Aggro loam or storm combo depending on the buildQuote:
Originally Posted by whiteshepherdman
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Aggro loam or storm combo depending on the buildQuote:
Originally Posted by whiteshepherdman
Combo, mostly because of your lack of pressure which gives them free reign to get all the duresses/chants they want and combo off without trouble.
Apart from that I'd say every matchup is pretty winnable, heck, combo and ichorid are hard but winnable as well, some hard ones are burn/sligh and merfolk can be a pain if they get the nuts.
ah mmk thanks for the help guys
With Zoo, Merfolk, and Countertop variants being the most popular decks in the format right now, it makes sense to me to drop the black splash and play red. Plague isn't as good against Merfolk as Firespout, which also shines in the Zoo matchup. The red splash also allows for REB in the board, which is good against both Merfolk and Countertop.
Here is the list I am considering running at the 5k.
UWr Landstill
4x Standstill
4x FoW
4x Brainstorm
3x Counterspell
3x Spell Snare
3x Fact or Fiction
4x Swords to Plowshares
2x Humility
3x Firespout
3x EE
2x Decree of Justice
2x Elspeth
4x Tundra
2x Volcanic Island
1x Plateau
4x Flooded Strand
2x Scalding Tarn
2x Island
2x Plains
4x Mishra’s Factory
1x Dust Bowl
Sb:
3x Hydroblast
3x Relic
3x Pulse of the Fields
3x Pyroblast
3x Meddling Mage
Pulse in the board makes Zoo an auto-win, and saves us against burn, goyf-sligh, and gobbos. I'm not sure about Meddling Mage, but it's this list's best option against storm. The uses of the blasts and relic is pretty obvious. Thoughts? Suggestions?
I don't consider Ichorid a bad mu. We cast swords on their Ichorids, countermagic to first draw spells, engineered explosives against tokens and cunning wish->extirpate (or the new trap if you don't run black). Post board Relics helps.
I think Merfolk or combo (supposing you don't play countertop) are the worst mu's
Have you ever actually played the ichorid mu? The plan is good in theory but sometimes you don't see the hate or they therapy it out of your hand or the first spell they cast is ancient grudge on your t1 relic. I board in 10 cards against and its still annyoing. Granted I can beat it but its still one of our toughest matchups and we'll lose about 70% of g1s.
Decent Ichorid players would eat us alive. Its no better than storm combo preboard and requires quite a few sideboard cards (though they are of broad use). Relic/Extirpate/MM/Plagues/Humility are all decent against Ichorid and may change the experience. Unlike Ichorid, Storm combo requires specific hate and unless you put many of it, it is still going to suck.
Little report for my 7th place at master of geddon II (Padua), 135 players, with a list I put up in a couple of days, and tested barely nothing! :tongue:
Plus I hate siding out, and so I tend to build decks more skill intensive MD and with a plain sb, while with this list is the contrary. :confused: So here it is, a wish-less vindicate-less wrath-less ... -less landstill:
// Lands
4 [4E] Mishra's Factory
4 [ON] Flooded Strand
2 [UNH] Plains
4 [UNH] Island
1 [TSP] Academy Ruins
2 [ON] Polluted Delta
4 [U] Tundra
1 [R] Underground Sea
1 [R] Scrubland
1 [MM] Dust Bowl
// Spells
3 [ALA] Elspeth Knight-Errant
2 [M10] Jace Beleren
3 [FD] Engineered Explosives
3 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
1 [5E] Nevinyrral's Disk (MVP!!!)
3 [OD] Standstill
2 [CFX] Path to Exile
3 [MM] Brainstorm
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [4E] Swords to Plowshares
4 [DIS] Spell Snare
2 [4E] Counterspell
2 [TE] Humility
1 [IN] Dismantling Blow (MVP!!!)
// Sideboard
SB: 2 [CFX] Path to Exile
SB: 4 [CS] Counterbalance
SB: 3 [UL] Engineered Plague
SB: 4 [ARB] Meddling Mage
SB: 1 [FD] Crucible of Worlds
SB: 1 [6E] Enlightened Tutor
Round1: Campigottto Sandro with blue enchantress.
g1. wow, not an easy MU to start with. My notes say I fetch a couple of times and I forced something, but I go in recursion with disk at t4, I think there's no need for further explanations, I didn't need to show my EE's and dism. blow.
g2. he starts too fast, I tried to get disk online once more, but he sees all of his orings, no way for me...
g3. land go for me, land go for him, mage on argothian enchantress for me (he had one in hand and drew one), followes by another mage on oring (which he draws!). T4 elspeth and I raced him with flying mages. He tries energy field but I show him dismantling blow and he concedes.
Side: +4 cb +4 mm +1 etutor (I lost the paper with the correct siding, if I find him I'll update, sorry! :cry: ).
2-1
1-0-0
Round2: ??? with reanimator
g1: he starts a bit slow with a force of mine to slow him down, hits a counterspell and obviously scoops to t4 humility with force backup and a couple of mishra's on the table.
g2: I see too much counters and flying mishras put a 4 turn clock
2-0
2-0-0
Round 3: carlo gnesotto aka jegger with ad nauseam
g1: wow, another difficult MU... plus jegger is one of the best ant players in italy (see here). I opened hand with double blue, double force, snare, standstill, counterspell. Yummi! I bashed him with factories till he reached 6 life, but then all my counters can't stop all his silence/orim's chant.
g2. bashed him with/mage factories till 6, but a reb on a mage and game errors decided the game. I eot tutored counterbalance, he goes orim in my upkeep. I should've force the orim, play cb, and pass, but I let the orim resolve and he wiped away my mage (on tendrils), then combed off. I bluffed double forced by paying 5 my only force, but I shoul've payed the alternative cost of fow and save the mana for the snare to counter his infernal tutor for igg. I've been stupid, I paid for that.
0-2
2-1-0
Round4: ??? (sorry, in that lost paper there were the complete names...) with dragon stompy.
No brainer, extremely favorable MU.
2-0
3-1-0.
Round 5: Filo ?!? with Wg stax.
g1: a friend whisper in my ear that my opponent is playing "a deck with ancient tomb". I start relaxed with lots of lands thinking of DS, play top pass and being punched hard by a chalice @1. I drop EE@0 and standstill, and he play armageddon, which I cannot respond to. I then draw tons of lands and keep his crucible off the table, resolve elspeth and win, countering all of his things and taking his only knight of reliquary to the path of exile...
g2: he locks too fast and 2 unresponded armageddon does the (fast) game.
g3: +1 crucible +3 mm +3 cb -4 snare -3 standstill -1 humility. I start well with basics and top + jace. He resolves smokestak and I resolve counterbalance. He charges stack up to 2, then casts the 2nd smokestack... I flip... elspeth! wooow, that wasa good flip! The turn after I resolved elspeth ftw, while he got killed by its own smokestack.
2-1
4-1-0
Round 6: andrea ?!? with ugr fish
g1: screw, very short game. the second and the third are a bit long, but snare > reb and elspeth wins alone.
2-1
5-1-0
Round 7: miani davide aka boucha with RGw sligh.
g1: he starts to burn e to 6 in a few time. I cast a standstill and waste him with dust bowl, lol!
g2: counterbalance missed all the flips... :cry: (side note: i'd really like to find 1/2 slots for the 4th brainstom and/or the 4th top, many times I wished to see more). EE and mishra did the rest.
2-0
6-1-0
Round 8: scattolin fabio with baseruption
ID
Top8: stefano venturini aka mostro with iona reanimator
g1: lol! he reanimates iona naming white and i draw nevinyrral's disk with jace, lol! when he is able to reanimate iona again he's at 3 with 2 elspeth soldiers watching him.
g2/3 I made some play errors, sigh! I could've maybe won, but heh, it's good anyway.
Props:
-ace and soldan,for organizing legacy event that gather so many people
-to the beautiful girls in the room... man, playing magic is good, playing magic with girls is more good! (playing magic with girls and a beer is even more good, but it's just too much for 8-turns with landstill :laugh: )
-the fans, that kept my brain cool for 9 turns!
-to fabio marchesi, my mascotte!
-to elspeth, a real warrior on the battledield, but now good even on the top of the deck, lol! :laugh:
-to manzoteam#1 and #2, that supported me and waited me (the car was mine, so my way or the highway! :smile: )
-to nevinyrral's disk and dismantling blow, supertech!
Slops:
-to the 2 players who, with the judge at their side, asked the opponent to roll a dice to decide the winner of the match... must be retarded! :rolleyes:
Congrats on your finish, gustha.
This just goes to show that even without cards like Wish, Vindicate, and WoG, that Landstill is still a beast. Truly my favorite deck in the format.
Gustha, it seems like in almost all of your matchups, you either brought in Counterbalance, or bringing in Counterbalance would have helped you. Do you think that maybe maindeck Counterbalance would have improved your performance at this tournament (given your pairings)?
Also, if you're going to run Counterbalance anywhere in your 75 (you should probably run 4), you should run 4 Top's maindeck. First of all, Top is the best spell in the deck. It singlehandly wins you games, and there is no other card in the entire deck that I want to see in my opening hand against every single matchup besides Top. Multiple Top's shuffle eachother away, so that's a non issue. Also, if you want maximum effectiveness from Counterbalance in the matchups where you truly rely on it as a crutch (like against RGw Naya Sligh), running 4 Brainstorm is a good idea.
How did Dismantling Blow fair for you? I'm not really a fan, since it is somewhat narrow in scope. I think I'd rather play Oblivion Ring in that spot, honestly.
How was the lack of WoG for you? I know against any deck that I see aggro, WoG is my favorite spell to have. Unlike EE, it answers every single creature on the table, regardless of cc.
Again, congrats on your finish. I've been advocating doing away with Cunning Wish for a while, and this tournament result seems like a great start at proving my point.
First of all, thanks.
Proving that landstill can do well without wish, or vindicate, or wrath was not obviously my main goal, but I can say it was my secondary (the first being winning the tournament, ofc :wink: ). Let's say it was a bet: having discarded wrath and wish, it remains to prove that landstill can do well even without vindicate. For this, I thank klaus for the suggestion of dismantling blow in the experience of UWr landstill, which I brought here in UWb. The card may seem situational in respect of vindicate, but:
-there's always an artifact/enchantment we want to break, and the rest is pretty much covered by many other things;
-it's instant;
-fill the same cc for counterbalance, and profits of the weak point of counterbalance in aggrocontrol decks;
-the kicker is quite useful, and top makes it great;
-is not a permanent, so doesn't conflict with EE;
-great in addition to disk, the real guest star of the deck.
Given my pairings, I think MD counterbalance would have helped much, in fact I brought it in almost every round, and would've helped me to 2-0 decks I 2-1'd, and maybe win the MU against ant, though the real MVP card of the day were, in order, Meddling mage and disk ex aequo, followed by dismantling blow. But my pairings don't give a good picture of the meta, which was full of goblin, landstill, enchantress, bant, merfolk, baseruption/canadian threshold, zoo. The list was more tuned vs aggro/tribal, but I didn't face one. That said, the meta could have been fair good for md counterbalance, and I think it would have improved some MU's and especially ant/reanimator, which I faced 3 times in 8 rounds.
It's long I don't feel the lack of wog, because spell snare keeps me alive just till I reach 4/5 lands, and that's were you can play every combination of EE/disk/stp/path/humility+elspeth to control the board no matter what the opponent plays. Basicallly with elspeth out you don't care to clear the board, but just to leave one single attacker on the other side of the field (without flying or trample :laugh: ). Plus EE is not only good vs creatures, but means another 3 answers to opposing counterbalances. And it diversifies the calls of pithing needle: you needle my ee? i have disk. You needle disk? you don't needle elspeth. You needle elspeth? Well, you are god! And I have dismantling blow! :) I won a match by eot tutoring snare to destroy double needle on elspeth and mishra, and that was pretty satisfying.
To sum up:
-yes, md counterbalance would've been a good choice. I'll maybe consider the switch for the championship's final (the tournament with the top24 players of the league), due to the fact that I'm expecting lots of combo-decks... or maybe I'll just play ant myself, lol! :cool:
-4th brainstorm and 4th top are really needed, or at least the 4th top really is. I've almost never seen brainstorm (3 or 4 in all the tournament!), but so many times I had a blind counterbalance out and flipped only lands, and wished I had another top, even if I sided in enlightenend tutor (MVP, it would be really great in your list). 4 is the right number to play, but then I don't know what to cut: not a land (24 has proven to be really solid, especially with all the denial I saw, and the manabase was tuned correctly), not a blue card (I don't want to go under 18), not the 3rd elspeth, nor the 2nd humility, nor disk, not a stp effects... Well, I'll think more on this and appreciate suggestions.
-during ant/reanimator MU, I wished I had some extirpate ready-to-hand...
I don't believe that is because of your personal pairings, but because it is great against almost every deck in the format. There are only a select few matchups where it isn't good, and those alone aren't worth running a card you keep bringing in against every matchup.Quote:
Given my pairings, I think MD counterbalance would have helped much, in fact I brought it in almost every round
CounterTop is great against Zoo and Goyf Sligh aggro, fair against Merfolk when they don't have Vial in play, and lackluster vs Goblins. The few decks out there that run a large concentration of 3cc spells make it a little mediocre, and I only run 7 4cc spells to answer the bigger cc decks like Stax, it's somewhat slow against Ichorid, but overall, it's just a great answer to the entire metagame as a whole. The fact that it drastically improves some seriously bad matchups like Burn and Aggro Loam should be reason enough to run it in the maindeck.
I suppose because of everything else you run, it works for you to not run it, but I just find it to be the most effecient means of mass creature removal available. For that reason, I would not want to go without it. Against some things, EE simply doesn't answer, and against others, Nevinyrral's Disk is rather slow. Both of them destroy my own Counterbalances, which is the primary reason why I don't like those cards with maindeck Counterbalance (but of course, you weren't running maindeck Counterbalance, so that changes the fundamentals a bit).Quote:
It's long I don't feel the lack of wog
4 Top should be a mandatory spell for every single Landstill list, regardless of the build. It's seriously the best spell in the deck.Quote:
4th brainstorm and 4th top are really needed, or at least the 4th top really is.
You ran a 3c manabase with Ruins and Bowl. I wouldn't want to cut below 24 lands either. I run a 2c manabase without Ruins and Bowl, so 23 works out perfectly for me.Quote:
but then I don't know what to cut: not a land (24 has proven to be really solid, especially with all the denial I saw, and the manabase was tuned correctly
I notice that nobody seems to use Ravenous Trap in the sideboard, is it because we're just not that worried about graveyards anymore or is it not worth the space for the Ichorid matchup?
I'm surprised that Shackles isn't being used more as well. I have found it often to be gg against most aggro decks, its seemly great provided you have the islands for it.
It's definitely a Wishable target, imo. However, the card is pretty narrow itself, and like gustha said, with 6/8 STP effects (MD/Post-board) + Countertop with the possible addition of Medding Mage and others create plenty of problems for Ichorid players. That said, are you safe from a Cabal Therapy raping your hand? No, but no player is.Quote:
Originally Posted by ultimoman
I had Shackles in the SB (with ET) for a long time, and didn't do so hot with it. Little slow to get out, and Grip-able.
I changed Black to Red just some weeks ago.Quote:
Originally Posted by Genericcactus
And i top4ed in the first (really small) tourney (34 ppl) I partecipated.
Your list seems tough, but I think too radical.
Probably you win g1 against merfolks, zoo, creatures in generally
But probably you lose g1 in mirror matches and against WStax, having no more time to play g3.
You don't recycle nothing, no CoTW, no Ruins
Landstill is good because we have 50-50 against quite everyone, i think you are 70-30 against aggros and 30-70 against the rest.
But I like a lot your sb strategy :wink:
22 lands are too few imho, and 6 fetches are too many!!!!
Against ANT you've 9 dead cards, +3 "maybesometimesuseful" cards in mainboard
In g2, you have maximum 6 cards to side in
I disagree with running 6 blasts in a sideboard and firespout in my testing was god awefull against most of the format. In theory its good but when you actually test it, you really want better overall answers.
Also to note: Spell Pierce is THE NUTS. It needs to be tested more thoroughly. It stops EVERYTHING we fear! Snare would be the split or replacement slot probobly, though we could consider counterspell.
I think spell pierce would be a good replacement for if you run 3 negates in your SB, It's great against ichorid and storm decks that are limited by their mana resources.
the argument isnt about low mana sources. its about the utility of the spell.
spell pierce for the cost is a one mana answer to vial/ trinisphere/hymn/ and a larger variety of answers that will inevitably get u into the later game. to be short this is landstills abswe all for shenanigans.
fyi its a mainboard card and not a sideboard answer.
No. You don't get the point that i was making in my suggestion. All that I am saying is that it will work against ichorid and storm since they don't have the extra mana needed to pay for spell pierce.
I never said that it wouldn't be a good answer against any other threats, you just jumped to that conclusion.
All that I was suggesting when i mentioned negates in the sideboard was that they might not be necessary anymore since spell pierce could do their job just as well.
fyi if you've got spell pierce, and you're staring at creatures... you're still gonna be staring at creatures.
i do get ur points. all im saying is that pierce answers problem cards in the early game that our md can't normally handle specifically vial. it also handles cb which makes the midgame much easier for us as it does w snare.
Spell Pierce indeed stops the single most troublesome early game spell there is - Aether Vial. Also 1cc discard, Trinisphere, opposing top, sometimes chalice. And to the less extent - Survival, opposing Standstill, Hymn, Counterbalance, although Spell Snare is heaps better there.
Personally, most of the games I lose, are when I get overwhelmed in the first 3 turns of the game. That gives us the general deck construction idea - survive the early game and overpower opponent later with 4cc bombs. The question is, can we really afford to run a conditional early game spell? Because It's going to suck later on. Don't we already have enough non-conditional means to 'stall' untill 4cc?
So, lets consider the early game options we already run:
StP -obviously. Nobody is going to cut these
Additional spot removal in form of PtE, F/I, Smother etc. To be sure. You don't always get StP in your opener, but when you run 6+ swords, its easy.
Spell Snare: hands down the best early game counter. Stops all kinds of problematic spells, Goyf, CB, Survival, Lords of Atlantis, Confidant, Hymn, Sinkhole etc. Much like StP, still solid later on. If I'm to run Spell Pierce, it isn't in this slot. Probably in the slot of additional spot removal.
Explosives: too versatile to cut it down to such a narrow and conditional spell.
Possible earlygame S/B cards:
Pithing Needle: has a lot of uses, fixes vial problem, but overally too narrow and 'clunky'. But I'd probably rate it higher than Spell Pierce and I don't play it.
Pyroclasm: solid against swarm strategies. And really, Firespout sucks, 3cc DOES make difference. If you want to run Firespout, run Wrath instead.
So here comes the problem, not only we have to evaluate how good Spell Pierce is, we have to find a room for it in the deck. I just don't happen to have that room. At least for now I consider other spells I run better than it.