[Deck] Zoo

Actually I find them to work wonderfully together. KoTR has the ability to infinitely fuel your lavamancer, an interaction that has won me multiple games.

I find that most of the times I drop Knight, as he is only a 2 of in my build, he is 5/5 or better. On turn three I often drop him as a 4/4 and he is a 5/5 by the next two turns. He also dodges Chill, Blue Elemental/Hydroblast, and any other red hating cards that, from what I hear, blue likes to play against us. Add it all up and it's better than Thoctar.

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Originally Posted by hungryLIKEALION

Actually I find them to work wonderfully together. KoTR has the ability to infinitely fuel your lavamancer, an interaction that has won me multiple games.

I find that most of the times I drop Knight, as he is only a 2 of in my build, he is 5/5 or better. On turn three I often drop him as a 4/4 and he is a 5/5 by the next two turns. He also dodges Chill, Blue Elemental/Hydroblast, and any other red hating cards that, from what I hear, blue likes to play against us. Add it all up and it's better than Thoctar.

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Good points. It does have it's advantages and tricks.

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Originally Posted by hungryLIKEALION

He also dodges Chill, Blue Elemental/Hydroblast, and any other red hating cards that, from what I hear, blue likes to play against us. Add it all up and it's better than Thoctar.

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Haha your replies are starting to sound like mine my friend:laugh:

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Originally Posted by Loxodon Baileyarch

It takes me back to Extended too when Saito's deck ran KotR and Treetop Villages. I'm definitely not condoning Treetop Village at all i'm just saying it'd be neat to have a 1of neat land. Too bad it doesn't work that way.

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That's the main reason why Knight is (IMHO) underplayed in Legacy: people try to build around her, while she just needs fetches/(enemy's)wastelands to be descent. Her tutor ability is just nice addition, not the main factor to run her.
It reminds me times when people tried to maximize Goyf with Tarfire (I'm not saying she's even near sir Goyf, just point out the same mistake people made in the past)

Horizon Canopy and/or Barbarian Ring can be nice (actually, they can be nice without Knight =))

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Originally Posted by eq.firemind

Horizon Canopy and/or Barbarian Ring can be nice (actually, they can be nice without Knight =))

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I hadn't thought of trying those cards, actually. I think I will give them a shot. I'm working on a new build anyway.

If you ever see Lands or Stax, a singleton wasteland can kill Tabernacle, which can be useful. I've also used it to stop EE recursion with Academy Ruins.

So, which are the optimal lists that we can find atm?

And the collors?

I really like domain zoo...

creature [23]

4 Dark Confidant
1 Isamaru, Hound of Konda
3 Jötun Grunt
4 Kird Ape
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Tin Street Hooligan/pridemage
4 Wild Nacatl

instant [10]
3 Gaea's Might
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Lightning Helix

sorcery [7]
4 Tribal Flames
3 Vindicate

land [20]
1 Badlands
1 Bayou
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Plateau
1 Savannah
1 Scrubland
2 Taiga
1 Tropical Island
1 Volcanic Island
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills

I went 4-1 and split the finals of a 12-man tournament yesterday with the same list I posted before. I beat Elves, 5c Zoo, UG Thrash, and UG CB/Top. My only loss was to combo.

Some random tech from my opponent in the Zoo mirror: Jotun Grunt. I don't know whether he was running them maindeck or sideboard, but they singlehandedly won him game 2. Goyfs became too small to handle them, so my only outs were Path, Thoctar, chump block plus burn spell (bad), or double burn spell (also bad). Has anyone else played around with Grunts? They seem decent.

I'm currently trying out a list similar to Felipe de Castro's .

It's not traditional Zoo (and he didn't really call it zoo), but it has the same principles.

I'm running the following:

//Creatures - 16
4 Kird Ape
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Mogg Fanatic
4 Tarmogoyf

//Spells - 31
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Lightning Helix
3 Chain Lightning
4 Manamorphose
3 Land Grant
4 Path to Exile
4 Lotus Petal
3 Bequeathal
2 Reckless Abandon

//Land - 13
2 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills
2 Savannah
2 Taiga
2 Plateau
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Plains

The deck tries to address zoo's biggest disadvantage - card advantage. Without black or blue the choices are limited (yes, I know the inherent problems with creature enchantments).

Early game, this deck runs very smoothly, but if it gets held up, it can have some issues. Pre-board it has issues going against control - post board it can be a pretty even match up (red/green have plenty of ways to deal with CBT/Chalice/Trinisphere). It rolls over weenies and usually goblins, too. Post-board against them it's pretty much a cake walk. All but 1 of your creatures are pyroclasm, so it definately goes in the board.

One thing I would like to try and replace is mogg fanatic. He is really weak for this deck (other than the synergy with bequeathal). I'd like to find a replacement for him. I've thought about mongoose.With fetchlands, petals, land grants, manamorphose, and other burn your gy fills up fairly quickly; however, it doesn't seem to be quick enough. Mongoose would, however, shine in a control match up if you manage to sneak him in first turn. Rogue Elephant, too, became an option, but with 13 lands the loss of one really hurts. Thought about Quirion Dryad, but once again, it is a little too slow. Any suggestions would be helpful.

Most importantly, the deck is really fun to play.

Land Grant and Lotus Petal are awful. Land Grant can get countered, which sucks for mana. Lotus Petal sucks because it's definitely card disadvantage and the tempo boost is very temporary and inefficient. If anything, you should run Chrome Mox if you want a tempo boost.

Also, the lack of Price of Progress is really questionable.

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Originally Posted by zulander

-4 Magma Jet, +4 Helix.

It's worth it. Trust me. Also, Thoctar is a beating, play him.

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I am still not convinced. After reading the full thread I got the average opinion that Thoctar is not a must have addition to the deck and is boarded out a lot. My personal view is that due to his color demands he is rather a mid-lategame option in terms of Zoo, so we are already talking about winning within the next turns with what is on the table and additional burn. I am not really set that the deck needs Thoctar. My former Goyfsligh could win without him ;) and I never felt the need of an additional big beater. Yeah on the other hand he is still a 5/4 for 3, so maybe worth trying out. I will at least test him because two slots can be freed. Knight of the Reliquary could also be an alternative. Although I have no experience with him at all he has the opportunity to be really big and serve some extra tricks. What stands against him is that she/he might be too slow for Zoo and potentially makes the deck as a whole too dependant on your graveyard (Goyf/Lavamancer already depend on it).

I am not sold on Helix. OK it does 3 damage which is great. 3 life I render irrelevant unless I have an aggro mirror where it is certainly great. I like Magma Jet because it smoothes out your draw in a deck which has none. In the end this might come down to a choice based on a tourneys meta game.

In addition playing Helix and Thoctar/Knights makes you play RGW and not RGw. From my experiences opponents (if able) always try to screw you on white first because they assume you playing an RG base with b or w splash. Thats the reason I wanted to go lightly on white cards. But maybe this experience is just too subjective because of me playing RGw Goyfsligh with w for 2x Helix and Nacatl. Dunno.

According to the site's search engine, Countryside Crusher has never been mentioned in this thread. Considering that it has seen play in aggro decks already, how many of you have tried using it in the Woolly Thoctar spot?

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Originally Posted by Nihil Credo

According to the site's search engine, Countryside Crusher has never been mentioned in this thread. Considering that it has seen play in aggro decks already, how many of you have tried using it in the Woolly Thoctar spot?

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I render him too slow growing in Zoo as compared to Aggro Loam. Knight definitely can grow itself faster and is probably bigger from the start.

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Originally Posted by Nekrataal

I render him too slow growing in Zoo as compared to Aggro Loam. Knight definitely can grow itself faster and is probably bigger from the start.

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But that is horrible for an aggro deck to do. You are wasting an attack with a 4/4 to make it bigger.

Countryside Crusher draws you into the spells you need while growing itself. Seems like it should at least be tried.

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Originally Posted by Jak.

But that is horrible for an aggro deck to do. You are wasting an attack with a 4/4 to make it bigger.
Countryside Crusher draws you into the spells you need while growing itself. Seems like it should at least be tried.

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But he can also just be a pathetic 3/3 for :1::r::r: for a couple of turns.
I'll test him in 3-cost slot too, but for now Knight seems to have the perfect balance between inicital P/T and ability to grow. Oh, and Knight can't be Hydroblasted.

Furthermore, if you're forced to go on defense (e.g. opposing Tombstalker), you can rely on Knight to sit back and get bigger. I just played one game where I had a 4/4 Knight in play and my opponent played Tombstalker. I obviously couldn't attack without losing Knight, so I sat back in defense, took 5 from Tombstalker, used Knight to tutor for Wooded Foothills, fetched another land, and swung next turn with a 6/6 Knight.

Yea honestly I think Knight's biggest perk over Thoctar is being blast-proof, usually when boarding out Thoctar it was either against decks with alot of land disruption that I was afraid of hitting all 3 colors or vs Blue decks that would likely be bringing in blasts. CSC while it could turn out to be better than Thoctar in terms of P/T and ability to be cast consistantly, it still seems like it would be boarded out versus blue where that wouldn't always have to be the case with Knight.

You're only going to face blast against blue decks, and I think the biggest reason to play a 3cc creature instead of more burn is to avoid Counterbalance. For a while I stopped playing with thoctar, and put in more chain lightning, but that seemed to make the CB matchup a lot worse.

Thoctar is a great topdeck v. control, but you never want to get to topdeck mode, and if you do, Knight will probably be bigger by that time (unless they're playing maindeck relics, but I've got Null Rod in the SB for EE/Relic/Top). If you feel confident enough to fight through an early CB/Top lock and to get control into burn range before they stabilize, I would play some burn over Thoctar or Knight.

On a side note, if you ever see 43 lands, Knight is amazing, as you can put a singleton Wasteland in your board, and tutor it up to kill Tabernacle/Glacial Chasm. It'll only buy you a turn or two, but that's often enough.

Thoctar is good against:

-board control/slow control, including some CB decks
-aggro, including (and especially) the mirror

Thoctar is not good against:

-Daze/Wasteland/Stifle/Sinkhole
-blue blasts
-combo (too slow)

Crusher would be similarly good against board control/slow control, and similarly weak against blue blasts and combo. Although Crusher is a little easier to cast through Wastes/Stifles/Sinkholes (and grows larger when they destroy your lands), it's probably worse in the mirror since it has a toughness of 3 rather than 4. And that's important, because it's actually staying in for the mirror whereas it's usually getting boarded out against Dazes and blue blasts.

I think Crusher is weaker than Knight of the Reliquary, and I'm still unsure how Knight compares to Thoctar.

I think Knight is worse than Wooly Thoctar against aggro (she's smaller in the early game), but can be better against board control decks (depending on if they have graveyard hate or not), and is much better against CB decks. Being able to outgrow goyf, fuel lavamancer, and get basic lands to avoid B2B/Wastelock can really help.