[Deck] Grixis Tempo

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Originally Posted by Manipulato

I disagree on point 2 & 3.
Stifle is most of the time quite useless against Storm Combo because they discard it with they're flashbacked discard from past in flames! I played more than once against them with Stifle and it's not a problematic card when they casted a discard spell earlier & go for the PIF kill. Pierce is better here in my experience. Forked Bolt would be dead, ok.

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Sorry, but I couldn't disagree more. Stifle trumps their entire strategy so they have to play around it. If that means they're going for PiF, then your Extractions (which you should have post-board) are amazing. Also if you're forcing them to go for PiF that means you've cut off a couple of different pathways they have to comboing out, which is how the tempo decks wins that matchup. On top of that, PiF is the weakest line they have against us because of Deathrite. I have won so many games against Storm because they Probe me while going off/on their last turn before dying, see a Stifle (or two), and realize they can't win through it.

When I played Abbot of Keral Keep a while back, I cut Stifle for Therapy in the main deck. I lost more games against Storm with that build than I do with the Stifle build. I don't think I've lost a match to Storm while playing a Stifle build.

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Originally Posted by Manipulato

About point 3...
Sure stifling a fetch is ok against them but I'm searching for something more impactful than just that. Negating the Anhilitor or Griselbrand trigger is not the place where I want to be! Sure sometimes there will be situations where this can buy you exactly the 1 turn you need to win but that scenario means that S&T already resolved and that should not happen. So Pierce would be defenetly better here too.

Dont get me wrong, I dont want to downgrade the power of Stifle but Im really unsure which package I should go (4 Stifle or 2 Pierce/2 FB). The argument with stifling a fetch is too weak for me, it should do more than just this to make it the right/better choice for me. Especially because Stifle is very Otp Otd dependent & easy to play around. I find it really strong against Miracles & Shardless for example because they have more targets then just the fetches (Miracle trigger, Cascade Trigger, Visions etc.)

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Have you ever played this deck? I'm guessing not; it sounds like you're deciding what list to play. I would highly suggest trying Stifle out, and if you don't like it, don't play it. I have had good success with it. Think about the types of hands you're willing to keep as a Legacy player. 5 spells with 2 lands? Mulligan to 6 with 4 spells and 2 lands? One Stifle backed up by one Wasteland out of this deck can put a hand like that in a spot where they have to draw mana off the top of their library or lose to a Delver or Deathrite draining them turn by turn.

Regarding Sneak and Show, Stifling a Griselbrand trigger is huge when you have a clock on the table. I beat a Sneak and Show player by Stifling a Griselbrand activation, then Bolting him after he activated it again. Killed him from 17. He hadn't attacked because he was trying to find an Emrakul to Sneak in. Anecdotal, but it has to be because one person plays that deck locally, out of about a hundred. You may also find yourself in a spot where they only have one red source to activate Sneak Attack, so you can Stifle that for value, especially if you're untapping into a Therapy.

I also think you're looking at this the wrong way, and basically comparing Stifle straight up to Spell Pierce and Forked Bolt. I play both Pierce and Stifle. They're both really good in the metagame. I don't like Forked Bolt very much. I hate sorcery-speed burn, especially when it's dedicated removal. I play Murderous Cut instead.

For this stifle debate going on, Grixis feels like THE stifle delver deck, even beyond the legendary RUG delver. You cannot over estimate the advantage of having deathrite to keep you on curve while still holding up stifle and wasteland.

Bug does this as well. The only thing this does better than bug is going wide and keep the reach of Bolt in its arsenal. I play Stifle in bug, not hymn. Having said that, I am currently trying to figure out what I want to play lately. I have put thought in to playing bug but the current debate is making me want to play this. I just dislike YP a lot. It has lost me games. I'd there any merit to playing a mix of YP and Stormchaser Mage, or is that a little to underpowered or lacking in synergy to an instant-based concept?

Sent from my SM-N920V using Tapatalk

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Originally Posted by Secretly.A.Bee

Bug does this as well. The only thing this does better than bug is going wide and keep the reach of Bolt in its arsenal. I play Stifle in bug, not hymn. Having said that, I am currently trying to figure out what I want to play lately. I have put thought in to playing bug but the current debate is making me want to play this. I just dislike YP a lot. It has lost me games. I'd there any merit to playing a mix of YP and Stormchaser Mage, or is that a little to underpowered or lacking in synergy to an instant-based concept?

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The thing with YP is that postboard you really don't want to play a second one or a Delver with YP on the field unless you absolutely have to because you can walk straight into a Zealous Persecution, Forked Bolt or Golgari Charm. That said they play these a lot of times straight when you play your Pyromancer, so later in the game you can put other stuff in play and hope they don't topdeck a small sweeper.

Playing this deck actually teaches a lot about playing to your outs: Very often you just have to figure out which way you're most likely to win. Sure they can topdeck Golgari Charms etc. but how likely is that? On the other hand, how much do you need an additional clock?

When you realize that you played to your outs there's no shame in losing imo, I remember my friend playing with RUG against me topdecking his Rough/Tumble followed by his single Dismember last week, destroying exactly Pyromancer and Angler while I had a Pyroblast in hand, ready to prevent any of his cantrips to search for outs. Sometimes you just lose because your opponent gets lucky, that's part of the game and the reason why it's fun. This isn't Starcraft.

My opinion on Stormchaser Mage: I've played UR Delver when I started buying my first Legacy deck (back in the TC era) and while Daze was fine because you played lightning fast but having reactive cards like Spell Pierce and Stifle in your hand is just the absolute worst! You just end up hitting for 1 each turn while they crash in with something like Goyf, not seeing any reason why to play additional spells or crack their lands (which gives you triggers on their turn).
I'm also not sure if denying mana is the way to go, I'd just slam 4x Swiftspears and go fullout UR-burn (I remember that having two of either YP or Swiftspear was reeeally good when playing Spells).
So yeah, Stormchaser Mage is an interesting card and Propably better than YP in straight UR-Delver because of haste, but here what you actually want to do is keep your opponent struggling while your YP generates an advantage.

The thing I have the feeling a lot of players do wrong with YP is that they play their cantrips too loose. Example:

I'm playing against BUG-Delver and have 3 lands, one of the a fetch. I've just played Young Pyromancer with my US and VI, my hand is Daze, Stifle, Brainstorm, Land. I pass the turn and my opponent plays his land and Decays my YP.

Now here is where many people seem to get into panic mode: They Brainstorm in Response, sometimes even Daze Abrupt Decays just because they want an extra token even though their opponent has a full hand and 15 life. They draw with Brainstorm and see a pile of cards which are not ideal, are left with a bunch of tokens and lose later on because they weren't able to brainstorm for the full value and their opponent just slams a Goyf.

The same is true when the opponent doesn't play a Decay: There's just no Rush to play the Brainstorm end of turn, if your top cards are a bunch of cantrips you're fine anyways. Otherwise you get to brainstorm away your bad cards next turn.

I have the feeling the scenario above (which I experienced similarly multiple times live and on coverages) comes from the days of DTT and TC where it was ok to cantrip horribly because all you wanted was getting to 6-7 cards in the gy as soon as possible.

Edit: Can you describe how YP has lost you games? If you had the feeling you just didn't draw enough gas it was propably because you either got unlucky or you cantripped loose. Did you get x-for-1ed by sweepers?
I must admit that YP shines way more against Control and Combo while Gurmag Angler is the MVP in fair BG matchups. Still, slamming a YP on the table when your opponent is struggling often times gets you further than a Tarmogoyf that just gets whiped away by a topdecked Decay 1-2 turns down the line.

Edit2: Can you describe to my why you pick Stifle BUG over RUG or Grixis? My friend wants to switch from RUG to BUG but wants to play with stifle and I got into a friendly argument with him about why. It just seems to me that BUG loses the reasons this color-combination is good and that's card advantage and midrangey versatility. It instead satisfies itself with removal that's double as expensive and doesn't even do much more against most of the field (even in a Tarmo-fight Bolt is decent enough being able to finish a wounded one), giving up the reach of Bolt.
The only thing it seems to get is Deathrite Shaman, but is that tradeoff really worth it? I know that Decay is a good card, I splash for it myself in the SB with an additional Trop? I don't argue that Stifle-BUG is a good deck, it just seems to me that Hymn-BUG and RUG/Grixis both do a better job by playing to their strengths.

"Have you ever played this deck? I'm guessing not; it sounds like you're deciding what list to play. I would highly suggest trying Stifle out, and if you don't like it, don't play it. I have had good success with it. Think about the types of hands you're willing to keep as a Legacy player. 5 spells with 2 lands? Mulligan to 6 with 4 spells and 2 lands? One Stifle backed up by one Wasteland out of this deck can put a hand like that in a spot where they have to draw mana off the top of their library or lose to a Delver or Deathrite draining them turn by turn."

"I also think you're looking at this the wrong way, and basically comparing Stifle straight up to Spell Pierce and Forked Bolt. I play both Pierce and Stifle. They're both really good in the metagame. I don't like Forked Bolt very much. I hate sorcery-speed burn, especially when it's dedicated removal. I play Murderous Cut instead.[/QUOTE]"


I play Delver strategies since Delver was printed and played all variants of Delver decks over the years (RUG Delver with Stifle, Team America Hymn Lili build & BUG Delver with Stifle, Grixis Delver without Stifle, UWR Delver etc...). So you dont have to treat me like a noob...If you have other experiences with Stifle ist fine but in my experience Stifle was underpowered against Storm Players because of the scenario I said (Maybe because they were good storm pilots? I dont know...)
How I said earlier I dont want to downgrade the power of Stifle, I know what it does and what not, I just wanted to hear the opinion and experiences from players who played both versions...

I agree with Manipulato, I am storm player during several years, and I must say that Stifle is rarely having any larger impact in the matchup. Though, is it an extra "out", but often a worse discard, or counterspell.

/m0ller

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Originally Posted by m0ller

I agree with Manipulato, I am storm player during several years, and I must say that Stifle is rarely having any larger impact in the matchup. Though, is it an extra "out", but often a worse discard, or counterspell.

/m0ller

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It's not great, agreed, but would you really say you'd rather play against Stifle than Spell Pierce?
I mean stifle as pointed out has to be dealt with (and DRS can sometimes shut off the PiF route) while Spell Pierce after a few turns is often times just 2 mana less and an additional storm count on your side.

@Manipulato, sorry for getting you confused with a n00b. I wasn't sure who it was that started this whole debate. I didn't mean that question to sound condescending but I realized that it probably would. Still, I thought it was important to ask.

Knowing that you're a player with Delver experience changes things somewhat, but still not totally. My advice stands: if you haven't tried a Stifle build, I would advise trying it. I've tried both and I prefer the Stifle build. It can only hinder you to avoid new things - plus, this is Legacy, how often do you really get to experience new things with your deck? Once a year? :P

As far as Stifle's effectiveness against Storm, some Storm players may not have had difficulty with it, but I would wager that has a lot to do with both their own play skill and the skill of their Stifle-wielding opponents. A lot of Stifle players get this one-track mind with the card and try to use it to Stifle fetches exclusively, which is the worst use of the card against Storm. This happens even with experienced Delver pilots. Consider what's more valuable: Stifling a fetch to POTENTIALLY win, or Stifling a Storm trigger to GUARANTEE a win. That isn't even taking into account that a skilled Storm pilot will try to bait out Stifles with fetches.

For reference, watch the SCG Players' Championship match between Danny Jessup (RUG Delver) and Caleb Scherer (ANT) (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJQXA7yoVM8). Caleb wins game 2 through a hand of (I think) five counterspells. He does this by getting Danny to value the wrong cards. I was surprised to see how poorly Danny played this match, because I know he's an excellent player. Caleb baits him into playing a tempo game by acting like he was short on black mana, luring a Stifle out with a fetch and baiting out a counterspell with a Ponder, all while he had a Sea in hand anyway, and Danny had no clock. You can't play a tempo game against Storm with Delver when you don't have a clock; it just doesn't work, as Danny found out. Danny's line might have worked if he was clocking Caleb with a Delver or Goyf the whole time, but that wasn't the case.

Stifle is very skill-intensive, and knowing when and where to apply it takes practice and experience. That's why I can see some people saying it's bad while others (typically those of us who have almost always played it) say it's good. It does depends somewhat on the meta, but it also sort of doesn't, honestly. Stifling a fetch is always going to give you a high floor for the card, except in two cases: 1, against Storm, where hitting the Storm trigger is better; and 2, against decks that don't have fetches. The primary occurrence of #2 is against Death and Taxes, where Stifle has about fifteen other valuable applications. It even has value against Elves where you can pinpoint a Stifle to keep them from going off (like Stifling the Craterhoof ETB trigger or countering a Symbiote/Ranger effect - or even countering a Glimpse/Sentinel trigger).

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Originally Posted by Agrippa91

It's not great, agreed, but would you really say you'd rather play against Stifle than Spell Pierce?
I mean stifle as pointed out has to be dealt with (and DRS can sometimes shut off the PiF route) while Spell Pierce after a few turns is often times just 2 mana less and an additional storm count on your side.

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I agree, but tend to disagree as well, it depends on many things, sometimes is stifle + delver swinging enough, same can be said about spell pierce. The statement might also be difficult with spell pierce. An example; deathrite eating you yard, particular rituals, which is the best way to beat past in flames, this makes spell pierce so much live, because, past in flames cost 6 mana suddenly, and you do not have much mana in the yard.

But I agree - stifle have impact. After all it's still a counter you need to get rite off at some point.

Further, it has much to do with how conscious you are in the match-up, and how skilled you are as a player. Fetch lands isn't always the best way to attack storm

I asked the ANT boys what they think about the whole Stifle thing...
That's what they say about Stifle in that MU...
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...-Combo/page195

Need some side boarding advice with the stock SB list
4 x therapy
2 x surgical
2 x submerge
1 x darkblast
2 x pyro
1 x vortex
1 x vendilion
1 x fluster
1 x needle

Vs
Miracles
Lands
Eldrazi stompy

Does the board need to change if expecting a heavy eldrazi field?

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Originally Posted by Manipulato

I asked the ANT boys what they think about the whole Stifle thing...
That's what they say about Stifle in that MU...
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...-Combo/page195

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I'm well aware that Flusterstorm is better against Storm than Stifle (which is what the main discussion in the linked thread is about).
Fact is though that we were debating wether to play Spell Pierce or Stifle which is another matter entirely. Because there it is the fact that Spell Pierce can counter pretty much everything in the early turns, but is dead later, Stifle can counter lands early and make our Daze/Wasteland-plan better as well as serve as a 1-of in hand which the opponent has to play around.
The point was made that Stifle can be circumvented by the PiF-route which is of course valid. But with DRS (and cards like Invasive Surgery and Hydroblast in my Sb) that should be even harder. In the old RUG-Delver Chain of Vapors on Grafdigger's Cage followed by Past in Flames often times lead to victory, but sometimes a simple open Deathrite can bring an entire strategy down now.

Tl; dr: I know I stated Stifle was almost Flusterstorm in my earlier points which is the highest impact it can have (countering the ToA/EtW). I'm well aware that that that's not always the case but the fact that people have to play around it as a final hardcounter lead me to this description.
Flusterstorm is 100x better, but definitely not a maindeckable card, especially not a 4-of so it's not really appropriate to compare these two.

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Originally Posted by nditiz1

Need some side boarding advice with the stock SB list
4 x therapy
2 x surgical
2 x submerge
1 x darkblast
2 x pyro
1 x vortex
1 x vendilion
1 x fluster
1 x needle

Vs
Miracles
Lands
Eldrazi stompy

Does the board need to change if expecting a heavy eldrazi field?

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Submerge for dismember

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Originally Posted by Manipulato

I asked the ANT boys what they think about the whole Stifle thing...
That's what they say about Stifle in that MU...
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...-Combo/page195

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Well, all I can tell you is my experience, and my experience has been the exact opposite of theirs. I hold Stifles for Storm triggers very often and I haven't dropped a match to Storm with Stifles in my deck. I don't know if that's because I'm doing other things better or just because I know where to place my countermagic very effectively, but when I sit down across from Storm I breathe a big sigh of relief.

Having several (and some really good storm players) around my local meta for years, I can honestly say that I might have won perhaps 2 or 3 games by casting Stifle on a storm trigger. This is either by a desperation play (they have not seen some cards in my hand) or a misplay (something that you can't count on) or some crazy/perfect set up lucky brainstorm play (again something that you can't count on)

Stifle does force storm players to play a certain way, but this it no different then the usual lines of play that they would have made anyway. Casting either Probe or discard to see what counters they have to play around is something they do all the time. It's a good card, but in no way the awnser for storm becouse of this reason.

Against Show decks, stifle on fetch and Waste on sol land is proberly the most effective way to keep Pierce/Daze usefull and delay while you hit with any clock you have on the board.

Bonus comment:
If you find yourself having a spot open in your sideboard, try Dimir Charm. It counters pritty much all important combo pieces (tutors, PIF, show&tell, NO, Glimpse, sweepers, kills ransom small creeps and counterplay creeps like Xantid Swarm.
If you have a lot of BUG in your local meta, have a look at Mizzium Skin. It fixes both the Golgari Charm and Abrupt Decay problems.

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Originally Posted by Draggo

Having several (and some really good storm players) around my local meta for years, I can honestly say that I might have won perhaps 2 or 3 games by casting Stifle on a storm trigger. This is either by a desperation play (they have not seen some cards in my hand) or a misplay (something that you can't count on) or some crazy/perfect set up lucky brainstorm play (again something that you can't count on)

Stifle does force storm players to play a certain way, but this it no different then the usual lines of play that they would have made anyway. Casting either Probe or discard to see what counters they have to play around is something they do all the time. It's a good card, but in no way the awnser for storm becouse of this reason.

Against Show decks, stifle on fetch and Waste on sol land is proberly the most effective way to keep Pierce/Daze usefull and delay while you hit with any clock you have on the board.

Bonus comment:
If you find yourself having a spot open in your sideboard, try Dimir Charm. It counters pritty much all important combo pieces (tutors, PIF, show&tell, NO, Glimpse, sweepers, kills ransom small creeps and counterplay creeps like Xantid Swarm.
If you have a lot of BUG in your local meta, have a look at Mizzium Skin. It fixes both the Golgari Charm and Abrupt Decay problems.

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Well, that's the idea behind it, right? Of course Storm players can defeat Force of Will and Deathrite Shaman, too, but should we stop playing them for that reason? Of course not, the whole idea is to cut them off every single angle they might win and, being a very well versed deck, they have outs to pretty much everything.
And when you say that you have almost never won by casting Stifle on a Storm trigger you that propably means that several other times your opponents conceded seeing your hand because they knew they couldn't win.
Don't get me wrong, I know that Stifle is far from an auto-win against Storm, it has its place though and personally I would never side it out.

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Originally Posted by Agrippa91

Well, that's the idea behind it, right? Of course Storm players can defeat Force of Will and Deathrite Shaman, too, but should we stop playing them for that reason? Of course not, the whole idea is to cut them off every single angle they might win and, being a very well versed deck, they have outs to pretty much everything.
And when you say that you have almost never won by casting Stifle on a Storm trigger you that propably means that several other times your opponents conceded seeing your hand because they knew they couldn't win.
Don't get me wrong, I know that Stifle is far from an auto-win against Storm, it has its place though and personally I would never side it out.

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I think you might got me wrong here. I don't say by any means that you should board out Stifle against storm. Just saying you should not expect to cast it on a actual storm trigger. You are better off trying to hit fetchland and mess up their mana instead.
But I play with 4 FoW, 4 Daze, 4 Stifle and 3 Pierce in the maindeck at the moment, so for me there are more options left to counter stuff if I use Stifle on lands.

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Originally Posted by Draggo

I think you might got me wrong here. I don't say by any means that you should board out Stifle against storm. Just saying you should not expect to cast it on a actual storm trigger. You are better off trying to hit fetchland and mess up their mana instead.
But I play with 4 FoW, 4 Daze, 4 Stifle and 3 Pierce in the maindeck at the moment, so for me there are more options left to counter stuff if I use Stifle on lands.

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But you're playing RUG, right? Or are you just not playing Probe?!
With RUG I agree that due to not being able to interact with PiF (especially preboard) your opponent will just not play into Stifle but flashbacking a discard before.
With Grixis though we can interact with the gy and PiF (I myself also play Hydroblast and Invasive Surgery in the SB), so it seems to me that just having a 1-of Stifle in hand prevents them from going off unless they're specifically casting a discard spell on you when you have their gy under control.
This is of course not always the case, but the later the game goes the more likely having an active drs is while stifle is also good against early (blind natural) storms (though less likely vs ant and more vs. charbelcher or tes).

No I'm playing Grixis. Currently with the following list:

12 Creatures:
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Delver of Secrets
3 Gurmag Angler
1 Vendilion Clique

30 Spells:
4 Lightning Bolt
1 Forked Bolt
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Stifle
3 Spell Pierce
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
2 Gitaxian Probe

18 Lands:
4 Wasteland
4 Polluted Delta
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
1 Badlands
1 Tropical Island

/Sideboard:
1 Grafdigger’s Cage
1 Null Rod
1 True-Name Nemesis
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Pithing Needle
2 Pyroblast
1 Mana Maze
2 Submerge
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Dimir Charm
1 Terminate

Proberly should swap the Mana Maze and Terminate for Flusterstorm and Sudden Demise. But then again, they both work fine for me so I'm in no rush of changing it.

And yes, I know I don't have Pyromancers in this deck at the moment. I played them for a very long time and they are also fine to play. Drop the Clique, 1 Angler and 1 Pierce and perhaps the Forked Bolt and you can add 3 or 4 Pyromancers to the party. I have to admit that this list plays alot more like RUG. I don't think that is a bad thing though.
With or without Pyromancers I think it's a bad call to cut all the probes. With the Pyromancer you obviously add tokens to the board, without them you still get the needed information on how to play most effective against your opponent. Although even with a full playset of Pyromancers, I prefered to play 3 Probes instead of 4 (not counting the time Cruise and Dig were legal).

I took a fairly stock stifle list to the Newington CT 5k yesterday and got stomped. Lost in round 1 to Miracles, round 2 to lands, beat shardless round 3, lost to the mirror round 4, lost to rug delver round 5, bye round 6, lost to deathblade round 7. I played out the whole thing for reps, and came away with some conclusions:

- I was really torn between either 4 stifle or a 2-2 split of forked bolt and spell pierce. Can definitely say going forward I'm done with stifle. It's awesome when it's awesome, but it makes for a terrible topdeck and so often isn't relevant.


- I always felt like I needed more reach to close games out. I often got an opponent to less than 5 life, and then couldn't finish the job. So going forward, I'm going to be testing out 4x chain lightning in place of the stifles. I'm really curious how this will turn out. I know we're a tempo deck, but lightning can kill dudes as well as go to the dome.

On the plus side, I actually beat lands in one game. That's a rarity.