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I doubt I'd bring it in against Survival. They're bringing in Grip to deal with your Counterbalance. I'd probably board in a Blast or three against them instead.
Against Painter I probably would. That would probably be a complete blowout against them.
Played ITF today and went 4-1-1. ID against 75-card-mirror, loss against ANT.
Won against Pox, Aggro Loam, NQGw and Ichorid.
I should have lost to Aggro Loam, but when he played Burning Wish, he recorgnized that he forgot to take that 4 th Life from teh Loam out of his maindeck back to the SB. So he had only 14 cards. He extended his hand and scooped.
It's a good deck, but the matchup against combo is shaky. You actually can't do anything before Turn 2 except Force of Will. And even if you consistently drop Counterbalance on Turn 2, you either have to have SDT played before or be fucking lucky with revealing for *whatever CC you need*.
Against Ichorid it was also retarded.
g1 1st Turn Loss.
g2 double Crypt with Ruins and EE
g3 Crypt with double Goyf and Counterspell. And Mulligan to 5 on his side.
But cool deck after all. I played this list:
// Lands
1 [SH] Volrath's Stronghold
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
4 [ON] Flooded Strand
1 [TSP] Academy Ruins
2 [UG] Island
1 [UG] Plains
3 [B] Underground Sea
4 [B] Tropical Island
2 [B] Tundra
// Creatures
4 [FUT] Tarmogoyf
1 [FD] Eternal Witness
1 [FD] Etched Oracle
// Spells
4 [TE] Intuition
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [CS] Counterbalance
3 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
3 [AP] Pernicious Deed
2 [FD] Engineered Explosives
1 [FD] Vedalken Shackles
1 [RAV] Life from the Loam
4 [MM] Brainstorm
4 [B] Swords to Plowshares
2 [MM] Counterspell
// Sideboard
SB: 3 [TSP] Krosan Grip
SB: 4 [UL] Engineered Plague
SB: 4 [B] Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 4 [DK] Tormod's Crypt
There was another ITF on the 2nd Place but with a stupid manabase (i.e. Basic Forest) and Wasteland.
Whoever that is, they're my hero :DQuote:
Originally Posted by Adan
I played this at a small local tournament(8 player) and I went undefeated. Match 1 was basically CB+Top ftw against burn. Match 2 was ElfBall+Burn which really didn't do squat. And Match 3 was RDW and CB+Top was pimpin again.
And let me add:
O...M...F...G! Etched Oracle is so awesome. It's versatility made it better than Goyf in almost every match. It served as a blocker, attacker, CA, and cleared the top 3 for CB+Top.
Hello Sourcers,
I have been leeching from this site for around 4 years now, always enjoying the posts of respected members such as Deep6er, Hanni, Bardo, AnwarA101, and Anarky87(a close personal friend). Unfortunately for me I live in central Illinois where there are few and far beyond local legacy tournaments. Luckily I was able to make it to GP Columbus and show my worth making a top 64 finish. I am not sure what inclined me to join as a member to The Source but here I am.
This past weekend there was one of those few and far beyond legacy tournaments where an unimpressive 18 people played. Prior to the tournament I had been slinging something similar to Hanni’s GAT lists but, when I saw this thread with a very similar style of play I had to switch. I have this love of casting Counterbalance and Shackles from grinding the PTQs with them. I played almost card for card Deep6er’s list with the following changes:
MD:
-1 Tropical Island
+1 Wasteland
SB:
-3 Spell Snare
+3 Stifle
I wanted a Wasteland main for the long matchup against Landstill that my friend was piloting. And for the board I think Stifle is a better card against Combo than Snare, which is probably imo one of the hardest matchups for this deck.
Long story short we split top 4 for 50 in-store credit each person. Not bad for an 18 man that I used credit to get into in the first place. I didn’t get to play against my friend playing UWb landstill so I am still undecided on the inclusion of Wasteland. I see valid arguments for and against it. One problem that I was having was against Goblins. In my testing of Counterbalance against the Jobbers is it is very poor. Turn 1 they play Lackey/Vial and can cheat guys into play. Their threats are mostly in the 3cc and 4cc range with them topping out at 5. They have very few 1 and 2 drops that I can counter with the balance. I found it very hard to be able to cast Deed and then blow it for 3-4 before I was dead (it actually never happened) due to their mana denial and aggressiveness. So for my sideboarding I played:
-4 Counterbalance
-1 Intuition
-1 Etched Oracle
[-1 Counterspell or -1 EE or -1 Shackle]
For
+4 BEB
+2 Stifle
[+1 Stifle if I take out one of the above]
I like Counterspell left in because the biggest threat I feel is for Joblins to cast Ringleader and getting 2-3 cards, which Stifle really helps with countering Ringleader and protecting my lands from Wasteland (in the rare case I feel it is necessary because usually you can life back your lands) and buying me a turn from a Lackey attack to get ‘Goyf online.
I would love to hear others thoughts about this and also a better way to combat combo. Even with stifle in the Sideboard it is scary to face a good combo player (luckily for me there wasn’t one at the tournament and I beat him 2 games where he had the win in his hand but failed to execute.)
Overall I absolutely love the deck and think it is the best deck in the format, it lets me play to my full potential and gives me so many options. This deck plays the best cards in the format and can definitely beat any deck in legacy.
Couple of things.
1) Stifle got worse against Combo because of Ad Nauseam. I've personally been against the use of Stifle as a plan against Combo, for forever, but whatever. It's legitimately awful against Combo now.
2) Wasteland is fucking terrible. The better way to beat Landstill is to use your recursion lands and Etched Oracle. Counterbalance is also amazingly powerful in this match up.
3) If you were really worried about Goblins, play Plague in the board. BAM!, (more or less) game over. Without it, it's a bit difficult. However, you have quite a bit of removal post board, with Blasts and Swords, to buy time to drop Deed. Tarmogoyf is pretty helpful in this respect, and that's why you leave Counterbalance in. Because countering all of their Warren Weirding's leaves them with a very large, very angry Tarmogoyf on the table.
4) If you wanted to have a plan against Combo, Orim's Chant is another idea for inclusion in the sideboard. Counterbalance is stronger, but Chant is a pretty amazing play too. However, nothing trumps Counterbalance against Combo decks. Thoughtseize is an idea too, but not one that I'm particularly partial to.
5) Goblins is pretty susceptible to Counterbalance against this deck.
Look at this:
1 slot: Lackey, Vial, possibly Fanatic
2 slot: Warren Weirding, Piledriver
3 slot: Warchief, Matron
At just the one to three slots, you have a solid third of their deck within comfortable range of your Counterbalance. You have an outside shot of countering Siege Gang with a Force, and Ringleader/Wort with a (remarkably) lucky Etched Oracle. You also have Brainstorm to help out. Using Counterbalance to protect Tarmogoyf is a very strong play against Goblins, and one I would be hesitant to board out. If Lackey/Vial are always resolving (and, in Lackey's case, connecting), then I have to ask what you're doing. You have quite a few answers to both of these cards (Force, Explosives, Swords) and if they're resolving, what's happening?
I won't lie, Goblins isn't a walk in the park, but it's no auto loss.
If you're worried about Goblins, using a sideboard that looks like this might be promising:
4 Tormod's Crypt
4 Engineered Plague
3 Krosan Grip
2 Blue Elemental Blast
2 Nevinyrral's Disk (cutting the Blasts means that your Dragon Stompy match goes out the window, these would help).
That would be a fine sideboard for a Goblin heavy meta game.
Needle seems really solid against Goblins as well considering the main reason they have an edge over ITF is their mana denial package of Wastes/Ports.
The problem with that is Needle would be a poor sideboard card because of how narrow it would be. Plague is significantly stronger, and absolutely destroys them. If you were to replace the Disks with Needles then you wouldn't have enough Needles to enable you to draw them effectively before they were able to activate the cards you were trying to shut down.
Needle is better proactively rather than reactively (which it would be in this case). A defensive Needle is generally a poor play (one of the reasons why I disagree with it's inclusion in Ichorid's board) and it's been my thought that there are always stronger inclusions to be had.
In this particular case, Plague is definitely stronger than Needle. Although, it would help, I don't think it would help as much as Plague does.
Plus; Goblins decks have differents answers to Artifact but not that much to enchantments.Quote:
Originally Posted by Deep6er
The counter part of Plague is that it only servs this MU but for what I understand it's only an option for players having issues with a full goblins metagame.
Actually, it helps somewhat against Ichorid. It's not amazing by any stretch of the imagination, but it helps a little bit. It has to be used in conjunction with Crypt, but it's not extremely awful. Just mostly awful.
Yeah, he's right though. It would mainly be for Goblins.
1) I agree that Stifle is terrible against the Ad Nauseam however, I knew that the 3 combo players there were playing Belcher so I felt that Stifle would be solid.
2) While the Wasteland plan is very slow against them it is very powerful in the endgame. I have not gotten to test it in this match up but when I was playing GAT I would Intuition for Loam/Wasteland/Raven's Crime. That package with LD every turn and 2-3 cards out of their hand would severely cripple them with the result of me swinging with a 'goyf for 3 turns. Counterbalance is very strong in this match up.
3) Engineered Plague would have been amazing for the meta but I didn't expect there to be 4 Goblin decks there. In game 1's I was having trouble getting my goyf's swarmed. It didn't help that I never saw Deeds to rectify the situation. I really like Shackles against them as it makes them always lose 2 guys when attacking me. Paired with a Tarmogoyf they have to be attacking me with 4+ guys to be getting in damage and then sacrificing their board position.
4) I have never been that big of a fan of Chant and me not owning any means that I probably will not ever play them. I will not deny that Counterbalance is a blow-out to combo but for it to be good you are looking at a turn 3 setup. T1 Top or Brainstorm to get top, T2 Counterbalance, T3 Top and have mana up to activate. I have not played against Ad Nauseam yet but aren't they usually doing something before your turn 3? Opening hands seem to rely heavily on having force or not.
5) 1 cost: Lackey and vial are usually being played before I can setup CB
2 cost: CB really shines here countering their Warrens
3 cost: Not much to say but I wasn't having much luck hitting my 3 mana spells.
Probably the best SB plan would be to leave in 3 CB while boarding out 1 CB, 1 Etched Oracle, 1 Counterspell, 1 Intuition for 4 BEB. I doubt if I were playing at any decent sized Legacy event I would run Engineered Plague. Disk seems solid but I feel those slots could be better used. No Goblins isn't a walk in the park but I would definitely rather be playing ITF in that match up. As for Needle I used to have it in my SB while playing DAT and I never really like it much at all. If you are trying to shut down Goblins Plague is by far the card of choice. Once you have it in play it immediately has a huge impact on the game.
Counterbalance is definitely worse than Counterspell and Intuition, and I have a hunch Oracle is better, too. Intuition is pretty saucy with Plague.
I have been testing Landstill matchup recently, and I found it very difficult. I don't know if the list I was playing against is the standard one, but with 4 Wasteland, 3 Crucible of Worlds and 2 Life from the Loam, it was quite a nightmare.Quote:
Originally Posted by Deep6er
There is simply no way to keep recursion lands on the table, especially as I am not playing any basic forests (I begin to think a singleton is needed) and being able to keep playing Loam is tedious.
Any hint on the matchup? Should I be boarding Crypts?
Thats alot of overkill from the landstill side this is not a common strategy of landstill. I suggest explode their crucible and keep loam off duty by resolving CB
That's good to know :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Waikiki
I cannot explode Crucible with only 3 basics in play. I try to counter it, but it is difficult to counter all copies. Also, CB does not solve the problem completely, since Landstill has EE of its own.Quote:
Originally Posted by Waikiki
@Azrael:
1) That's fair. Stifle is pretty amazing against Belcher.
2) Counterbalance is still a better plan because it doesn't rely on you casting Loam every turn and fucking with the top three cards of your deck, which are extremely important against control. Skipping land drops to effectively do nothing but destroy one land is awful. They're capable of sitting on fetches too. Which makes the plan even worse. Because while you've been dicking around not accomplishing anything, they've been drawing cards looking for the answer(s) that they have to your plan.
You know what's not powerful? Paying two, milling three, and skipping a land drop, to destroy one land.
3) Shackles is pretty insane against Goblins. However, I disagree with boarding out Intuition against Goblins. If you're going to keep in Shackles (which I don't do against them, I have a different sideboard strategy altogether), then boarding out one of your ways to find it (and then keep it going) seems poor. Additionally, it will help you find the cards that you need to survive when the situation goes south.
4) Actually, if you just drop Counterbalance turn two, it's only bad if you have a three drop on top. Anything at zero, one, or two is bad for them. Hell, even having a Force on top kills Ad Nauseam. There's a wide range of casting costs associated with going off, so just playing Counterbalance is insane against them. It's not like Counterbalance doesn't work if you don't have Top. With Force to protect you from the turn one win, and Counterbalance to lock the game, you're doing about as much as can be reasonably expected to protect yourself from combo decks.
5) Logically, you stop the one cost cards from happening, and then use Counterbalance to stop the future iterations of those cards from coming down.
@Frogboy: I would disagree. Counterspell is of limited usefulness against Goblins, and I would rather have Counterbalance against them. That's why I board out Counterspell against them. Boarding into four Blasts helps stop Ringleader, while Counterbalance can help with keeping the other problematic cards from resolving. Thus, helping you save your Blasts for the important cards (Wort, Ringleader).
@Esmandil: That's a very odd configuration for a Landstill deck. Generally three or four Wastelands make sense, but to see both Crucible and Life from the Loam is awkward. Not to mention a poor choice on his part.
Anyway, the idea is simple. You're going to have to build up lands. Sit on fetches (after fetching up basics to give you mana to play with. After that, you're going to have to find Life from the Loam. Top helps with this, as does Intuition. He's going to Waste your green sources as soon as you use them, so always crack fetches to Loam. Keep on playing fetches. Sit on recursion lands until you're capable of using them in that turn. That way, he can't cut you off of recursion lands. With a little bit of luck, you'll be able to blow away his Crucible and drop Counterbalance to stop Loam in the same turn, with mana left over. It's a waiting game against them, just remember to keep it together. You need mana, so you're going to have to assemble it slowly and carefully.
Alternatively, an early Counterbalance/Top would be insane against them. Meaning that you'll only have to Force their Explosives (if possible, leaving a Force on Top to counter their return Force).
Running Krosan Grip and Tormod's Crypt (not boarding all of them in) post board also seem like a good idea. I generally board in Krosan Grip against Landstill anyway, but boarding in a Crypt or two would probably be pretty strong against that particular configuration of Landstill.
I played ITF again at a small local tourney. I ran a pretty standard list(swap 1 U. Sea for a Tundra and -1 Plains for a Executioner's Capsule) with 4 Grip, 4 BEB, 2 Chill, 2 Wipe Away, 3 Crpyt for a board. Capsule works because everyone here plays aggro or burn. That explains the Chills (which sucked). If you don't care to read this, I won.
Match 1 vs UW Scepter Chant with Wish
Game 1 - I keep a 2 land hand hoping to draw another (didn't happen for 4 fucking turns) He gets an early Scepter+Chant, I scoop after he gets a wincon down. 0-1
Game 2 - I board in 4 Grips and 2 Wipe Away. Take out Bauble, a CB , a STP, a Goyf, Shackles and Witness. Bold was a huge mistake, but I didn't need or miss Shackles or Witness. Game goes in my favor pretty quickly. Early CB, he Meddling Mages Top, I Grip 2 Scepters and I beat his face in with 2 Goyf. 1-1
Game 3 - He's on the defensive for the first 10 turns because of CB Top. I'm unable to find a threat. We draw-go forever, I have access to EE+Ruins which helps. I get an Oracle out, he STPs, I kill it and draw 2 lands and a CB to replace the one I blew up (he'd resolved a Scepter). Finally, I lock him and have Oracle on the table, but he plays Maze of Ith and we draw-go for another 7 turns each before I find an Intuition grabbing Stronghold Goyf Goyf with Loam in hand. He ends up getting another Maze (W...T...F) and I slowly chip at his life ftw. 2-1
Match 2 Burn
Game 1 - Nothing eventful. I play 3 Goyfs, he burns them and has no hand. I Stronghold them back to life to win. 1-0
Game 2 - Last turns look something like me at 11, he has 3 Seals. I fetch and grab a land, he Fireblasts me, I check and pop Top to BEB it, and he scoops. If it weren't for the lucky BEB on top, I'd have lost. 2-0
Match 3 - Mono Black Pox
Game 1 - I start with an early CB and counter a few key spells. I play Goyf, which he kills with Innocent Blood. I play 2 more Goyf and a Top and counter his removal. He plays Nether Spirit and I Shackle it leaving him at 1 with a Smallpox in hand. 1-0
Game 2 - Long game. He leads with a Wasteland, I go Island. Turn 2 for both of us is a repeat, but I play CB. It gets nasty from here. He Duresses my Loam which I leave for a while. CB doesn't do shit for the next few turns as he tears apart my hand, Extirpates my Loam (haha) and Sinkholes my Islands, and Wastes one of my duals, leaving me with a Stronghold and 2 Delta. On his turn he plays Crucible, and tries to Wastelock me, but I float the mana from Stronghold, double fetch and Grip his Crucible, leaving him with 2 Swamp. I start to play duals and a Top and counter almost every spell he has. He Extirpates Goyf and Crypts me leaving my deck with 2 remaining wincons: Shackles and Witness. I steal a Nether Spirit, counter his other with CB, swing (he blocks with a Factory) leaving him unable to bring back his Spirits. Finally I play a Witness and go all the way.
I don't like playing against other control, but I came out on top. I'm retarded for subbing out a Goyf and CB in Match 2. Oh well. I'll learn from my mistake. half the field was burn, so I figured Chill would be good. I was wrong. I'd much preferred those slots to be more BEB or something else completely. Wipe Away was filler that I knew would be good against Scepter Chant (knowing he had Mages)
If anybody is still running Shriekmaw, I think it could be a good thing to switch to Stinkweed Imp as a self-recurring killer that isn't restricted to non-black/non-artifact creature.
Except for the part where Stinkweed Imp needs combat damage to kill something. Sure, you might keep someone from swinging into you because you have a dude with deathtouch, but it's not like you just having Stinkweed Imp is going to suddenly kill their dude. Best case scenario, you stall them until they draw a way to remove Stinkweed Imp and then just beat your face with their dude that you never killed. I guarantee you that the number of games you will lose because Stinkweed Imp sucks is far larger than the number you will lose because Shriekmaw can't kill a black dude.Quote:
Originally Posted by Enigma
I could possibly see it as a board card, maybe, to bring in for Shriekmaw against decks that are in heavy black. But in that case, you could just run better removal in the sideboard like Edicts or Deed.
Plus, you have Swords to Plowshares. You can still deal with stuff that Shreikmaw can't remove.
I sleeved up the Fear today for the first time and played 5 games with it, 4 vs 2 types of reanimator and 1 vs a mono black controlish deck. I ended up going 4-1 all of which were pre-board.
A landed Simic for reanimator is simply game over. The rest can be somewhat managed via countering, swords, or a lucky explosives for animate dead. I have found top to be crucial to get what is needed for this deck, even moreso than my experience with landstill. This is probably the case because the deck is not drawing inordinate amounts of cards so it needs quality and consistency.
Overall I plan on trying it out some more. The decklist was the one referenced a few pages back.