Congrats on the finish. Maybe it's a bit greedy of me, but I'd love to read an overall tournament report if you're willing to write one. If not, then I'm curious to hear how the two matchups against TES played out.Quote:
Originally Posted by j.Tho
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Congrats on the finish. Maybe it's a bit greedy of me, but I'd love to read an overall tournament report if you're willing to write one. If not, then I'm curious to hear how the two matchups against TES played out.Quote:
Originally Posted by j.Tho
Quote:
Originally Posted by JVzer0
Sure. Some of the matches are hazy. It was a long day and I ended up playing a lot longer than I thought I was going to. I wish I'd taken notes. Next time I will.
I do remember the two TES matches somewhat clearly, as well as the two matches I lost and a few others. I'll do my best to assemble some sort of tournament report, but I'll start with the TES for now.
So as you can see from my deck list, my sideboard is pretty geared towards combo. I bring in ten cards against TES (4x Canonist, 2x Teeg, 4x Mindbreak Trap). Surprisingly, I took game one in both my TES matches, lost game two, won game three.
(apologies in advance if my opponents are reading this and I got some details wrong. I'm sure I did, but the overall narrative of each game should be essentially correct)
TES #1 (Round 6)
Game 1
I'm on the play. I drop a turn one Nactl and pass. My opponent keeps a hand with no land (I can't remember if he mulled or not). He plays a lotus petal and ponders. Still no land drop. On my turn I play a land, swing 3 and then play another Nactl and an Ape. My opponent plays a mox diamond (I think?) and brainstorms. I play a land, swing 8, play pridemage, kill mox, pass. Nothing really happens on my opponents turn. I take game 1.
Game 2
I don't see any of my hate, but I have a decent seven so I decide to keep. I populate the board and hold some burn in my hand. He goes off turn 2 I think? He hits an empty the warrens with his ad nauseam and I hope he decides to storm with it, which I'm pretty confident would give me the win, but he keeps going and eventually flips over a burning wish, which leads to tendrils and game 3.
Game 3
I keep an opening hand with some hate bears. I go Ape into Canonist into Zenith for Teeg into Goyf. My opponent manages to burning wish for a pyroclasm a turn too late and I take game 3
TES #2 (Round 9)
Game 1
My opponent mulligans to 6 on the play and keeps (after the match he explained he kept a hand with Tendrils in it, which is not ideal, but he didn't want to go to 5). He drops a fetch, cracks it, and turn one duresses me, taking a Bolt. I play a loam lion on my turn. My opponent ponders turn two. I play another land, a nactl, then I swing and chain lightning my opponent to 14. Turn three he plays a second land, ponders, passes. I drop another land on my turn, swing for 5, play a pridemage, pass. My opponent is at 9. He dumps his hand and plays a defensive tendrils to stabilize, he passes back to me with an empty hand and a lions eye diamond in play. I swing for 7, sac pridemage to destroy his diamond, play a goyf and my opponent concedes.
Game 2
The details of this game are running together in my memory. My opponent mulls to 6 again. I keep a hand with a canonist in it I think, I don't remember exactly. I know my first play is Loam Lion and he strips my hate from my hand. I get him to 10 life. He casts ad nauseam, bringing him to 4, then he combos off.
Game 3
This time my opponent keeps his opening hand, and I mull, mull, mull to four! But check out my four: Horizon Canopy, Loam Lion, Ethersworn Canonist, Ethersworn Canonist. Good lord. Turn one canopy, loam lion, pass. My opponent plays a land and takes a long time looking at his hand. He has the turn 1 win, but he saw me board in 10 cards so he assumes I have mindbreak trap in my deck. He also assumes that because I mulled to four mindbreak trap is most likely the only card that can beat him. After much internal debate he taps for black and duresses me, which is totally the "right" play, but turns out to be the wrong play. He sees my two canonist, shakes his head, and passes. I top deck a plateau, swing for 1, play my first canonist, pass. He ponders, plays a land, passes. I draw a zenith, swing 3, play canonist, pass. He passes. I draw a fetch into taiga, swing 6, zenith for teeg. Next turn my opponent Chain of Vapors a canonist and then concedes.
Both my opponents were super nice guys. They had been playing the deck for a long time and it was fascinating watching them evaluate their hands and then combo off. After our match, my round 5 opponent was also cool enough to explain the difference (or lack of difference) between TES and ANT, putting both decks in a historical context that was actually pretty interesting.
I had played against TES the day before in a Legacy side event during the standard portion of the open. It was the first time I'd ever played against TES and my opponent was deaf so I was worried I would be totally confused, but he was really cool guy and had an easy to follow dice system for keeping track of mana and storm count that I think probably helped me learn more about the deck than I would have otherwise. I lost that match. I took game 1 with early pressure that forced a defensive tendrils. Game 2 teeg and canonist helped bring him to 1 life, then he managed a storm count off of artifacts that allowed him use the grapeshot he had wished for on the previous turn to kill my hate bears, letting him ill-gotten gains to the win. Holy shit. Epic Storm indeed! Game 3 he won on his first turn.
I'll try to give some sort of write up on the other matches later today
@j.Tho: really solid build and I enjoyed your rationale for including/not including certain cards. I have been feeling the same about Knight lately - mind you, you don't really want to use her tap ability. If you need to, you're not swinging with a big dude. I just like the 3 CC on my curve, although I may go down to 2x Knight instead of 3.
I'm not a big fan of Apes/Lions - much prefer Lynx w/ 12 fetchlands - but they do help vs. T1 Lackey etc so that you can focus your burn on the opponent.
Curious to hear about your Merfolk matchup - did they side in Jitte, Mind Harness, Submerge against you?
Good report, j.Tho. Having solid combo hate in the board is really important, and I like that you went all out. However, I think some of your more unconventional maindeck choices hurt you. Especially in the merfolk matchup, Grim Lavamancers are key, and Rift Bolt should have been Path as you admitted.
I am on your side when it comes to the 2/3s, though. They have always been solid for me. The consistency they bring is worth much more to me than the occasional explosiveness of Lynx. I'd encourage you to try out some equipment to compliment them. Basilisk Collar in particular is fantastic at turning 2/3s into threats throughout the game, and it's obviously a house with Lavamancer.
Terravore is not a bad replacement for Knight. His body and evasion is significant. That said, sometimes the ability to tutor lands is really important. My current list curves out at 3cc with 2 Knights (and I don't play Zenith), along with 1 Canopy, 1 Karakas, and 1 Bojuka Bog (SB) as tutor targets.
Speaking of Zenith, I'm still not convinced of it's strength in Zoo. Making every creature costs an additional mana is not something Zoo can tolerate easily, and I don't believe the deck gains enough utility to justify the cost. If Counterbalance was still a DTB, I could see the reasoning. Perhaps testing will change my mind.
Here's my current list:
4 Wild Nacatl
3 Kird Ape
2 Loam Lion
3 Grim Lavamancer
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Qasali Pridemage
2 Stoneforge Mystic
2 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Chain Lightning
3 Lightning Helix
3 Path to Exile
1 Sylvan Library
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Basilisk Collar
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Karakas
4 Wooded Foothills
3 Windswept Heath
3 Arid Mesa
3 Plateau
2 Taiga
1 Savannah
1 Forest
1 Mountain
1 Plains
Sideboard:
2 Gaddock Teeg
2 Ethersworn Canonist
3 Mindbreak Trap
2 Red Elemental Blast
2 Krosan Grip
1 Oblivion Ring
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Pyroclasm
1 Bojuka Bog
10 SB cards against combo, and my opposing aggro matchups are still very favorable. With Knight--> Karakas, O Ring, Teegs, and Blasts, I have decent game against NO Show, as well.
Forgive my intrusion (I'm not a zoo player) but something's come up that I wanted to ask people that actually had experience playing Zoo.
Unless you've been living at the bottom of a lake for the past couple of weeks, one of the cards from the upcoming set that has everyone buzzing is Mental Misstep, which allows you to counter a spell with CC1 for the low-low cost of paying two life. Now, on the previous page, you guys had a discussion that went along the lines of:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Vandalize
Quote:
Originally Posted by troopatroop
(I'm paraphrasing here, obv.).Quote:
Originally Posted by jandax
I agree wholeheartedly here. Zoo is far too resilent and redundent to collapse because people are PAYING LIFE to counter your spells. I also applaud your levelheadedness here; it's refreshing to get away from the doomsayers. MM will be the death of legacy! Tempo Decks>All! 56 card decks!
And it's this last point I wanted to discuss with you all, because Zoo is considered one of the prime benefactors of this "gift". Supposedly, Zoo now has a way of interacting with noninteractive decks, or disrupting decks in ways it couldn't before. Things like:
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jason
But as literally no one on this thread has mentioned moving it either into the main or the sideboard, I'm curious where you stand on it. There are a bunch of interconnecting points in this question; will this help against Swords/Path? Will this help you against combo? Is this an automaindeck card, or a sideboard? What would you sideboard it in against?Quote:
Originally Posted by ivanpei
Also, I apologize for the tone of this. I'm writing my final papers and I've been reading advanced postcolonial theory, and that gets to you after a while.
Swords/Path: Green Sun's Zenith exists and is much better.Quote:
Originally Posted by LostButSeeking
Will this help against combo? No, because it does not mesh well with Zoo's strategy for fighting combo.
Main or side? Neither, as it is not really very good in this deck, even in situations where you want to counter a 1cc card. There actually aren't a lot of 1cc cards that hurt Zoo and to which it currently has no other effective answers.
[QUOTE=keys;542185[deck[/QUOTE]
-5 Kird Animals, +3 Steppe Lynx, +2 Fireblast
Try it
I can't help but notice that it costs a lot more tempo to get another Goyf than to stop your first from getting Plowed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Aggro_zombies
This doesn't mean anything. "I don't board in 4 Tormod's Crypt because it doesn't mesh with the rest of Zoo's strategy for fighting Ichorid."Quote:
Will this help against combo? No, because it does not mesh well with Zoo's strategy for fighting combo.
What in the flying fuck does that mean? I'm pretty sure countering Rituals and High Tides is good for a fast deck trying to beat combo.
You don't seem to have done a casting cost comparison on these answers. Like you can Pridemage a Vial, but tha'ts a fuckload worse than just countering it for free.Quote:
Main or side? Neither, as it is not really very good in this deck, even in situations where you want to counter a 1cc card. There actually aren't a lot of 1cc cards that hurt Zoo and to which it currently has no other effective answers.
I have. Don't like it.Quote:
Originally Posted by jandax
Lynx is better in burn, speed zoo, or any deck that is just goldfishing. Zoo needs fast but reliable damage. Kird animals carry equipment and play defense much better as well. Kird Ape with a Basilisk Collar will hold the ground against most threats.
Fireblast is awkward in a deck that plays basic plains, forest, savannah, canopy, karakas... I prefer Helix. It's a bigger life swing in aggro matchups and won't cut me off red if I need to use it early. The life gain can also put me out of Tendrils range, or buy an extra turn against progenitus.
I can't help but notice that GSZ for Tarmogoyf is infinitely better in situations where you're trying to solidify board position or race than drawing a card that does literally nothing to alter the board state.Quote:
Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin
Well, yeah, countering Rituals and High Tides is great. But...given that you're only allowed to run 4 Mental Missteps, and given that these are the only counters available for Zoo (aside from the craptacular Mindbreak Trap), and given that Zoo's plan in those matchups is to produce as much damage as possible in the smallest time frame, and given that Ad Noz and TES decks can win with artifact mana that costs zero and tutors that cost two, and given that High Tide has as many counters as Zoo does (assuming 4 Misstep) and can halt the racing plan with a 3cc card (Hibernation), and given that Mental Misstep does not turn sideways for damage or invalidate entire suites of cards (like Null Rod does), why does this help Zoo's combo matchup...?Quote:
Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin
Since when does Zoo care that much about Aether Vial? Since when is countering Vial worth two life and a card, and since when is countering Vial better than just running more burn which can at least kill the opponent in situations where you're ahead and trying to win? In other words, since when has the Vial matchup gotten so bad for Zoo that it's worth it to board in a card that hits maybe four other relevant cards against those decks and does nothing otherwise?Quote:
Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin
I mean you already run 20+ creatures. You shouldn't need to do much else to have a threat on board unless they produce removal, which is where Misstep comes in. Ditto to applying pressure to combo. It's perfectly possible to fit in Misstep and still run 20+ creatures and 12+ burn spells.
And Aether Vial is a huge deal in the Goblins matchup, since it gives a good Goblins player much more time to play defense and throw up blockers.
I mean, when you put it that way, why not just run Avoid Fate?...Quote:
Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin
I realize MM is free and more versatile than just creature protection, but I think I'd rather run another burn spell or dude instead, something more proactive. A lot of the things I can see MM doing can be solved with tools zoo already plays. For instance:
Your opponent removes an Ape? you play another Ape. Your opponent doesn't remove an Ape? awesome, now you have two Apes.
Your opponent plays a small creature? Hit it with a bolt. Your opponent doesn't play a creature? awesome, hit your opponent with the bolt.
But I could be wrong. Mental Misstep is a really powerful tempo card. And it could be the case that being able to populate the board and play removal while using a free spell to deny your opponent their early plays, is totally, utterly back breaking. MM could turn out to be a pseudo turn-one Time Walk. And in that sense it would be a very proactive card that is totally in zoo's game plan. It will be interesting to see what happens with the card.
And I guess there is something to be said about being able to mess with a combo decks math by MMing their rituals or whatever, or protecting your actual hate cards from their thoughtseizes, but I don't think that's a powerful enough effect to warrant a place in a sideboard. I could see MM being either good enough for the zoo maindeck, or nowhere in the 75.
Now that I've had time to contemplate how awesome Mental Misstep will be for the format, I'm setting my eyes back on Phyrexian Metamorph. I think this will actually be the big card for Zoo in this set.Quote:
Originally Posted by lordofthepit
As I've mentioned, and as I'm sure everyone is aware, it plays awesome against the following legends that normally own Zoo's ass:
- Emrakul. It's almost always brought into play with Show and Tell. Between 4 Phyrexian Metamorphs, 4 Knight of the Reliquary, and 1 Karakas, Zoo decks now have nine ways to say no to Emrakul off a Show and Tell, and it can't even be countered at that. (Plus Grim Lavamancer with a Basilisk Collar, fetchable with Stoneforge Mystic, does the trick too.)
- Iona. No opponent in their right mind names blue against Zoo with Iona, but Zoo now has an additional trump. This along with Karakas (or a preemptive Metamorph), or even simply racing (which gets much easier with any type of equipment in play).
- Progenitus. This has traditionally been the most difficult threat to answer, but Metamorph does the trick regardless of whether it's dropped off a Show and Tell or a Natural Order.
Here are some other problematic creatures:
- Sphinx of the Steel Wind. Your Sphinx of the Steel Wind trumps theirs because Zoo is more than happy to trade. If they don't want to trade, you're swinging for 6 with lifelink each turn, and vigilance means they can't even strike back unless they want to trade.
- Tombstalker. Path, Swords, or double burn does the trick, but here's another answer.
- Coralhelm Commander. The Merfolk matchup is favorable, but when I lose, it's almost always to a Coralhelm Commander backed by Kira and other countermagic. We'll have to level up, but now we have a flier that matches theirs, and benefits from their Lord of Atlantis.
- Kira, Great Glass Spinner. Also a pain in the ass. Problem solved.
- Siege-Gang Commander. Zoo tends to have more "open mana" late game than Goblins, because of their card advantage engine, so we make better use of the 8 damage from SCG. Metamorph is terrible against any of their other creatures though.
- Dark Confidant. If for some reason, you cannot kill this as soon as it hits, at least you can benefit from Bob. In general, Zoo could probably use Bob better than its opponents because our curve should be lower and it will allow us to draw into more removal.
- Mother of Runes. An unremoved Mother of Runes is a pain in the ass to deal with because it slows your ground attack to a halt while eventually allowing their fatties to swing through yours. You can return the favor now.
Of course, you can (usually) always target a Tarmogoyf, Knight of the Reliquary, Terravore, Qasali Pridemage, Stoneforge Mystic, etc.
I think with this card, Zoo can be tweaked to have a strong matchup against opposing aggro strategies, control decks, and even artifact-based and fatty-based combo. "Stack" based combo like Belcher, Tendrils, and High Tide remain a bad problem, and Metamorph is a terrible card in those matchups. You want a creature in those matchups, and you want them immediately without having to "wait" for a better creature to drop. But if Mental Misstep catches on in the format as much as it has been hyped, those archetypes will likely become a reduced presence in the metagame: not only do they tend to rely on some key 1 cc spells, but Countertop is one of the decks that likely stands to gain most from Mental Misstep, which provides yet another force against stack-based combo.
Likewise, Phyrexian Metamorph is pretty terrible against Elves (you want removal, not fatties, so duplicating a fatty for 3 mana is even worse, plus they have no worthwhile targets until they're ready to Time Walk and annhiliate you), but Mental Misstep hoses them pretty hard too.
Regarding Mental Misstep, so far I totally agree with Aggro_zombies and j.Tho.
The way I see it, the only place where it'd be of any use would be against combo, where it's even worse than Mindbreak Trap.
I guess I'll have to try it out though, to be completely sure.
Regarding this list:
8 Fetch
1 Horizon Canopy
3 Wasteland
1 Karakas
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Savannah
2 Taiga
1 Plateau
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Mountain
3 Noble Hierarch
4 Wild Nacatl
1 Grim Lavamancer
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Qasali Pridemage
1 Gaddock Teeg
4 Knight of the Reliquary
1 Terravore
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Path to Exile
2 Sylvan Library
1 Umezawa's Jitte
Sideboard:
1 Wasteland
2 Bojuka Bog
2 Pithing Needle
2 Pyroblast
2 Krosan Grip
1 Choke
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Null Rod
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Rule of Law
I am planning to add 4 MM to that list. The list has proven to be solid in my local metagame netting both my test partner and me a Dual land as price in a ~60 man tournament with a dual pick for top 10. The list lacks cardtypes to support Tarmogoyf if the opponent happens to not to and has trouble against NO decks, Combo, being tempoed out by other agressive decks (Mirror, Fast Zoo).
I have tested a bit with the following changes:
- 1 Jitte
- 1 Path
- 2 Goyf
+ 4 MM
This increases my chances to draw a bad topdeck when behind on the board and out of cards (like Noble Hierarch does) but offers so much in every other situation. The card offers so much tempo because you can invalidate mana spent by the opponent at the cost of 2 life which is great both on offense as well as defense.
Some possible strong starts:
On the Play:
T1 Nacatl/Hierarch
MM on Removal/opponents creature/Vial
T2 Wasteland
attack/cast more stuff
On the draw:
A lot of green based creature "mirrors" go like this
Person on the play keeps connecting and deminishing my life due to exalted making blocks impossible. If you spend targeted removal early you are out of it for KoR/big Goyfs by turn 3 to 5. If you try/have to doubleblock removal from their side is a real blowout. MM is an awesome solution here. It is narrower than another Sword/Path for this kind of problem but I believe it also is more powerful because it is "free" so I can tap out for a KoR instead of casting a Goyf and leaving white for Sword/Path.
I can also hardcast the spell later in game to preserve life via Noble Hierarch. I still have to test the changes to the Dredge matchup since I hope it will greatly benefit as well so that I can afford to maybe cut 1 GH from the board and play a second choke to help with High tide (and be of use in other matchups as well). MM will also slow down Storm decks to make Hate bears have an impact more often in those games while also stopping Deathmark, Chain of Vapor on Hate bears later. This way the storm player will need two kind of solutions in deck (or BW) to interact both with permanent based hate and hand based hate leading to situations where they will have the wrong kind of answer to my troublemakers. This will not make combo an easy matchup but should increase my odds above 40% postboard at the least.
MM is of great use against a great many decks and has the additional benefit of being a nice card to have against combo. If I would be worried to really beat combo I would run a different archetype. I agree that the card is too weak as a specific storm combo hoser and I would not put it into the SB either and stick to E. Canonist; Teeg; Rule of Law, Mindbreak Trap etc.Quote:
Originally Posted by trivial_matters
It's a great answer vs. Progenitus. The question is, do you want to run this in the SB instead of 4x REBs? That's what I would do vs. the S&T plan and the occasional Counterbalance. (I could even see Metamorph used in CB, but that's another discussion.)Quote:
Originally Posted by lordofthepit
I would say based on your analysis, the advantages outweigh the drawbacks. Being able to legend rule anything is pretty nice. It would be interesting to see if this strategy starts to catch on, and if Zoo can find the slots for it.
Word.Quote:
Originally Posted by j.Tho
@Plague Sliver. The merfolk players did indeed side in submerge, which was annoying, but not backbreaking. I assume they also brought in Jitte, but I didn't see any. It's a favorable matchup for zoo, but I lost to merfolk 1-2 in the first round (which is why my tie-breaks were so bad and I got 19th instead of top 16). Game three I had all the tools to win, but I was playing around wastelands (that didn't exist, turns out) and I stupidly left myself without two red sources when he played Kira. Ugh. Live and learn.
The next time I saw Merfolk was round 8. I won the match 2-0. My opponent had splashed white and was playing an equipment package. I play a red deck in standard, so I have plenty of experience using burn against decks that try to equip small creatures. I just kept the weapons out of the hands of his adepts and curse catchers. Game two I won off the back of three pridemages and a hilarious fireblast for exactly 4 damage.
Rift Bolt was an all-star in both of these matches
@Keys. Absolutely. Grim Lavamancer is super powerful, very good against the tribal decks. I decided to go with Kird Apes over Lavamancer because Apes are faster.
Additional thoughts on Mental Misstep:
Magic is sometimes described as a game of questions and answers, and I personally think it's a good way to evaluate and discuss card choices. Every deck needs to both ask and answer questions at different stages of the game. Depending on the matchup and board state, any given card has the potential to do either. For example: a turn one Kird Ape against an opponent's Noble Hierarch feels more like a question; a turn one Kird Ape against an opponent's Goblin Lackey feels more like an answer. It's important not to create a false dichotomy. Even the more answer-ish cards like Path to Exile are also simultaneously asking questions, but for most decks the threat posed by cards like PtE is so abstract that a specific response is unnecessary -- or is automatically built into the deck. Some decks, of course, rate spot removal higher on their threat list, which is why you see Kira, Great Glass-Spinner in merfolk lists. Kira is the best kind of answer because it's also a creature and therefore itself poses The Question: figure out a way to deal with me or you lose. A pretty good question. It's why hate bears are so good.
Zoo is a deck that more often than not wants to be asking the questions during the early turns of a game, and it runs cards that accomplish this. The zoo list is full of redundant, powerful low-curve creatures. its burn suite provides early answers that transition to late-game reach. It also has a few versatile answer cards like Path to Exile.
So let's think about Mental Misstep and how it fits into Zoo. What does MM answer that needs to be answered? Zoo necessarily doesn't care about protecting its creatures beyond making sure they enter the battlefield with enough toughness to swing. Zoo doesn't care about giving permission to an opponent's early plays. Zoo doesn't care about any other decks' one drops, unless it's playing against another zoo deck (I actually think MM would be pretty good in the mirror to break parity and gain a tempo advantage). Zoo just doesn't give a fuck.
How can zoo can afford to be so punk rock?
Zoo plays 3/3's for G. On turn two, a 3/3 for G doesn't need any support. It doesn't need to worry about getting into the red zone -- you don't need to clear a path, you just swing, if your opponent kills your 3/3, you play another 3/3 and you pass with land untapped. Merfolk, on the other hand, need to tap out for multiple two or three drops to even start to compete with zoo's one-drops. They *need* free early counters to get them to an eventual game state in which their lords steal the momentum. Zoo doesn't give a fuck. It has huge one-drops. It gets face tattoos and smokes cigarettes in front of its parents. Fuck you.
Anyway.
If think I were to play one of the new pain spells to gain additional tempo, I would play Gut Shot.
im just thinking of how to dodge a Landstill with mainboard humility which was very annoying.. a gaddock would do..
can someone suggest Gaddock over True Believer?
You're my new hero, lol. Thank GOD, somone else understands threat density!!! Regarding your MM vs. zoo mirror, I think the obvious choice (if you have a meta full of zoo) is Path to Exile swapping. Your burn still provides early game removal & late game reach, and MM means you can out-tempo them (and be ready for THEIR MM) In a generic metagame, MM is bad. In a zoo heavy metagame? MM might be good. Regardless, would a card that conditional be good in the maindeck? I don't think so. Mindbreak Trap may be better in the combo matchup...but if you expect a ton of zoo with MM to fight combo decks, it might have a small representation because of that. Lots of mind games being played here...bring 4 MM's in case you think you need them at the tourney and work them in according to your need for the combo matchup and how crucial Path to Exile is given the metagame.Quote:
Additional thoughts on Mental Misstep:
Magic is sometimes described as a game of questions and answers, and I personally think it's a good way to evaluate and discuss card choices. Every deck needs to both ask and answer questions at different stages of the game. Depending on the matchup and board state, any given card has the potential to do either. For example: a turn one Kird Ape against an opponent's Noble Hierarch feels more like a question; a turn one Kird Ape against an opponent's Goblin Lackey feels more like an answer. It's important not to create a false dichotomy. Even the more answer-ish cards like Path to Exile are also simultaneously asking questions, but for most decks the threat posed by cards like PtE is so abstract that a specific response is unnecessary -- or is automatically built into the deck. Some decks, of course, rate spot removal higher on their threat list, which is why you see Kira, Great Glass-Spinner in merfolk lists. Kira is the best kind of answer because it's also a creature and therefore itself poses The Question: figure out a way to deal with me or you lose. A pretty good question. It's why hate bears are so good.
Zoo is a deck that more often than not wants to be asking the questions during the early turns of a game, and it runs cards that accomplish this. The zoo list is full of redundant, powerful low-curve creatures. its burn suite provides early answers that transition to late-game reach. It also has a few versatile answer cards like Path to Exile.
So let's think about Mental Misstep and how it fits into Zoo. What does MM answer that needs to be answered? Zoo necessarily doesn't care about protecting its creatures beyond making sure they enter the battlefield with enough toughness to swing. Zoo doesn't care about giving permission to an opponent's early plays. Zoo doesn't care about any other decks' one drops, unless it's playing against another zoo deck (I actually think MM would be pretty good in the mirror to break parity and gain a tempo advantage). Zoo just doesn't give a fuck.
How can zoo can afford to be so punk rock?
Zoo plays 3/3's for G. On turn two, a 3/3 for G doesn't need any support. It doesn't need to worry about getting into the red zone -- you don't need to clear a path, you just swing, if your opponent kills your 3/3, you play another 3/3 and you pass with land untapped. Merfolk, on the other hand, need to tap out for multiple two or three drops to even start to compete with zoo's one-drops. They *need* free early counters to get them to an eventual game state in which their lords steal the momentum. Zoo doesn't give a fuck. It has huge one-drops. It gets face tattoos and smokes cigarettes in front of its parents. Fuck you.
Anyway.
If think I were to play one of the new pain spells to gain additional tempo, I would play Gut Shot.
how would you handle a counterbalance deck? Krosan Grip and Pithing needle?