[Deck] GW/x Maverick

Hm, I really like the mana dorks as you have access to 3mana in turn 2 which gives you access to a 2 drop and StP/another mana dork or a zenith for 3 to gaddock teeg in case of a combo matchup. Or at least 2 mana if they wasteland you. It also fixes colors to live with the combo. Deathrite shamans are necessary and hierarchs often do not get removed by StP or LB as they do not seem dangerous. That allows a 2 drop second turn without the fear of daze. Batterskull imo is still a threat! You just have to wait for the right occasion! Here you also are safer with the mana dorks as you can hardcast batterskull eventually.

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Originally Posted by lavafrogg

I'm not sure how maverick has gotten any worse. I think people just moved on to new things ie lots of maverick players have started playing nemisis decks as he is the new 3cc monster on the block. I think a list with multiple pride mages can keep any equipment off the board and then maverick can show why GW hate bears is so strong.

Death and taxes is a DTB and maverick is a better version of that.

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Unless you're fairly far ahead on board, Maverick just loses to TNN. Also, Maverick is unable to run traditional TNN hate cards such as Golgari Charm, Toxic Deluge, Wrath effects, as those cards would severely hurt our deck as well. That isn't where you want to be right now.

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Originally Posted by Arsenal

Unless you're fairly far ahead on board, Maverick just loses to TNN. Also, Maverick is unable to run traditional TNN hate cards such as Golgari Charm, Toxic Deluge, Wrath effects, as those cards would severely hurt our deck as well. That isn't where you want to be right now.

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I haven't found this to be correct. Of all the fair decks, i think that GWb maverick actually has a decent shot against TNN. I think the biggest issue with TNN isn't the card itself, but TNN + equipment. Luckily, GWb has plenty of ways to deal with the equipment itself, from Qasali Pridemage to Krosan Grip to Abrupt decay. With the black splash, you can/should play some ammount of Zealous Persecution in the board, to kill TNN against everything but Merfolk. Normally, Mavericks creatures are bigger than the TNN (Big knights or exalted), so we can just race the TNN. If they want to leave it to block, then we go to our second out, giving our attackers protection. This can come in the form of either Mother of Runes or Sword of Fire and Ice (which I think should be maindecked right now). Finally, if you are playing depths/stage in your Maverick list, if all else fails you can just go over the top with Merit Lage. TNN is a good card, but it is far from unbeatable.

As a Stoneblade player, I've never lost to Maverick unless they're already pretty far ahead on board. Everytime I landed TNN on an even or an ever so slightly behind-for-me board, I've won as all of their anti-creature tech they normally crutch on does nothing and I do not need to fear any Golgari Charm/Wrath effects from them. Also, of all the fair decks, Punishing Jund has the best shot at defeating the numerous SFM-TNN decks out there; loads of spot removal + discard leverages their sacrifice spells (Liliana, I've seen Diabolic Edict run too) and they have access to REB and Pyroblast + Golgari Charm postboard.

Re-reading your example, I don't think you read my initial statement of "unless you're fairly far ahead on board". Your example of having a Mother + Pridemage + SoFI + KotR + holding Zealous/Decay in hand versus a sole TNN... yeah, Maverick is winning that battle. But when I've Supreme Verdicted your board away and you topdeck a Pridemage while also having a Maze of Ith out? You're dead to my topdecked TNN. Your example sort of proves my point; unless Maverick is already fairly far ahead on board, it doesn't have the tools necessary to deal with TNN whereas other midrange decks do.

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Originally Posted by Arsenal

As a Stoneblade player, I've never lost to Maverick unless they're already pretty far ahead on board. Everytime I landed TNN on an even or an ever so slightly behind-for-me board, I've won as all of their anti-creature tech they normally crutch on does nothing and I do not need to fear any Golgari Charm/Wrath effects from them. Also, of all the fair decks, Punishing Jund has the best shot at defeating the numerous SFM-TNN decks out there; loads of spot removal + discard leverages their sacrifice spells (Liliana, I've seen Diabolic Edict run too) and they have access to REB and Pyroblast + Golgari Charm postboard.

Re-reading your example, I don't think you read my initial statement of "unless you're fairly far ahead on board". Your example of having a Mother + Pridemage + SoFI + KotR + holding Zealous/Decay in hand versus a sole TNN... yeah, Maverick is winning that battle. But when I've Supreme Verdicted your board away and you topdeck a Pridemage while also having a Maze of Ith out? You're dead to my topdecked TNN. Your example sort of proves my point; unless Maverick is already fairly far ahead on board, it doesn't have the tools necessary to deal with TNN whereas other midrange decks do.

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No, what I'm saying is that theres many different ways to deal with TNN, not that you need all of them to beat it. Empty board and TNN? Keep equipment off him and its a fairly slow clock. Using him to blank all my attacks? Just need mom or sofai. Winning the combat war? Just go over the top with knight into stage/depths. If you consider having a Knight on the board or having a removal spell in hand (equipment or zealous) "ahead on board" then I guess you're right but none of those things are all that unreasonable.

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Originally Posted by MBTL90

No, what I'm saying is that theres many different ways to deal with TNN, not that you need all of them to beat it. Empty board and TNN? Keep equipment off him and its a fairly slow clock. Using him to blank all my attacks? Just need mom or sofai. Winning the combat war? Just go over the top with knight into stage/depths. If you consider having a Knight on the board or having a removal spell in hand (equipment or zealous) "ahead on board" then I guess you're right but none of those things are all that unreasonable.

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If you have an attacker (KotR, Ooze, etc) + Mother and/or SoFI, I'd call that being far ahead on board. Also, you stated earlier that Maverick is the best suited deck to combat the various TNN decks out there, yet the tourney results do not bear that out. What do you know that others do not? If Maverick is the best anti-TNN deck out there, I have to imagine that more people would be playing it as TNN is everywhere nowadays.

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Originally Posted by Arsenal

If you have an attacker (KotR, Ooze, etc) + Mother and/or SoFI, I'd call that being far ahead on board. Also, you stated earlier that Maverick is the best suited deck to combat the various TNN decks out there, yet the tourney results do not bear that out. What do you know that others do not? If Maverick is the best anti-TNN deck out there, I have to imagine that more people would be playing it as TNN is everywhere nowadays.

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I said of the creature based fair decks, not best deck period to fight TNN. I misspoke a little though, jund is probably better off, and I don't really consider pox/loam "fair decks." Best way to actually beat TNN is to ignore it, ala combo, but I'm an aggro player at heart

I did a fairly in-depth analysis of Maverick pre-TNN and post-TNN in the now locked "Do you want to see TNN go away" thread. In it, I showed that Maverick averaged a 9th place finish for Jan 2013-November 2013 and now that all of Dec 2013's data is in, it dropped to 18th for that month (it's previous low during the Jan-Nov stretch was 13th place).

Unlike other fair decks, Maverick actually has a pretty miserable time trying to 1-for-1 TNN decks, it needs to be fairly far ahead on board (your relevant attacker + Mom/SoFI example) in order to have all of the hatebears synergize and out-advantage the opponent. However, Jund can simply go "resolve Liliana of the Veil, sac your TNN" and now they're super far ahead on board without really even trying that hard. There's nothing like that available in Maverick nor do we play with our own TNN, so we're still relying on having an established board before TNN can start impacting the game. If we don't have that board presence though, we lose those matchups whereas other fair decks that also don't have established board presence can fairly easily get back in the game (Liliana example, playing their own TNN, etc).

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Originally Posted by Arsenal

Unless you're fairly far ahead on board, Maverick just loses to TNN. Also, Maverick is unable to run traditional TNN hate cards such as Golgari Charm, Toxic Deluge, Wrath effects, as those cards would severely hurt our deck as well. That isn't where you want to be right now.

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What is the logic behind death and taxes?

Thank you for your responses.

Flyers. They run Flickerwisp and Serra Avenger, both don't care about TNN at all. Also, their anti-Equipment hate (Revoker) is better than our Pridemage as Revoker can swing for 2 while blanking the opposing Jitte whereas we need to blow up our Pridemage in order for it to impact the board. With D&T being on the SFM plan (most Maverick lists eschew SFM altogether for some reason), they can also apply a fair amount of pressure while not committing much in terms of resources; Maverick needs to have a full board of value creatures in order to eke out an advantage.

They too can just lose to TNN if they don't have the proper board or cards in hand. I've watched games where D&T just loses to TNN when they're ground crew doesn't matter and they're cute Mangara-Karakas combo doesn't save them from a guaranteed 3 points every turn until death. TNN is a slow clock, but a near-inevitable one that simply beats decks that (a.) don't run they're own TNN and (b.) don't run good natural answers to TNN.

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Originally Posted by Arsenal

Flyers. They run Flickerwisp and Serra Avenger, both don't care about TNN at all. Also, their anti-Equipment hate (Revoker) is better than our Pridemage as Revoker can swing for 2 while blanking the opposing Jitte whereas we need to blow up our Pridemage in order for it to impact the board. With D&T being on the SFM plan (most Maverick lists eschew SFM altogether for some reason), they can also apply a fair amount of pressure while not committing much in terms of resources; Maverick needs to have a full board of value creatures in order to eke out an advantage.

They too can just lose to TNN if they don't have the proper board or cards in hand. I've watched games where D&T just loses to TNN when they're ground crew doesn't matter and they're cute Mangara-Karakas combo doesn't save them from a guaranteed 3 points every turn until death. TNN is a slow clock, but a near-inevitable one that simply beats decks that (a.) don't run they're own TNN and (b.) don't run good natural answers to TNN.

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Cool. I'm on SFM with mindcensors main along with multiple ooze and teegs. I guess people just don't play maverick like it should be played.

That being said... Seeing how maverick plays tons of mana dorks... How do decks these days deal with exalted angels? Seems like it could come down reliably enough with all of the other threats in the deck. Exalted angel does not give a fuck about most removal played these days and kills most anything in the air.

Exalted angel? Either it gets killed as it is a morph, or you wait 5/6 rounds to play it and it gets StP'red or countered... I think nowadays that card has too less value for 6 mana. I rather would play thrun over exalted angel as it can't be countered and killed in the first place and is a clock too, but you can play it ealy enough!

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Originally Posted by Stuhl

Exalted angel? Either it gets killed as it is a morph, or you wait 5/6 rounds to play it and it gets StP'red or countered... I think nowadays that card has too less value for 6 mana. I rather would play thrun over exalted angel as it can't be countered and killed in the first place and is a clock too, but you can play it ealy enough!

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You know you can use this logic against any card in magic.

If the morph can survive one turn (Mother), then its not that bad. Blanks Abrupt Decay, requires Jund to 2-for-1 with Bolts and PFire or combat, and flies over the top of TNN for a lifelink profit.

Thrun might come down uncounterable, but he does nothing against TNN. TNN roadblocks him all day creating a stale board and he does nothing against an aggressive TNN.

Sigarda is better - 5 mana, hexproof and zenitable. As much as i like exalted, it works better in stompy variants with sol lands and under a suppresion field.
Maybe mystic enforcer?

In black versions maybe 1-2 lilianas would fit as they are also a good TNN hate.

I'm running my list from last page back for another event tomorrow. Any suggestions would be welcome. In particular, I'm looking for a land to cut for a Cavern of Souls, and perhaps a way to fit in Garruk Relentless or Thrun, the Last Troll (I faced two miracle decks last time; I figure the best way to dodge them is to prepare for them). Despite not facing a single Delver or Merfolk deck the last time, I still expect them to be out in force, along with a few burn decks, some monoblack and a fair bit of combo (Elves, Dredge and S&T in particular). Oh, and a minimum of three miracle decks, unless someone has switched it up since last week. Tall order, anyone?

I've found elspeth to be a really good card vs. Miracles, although I suppose nearly any planeswalker will be good versus them.

Anyone playing GWu maverick for spell pierce and meddling mage? Seems like everything I want to play right now.

Spirit of the Labyrinth. Holy fuck. This might be out ticket back in. Definitely going to cut my 2 Sylvan Library, 1 Path to Exile, 1 Bow of Nylea and start running 4 of her. Thalia and SoL just seems super good versus every single blue deck right now.