[Deck] Deadguy Ale (B/w Confidant)

personally, i haven't got problem playing 1 drop or two drop white spell with 4 scrubland, 1 godless shrine and 2 plains(and fletchland that can provide plain : 2). Maybe am i lucky, but i've never tell myself "damn, i need one more white mana, should have play mox diamon".
And about the argument that you do your 3 cost spell before your 2 cost spell, i think it's just better. Cause if you do your 3 cost spell in the begining of the game, then you have ton of mana to disrupt your enemy.
Finally, i've never feel to need a mox diamon in my opening hand, contrary to dark ritual.

Holo.

Agreed. Dark Ritual is tons better in deadguy. Plus the option of turn one Hippie and turn one E-plague shouldn't be ignored.

Serrra Avenger is actually a good choice in this deck, IMO. Your going to be casting disruption anyway during the first three turns so why not use Avenger for the fourth turn? You should have the second white source at this point plus its a powerful offensive beater that plays defense against other aggro based decks.

Avenger is a bad idea without Mox Diamond or basic Plains. one white source should be easy enough, but aggressively getting Scrublands is begging for a Gobbos player to Waste your land.

And with that many BB casting costs in this deck whhich are crucial to it, basic plains is a bad idea. So I do doubt if you'd ever get to cast that Serra Avenger...

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Originally Posted by Hummingbird TG

Avenger is a bad idea without Mox Diamond or basic Plains. one white source should be easy enough, but aggressively getting Scrublands is begging for a Gobbos player to Waste your land.

And with that many BB casting costs in this deck whhich are crucial to it, basic plains is a bad idea. So I do doubt if you'd ever get to cast that Serra Avenger...

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At the moment, i've never find hard to cast it.
It is true that white tend to share more and more card, and that it isn't anymore a black deck with white splash, but black AND deck.
Nevertheless, i think that to go with more white card just fit well the goal of the deck.
And Avenger is really a total MVP, every fish player now that.

Holo.

Avenger is good, but what does Avenger do that Shade doesn't? It is Vigilant and Evasive, thus goes well with Jitte. But it is nowhere as fast as Shade; no reason to do cute Jitte tricks when you could be finishing your opponent, no?

avenger help a lot in defferent matchup like gobelin and threshold.
it also can attack AND defend, making her a house with jitte.
i know that shade is really a monster too, but i see shade more as an offensive creature, and avenger as a offensive and defensive creature, and this is it what we need in my opinion : attack and defend in the same time.
Moreover, i nearly never equip a jitte on shade, cause shade is already pumpable (even if it eat lot of mana though).

Holo.

Um...I can't find slots for Jitte, thus I don't run Avenger. Any ideas what i can cut for it?

Furthermore, Gobbos, with Pyrokinesis, Incinerator and Fanatic and Ringleaders for draw power, can easily draw into enough removal to get rid of your creature, regardless of what it is...

Although I wouldn't mind more threats in either of those matchups, I find most of my other tools invaluable, so much so that its hard to find slots for Avenger and/or jitte. I'll post my list in a minute.

My List:

//Mana 26

4 Scrubland
4 Dark Ritual
4 Bloodstained Mire
3 Polluted Delta
4 Wasteland
7 Swamp

//Creatures 12

4 Dark Confidant
3 Hypnotic Specter
3 Nantuko Shade
2 Jotun Grunt

//Other 22

4 Duress
4 Hymn to Tourach
2 Gerrard's Verdict
4 Sinkhole
4 Vindicate
2 Cursed Scroll
2 Engineered Plague

I am currently running this build :

Lands (21)
4 Wasteland
2 Bloodstain Mire
2 Windstep Foothill
4 Scrubland
1 Godless Shrine
6 Swamp
2 Plains

Creatures (17)
4 Dark Confidant
3 Nantuko Shade
3 Hypnotic Specter
2 Jotun Grunt
3 Mother Of Rune
2 Serra Avenger

Spells (22)
4 Dark Ritual
4 Sinkhole
4 Duress
4 Hymn To Tourach
4 Vindicate
2 Umezawa Jitte

Sideboard (15)
4 Ghostly Prison / Engineered Plague
3 serenity
3 Pithing Needle
4 Extirpate
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Jotun grunt

I've cut two cursed (even if i like it very much) cause i already run shade. With shade AND cursed, it his hard to find enough mana, so i'll left only shade to eat the mana that i have. Moreover, you must have 1 card in hand in order to make scroll very effective. You can also cut gerrard in order to go more aggroish.

Still, i'm happy with this build, but i don't know if a split of plague/prison will be better then a 4 of one, and this is THIS point that i want to argues with you guys.

Holo.

@Holo: Your lists' numbers seem abit off.

First, you run 21 lands, as you pointed out.

But, you run 17 creatures, not 15.

And 22 Others, not 25.

But they total up to 60, so no matter.

Anyway, on Cursed Scroll and Shade: Shade often doesn't get to stick on the board. Cursed Scroll does. As a creature, Shade(especially with its 1 toughness), is easily killed. Cursed Scroll stays to clock your opponent, doing two every turn. it's also the reason why I dislike Jitte - with so few creatures, it is easy for your opponent to cut you off your creature flow, and strand your Jittes.

About the Gerrard's Verdicts on my list, they're new and not yet tested. i'm about to test them after regionals(Im helping a friend with his regionals deck). I'm keen to see how they do against CRET Belcher and TES, which i do predict a rise of...

Also, no Dystopia in the board? That this is a frickin house against Thresh, Fish and Meathooks(Sliver). It also helps us with any form of Green Aggro(Tarmogoyf is very, very dangerous).

On the subject of EPlague and Prison, I find 4 Eplague at least to be good. Firstly, with prison they can still force through a few attackers, or sit back and let a Siege Gang Commander do all the work from longrange. EPlague ensures no lackey/commander/Incinerator/Fanatic shenanigans, or other tricks in general. 2 Eplagues also give you enough time to beat FTW with a Shade.

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Originally Posted by Hummingbird TG

@Holo: Your lists' numbers seem abit off.

First, you run 21 lands, as you pointed out.

But, you run 17 creatures, not 15.

And 22 Others, not 25.

But they total up to 60, so no matter.

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Fixed.

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Originally Posted by Hummingbird TG

Anyway, on Cursed Scroll and Shade: Shade often doesn't get to stick on the board. Cursed Scroll does. As a creature, Shade(especially with its 1 toughness), is easily killed. Cursed Scroll stays to clock your opponent, doing two every turn. it's also the reason why I dislike Jitte - with so few creatures, it is easy for your opponent to cut you off your creature flow, and strand your Jittes.

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In fact, i'm running more creature than a traditional BW Confident build (just like anti~american build though) and it is not that hard to get a jitte on a creature. For instance, i found more difficult to get a jitte than a jitte on a creature...

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Originally Posted by Hummingbird TG

About the Gerrard's Verdicts on my list, they're new and not yet tested. i'm about to test them after regionals(Im helping a friend with his regionals deck). I'm keen to see how they do against CRET Belcher and TES, which i do predict a rise of...

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That's true that Gerrard's Verdicts are great in a combo metagame. If you run them, run only two, cause it cost 2 mana, and it is black and white. It is more a metagame call than anything else i think (here in Paris, there is more aggro and aggro-control than combo).

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Originally Posted by Hummingbird TG

Also, no Dystopia in the board? That this is a frickin house against Thresh, Fish and Meathooks(Sliver). It also helps us with any form of Green Aggro(Tarmogoyf is very, very dangerous).

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I run too much white permanent to play dystopia, that's why i run perish instead. I've been testing againt UGr Threshold, and that's true that it is difficult to handle a tarmagoyf.

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Originally Posted by Hummingbird TG

On the subject of EPlague and Prison, I find 4 Eplague at least to be good. Firstly, with prison they can still force through a few attackers, or sit back and let a Siege Gang Commander do all the work from longrange. EPlague ensures no lackey/commander/Incinerator/Fanatic shenanigans, or other tricks in general. 2 Eplagues also give you enough time to beat FTW with a Shade.

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At the moment i'm testing Prison cause it goes well with the LD strategie, so wait and see for more testing, i'll post later my comment on prison.

Another thing i'm considering to do is include another jitte or a SOFI, but well, what should we cut so ? maybe a duress or a dark ritual (think that dark ritual would be cut, cause it is more a dead card in late game).

Holo.

[Brainstorming]

Solutions to fast combo? Our disruption which can hit play turn 1 are:

-Duress
-Chalice of the Void(for 0)
-Rit -> Hymn/Chalice for 1/Plague

Certainly, that is too few? Although more options open themselves to us on turn 2, it may be too late for they could have easily gone off by then, especially for Belcher.

Should we run Null Rod? Cabal Therapy? Sphere of Resistance? How should we side?

Any opinions on this?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Hummingbird TG

Any opinions on this?

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Unmask + Duress + Therapy if you're really concerned with ultra-fast combo. A turn one Swamp, Unmask, Therapy is utterly devastating for most turn 1-3 combo decks. Followed up with Hymn and/or a strong beater like Negator or Shade and it's a very tough game for them to win. If you're talking about the sideboard, you'd run Therapy and Unmask in the board, and side out your slower creature removal (Cursed Scroll), your Plagues (if they're not running EtW), your Sinkholes, and your Vindicates in that order.

against combo, i'd prefer to add extirpate. Why ? Cause if you can extirpate one of their win condition, or one of their mana card, you can wrench them. Moreover, with 8 discard spell, 4 extirpate will be enought to stop combo in my opinion.

Holo.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Hummingbird TG

Avenger is good, but what does Avenger do that Shade doesn't? It is Vigilant and Evasive, thus goes well with Jitte. But it is nowhere as fast as Shade; no reason to do cute Jitte tricks when you could be finishing your opponent, no?

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Agreed here. Avenger is better in WW and WU fish decks in Legacy and Extended where you can use cards like Aether Vial to sneak it into play a turn earlier.

Bitter Ordeal looks good, but only if you are playing a sweeper like Damnation.

Damnation kills all our creatures, and is worse than EPlague against Gobbos. No reason to play it. Bitter Ordeal is just worse than Extirpate or Cranial Extraction.

Serra Avenger is here to be another good threat with shade. i haven't found at the moment another better creature with a low mana cost (white speaking). If you got any idea for another threat, just say !

Holo.

I often find Shade and Grunt to be more than satisfactory, and 3 Shade and 2Grunt to be enough. Shade can be blown up to rediculous proportions to smash the opponent, after all...

Shade is amazing, but moreso with Mommy to back him up. I don't know for sure if avenger makes the cut, but mommy's just the tits.

Also, I don't think mox diamond is right. I might be going back to an older build with a heavier white manabase to support Mom.

That probably begs the question, basic Plains or no? After all, turn 1 Fetch-> Scrubland seems a bad idea with Goblins back around. And then, would white Fetches be run?

The deck is starting to have similarities with bunnies...replacing creature kill with discard and Land D. Having almost similar creatures...except the count..

Bunnies did very well against aggro and aggro control..which is the problem for pikula it seems...just mix and match both.. we might get into somewhere..

Perhaps you should take a peek at the bunnies mana base..
http://mtgthesource.com/forums/showt...hlight=bunnies

it runs chrome mox instead of mox D. or dark ritual...

just some reference... If you are planning to go with a similar mana base or something like it.. I would still suggest serra avenger..vigilance on a 3/3 body is tight, specialy with jitte... If we are adding basic plains to the mix, you can lower the shade count to 3 instead of 4...

Just a thought...

Um. Pikula does Very well against Aggro on it's own, especially if you mean Gobbos. i think on average the matchup is 60-40 in our favor if you maindeck Plagues, just 2 of them. (Side in the other 2 and 4 Swords)

Besides, B/W Confidant is a Control deck, while the deck you suggested is a Sui deck...

I wasn't suggesting that we go the aggro route.. I was just suggesting the mana base if we were to up the creature count to 15-16 with serra avenger which requires double white and mom...while still staying with the discard and Land destruction..

Oh and if were going to leave mom around.. I'll even be tempted to test negator.. with the heavy discard, Land D. and mom for protection.

Ive always had problems with goblins using pikula game 1 ... even with 2 main deck plagues..Maybe im playing the deck wrong. I think it was like 40-60 game one.. then it gets better after boarding...

One problem: running Negator would mean we have to cut Shade, who is equally ridiculous with Mother of Runes, but much, MUCH better when you don't draw a Mother of Runes. We can't have more than 3 slots on creatures who don't disrupt...

And, about the manabase: I prefer fetches which can all fetch basic swamps. We run a crazy lot of BB cards here, no?

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On the Goblins Match: I doubt we can lose post board. 4 Vindicate, 4 StP, X Extirpate for Ringleader(there may be spare slots), 2 Cursed Scroll, 4 Plague...and 4 Bob to draw them. Shade adds pressure so they have to find an answer fast, to Plagues AND Scrolls. Ringleader can't draw answers to Plague.

Gator can't be played, even with mom in the deck. If we play them, it's a 3-of for both, and sometimes you will have a hard time getting those two on the board in the same time. Even if we can try to play around Gator draw back, i don't think it deserve a slot. Moreover, don't Pikula himself say that Gator just don't fit the deck strategie ?
Shade is better, cause it is a threat by itself and don't have any drawback.
On the goblin matchup : i've no maindeck plague nor scroll, and i got 4 Plague plus 4 Extirpate and 1 SOFI SB, and i'm doing relatively well against goblin (4 vindicate, 4 plague, 4 extirpate and 4 bob for the draw). In this matchup i've found Serra Avenger to be awesome (with jitte or SOFI).
My version goes a bit more aggroish than the controlish way, but i find it well balance (the only problem is to get double white, that's why i've had some ravnica dual land).

Holo.

BTW, how is the CRET Belcher matchup? I find Deadguy to be far too slow here personally, relying on Dark Ritual or Duress to interact turn 1, which is crucial to winning. And then there are the random turn 1 Belcher, Kill, gg.

I think Fish does far better here. Is Unmask MD really necessary?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Hummingbird TG

BTW, how is the CRET Belcher matchup? I find Deadguy to be far too slow here personally, relying on Dark Ritual or Duress to interact turn 1, which is crucial to winning. And then there are the random turn 1 Belcher, Kill, gg.

I think Fish does far better here. Is Unmask MD really necessary?

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a friend of mine has a CRET belcher deck.
here i would say that game one i mull till i get duress or dark ritual/hymn or dark ritual/ specter (even if the last case is dangerous).
game two, i side in 4 extirpate and 4 plague, so well, just RFG as much of their mana acceleration as possible and put a plague on the board.
I haven't any % for this matchup, but i can for sur ask my friend if we can make 10 game without board, and then 10 with.
Actually, i think it's like 55 % for us, dues to all the discard we have.

Holo.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Holo_rip

a friend of mine has a CRET belcher deck.
here i would say that game one i mull till i get duress or dark ritual/hymn or dark ritual/ specter (even if the last case is dangerous).
game two, i side in 4 extirpate and 4 plague, so well, just RFG as much of their mana acceleration as possible and put a plague on the board.
I haven't any % for this matchup, but i can for sur ask my friend if we can make 10 game without board, and then 10 with.
Actually, i think it's like 55 % for us, dues to all the discard we have.

Holo.

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I have done some testing in this matchup, and I feel that our best shot of winning the match is to win the die roll. If we are guranteed to go first games 1 and 3, then we can try to get a hand with a turn 1 disruption spell. Letting the CRET Belcher player be on the play is just so dangerous for us, as we all know that deck can consistently do turn 1. Our best hope on the draw is that they go for ETW and we are sitting back on Ritual-->Engineered Plague. Other than that, we don't have much of a shot on the draw unless they keep a shitty hand. I would say 55% our favor if we win the die roll, and 65-70% their favor if they win the die roll.

EDIT: These are not solid percentages, I am just throwing these out based on what I have experienced.

There's a problem with that. We don't know what we're facing game 1. Mulling into Duress or Ritual -> Hymn blindly is generally a misplay.

Normally, i always want an opening hand with some distruption in (discard or land destroy). If we begin, so i can't see how you can't disrupt him with an hymn or duress (or both), and then we can see what our opponent is playing. Sure it is hard, cause sometime we could not be able to cast a discard spell first turn, but we have to do with it.

Holo.

You see, normally, we can keep a hand with a turn 1 Duress or Rit -> Hyppie or Rit -> Hymn, or even Rit -> Sinkhole or Rit -> Shade/Bob sometimes. CRET Belcher forces us to have Duress or Rit+Hymn. That, in my experience thus far, has not been very common.

Deadguy have many answer/disruption, and it must disrupt the opponent in the first few turn.
I think you would agree with me when i say that, a T1 belcher kill is not that usual, it happen yes, but not everytime (just like for the others combo deck).
Combo deck tend to be one of our best matchup, dues to the discard package we have. I even tend to be better game 2 and 3. That's why, i must say that combo deck aren't the scarriest thing i can think of.
I think we should think about way to defeat aggro and aggro / control deck, cause it is those deck that tend te be hard.

Holo.

The only matches I actually fear except for belcher are random red Aggro decks, where our Dystopias and plagues do nothing and we have to cope with a mere 4 Vindicates and 4 StP, burn decks, where our answers fail to do much maindeck, and postboard we rely on Chalice to hit @1, and LftL decks which have an incredible long game, and pesky Mazes of Ith.

Could you please post your youngest Deadguy version ? Cause i've fail own you can introduce CotV in such a deck.

Holo.

//Deadguy Ale

Mana 26

4 Scrubland
4 Bloodstained Mire
3 Polluted Delta
4 Wasteland
7 Swamp
4 Dark Ritual

Creatures 12

4 Dark Confidant
3 Hypnotic Specter
3 Nantuko Shade
2 Jotun Grunt

Disruption 22

4 Duress
4 hymn to Tourach
4 Sinkhole
4 Vindicate
2 Gerrard's Verdict
2 Cursed Scroll
2 Engineered Plague

//Sideboard 15

2 Engineered Plague
3 Dystopia
4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Chalice of the Void
3 Extirpate



Chalice is for 0 and 1. It doesn't really interfere with much, only stopping Ritual and Duress(Cursed Scroll doesn't count; in the matchups where you want Chalice, I don't see anyone wanting to keep in Cursed Scroll, e.g. Combo).

Chalice acually works very well in a deck like this. Back in the day (last februaryish) I ran 3 SB to side in against combo and threshold. They were quite the nail in the coffin when set at 1 after you'd already used your initial duress/rit and any other 1 drops you'd be drawing would be inconsiquential compared to your opponent's 1-drop density. It was also the obvious choice for the most devistating thing black could do against a 0cc reliant combo deck on the play.

I've been messing around with mother of runes a little, and she's pretty awesome even without diamond. I haven't found casting her much of an issue, and she's pretty damn amazing both early game stalling and late game finishing (MOm+Shade=unblockable button of damage). Acually, my MB right now is 6 cards off of HummingBird's. -2 verdict, -2 scroll, -2 plague, +3 Mom, +3 Jitte. I'm not sure if this is the right choice, but it's been working out damn well for me.

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The only matches I actually fear except for belcher are random red Aggro decks

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If you play in a heavy burn meta, Warmth should be your choice.
Getting one of them on the table is almost enough to win.

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-2 scroll

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I havent ever thought of cutting the Scroll.
This card is so great in Bw Confidant. Crused Scroll has won me many games.

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Originally Posted by rsaunder

Chalice acually works very well in a deck like this. Back in the day (last februaryish) I ran 3 SB to side in against combo and threshold. They were quite the nail in the coffin when set at 1 after you'd already used your initial duress/rit and any other 1 drops you'd be drawing would be inconsiquential compared to your opponent's 1-drop density. It was also the obvious choice for the most devistating thing black could do against a 0cc reliant combo deck on the play.

I've been messing around with mother of runes a little, and she's pretty awesome even without diamond. I haven't found casting her much of an issue, and she's pretty damn amazing both early game stalling and late game finishing (MOm+Shade=unblockable button of damage). Acually, my MB right now is 6 cards off of HummingBird's. -2 verdict, -2 scroll, -2 plague, +3 Mom, +3 Jitte. I'm not sure if this is the right choice, but it's been working out damn well for me.

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i've been doing this the first time i've picked up Deadguy.
MoR is a house with jitte in his hand. Moreover, it help to sneak our creature during the attack phase. And finally, it is another "must" answer card, so the opponent can't answer all our threat.
Ho and, another thing, i really dislike the idea to have only two MD plague. For me it is 4 or nothing.
I also really like Hummingbird TG version of Deadguy. A lot more controlish though, but i would find myself to do this change : -2 plague, +2 jitte, cause even without MoR it is too awsome. And finally, i would make an SB like this :
4 E. Plague
4 Extirpate
4 Chalice of the Void
3 Dystopia


Holo.

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Ho and, another thing, i really dislike the idea to have only two MD plague. For me it is 4 or nothing.

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Thats absolutely right! Those two slots should be used by more "important" cards. Play 4 plagues or none. And 4 is only senseful in a Goblin dominated meta.

If I were going to play a more controllish build like HummingBird's (i.e. the one I used to play and love to death), it would include 2/3 e. plague, scrolls, and a couple copies of smallpox. It doesn't play quite enough creatures to make jitte effective.

Less than 4 plagues is okay, it just takes some knowledge of where they need to go. Generally for me, they're a meddling mage naming and 1/1 creature (mana producing against survival, goblin, whatever), and the deck just doesn't need four of that. 2 or 3 copies MB are a very plausable option to have a little edge against goblins or an out to ETW, but it's really a metagame decision.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by rsaunder

If I were going to play a more controllish build like HummingBird's (i.e. the one I used to play and love to death), it would include 2/3 e. plague, scrolls, and a couple copies of smallpox. It doesn't play quite enough creatures to make jitte effective.

Less than 4 plagues is okay, it just takes some knowledge of where they need to go. Generally for me, they're a meddling mage naming and 1/1 creature (mana producing against survival, goblin, whatever), and the deck just doesn't need four of that. 2 or 3 copies MB are a very plausable option to have a little edge against goblins or an out to ETW, but it's really a metagame decision.

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i have to admit that i've never test smallpox in B/W Confidant, but well...
i don't see when you cast it. for me it is too situational and to symetrical to be a card to run.
maybe could you give us some exemple of how to use smallpow (i'm an avid pox player, but here i can't see how to play it without beeing hurt more than my opponent).

Holo.