Planeswalker Rock

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Originally Posted by eq.firemind

I've played some games vs 40+Lands yesterday. My general impression is that we are forced to play aggro here and that can't be good
Games 2 and 3 are winnable due to SB hate, but there is a problem: even 1 game can take forever. In tourney setting we should be able to win that game 1. Otherwise, there is a high possibility that game 2 will be draw due time and the match will be lost.
The best card preboard is Ajani Vengeant, but I learned the hard way that they can find Barbarian Ring and shoot AV down faster than he reaches 7 Loyality.
In this light, some MD gravehate (faster than [cards]Primal Command[cards]) is 2 debatable slots seems like not bad idea.
Possible things:
1) Maindecking 2 Jund Charms. Versatile, but too colorintensive for maindeck.
2) Jotun Grunt - I actually like this one. Early big blocker, can survive enough time to do serious damage after we Deed the board, steamrolls Loam-based decks and opposing tarmos, can be Recurred.
3) Loaming Shaman - stronger instant impact on the gamestate, but lesser stats that Grunt. Recurring Shaman wrecks GY-strategies.
4) Offalsnout - Yeah, I know, odd card. But it can RFG that pesky Loam or completely wreck Dredge for just :b: at instant speed or surprise block something small.
Please respond if I missed something.

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Never try to be aggro in any MU (except maybe Enchantress). The deck simply can't do it. I don't know exactly which version you played but MD, you have 2 MD answers to 40+-lands : Recurring Nightmare recursion and Primal Command. Ajani is somehow the kill but you can't rely on it alone. Of course never let Exploration in play or you'll be swarmed too fast. In any case, the best game plan is often to concede g1 as soon as you feel you're being controlled. Post SB enter all the grave hate you can. They probably can't do much against it and if you did not lose too much time in g1, you should be able to eventually win the game. I would not play other specific MD cards to beat loam decks. You have 2 cards to win the MU: Primal Command (which you can play 5 times, tutoring witness and you should be able to win or ultimate Ajani opponent's lands within this time) and Recurring Nightmare on 2 witness to develop mana base, STP their manlands and play and replay Planeswalkers. I forgot to precise that ultimate Elspeth is great too in this MU since it protects your mana base.

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Also, I tried Garruk in Elspeth's slots and he has some good sides.
The -1 to create chumpblocker is worse than Elspeth's +1, but 3/3 > 1/1.
And the ability to skyrocket mana is relevant when you need to Deed out something huge like Tombstalker.
But the real thing is that the deck doesn't need :w::w: anymore, so manabase becomes solid as rock.

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I don't care to have 3/3s instead of 1/1s. The ability to skyrocket mana is not relevant anymore as soon as you have 4 manas to cast it. About the better mana base, it's an argument but it's not enough to my eyes. I tried Garruk at some point and I was dissppointed a lot by it. And don't forget how ultimate Elpeth is great.

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Originally Posted by Maveric78f

I think he's right. I should have explained better why Tarmogoyf does not belong to this list. This deck does not need vanilla beaters. I would probably play Jotun Grunt (stronger earlier and dies when pernicious sweeps the board anyway) or Tombstalker because it survives deed and is a flier blocker. But I really felt I did not need them and that utility creatures, that are only creatures to chumpblock and to have fun with recurring nightmare is better.


I'm not sure what dopest means. I'd say that "pernicious walker" is too straightforward.


We don't really disagree. The MU I gave was in case they play only 1 copy of tendrils. I know the combo MU is a nightmare in general but Hide/Seek offers some outs.

But it's not that much a problem. If you look at the GP Madrid day2 breakdown, you'll see that there are more Zoo decks than all combo decks gathered, so that the choice of this deck was not that awful. I also think that this deck's SB can be adapted to wreck combo as Skeggi did in his Red Rock.


Your deck looks awful and your advises arecompletely off-topic. How can you say it's the same deck if you play the crappy Ajani Goldmane and no Deed. The goal of Veteran Explorer is not to make card advantage. Definitely not. It's to have a blocker to Lackey turn 1 and to go to late game very fast where the deck shines. Veteran Explorer is absolutely amazing in this role.

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When you are that resistent against advices then play your weak list.
Ajani Vengeant does absolutly nothing in that deck.
Hf by getting owned.

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Originally Posted by Maveric78f

Never try to be aggro in any MU (except maybe Enchantress). The deck simply can't do it. I don't know exactly which version you played but MD, you have 2 MD answers to 40+-lands : Recurring Nightmare recursion and Primal Command. Ajani is somehow the kill but you can't rely on it alone. Of course never let Exploration in play or you'll be swarmed too fast. In any case, the best game plan is often to concede g1 as soon as you feel you're being controlled. Post SB enter all the grave hate you can. They probably can't do much against it and if you did not lose too much time in g1, you should be able to eventually win the game. I would not play other specific MD cards to beat loam decks. You have 2 cards to win the MU: Primal Command (which you can play 5 times, tutoring witness and you should be able to win or ultimate Ajani opponent's lands within this time) and Recurring Nightmare on 2 witness to develop mana base, STP their manlands and play and replay Planeswalkers. I forgot to precise that ultimate Elspeth is great too in this MU since it protects your mana base.

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They have 4 Exploration and 4 Manabond to accelerate into mad things and we have only 4 Thoughtseize to stop them and only 50% chance to win the die roll in that game 1 - not bright if you ask me.
The problem is that we can't aggro them to death and at the same time they have better attrition game/earlier critical mass if their gameplan is not disrupted early. Turn 5 Command is way too late - they can recover from it with ease. But. The turn 1-2-3 'Seize their exploration/manabond, RFG their first Loam, anything that breaks their gameplan before they reach critical mass gives us very good chances. That's why I suggest some form of early GY-hate in 2 flexslots.
Anyway, I'll test it 'cause the deck is great and I want to make it better.

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Originally Posted by Maveric78f

I don't care to have 3/3s instead of 1/1s. The ability to skyrocket mana is not relevant anymore as soon as you have 4 manas to cast it. About the better mana base, it's an argument but it's not enough to my eyes. I tried Garruk at some point and I was dissppointed a lot by it. And don't forget how ultimate Elpeth is great.

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Well, you have more expirience with the deck, but I still want to learn that question hard way (should be very usefull to have better grip on the deck).

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Originally Posted by Frozen Shade

When you are that resistent against advices then play your weak list.
Ajani Vengeant does absolutly nothing in that deck.
Hf by getting owned.

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I think you should post your deck here (or give us a link) if you feel it has same concept and explain why your choices are better. At least it will be more productive than the "your deck is shit, you play dumb cards" statement.

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Originally Posted by eq.firemind

They have 4 Exploration and 4 Manabond and we have only 4 Thoughtseize and only 50% chance to win the die roll in that game 1 - not bright if you ask me.
The problem is that we can't aggro them to death and at the same time they have better attrition game if their gameplan is not disrupted early. Turn 5 Command is way too late - they can recover from it with ease. But. The turn 1-2-3 'Seize their exploration/manabond, RFG their first Loam, anything that breaks their gameplan before they reach critical mass gives us very good chances. That's why I suggest some form of early GY-hate in 2 flexslots. Anyway, I'll test it 'cause the deck is great and I want to make it better.

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Preboard, it's a difficult MU. I won't deny it. I don't count on seize to get rid of their enchantments but on deed+seize/cabal. It's not so bad that they have multiple land drops in early turns but it becomes problematic as soon as they have life from the loam online. Sometimes, they are just going to mana deny you and you won't be able to do anything (just scoop as fast as you can in this case) but sometimes, you'll be able to develop and to play your lategame crazyness either via control (Primal Command) or via insane card advantage and quality (Recurring Nightmare).

I know that what you proposed would reinforce this MU. I just feel it's too dedicated to this particular MU to be MD. Post SB, we have the tools

As a conclusion, the game plan is to see g1 if you can develop correctly and disrupt them enough to settle your game plan. If you can't, scoop early and wreck them post SB, hoping you can finish g3. I think it's reasonable to assume you can.

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Well, you have more expirience with the deck, but I still want to learn that question hard way (very usefull to have better grip on the deck).

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It's clearly the best to prove yourself the choices. I do it all the time. I provide you with my arguments and feelings. Feel free to play what you want. The only thing I'd ask you is to remember in place of what you play the slots in order that you can give a real time comparison with the list I would have played.

Updated with some MUs.

I'm liking this deck and will probably end up building it sometime soon.

You have run a fair bit of testing with this it seems. I noticed you've tested against U, R, and B chalice aggro variants, but not the Green Chalice Aggro variant. How do you think that matchup would play out?

I'd also happily test the Pox matchup once I get Workstation going (which might not be for a while).

Green Chalice Aggro has no stated list as far as I know. It would be the same for Demon Stompy except that I'm a great fan of this deck so that I had to test it.

As I don't play Perish and as I have no real MD solution to a resolved Natural Order, I'd say it's slightly defavorable MD. But after SB, Hide/Seek are once more the best SB card acting both as anti-artifact and as Natural Order owner. About the rest of the deck, I don't think we have to fear it because it has very little evasion and deed and swords to plowshares are not impressed by Spawnwrithe. I'm not sure garruk would be a threat neither since it can "only" make 3/3s as relevant ability (and it's easily killed by Ajani). This discussion is purely theoretical.

Against Pox, we count either on flood, Veteran Explorer or sensei's divining top. I usually had no problem, but I'm not sure I've tested a lot since Bloodghast which can be an annoyance.

One thing: Veteran Explorer is bad against anything with NO=>Prog. You never want to speed up their Hydra.
Now, I know 3 good decks that play NO=> Prog: Green Chalice and ProBant with or w/o Countertop.
Both Hide and Seek are great against all theese decks (Seek for Prog, Hide for Chalice/Trini, Counterbalance, Jittes, Pithing Needles)
So I think -4 Veteran Explorer, +4 Hide/Seek is the starting point of sideboard plan.

I'm not sure Veteran Explorer is bad in these MUs. Post SB, you play seize, therapies, Innocent Blood and Hide/Seek.

I've tested this deck alot lately and it's a blast to play! Possibly the Mystical Tutor ban will decrease the number of combo decks, which is a great thing for this deck. It just smashes aggro. Here are a few remarks:

1. Beating blue based control is generally easy. Often you can rape their hand with Therapy. However, once they land Jace, you simply lose. If they put it to 5 loyalty immediately you cannot burn it with Ajani. You don't have alot of creatures to decrease the loyalty either. What are your thoughts on this?
2. In my opinion the 4th top is mandatory. Top is such a great card to land on turn 1, and you can easily fetch away a second one.
3. I don't think the deck needs that many extra cards to dominate the late game (read Recurring Nightmare and Primal Command). Instead, I prefer cards that help survive the early and middle game. Currently I play 2x Engineered Explosives in these slots. I think these are better than Crime/Punishment because of the mana requirements and the ability to split the mana investment over two turns. Punishment is a late game card, and we already dominate the late game so it's not very relevant. Blindly dropping EE on 1 or 2 is a good play as well. The EE's might also help solving the Jace problem. I've tested 2x Innocent Blood in these slots but they were dead too often.
4. The Jund Charms in the sideboard are outrageous, the mana is too hard to obtain.
5. Hide/Seek is golden, and so are Extirpate and Innocent Blood. I suggest a number of Duress in the sideboard to increase our chances against combo (and they also help against control).
6. The mana base is excellent, good job with that.
7. In the opening post it is stated that Elspeth is the best planeswalker. However, in this deck, I've found that Ajani is superior.

I hope this will revive the thread a bit!

As this thread was created before it was spoiled, I have a question: Could Gideon Jura be considered? Replacing one Ajani or one Elspeth?

Raising the deck from the grave. It had to be abandoned at some point when the metagame was either Combo or Vengevine Survival. But it is now much better.

It also gained some valuable cards, like GSZ and the Scavenging Ooze (as a tutor target). Garruk#2 seems also worth some testing even if it's 1 mana more expensive than Elspeth. I'm not exactly sure which list to play right now. The R splash is debatable now that we have 2 good planeswalker in-colours. I think I would miss the Ajani ultimate in too many MUs though. And maybe more importantly, the SB was based on this splash.

I don't want to change to many things at first, in order to keep some familiarity with the deck. And I would only make space for Dryad*1, GSZ*4, Ooze*1 and 1*Qasali, removing 1 land, the 2 dabatable slots, 1 top, 1 Recurring Nightmare, 1 Witness and 1 Finks.

Creatures: 12
4 Veteran Explorer
3 Eternal Witness
3 Kitchen Finks
1 Ooze
1 Qasali

Walkers: 6
3 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
3 Ajani Vengeant

Sweepers: 8
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Pernicious Deed

Discard: 7
4 Thoughtseize
3 Cabal Therapy

Remaining slots: 6
2 Sensei's Divining Top
4 GSZ

Mana-base:
2 Forest
2 Plains
1 Swamp
1 Mountain
4 Verdant Catacomb
3 Windswept Heath
1 Wooded Foothills
2 Bayou
2 Savannah
1 Scrubland
1 Taiga
1 Dryad

Side-board:
2 Innocent Blood
4 Hide / Seek
2 Jund Charm
2 Crime / Punishment
4 Extirpate
1 Tormod's crypt

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Originally Posted by Maveric78f

Raising the deck from the grave.

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Where have you been btw? I used to run into you all the time on MWS like about 1,5 years ago, and you've been inactive here too....

I used to play this deck quite a bit back then, but eventually gave up for 2,5 reasons:

-) Jace TMS
-) The one million years it took the deck to actually kill
[-) my other deck was GW Survival, and it became too good to play anything else]

Now reason 2,5 is obviously gone, and I think replacing Ajani V. with something faster might be a step in the right direction. Could maybe a pairing Elspeth and Garruk 2.0 work?

Also, I still think we will have a lot of troubles against a resolved Jace.

That list looks very close to some of the builds in the nic-fit thread. Vet explorer helps accel into some bigger beats like thrun, baneslayer or sun titan, which helps speed up the kill.

The Sun Titan + Deed plan works really good if you get to resolve it. Besides I would like to see Garruk vol. 2 in this style of deck and perhaps abandon the red.

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Originally Posted by hyperchord24

That list looks very close to some of the builds in the nic-fit thread. Vet explorer helps accel into some bigger beats like thrun, baneslayer or sun titan, which helps speed up the kill.

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Thanks, I'll have a look. Only thing I'd like to note that the deck never wants to spend mana without an immediate effect (come into play). Thrun, being unkillable is ok, sun titan with the CiP effect is ok too, but baneslayer is too easy to get rid of in such a deck with low protection.

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Originally Posted by muscleb

The Sun Titan + Deed plan works really good if you get to resolve it. Besides I would like to see Garruk vol. 2 in this style of deck and perhaps abandon the red.

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That's possibility, however I would like first to test a list that remains close to the one I extensively abd succesfully tested in the metagame 18 months ago.

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Originally Posted by Philipp2293

Where have you been btw? I used to run into you all the time on MWS like about 1,5 years ago, and you've been inactive here too....

I used to play this deck quite a bit back then, but eventually gave up for 2,5 reasons:

-) Jace TMS
-) The one million years it took the deck to actually kill
[-) my other deck was GW Survival, and it became too good to play anything else]

Now reason 2,5 is obviously gone, and I think replacing Ajani V. with something faster might be a step in the right direction. Could maybe a pairing Elspeth and Garruk 2.0 work?

Also, I still think we will have a lot of troubles against a resolved Jace.

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I've been away from magic during this time. Even now, I'd like to play more than 3 games a week but I can't find time...

Jace being a problem... Well, I'm not that sure because we can discard it, or kill it with Ajani. This is also a reason why I don't want to give up R for the moment. Also, Elspeth and Garruk are too similar according to me to play them altogether in a control deck. I would more consider replacing Elspeth with Garruk than Ajani.

I just had a look to the Nic Fit thread. The opening list is indeed quite close to my list and that's the place where I found the most interesting idea for the deck : Karn liberated. It does quite the same as Ajani Vengeant, in better, much better, but a much higher cost too. Anyway, it definitely deserves testing. Going back to 3 colors, is really valuable.

Creatures: 12
4 Veteran Explorer
3 Eternal Witness
3 Kitchen Finks
1 Ooze
1 Qasali

Walkers: 6 (all 3 for tests, but I will probably come back to play only the 2 best of them)
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2 Karn, Liberated
2 Garruk#2

Sweepers: 8
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Pernicious Deed

Discard: 7
3 Thoughtseize
4 Cabal Therapy

Remaining slots: 6
2 Sensei's Divining Top
4 GSZ

Mana-base:
4 Forest
2 Plains
1 Swamp
4 Verdant Catacomb
4 Windswept Heath
2 Bayou
2 Savannah
1 Scrubland
1 Dryad

Side-board:
To rebuild without R.