[Deck] Solidarity

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Originally Posted by JDK

Piloted Solidarity to a Top4 finish in my local Legacy Open:

//Lands
2 Flooded Strand
11 Island
2 Polluted Delta
3 Scalding Tarn

//Spells
1 Brain Freeze
4 Brainstorm
1 Cunning Wish
1 Dig Through Time
2 Flusterstorm
4 Force of Will
4 High Tide
4 Impulse
4 Meditate
2 Opt
2 Peek
2 Repeal
4 Reset
2 Snap
2 Turnabout

//Creatures
3 Snapcaster Mage

//Sideboard
1 Snap
2 Wipe Away
1 Ravenous Trap
1 Pact of Negation
1 Echoing Truth
2 Flusterstorm
1 Turnabout
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Swan Song
1 Blue Sun's Zenith
1 Dig Through Time

R1: vs. Punishing BURG (?) 2-0
R2: vs. Punishing Control (UWR) 1-1-1 - Games 2 & 3 he has more counters than I probably drew in the whole tournament. FoWs, Pyroblasts, Counterspells, Izzet Charms, Swan Songs, Canonist, Flusterstorm...
R3: vs. UR Delver 0-2 - I concede because I am already qualified for the invitational and he isn't (wasn't at that point).
R4: vs. Enchantress 2-0 - Game 1 he thinks Emrakul saves him. Game 2 he just tried to stick two Solitary Confinements and thinks again to be save with Emrakul.
R5: vs. Deathblade 2-0

Top4: vs. UR Delver - Game 1 I get stuck at two lands. Game 2 I try to go off with facing lethal, but he has Pyroblast, Force of Will, Spell Pierce and Flusterstorm and I couldn't play around the latter.

Initially I wanted to play two Dig Through Times MD and just 2 Snapcaster Mages, but I didn't have access to the third DTT (wanted one in the SB). Anyway, Snapcaster Mage again proved to be of much value and 3 will stay in my maindeck for now. The Swan Songs should probably be Pacts. I cut Rebuild/Recall due to a lack of MUD & Co, since my meta is somewhat predictable.

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That list is very close to my current build; The changes are:

-1 Island
-1 Opt
-1 Flusterstorm
-1 Force of Will
-1 Turnabout

+1 fetchland
+1 Peek
+1 Cunning Wish
+1 Dig Through Time
+1 Brain Freeze

And my sideboard is:
1 Stroke of Genius
1 Brain Freeze
1 Turnabout
1 Echoing Truth
1 Rebuild
1 Flusterstorm
2 Murmur's From Beyond
3 Twincast
3 Surgical Extraction
1 Ravenous Trap

I find Twincast to be a strong card against Delver decks because it allows you to Twincast their Treasure Cruises in the setup phase to maintain card parity, and it lets you fork spells around their countermagic mid-combo. I do not personally like having more than 5 counterspells in this deck at any point, both because it's usually unnecessary and because it leads to drawing a lot of air mid-combo which is just as fatal as not having enough. Twincasts are often just as good, and they also can help combo out. They're also nuts against a lot of different combo decks, which is another set of matchups where you'd want more counterspells. I do like Flusterstorm more than Force of Will in many situations, but of course we need Force of Will in some numbers.

I find this list to be the most flexible and it gets a solid addition in Dig Through Time. It will be an interesting to see how the metagame continues to adapt to Treasure Cruise, and to whatever happens in January, and consequently, if this deck has a strong place or not in the metagame.

Has anyone tested Top? That seems good at setting up combo turn in this deck.

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Originally Posted by Patrunkenphat7

Has anyone tested Top? That seems good at setting up combo turn in this deck.

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Sadly, Top isn't what you're doing; this is a deck that plays entirely on your opponent's turn. You can literally do nothing on your turn and win. Top negates that advantage.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

That list is very close to my current build; The changes are:

-1 Island
-1 Opt
-1 Flusterstorm
-1 Force of Will
-1 Turnabout

+1 fetchland
+1 Peek
+1 Cunning Wish
+1 Dig Through Time
+1 Brain Freeze

And my sideboard is:
1 Stroke of Genius
1 Brain Freeze
1 Turnabout
1 Echoing Truth
1 Rebuild
1 Flusterstorm
2 Murmur's From Beyond
3 Twincast
3 Surgical Extraction
1 Ravenous Trap

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I don't think Murmurs From Beyond has any spot here. I'd rather play Dig Through Time or Intuition in that spot. Yeah it's CA, but you have no selection (yourself).
Twincast is probably the most fun card in the whole deck, but I never felt the need for it and I get the feeling it is too slow against UR Delver to begin with. Against more aggressive UR Decks you don't just face threats, you also play against a significant amount of counters (especially post-board). Due to the aggressive nature you have to work with few lands and that's why I want Pact over Twincast. Against slower URx decks it's probably better, though.

Has the 1 Cunning Wish been okay for you?

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Originally Posted by JDK

I don't think Murmurs From Beyond has any spot here. I'd rather play Dig Through Time or Intuition in that spot. Yeah it's CA, but you have no selection (yourself).
Twincast is probably the most fun card in the whole deck, but I never felt the need for it and I get the feeling it is too slow against UR Delver to begin with. Against more aggressive UR Decks you don't just face threats, you also play against a significant amount of counters (especially post-board). Due to the aggressive nature you have to work with few lands and that's why I want Pact over Twincast. Against slower URx decks it's probably better, though.

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If you're having trouble beating a Delver deck, then the way to beat them is to contain their faster cards with bounce and Snapcaster Mages on blocking duty, and using Twincast to get your spells around theirs so that when you draw into counterspells you can free up the spells that are pinned down and go about your business. It's impossible for us to win off of three lands through counterspells, so the only thing that makes sense would be boarding in Snaps and Repeals to extend the game so we can make more land drops and beat them with a board full of islands. If that's not working, two other cards that are useful are Mindbreak Trap (they will always have cast lots of spells and it's a great way to fight multiple counters at once) or multiple Brain Freezes so that you can try to get them over a few turns. Flusterstorm is not bad either, but if you're trying to not lose too much tempo, Twincast is a much better card. To be certain, Pact and Flusterstorm and Force of Will are all great cards, but the way you beat lots of counterspells is not with lots of counterspells yourself. If you board in too many, your deck becomes more unstable when going off. But you will not be able to win consistently if you are playing their game and trying to go off on turn 4, especially if you are boarding out business spells for counterspells.

All that being said, UR Delver has absolutely always been the most difficult matchup because all of it's cards are perfectly positioned against ours and it's the fastest at what it does. RUG Delver was a cakewalk compared. That was even when they were playing bad cards (against us) like Price of Progress and Sulfuric Vortex. And now they have the ability to play the late-game too. It might be too difficult to beat now, which is why I'm not really championing this deck right now. But I fully expect the metagame to either evolve to contain UR Delver, or to completely change with the next B/R announcement. We'll know a lot more about what the metagame will look like after the GP.

Murmurs from Beyond is not a card for wishing for, it's a card for boarding in in grindy matchups that are slow with either lots of discard or lots of counterspells. It's always a two-for-one regardless of how much pressure our graveyard is under, and if our graveyard is not under any pressure then it's insane. It's for matchups where card advantage is more important than card selection (which is all of them, but there are some where you need to recoup CA). Dig Through Time doesn't work at all under a Rest in Peace.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

Murmurs from Beyond is not a card for wishing for, it's a card for boarding in in grindy matchups that are slow with either lots of discard or lots of counterspells. It's always a two-for-one regardless of how much pressure our graveyard is under, and if our graveyard is not under any pressure then it's insane. It's for matchups where card advantage is more important than card selection (which is all of them, but there are some where you need to recoup CA). Dig Through Time doesn't work at all under a Rest in Peace.

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Murmurs is terrible. From the top three cards, the best one gets binned. And the opponent knows the others. You must know that usually from the top three cards, it is often more valuable to have the best one than to have the other two, right? I'm absolutely positive -with a little research- I can come up with three better options.

First one I can think of: Fact or Fiction. One more mana, but definitely worth it.
After some searching I found the second: I would also prefer Three Wishes.
Thinking about one of my arguments: Peer Through Depths is better, since it gives you the best of the top five.

That is true assuming that the opponent knows what the best card is in the stack. That is something that is often untrue, and completely irrelevant if we have a Snapcaster Mage.

edit: turns out I don't care. Don't like it? Don't play with it. It is a good card that has viable applications that are needed in the spaces that I've suggested for it and that no other card does.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

That is true assuming that the opponent knows what the best card is in the stack. That is something that is often untrue

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You have to assume that they know. Or at least have a vague idea. The deck idea is quite simple. Execution is hard, but let's face it, you need Tide, an Untapper and a draw spell. Also, mark my words, this deck will become a LOT more popular now Dig through Time is a thing. A friend of mine just piloted it to the finals of our local tourney (41 people), only losing in the finals to a lucky Elves player who got Ruric Thar though twice without him being able to either go off in response or to counter it. What are the odds?

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

completely irrelevant if we have a Snapcaster Mage.

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True, but post board you cannot count on your yard to be of any use. Note they will anticipate your Dig Through Time and Snapcaster shenanigans and board in grave hate. They'd be idiots not to, since there's usualy not that much that actually ineracts with Solidarity anyway.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

Seeing as how you are suggesting cards that have been tried and thrown away, it's pretty clear you've never played this deck.

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Coming from a guy who suggests the worst one in the list. Come on man, with Meditate and Dig Through Time as options, who suggests Murmurs from Beyond? :confused:

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Originally Posted by Asthereal

You have to assume that they know. Or at least have a vague idea. The deck idea is quite simple. Execution is hard, but let's face it, you need Tide, an Untapper and a draw spell. Also, mark my words, this deck will become a LOT more popular now Dig through Time is a thing. A friend of mine just piloted it to the finals of our local tourney (41 people), only losing in the finals to a lucky Elves player who got Ruric Thar though twice without him being able to either go off in response or to counter it. What are the odds?

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It's turn three. On their endstep, you cast it and reveal High Tide, Meditate and an Island. What is the best card in that stack? What if what you really need is the Island? Is there any way that they're going to know that? What if you need all three, and they just give you the "worst" two? What if you can work around it? What if it's actually turn 7 and you have six lands in play and the opponent assumes you still need the High Tide to win? If you are playing this deck assuming that there is ANY specific card in it that you need to resolve to win, you have no idea what you're doing.

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True, but post board you cannot count on your yard to be of any use. Note they will anticipate your Dig Through Time and Snapcaster shenanigans and board in grave hate. They'd be idiots not to, since there's usualy not that much that actually ineracts with Solidarity anyway.

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In my current build, my deck has five cards maindeck that care AT ALL about the graveyard. If they bring in Rest in Peace, game three I board out Dig Through Time and Snapcaster Mages for Twincast and Murmurs from Beyond. My deck is a little worse, but I can still easily win with it and they now have dead cards in their deck that they are digging towards to beat me. If anyone brings in Graveyard hate against this deck and expects it to be a knock-out blow, they will lose very quickly.

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Coming from a guy who suggests the worst one in the list. Come on man, with Meditate and Dig Through Time as options, who suggests Murmurs from Beyond? :confused:

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None of the suggestions you came up with do what Murmurs from Beyond does. Peer Through the Depths is not card advantage. Fact or Fiction isn't even guaranteed card advantage and costs too much to be an effective setup spell. Three Wishes is great when going off, but it is completely useless as a setup spell. If you're going to sit there and suggest cards that have already been tried and dismissed, I'm not even going to bother with responding anymore.

If you guys are going to be playing with cards like Murmurs why not play Three Wishes?

There aren't many cards that do exactly the same. They tend not to create fourty cards that do the same, since people might find that uncreative, boring and simplistic. The cards I mentioned are better. But by all means, play your Murmurs if you want.

In defence of Fact: yes, it's a mana more, but it gets you either of these:
1. Three moah cards, and two good cards in the yard to Snapcaster.
2. Two good cards and a netto four bad cards in the yard to feed to DDT.
3. Four bad cards you can hopefully improve with a Brainstorm at some point, plus one great card in the yard to Snapcaster.
4. One brilliant card, and a pile of crappy five in the yard, which in itself pays for your next DDT.

Isn't that worth the extra mana, compared to Murmurs, which gets you two cards that may or may not help you, and a good third card in the yard to Snapcaster? Wow, what a card advantage. Plus one card. That's like DDT, but then the usually worst two of three cards instead of the best two out of seven.

But to be clear here: I'm not saying "play Fact". I'm saying Murmurs is bad.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

Fact or Fiction isn't even guaranteed card advantage ....... If you're going to sit there and suggest cards that have already been tried and dismissed, I'm not even going to bother with responding anymore.

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Oh, and please don't go full retard, and then say such a thing. It's insulting. I'm trying to help here.

Three Wishes is not card advantage except when going off. You lose all of the cards you've found if you don't cast them, so as a setup spell, it's actually card disadvantage. What I am looking for is a setup spell that will provide card advantage for a reasonable mana cost. Murmurs is a fine card against someone who tries to beat us with heavy discard or an unreasonable number of counterspells since it gives us more cards than them. Snapcaster Mage is just icing, but you have to be able to win dirty with this deck to be able to contend with it.

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Originally Posted by Asthereal

There aren't many cards that do exactly the same. They tend not to create fourty cards that do the same, since people might find that uncreative, boring and simplistic. The cards I mentioned are better. But by all means, play your Murmurs if you want.

In defence of Fact: yes, it's a mana more, but it gets you either of these:
1. Three moah cards, and two good cards in the yard to Snapcaster.
2. Two good cards and a netto four bad cards in the yard to feed to DDT.
3. Four bad cards you can hopefully improve with a Brainstorm at some point, plus one great card in the yard to Snapcaster.
4. One brilliant card, and a pile of crappy five in the yard, which in itself pays for your next DDT.

Isn't that worth the extra mana, compared to Murmurs, which gets you two cards that may or may not help you, and a good third card in the yard to Snapcaster? Wow, what a card advantage. Plus one card. That's like DDT, but then the usually worst two of three cards instead of the best two out of seven.

I'm not saying "play Fact". I'm saying Murmurs is bad.

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I'm not concerned about the one extra mana, I'm concerned with the three extra mana it's going to cost. Fact or Fiction begs for a Spell Pierce. Or a Daze. Or even a Force of Will. If they Spell Pierce your Murmors from Beyond, it's a reasonable card to Snapcaster back. Also you just won that exchange, because who Spell Pierces Murmurs from Beyond? Dig Through Time has the same problem. If I wanted to spend 4 mana to draw two cards, I'd play Divination. At least that way, the opponent would have no say in what those two cards are.

If you just got two cards for one card, it is almost irrelevant what those two cards are. If you can't understand that, you need to practice more.

If you really think the card is complete garbage, perhaps you should read this thread? It's been a playable card in this deck before. Fact or Fiction never has.

I've always been a fan of Intuition in Snapcaster heavy builds. Because it fuels the graveyard with redundant copies of cards, and with Snapcasters, it's like drawing 3 cards with Intuition.

In terms of set up, doesn't just Brainstorming and Peeking and Opting do pretty much what you want them to do if you know what cards you need to go off, or do you want something a bit more tangible and will set up your Snapcasters better?

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Originally Posted by Redkid43

I've always been a fan of Intuition in Snapcaster heavy builds. Because it fuels the graveyard with redundant copies of cards, and with Snapcasters, it's like drawing 3 cards with Intuition.

In terms of set up, doesn't just Brainstorming and Peeking and Opting do pretty much what you want them to do if you know what cards you need to go off, or do you want something a bit more tangible and will set up your Snapcasters better?

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I don't think you want to build the deck in such a way that you are reliant upon Snapcaster Mage to go off, because in that scenario, you will just lose to a Rest in Peace. The deck has a strength in that using the graveyard only adds consistency to the kill, but is not a requirement. It's been a discussion since Flash of Insight was the two-of graveyard card. The thing that Murmurs from Beyond does that Impulse and Opt and Peek and Brainstorm do not do is provide legitimate card advantage for a fair amount of mana that is useful both in going off and in the setup phase.

For instance, what good is it for them to put a Meditate in the graveyard off of Murmurs from Beyond if they give you two cantrips? Or if you have an Impulse in hand? The deck is so good at card selection that it doesn't matter what two cards you get. All that matters is that you gained a card on the opponent. Absent a Gitaxian Probe from the opponent directly before you cast Murmurs from Beyond, they will not know exactly what is in your hand and exactly what they can and can't give you. It is a very strong card because it helps recover from cards like Thoughtseize and Hymn to Tourach, which is something that Three Wishes or Peer Through the Depths can't do and that Fact or Fiction or Dig Through Time can only do in a more limited way.

Put another way, if you have a Brainstorm in hand and they give you an Island and a Fetchland off of Murmurs from Beyond (which is probably the worst possible), you're still ahead because they gave you both a land drop and a card to shuffle away.

I read most of the thread. What you seem to miss is the fact that this thread is a few things:
1. VERY old. This deck was viable in ~2007. A lot has changed since then.
2. Full of posts from people who are not experts in the deck. Not that I am one, but I talked a lot about the deck with someone who is. He doesn't post here often, simply because he feels there's not many people whose comments actually help...
3. Imcomplete!! This deck needs a LOT of work before we find the optimal list. Cards that have been cast aside earlier may prove to be better than cards that were not. Yes, this also applies to your Murmurs, I am aware of that. But the arguments I presented are real. Murmurs seems below par at best.

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Originally Posted by Asthereal

I read most of the thread. What you seem to miss is the fact that this thread is a few things:
1. VERY old. This deck was viable in ~2007. A lot has changed since then.
2. Full of posts from people who are not experts in the deck. Not that I am one, but I talked a lot about the deck with someone who is. He doesn't post here often, simply because he feels there's not many people whose comments actually help...
3. Imcomplete!! This deck needs a LOT of work before we find the optimal list. Cards that have been cast aside earlier may prove to be better than cards that were not. Yes, this also applies to your Murmurs, I am aware of that. But the arguments I presented are real. Murmurs seems below par at best.

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If you're talking about Seraphus, Murmurs was his idea first. I can guarantee you that he likes it better than Fact or Fiction. Guarantee. And even he hasn't been playing this deck for as long as I have.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

If you're talking about Seraphus, Murmurs was his idea first. I can guarantee you that he likes it better than Fact or Fiction. Guarantee. And even he hasn't been playing this deck for as long as I have.

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I'm not talking about anyone in particular. I know two experts, one of whom I talked to on Sunday, and the other hasn't played this deck in ages because it wasn't good enough. I am simply stating you should be conscious of the fact that not all you read on the web is useful. Most of it is not. We are discussing a card that I feel is bad, and I have stated my reasons. You feel it's good, and have stated yours, but your reasoning is bad. Let me show you why:

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

I'm not concerned about the one extra mana, I'm concerned with the three extra mana it's going to cost. Fact or Fiction begs for a Spell Pierce. Or a Daze. Or even a Force of Will. If they Spell Pierce your Murmors from Beyond, it's a reasonable card to Snapcaster back. Also you just won that exchange, because who Spell Pierces Murmurs from Beyond? Dig Through Time has the same problem.

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Here you are saying:
A. Fact is bad because it begs for a counter.
B. Murmurs is good because only an idiot would counter that.
C. Murmurs is easier to Snapcaster back.

But actually, you should ask yourself:

Why would people love to counter Fact, and would I feel they are idiots if your counter Murmurs? The reason is: because Fact is WAY more powerful than Murmurs. You are contradicting yourself because if you say Fact is the only one worth countering, in fact you are reasoning in favour of Fact.

And for your point in C: if you can Snapcaster Murmurs, you have five lands. At that point additional land is not needed, and they will know, which makes the effect of Murmurs a lot worse. Not to mention the fact that if the grave isn't attacked (and Snapcaster has a clear coast), your focus should be Dig through Time because it's simply better in every way (costs less, better effect).

Additionally -already mentioned that, but it belongs here- you said the Fact isn't guaranteed card advantage. But it is.

These are two clear moments where you post complete nonsense to advocate your point. You cannot contradict this. So please, again, try not to be condescending towards me by telling me I am inexperienced, don't read enough or wharever, and post sound arguments to make your point. Right now all you have is: someone suggested it, it wasn't me, and it's only three mana! That doesn't cut it. I'm sorry.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

If you're having trouble beating a Delver deck, then the way to beat them is to contain their faster cards with bounce and Snapcaster Mages on blocking duty, and using Twincast to get your spells around theirs so that when you draw into counterspells you can free up the spells that are pinned down and go about your business. It's impossible for us to win off of three lands through counterspells, so the only thing that makes sense would be boarding in Snaps and Repeals to extend the game so we can make more land drops and beat them with a board full of islands. If that's not working, two other cards that are useful are Mindbreak Trap (they will always have cast lots of spells and it's a great way to fight multiple counters at once) or multiple Brain Freezes so that you can try to get them over a few turns. Flusterstorm is not bad either, but if you're trying to not lose too much tempo, Twincast is a much better card. To be certain, Pact and Flusterstorm and Force of Will are all great cards, but the way you beat lots of counterspells is not with lots of counterspells yourself. If you board in too many, your deck becomes more unstable when going off. But you will not be able to win consistently if you are playing their game and trying to go off on turn 4, especially if you are boarding out business spells for counterspells.

All that being said, UR Delver has absolutely always been the most difficult matchup because all of it's cards are perfectly positioned against ours and it's the fastest at what it does. RUG Delver was a cakewalk compared. That was even when they were playing bad cards (against us) like Price of Progress and Sulfuric Vortex. And now they have the ability to play the late-game too. It might be too difficult to beat now, which is why I'm not really championing this deck right now. But I fully expect the metagame to either evolve to contain UR Delver, or to completely change with the next B/R announcement. We'll know a lot more about what the metagame will look like after the GP.

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Well, thanks for stating the obvious. :tongue: I mean, seriously, you saw my list so you know I am even playing 4 bounce spells maindeck. Plus 3 Snapcaster Mages. In the end it didn't even matter since the deck was too fast for me. Twincast would have done actually nothing in my games against UR Delver. Didn't help that I was on the draw and stuck at two lands in game 1.

I actually thought about Trap (cut the one in my SB just before the tournament for a second Swan Song), but didn't like the idea of it being possibly dead (it would have been amazing in several games actually). Will need some testing though. Pact or Trap, I guess.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

Murmurs from Beyond is not a card for wishing for, it's a card for boarding in in grindy matchups that are slow with either lots of discard or lots of counterspells. It's always a two-for-one regardless of how much pressure our graveyard is under, and if our graveyard is not under any pressure then it's insane. It's for matchups where card advantage is more important than card selection (which is all of them, but there are some where you need to recoup CA). Dig Through Time doesn't work at all under a Rest in Peace.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

That is true assuming that the opponent knows what the best card is in the stack. That is something that is often untrue, and completely irrelevant if we have a Snapcaster Mage.

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On the one hand you argue against DTT with Rest in Peace and on the other hand you argue for Murmurs with Snapcaster Mage. Meh.

I get why you play Murmurs and in those MUs it's completely fine. I just think I don't need more carddraw than I already have, since you can recover pretty nicely with Meditate, Snapcaster Mage and DTT. So for me, a wishtarget beside USZ has to be able to fetch me gas midcombo. The gas I want AND actually need.