[Deck] Czech Pile

Here's an interview with Tomas Mar (the creator of Czech Pile) at MKM that was taking place yesterday and today.
He talks about the DRS banning and the future of the Legacy meta and the future of BUG / Grixis / 4C Control.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhK9B4SoUkc

Some general points he mentioned:
- Combo is great at the moment, together with DnT, Miracles, Lands and Aggro Loam.
- He also proposes that RUG isn't that great anymore (with him having played it a lot in the past as well)
- SFM is outdated and those decks usually aren't fantastic vs combo. He proposes Blade decks will fall off soon.

Grixis / BUG / 4C Control:
- DRS wasn't actually all that important in the grand scheme of things and he is pretty sure decks like these can still thrive.
- From what I can gather, he feels that 4 colors might still be mandatory, depending on how much Miracles is present. Decay and Life from the Loam will be big players in these kinds of decks, since he feels that Decay and Red Blasts are both really important in that matchup. Loam will have to be a crutch without DRS.
- Strix is going to be good in this meta, which is one of the reasons why RUG Delver will struggle more; RUG has gained nothing new and decks like these defenitely have gained a lot through the years.

I don't know what Tomas exactly played at MKM, but I'm sure lists will be posted soon enough and we can have a look at what direction he's taken.

This weekend I played a list similar to the one MEWTU posted above.

Main:

9 Creatures
4 Baleful Strix
3 Snapcaster Mage
2 Gurmag Angler

3 Planeswalkers
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Liliana, the Last Hope

28 Spells
4 Force of Will
2 Counterspell
3 Thoughtseize
1 Inquisition of Kozilek
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
2 Preordain
2 Lighting Bolt
2 Fatal Push
2 Kolaghan's Command
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Diabolic Edict

20 Lands
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Polluted Delta
2 Bloodstained Mire
2 Island
1 Swamp
3 Underground Sea
3 Volcanic Island
1 Badlands

Side:

2 Hymn to Tourach
2 Hydroblast
2 Pyroblast
1 Flusterstorm
1 Dead / Gone
1 Diabolic Edict
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Marsh Casualties


It was a 4 rounds + top 4 tournament. I went 2-1-1 in the Swiss rounds, won the first match of the top 4 and then we split the final.

Overall the deck performed very well! It's very good against lands, d&t and, red prison decks, which are about 60% of my local meta lol

I will probably add 1 or 2 Engineered Explosives in the side to deal with enchantments, as I lost to a RIP+Helm combo and got a draw against an Academy Rector / curses deck. I might also add another Thoughtseize and remove the Inquisition of Kozilek.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Yeaux

Hey Mewtu - glad to see somebody else is having success with Grixis right now. Yesterday I ran the Grixis Control list that the Brainstorm Show podcast guys talked about through a League and went 5-0. The list is:

Nice work!

I really liked Gurmag and Bitterblossom. Sticking an early BB against most control decks or even decks you generally have a hard time closing out allowed me to have the constant pressure that control decks like this can lack sometimes. Sometimes fetching the basics to play around wastelands was awkward, but without any main deck hymns, it's not too bad. The amount of wastelands that were invalidated from my opponents I miss hymns, but this deck having four MD targeted removal makes up for it a bit. Next time I run it through a league, I'll likely move the MD moon to the side for another JTMS or other sticky threat.

---

Interesting take with the heavy basics + maindeck Blood Moon. Was it good enough? I feel like 5 basics is at least 1 too many and possibly 2, and Blood Moon is a super polarizing card right now - either very good or very bad, for the most part. I don't really love having too many cards like that in my maindeck (I do have Edict and Deluge to be fair though) so don't think I'd want it main. Same goes for Bitterblossom (being polarizing) -- I was considering playing 1 in my sideboard exactly for Miracles like you said. We'll have to see if that becomes a big enough part of the metagame and is a bad enough matchup to warrant it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Misersoneof

Was waiting to see if this deck would be kicked out of the DTB section but I guess Czech Pile (or Grixis Control??) is here to stay.

1. Sneak and Show

This deck was one that I thought was not discussed enough after the deathrite ban. It lost nothing in the banning other than its worst matchup (grixis delver) and a slightly unfavored matchup (storm). I think this will be the deck to beat going forward. Additionally, the Japanese are also notorious for their love of show and tell. What cards are important to have against this deck?

Do you disagree with anything that I have written above?

---

The only thing I disagree with -- if you think (or hope, like me hehe) that Storm is dead then you are sadly mistaken, my friend. Otherwise agree and I think Grixis can still be tier 1.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by supachai

Hi all,

As the author of this deck's Primer, I wanted to have a quick discussion on how to proceed with this thread. With DRS gone, the future of this deck is certainly going to be different. I already added a note in the history section that this will bring significant implications. It may become Grixis focused or BUG, or maybe both will exist in some form. I suppose the question is, should we keep this thread as a place to discuss these new versions or create new ones and leave this one as a small piece of Legacy history?

I realize the meta is in flux and will take some time to stabilize. If we are to keep this one, I could potentially try to update the primer with new information and lists. I also wouldn't be opposed to someone else taking the mantle in a new thread as I will be busying taking a new job in the coming months. Please chime in on your thoughts. It is sad that Czech Pile was such a short-lived deck, but I am happy that I was able to contribute to the community in some way, and I hope that the deck adapts and continues to exist in some shape or other.

---

I think that the name Czech Pile (and thus the thread) should remain based around UBx(x) value based control as it has always been. I think Grixis will be overall both stronger than BUG and closer to the original archetype (like you said, BUG lists are gonna start sticking in Hierarchs, and Goyfs and get pretty green -- we are closer to UBx with a very light splash) but really, time will tell.

I would say you can have BUG Leovold and Grixis Control (Czech Pile if you still want to call it that; I typically love funky decknames and miss getting to play with Solar Flare, Structure & Force, URzatron etc; but for whatever reason never loved Czech Pile haha -- that's neither here nor there though) as the two branches of what was originally 4CC/Cz Pile, basically.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DemolitionColorScheme

Here's an interview with Tomas Mar (the creator of Czech Pile) at MKM that was taking place yesterday and today.
He talks about the DRS banning and the future of the Legacy meta and the future of BUG / Grixis / 4C Control.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhK9B4SoUkc

Some general points he mentioned:
- Combo is great at the moment, together with DnT, Miracles, Lands and Aggro Loam.
- He also proposes that RUG isn't that great anymore (with him having played it a lot in the past as well)
- SFM is outdated and those decks usually aren't fantastic vs combo. He proposes Blade decks will fall off soon.

Grixis / BUG / 4C Control:
- DRS wasn't actually all that important in the grand scheme of things and he is pretty sure decks like these can still thrive.
- From what I can gather, he feels that 4 colors might still be mandatory, depending on how much Miracles is present. Decay and Life from the Loam will be big players in these kinds of decks, since he feels that Decay and Red Blasts are both really important in that matchup. Loam will have to be a crutch without DRS.
- Strix is going to be good in this meta, which is one of the reasons why RUG Delver will struggle more; RUG has gained nothing new and decks like these defenitely have gained a lot through the years.

I don't know what Tomas exactly played at MKM, but I'm sure lists will be posted soon enough and we can have a look at what direction he's taken.

---

At work but definitely going to watch this later. Totally agree that DRS wasn't that important to 4CC. It was more of a necessary evil but I think the deck is just as powerful without it while playing in a meta without it. It was a lightning rod for removal and the banning now makes removal very bad against us (love when my Strix gets StP'd :D), and now we can play 4 Thoughtseize maindeck and not feel bad about it; it's my favorite turn 1 play in this list now, and also just in general.

Interesting take on the still needing 4 colors though and not sure I agree there. The main appeal to playing green was basically T2 Leovold. Since we can't do that any more, I don't see needing to further stretch our landbase just to play what will basically end up a singleton Decay maindeck and maybe another (one, two TOPS) sideboard; and Life from the Loam isn't really where I want to be at, that seems kind of random. Besides enchantment hate in Decay, everything that we would consider running from Green (Sylvan Library, Ancient Grudge, what am I missing?) is pretty easily replaced IMO. If you're that terrified of Counterbalance (I'm not, really) then running straight Grixis with a few EE's somewhere in the 75 (some are even running them maindeck, probably in my Toxic Deluge slot) is just better against the field while still being decent in those scenarios.

Do agree that Strix is still amazing, probably my favorite card in the deck (besides Thoughtseize :D)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Politta

This weekend I played a list similar to the one MEWTU posted above.

Main:


2 Hymn to Tourach
2 Hydroblast
2 Pyroblast
1 Flusterstorm
1 Dead / Gone
1 Diabolic Edict
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Marsh Casualties


It was a 4 rounds + top 4 tournament. I went 2-1-1 in the Swiss rounds, won the first match of the top 4 and then we split the final.

Overall the deck performed very well! It's very good against lands, d&t and, red prison decks, which are about 60% of my local meta lol

I will probably add 1 or 2 Engineered Explosives in the side to deal with enchantments, as I lost to a RIP+Helm combo and got a draw against an Academy Rector / curses deck. I might also add another Thoughtseize and remove the Inquisition of Kozilek.

---

Nice! What'd you play against?

How'd you like the MD Deluge/Edict? Those are kind of the slots I'm most unsure of since they're polarizing cards (either very good or nearly useless like I mentioned above).

What'd you bring Dead/Gone in against? Do you think it was better than just another Edict?

You went pretty heavy on GY hate in the sideboard, did that pay off?

Agreed on TS vs IoK - I'm of the opinion that it's basically always incorrect to play IoK over TS in Legacy. The potential risk of the opponent having a blockbuster card that we need to remove (Jace, Ad Nauseam, FoW, the list goes on) is just too high, and with the lower lifeloss in the format due to duals vs shocks the pain is negligible in most cases.

I was on vacation last week but will probably mess with the deck online at some points this week and then playing it with the gang on Sunday - will report back with thoughts and results. Going to make some minor tweaks to my list, probably try to squeeze in another creature (likely Snapcaster Mage) in the maindeck, and maybe mess with those two flex slots I've been mentioning. And some slight sideboard tweaks.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MEWTU

Nice! What'd you play against?

How'd you like the MD Deluge/Edict? Those are kind of the slots I'm most unsure of since they're polarizing cards (either very good or nearly useless like I mentioned above).

What'd you bring Dead/Gone in against? Do you think it was better than just another Edict?

You went pretty heavy on GY hate in the sideboard, did that pay off?

Agreed on TS vs IoK - I'm of the opinion that it's basically always incorrect to play IoK over TS in Legacy. The potential risk of the opponent having a blockbuster card that we need to remove (Jace, Ad Nauseam, FoW, the list goes on) is just too high, and with the lower lifeloss in the format due to duals vs shocks the pain is negligible in most cases.

---

I played against Mono Red Prision (2-0), Academy Rector / curses (1-1), RIP+Helm combo (0-2), and D&T (2-0). In the top four I played against another D&T (2-0) and split the finals with the guy that was playing Academy Rector / curses.

The graveyard hate was because the week before we had 2 dredge players + 2/3 reanimator players! None of them showed up this time tho lol

I really liked the main deck edict, but I might replace the deluge with the Dead/Gone that I'm bringing in almost every match lol It's useful agains lands kid of decks, but also against d&t, maverick, tcc decks etc

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MEWTU

Interesting take on the still needing 4 colors though and not sure I agree there. The main appeal to playing green was basically T2 Leovold. Since we can't do that any more, I don't see needing to further stretch our landbase just to play what will basically end up a singleton Decay maindeck and maybe another (one, two TOPS) sideboard; and Life from the Loam isn't really where I want to be at, that seems kind of random. Besides enchantment hate in Decay, everything that we would consider running from Green (Sylvan Library, Ancient Grudge, what am I missing?) is pretty easily replaced IMO. If you're that terrified of Counterbalance (I'm not, really) then running straight Grixis with a few EE's somewhere in the 75 (some are even running them maindeck, probably in my Toxic Deluge slot) is just better against the field while still being decent in those scenarios.

---

I basically took the opposite approach to yours - cutting Red (my lists always skewed a little greener than most anyway, never went to 3 Kolaghan's Command or below 2 Decay) and have been very happy with it. I'm on striaght BUG with 4 one mana discard spells (3/1 TS/IoK) and 2 Pierce. Tarmogoyf is an absolute hammer in the current meta and closes games very quickly against Loam, Lands, and combo while locking Delver decks off of the ground. The big change BUG has to make is to focus on being more efficient and less focused on value (without going quite so far as being a Delver deck). You do give up some equity against Jace, but Leo is a solid answer to Jace and Painful Truths and Sylvan Library help you keep up. I'll add Loam to the list of stuff to test, especially if I'm going to try a 4c list.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Politta

I played against Mono Red Prision (2-0), Academy Rector / curses (1-1), RIP+Helm combo (0-2), and D&T (2-0). In the top four I played against another D&T (2-0) and split the finals with the guy that was playing Academy Rector / curses.

The graveyard hate was because the week before we had 2 dredge players + 2/3 reanimator players! None of them showed up this time tho lol

I really liked the main deck edict, but I might replace the deluge with the Dead/Gone that I'm bringing in almost every match lol It's useful agains lands kid of decks, but also against d&t, maverick, tcc decks etc

---

ahh haha word.

Yeah the Edict has been nice for me, and same exact thought on the Deluge. When it's good, it's REALLY good, like game endingly good -- but when you draw it vs like Miracles or Lands or whatever you feel like a dummy. I actually played around with the slot abit last night which I'll highlight below.

I like the versatility of Dead/Gone, that's a cool idea.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by btm10

I basically took the opposite approach to yours - cutting Red (my lists always skewed a little greener than most anyway, never went to 3 Kolaghan's Command or below 2 Decay) and have been very happy with it. I'm on striaght BUG with 4 one mana discard spells (3/1 TS/IoK) and 2 Pierce. Tarmogoyf is an absolute hammer in the current meta and closes games very quickly against Loam, Lands, and combo while locking Delver decks off of the ground. The big change BUG has to make is to focus on being more efficient and less focused on value (without going quite so far as being a Delver deck). You do give up some equity against Jace, but Leo is a solid answer to Jace and Painful Truths and Sylvan Library help you keep up. I'll add Loam to the list of stuff to test, especially if I'm going to try a 4c list.

---

Word, interesting take. I played against a similar list last night. Luckily didn't have too much trouble with Goyf due to Strix and Push/Snapcasters.

Some random testing results from last night (just from tournament practice room as I was drinking while messing with the list between matches and didn't feel like running a league, so kind of meaningless hehe but I'm bored at work)

I played around with the Blood Moons in the sideboard and the Deluge in the maindeck, ended up adding another Lili to the main and moving the Deluge + 2 more sweepers (Deluge #2 and EE) to the sideboard. I also added a Spell Pierce in there somehow but don't remember exactly how haha. And went -1 Preordain +1 Snapcaster Mage maindeck which I think I really like.

Played vs Reanimator and got absolutely ranched. Game 1 he mulliganed to 4 and still was able to reanimate the big white Thalia dude (forget the name) which I held off for a while with a Strix but just got flooded out and eventually he reanimated an Elesh Norn and beat me down. Game 2 I had an interesting decision and opted for T1 Nihil Spellbomb, T2 Thoughtseize (rather than other way around), which I think was correct but he topdecked exactly the Reanimate to allow him to use every single card in his hand to reanimate a Griselbrand. Maybe I played it slightly wrong, idk. Basically just drew very poorly in these games with few counterspells and hate cards, don't think it's a GREAT matchup though but certainly winnable.

Then I played BUG Control like btm10 mentioned above. Game 1 went long with both of us blasting each others' hands (he was heavy on Hymn) and killing our threats), we ended with like 15 cards in our deck each. At one point he played a Leovold, I untapped and .... brainstormed. Heh. I blame the beer. Lost that one super closely, feel I would've won if I hadn't punted that (I had Snapcaster for Fatal Push in my hand at the time of the BStorm). Then easily won game 2 and 3. Game 2 he tried to do some stuff with Life from the Loam, idk it seems pretty irrelevant and I just eventually resolved a Jace or something and killed or countered every single thing he ever played, game 3 went about the same and I beat him down with an Angler. Lili Last Hope into -2 to grab a Strix or SCM is so amazing against Abrupt Decay, Red Elemental Blast was really nice, and they have next to zero answers for Angler. I think we're just favored in this matchup, he even had Wasteland but it wasn't that consequential (and probably not running the full 4 anyway, I'm guessing 2 or 3). Would love to test this one more as I love the grindy matchups like this, btm10 if you play MTGO we could definitely play some games some time, lmk.

Then pretty easily 2-0ed storm, so now I'm 2-2 vs the archetype and feeling a lot better than I originally was -- heavy discard, some permission plus a quick clock in Angler did the trick. I'm almost considering going to 3 Anglers but drawing 2 can be awkward.

The second Liliana was great in the BUG Control matchup and useless in the other so not yet sold on that slot. Like I said though really liked the shift to 2 Preordain 3 Snapcaster Mage and will probably stay there.

(Also let me know if these types of anecdotes aren't useful and/or interesting and I'll stop posting them and stick to true League/paper tournament posts, but I think it can be kind of fun - I enjoy reading them when other people post, anyway)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DemolitionColorScheme

Here's an interview with Tomas Mar (the creator of Czech Pile) at MKM that was taking place yesterday and today.
He talks about the DRS banning and the future of the Legacy meta and the future of BUG / Grixis / 4C Control.

---

What's up with the interviewer? He seems pretty annoyed. Super unprofessional.

Looking through some Grixis list that placed well these few days:

https://mtgdecks.net/Legacy/lps-invi...urnament-51843
https://mtgdecks.net/Legacy/preserva...urnament-51845
https://mtgdecks.net/Legacy/grand-pr...urnament-51832 (big event)

Some of the commonalities of the lists i noticed were:
3-4 Baleful Strix
3-4 Snapcaster Mage
2 Thoughtseize
3 Hymn to tourach
2 Jace, TMS
8 Cantrips

The interesting difference was the creatures played: TNN, Angler and even Kess.

While i agree with Tomas's view that green is very good against miracles with leovold and decay but playing early discards can circumvent cards like counterbalance or jace. Secondly, the card advantage engine has always been anchored in the grixis colours and not green (snapcaster, command and hymn).

Good to see Grixis still putting up results after drs banning. Maybe it will take a while to find the optimal list.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by beta

Secondly, the card advantage engine has always been anchored in the grixis colours and not green (snapcaster, command and hymn).

---

This confused me, can you please elaborate what you mean? Snapcaster is a blue card, hymn is a black card, so the only card you mentioned in that list that's Grixis is K Command, which is a fairly new card. I obviously misunderstood something :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by RhoxWarMonk

This confused me, can you please elaborate what you mean? Snapcaster is a blue card, hymn is a black card, so the only card you mentioned in that list that's Grixis is K Command, which is a fairly new card. I obviously misunderstood something :)

---

:eyebrow: exactly
To play commands you must be on grixis colors not bugs ones

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by NegatorITA

:eyebrow: exactly
To play commands you must be on grixis colors not bugs ones

---

Yea what I meant was the cards giving us card advantage are all grixis in colour, or made up to be grixis. Like snap, hymn and command. I am arguing the fact that what made Czech pile strong back then was that it primarily function as a grixis deck splashing for green, and although drs is banned, we can still potentially tap on the grixis cards which was the engine for Czech pile all along.

Apologies, English isn’t my first language.:tongue:h

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by beta

Yea what I meant was the cards giving us card advantage are all grixis in colour, or made up to be grixis. Like snap, hymn and command. I am arguing the fact that what made Czech pile strong back then was that it primarily function as a grixis deck splashing for green, and although drs is banned, we can still potentially tap on the grixis cards which was the engine for Czech pile all along.

Apologies, English isn’t my first language.:tongue:h

---

No need to apologize at all, I just misunderstood the part about k command :) I agree the value engine is certainly grixis and it's very viable but many are having some success with Bug control as well. I do think this shell is better for what the deck is trying to do though and I also feel bug is more a midrange deck right now than anything.

Many grixis (and more miracle) in today challenge, I'm pleased by this and my new underground sea, so is time to build grixis control again? Or will fade away at the next gp?

Thanks Mewtu and Demolition for the feedback. Appreciate it.

Interesting perspective by Tomas Mar as well. I certainly think value-control will continue to exist in some form, and I'm perfectly okay keeping the Czech Pile thread as the primary place to discuss these new decks, even if they are different colors. Hopefully I can find some time to update the primer.

Guys I just wanted to say, on the Discord there is TONS of discussion going on. Is it even worth updating/maintaining a thread like this? I'm talking like, 10x more discussion. People chatting back and forth all day long, etc. Compare to the zero to three or so posts we get per day around here.

Does anyone have a link to the discord?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CTlegacy88

Does anyone have a link to the discord?

---

- https://discord.gg/GuBX4wd

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MEWTU

Guys I just wanted to say, on the Discord there is TONS of discussion going on. Is it even worth updating/maintaining a thread like this? I'm talking like, 10x more discussion. People chatting back and forth all day long, etc. Compare to the zero to three or so posts we get per day around here.

---

I think it's worth to people that don't want to hop on the Discord-train. I mean, I'm active there all day (as Arafúra), but I can imagine there are still folks out there that don't use Discord or don't wanna.

Looks like Grixis Control is the most played list at the Pro Tour, with a whooping 20 entries! Sneak n Show and Eldrazi were 2 and 3 respectively.

We'll see how it does this weekend but I thought that was extremely interesting.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by RhoxWarMonk

Looks like Grixis Control is the most played list at the Pro Tour, with a whooping 20 entries! Sneak n Show and Eldrazi were 2 and 3 respectively.

We'll see how it does this weekend but I thought that was extremely interesting.

---

Where did you see this exactly? Is there any listing or footage?