[Deck] Solitaire (Enchantress)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SpatulaOfTheAges

I would never run less than 4 Elephant Grass.


2x Exploration

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That is awesome you ran Exploration in your list if you haven't been running them yet. They help keep the combo going and being able to play multiple Sanctums in 1 turn if they wasted the first one is awesome, I play an Emrakul in my list so it helps ramp that much faster. I also agree with the MD Ground Seals. The extra card can really help especially if you draw what into them or you get what you need off of it. Also it helps game 1 against Reanimator turn it into extra gravy. Did it ever really hurt not running a singleton plains? I know E-tutor is a staple for some decks but I've cut it awhile back because I felt they were kind of clunky and they arent an enchantment and I havent really missed it. What happened in your match-ups that would make you cut them completely?

In weighing E. Tutor vs. GSZ, the decision for me came down to the amount of blue I was expecting to face. E. Tutor is more card disadvantage that you don't want, since as I mentioned in my sideboarding comments, the matches usually become attrition based.

The lack of a basic plains hasn't hurt me. I did get cut off of white once, but that was my fault for Groving a Wild Growth instead of a Utopia Sprawl, and then hitting all the basic forests in the deck off my 2 Enchantresses, and stalling out long enough for him to hit all my white.

Inspired a bit by Spatula's no Basic plains list I took the following list to a local tournament:

Creatures (6)
4 Argothian Enchantress
2 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

Sorcery (1)
1 Green Sun's Zenith

Instant (1)
1 Crop Rotation

Artifact (1)
1 Pithing Needle

Enchantments (32)
Draw
4 Enchantress's Presence

Card Quality
2 Mirri's Guile

Ramp
4 Utopia Sprawl
3 Wild Growth

Stall
4 Elephant Grass
4 Energy Field
2 Solitary Confinement
3 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Sea's Claim <--Get Karakas

Attrition
1 Karmic Justice

Wins
2 Defense of the Heart
1 Sigil of the Empty Throne

Mana (19)
1 Island
7 Forest
2 Karakas
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Serra's Sanctum
2 Forbidden Orchard
1 Savannah

Sideboard:
1 Solitary Confinement
1 Pithing Needle
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Seal of Removal
4 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Sterling Grove
2 Grafdigger's Cage

I decided to play this as opposed to my Spreading Illusions deck to help out and do my part in this thread.

Some card choices in the end were not optimal (Grafdigger's cage / Defense interaction) because I threw it together as a melding of the two lists overnight. Even though I have played traditional enchantress I wanted to play something I was more familiar with in the current meta. I hope people can find this useful.

I placed 5th out of 21. OF COURSE this would be the first time they would not play out the top eight and just cut to top 4. So my 3-1-1 record wouldn't get me there (stupid tie breakers)

Anyhow the match-ups:

Round 1 W/G Maverick? 2-0

Boarded in 3rd confinement.

Defense -> Emrakul fast both games.

Round 2 Burn 2-0

Energy Field was a rock star. Was beat down to 2 like turn 4 and stabilized off the (Multiple Goblin Guides and rift bolts). Won off of E. Field WoSaM lock.

Game 2 board in Solitary- T2 Energy Field and just sat there. Got the Defense of the Heart -> Forbidden Orchard scam going and my opponent was using their burn to keep it from triggering. I built up a solid hand of enchantress effects and solitary in the mean time but never had to use it. Opponent scooped after he couldn't beat defense many turns deep.

Round 3 Goblins 2-0

Energy Field / Wheel of Sun and Moon turn 3 both games forcing the scoop. I asked where were the REB's and then he pointed out he kept a hand that was just vial and cavern of souls. It was a long way from being found and cast.

Round 4 Deadguy Ale 1-2

Won the first game off of Confinement / Defense. I never saw the discard so I assumed it was a board controlling version and left out the Leyline but brought in confinenment, and Sterlings. Got blown out by Cabal Therapy.

I was on the draw. My hand was Argothian, Argothian, Utopia, Utopia, Elephant, Forest, Forest. My opponent blind calls Utopia, followed by the flashback on argothian

I was decimated. I stabilized off of Energy Field for many but got blown out by Serenity

Game 3 I had lost the Sterlings, needle, and sea's claim for Leylines.

I had my first mulligan of the day with a leyline no land hand. Kept a 6 card hand with action and no Leyline. Lost a tight long game in the last 5 turns Recovered through multiple Serenitys but just didn't get there.

Round 5 Bant Natural Order 1-1

Won game one off of E Field / Wosam & E Grass.

Lost a 30 turn game 2 in extra turns to multiple Engineered Explosives. I played Needle, but named Qasali before I knew Engineered was in the board.

All in all minus some tweaks and fixes I loved this list. I think I mulliganed only 2 the whole tournament which is a vast improvement to many lists I have been playing. Mirri's Guile is that good. I still also find E. Field to be super good, but I understand why people wouldn't play it.

Crop Rotation was kinda horrible, and never played Sigil.

Hopefully this helps.

EDIT: Variation from the decks core in (Bold):

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ForlornEgoist

6-8 Fetch (-2 to 4 Fetch)
2 Sanctum
0-1 Karakas (+1 to 2 Karakas)
5-8 Forest
1-3 Plains (- 1 to 3 Plains)
0-½ Mountain (-½ Mountain)

4 Growth (-1 Wild Growth)
4 Sprawl
4 Argothian
4 Presence
4 Grove (-4 Grove main)
4 Grass
2-4 Confinement
1 Sigil
0-1 WoW
0-1 Emrakul

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Sorry for the double post but I have new information.

After playing this list more on MWS today I have denoted the weaker slots with an * & the strong non-core slots with a ++ below:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Freggle

Creatures (6)
4 Argothian Enchantress
2 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn* - Possibly the second one.

Sorcery (1)
1 Green Sun's Zenith++

Instant (1)
1 Crop Rotation*

Artifact (1)
1 Pithing Needle* - questionable only because it is not easy to call the right card and it does not cantrip

Enchantments (32)
Draw
4 Enchantress's Presence

Card Quality
2 Mirri's Guile++

Ramp
4 Utopia Sprawl
3 Wild Growth

Stall
4 Elephant Grass
4 Energy Field++
2 Solitary Confinement
3 Wheel of Sun and Moon
1 Oblivion Ring++
1 Sea's Claim*

Attrition
1 Karmic Justice++

Wins
2 Defense of the Heart
1 Sigil of the Empty Throne

Mana (19)
1 Island
7 Forest
2 Karakas
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Serra's Sanctum
2 Forbidden Orchard
1 Savannah

Sideboard:
1 Solitary Confinement
1 Pithing Needle
3 Surgical Extraction* - the third one
2 Seal of Removal* - Doesn't seem needed
4 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Sterling Grove
2 Grafdigger's Cage*

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I also played some games among friends today and yielded the following results:

Sneak and Show 4-0 [Multiple Emrakul's, Needle, Oring, Multiple Karakas's, plus the normal hate is too much for this deck]
Fast Zoo 3-0 [E. Grass, E. Field, and Solitary are rock stars]
Big Zoo 2-0 [see above]

Yes it was a lucky day.

This list is still weak to the normal :u: & :b: based strategies, but better to the super fast aggro ones.

I personally do not miss the Sterling Groves at all. It competes with Karmic Justice for a slots. So ultimately it comes down to Card Advantage vs. Card Quality

As mentioned earlier Sterling Grove primarily acts as a 3 mana top deck tutor which is inefficient and card disadvantage. When it functions in its other role as enchantment shroud provider it is of my opinion that more business enchantments are better.

Shroud is only worth anything when a destruction or exile spell or effect targets. At which point Sterling Grove acts as card quality since it is the only viable target (outside of multiple groves then nothing can target) making the other quality enchantments seemingly impervious. It's a good ability. At which point if it is targeted you can pay :1: sac it and top deck any enchantment. That is still card that is not card disadvantage (net push 1 for 1), but is card quality.

I also find Sterling Grove not all that easy to cast, and overall adds more clunkyness, durdeling to the deck and can slow down some openers. Looking at Grove you may decide to top deck tutor into a presence perhaps inventing a whole line of inefficient slow play

Sterling Grove is still weak to what the entire deck is weak to which is board wipes, but can still provide card quality when mana is open.

Compare this to Karmic Justice. Karmic in an opening hand is just as bad so you will be running at max 3 total copies, but it also can act as either a card advantage engine or a card quality outlet (depending on how your opponent want to combat it.)

When targeting something other than Karmic Justice your opponent has to be hard pressed to choose something over targeting the Justice to not get completely buried under card advantage & quality removal. Karmic also has the added benefit of being very good at deterring mas removal tactics or making them moot.

I also find Karmic easier to cast like off of 1 giant Sanctum tap for example. Too bad Karmic doesn't work with annihilator.

Where Karmic is bad is in the combo MU this is where you basically switch the deck to trying to lock down Leyline with Sterling.

So all-in-all I feel that this untweaked list gives the deck the most well rounded game 1 MU's against most of the meta as it stands today. Maybe I'd make the followng changes:

-1 Crop Rotation
-1 Sea's Claim - Look to Legend Rule opponents Karakas's

+1 Solitary Confinement
+1 Karmic Justice

In regards to Sterling Grove we also need to look at the primary threats our enchantments will face. Lets analyze the field quickly for DTB:

RUG/UR Delver
Maverick
Miracle Control
Combo (Dredge/Reanimator/S&T/SA)
Rock/Nic Fit

In all of the above categories what are going to be the primary cards that "target," enchantments? Of course there will be varying degrees of SB's but I think with confidence I can say Krosan Grip from RUG/UR, Qasali Pridemage from Maverick/Rock, and Ray of Revelation from Dredge. Beyond these cards our enchantments are much more likely to be removed via discard, board removal (eg. Deed) or as is the most common case for us, counters.

I'm unsure as to the rest of Enchantress players here but in a majority of situations Grove became a 3 cost tutor. In this meta I honestly don't think its not MD material as our enchantments get removed typically either by counter, discard, or board sweep. Enlightened Tutor, Mirri's Guile, Green Sun's Zenith are just among a few card selections which I believe warrant MD space over Grove.

Now, don't mistake this suggestion as me denying Groves necessity in this deck. I understand completely what it provides (and having been an Enchantress player for years can safetly say it has saved my deck) however Enchantress is a deck many people are fearful to play in a counter-heavy meta and as such few players worry about having targeted enchantment removal. A 3cc tutor seems hardly viable, particularly since it requires we waste a turn to do it early game. I still think that having access to Grove is important, so perhaps it can be a 2 of in the sideboard. I, myself, intend to do thorough testing without it MD and see how it affects the deck.

Forlorn Egoist

Went to Jupiter Games this weekend, ended up 3-3. I'm getting better, though, and I'm excited for the chance to play the deck again.

I ran the same MD as I did at SCG:Buffalo (I am in love with this list - it runs so smooth.)

4x Windswept Heath
2x Misty Rainforest
1x Wooded Foothills
2x Savannah
1x Taiga
1x Karakas
2x Serra's Sanctum
5x Forest
2x Plains

4x Argothian Enchantress
4x Enchantress's Presence
4x Sterling Grove
4x Elephant Grass
3x Solitary Confinement
3x Mirri's Guile
4x Wild Growth
4x Utopia Sprawl

1x Choke
1x Oblivion Ring
1x Runed Halo
1x Words of War
1x Humility
1x Sigil of the Empty Throne
2x Green Sun's Zenith
1x Replenish
1x Crop Rotation

SB:
4x Leyline of Sanctity
1x Stony Silence (I was told that Metalworker was popular here. I didn't see it, but there were lists there)
1x Karmic Justice
1x Replenish
1x Oblivion Ring
1x Runed Halo
2x City of Solitude
1x Choke
1x Crop Rotation
1x Bojuka Bog
1x Card I can't remember

Round 1: Zombie Bombardment
I had this matchup easy - won game 1, lost G2 to too much discard. G3, however, I kept a completely unplayable hand in one of my worst misplays in memory.

0-1

Round 2: Countertop
Game 1 I got him good; He had countertop in play and had just played Jace so he only had one island untapped. I had a graveyard full of goodies (Choke, etc) that he had countered. I baited his counter with a Confinement, which ie then CounterTop'd. I then cast Replenish to his tapped out board and no counter in hand; He scooped a few turns later.

Game 2 he overran me with 3 Mishra's Factory before I could get anything going. :/

Game 3 was a close, close game; late in the game, he had me at three with 3 Mishra's Factory in play (AGAIN). I had a City of Solitude in play, so he was just blind-flipping at this point. I Mirri's Guile'd into a Choke and some other cards - if he had be at any life total above three or had 1 less Factory, Choke would've won me the game since at this point, his islands were all tapped. But, unfortunately, 3x Factories alone gets there for 3 damage. I survived that turn off of a confinement I think, but lost shortly thereafter.

0-2 (At this point I was out of contention, but I didn't know it yet. I thought 4-2 was going to T16, so I kept playing.)

Round 3: UR Delver

This guy didn't even show me a counterspell (FOW or otherwise) Games 1 or 2. Suffice it to say, he did not get there.

1-2

Round 4: Sneaky Show (Jon Barber)

Well, going into this round I was 1-0 lifetime against this deck; also, this was a friend of mine who was also 1-2, so one of us was going to be really boned after this round. Game 1 he drew a million lands and didn't get the second piece to the combo. Game 2 he T2 Show and Tell'd Emmy into my Oblivion Ring, and couldn't get anymore action afterwards.

2-2

Round 5: RUG Delver

I still insist that this matchup is favorable against us unless they have the nuts draw. This match went well for me; he just couldn't get nearly enough pressure in time (G1 he had me at 10 and G2 he had me at 13 when I locked). I'm not sure if it was because he didn't know what to counter or what... but this matchup went very easy for me.

3-2

I was pretty excited at this point; 4-2 was supposed to T16 (There were less than 80 people there, I think?), so I was win-and-in after going 0-2 (or so I thought. Turns out 0-2 breakers took me out of contention anyways).

Round 6: Sneaky Show

God damn it. Of course its a combo deck that gets me in the last round. Well, I was 2-0 against the deck, so I was almost kind of optimistic. Game 1, he got T3 Griselbrand. That card is actually worse for us than Emrakul or just about anything else they could Show and Tell, I think. The fact that they just draw 7-14 cards off of him is just dumb, and makes it so that unless you Show and Tell Humility into him, there's nothing you can do afterwards. I'm pretty sure Humility is the only thing I have that stops him from drawing cards off of him...

G2 he got T2 Griselbrand. *sigh* (However, this opponent went 4-2 and didn't T16 either. That felt pretty good. :P)

3-3

All-in-all, it was a very good tournament experience for me. I only made one glaring misplay as opposed to the 2x I made at the starcity and I think I played tighter all around this time, so there's definitely been improvement and there will be more on the way as I try and attend more events. I still feel very good about the deck in this meta (as long as I don't get paired against storm combo all day. :P )

I dont understand why anyone would be afraid to play enchantress in a counter heavy environment. Frankly I love the blue matchup. Yes spell pierce can be annoying, but you just have to bait out their counterspells with other important cards (choke, city), or run engine cards down their throat until they cant counter one. And when that one engine piece resolves, unless they have a geist and sword online, you'll probably end up winning the game. Now if they have a counter for every spell, then thats the way the cookie crumbles, but that rarely happens. Not to mention that at larger tournaments people either dont realize that you still draw a card even if the enchantment is countered, or they underestimate our engine. At which point I chuckle and think to myself, "i have more enchantments than you have counterspells, and eventually you will run out." And if they go for the "counter pretty much everything game plan," then a mid game replenish usually resolves and they now have nothing left.

I also extremely disagree with cutting our growth/utopia count to 7 instead of 8 to free up slots. Without that turn 1 boost our deck is extremely slow, and there better be a damn good reason for keeping a hand above 5 without one in it. The ramp accelerates our gamplan a whole turn, which as we all know is huge in legacy. Theres a reason why our deck was unplayable when mental misstep was legal, and this is largely it. I would never dream of playing anything less than 8, and if I were looking to free up slots Id do it elsewhere.

I also disagree with cutting groves out of the deck. I easily consider it one of our strongest cards. To say that it is card disadvantage is completely false, because unless you've played it before an enchantress effect (which only should happen on a bad string of mulligans) it has already drawn you at least 1 card. So it is stricly better than E. Tutor in that regard. Karmic justice really doesnt do anything that grove outright prevents aside from mass enchantment hate (which the only one that is played that comes to mind is reverent silence out of wish boards). Not to mention that against decks that have no targeted hate you can agressively filter your draws when needed. It does far more for our worst matchups than justice does, and even outright prevents them from choosing a critical card to destroy in the matchups with removal. Because if they they just have to swing in with a few dudes to kill you, they will destroy the grass or confinement that is the only thing saving you, and still attack with 1 less guy. So Id rather prevent that from happening in the first place (corner case yes, but it can and has happened once or twice). On the topic of using it to divert removal, why arent you just chaining groves? Ive done that against maverick before, and its not like they can counter the enchantment you put on top so there really arent any problems there.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by cthulhu_dude23

The ramp accelerates our gamplan a whole turn, which as we all know is huge in legacy. Theres a reason why our deck was unplayable when mental misstep was legal, and this is largely it.

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If you found the deck unplayable, you didn't adapt. I'm all for ramp, though.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by cthulhu_dude23

Karmic justice really doesnt do anything that grove outright prevents aside from mass enchantment hate (which the only one that is played that comes to mind is reverent silence out of wish boards).

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Reverent Silence is barely played. Karmic Justice is mainly to answer Engineered Explosives and Pernicious Deed.

@Mrmaul558

Nice to see you had a decent run. Sorry you didn't quite make the top 16, but playing the max matches will only make you better.

@Forlorn Egoist

Thank you for succinctly saying what I have been fumbling with. Sterling Grove is a great card it is just not positioned very well right now.

@cthulhu_dude23

I respect your opinion, and at this point I’ll have to say to each his own. I think you put too much stock into the 8th Growth. Statically speaking it affects your opening 7 1.5 in 100 games or roughly 1 game in a 33 round tournament each round going to game 3.

Probability of 1 of 8 successes in a 60 population sample 7 = 0.421712174396046
Probability of 1 of 7 successes in a 60 population sample 7 = 0.416104299736525

It is for Magic statistically the same.

As for Sterling Grove there is no question it is powerful under the right conditions. …but you have to remember you do not control those conditions, and the meta is leaning away from an environment where Sterling Grove is good. The tutor ability alone is bad it’s a crappy Idyllic Tutor.

Then you also have to weigh the alternative. If shroud was the be-all-end-all of Magic then any white deck should run Standard Bearer I know it a little rough to say that, but there is some truth in the statement. It is to show that many times it is better to run more “business” than it is to protect what you believe to be the business.

Consider this you’re just about 4 times more likely to get a 2 Sterling Grove hand than you are to feel the effects of 1 less growth spell.

Probability of 2 of 4 successes in a 60 population sample 7 = 0.0593435663969977

This number only goes up the more draws we have, and Grove is situationally bad in multiples.




…but enough about that. Our strength is our primary game plan trumps almost all other viable game plans in Magic.

There are 4 win cons in Magic:
*Life @ 0
*Poison @ 10
*Can't draw
*I win cards

To combat these we have (respectively):
*Damage Prevention (Solitary Confinement & Energy Field*)
*Damage Prevention (Solitary Confinement & Energy Field*) - Poison is tied to damage.
*Graveyard recursion & Shroud (Wheel of Sun and Moon*, Emrakul, the Aeons Torn & Solitary Confinement : SB : Leyline of Sanctity)
*Removal (Oblivion Ring, Karmic Justice)

*not widely accepted

Therefore, I'm beginning to think we would be better off by tuning our sideboard to just push forward our main game plan as opposed to cherry-picking certain archetypes, and get our main as redundant as possible.

It has been identified many times over that our nemeses are counter magic, discard, permanent sweepers and fast combo so let's break each one down.

Counter Magic

As Folorn Egoist said the best way to beat counters is redundancy. This is part of the reason why I still feel the inclusion of Energy Field is a good call for the main deck. In many situations it is functionally identical to Solitary Confinement but is a little less forgiving on it's condition. Common strategies for combating :U: are:

City of Solitude
Choke
Carpet of Flowers
Replenish

City of Solitude, Replenish & Choke being the most popular. These strategies look to deplete the control deck by making them counter these spells or eventually loose by cutting of their mana or closing the window of interacting with our spells on the stack. As cthulhu_dude23 points out.

The problems with these spells are they are not good in multiples. They are mildly cost prohibitive for enchantress @ 3 & 4 (you want to keep the curve as low as possible) and their effects do not stack well (you really only wan to resolve 1)

…but what is the alternative?

I'd like to propose a 3rd strategy Multani's Presence. I know, I know I have laughed at this card time and time again. …but as it turns out as the deck gets more and more redundant this spell is more, and more powerful. It’s major pros are:
• It is the exact perfect casting cost for the deck
• It can only be Force of Willed T1 on the play (which is still a bad play on the part of the control player)
• T2 provided we hit a ramp T1 it can be cast outside of Spell Pierce and Daze range.
• It effectively nullifies their core strategy.
• Stacks well.
I have been testing it tonight, and I have to say it is a little mind boggling this “silly” card is in :u: MU’s

Discard

***Theroy-craft warining***
I would imagine it would be the same if we were to use Compost in our “tough” black MU’s. Redundancy and independent card drawing should trump black tactics.

Board Sweepers

Seems to me is hands down Karmic Justice

Fast Combo

I’m not entirely sure what this should be yet. Until proven otherwise it will be Leyline of Sanctity.

So newly tooled SB looks like:

4 Multani's Presence(:u:)
4 Compost (:b:)
4 Leyline of Sanctity (combo)
2 Sterling Grove combo (Heavy Targeting & Combo)
1 ? Replenish? - (:u: & :b:)

Make piloting easier too.

@esg i wasnt thinking of deed, and once you take out groves the decks that board EE usually cant do it for more than 2 and that only hits halo and argothian in traditional build. And when they pop it for 1 it mainly harms us in the early game when we wont have a justice down. Deed only sees play in nic fit and bugstill, so personally im not for playing a mainboard justice.

During the MM era there werent a whole lot of decks around that gave us a favorable matchup imo. Then again i was primarily playing NOBant at the time, so im probably wrong.

@freggle ive got to give you props for defending your point and providing a clear and precise argument. You provided stats that are very convincing for cutting the 8th growth card.

I guess the primary reasons for my position is that ive never really had a problem with groves in the traditional build of enchantress. And that ive never really liked the wheel/field version of the deck.

In that version there really isnt room for grove, so its perfectly reasonable to cut it. I find that in the traditional version it is no more worse in the late game than say a wild growth, and it has an upswing aside from drawing cards if it needs one.

The wheel/field version has always come of to me as more clunky as it is a 2 card combo where as the only other cards confinement needs are your engine pieces which you bring out anyway. Not to mention it takes up so many slots in the deck and extra pieces of the same card are completely useless. And you dont gain shroud which hurts against combo.

Ive never felt a draw to this version or really felt the need to play it to be honest.

I do like presence as another answer to the U matchup and could see running a couple in the sideboard for it.

As you said freggle, to each his own. As Ive said before, i am rather stubborn and a stickler for the traditional. It takes a lot of evidence to convince me to make a larger paradigm shift like this one, and i just dont believe in it.

Karmic Justice isn't a business spell.

If you have enchantresses online, both Sterling Grove and Karmic Justice are useful, although Karmic Justice is one mana more.

If you don't have enchantresses online, Sterling Grove gets you an Enchantress or other business spell next turn, Karmic Justice just protects things not worth protecting.

There's no other enchantment that does both those things.

re: Multani's Presence - It's not what it seems. I played it for a long time, and Choke is just much, much better. For one thing, it's a terrible topdeck.

Similarly, if I was super worried about discard, I'd run Leyline of Sanctity first, as it also gives us an out vs. combo. Next in Line would be Spreading Algae.

Finally had a little success with this build of mine. Monthly Legacy at my LGS drew 15 people this weekend, and I went 3-1 and got 3rd! Prizes were to T4, so I was pretty happy.

Round 1: Dredge
This matchup went well for me; Game 1, he T1 LED'd into Faithless Looting. I was a bit scared, but he didn't really dredge into anything. In a few more turns he had flipped and dredged all 4 of his Gravetrolls hitting 3 Ichorid, 2 Bridge from Below, and no Narcomebas. He spent a few turns Cabal Therapy'ing me but ultimately didn't get any pressure on in a reasonable amount of time which allowed me to stop his eventual zombies with Elephant Grass and secure the lock.
G2, he mull'd to 5 on the play, played a land and said draw go for 4 turns. When he finally discarded a Stinkweed Imp, I played the Bojuka Bog in my board to remove it and give me one more turn. :P The next turn he cast Faithless Looting discarding Dread Return and Ichorid or something, at which point I played Wheel of Sun and Moon targeting him, at which point he scooped.

1-0

Round 2: UW Miracles
I always love playing Countertop Matchups; Usually the deck can't 1-for-1 you out of the game since eventually, all your spells either cantrip or mulldrifter, so you just drown their counterspells in card advantage. The only time it can be rough is if they get early Counter/Top lock and can secure it with a Jace. That can be hard to fight through, but Replenish can often grab those matches too.

Long story short, this match went exactly as I've described; Game 1 he never played a Counterbalance, so he just couldn't counter everything he needed to. Game 2 I ended up playing City of Solitude (which got countered) with 2 choke in hand. Needless to say, he scooped that match pretty quickly.

2-0

Round 3: ANT Storm Combo
At this point there were 3 2-0's; Me, Storm and RUG Delver. Unfortunately, RUG Delver got paired down (and eventually took first), so I had to face an awful matchup. Game 1 he stormed me out; It sucked though, since he was going to "go off" turn 2, but was forced to redo the math when I played T2 choke. He was going to fizzle, but I stopped him. :P Then he Orim's Chanted me the turn I was going to play the Runed Halo later in the game, followed by storm kill the next turn. :/ Game 2 he kept a 2 Duress hand and drew a ton of lands (did end up Emptying the Warrens for 6 goblins on T5 though...lol). Game 3 he has a reasonably slow start, I'm actually able to play a Choke for his one island and then Runed Halo on Tendrils (with another Runed Halo in hand). He decides "what the hell" and goes for it, since my board isn't ever going to get better for him. He ends up Grapeshotting me for 18. FML

2-1

Round 4: RUG Delver
I still insist that this matchup is favorable for us, and this particular match was no different. I'm a little fuzzy on the details, but G1 he wasn't able to kill me in time to lock down (I was at 5), although I did almost throw away the game when I drew a card too fast with Confinement in play (he had Lightning Bolt/Forked Bolt in hand...). Luckily, Forked Bolt is a sorcery. lol
Game 2 I was on the ropes a bit more, and made a few misplays but got there with O-ring on his early delver and then Sigil tokens.

3-1

This was only a 4-round tournament. I ended up placing third behind the RUG Delver I avoided in Round 3 (he want 4-0) and the storm deck that beat me in round three (3-1). Prizes were Savannah for 1st, Badlands for 2nd, Foil 9th Blood Moon for 3rd, Watery Grave for 4th. I was quite happy to get the Foil Blood Moon, as it goes straight into my SB. :)

Good job on your finish mrmaul558!!! Did you use your most recently posted list?

I will be attending a tournament next Saturday (18 Players max) and a really big one on 30th of September. Im still struggling with my final list. Right now i'm playing cthulhu_dude23s list with maybe 2 cards difference. I think +1 Oblivion Ring and -1 City of Solitude main.

My Metagame is full of Miracle, Maverick, Esperblade and Show-n-Tell. Especially the last one gives me headaches. I'm pretty sure i will move Humility to the maindeck somehow, but i badly want to squeeze 1x Crop Rotation and 1x E-Tutor into the maindeck also.
I have pondered with the idea to touch the Sterling Groves, and maybe cut them to 2 or 3. It feels like an act of sacrilege though... What would you suggest?

Gainsay (5th Place)
Legacy MOCS #4213076 on 08/18/2012
Download a .dek file for use in Magic Online

Main Deck

60 cards

7 Forest
2 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Savannah
2 Tropical Island
3 Windswept Heath
19 lands

4 Argothian Enchantress
4 Cloud of Faeries
2 Eternal Witness
10 creatures

2 Carpet of Flowers
1 Chrome Mox
4 Elephant Grass
4 Enchantress's Presence
4 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Mindbreak Trap
1 Seal of Primordium
4 Seal of Removal
4 Utopia Sprawl
4 Wild Growth
2 Words of Wind
31 other spells


Sideboard
1 Carpet of Flowers
2 Chill
1 Compost
1 Energy Field
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Harmonic Sliver
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Krosan Grip
1 Lignify
2 Mindbreak Trap
1 Seal of Primordium
1 Tormod's Crypt
15 sideboard cards

Any point in discussing this version of Enchantress? It took 5th in the MOCS at Gencon this year. Sure Words of Wind takes the opponent out of the game faster but the lack of a decent win con leaves me skeptical.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Imaginasian

It took 5th in the MOCS at Gencon this year.

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I don't know everything about MODO, but I do know that MODO legacy =/= Paper legacy in both metagame and card availability.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by JanoschEausH

Good job on your finish mrmaul558!!! Did you use your most recently posted list?

I will be attending a tournament next Saturday (18 Players max) and a really big one on 30th of September. Im still struggling with my final list. Right now i'm playing cthulhu_dude23s list with maybe 2 cards difference. I think +1 Oblivion Ring and -1 City of Solitude main.

My Metagame is full of Miracle, Maverick, Esperblade and Show-n-Tell. Especially the last one gives me headaches. I'm pretty sure i will move Humility to the maindeck somehow, but i badly want to squeeze 1x Crop Rotation and 1x E-Tutor into the maindeck also.
I have pondered with the idea to touch the Sterling Groves, and maybe cut them to 2 or 3. It feels like an act of sacrilege though... What would you suggest?

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Yes, I ran that MD exactly, with just a change or two to the SB, but mostly the same there as well.

I like MD choke way more than MD City of Solitude. I don't think Enlightened Tutor is necessary anymore - I suggest you playtest my list against those matchups (except maybe Show and Tell) and see how you like it. It should give you good results against both of those blue decks, and especially against Maverick.

@ Spatula - Thanks for the comments it has been noted. I equate Karmic Justice to a Thalia type card. You never really know what you are stopping, but you hope/figure it's doing something. Like it makes Wasteland a bad move unless they really need to be 2 for 1'ed for a particular land. I also like that it stacks well. ...why Spreading Algae over Compost? ...I read your comments a few posts back as well as all the comments on the gatherer. The Gatherer comments state that many people play around it, and I know from black decks I build that they are usually land heavy to trigger Bloodghast and not be too hurt by Smallpox or Pox. Wouldn't drawing out of your woes be better?

@Mrmaul558 - Glad your having some success. As for cutting Sterling Groves in all honesty it comes down to a few things. Do you expect to see a good deal of targeted removal? ...What do you plan to do with the new slots, and how does that effect the overall deck consistency? I started computing comprehensive statistics on things until grad school started again to try and figure out what a statistically "perfect" enchantress shell would be. Tough project (for me at least)

@Imaginasian - That is some old school tech. I think we could discuss it (there is no harm in that) but I have nothing to add at the moment outside of too few Energy Fields :smile: and Cloud of Fairies is pretty great in :u: enchantress.

@ Imaginasian: I agree with Freggle. Thats is, indeed, quite old school tech. Next thing you know, the person who Top 8's finally w/Enchantress will be running Earthcraft + Squirrel Nest. :tongue: 'Course, this combo is exactly why Earthcraft is banned in Legacy. ^_^'

All-in-all, a rather interesting list. Whats conveinant is that the pilot doesn't sacrifice the combo MU with this list (since Seal of Removal fulfills the O-Ring slot). The list looks as though it is geared towards handling early game aggression better than G/W lists. I'm hesitant that the list only runs the 1 WoWi as a "wincon," since decks do SB in Surgical Extraction or Memoricide (Nic Fit) against us, but then again I'm sure they tend to have more relevant targets in their mind, especially since Blue Enchantress is a rarity.

Its been years since I've played UG Enchantress so I can't really comment as to its effectiveness, however, I'm glad to see it posted a good result.

On a random note, I wonder how a list built to answer creature decks would fair in this meta? I'm not going to post a list since this is just a thought-of-the-moment, but perhaps running something like:

4 Elephant Grass
4 Porphyry Nodes
4 Drop of Honey
1 Humility
1-2 Solitary Confinement

I know, the price tag on Honey is beyond reasonable and this idea seems subpar, however a part of my wants to try it out. Seems like it'd be absolutely trolling to play. >:D

Forlorn Egoist

Drew Levin wrote an article with a blurb about this deck here: http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/l...Isnt-Dead.html

I think this deck is much more streamlined in that you don't run any win conditions that "don't do anything" until you're ready to combo out. However, you lose a lot of great silver bullets that are available in white, as well as the obvious Solitary Confinement and Sterling Grove, which are amazing.

That being said, this deck has a much easier time "going off" sooner. You don't need to land Solitary Confinement with enough Enchantress effects on board and Enchantments in hand. Just looking at the list, there are some neat mini-combos:
- Cloud of Faeries are a super ritual effect with your Wild Growth effects
- Words of Wind neatly allows you to replay Cloud of Faeries and Wild Growth to get more use out of them on a single turn. (Bouncing a Carpet of Flowers on your first main phase = sick!)
- Words of Wind, Seal of Removal, and Eternal Witness form a nice loop that allows you to "capsize lock" your opponent.
- Words of Wind allows you to reset your Elephant Grass while reducing your opponent's board presence.
- Eternal Witness is awesome utility and allows you to run 4 GSZ to get more virtual Enchantress effects early without being "dead" late.

That being said, I don't regularly play Enchantress (and certainly not G/u), so who knows how it actually runs, especially if your opponent keeps you off Words of Wind.

Porphyry Nodes and Drop of Honey kill your enchantresses, so it seems inadvisable. Shroud creatures can't preserve them anymore. That used to work years ago. If it still worked, I would play these cards in a heartbeat.