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Jeez, the things you learn on TheSource. Thanks for illuminating Morden! I guess in the match-up where you'd rather have discard and are stuck with this configuration is my main concern. So you play the Flusterstorm trick and you're just all in rather than being able to discard your opponents countermagic. The situations I've been in recently are like this.Quote:
Originally Posted by Morden
Yes, that's its biggest problem. Thing doesn't influence the board immediately. I can see it in all the "hatebear" MUs like DnT, Aggro Loam, probably also Stompy decks. I might revisit this tech.Quote:
Originally Posted by ScottW
What Morden said. It becomes cc1: discard a card.
Decided to play a double PiF + Empty main list in a 16 player event for a change:
UR Delver 2-0 1-0
Death 'n Taxes 2-0 2-0
Shardless 2-0 3-0
Miracles 0-2 3-1 (chose the wrong option g1, could have beaten the lock. g2 I mull to 4 but almost win; he finds a flusterstorm with the very last card he looks at with top)
Eldrazi ID 3-1-1
SF: Miracles 2-0
F: Eldrazi 0-2 (g1 was hopeless on the draw. g2 I had lethal through his Chalice1+Thorn because he was on 12, but his Fearie Macabre stopped that plan and stalled me enough)
G2 against DnT: They mull a couple of times (to 4 or 5) and lead land, go. We have a turn-1 pif kill or 14 goblins. They revealed a Fearie Macabre while shuffling. You have no clue what/if any sweepers they have (or how much graveyard hate). Which option maximizes your odds in this great spot?
Preboard against Miracles: They have active CB lock and a full hand (with no lands, quite certainly) around turn 8-10 I think. We know he has at least one force. After a busy turn we can make ~22 goblins (he shuffled 2 Terminus away earlier, but has one in hand, 2 brainstorms used, only 3 lands) or win if he doesn't have the second force, which one?
How did you win game 1? Did they see Empty? I'd play Goblins if not - possibly they mulled aggressively for hate plus whatever else and you already saw graveyard disruption. I haven't seen anybody play Faerie Macabre in DnT but I don't play against it often. Also, what sweepers are you concerned with? Council's Judgment, Jitte? They'd have to get to 3 lands, etc. on a pretty low Mulligan.Quote:
Originally Posted by JamieW89
Congrats on the finish!
In the first scenario, I'd probably go for the Goblins. I can't imagine they'd have time to find a Batterskull, so they'd be down to jank sideboard tech like Engineered Explosives. D&T is one of the matchups against which I think goblins are uniquely useful. If your hand had 3 Tutors in it (can't think how that'd work on T1 at the moment; it's late, and I'm drinking), I'd hit them with Tendrils.Quote:
Originally Posted by JamieW89
It's a risk to play Empty against Miracles, but I've got rotten luck/skill against the deck, so I won't claim to be an expert. If you were to have a Therapy in hand, Empty is absolutely the way to go. If not, and if he's tapped out, I'd go for the Drils. If he's not tapped out, Flusterstorm is a problem you can't hope to solve without discards. [EDIT: if he's floating it with Top, that's a real problem you can't solve without KGrip'n'Sip.] So I guess Empty is probably the best play here, but I feel like I can't give a great answer without more info.
Apropos of nothing, I tried goldfishing Sensei's Divining Top instead of Dark Petition in the main this week. Caveats: I haven't had the chance to play against other people at all since Monday; the singleton Top didn't come up too much in random testing (I could've goldfished six-cards-plus-Top hands, but I didn't because I've not had much time); and I fully understand the arguments in favor of an additional Preordain instead of Top, but I don't like more Preordains because of its lack of impact. Preliminary findings:
—Top is very slow compared to pretty much everything else we can play. This doesn't mean it's not useful, especially in matchups against slow decks or discard, but it's no good in my meta to maindeck it.
—Top's no good with only 14 lands. It necessitates sideboarding an extra land, or it just sits on the board doing nothing.
—The benefit to Ad Nauseam from cutting a high-costed spell wasn't as great as I'd expected. I'm not too surprised, but I think that running a Petition (/some fifth high-cost business) might be better on balance. I'd need to test more to come up with further results, but I had noticeably greater trouble assembling kills with only four tutors. Ad Nauseam definitely worked better without Petition, but I feel like there are a number of unorthodox ways to assemble an excellent hand without going for the redzone immediately, and that optimizing those lines of play is better than cutting back to four ≥4-cost business spells.
Again, playstyle impacts all of this quite a bit, and I'm less enthusiastic about Petition than I was when I started playing the deck, but I don't think it's worth it to cut our fifth piece of mana-intensive business for low-impact or slow cards, especially when even Miracles presents a fast clock (Monastery Mentor). Empty, good as it can be, is really bad in a number of matchups, so I don't maindeck it.
Your input/criticism is always appreciated!
Hey Ronald Deuce,
I should have noted that I already gave the "it's late and I've had a few drinks response."
I play Top and like it quite a bit. It extends the hand and is too good against so much hate like CotV, Thalia, discard, etc. I've upped my main board to 2 and I'm usually happy to see it.
Thanks a lot for the response! I'm with you; Top's really good if we've got the mana and the time to capitalize on it. I have a lot of fast matchups to deal with in my meta, though, and it feels a bit like I'm throwing a turn when I play it, especially against D&T and the like.Quote:
Originally Posted by ScottW
Speaking of D&T, got swept by it today; game 1, I was dead if I let Thalia resolve, so I had to dump my hand to tutor out a Cabal Therapy. I was about a turn away from a combo in spite of that, but it didn't happen quickly enough. In game 2, he landed Mom, Revoker, Thalia, and Canonist. I had nothing to deal with that, though I'm not sure it's worth it to start boarding in Massacre again. He had a Prelate in hand on the last turn, so things were going nowhere fast and probably wouldn't have improved even if I'd had Massacre. Good as I think Prelate and Recruiter are for D&T in games that go long, it felt like he didn't need them if he got a strong opener.
Had a similar matchup against Maverick today. I think I punted game 1 by keeping a bad hand and trying to AdN for value down to 5 life, but in the next game I got skewered by Thalia followed by Gaddock a turn before I could've Decayed and won.
Beat Posts and S&T 2-0, though, and the S&T matchup was pretty crazy. Sealed game 2 with an Empty for 16, which I tried on a whim. Does anyone else bring in Empty for that matchup? Think it was a tad lucky, because I had a Therapy for flashback to take his Show and Tell.
the main problem for me with S&T is only leyline. If you know that your opponent doesn't play them, empty is completely useless. If you are unsure you can face the match in this way:Quote:
Originally Posted by Ronald Deuce
1)deal with leyline with empty
2)deal with leyline with boucing spell
3)don't care about leyline
everytime I went for the third option, I lost. Really, once an opponent mulliganed to 5 just to find a leyline, with no lands in hand.
I'd go with the second option: empty is good when it's a fast option; in this matchup you have to storm turn 1, loosing too much time gives the opponent the opportunity to combo off before you. And with leyline on the field you cannot use discard to reduce his hand and make him harder to win.
Bouncing spells probably will be eaten by counterspells, but at least you have an opportunity, and if you have xantid you can play the bouncer in your turn, who cares.
Xantid is bad.Quote:
Originally Posted by Morden
If I suspect Leyline, I bring in one Krosan Grip. It's not optimal but at least it deals with Leyline, Sneak Attack without drawbacks.
Interesting info re: S&T, guys! Appreciate the discussion. Personally, I haven't seen Leyline of Sanctity from that player, but that doesn't mean he doesn't (or won't) run it. I actually sideboard very lightly for the matchup, usually only switching my Petition for a Tendrils. Thought I'd give Empty a shot to see what would happen, and I guess it paid off. One thing about Empty that I feel is uniquely useful is that we can hip-shoot it floating only 4 mana without worrying about hitting storm 10, so on Sunday in the S&T match I played it against an uncertain hand that had managed to stop me from developing a mana surplus for the Infernal Tutor I had in my hand. Still weak to Flusterstorm (and a host of other things), but I like its curveball potential.
I've got an unrelated question. Lately I've started to see lists get pretty good results running 15 lands, 4 high-cost business spells, and a split of 1 PiF to 1 Petition. I don't mean to denigrate people who are doing this, but I can't make sense of a build like that. I like Petition, but I feel like one needs a redundant PiF or a redundant Petition to make 5-big-spell lists work, and on only 4, I can't see why it would be better to split the two slots rather than going double-PiF. Can anyone shed light on this?
I don't like empty in the main, but play some in the board for the reason you gave, plus they're sometimes nice against Eldrazi.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ronald Deuce
I play 1 ToA, 1 AdN, 1 PiF, 1 DP, and I like it because it's more flexible - PiF is definitely very good, and I think running two is perfectly defensible, but I like that the DP can be Past in Flames sometimes, and other things other times (at the cost, perhaps, of not always being as efficient as just having the PiF naturally). Also, I find myself doing the LED -> PiF -> cantrips value play much less than some other people here do (though I think many of those players have more experience than me, so they might have more insight).
Agree. Krosan grip can be really good, sometimes (rarely, but happens) they land sneak or omni but they don't find a finisher.Quote:
Originally Posted by CabalTherapy
Xantid is not my favourite card, I have only 1 in my sideboard, but I see no reasons to not play it in this matchup......
Hmm, I don't think so. Especially if you have the ability to play and flash back cabal therapy. Applying pressure with double discard is very deadly.Quote:
Originally Posted by Morden
What are your guys thoughts on sanctum prelate? the card simultaneously scares the hell out of me but also I think "3 CMC lolz". I'm considering doing a heavy thoughtseize build with ad nauseam in the board in favor of empty and swapping the duress for thoughtseize.
Sure. Play all the Xantids you have in your board. But generally speaking one is better off without any at the moment. It doesn't seem that this will change in the near future.Quote:
Originally Posted by Morden
Storm palyers don't know the phrase "scares the hell out of me". I wouldn't change the deck only because some shitty white card got printed. DnT doesn't even want to run this thing that much (source: DnT thread) and casting costs are too awkward for Thalia Stompy, where there are better dudes at cc3/4. Daze it, destroy it, win before. I am always asking myself: Is this card better than Thalia/Teeg against us? No? Well, then it'll only be a second choice.Quote:
Originally Posted by rlesko
1, EtW - I imagine Faerie being mostly a target for Recruiter but would have it for more likely than a random sweeper, 14 can't be beaten otherwiseQuote:
Originally Posted by JamieW89
2, as given I'd try to win... it's 3-4 Snapcasters+2BS and 1 more turn against 3FoW+1-2CS now
what actually happened?
also have one:
G2 on draw against Infect ... Op mulls 6, starts fetch->Hierarch ... we know he has most likely only 1xSE in the SB, assuming 4FoW 4Daze
hand: GP, ADN, BS, IT, TOA, LED, Volc
draw for the turn: LED
How do you play the T1? (optional BS spoiler is up in the quote)
Both options won against D&T, but after the match we agreed that Empty was perhaps a bit safer, unless you expect multiple sweepers. If they keep StP in they can beat it with 2nd land, mystic, plow and any follow-up creature. Maybe a fear of something like TiTi would let them keep some StP's, which would probably make the PiF line better. However, everyone knows I really like Empty (I usually run it main, used it against him in every game during our last match), so I went with PiF.Quote:
Originally Posted by Slosh
I should have given more information regarding the second example. The Miracles player had no mana open with just 3 lands in play. He also appeared to have no lands in hand. The top three of his library appeared to consist of 3's, 5's, and 6's as my spells (including LED,Rit,Cabal Rit, and PiF) either resolved or met spell-based interaction despite the lock on the table (I am not completely sure whether he ever flipped top or not.. We'll assume he never did - otherwise all the assumptions might fizzle :P).
As such the odds for the Tendrils kill are just those of dodging the 3 remaining Forces in 8 cards (5 unknown hand cards and top 3). The odds for the Empty line mainly consist of dodging 2 Brainstorms in 5 hand cards and dodging 3 Terminus in the top 4 (from which the top-3 seemed full of high cost spells). Snapcaster Mage would not have done it with just three lands and one turn.
Given these assumptions the chance of dodging a Force was about (32/35)*(31/34)*(30/33)*(29/32)*(28/31)*(7/10)*(6/9)*(5/8) which is 18.1%.
The chance of dodging 2 brainstorms was about (33/35)*(32/34)*(31/33)*(30/32)*(29/31) = 73.1%
The chance of dodging 3 Terminus in the top-3 was about (7/10)*(6/9)*(5/8)*(43/45) = 27.9%
The combined odds for the Goblins line are 20.4%
Assumptions:
1) None of 20 lands, 1 CB lock, and 4 used spells in his hand. (Actually 2 of the Terminus are unlikely to be in his hand, but didn't account for that)
2) Only 3/5/6 cmc cards in the top-3.
3) 3 Mentor, 3 FoW, 3 Terminus, 1 CJ as unplaced 3/5/6 cmc cards.
Given also that there are more hidden odds that beat the Goblins line (e.g. a Ponder kept in hand due to mana limitations or potential fow pitch could further increase the chance to find a Terminus, or playing SCM->BS to hit a land as 4th card if the top-3 does not have Terminus) the two lines are quite close.
I went with the Goblins, felt like it was wrong after, but if this math is any decent (not the greatest likely, but it's a complex situation and we need some dodgy assumptions) then it didn't really matter much.
I cannot find the Brainstorm spoiler, but in this spot I'd probably want to take our free kills if they exist (Infect isn't that easy, we're on the draw, our hand can work out badly if we just Probe first, Daze being annoying on our Brainstorm is still an issue turn-2, and they see a ton more cards potentially as well as having access to cards like Flusterstorm if they did have them).Quote:
Originally Posted by Slosh
If our first decision is to actually cast the Brainstorm on turn one, the key theme becomes the sequencing of spells versus Daze. We can lead with (1) Volc, LED, LED, Brainstorm, which minimizes the chance of a LED getting dazed, but begs the Brainstorm to get dazed, or with (2) Volc, Brainstorm, LED, LED when they will clearly daze the 2nd LED. It does give you more flexibility though as you could find things like Petal, discard+land etc. Option (3) is playing Volc, LED, LED, then putting Probe on the stack, and responding by Brainstorming, so that you can sacrifice your LEDs to pay for a potential daze. This seems quite weak, as it needs to hit something like Infernal + Dark Rit/Cabal Rit if they do have Daze. It also will not let you reevaluate your hand after the brainstorm if you'd want to.
I guess I'd just play the Volcanic and Brainstorm, intending to follow it up with two LEDs, and probing into AdN revealing the best card we have if they do nothing. But the cards we draw from the Brainstorm can change that (as will any Daze ofcourse).
What did/would you do?
Agreed wholeheartedly. There are plenty of matchups in which it's great, but a lot in which it's really, really bad.Quote:
Originally Posted by taconaut
Thanks for the input! The main thing I'm wondering is why you'd only run four ≥4cmc spells if you're only running one Petition and one PiF. I've really found a second PiF to be stellar against countermagic, and I used to play double-Petition, which is really fast and flexible (both builds ran five ≥4 spells). I guess the best way to express my thinking is with these questions:Quote:
Originally Posted by taconaut
—If you're running four ≥4 spells, why not run a second PiF to shore up your kills against Force et al. and give you the chance to search for more cards?
—If you're running Petition, why run only four ≥4 spells, when five would give you more speed and a greater threat density?
—If you're running four ≥4 spells to optimize Ad Nauseam, aren't you banking on your opponent's not running countermagic if you're only running one PiF?
—If you're running 15 lands maindeck, why not run an extra business spell to reduce flooding and increase your threat density?
Don't mean to grill you over your choice; I just wonder what the reasoning is when it feels contrary to most of what longtime stormers say and what I've picked up since I started playing the deck. I'm interested to hear from anyone else who's tried the build in question, as well. Thanks in advance!
1, Ok I see your point, did not respect swords G2, imo doesn't compensate for Faerie+hypothetical GY hate > hypothetical sweepers and I'd stick with EtWQuote:
Originally Posted by JamieW89
2, this is a well elaborated answer for a vaguely presented scenario =D ... with more info I like your choice better, can't argue with your math, a FoW on top is more likely to get juggled around not using Ponders, because what does he have in his hand anyway...
3, BS was the first line of the reply quote - BS->LP, DR,IT ... so far I played Volc, LED, he asked me for exact wording on LED, played 2nd LED, BSed - he had no response... I know the guy is unsure in the MU thus totaly unpredictable, I was able to make him 2x FoW really weak traps G1 and win but I think he'd Daze the BS if he had 1
I thought about your words. In fact, thoughtseize can replace xantid. I board it against reanimator, infect, S&T basically. Not miracle, 'cause it's useless against countertop, canonist, and can be killed by swords/terminus/izzet. So, looking at those matchups, I see the problem that they are very fast, like us, and can be important to disrupt their plan rather than protect us.Quote:
Originally Posted by CabalTherapy
All of them can win easily turn 2.....if our turn 1 is land->xantid->go, it's a joke for them. Land->thoughtseize can be very annoying instead for them.....and life points in these matchups don't really care.
Do you agree with this?
(1) I have a second one in the board, and it is great against countermagic. The Philly meta, at least around me, doesn't have as much countermagic (it's more permanent-based hate like Eldrazi, etc) so I can get away with just the first copy in the main. Also, I play seven discard spells, which also helps with countermagic. I also don't like opening hands like: ToA, PiF, PiF, Volc, Lotus Petal, Probe, Fetch, and feel like I get more of those the more expensive spells I put in.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ronald Deuce
(2) I do sometimes feel like I could use a greater threat density, but the two extra tendrils/one extra PiF in the board helps with that. As for the speed, I actually play a chrome mox, and I like Ad Nauseam as a line much more than I think the typical stormer on this board does.
(3) Not necessarily banking on it, but more leaning on discard to clear the way once I've picked my spot. Plus, it does help in those random matchups where they don't have countermagic and we just need to go fast-we've all had those matchups with non-meta decks, and just going for a fast ad nauseam solves a lot of strange problems you can encounter.
(4) I actually don't really feel flooded all that often - it'll happen once in a while, but I feel like the amount of times I get flooded are smaller than the amount of times I'd have to mull no-land hands at 14 lands. I can keep a seven with a fetch and a ponder/probe, but trying to make something like petal into a cantrip on a no-lander always feels terrible. I'd rather have an extra land and get to play magic than have to mull to six or five and just have a huge hole to dig out of.
Other topics people mentioned:
I think for the DnT scenario, the line I'd take would depend on what was in my hand between Past in Flames/Goblins, but honestly, I mostly just try to Ad Nauseam them rather than go for green men against the white creatures deck. It doesn't rely on the graveyard as much, it can't just get blocked by squires, and it's just pretty fast. Had you cut Ad Naus, or couldn't make five mana after tutor or something?
Against Miracles, did the goblins work out? I'm surprised the miracles player kept in that many Terminuses. Going goblins against them feels intuitively awful to me too, but it's hard to say given all the information you've listed. Did you have the Empty in hand and a tutor in hand? Would it have been possible to tutor for discard?
Against Infect, I'd probably just go Volc, Brainstorm if I were feeling frisky, but in the abstract it's super brutal if we get dazed there. Is it possible that it's just safer to volc, probe, see what we have to play around, and work from there? If you see the coast is clear on the probe and draw the Lotus Petal, you can just Brainstorm with lotus petal for daze and put back the ad naus, pass the turn, they can't kill you next turn (right? unless they have like, what, invigorate, mutagenic growth, and two berserks?), then you go and can DR, LED, LED, IT, Ad Naus and win from there?