[Deck] GW/x Maverick

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Originally Posted by Deckerator

Then I should cut Sigarda and tormods crypt? and add a second teeg for the sideboard and surgicals? But are surgicals good enough against dredge? Because last time i played Surgicals and bojuka bog and last to dredge

My actual list:

4 Windswept Heath
1 Misty Rainforest
3 Savannah
3 Wasteland
2 Forest
2 Plains
2 Cavern of Souls
1 Gaea's Cradle
1 Karakas
1 Maze of Ith
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Dryad Arbor

4 Mother of Runes
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Fauna Shaman
3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Loyal Retainers
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Scryb Ranger
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
1 Griselbrand
1 Peacekeeper

4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Swords to Plowshares

2 Umezawa's Jitte


Any comments on the list are welcomed.
I thought about adding Lightning Greaves because door had a really good argument. But i have no space.
Furthermore would it be good to add Sylvan Library and/or Stoneforge Mystic?
Comments on Griselbrand: I add him because of my second loyal Retainers. I like him because of his lifelink, flying and draw 7. he can grow really big with exalted.

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OMG, this list looks monstrous! I think you want too much from the deck. I would recommend following the major maverik's plan than adding new combos into the deck. Griselbrand doesn't belong here, as you cannot reliably fast cheat it into the battlefield as Sneak'n Show or Reanimator do. Also Grisel unlike Elesh Norn doesn't win in the mirror. He doesn't sweep the board, nor can you cast it from your hand. Iona on the other hand may be in the sb if you like it. I'd enjoy sneaking it against high tide :laugh:

I'd recommend leaving 1 loyal, 1 elesh and 3 shamans. Move peacekeeper into sideboard. In the maindeck he's relevant only in sneak'n show-heavy metagame. Lightning greaves is recommended to play with mystics, cause you need to be able to find it. But usually playing mystics slows you down a bit. So it depends on your style of playing. 1-2 Sylvans are always recommended.
Also I'd suggest throwing away caverns and adding the 4th wasteland. If you feel problems with dredge, add 3rd surgical and/or faerie macabre in the board. General strategy is to find as soon as possible scavenging ooze and gaddock teeg or elesh norn in the first game. You can slow them down by fetching a dryad arbor to block some zombies to remove the bridges. Also use counters from jitte to kill your own creatures for removing bridges when necessary. But prey not to be killed during first 2-3 turns. After sb it's usually easy if you keep hand with some g/y hate.

Ouh I'm really sad. No one likes my Griselbrand/Loyal Retainers Combo. :tongue:
That means:
-1 Peacekeeper (move to the sideboard)
-1 Griselbrand
-1 Loyal Retainers
+2 Sylvan library

thanks for all this good advices.
More ideas to my deck are welcomed.
How would the sideboard look good?

sideboard:
-1 Sigarda, Host of Herons

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Originally Posted by Deckerator

-1 Peacekeeper (move to the sideboard)

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?

it is always hard to comment on sideboard, it depends on your meta or whatever you fear most.

lot of maverick players did try gut shot, you could do for example -2 path -1 choke/etersworn +3 gut shot.

well I still play sigarda in my 75's but whatever.

What im interested in is what ur top 5 most hated cards are.

I'm asking for a short explanation and - although I know that ur answers might differentiate strongly depending on the meta and the most faced cards - I'm asking for ur subjective opinion.

The cards that I generally hate the most are:

top: 1. Humility/Moat
2. Terminus
3. Engineered Explosives, Perish, Wrath
4. Submerge
5. Linvala (having to face her)

Interestingly enough.... Gaddock Teeg solves many of those problems. Just protect him with Mother of Runes against the UW decks.

I know. I'm already running 1 mainboard and one in my sideboard. Apart from Perish and Linvala all those problems are solved by teeg.

Aren't u sometimes emotional and afraid of facing a card (although there is no reason to fear this card more than any other hatecard)?

The card I hate seeing the most is Sulfur Elemental out of the RUG sideboard, followed by Forked Bolt. Also, seeing Submerge from the SB of Intuition Elves is a serious blow against the Ethersworn Canonist plan vs. them, because even if you play around it, you'll lose to the elven aggro swarm because you can't drop SFM->Jitte or turn your fetches into that crucial third land drop while also holding off the Glimpse combo.

The presence of RUG Tempo restricts the blind build of the deck. I'd love to run some maindeck Mindcensors, but the 1 toughness just leads to an unacceptable number of x-for-1s. Even Thalia is questionable, as M@verick has pointed out above. She's horrible on the draw vs. RUG. (And isn't so hot vs. Miracle Control because it slows you down right into a Terminus.) I've been experimenting with numbers of Crop Rotations, Weathered Wayfarers (I still run GSZ), Life from the Loams, 1x Sylvan Safekeeper and maindeck Toolbox lands (Bog, Maze) in the Thalia/Fauna Shaman slots. Even though getting Rotation countered still sucks, pushing the abuse of the land toolbox gives the deck some punch. It's a surprisingly effective bridge to midgame Knight beats vs. creature combo decks. It's not perfect, but the toolbox leverages slow draws on combo's part to let Maverick set up the beatdown clock, while maintaining generic utility vs. random decks better than the maindeck choices popular now, and with all CMC <= 2, isn't painfully slow. (People have fits deciding to let me untap with Wayfarer vs. holding removal for Knight.) Drawing utility lands leads to more mulligans, but oh well. I feel it just puts Maverick back on par with most other decks in the mulligan department. Also, Running LftL without Cycle Lands is a liability when opponents are already hating the GY to shrink Knight, and this deck is slow enough without come-into-play-tapped lands. I've cut Cradle for a third Horizon Canopy to mitigate this.

Problem is, the land toolbox is ANOTHER horrible concept vs. RUG. I'm considering going back to some number of Tarmogoyf in my Lands Toolbox build just to blank their Goyfs and Geese while I deal with Delver. Path to Exile is a suboptimal sideboard card in matches you'd bring it in other than RUG, I think, because most of the decks you need it against usually run a ton of basics, are faster than Maverick, and will beat you up with the land drop. All I can say is, cast it during their upkeep if you don't see Steppe Lynx.

Consistency really is Maverick's strength. It's a midrange aggro deck, and topdecking a useless card in turns 5-8 is crushing to a typical game state with this deck in my experience. With only four removal spells, we'd rather be winning here than going attrition war and praying to untap with alpha strikes. However, Sylvan Library is a house, play two. It typically reads "Pay 8 life, win the game." I leave it in vs. RUG if my sideboard permits, and if Jitte gets going, it's great.

****
Get used to the little tricks this deck can do, Scryb Ranger shenanigans, stuff like Horizon Canopy during the upkeep under a Sylvan Library (Pick 2 of 4), Dryad Arbor/fetchland/Ranger combat interactions, thinking multiple turns ahead with combat math, resolving a Jitte (Jitte is a broken card) before trying to bust this deck open with power cards. I think Maverick is a really unique deck. It's almost like it has a perfect opening of 5-8 slots in the main deck where you must pick cards appropriate to the tournament you're going to play in that day, 5-8 slots that are almost independent of the rest of a really strong deck, if you stick to normal Legacy deckbuilding wisdom anyway.

I encourage people to re-read the OP of this thread any time they get frustrated trying to build the Perfect Maverick in a vacuum-meta. It's very informative and serves well to remind you that this deck is very flexible, and desperately needs to be metagamed when picking your final 75.
*****

The new Ajani? Honestly, if I'm going to run support cards aren't named Elspeth, Knight-Errant to give my dudes evasion/bigger clock (i.e. cards that don't change board position), and don't want to rely on Mom for that role, really, I'd rather just play a copy or two of Berserk and run it out during the alpha-strike. At least it doubles as janky spot removal in a pinch (synergy with Maze of Ith here)

As another windy aside, one of my favorite matchups playing Maverick is non-LED dredge decks. Maybe I'm really lucky drawing Ooze/Teeg/Bog and SB hate cards in my openers, but people walk into this matchup expecting to do unfair things against your midrange deck wind up getting hosed every time they don't have the God Hand. I feel absolutely no need to run Surgical Extraction for Dredge. However, it's an argument vs. Reanimator in Thalia/Non-Thalia builds going against Purify the Grave, which is slower but packs a lot of resilience vs. combo protection. Faerie Macabre is probably the best idea. It's fast like Surgical, costs nothing extra under Thalia, and dodges the counter-magic part of combo-protection (the other being discard) from Reanimator. I've seen too much of Pithing Needle naming Tormod's Crypt out of Reanimator to spend SB slots on Crypt. Beating dredge is easy, you just have to know how the deck works.

P.S.: Gaddock Teeg for Maverick MVP!

P.P.S.: Gaea's Cradle remains the most frustrating card in the core deck.

I don't like playing against Perish especially in Esper Blade, it's cheap enough to block the fast aggro plan and it will avoid the wasting game. We don't have any answer to it (as far as I know) except for not overextending.

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Originally Posted by Nutox

Gaea's Cradle remains the most frustrating card in the core deck.

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So don't play it. Nothing wrong with basic Forest or additional fetchland.

Btw if you have issues beating EsperBlade, I suggest more Elspeths. One main and two more in the sideboard should do the trick. StoneBlade has a LOT of issues beating the old girl. :)

perish is no as good of an answer as virtue's ruin is.
Just play gaddock and mom, and keep karakas untapped all the time and you should be fine.
PD: playing less than 2 karakas right now is wrong.
PD2: playing less than 2 planeswalkers in the 75 is also wrong (i suggest 1 elspeth main, and 1 garruk if maverick is popular, and 1 extra garruk/elspeth in the board)

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Originally Posted by arcannys

PD2: playing less than 2 planeswalkers in the 75 is also wrong (i suggest 1 elspeth main, and 1 garruk if maverick is popular, and 1 extra garruk/elspeth in the board)

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why? I always felt that walkers are an overkill versus control match ups. Also Linvala is way better in the mirror and damages other decks as well.

@Fizban
I've been testing Dauntless Escort as a way to beat a perish/wrath or other sweepers. Normally Gaddock Teeg stops most of them. Damnation, Wrath, Massacre. But can't stop perish or virtues ruin. This little dude even stops pernicious deed.

also, 3/3 gsz'able body isn't bad either.

also, is Eternal Witness worth a spot as a one of in this deck? Worth buying back an STP or a key piece of equipment? i've been using it in my list.

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Originally Posted by door

why? I always felt that walkers are an overkill versus control match ups. Also Linvala is way better in the mirror and damages other decks as well.

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Control decks are packing terminus right now, aside from the eventual BUG deck with deed, which makes planeswalkers a rlly good asset against those type of decks. Not to mention most black decks are using perish/ruin out of the board so you cannot rely entierly on your gaddock teegs.
Linvala will never be better than a planeswalker in the mirror match, since most lists are packing 2 karakas maindeck aside from STP...
Right now (and probably what im gonna be running in the GP) im running 1 elspeth, 1 linvala and 1 thrun MD and an extra garruk in the board for control MU and the mirror match.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by RKPW

@Fizban
I've been testing Dauntless Escort as a way to beat a perish/wrath or other sweepers. Normally Gaddock Teeg stops most of them. Damnation, Wrath, Massacre. But can't stop perish or virtues ruin. This little dude even stops pernicious deed.

also, 3/3 gsz'able body isn't bad either.

also, is Eternal Witness worth a spot as a one of in this deck? Worth buying back an STP or a key piece of equipment? i've been using it in my list.

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Yeah, that's a nice answer... I think I'll get one tomorrow and try it out immediately! Thanks!

Witness is great (and human too) but I for one had to cut some things for some speed, and witness is generally slow. If I'm packing SoLaS I'll be sure to include her again though ;)

Greetz

I tried out and suggested Dauntless Escort ages ago, great to see someone else come back to it :)

-Matt

one question about terminus:


if the opponent draws terminus, I have thalia and he has one mana only. Can he cast terminus after placing another mana from his hand?

My understanding says that once the miracle card has been drawn the miracle effect goes on the stack and u have to pay the costs immediately (althought its possible to crack fetchlands as a response).

Quote:

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Originally Posted by xiaocho

one question about terminus:


if the opponent draws terminus, I have thalia and he has one mana only. Can he cast terminus after placing another mana from his hand?

My understanding says that once the miracle card has been drawn the miracle effect goes on the stack and u have to pay the costs immediately (althought its possible to crack fetchlands as a response).

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Yes, the triggered ability for Miracles goes on the stack when they draw (and reveal) the card. They have to pay for it when the trigger resolves otherwise they'll have to cast the card normally.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by xiaocho

one question about terminus:


if the opponent draws terminus, I have thalia and he has one mana only. Can he cast terminus after placing another mana from his hand?

My understanding says that once the miracle card has been drawn the miracle effect goes on the stack and u have to pay the costs immediately (althought its possible to crack fetchlands as a response).

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He can't play lands when something's on the stack. You're right.

In my meta there is a lot of G/W.
Is it a good idea to sideboard NO package? Or is this too slow?
I thought about sideboarding 3x Natural Order and 1x Progenitus.
Maybe it helps against other non blue decks to win the match fast.
What are your comments about it?