.
The other game was a bit closer I probe see: force, brainstorm, wasteland x 2, stoneforge. He had played out deathrite turn one. I cantrip after I probed and passed. Stoneforge hits the ground running searching up jitte hmmm that's strange... Next turn he plays out TNN :cry:. I try to force it which he forces back (he had used the brainstorm so maybe I get lucky, but no). At this point I'm probably dead, but try to keep going. I play out two needles one on wasteland (still need mana if I want to win :wink:) and one on jitte. I spend the next turn or so trying to find some way to race the TNN + deathrite, but can't.
This is one match up that I think naming fetches if you have perfect information might be better. Deathblade is such a greedy deck that they need their fetches so that they get perfect mana. Being able to make their mana base even more of a living hell for them seems like a good line to take.
Now that I've actually played with this build a lot I think it's worth looking into more. Needle is great hitting lynch pin cards like Deathrite and Top. I'm not 100% sure my split or selection is right. Three needles definitely feels like the right amount to have any consistency, but drawing 2 almost always seems bad. I guess this is where brainstorm is supposed to do it's work and fix our hand, but maybe something like 2 needle 3 probe 1 pierce/snare/forked bolt might be better. On the other hand I was always happy to have needle to name deathrite or fetches so maybe 3 is necessary and just shuffle the extras away.
Hopefully I will get some more testing done during the week. If I don't I will test some more next week during the tournament again, but I'm definitely seeing potential with this card. It's so versatile and hits the full play set of cards that just get annoying like deathrite, mother, wirewood, stoneforge where the one or two extra bolts wouldn't be nearly as good hahaha. Needle is also more flexible too which makes it more appealing.
It's a bad match up so if you're wondering about the secret sideboarding tech to beat it don't. Accept that it's a bad match up and move on hahaha. Here's what I do though:Quote:
Originally Posted by ShiftyKapree
-4 force (really bad against hymn), -2 daze (otd), // + artifact hate, + pyroblast, + rough, + submerge
As for what you bring in it can vary a lot.
If you see TNN main board all the pyroblast you have (probably 1 or 2 even if you don't see it to hit strix/creeping tar pit).
Artifact hate isn't horrible if you want extra removal to deal with strix particularly grudge since they have a lot of discard effects.
Submerge you will want to bring in if you see Goyf/tombstalker over TNN. We can't beat goyf/tombstalker, but despite it being free removal if they are on the TNN plan submerging strix and Shardless isn't worth it and after that they only have... deathrite.
Rough isn't horrible here it can snag deathrites (good enough to board in off that alone) and maybe a shardless or you could trade goose for goyf second main.
Vendilion clique is pretty good since the game will go long. Same goes for vortex and sylvan library.
Any other sideboard options are fairly fringe and may or may not be good. I will say that Price is king here hahaha.
thanks for the very informative inputs Ck! good read indeed..and im taking most of ur tips when i play 2wks from now..though my needles will be coming from the sides...well, on my part..based on experience vs deathblade..with them having variables in fetches..lotv,sfm,equipmnts and drs remains to be an awesome target compared to fetches..i had a game wherein i thought i completely tempoed him...when i ran out of gas vs a resolvd drs..and that was it..as he was able to get right colors back and crushed my board with lotv...sitting beside me are 2 needles labeled delta and flats..will be waiting still for ur test results.thanks man.
I think if the plan were for Needles, I would play 4 Foothills, and a 1/1/1/1 split of the 4 blue fetches. Obviously naming foothills will be bad, but it is probably the least played fetch in legacy right? Also that way you wont ever feel bad about naming a blue fetch because you only run it as a 1-of.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer
Yeah naming lili, sfm (only if they've already fetched up bsk), sofi/jitte and deathrite are all much safer choices. Naming fetches is pretty much a crap shoot, but if you have perfect info it can be devastating. Just being able to name one of the known fetches in a BUG hand can sometimes force them to choose between g or b mana. Snare seems pretty good right now and cutting the third submerge is ok I mean you might get unlucky and run into Team America with goyfs and tombstalkers, but that's variance for you.Quote:
Originally Posted by poxy14
I did just look over about 5 top 8 deathblade builds and all have a consistent split of 4/4/2 on delta, strand, and marsh flats. While this might not always be true someone might try to skimp and save money by running 2/4/4, but you still know those are the only fetches they will be running.
I have also recently thought of, and tested builds with 2 or 3 maindeck pithing needle, 4 gitaxian probe, and 0 stifle. I can say that it can certainly lead to some killer starts if you have probe + needle and are able to name a fetchland in their hand (I play 4 wooded, 4 polluted). It is also very solid against deathrite shaman, sensei's top, and vial. On the other hand, it is next to useless against storm, reanimator, and burn. I lost twice to reanimator decks last weekend, in part because of the needles - you can name Griselbrand, but a resolved Griselbrand is still game over, so there is no point.
Some other considerations about needle: It isn't blue, and it is a permanent, meaning that it is harder to flip delver and dump 7 cards in the graveyard.
At this point it is my conclusion that needle should not be played as more than a 1-of in the maindeck or sb.
I really like gitaxian probe. Here's the list I'm testing at the moment:
54 Core Cards
4 Probes
1 Forked Bolt
1 Spell Pierce
Should I go up to 2 pierce? 2 forked bolt? Cut a probe for something else?
Honestly I don't even play probe, tried it out in a few tournaments and it always let me down, I personally play the 54 then 2 spell pierce, 2 forked bolt and 2 spell snare. I would play probe again if TES and SNT increase in tournament numbers. As of now I like 2 forked bolts to deal with DRS, MOM, Flickerwisp, etc. The format is full of creatures and knowing what's in there hand isn't really going to change the match-up greatly. If you play probe the options are rug, tes, dredge and I think that's about it. Now if you don't play anything they are going to play around stifle. It's just not worth the loss of 2 life in some races where that 2 life mattersQuote:
Originally Posted by kaminamina
I think needle has a lot of potential, but completely disagree with cutting stifle. The whole point is to up the disruption count and cutting stifle does the exact opposite. I'm running 54 core, 3 probe, 3 needle and have had no problem flipping delvers. It's still 27 instant/sorcery which is still better than BUG (25ish) and on par with American Delver. If it works for them it can work for us. There will be a very marginal amount of times that delver won't flip, but not a noticeable amount.Quote:
Originally Posted by M+1
Goose getting to threshold asap isn't as much of a problem when you have perfect info from probe. With stifle and needle you can use the info to its full potential and keep the game in the early stages where we rule. At that point goose getting to threshold isn't as necessary. It also in an odd way improves goose's threshold rate by counter acting all deathrites not just one.
Sure it's useless against storm... our best match up oh well :rolleyes:. If you have trouble beating storm with this deck you should probably be playing something else. It kind of bricks against burn outside of grim there's not much to hit. So that is an issue if burn continues to become more of a competitor, but a few months ago I would just disregard it as a cheap entry deck to the format (and still do sort of).
Reanimator is one of our worst combo match ups. That deck can consistently go off turn 2 and semi consistently turn 1. We know they have 4 delta and maybe hitting hapless research is worth while, but I haven't actually tested this match up. We still have a great boarded match up after bringing in x pyroblast, x flusterstorm, vendilion clique, etc. I do think that even if it's one of our worst combo match ups we still have the best game 1 against them in the format.
Despite bricking against those two combo match ups it still has good targets in SnT and back breaking against elves (I would think, but I haven't tested it). Elves rides to victory on the back of their Quirion and Symbiote triggers. Take both or even one of those away and I'm sure it would throw the best elf mages through a loop. I mean it's not even the produced effect of the trigger "untap target mana dork" that makes them so valuable. It's the fact that they can do stuff like "bounce forest untap dork play forest as land for turn etc" or "bounce visionary untap dork replay visionary make glimpse turn so much better".
That's just a meta call. Stephen Mann won at SCG Indianapolis with 4 probe / 2 pierce. If elves and D&T are popular in your meta forked bolt is probably right. If you want overall good cards against all decks spell pierce is the right choice. It almost never blanks against any one deck and is the best soft counter in the format.Quote:
Originally Posted by kaminamina
On another note I just finished testing this needle build against Jund, Junk, Miracles and TES. Same 54 core with 3 probe 3 needle.
Miracles UWR Joe Losset version 3/1 mainboard | no sideboard games
Let me just say needle maindeck against miracles is stupid :laugh:. So long as you resolve needle on top it becomes significantly easier. In addition by naming top you increase the amount of bricks in their deck by at least 6 probably 7. We no longer care about counterbalance resolving so it just becomes another brick along with their tops :tongue:. If you end up drawing a second needle or cantriping into one naming Jace is also really back breaking. At that point if we have needle on Jace and Top what form of card filter do they actually have left? Brainstorm and that's it really. Essentially Needle increases the amount of high mana bricks that suck early game by 7 when naming top. After naming top they have trouble even getting to their mid to late game where they get ahead.
To put it simply playing against miracles when you neuter there tops is a completely different game. The amount of miracle triggers they try to resolve goes down. There mana becomes worse. Our wastelands actually stick to some degree since they can't find land easily. Digging for answers against goyf in swords or terminus is much harder. They don't have a main deck combo that kills us. Think about playing against a standard esper control deck. Clunky bad card filter lots of late game bombs without a good early or mid game and that's essentially what you are playing against :laugh:.
Miracles UW Eruopean style 3/1 | 1/1
So essentially everything I said above, but add in stoneforge as a needle target.
Jund 3/2 | 1/3
Even our worst match up became better. There was at least one game where I completely demolished him by having needle on verdant turn 1 (off of probe) and Needle on deathrite shortly after. The other funny thing you can do here because Jund has no counters is force them to play into stifle :eek:.
When you probe pass with U up they play around stifle and do something like fetch pass or deathrite off of non fetch. If we have the bolt we kill DRS at their EOT. Now if you play out needle turn 2 and we didn't have bolt we name DRS. Then they're still forced to play out their fetch next turn. On top of that their fetch has no value if DRS is dead / in dispose. Either way it's a win win for us :cool:.
Better Wastelands:
Remember way way way back when wasteland was just "destroy target nonbasic"? Then DRS came into the picture and said "sure wasteland us we will still use the land" and essentially "countered" wasteland if you will, or at the very least numbed the pain of it. Now if you get needle on DRS it's essentially like the good old days Wasteland is back to what it was hahaha :laugh:. After Needle any subsequent wasteland / stifle becomes back breaking. Their fetch count may have gone down some and they can't even recover with DRS :smile:.
Another weird thing about this match up they run mandatory 4 verdants for their basic swamp and forest. If you can get a needle early turn 1 on Verdant then stifle can be saved for their other 4 - 5 fetches and the mana denial plans success rate shoots through the roof. More or less the needle here acts the same as it does in the BUG variants: mana denial plan gets better, deathrite is not an issue, liliana is less of a problem.
The first downside of needle so far:
This was one of the few matches that I wished needle was a forked bolt sometimes. Apparently aside from delver and goyf there's also another creature in legacy that doesn't use activated abilities that does need to be answered asap :eyebrow:... bob lols. I almost forgot about this guy since you never see him in bug variants much and deathblade runs maybe 2 or 3 if that. This has been the one and only real let down of needle so far. I can't really think of many other threats (flickerwisp, serra avenger oh hey both in our worst mu) that forked bolt could answer and needle couldn't deal with.
TES 4/2 | no sideboard games
So yeah needle just blanks here :frown:. Don't worry though... it's one of our best match ups :wink:. The only activated abilities they have are 4 fetches and usually their split up. Regardless I don't even care. Sideboard we bring in flusterstorm and we already have force + stifle.
I have looked at ANT TES' slightly slower, but more consistent brother. They run 6 fetches 4 of which are mandatory Deltas for their basics so it's a bit better in that match up. I would still probably just board them out because everything else in our deck is great against them. The other thing we just have better cards in the board than needle maybe hitting delta.
Junk 4/2 | no sideboard games
Essentially the same as any other BGx variant name deathrite or liliana. Some slight unique uses it can have here is naming Kotr which I never had to do oddly enough. It's amazing how much just naming deathrite improves our early game and dazes / other mana denial.
The more I test this build the more I like it. Needle acts I guess the best way to describe it as our own Abrupt Decay for one mana. We can deal with a large variety of threats and also use it offensively for mana denial. It's an out when others like pierce might come a turn after they play out lili or got Sword + thopter combo. This is assuming they only got one activation on either of these anything more and we probably still lose. It's just so powerful in what you can name. Even something like Imperial Painter I would think becomes less scary when we can name Grindstone hahaha.
I hope some more people will test this build. I'm definitely thinking about taking it to a tournament in a week or two. I want to try it out against a few more decks first though, like Elves, SnT, D&T and Deathblade.
Thanks a lot for very long and informative post!
I'm interested in your testing, and I hope we'll learn how you went during the tournaments you wrote about!
what are your opinions on follwing cards:
- scavenging ooze/green suns zenith in the main/sideboard instead of the 4th goyf.
- grim lavamancer insead of rough/tumble (-> remember that the little wizard shrinks goose)
and the general idea of cutting creatures from 12 to 10/11 to increase removal/countermagic like jona did during grand prix ghent. (he went 9:0:0 on day 1 with his rug deck which had just 2 tarmogoyfs but additional removal spells and 1 counterspell)
Playing too many reactive cards will get you behind against BUG delve, BUG shardless, Jund, UWR delver, DNT, REALLY fastQuote:
Originally Posted by sawatarix
Scooze and green sun seem beyond terrible, they seem very slow in a deck with 18 land/ and typically only 1 green source in play.Quote:
Originally Posted by sawatarix
Lavamancer seems fine but I like rough tumble to help me catch up from behind
Any tips on playing against BUG delver? I keep getting smoked by that deck.
Been playing 54+ 2 pierce 2 snare, 2 forked bolts
@Kobe: The MU is slightly in their favor, but it's not unwinnable. The biggest advice is kill/counter DRS ASAP, otherwise mana denial is your best plan of attack. Save burn for ground stalemates if you can, they can get a little gummed up. Submerge post-board is amazing, especially when you bury it into a fetch.
I've been running the standard 54 + 3 Spell Pierce, 2 Forked Bolt, 1 Spell Snare version and have really been liking it a lot. It's moneyed me at every Legacy FNM I've taken it to in the last 3 months (except the first time I played it) and I'll be bringing it to SCG Baltimore this weekend. Sideboard looks like this:
1x Ancient Grudge
1x Destructive Revelry
1x Flusterstorm
1x Grafdigger's Cage
2x Pyroblast
1x Red Elemental Blast
2x Rough // Tumble
2x Submerge
1x Sulfur Elemental
1x Sulfuric Vortex
1x Surgical Extraction
1x Vendilion Clique
It's been extremely solid, the only card I kind want to jam in there is a Pithing Needle or two, maybe for a REB effect, not sure. I feel totally confident against combo of all varieties, not bad against Miracles and the mirror, meh on the Team America matchup and very afraid of Maverick, D&T, and Deathblade. Any advice for those rough MU's, Deathblade in particular?
I think GSZ has use in the board against Miracles. Having a "fifth" goose against them or Goyf after they terminus seems useful, but I haven't actually tried it. Cutting the a goyf for a scooze just seems bad. I mean I tried 3 goyf / 1 sylvan when I was running an 8 bolt version which worked really well. The difference here is the library helped dig for more burn or was just absurdly good against combo. Using scooze as the 4th goyf is just bad though because it's worse and we only ever really have 1 green source in play. The other thing is it dies to all the same removal with the exception of bolt, but if you can hold up two green after casting it to play around that then we're already behind hahaha.Quote:
Originally Posted by sawatarix
Grim seems ok I mean it's worked in the past: http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...p?DeckID=64109 . I'm not sure how it compares to rough since I actually haven't used it myself. It might be better against D&T to shoot down pesky fliers or having reusable removal against mom.
I did recently take RUG Needle to my weekly tournament and it did really well 3/0/1. Oddly enough Needle never actually did anything hahaha.
RUG Needle:
4x wooded foothills
1x flooded strand
1x polluted delta
1x scalding tarn
1x misty rainforest
3x volcanic island
3x tropical island
4x wasteland
4x delver of secrets
4x tarmogoyf
4x nimble mongoose
4x ponder
3x gitaxian probe
4x force of will
4x daze
4x stifle
4x brainstorm
4x lightning bolt
3x pithing needle
SB:
2x submerge
2x pyroblast
2x flusterstorm
1x vendilion clique
2x grafdigger's cage
2x rough and tumble
1x sulfur elemental
1x ancient grudge
1x destructive revelry
1x seal of primordium
Not sure about seal yet. I'm testing it because a friend suggested it based on the idea that you don't have to worry about leaving up lots of countermagic when using our artifact / enchantment hate.
On to the actual matches now:
Round 1 ANT 2/0 | 1/0 Very useful testing the one deck that needle almost completely bricks against.
OTD Game 1 I get a solid turn 2 delver after turn 1 probe revealed:
3x lion's eye diamond
ad nauseam
volcanic island
cabal therapy
I probably should have lost this game, but this was my opponents first time playing the deck. When he decided to go off at 14 life he played ad nauseam, but cracked all 3 LEDs. He proceeded to go down to 2 life after hitting past in flames the first reveal and then 2 tutors. The problem was he couldn't empty his hand for his infernal tutor. There was probably some out to this, but I don't know storm very well and he was on tilt knowing I had the bolt in hand hahaha.
Game 2 This game he just hit stone cold nothing. He got off something like a turn 2 or 3 carpet of flowers and proceeded to play out 3 or 4 different can trips all of which apparently bricked for him. On my side of the board I got an early delver of secrets followed by a vendilion clique to make for a fast clock.
Boarding was something like - 4 bolt, 3 pithing needle // + 2 flusterstorm, 2 pyroblast, 2 grafdigger's cage, 1 vendilion clique
Round 2 NO BUG 2/1 | 2/0 Incase you're not familiar with the deck it's on par with Shardless bug in terms of difficulty for us. http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...p?DeckID=67745
OTD Game 1 He crushed me here I was doing ok and then I punted swinging in with delver + goose thinking goose was threshed, but he had just tapped deathrite last turn. Despite that mess up I still had no countermagic for the NO that was going to drop the next turn.
Game 2 I got two delvers both of which were not cooperating when they were trying to flip. He was stuck on mana after I got a wasteland turn 3. Turn 4 I could have shuffled away a goyf with a fetch having both delver triggers on the stack, but I assumed he had an abrupt decay at that point. Unfortunately I was right and one delver met an untimely death. Shortly after though goyf and a newly flipped delver made fast work of him.
Game 3 I got a turn 1 delver here and for a change he didn't have Abrupt Decay hahaha. This game I got a really good rough after he had one shardless hit a brainstorm (which got dazed) and the second one hit deathrite. After the second shardless I roughed followed by playing out a 5/6 goyf.
Boarding - 2 pithing needle, - 2 daze // + 2 rough, 1 ancient grudge, 1 vendilion clique. Needle isn't great here it only really hits their deathrites so I boarded all, but one out which may have still been wrong.
Round 3 Mirror 2/0 | 3/0
OTD Game 1 I got a delver out and protected it was pretty much how this game turned out. He thought he was winning the race, but I had two bolts with force back up.
Game 2 This game we both got goyfs out and he was winning the race, but I proceeded to play out 2 geese. I was just able to play runner runner runner and overwhelm his one goyf.
He was a friend of mine and I knew he was running a 4/4 split of misty and tarn so I think I boarded something like: - 4 force, 1 pithing needle // + 2 submerge, 2 flusterstorm, 1 pyroblast. The other useful thing about needle here is it could if he starts the wasteland + loam plan just name wasteland and essentially time walk him for at least a turn.
Round 4 Esper stoneblade ID | 3/0/1
This was just a horrible match up when we played it for fun. It was a homebrew that was trying to play too fair for me. He had all the basics, back to basics, 2 supreme verdict and 2 flusterstorm all main deck.
Hopefully I'll get to test this against some of the match ups I'm actually interested in soon like Elves or D&T lol.
It's just a bad match up somewhere around 60% in there favor and highly die role dependent. They just have a constant stream of threats that we have to answer: Deathrite, Goyf, Hymn, TNN, Liliana, Abrupt decay (can't answer, but add it to the list of cards that make this match up bad). Your best bet is to be OTP and have a good stifle wasteland plan going. Goose is arguably the best threat here because their one answer is Liliana which we can keep them off of, but they still have goyf. Board out forces because they're horrible here bring in 2 submerge (unless you see TNN in which case pyroblast instead) and maybe something like Vendilion and a rough.Quote:
Originally Posted by KobeBryan
Creature [12]
3 Tarmogoyf
4 Nimble Mongoose
4 Delver of Secrets
1 True-Name Nemesis
Instant [24]
2 Spell Snare
2 Spell Pierce
4 Force of Will
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Daze
4 Brainstorm
4 Stifle
Sorcery [6]
4 Ponder
2 Forked Bolt
Land [18]
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Flooded Strand
4 Wasteland
3 Tropical Island
3 Volcanic Island
Sideboard
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Sulfur Elemental
1 RED
1 Pyroblast
3 Submerge
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Rough//Tumble
2 Sulfuric Vortex
1 Krosan Grip
1 V-Clique
This is the list I have recently changed too, and though I do like the extra bolts I have found myself doing poorly in the last couple of events. I might be in a rut, but I typical try to not put luck in as a factor. I have made some mistakes, but I feel like there is an error in my build. I have a pretty strong Miracles meta, and I was wondering if pithing needle was an option and what could be taken out? I am also wondering if I should have more side for artifact hate, (grude, DR etc). I went from doing well at scg events and mox events to 0-2, 1-2 dropping each event. Any help is appreciated
Your list seems fine. The 2/2/2 pierce, snare, forked bolt is a well tested and successful build. Regardless if you call it luck or not; variance is still a factor of the game. If we get no land hands that's what we get for playing a deck with only 14 "real" lands in it lol. If we play against BUG and they chain hymn into goyf into Liliana over the course of three turns it's not that we messed up it's that they have something like 12 cards that almost auto win against us main deck.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr Brian Pepper
Pithing needle is really good against miracles. I posted on this page actually about my testing with my current build against miracles (3 needle, 3 probe, 54 core) which makes mainboard games significantly in our favor. You could use another piece of artifact hate in the board. Maybe shave the third submerge which from my experience has lost a lot of value as of late with TNN. The other card would be sulfuric vortex, but since you say there's a lot of miracles in your meta you will probably want to keep that.
As for what artifact hate good old grudge is one of the best especially against Shardless BUG when we want to kill/counter strix constantly and they pack a ton of discard. Since you have a lot of miracles though destructive revelry might be better. Overall I'm pretty sure you just want 2 artifact / enchantment hate in the board. The only reason why I have 3 right now is because I'm testing Seal of Primordium.
Needle or Null Rod. Stoneforge decks hate Null Rod.Quote:
Originally Posted by TheHeff
What decks are giving you the most trouble? Since you've mentioned Miracles is a big contender in your area, maybe it has been giving you trouble? Forked Bolt is awful in that matchup (obv. very good elsewhere, I'm a fan) and Snare is basically an insanely narrow Pierce(hitting ~5 cards in their deck). Sylvan Library is a very strong card against them and it's definitely something you should look at as a sideboard card. Actually, it's probably just better than Vortex straight up since you can bring it against other decks like combo or D&T. It's also possible to play one in the maindeck depending on how much Miracles, Taxes, and combo you expect to face.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dr Brian Pepper
I'm not sure, I have always had trouble with miracles, and a lot of people I test with play the deck so I get some solid testing in against the deck. Library is good, but Vortex is such a killer in the miracles match up I can't cut it. Recently I lost to TES, which I presume is a great match up for us, he just had a good hand and I had a mediocre one. Reanimator has also been a problem, and Shardless. Overall I guess I have just not been on my A game lately, this deck is just the bees kneeQuote:
Originally Posted by HammafistRoob
Trying to deal with Miracles, I'd cut Forked Botls and add Needles. Their deck crumbles without SDT.
Any flash dudes are perfect, as you don't need to tap on your turn. I guess WOrb is fine, too.