[Deck] Nic Fit (GBx Explorer Zenith Control)

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Originally Posted by Megadeus

Is chameleon collossus really that good? It seems underwhelming

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Chameleon has been insane -- arguably better of an addition than the Avenger, even. It operates off the same principle as the Avenger -- you turn your manabase advantage into a clock when you don't have access to a Scapeshift for whatever reason. 8 lands (common in the deck) represents a potential 16-power Colossus. I have periodically made it 32. Pro-black is surprisingly relevant -- it can't be Pulsed or Vindicated; nor can Batterskull's Germ Token say anything to Mr. Chameleon. With enough lands, it's easily possible to just race a Batterskull.

There is an argument that could be made for cutting both Chameleon and Avenger for a pair of Garruk Primal Hunters -- if you would want to try that out, I wouldn't have any opposition. Avenger has been very strong just as a late-game Zenith to kill someone, but it's PROBABLY the weakest card in the deck at the moment. That's saying something, lol. If I came up with a 2nd card to card for the 2nd copy of Primal Hunter, I would probably test -1 Avenger -1 mystery card for the pair, but before I tried Chameleon I was on a 1-of Primal Hunter, and he was atrocious as a 1-of. PH needs to be a 2-of. I personally don't believe that Chameleon is the cut for the 2nd Primal, but I mean, I don't have anything else to advocate, so....an ye harm no-one, do what ye will.

I'm willing to try it! Yeah avenger seems odd as well. But ive learned to never count out any card in nic fit

I've got the same feeling regarding Avenger. Eventhough he's loads of fun he's just mediocre most of the time. He costs a boatload of mana+ needs lands to be relevant. Yes I've killed people with it when I was unable to kill with Valakut with Leyline of Sanctity out. Building 8 7/8 plant tokens is quite hilarious but its just a cornercase where Avenger is good.
I've been toying with that slot. Currenly I'm running Thrun but he really wants access to Kessig Wolf Run. But running Wolf Run makes to manabase less stable. Trample is a really relevant ability

Other dudes I'm going to test:
-Broodmate Dragon
-Ant Queen
-Creakwood Liege
-Deity of Scars
-Essence of the Wild
-Graveshell Scarab
-Wolfir Silverheart

but thats just me browsing through Gatherer.

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Originally Posted by XdeckX

I've got the same feeling regarding Avenger. Eventhough he's loads of fun he's just mediocre most of the time. He costs a boatload of mana+ needs lands to be relevant. Yes I've killed people with it when I was unable to kill with Valakut with Leyline of Sanctity out. Building 8 7/8 plant tokens is quite hilarious but its just a cornercase where Avenger is good.
I've been toying with that slot. Currenly I'm running Thrun but he really wants access to Kessig Wolf Run. But running Wolf Run makes to manabase less stable. Trample is a really relevant ability

Other dudes I'm going to test:
-Broodmate Dragon
-Ant Queen
-Creakwood Liege
-Deity of Scars
-Essence of the Wild
-Graveshell Scarab
-Wolfir Silverheart

but thats just me browsing through Gatherer.

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To be honest, the biggest strike against Avenger of Zendikar is that I've added Chameleon Colossus to the deck. Both slots operate off of the "I have more mana than god, but I can't Scapeshift you. What do?" theory. Avenger CAN get you out of some really nasty board states where your opponent overcommited and you haven't drawn a Deed. That IS a thing that happens. But overall, Chameleon just does Avenger's job better.

Also, I can save you the trouble with a few of those.

-BOORDM8 DARGON: was in the original Scapewish list, however long ago that's been. Was incredibly mediocre ranging to bad. Got cut within a couple months...and I even had a german foil =(

-Ant Queen: takes wayyyyyyyy too much durdling to do its thing. Oftentimes you bring it out and have either 0 open mana to make an Ant, or like enough to make 1-2. Then it gets killed somehow, and you're sadpanda. Queen can totally take over a game if it's left alive, and in that regard it's just one more instance of such a creature in this deck (everything in here can do that). But IMO, creatures in Scape either need to do something immediately (comes into play triggers), or else is a phenomenal beatstick (Chameleon-level).

-Wolfir Silverheart: is actually playable. A friend of mine from Ithaca has been experimenting with Wolfir in a number of Nic Fit shells, and it's been doing good work for him. It falls into the class of "Chameleon-level Beatstick." It needs things around it, though -- it basically mandates that you run Thrun, Kodama/North, and/or Wolf Run. YOu can stick it in your deck as-is and it'll be okay -- but it's better if you build around it. IMO, it's more of a toy for

I haven't tried any of the other options, but looking at them, I'm pretty skeptical. Deity is not Chameleon-level -- in fact, I would sooner just run a 2nd Chameleon Colossus. Essence of the Wild actually seems detrimental, since it will override the come-into-play triggers of our other creatures, which is usually going to be more relevant than having a vanilla 6/6.

Scarab and Liege are actually somewhat interesting, and probably worth a try. Looking at Liege, I feel like Master of the Wild Hunt would be better, but it's probably still worth the test.

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Oh, also, I've done some testing with Ruric Thar, and he was miserable. He'll probably be fine as a Reanimator target for vs combo, or in Elves to NO for, or something -- but he is definitely NOT what Scapewish wants, even remotely.

Id still strongly advocate just using 2 abrupt decays in that slot. RiP miracles and BUG tempo can still give this deck trouble. This deck already has plenty of powerful things to do with its mana. Having a way to un-interactively deny tempo or miracles win strategy is invaluable. I once tried cutting decays for Avengers and another wood elves and lost to tempo decks and miracles when I shouldn't have. KotR (fetching wastes) and Liliana can also be trouble when we are still stumbling out of the starting gates. Decay stops them as well. I'd have 4 abrupt decays if scapewish had more room for stuff.

Took 8th at Jupiter after a pretty sad semis match, with Scapewish. Details to follow on Monday, as usual.

Hey guys, I need a little help. I play with a punishing nic fit very similar to HoneyT's list (BTW, thank you for that awesome list), but my question is about sideboard. I don't like carpet of flowers very munch and I've always been thinking on what putting in the place of the three sideboard copys of them. How do you feel about three blood moons? If that's not a good idea, can someone please teach me how to deal with the 12 post matchup? Since a friend of mine made a mono green version of that deck, I haven't win a single match, and I'm starting to feel dumber than the advisable to play with nic fit.

I am a Rector fit player and I was wondering what peoples thoughts were on the new cards from M14 Primeval Bounty and Ajani's Chosen.

The trouble I am having with Rector fit is that is the early game. If I can't keep things under control early then my late game is useless. I am thinking of taking out Maelstrom Pulse and Vindicate for Abrupt Decays. Still trying to figure out what else I can change out to help out my early game a little more.

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Originally Posted by CRich3

I am a Rector fit player and I was wondering what peoples thoughts were on the new cards from M14 Primeval Bounty and Ajani's Chosen.

The trouble I am having with Rector fit is that is the early game. If I can't keep things under control early then my late game is useless. I am thinking of taking out Maelstrom Pulse and Vindicate for Abrupt Decays. Still trying to figure out what else I can change out to help out my early game a little more.

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Rector is generally the slower member of already slow family.

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Originally Posted by Nithkar

Hey guys, I need a little help. I play with a punishing nic fit very similar to HoneyT's list (BTW, thank you for that awesome list), but my question is about sideboard. I don't like carpet of flowers very munch and I've always been thinking on what putting in the place of the three sideboard copys of them. How do you feel about three blood moons? If that's not a good idea, can someone please teach me how to deal with the 12 post matchup? Since a friend of mine made a mono green version of that deck, I haven't win a single match, and I'm starting to feel dumber than the advisable to play with nic fit.

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12-post will always be a bad matchup for Punishing Nic Fit. Not much you can do. Unless the meta is infested with the deck, I would not recommend spending any SB slots for it.

Carpet of Flowers is an integral part of Punishing Nic Fit's SB plans. You side in 3 Carpets against UWx control decks for 3 Explorers. That way you still have enough enough mana for your cards without giving them the mana boost for Jaces and Entreats. It is also amazing against RUG because it helps you overcome their mana denial, and a solid addition against BUG and Merfolk.

12post is a bad matchup for any Nic Fit. Scapewish can arguably take it down it best of the family, because of the combo -- it just becomes a race to stupid amount of mana. But even then, if they Crop Rot into Glacial in resp. to the triggers, you can just randomly lose. Definitely not a fun time.

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Jupiter report, as promised. I played the Scape list in my sig, with the following modifications:

Main:
-1 Avenger of Zendikar
+1 Scapeshift

Board:
-1 Damnation
-1 Bramblecrush
+1 Reverent Silence
+1 Maelstrom Pulse

As noted previously on this page, Avenger has been merely fine but not amazing, since Chameleon largely does what Avenger does, but better. I grappled for quite a while with what I wanted to add, and I decided that increasing my Derp, Win count was probably correct. The combo can pull you out of situations that you should never win, and drawing multiple Scapeshifts is never really horrible -- vs blue decks, you can just run the first one into whatever counterspell they have and then proceed to kill them, and vs nonblue decks you like having extra copies because of their discard.

The rationale for the sideboard changes was that 1. Enchantress is picking up in popularity a lot right now for some reason, and 2. Leyline-based combo is becoming increasingly prevalent. Reverent Silence is thus a better option than it has been in the past, because you can side in all 3 Slaughter Games, leaving Rev Silence as your go-to Wish target, to nuke their Leylines. With Bramble leaving the board, then, the Damnation -> Pulse switch was obvious, because you still need a wishable "Destroy target thing" card. Neither of these changes ever even came up.

I got to the venue fairly early; around 10 or so, picked up my order on-site (which contained my 4th, nonfoil Scapeshift *tear), and hung out with friends while waiting for the event to start.

Round 1: Rob with Maverick

Wonderful, I get a teamkill round one.

Game one Rob keeps a slightly shaky hand off a mull to 6. I Therapy calling Knight of the Reliquary, and see Green Sun, Mom, Waste, Cradle. He untaps into Mom #2 and Wastes my Bayou. I just play another green source, drop my Explorer, take his Green Sun, and proceed to move to the win phase while he floods out.

Game two he has a highly aggressive start, including a Thalia, but I have ramp dudes into Deed. His life total stops at 17, which means the mountain got to be furious.

Round 2: Timur with Jund

Hey look. More friends that I need to beat.

Game one is a crazy slugfest with each of us being completely in topdeck mode, and proceeding to rip bomb after bomb after bomb. He gets Punishing Grove online, though, he keeps wiping out my board while beating with Goyfs. I eventually rip a land when I needed to rip a Wish or a Shift (hadn't seen a copy of either yet, sadly), and die summarily.

Game two is a much quicker affair where the mountains got angry and Timur couldn't really do anything about it.

Game three was another slugfest which was primarily determined by Huntmaster. I had a double Explorer opener, but no sac outlets for them, so I just kept beating down his turn 2 Lily with one while leaving the other on Moat duty. Eventually Deed happened, followed by a Huntmaster landing while Timur was hellbent and did not have Punishing Grove online. I proceed to control his flips over the next few turns, and generate enough advantage and enough aggro that Timur can't recover even when he draws into double Goyf.

Round 3: different Rob with Burn

This was Rob's first legacy event after having sold his standard cards to break into the format. I had watched his last match as we were sitting next to each other, and as such I knew exactly what to expect. He also seemed like he knew what he was doing in terms of playing Magic, if not legacy.

Game one Rob opened with one of the most horrifying things that burn can do to Nic Fit: the keepable one-lander. He melted my face off in very, very short order.

Game two he had a much slower hand, and I was able to ramp safely into a Thragtusk. My life total never went below 14 this game, and I introduced him to my mountains in short order when he tapped out for a Hellspark and like a Chain Lightning.

Game three I was definitely more worried, as he was both on the play and had commented after I Shifted him that "now would be a really good time to have a Price of Progress in my hand," which meant that he knew that keeping a hand with Price would be a good thing whereas previously he'd pretty much only ever seen basics. He had a really odd triple Hellspark draw, and was aggroing out. I ramped a bit by blocking things with Veteran Explorers, and used a Deed to force him to slow-roll his Hellsparks while also taking out his Vexing Devil. Eventually it came down to the following board state:

He has one card in hand, with two Mountains untapped. He's at 20, I'm at 5. He still has 2 Hellsparks in the graveyard. I have 7 lands in play, with Green Sun and Scapeshift both in my hand, but no discard anywhere. I also have the Collective Voyage that I Wished for the previous turn (as I wasn't drawing the 8th land naturally to kill him with Shift). I resolve Voyage for 1, and he opts not to pay mana, leaving 2 up, which is obviously representing Price. I tank for a while, trying to figure out if he's bluffing or not. I eventually come to the conclusion that if I Zenith for Thragtusk, I'll go to 10. He'll unearth both Hellsparks and swing, which will put me 7 after I block one. Then depending on what is in his hand / what he draws for turn, I could very easily be "just dead." If he has any non-Price burn spell in hand, Scapeshift wins on the spot.

I ended up gambling and went for it. I was relieved when he flashed me the mountain that he was holding his hand -- he then proceeded to look at the top card of his deck, which was definitely a Price. Talk about dodging bullets!

Round 4: Paolo with RUG

I'm feeling very confidant as I sit down, because if I win here, I can double ID into top 8; and it's RUG, so I have a good matchup.

Game one he has double Stifle double Force with Delver, Goose, and Goyf for beatdown. Sick life. Note: this is the reason to play RUG. It has hands where it LITERALLY can't lose.

Game two I proceed to throw fantastically. I resolve a Sakura-Tribe early, and decide that looking at my hand is for chumps while searching. As such, I search up basic Swamp when I had plenty of black duals in my hand, and two double-green cards which I am now unable to cast. Wonderful. I then make another horrible misplay later in the game where I put my Top back wrong, and was unable to REB his flipped Delver as a result. He dropped me to 5 and then casually double Bolted me for the win.

:|

Round 5: Doug McKay with Living Death

The last time I played against this particular Doug deck, I was playing Dreadstill. It seemed like he'd made some improvements to it, as he was tearing the room up -- he had also been X-0 in R3, then lost to Nick Patnode on Elves. Unfortunately for Doug, his deck opted to not show up in either game, really. I don't remember the specifics of the matchup really, other than it was pretty free wins. Game two I employed one of my favorite sideboarding tricks, which is to side out a Therapy to then Wish for, which then cleared the way for my lethal Scapeshift.

Round 6: Patnode with Elves

Patnode opts to play it out, both because he wants the top seed (as Paolo is IDing in) and because he thinks that if he wins, Doug might be able to still sneak in at X-2. I'm sad, but I understand his logic. All I can do is hope that if I lose, it doesn't knock me out (a reasonable assumption since my breakers were already insane, and adding Patnode to them would make them even better).

Game one, he wins the die roll, and I open with a somewhat slow hand that has Burning Wish and mana. I reason that if I make it to turn 3, he loses instantly because Pyroclasm. I don't make it to turn 3, and die with the Pyroclasm in my hand.

Game two I mull to 4 vs his hand of 7. I forget what exactly the hand was -- I think it was like land, land, Therapy, Deed. I lead with the Therapy, calling Glimpse, and hit one. That slows his hand down enough that I draw into an Explorer, which gets me Deed, which wraths him, which gives me enough time to build up to a Scapeshift for the win.

Game three I mull to 6 looking for action, and see another mana + Pyroclasm hand. This one also has a Therapy, though, so I can curve Therapy->Wish->Clasm. He leads with a dork and ships back. I Therapy him, naming Glimpse. I brick, seeing a Crop Rot, 2 Heritage Druids, and a Green Sun. He plays out a topdecked elf and one of the Druids and passes back. I wish for the Clasm, and he proceeds to use mana elves + Rot for Cradle + Green Sun to Hoof me for exactsies after fetching for a Dryad Arbor. Awkward.

I end up in 8th seed going into the top 8, with something like 68% breakers. That's great, but it also means I'm paired up against #1 Seed, which means I get a rematch with Patnode.

Quarters: Patnode with Elves, #2

Game one I open double Therapy, double Explorer, with Deed and the lands to play it all. I wipe out his hand while accelerating like crazy, sweep him when he builds a bit of a board, then land Primeval and slow-roll Valakuts.

Game two my hand is kind of mediocre, but it has some disruption. He quickly goes into double Craterhoof despite me taking away his draw source (a Beck), and I die really quickly.

Game three I keep the following:

Swamp
Thoughtseize
Therapy
Explorer
Deed
Deed
Green Sun

My rationale is that it's a play on the math. I have 13 green sources in deck. Once my opening hand is taken out of consideration, I have approx a 1/4 chance of drawing a green source. Considering that I get to lead with Thoughtseize, and then have a guaranteed Therapy hit on turn 2, I figure that the odds favor me drawing a green source within the first 3 turns (prob somewhere around an 80-85% chance). I also know that mulling is dangerous here, because you need 3 things to actually beat Elves: discard, ramp, and a sweeper; and this hand has all three.

I lead with Thoughtseize, and see triple Natural Order and a couple of dorks. Therapy obviously takes out the Natural Orders -- painfully for Patnode, in his one intervening draw phase he managed to somehow draw the 4th NO. We're both severely crippled at this point, and we limp along playing draw/go/beat with a pair of 1/1s for a few turns. I think on something like turn 6 or 7 he finally gets going, and Zeniths up a Hoof to kill me. I somehow managed to not draw another land that whole time. Top card of my deck was a Taiga when I died.

Sometimes playing the odds backfires =(

Obviously hindsight is 20/20 and all -- and equally obviously, with Patnode's keep, literally any Therapy hand would have won me the game if I had lands to cast spells. I probably should have played it a bit safer, but the early disruption is just so critical against Elves that it's hard to say no to both two pieces of discard -and- the potential to just go nuts upon hitting the green. Either way, I still walked with a set of Scrublands and another Jupiter Top 8 to my name (my 4th now), so I can't exactly be displeased.

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Doug McKay with Living Death

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So... Any insight on this deck?

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Originally Posted by Claymore

So... Any insight on this deck?

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I mean, Doug was doing what he does -- he cycling Tuskers and so on and getting ready to do things....but he just kept drawing lands and cantrips, and not anything that was actually doing anything. I was ready for him with Phyrexian Tower out and untapped, so if he tried to Living Death I could make sure that my best creature (Thrag I think at the time) was coming back too. He just never drew anything against me. He still finished like 10th I think at x-2.

Congrats Kevin! Glad to see Scapewish still doing well. Its nice you didn't run into any storm/S&T decks. How was the extra scapewish?

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Originally Posted by TheArchitect

Congrats Kevin! Glad to see Scapewish still doing well. Its nice you didn't run into any storm/S&T decks. How was the extra scapewish?

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I think I saw it once on the entire day, to be perfectly honest (and I could tell, since it was the only one that wasn't foil). I'm probably going to continue testing with it for a little while (and would encourage others to do so as well, so I can get more feedback from more players on it) -- but I dunno if it's actually as good in person as it is on paper.

Chameleon was also less good this weekend than he has been in the past, but that's primarily because of the decks I played, I believe. I remember him winning me game 2 vs Timur, but otherwise Saturday wasn't a Chameleon kind of day. I didn't play against Batterskulls, really.

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Originally Posted by Arianrhod

Chameleon was also less good this weekend than he has been in the past, but that's primarily because of the decks I played, I believe. I remember him winning me game 2 vs Timur, but otherwise Saturday wasn't a Chameleon kind of day. I didn't play against Batterskulls, really.

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Honestly I think any creature killed me there. Chameleon just gave me the least time. Why Grove, why do you hide when I need you most.

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Originally Posted by Zirath

Honestly I think any creature killed me there. Chameleon just gave me the least time. Why Grove, why do you hide when I need you most.

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Granted, but that's a reason to favor Chameleon in the list. On an open board, he usually kills within 2 turns.

Gratz to the finish Arian.


In M14 there are three interesting cards so far. None of them an auto-include but they are worth looking into.

1.
Primeval Bounty 5G
Enchantment
Whenever you cast a creature spell, put a 3/3 green Beast creature token onto the battlefield.
Whenever you cast a noncreature spell, put three +1/+1 counters on target creature you control.
Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, you gain 3 life.

Like someone mentioned this could be a Rector target. It doesn't go nuts like Recycle but it is more consistent. It produces value every turn like a Planeswalker. Fetchlands gain 5 life, late Explorers gain 6 life and make a beast. Pump abilities are usually not that useful in Rector because you are somewhat locking them but three counters is a lot. And it works well with Divining Top. With one Top you gain three counters every turn on top of what you do anyway and with two Tops you have a nice little combo. 6 Mana for +18/+18.


2. Archangel of Thune 3WW
Creature - Angel
Flying, lifelink
Whenever you gain life, put a +1/+1 counter on each creature you control.

I don't think this is a thing but it is worth noting that this is an infinite combo with Spike Feeder. It also makes Kitchen Finks come back whenever they die. It also works nice with Primeval Bounty. I could see it maybe in the place of Baneslayer in Rector, not as a 1-1 replacement but something similar. I don't think it is good enough but maybe someone can get something done with it.


3. Shadowborn Demon 3BB
Creature - Demon
Flying
When Shadowborn Demon enters the battlefield, destroy target non-Demon creature.
At the beginning of your upkeep, if there are fewer than six creatures in your graveyard, sacrifice a creature.
5/6

This card has a lot of potential. 5/6 Flying is just huge, that is important. The sacrifice drawback can be worked around with Tokens or even abused (Rector).

There is another enchantment that is rather intresting.

Into the Wilds 3G
Enchantment
At the beginning of your upkeep, look at the top card of your library. If it's a land card, you may put it onto the battlefield.
"Wonders hide where the trees grow thickest."
—Mul Daya proverb

It can be hit on turn 2 if need be and with top it can advantage (set it up so you have land, card you actually want to draw, something else) for a free land every turn that helps you power through your deck a little faster. At the same time, it isn't really that amazing and there are probably better cards for any slots.

None of the aformentioned cards seem particularly interesting to me and not worth working for. The effects don't seem powerful enough compared to alternatives, they all seem too slow for too little impact and even though Nic Fit is a deck designed to go over the top of most decks and play a strong lategame, the core of the deck, like any Legacy deck, has to be focused on early game interaction. What you win with when you have established some kind of control or advantage needs to be powerful and/or fast and not just cute. New set, new toys and new ideas lead to innovation but also overly optimistic evaluations in my experience. But by all means, try everything! :)