Quote:
Originally Posted by Quasim0ff
for mangara and thalia what is Karakas?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Quasim0ff
for mangara and thalia what is Karakas?
A form of hexproof, more or less.Quote:
Originally Posted by caprino
In case of Mangara you first activate Mangara's ability, keep priority and then return him to your hand with Karakas before his ability resolves. This allows you to loop Mangara, removing one of your opponents' permanents on each of your turns.
Out of curiosity, do you use Google Translate to convert your posts to English? I honestly mean no offense by this, by the way.
Well, this is exclusively for their fetchlands, often Polluted Delta because they always play 4x of them. It's simply because I prefer more early disruption instead of really slow cards as Flickerwisp and Mangara could be. In addition, is a decent turn 1 if you don't have Mother or Vial, it's better than "land go". I've won some games by a Needle into Delta although it's hard to believe I know [emoji38] . This plan it's not too good but I think that it depends on the number of cards you want to board in and the number of cards you want to board out. I used to do the same against Omnitell in the DTT era (often with Flooded Strand as main target, but in G1 you can see how their fetchland configuration looks like) for same sideboard reasons.Quote:
Originally Posted by nevilshute
you use the translator, sorry if it is not always clearQuote:
Originally Posted by Echelon
what are the most decks hard to beat?Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
Did anyone say Jund?Quote:
Originally Posted by caprino
Because it's Jund.
I keep some number of STPs vs Miracles these days but I also play a pretty different build. Given what you're trying to do, however, I think you shouldn't just not drop a Mirran Crusader, in fact you should bring in the other two. 4 Crusaders + two Swords to hook up to them is very powerful vs Miracles, gives you something close to a one creature / one hit kill, helps ensure you don't have to ever commit too much to the board.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
For similar reasons, I think you keep the Jitte here. While not insane against Shardless, it is insane with Crusader and you're playing 4. You also can't be blown out by their removal if you're hooking it up to a Crusader - worst that can happen is they Decay the Jitte.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
Going to 0 STPs seems wrong against Lands, even if its an uphill battle if you ever have to use one. I have been keeping 2 in. I guess 2 Needle helps replicate the 'Keeps me alive past an early combo hand' effect. Still, when games go longer I don't mind having a STP sitting in my hand as an insurance policy.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
Why do you like SoWaP more than SoFi here? I don't find these games to be a race as much of a question of who draws into their more powerful cards. So I think SoFI's card advantage is far more important.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
I think we've talked about this before, but I've started boarding almost counterintuitively vs Infect (taking out Thalias, some moms) and generally found it to be correct, as I've been taxed out of my own STPs too many times in the past. I think Council's Judgment is gonna be extra hard to resolve if you're playing Thalia. I also like keeping in Mangara - he's slow but does reliably kill Blighted Agent and they usually can't beat Mangara lock.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
I would bring in the additional 2 Mirran Crusaders. Yeah they're boltable, but what isn't, and when they can't immediately kill it it can eat any of their creatures and race them.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
I've also found Mangara-lock to be generally good vs Merfolk since they play so little interaction, maybe would take out only one and bring in one Needle? I don't know. You'd still have 5 Needle effects at that point, which should be enough since you don't even always want to Needle Vial or Jitte and Mutavault's generally answered by the rest of our deck.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
I think taking out all Thalias vs a Delver deck feels wrong, though I see the logic in this case and you are bringing in a lot of non-creature spells. I might take out 1 Thalia, 2 Flickerwisps and something else. Maybe only bring in one Council's Judgment now that it's often a 4 mana spell.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
I think you want all your equipment here for all the reasons mentioned earlier. If you're playing 3-4 Crusaders, you're playing a fair deck with a somewhat unfair combo inside, and you want to maximize your chances at hitting that combo.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
I have to imagine that Google Translate fails on MTG as bad as my phone's autocorrect, so I will be generic where possible.
(Echelon, how did you know, btw?)
Caprino, Elves is the hardest common matchup. You want side board stuff like:
Chalice of the Void (x=1)
Containment Priest
Grafdigger's Cage
Warping Wail
But also, these can help some and you should bring them in if you have them:
Ethersworn Canonist
Spirit of the Labyrinth
Aven Mindcensor
Ratchet Bomb
Pithing Needle
Thanks for your reply iatee, I really appreciate the feedback. I think it's fantastic to keep improving every day and of course I like some points of your opinion that I had not appreciated by myself yet.
I think our thoughts on how to board are different in the sense that I really want to minimize dead draws from a non-manipulation deck thinking on how the games against X archetype are more likely to develop based on my experience, and you prefer to have answers for all the situations, even if they are a bit remote, keeping in some slots that sometimes could be bad.
And is for this reason that we disagree in some points, especially in terms of leave or not StP in some matchups I see. Well, first of all, against Miracles the gameplan is clear. You want to win ASAP or at least spending the fewer resources better, because the more the game gets longer, the more we have lost IMHO, so I don't want to draw useless cards under CB/Top having already some answers for threats like Monastery Mentor or Izzet Staticaster. I want to keep my opponent playing fair with permanents.
Same against Lands. StP are bad virtually the entire game, so here I want preassure keeping Wastelands for key lands and Ports for keep them out of more than Loam each turn. When you exile Marit Lage with a StP you must know that you have lost unless you follow StP with a Cataclysm and even with this you will lose the game probably. Maybe we need another sideboard plan against the new version of Lands, keeping a couple of StP for Confidants mainly and the full set of Revokers for Molten Vortex.
Against Shardless BUG, 4 x Mirran Crusader are a really good reason to keep in Jitte but you often eat a Null Rod or lose a turn when you're trying to equip Jitte and he decays it to really haven't got too much impact in the field if you charge it. So I prefer to keep it in when I am going to play a pure-race matchup or one in which I need to keep controlled the table. I hate when I have to go back and I have a couple of useless equipments in play. And again, here I am looking for an after-mass removal play because after that, I want to draw more creatures and if you topdeck the Jitte and a couple of lands, you will be out.
Playing against 4C Loam I prefer SoWaP over SoFaI because you run over KotR with it and you can race your opponent better if you have him stucked through Wastelands/Ports, having his hand plenty of uncastable cards or if he is loaming each turn and has his hand plenty of lands.
Against Infect I would never cut Thalias. You surprised me a lot with this. I consider they're fundamental in our gameplan here and I'd run 8 of them without doubt. In reference to Mangara of Corondor I think you're right and I have to keep them over Council's Judgment, even assuming that they can protect Blighted Agent from Mangara of Corondor with a Vines of Vastwood and not from CJ, but Mangara is easier to cast. Probably a better option.
Facing Burn I think you're right again. Probably it's better to board out the full set of Revokers to bring the other 2 Crusaders?? Even being scared about Grim Lavamancer free wins...
Again I like your reasoning against Merfolks and it's better split between Mangaras and Needles, or probably 3 Revokers/2 Needles to keep under control Mutavault/Mishra's Factory and not assuming risks about a posible Dismember to Revoker?? although you can eat a CotV... it's not an easy choice.
I like to board out Thalias vs BUG Delver apart from the number of noncreature spells I'm bringing in, for the 3/4 sweepers they bring in. I feel the matchup similar to Shardless BUG matchup post board, changing Shardless Agent for Delver of Secrets, so I board similar to that. For this reason, I feel these games won't be fast games and Thalias won't be much relevant taxing the opponent.
Finally I don't like to run all the 4 equipments at the same time against anything. I feel it's a bit awkward, and is by this reason that I board out Jitte, that I think it is the worst here.
Again, thanks for the reply. Would be fantastic if you could help a bit with the remaining issues guys, telling us you opinion (Infect, Burn, Merfoks or other matchups you want to talk about for sure). I like to have a structure about how to board in events I play, even knowing the majority of sideboard plans from my testing I always bring with me my notes, and of course it's interesting to know other experienced players' point of view!
Hahaha, I agree. This matchup is dreadful. Thankfully, Jund isn't quite as prevalent as it once was.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stevestamopz
Yeah I think I've always played slower builds of the deck and especially now as I've been fixed on how Imperial Taxes plays (vs Miracles and Lands it is good at going long but worse at winning quickly, so you're more scared of an early creature on their side, be it 20/20 or Mentor) And in the total opposite direction, I want to play a super fast prison game vs BUG Delver (cast Thalia, try to resolve a Magus of the Moon) but I can see taking out Thalia if you essentially want to beat BUG Delver in a very fair game, especially with their post-board removal.
I think vs Infect you should test dropping Thalias for a while at least. I think the big issue is that STP is our best card in the deck and it is incredibly difficult to hold up STP after Thalia is down. It's not that Thalia never wins, it's that it's a matchup where *our* non-creature spells are essential early + our Wastelands/Ports need to stay open too. They can win with very little mana and they play ramp. So if they cast Hierarch into Agent and we have a T2 Thalia, they still have 4 mana to work with on T3, which is more than enough.
I think while 4 equipment vs Stoneblade can be a bit awkward, a lot of it will be destroyed / turned off by both players along the course of the game, so having something live to fetch with your late game Stoneforge is strong.
I actually didn't think about getting past a KotR with SoWaP, couldn't think of a relevant white card in their deck cause I forgot he was white.
Vs. Burn maybe cut 2 Flickerwisp so you stay dense on 2 drops and still have a few hedges against Lavamancer? Against Burn especially it's pretty ugly to have to hardcast it and your Vials aren't always there or can get smashed.
Yesterday i play Vs maverick and esper mentor...side in and side out Vs this matchup? Thanks. Main deck list you play is fantasticQuote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
Against Maverick I think the sideboard plan depends on if you're facing a Dark, Punishing or a classic GW Maverick, for bring in more or less RiP for example (if any of them) or bring in SoWaP. First game against them I think that we have enough tools to win between flyers, 4 x Revokers main and more options to swing with an equipment. Post board we should be careful with cards like Zealous Persecution. It's hard to board this matchup because you want to bring in a lot of cards and you have no space. So against Dark Maverick (which is the most popular) I'd board similar to this:
+2 x Council's Judgment
+2 x Pithing Needle
+2 x Mirran Crusader
-4 x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
-1 x Mangara of Corondor
-1 x Sword of Fire and Ice
As you can see, probably I'd opt for controlling better their tricks with more Needles over a more aggressive plan with SoWaP that could be sweet as well.
I have to leave now [emoji29] . Let me a couple of hours and then I'll post you how I'd board vs Esper Mentor
The sentences in his post felt odd, as if they were translated word by word. The syntax just seemed off. It reminded me of a sketch a Dutch comedian once performed. Before the man became a comedian he worked as an English teacher at a highschool and during the sketch he shares some anecdotes concerning work he received from his students. One of the gems he shared with the audience was the sentence "Orphan up your guard". Apparently the student ment to say something along the lines of "be on your guard" but translated the sentence word by word, unable to recognise that the result he came up with wasn't quite what he ment. Some time ago there also was a commercial on Dutch television based on that premise. In that commercial a Dutch tourguide tries to explain various sights to the tourists he's guiding but does so while translating Dutch proverbs to English pretty much word for word (with some pretty horrible yet hilarious results).Quote:
Originally Posted by Finn
Also, one of my wifes' former classmates once proclaimed she found something very cathedral. She ment stupid or dumb, which in Dutch is dom but Dom is also the name of a Dutch cathedral. Turns out people can be very cathedral too.
Long story short: his syntax was way off and that got me curious.
Against an Esper Mentor without Stoneforge Mystic package and without CounterTop lock (like this: http://www.tcdecks.net/deck.php?id=18293&iddeck=138277) I'd board similar to this:
+2 x Council's Judgment
+2 x Cataclysm
+2 x Mirran Crusader
+1 x Sword of War and Peace
-4 x Phyrexian Revoker
-2 x Swords to Plowshares
-1 x Umezawa's Jitte
I don't have tested the matchup enough and those lists are really variable. It's hard to deal with Cabal Therapy here as against Grixis Control decks, so maybe if they run DRS you have enough reason to board in a couple of RiP, closing Snapcaster Mage as well. Lingering Souls is a card that hurts us a lot too buying a lot of time for them, so if you face it probably you should bring in RiP definitely and maybe keep Jitte in, replacing SoFaI.
Deal with this kind of decks is harder than against Miracles for example IMO. They clean your hand and after that they start to play great cards against D&T, bomb after bomb. The problem is that they usually force you to cast more creatures if you want to race them, opposite than Miracles, and can clean you the board when they want with Toxic Deluge or Zealous Persecution as well. If your metagame is full of this kind of decks you should run a couple of Ratchet Bomb in your sideboard.
Thanks, Vs dredge?Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
I don't have "the truth" about how to board. There are different ways to board depending on the plan you want to develop, the matchup... etc.
The best for you is to try configurations by yourself to improve and become a great player.
As someone who runs both D&T and Esper Mentor, I'd definitely keep in all Plows and the Jitte. If I'm on Mentor, it's very hard for me to deal with an active Jitte, and 1cmc instant removal that doesn't care about Mentor's p/t is gdlk.
I try to minimize dead draws and I think the rest of the maindeck options are better in this matchup so I opt for go ahead without the full set of our 1CMC spot removal. If they cast a Mentor and have the protection for your StP you'll probably lose really quickly, doing your StP a bit irrelevant and depriving you from a better draw here, so I prefer to not enter on this kind of game. It depends on your priorities I believe, but you make Mentor better if you give him so much value and at the same time I think you're doing your deck worse. Playing with Jitte is not an easy choice here, even more when you're running 4 equipments. There are situations in which all of them can shine so whatever you choose here is at least respectable.
I played again at my LGS as almost each friday. This time I won a 28 players event with a 5-0 record and the same list I posted a couple of pages before which is giving me great results lately. I really love D&T since I started to play it 2 years ago. You have no manipulation but playing well you can win against everything and with different gameplans. The experience is fantastic as well. I win a lot of games, especially grindy matchups, only by making less mistakes than my opponent.
R1 --> BUG Control (2-0). I knew he was on this and I kept a really good hand while his hand was really slow. I managed the G1 to win with Crusader + SoFaI. He tried to destroy the Sword with an AD but a Flickerwisp was in my hand to let me win the first game with Crusader equipped. G2 was really long. I ate a couple of Toxic Deluge, 3 AD, a couple of Lilianas, Disfigures and Needles... and he ate my 2 Cataclysm. Finally I won topdecking another Crusader. It was really hard post-board with tons of love.
R2 --> Elves (2-1). He was really unexperienced on Elves and played a bit bad over the match, forgetting some tricks and not bringing in Abrupt Decays. I won G2 and G3 with Crusader + Jitte.
R3 --> High Tide (2-1). I was not sure he was on High Tide and I kept a slow hand without disruption first game so I only could try win through a high clock without success. G2 and G3 I won especially with the help of Cataclysms, combined with Thalias, Canonists, Ports and Revokers.
R4 --> Sneak & Show (2-0). G1 was a hard lock with Karakas + Revoker to Sneak Attack. G2 he had a bit slow hand and I could play Vial + Needle + Revoker keeping Karakas in hand while I was Porting him. He hurted me a bit with a Blood Moon but could not find the pieces of the combo facing a clock with Thalia + Revoker + Crusader and Mother backup for a possible Pyroclasm.
R5 --> Junk Depths (2-0). I had played against this mate a lot of matches with different archetypes. G1 I kept a hand with 2 Wastelands and Vial, Mom, Avenger, Crusader, Plains. I prayed for a T1 without Shaman because I had tools to go for mana denial plan but I had no StP. I ate it followed by a Bitterblossom. He discarded my Crusader with a Therapy, what hurted me a lot because Crusader was my solution against a problemathic card as Bitterblossom was at this moment. Without him I spent some turns without a real clock. I was lucky drawing a StP later for a Dark Confidant. I drew a Mystic a few turns later when he was short on mana because of 3 Wastelands. I searched for Jitte and started to swing with him + Serra Avenger until he conceded. G2 he draw a lot of mana and I managed to play a little number of creatures playing around sweepers. He did not find enough answers because he was entertaining drawing more and more lands and I had Karakas down if he wanted to try the combo with the DD that he had, finding TS with a Crop Rotation or something.
I agree with Arsenal, and yeah I think it goes back to our difference in sideboard philosophies.
I look at that Esper Mentor decklist and I see about 4 cards I really 'care about' g1 (3 Mentor, 1 Toxic Deluge) and an additional 3 post-board (Zealous, Null Rod.) I want to have answers for those cards / play around them when possible, as they are ways we can just lose on the spot Everything else in that deck doesn't particularly scare me, the only other powerful thing the deck can do is a Probe/Therapy/Strix opening, but there's not that much you can do about that. (Sometimes I like using my SB to go down on 4-ofs vs Cabal Therapy decks, but I think that's pretty marginal.)
Mono-W D+T has no card selection but we're playing against someone who does - the % chance that the Esper Mentor deck will find one of those 3 Mentors is very high, especially in a post-board grindy game. So on a relatively even board, if we don't have a way to kill a Mentor within a turn or two, we just lose + they have a very high chance of hitting one of those Mentors - keeping 4 STPs is just a sacrifice you have to make to those statistics.
I am actually not sure I would bring in Cataclysm - it's only necessary if they already have a board filled with Mentor tokens, but even then it doesn't kill the Mentor itself (so often it will just buy you a few turns.) Unlike Miracles they're not really as dependent on having a large # of lands in play so the Armageddon side of the effect is only okay. Cataclysm also kills Jace but it has a lot of downside too as if there isn't a Mentor in play, we're going to have more creatures than they do. So, in short - I think it's better to have an answer for the Mentor immediately instead of after they've gone wild with it.
[QUOTE=Koke_MTG;943841]...
...
R4 --> Sneak & Show (2-0). G1 was a hard lock with Karakas + Revoker to Sneak Attack. G2 he had a bit slow hand and I could play Vial + Needle + Revoker keeping Karakas in hand while I was Porting him. He hurted me a bit with a Blood Moon but could not find the pieces of the combo facing a clock with Thalia + Revoker + Crusader and Mother backup for a possible Pyroclasm.
...QUOTE]
I don't think MoM helps against pyroclasm because pyroclasm does not target?
[QUOTE=Hyped;943876]Mom is pretty fantastic against pyroclasm and other sweepers that deal damage. The commonly used acronym to explain protection is DEBT. Protection allows you to give protection from damage, equipping/enchanting, blocking and targeting. Since pyroclasm is just dealing 2 damage to each creature it falls under the damage category.Quote:
Originally Posted by Koke_MTG
Protection prevents all damage from that color. Won't save you from black -x/-x effects or a white wrath, but Mom is gonna be good against basically any red deck because their removal is always damage based.
Edit: Cpt beat me to it.
Yeah, maybe you're right, but I think a split between early answers for a Strix or a T3/T4 Mentor and our reset button as Cataclysm is, is an 'okey' way if you want to hold density of creatures post-board. Cataclysm provides you to grip the game when it gets ugly and the opponent assume a role similar to the Miracles player. I bring them in because I am not sure about the matchup, I see it a bit uncertain and I feel that I could need something like it as well. Other option could be to cut a Plains keeping in the 3rd StP, but as I said, there are many different versions of Esper Mentor decks so I think it depends on the build because if the version you're facing is based on CounterTop lock you should base your removal in other options than StP. The large number of versions and how each of them make our list change, and the little experience I have against Esper Mentor (no more than 8-10 rounds played against) do that I don't have very clear how to board against them.Quote:
Originally Posted by iatee
Looks like c2232 had another good day at SCG with Imperial: http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...?DeckID=100735 - congrats! Hope we can get a tournament report.
Bold choices: 3 SfM, Bskull in the SB, 2 Revoker, 2 Karakas, only one Ethersworn in the SB.
Going down to 3 SfM has been something I have wanted to test - I actually played 3 SfM 2 Revoker the other day at a casual 3 round event this week when I was splashing green for Mayor. I was never punished for it, but it was a pretty casual affair and a small sample set.
I tried Bskull in the sideboard exactly once, got punished vs Merfolk immediately, and gave up on it. But I think it's definitely worth exploring further, since it's easily the worst card in the deck in your opening hand and vs quite a lot of the field. I think I'll try it again for a while at least. My biggest concern is actually that it makes things tougher vs burn g1, and I think this build is a little soft to burn - heavy on 3 drops, lots of non-basics for Price. Playing lots of copies of Vryn Wingmare helps though.
First of I will go over my bold choices
- 3 Stoneforge Mystic – I saw this idea here in the source and decided to try it out for about the past month, honestly I haven’t really regretted it. I only have two equipment in my main and I usually just need to search up one equipment…. If she dies, she dies.
- Batterskull in the Sideboard – I have been running this in the sideboard for over a year now and have literally never regretted it. It does make your burn matchup worse but burn is such a small part of the meta that it doesn’t matter to much. The reason I moved it to the side is because I rarely ever wanted to get it over sofi or jitte, when I did get skull my mystic would die and I would be stuck with it in my hand, if mom is out and active I can see wanting skull but im not sure it would be all that much better that sofi or jitte…… this idea has gone through a lot of discussion and testing throughout the past year but I am happy with it, though I don’t disagree with it in the main.
- 2 Karakas – yeah, I need all the basics I can get so I had to cut one so I could have 4 plains
- 1 Ethersworn – I figure its searchable, I do fluctuate with these but its usually one
- Surgical Extraction – This is an all star, I have been a huge fan of this for over a year….. loam and punishing fire really stick it to us and I don’t see consistently beating lands, aggro loam, or jund without it.
- Magus of the Moat – yeah, its cute but I doubt I will keep it.
Tourney report as best as I can remember.
Round 1 – Death and Taxes (Eric Craighead)
Game 1 – Vial into SFM for Jitte, I also landed a Magus with him having only one basic
Game 2 – I got the early Jitte but he curved out mom, SFM for Jitte, Brimaz, Wilt-leaf liege
Game 3 – I got vial into SFM for Jitte, and he got Mom, SFM for Batterskull…. He ended up getting batterskull equipped with Jitte and attacked, I vialed in Mirran Crusader and he gave the Skull pro-white connected and jitted my Crusader. At the end of his turn I Mysticed in SOFI untapped and equipped Jitte and SOFI to my SFM and vialed in Flickerwisp for his Skull, the equipped SFM connected and cleared his board.
He said he was relatively new to the deck but he played pretty well, I have played the mirror far to many times though
Round 2 – Maverickish? (Jason Collins)
Game 1 – This dude played Gitrog Monster against me!!!! No shit, actual Gitrog Monster, it drew him like 7 cards. I ended up mangaraing the gitrog and running away with Mirran crusader
Game 2 – He played thalia and I played consecutive Wingmares with a wasteland which kept him down. I ended up playing Magus of the Moat and beating down with the wingmares until he killed them at which point I ended the game by swordsing my Moat and swinging for lethal with Mirran
Gitrog Monster!!!! I think this could end up becoming a legit tier 2/1.5ish deck. The synergy with loam and reliquary knight and gitrog was pretty amazing
Round 3 – Grixis Delver (Jonathon Mihu)
Game 1 – He had an early delver and 3 bolts which killed mom SFM mom, I ended up getting SOFI equipped to something and ended the game quickly
Game 2 – he got and early 2x pyromancer versus my vial and mom, SFM and thalia, I kept vial on two and beat him down with SOFI thalia and bouncing thalia with karakas vial in thalia and reequip. This was a pretty grindy game
Vial on two, thalia, and karakas is so amazing in so many ways
Round 4 – Elves (Danny Jessup)
Game 1 – He drew poorly and I got the early jitte
Game 2 – he mulled to 5 and actually went off pretty hard with glimpse on turn 2, I sudden demised his board away turn 3
I have been playing D&T for 3 years and this is my first match win against elves, his poor draws and my nut draws are exactly what I needed and it was still close….. I hate elves!
Round 5 – Miracles (Alix Hatfield)
Game 1 – this game was all about 3 drops, he got counter balance out but no top, two blind terminus flips helped him but I consistently followed up with a 3 drop equipped with sofi
Game 2 – This was pretty grindy but I ended up countering a terminus and a last ditch entreat with warping wail
Im very proud of this match, Alix is a legend of legacy and very skilled with any deck he picks up. I get to play against him at my local shop and it is always intense.
Round 6 – Aggro Loam (Kory Ponting)
Game 1 – Punishing fire is a bitch
Game 2 – He got garruck and Arlinn Kord out, I revokered Kord and had a plan to kill the garruk with revoker equipped with sofi, unfortunately he fetch for dryad arbor and blocked……… I had a port in play….. I almost threw a chair…… sad face
Kory and I have play tested against each other quite often, it is really a 50/50 match between us. also Kory runs a legacy stream on twitch called Snapcasters, check it out.
Round 7 – Aggro Loam (Nick Ditizio)
Draw into top 8
Quarters – Aggro Loam (Kory Ponting)
Game 1 – Punishing Fire is seriously a bitch
Game 2 – Super grindy game with magus of the moon and extraction on his punishing fire also I wastelanded his dryad arbor before he could block this time.
Game 3 – Vial, wasteland, wasteland, wasteland, magus of the moon…… it’s a combo!
Top 4
We split the tickets and scooped Bailey into 1st so he could have the points
Please hit me up with any questions, i always enjoy discussion concerning our baby.
Somebody should start a Source thread about this, you guys have been doing a great job!Quote:
Originally Posted by c2232
Questions:
- How have you been boarding vs Miracles with your sideboard? D+T?
- I notice you don't have a Leonin Relic Warder or a similar disenchant effect. Did you ever feel like you wanted it as a tutor target? I know having a Mangara helps.
- Your creature curve is *really* high even for an Imperial Taxes list, 9 2 drops, 14 3 drops. What might not be apparent to people before they play with a curve like that - it has a lot of upside. You can tick Vial to 3 very quickly and you're cheating on a *lot* of mana throughout the game. You also mentioned Counterbalance and how 3s are pretty easy to sneak through. And with Caverns, you're less likely to be blown out by a Daze. Still, there can be downside too - have you ever felt like your hand gets clumped with 3 drops in a non-Vial game?
- Any other interesting Warping Wail plays outside of the Miracles game?
Other thoughts:
- I really like how wide open your creature base is - with the Sfm/Revoker/Bskull cuts you have room to play the full Thalia/Wingmare prison game and also play all of the flex creatures (Crusader, Fiend Hunter, Mangara.) Of those 3 cuts, I am most hesitant about the Revoker, because shutting off DRS is so key to both the Magus and the Thalia/Wingmare plans.
- Overall, I think we need to try these heretical things more often. Imperial Taxes is still a deck that hasn't been solved and a lot of the numbers that are probably optimal for Mono-W should be questioned. Having tutors in your deck means that you can skimp a little bit on some numbers in order to get a wider toolbox to work with.
- vs Miracles I have been taking out Magus of the Moon and two sword for Pithing Needle, Warping Wail, BatterskullQuote:
Originally Posted by iatee
- I have commonly been a huge fan of relic warder….. so much so that I have usually put him main deck. I did miss the little guy and will probably move him back to at least the sideboard
- I kinda liked the high curve, our two drop are really repetitive and can be a pain in the ass so I appreciated the fact that I could just go to 3
- I killed a grim lavamancer with but that’s about it
- I agree that 2x revoker may be a little short, it has so many uses that it should be a 3-of
- imperial taxes is far from refined, unfortunately I don’t get much time to playtest so I usually have to “test” it during tournaments. I read that source everyday and have gotten some really innovative ideas (3 SFM) and some really shitty ones (someone said they played 21 lands and never had a problem….. I tried cutting to 22 and was screwed all night long…… do not cut lands, 23 is perfect)
Haha I will take credit for that 3 SfM suggestion. I think 3 SfM, 2 Revoker or 2 Flickerwisp are all viable, I have done quite well with 2 Flickerwisps, though I think I'm going back to 3. (I mean why play D+T if you can't wreck people with Flickerwisp tricks?)
Relic-Warder has been consistently good for me to the point where he's usually an auto-include on the RiP/Ethersworn level. Just wish he were a human. He is also one of the few outs to Dread of Night, which this build is pretty soft to.
And yeah, if anything I would go to 24 lands before 22, especially with your curve.
@c2232
Great job! Really like the build!
Questions:
What do you take out to get to a 3rd Phyrexian Revoker? The main looks really tight, the only thing I can really see is dropping a Vryn Wingmare, but it is one of those cards that is so much better at 3 than 2.
What would you change in the sideboard, aside from what seems like a clear choice of -1 Magus of the Moat, +1 Leonin Relic-Warder? How would, for example, get in another Ethersworn Canonist? Maybe -1 Sudden Demise or Cunning Sparkmage?
Aside from it being 1R, Haste, and Human, which are obviously all very good, has Cunning Sparkmage performed better for you than Goblin Sharpshooter, with its capacity to machine-gun x/1 creatures, which is most valuable against DnT, Elves, Goblins, and anything trying to drum out a bunch of tokens to kills us (though most of those are probably too fast for us to get to turn 4, i have seen them stumble on getting enough tokens out to kill us if they don't go off before we land Thalia/Canonist)?
Have you had issues with combo decks like Sneak and Show, Reanimator, and Dredge since you have dropped Containment Priest or are they just not present enough to worry you? Or does Warping Wail provide enough assistance in those matches? How are you boarding for them? EDIT: Oh yeah, against Dredge and Reanimator, you also have 2 Surgical Extraction... Is that helpful against any of the FTK decks, like Char Blecher or Oops, All Spells? Oops like to throw its wincon in the grave, but what about Char?
I have to say, with 2 Warping Wail, 3 Sudden Demise and Cunning Sparkmage, I would think Elves would be much better, even with only 1 Ethersworn Canonist.
Cheers!
Thank you.Quote:
Originally Posted by redtwister
For the 3rd revoker im thinking about wingmare, mirran crusader, or fiend hunter
cutting 1 sudden demise is possible, also im not really a huge fan of warping wail long term, I think its good now but I can see it not being worth the slot
I have not gotten a chance to try sharp shooter yet and I have only limited testing with sparkmage.
I have never played containment priest, I have never really liked it much. Most of the matchups you mention aren’t problems for us. Obviously with my list sneak and show and reanimator are a lot worse but they aren’t really that prevalent right now.
I have never ever played against belcher or oops, my theory against those matchups is that sometimes life sucks…. Its like 1% of the meta. The surgicals are primarily for loam and punishing fire but they are tits against the graveyard decks too.
My impression of Goblin Sharpshooter was that when it was wreck-the-board-good, it was generally win more. The biggest issue vs Elves and Infect is their speed, so sideboard cards that are good against them starting on t4 aren't gonna do it. However, I don't think the differences between the various pinger effects is that large overall.
Hello, all, I was also at SCG Baltimore, I piloted Imperial Taxes to a 4-3 finish at 33rd(daggers).
I wanted to share some of my experiences and input.
My list was somewhat more "traditional" than Travis's and I've been playing it for a while, I think there are a bunch of changes I would make at this point to it.
http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/deck.asp?deck_id=1253839
Round 1 vs Jeskai Stoneblade http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...?DeckID=100767
Game 1: He showed me a ton of basics, I had mom and recruited for Stoneforge into Sword of Fire and Ice and took over the game.
Sided out Maguses, boarded into Pia and Kiran, but wasn't sure what the second slot should be. I boarded into Warping Wail, but I don't think that was correct. Maybe a random Fireslinger for Cliques/Snapcasters would've been ok, but it was kind of painful. I think some of my sideboard decisions were poor.
Game 2: I punted, racing TNN's with Sword, I locked myself under Thalia on accident and was not able to cast my 3 Swords to Plowshares sitting in my hand to get out of range of his exactsies lethal. I'm still kicking myself.
Game 3: He wiped my board with Kozilek's Return out of nowhere and I couldn't draw a 5th land to cast Batterskull to stay in it.
A painful round 1, but he played well and had a good finish.
Round 2 vs Infect
I have a lot of experience in this matchup as there are three pilots in my local meta, and I also own and play the deck from time to time.
Game 1: Invigorate, Berserk, kill you? Yes. Yes you do.
Sided out Batterskull, Revokers, Crusader, boarded in Magus, 2 Fireslingers, 2 Canonists
Game 2: Jitte + Mangara, holding up a Flickerwisp and Swords for his Stalker for the win. For people who haven't played this matchup a ton, always wait until they activate Inkmoth and then respond to the activation by Porting. If they have Vines and want to use it, they have to activate again in response and use the Vines, which taxes them a mana, often makes a big difference.
Game 3: Fireslinger + Magus of the Moon.
Round 3 vs Entreat Miracles
I double mulled to 6 and kept Vial dependent hands. He dealt with my turn 1 Vial in both games before I could get value off of them, in game 1 he used Council's Judgment and in game 2 he Pithing Needled it. Rough. I play Miracles again later on, so I'll go over the board plan later.
Round 4 vs Eldrazi Stompy
I've jammed this matchup with one of my friends to experiment with my own Eldrazi brew, and I personally like this matchup.
Game 1: I open with 3 lands, and he opens with Tomb into Chalice. I waste his Tomb, he plays another and passes. I draw Wasteland, and Waste his Tomb. He plays Temple, passes. I waste his Temple. He plays Temple. I waste his Temple. He plays Temple. Jeezus. He kept a 5 lander and drew two lander... so there goes my plan. Displacer ends up destroying me. Without a Swords to kill it, he amassed a mimic and Thought Knot to just lock me out. It's like a super Eldrazi mom.
I boarded out 4 mom, and boarded into 2 Fireslingers, a Magus of the Moon, and... again I was unsure of the last side in. It's around this point where I think there are some very real problems with the board. I end up bringing in a Warping Wail because I can't decide.
Game 2: Magus is really good. Shuts down his displacer and lands, I lock him out and go to town.
Game 3: He gets a bit stuck on lands, and I punish hard with a port into vialed Magus. I end up slowly dealing with his Mimics with Fireslinger and manage to get Jitte going. The game goes downhill for him and I manage to grab it. I am again disliking my choices in constructing my sideboard.
Round 5 vs Shardless
Game 1: Recruit Crusader, suit up Crusader with Jitte, crush.
I don't think I sided out anything, I wasn't sure what to take out for the third Magus and he showed me a basic Swamp so I wasn't sure how good the third Magus would be. In hindsight, I should've boarded into two Rest in Peace and the Magus, but I'm still not sure what I cut.
Game 2: A long, grindy match, I stick a Magus and am dealing with Goyf town, but eventually he manages to Toxic Deluge out with his basic Swamp and then Golgari Charms away my attempt to stabilize.
Game 3: We went to time, with clear boards and top deck wars. On turn 5 he brainstorms and we reveal hands and I scoop to him because he was a nice guy and I honestly believe he would've won with his upcoming draws.
Round 6 vs Deathblade
There's a testing group around the MD/VA area made up of Paul Lynch and a couple of other Legacy players who love this Deathblade list.
I know it runs no basics, and is BWUG. It's Magus time.
Game 1: I don't draw a third land for like 6 turns and die to an unending stream of removal. He's seen Cavern, Port, and White cards.
I side out a Swords to Plowshares for a Magus of the Moon.
Game 2: I have a vial, he goes for Stoneforge on turn 3 while I'm porting him, and fetches Batterskull. This lets me slam Magus. I beat his Batterskull while getting Crusader with my own Batterskull.
Game 3: He Stoneforges on turn 2... and gets Batterskull again. I don't understand his line of thinking, since Jitte is a way better choice against us and is totally castable under Magus and if I don't remove the Stoneforge, it's game over. I play a Plateau and slam Magus on my turn 3 and spend the rest of the game dealing with Batterskull before killing him with Crusader with Batterskull.
Some sketchy choices from my opponent, I'm not sure if I could've won those games otherwise.
Round 7 vs Predict Miracles
Game 1: I died to Terminus into Entreat.
Sided out 1 Swords to Plowshares, 2 Magus of the Moon, brought in Pia and Kiran Nalaar, 2 Warping Wail.
Game 2: He got brainstorm locked and I recruited Stoneforge, it was too much.
Game 3: I opened with 3 Vials, and just prayed he didn't have Pithing Needle. I ticked them up to 4 and 3 and 3, and eventually Recruited for Pia and Kiran, and went to town with two Flickerwisps in hand. His Clique was pretty embarrassed, Terminus did nothing as I just Flickerwisped Recruiter, and eot tutored Pia and slammed it again, and he dug for another swords before I slammed Flickerwisp again to prompt a concession.
My local meta is Infect, Elves, Reanimator, Belcher, Storm, Delver, a bit of the mirror, a bit of Miracles, and whatever this boss feels like playing.
I didn't play very much of that, and I probably should've changed my board to be more flexible.
Thoughts:
Maindeck:
I need more Plains. I think I'll shave to 5 fetches to run the 3rd plains. I want to get the fourth somehow, but I don't want to cut Karakas with both Mangara and Pia. Not quite sure what to do, I'll have to think on it. Maybe shave another fetch?
Shaving a Stoneforge and a Batterskull seems pretty good actually. I thought about it a lot all weekend and we rarely fetch it first. I think it would be rough vs Eldrazi Stompy, but that's the only matchup I can think of where I absolutely need Jitte. It's often stranded in our hands, too. I've been wanting to try Wingmare and I'll probably make this change.
Sideboard:
I guess 3 Canonist is really too much. The last big event I played in, I had to play storm several times, but I think the meta here in Baltimore is very different from that of the Bay Area, and I should've really reflected that. I would probably only play a single Canonist now.
Warping Wail hasn't really been that amazing for me, it's been great to have against the Entreats and Terminuses every now and then, but it's often hard to hold up because we usually use our colorless for Port and Wasteland, so I've found it quite hard to support. Necessary evil? Not sure.
I guess Sneak and Show is not seeing much play, so these Containment Priests are just for Elves. I guess my sideboard devotes a lot of slots to Elves because of how awful the matchup is.
For Travis, how good is Fiend Hunter? It seems like a strange choice to me. If you think Magus of the Moat is too cute, I've been really enjoying Pia and Kiran lately, I basically board it in against any grindy matchup where my opponent is not running Wasteland, and it's been quite a house. You recommend Surgical over RIP? Do you also bring it in against like, Snapcaster Mage, or just like, exclusively the Dredge, Loam, Reanimator type deal?
I play with a small legacy group in the DC area. Do you play near DC? PM me if you want to get our groups together sometime.Quote:
Originally Posted by Violence
It'd be about an hour. I primarily play at Dugout Zone in Ellicott City and Amazing Spiral in Baltimore. If you'd like to attend our monthly events, I can let you know about themQuote:
Originally Posted by saberoca
I have enjoyed Fiend Hunter, the access to a tutorable removal spell has been pretty solid.Quote:
Originally Posted by Violence
I run both RiP and Surgical. I run RiP against decks like shardless that have both Goyf and Deathrite or RUG Delver to shut off Goyf and Mongoose. Surgical comes in with RiP against heavy graveyard decks like Dredge or Reanimator and against Loam/Punishing Fire Decks like Lands or Aggro Loam. I have honestly loved Extraction, i could not recommend it enough.
Congrats Violence, it's a shame we were so close to getting 2 Imperial lists in the top 32.
I was skeptical of Fiend Hunter for a while, but after playing with one myself for a while it's been reliably good for me.
As for your SB, I think running multiple copies of cards like Containment Priest and Fireslinger is not necessary with 3 Recruiters, especially as they are SB cards that only come in for a small subset of matches.
I think your last side in vs Eldrazi should have been Pia and Kiran. Some games you might get Wasted out and it's stuck in your hand, but other games it can actually stabilize on its own vs a huge board.
Vs Shardless, and any other grindy black deck, your first thought should be to side out some x/1s - because they are sure to have at least some sort of Golgari Charm effect. Also, even Shardless decks that play a basic or two are very taxed vs Magus because their deck requires so many colored sources (Hymn, Jace, Baleful Strix) - playing around Magus seriously impacts their gameplan and sometimes they just can't afford to go basic Swamp into basic Forest. If post-board you have 3 Magus + Crusader + 3 Recruiters + 2 RIP you have a ridiculous number of cards that just wreck them.
A single Canonist seems really risky to me, it paid off for c2232 and can be a meta choice, but Canonist is one of the best cards against *most* of our rough matchups (Infect, Elves, Storm) and you generally want it ASAP. I mean if my local meta was "Infect, Elves, Reanimator, Belcher, Storm..." I think I would be playing one in the main.
Quote:
Originally Posted by c2232
Thanks for the input, guys, that makes a lot of sense.Quote:
Originally Posted by iatee
7-1-2 across two days at GP ABQ. Seems like white still has legs.
Friday:
BUG Delver 2-0
4C Delver 2-0
Infect 2-1
Enchantress 1-1-1
Punishing Jund 2-1
Saturday:
Sneak and Show 2-0
Zombardment 1-2
Reanimator 2-1
Punishing Lands 1-1
RUG Lands 2-0
This week I've kept winning the friday Legacy event at my LGS with the list that is giving me great results lately. I've won 3 of the last 4 events there with it.
This time I didn't have a great variety of matchups:
BUG Food Chain (2-1)
Death & Taxes (2-0)
BUG Delver (2-0)
Shardless BUG (2-0)
Wg Death & Taxes (2-0)
The hardest matchup was Food Chain because I had very little experience against that and it's a bit hard matchup because we have a short number of cards to break their combo (Revokers and Canonists) and they have -X/-X sweepers as the rest of BGx decks to keep us where they want. Other thing is that we haven't good answers against a T2 Manipulate Fate and then 3 Misthollow Griffin attacking because our removal only provides us to gain a turn so they can kill us easily without the combo way. So my best threat against them is an early race with Crusaders through DRS and Baleful Strixes as always.
Opposite to this, I didn't have the same luck yesterday at a GPT for GP Prague and I finished with a mediocre result:
Junk Depths (1-0)
UWR Miracles (0-2)
Goblin Stompy (2-1)
BUG Delver (1-1)
Junk Depths (0-2)