[Deck] Spanish Inquisition (B/x Storm Combo)

Yeah, I absolutely love wild cantor. Without it the fizzle rate would increase dramatically, at least in my experience I love it when I have access to cantor and green mana but no black mana, the kind I need the most typically. And it hasn't come up yet but it can imprint for red mana on chrome mox to enable PiF. But the colorfixing has been invaluable for me, I'm never going to cut the card unless WotC prints something better (highly unlikely but you never know.)

Sometimes I wish PiF was IGG, since you can't get artifact mana back with PiF but it's a case by case scenario and sometimes PiF is straight absurd, especially because of the 4R flashback on it so LED becomes the nuts with it and PiF in hand and it conveniently colorfixes for it as well.

The only debatable card to me is eternal witness, it's always odd because EVERY time I want to pact for eternal witness I either have it in hand so LED doesn't work or I've pitched it to chrome mox/LED activation. But it's nice to virtually increase the business count by 4 if you've already played a D4 or something else and if you haven't you kept a terrible hand and deserve to be punished for it unless you're feeling really lucky with the triple LED or tons of mana hand that you'll draw into a business spell in the first couple of turns.

EDIT: Short tournament report for those interested, I didn't take notes and I don't remember a whole lot except going 3-1 with the list Vacrix just posted with a little different sideboard (I had 3 nature's claim and 2 slaughter pact in the board over the SSG's and EtW's and an autumn's veil, which I ran over swarm and it was solid against my 2 blue opponents.) Also ran IGG over slithermuse since I don't own a copy currently due to selling almost all my foil cards at GP Indy and I didn't want to buy one so I just went with IGG since that's the other card for the slot.

Round 1: Someone playing red kuldotha forgemaster combo

Game 1: He goes mountain pass, I put him on burn initially since I've never went up against forgemaster combo before and burn is the more heavily played deck of the 2. I fizzle turn 1 after my first draw 4, but then I go off next turn after and win since I didn't cast a pact seeing him cast a metalworker turn 2.

SBing: +3 nature's claim, +2 slaughter pact, -1 e. witness, -1 odious trow, -1 wild cantor, -2 summoner's pact or something along those lines.

Game 2: He starts off with ancient tomb into grim monolith, I'm initially afraid he'll drop turn 1 3sphere but he doesn't play anything else so I'm happy. My turn I play dryad arbor and a mox imprinting land grant with 2 nature's claim in hand. I put him on being mana screwed so I nature's claim his grim monolith putting him up to 22. Next turn he goes city of traitors into grim monolith into nothing. Huh. Guess I read him wrong but I don't care as he hasn't played anything relevant. My turn, I play bayou and pass or something. He plays a kuldotha forgemaster, which I nature's claim. On my turn I belch him for approximately infinite or something, this match wasn't very exciting at all.

1-0 (2-0)

Round 2 versus merfolk with only 2 force's I found out afterwards and some dazes and stuff, but not an optimal list because the guy doesn't have all the cards for the deck I find out afterwards.

Game 1:
I'm on the play and keep my opening 7. He doesn't interact at all, I belch him out on turn 2 after seeing island aether vial from his side he dazes my belcher but I have the mana to pay, and with no lands in deck and LED in hand I make short work of his life total.

SBing: -4 Pact, -1 Tendrils, -1 Wild Cantor, -1 Odious Trow, -1 Eternal Witness, -1 IGG, -1 Culling the Weak +4 Carpet of Flowers, +3 Duress, +3 Autumn's Veil

Game 2: He again lacks any interaction and I make short work of him with belcher after playing a draw 4 and untapping into the kill with belcher after duress see's nothing on his end. Again, this match wasn't very interesting since he didn't have much of a counter suite but I can't complain.

2-0 (4-0)

Round 3 versus Travis with Spiral Tide (I know his deck since I lent it to him, the whole 75)

When the pairings go up I sigh, since he's my friend and I really don't like my chances in this matchup since I know his whole 75. I say a remark along the lines of "Why did I put that mindbreak trap in the board again?" while we're shuffling off, I know game 1 my only shot is to win quickly and hope Travis lacks countermagic.

Game 1: He's on the play, even worse for me but he goes fetchland pass. On my turn, I have a sweet hand overall if he wasn't playing blue I couldn't really lose. So I start off with land grant, revealing my hand of dark rit, draw 4, summoner's pact, lotus petal, LED, and maybe an ESG or something. He force's the land grant. I decide to go all in this turn, because my only hope is for him to lack flusterstorm because flusterstorm >>>> my deck game 1 barring a really ridiculous draw on my part. So I summoner's pact for dryad arbor, play it, go petal, dark rit, cruel bargain. It resolves after he fetches and brainstorms, looking for FoW. He doesn't find it, I draw chrome mox, culling the weak, infernal tutor, and some other card maybe cabal ritual or something. So I combo him out and win turn 1 through a force of will, and I can't believe it happened myself since this MU is bound to be miserable in preboard games. We go onto sideboarding though.

-4 Summoner's pact, -1 IGG, -1 Tendrils, -1 Wild Cantor, -1 Culling the Weak, -1 Eternal Witness, -1 Charbelcher +4 carpet, +3 autumn's veil, +3 duress

Game 2: Travis goes land go, my hand is stacked with ESG, autumn's veil, dark rit, LED x2, infernal tutor, and cabal rit. I kept this hand, hoping to draw an IMS because if I do I can just win through flusterstorm + force of will if the IMS is a petal/chrome or a naturally drawn bayou. I draw and play land grant immediately, revealing my hand. Travis lets it resolve, I get bayou. I go bayou, dark rit, cabal rit, LED, LED, exile spirit guide, attempt veil, which he forces. I decide to go for it anyway and my infernal tutor cracking both LED's in response get's forced as well, both force's pitching turnabout. I sigh and pass. He goes land, merchant scroll for FoW I think, and passes. I draw a land grant, play it for arbor, play arbor, and pass. Have to win somehow, right? He goes land go, I draw dark rit, attack, and pass. He goes land, go. I draw cruel bargain, I go for it and he FoW's. At this point we're both in topdeck mode, I swing with arbor again and draw a carpet of flowers (!) and slam it. It resolves, I attack and pass. He goes land, meditate, pass. I topdeck a duress, duress him, seeing high tide, flusterstorm, merchant scroll, and lands he has 6 lands in play or something so he can't flusterstorm it due to 4 black sitting in my pool and both lands untapped. I take the high tide, thinking it over and deciding due to his deck having more business overall I should take the high tide since he could get lots of mana with it with the right draw and just untap and kill me. I swing with arbor, untap and draw a cruel bargain and cast it using carpet. It resolves, drawing me me into charbelcher and some other cards that can't activate belcher that turn. I cast belcher, since he can't flusterstorm it, and pass back to him. He draws a turnabout and scoops. He could have tapped my belcher on upkeep we determined afterwards but it wouldn't have mattered since he had a land on top anyways so I win. Whew. Winning through 3 FoW's, then again carpet of lotuses was the reason I won that game what with him playing all the islands and it effectively turned off flusterstorm.

3-0 (6-0)

Round 4 versus burn

We split the packs but decide to play it out just for fun.

Game 1: I go petal, dark rit, draw 4. I don't win that turn and I let him play first due to my deck being unfair and I don't think his deck is super competitive or anything. I discard summoner's pact. He goes turn 2 flame rift and passes. I untap and kill him on my turn with belcher.

No sideboarding, I found out he brought in 2 mindbreak traps but I wasn't playing around anything.

He goes turn 1 suspend rift bolt, I go arbor pass or something, I durdle around too much and he wins (my memory is a bit foggy on this match since I didn't care that much)

I go turn 1 draw 4, fizzle, pass. He goes for 3 to my dome or something. I lay another land, can't cobble a win together, and he kills me or something again my memory is a bit foggy on this entire match since we split the packs.

Nice report Dark Ritual. Winning through 3 FoW is pretty tight, even after going all with IT/LED. Just goes to show how savage this deck can be in topdeck mode.

I just finished a local tournament, 10 players 4 rounds. Nothing special, in fact it was a pretty lame tournament overall. Scrubs. I went 3-1. I played the same list as Dark Ritual, but with the EtW/SSG sideboard.

Round 1: Pattern of Rebirth
G1: He leads with Forest, BoP. I play Belcher and pass the turn. He plays a Swamp, I Belch for lethal on my next turn.
G2: He leads with Forest, pass. I Belch him for Lethal again.

Round 2: G/W control? Not really sure what he was playing.
G1: I natural Slithermuse into Tendrils turn 1.
G2: He leads with Leyline of Sanctity, I pick up the cards. We were talking after the first game and he mentioned that he didn't have the Leylines to beat Dredge. Should have boarded in EtW plan.
G3: I mulligan to 4 cards after hitting no IMS. I manage to build up to a Belcher that hits for 13. We play draw go for a little while. I almost have enough cards to go off again and then he plays Leyline. A few turns later I'm almost to EtW but he kills me.

Round 3: Burn
G1: I let him play first. He plays Goblin Guide. I draw, and pass. He plays Mauraders, I play Slithermuse for 5 into D4, into D4, but he has Fireblast. I was a few short of playing Belcher instead of the D4. Also, if I had chosen to play first I would have had a first turn Slithermuse for 7 rather than 5. My mistake.
G2: Petal x3, ESG, LED x2, Slithermuse --> D4 into Tendrils turn 1.
G3: I play Belcher and pass. Two turns later I activate for Lethal.

Round 4: Slivers
G1: Belcher for Lethal turn 2.
G2: He doesn't have a sideboard but maindecks a single Leyline of Sanctity.. Guess what's in his opening hand. Lol...
G3: I anticipate Leyline again not knowing he only has one, board in EtW. I play Belcher and pass the turn. Activate next turn for 14, pass. He plays a bunch of dudes. I mini-EtW for 8 tokens and block his dudes for a couple turns. He hardcasts Leyline and I can't reactivate Belcher. I survive a few more turns with Odious Trow regeneration and play D4 + D4 into EtW for 24 tokens, at one life. Whew. He swings with his 6 guys but I have blocks, swing back in for 20 with 18 tokens, Arbor, and Trow.

A guy playing control affinity won the whole thing. I played a few games with him and he had a shit ton of maindeck hate for me. Lost all those games 0-4. Hes running maindeck.. 4 Chalice, 4 Cannonist. He mulligans into one of those each game and plays it turn 1 with Mox Opal/Petal + Land. I was a card short of playing Belcher w/activation in 3 of those games as he had Chalice at 0. I also played against his Psychatog deck, 2-0.

Overall, shitty tournament. I think I'm going to stick with EtW post-board plan because it works well against random hate like Leyline and its obviously good against control. Autumn's Veil looks better and better every day. I'll probably switch out Swarms for Veils and see how that goes next week.

I did some playtesting IRL against BUG Control today with some interesting results.

Preboard I went 3-3, dropping one game to a play mistake that I can't recall.

Post-board I went 3-4, dropping 2 games to play mistakes. In one game, I played Belcher with activation going all in, but since I was going all in, the safer play was to find Slithermuse and draw 6 cards with one black floating. Instead I went for Belcher and the top card was a land. In another game I was in a pretty good position having Duressed him with a Carpet of Flowers on the field with a Chrome Mox and a Bayou. I dropped a Lotus Petal and a 2nd Carpet of Flowers anticipating discard but he dropped Deed instead and wiped my board. In hind sight that was a horrible play mistake. I should have obviously kept the 2nd Carpet in hand because I know he's playing 3 Deed 1 Pulse.. stupid.

So I could have gone 4-2 preboard and 5-2 post-board had I been a bit more attentive. Granted we were playing non-stop for like 5 hours so I got a little lazy. Still I'm happy that I could go relatively even with what should be one of our harder matches. So ideally I could have gone preboard 4-2, postboard 5-2; which is 9-4, or 9/13, or 70%. I actually got 3-3, 3-4; 6-7 or 6/13 or 45%. I think if I were playing better, not making simple mistakes (haven't really been playing as much as I used to) I could have gotten that 70%. 70% against BUG Control seems pretty dam good considering we are a so-called Glass House, though I would have to have a much larger sample size to come to a conclusion on the actual percentage. Carpet is really fucking good here. I dropped it and he only plays 2 Bayou so often I was getting 2-5 mana out of my Carpets. One time, I won through Jace AND Liliana, with an active Loam and Force of Will. SO fucking dope. It's worth mentioning that the games I lost were extremely close, one mana or one card shy of the win. There were no blow outs, even when he dumped Force, Spell Snare and Spell Pierce on my business spells in one turn (managed to win that one). He didn't make that many play mistakes as I was guiding him through how to play against me in between games to make it more realistic and get more accurate results. Had he made a few play mistakes, those close games might have easily tipped in my favor.

I also did some brief playtesting against Solidarity. I went 2-1 preboard and didn't get a chance to play post-board but Carpet is fantastic here as is the rest of the board, but to maintain speed, I think I'd board out Pacts for Carpets, and the creatures you fetch with them for Swarms and some Duress's, no Veils. I dropped one game to a Belcher misactivation... again... I had the option to IT into Slithermuse and I figured that he'd be so slow that with 2 perpetual mana sources in play after Belcher I'd be able to activate it again before he went off. I didn't draw another and he decked me turn 5.

Cool guy. I'm surprised he had so much patience to play against me for like 5 hours. I plan on doing more testing in the near future against BUG Control that way I can finally update the Primer with some new tech, updated lists, and matchups/percentages.



EDIT:
Also, I'm playing a 3 Belcher, 2 ToA configuration in the maindeck. I've also dropped Eternal Witness from the maindeck temporarily. I don't find myself making that line of play often enough to warrant its presence when I can make more common plays more consistent.

EDIT:
My mistake. I'm playing 4 Belcher, 2 ToA. I dropped the Ewit for another business spell. Its been more consistent.

Thanks for the info as I am still developing my SI and am very interested in how they deck can do IRL. I am still working to make a D7 SI list without goblin charbelcher in the mix. I have had some good results but I am far from being good enough with the deck as I still make too many mistakes. I would be interested to see your entire list some time as it might help me figure some things out better.

Oh, I have also been working with past in flames in my deck as the 61st card. It has been ok; but I think that it is a little too weak overall to warrant displacing anything else.

This is my current list:

Pact SI:
Business -
4 Cruel Bargain
4 Infernal Contract
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Goblin Charbelcher
2 Tendrils of Agony
1 Past in Flames
1 Slithermuse

Mana -
1 Odious Trow
1 Wild Cantor
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Summoner's Pact
4 Culling the Weak
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Chrome Mox
4 Land Grant
1 Bayou
1 Dryad Arbor

SB
4 Carpet of Flowers
3 Autumn's Veil
2 Xantid Swarm
4 Duress
2 Deathmark

Honestly 20 business spells is probably 1 too many. I'll likely cut one or two business spells and try playing something in its place.

Wild Cantor has found a permanent place in my maindeck until further notice. Its simply too good. I've used it to gain threshold, produce red for PiF or blue for Slithermuse, or black for a D4 or initial ritual, and it obviously has an application as a Culling the Weak target. Further, it enables pass the turn plays on occasion when its just sitting in your hand with a Bayou or something.

Eternal Witness has been good to me, but I think more often then not you are going to want something else when you draw it. That happens far more often then when you use it. At least Odious Trow when drawn can produce black or green on Chrome Mox, occasionally hold down the fort against 1 creature, and facilitate Culling the Weak. Eternal Witness rarely will be useful when drawn off a D4 and I find that every time it was useful, Tendrils would have been just as good in its place. I'm dropping it from my build for now.

Past in Flames is awesome. I find myself trying to setup the play post-board where I can just resolve my whole graveyard cause I'm sitting on LED's and 2 or 3 perpetual mana. Its nice knowing that you have that option WITH Flashback. I'd recommend keeping it in post-board; if you are worried about finding the red, don't worry. LED, Carpet, and Lotus Petal are 12 total red sources and that's more than enough.

Slithermuse, still awesome. Its actually my preferred line of play now if I can help it. Belcher, pass the turn isn't quite as threatening as you can whiff on drawing the LED, or ritual, you can whiff on the Belcher itself, and post-Muse you will usually have threshold, so starting with a fresh hand of 6 or 7 is MILES better than when you draw your initial hand. Also, the play is possible from as few as 4 cards, not unheard of.. Petal/Grant, Dark Ritual, IT, LED --> Slithermuse. I've also hard casted it from my hand multiple times after getting a hand like Grant, Petal x2, Chrome Mox, Cruel Bargain, Slithermuse, ESG. Often you can Muse with at least an initial black floating, and quite often it gets there. I haven't missed Ill-Gotten Gains much, though I have had plenty of opportunities to find it and win right on the spot. I might try it again in place of a business spell, likely Past in Flames and see how that goes.

In regards to the board, Xantid Swarm was great even against BUG control which still has quite a bit of maindeck kill spells post-board. I think its good to play as a 2'of that way they dilute their deck with kill spells which are not as useful, and organize their Brainstorms and Ponders to find kill spells when they are going to be less effective when your main protection is Duress and Autumn's Veil.. with the threat of Carpet of Flowers. Honestly, Carpet of Flowers is so good that it often wins the game by itself. The opponent sees it in game 2 and sees it play a D4 for free, countered, Duress, countered, D4, countered.... Belcher.. resolves! Then activation.. and yet they let it resolve in game 3. Its simply too good. Especially post-board, when I have so many business spells. I usually board out 4 business spells, and board in 13 cards against blue. That means I have 9 Protection and 16 business spells to deal with. 25 must counter spells is asking quite a lot of a blue deck, as thats more cards then their entire counter suite. Granted, I do want to cut 2 protection spells for Nature's Claim. Its too good in some matchups.

Autumn's Veil has been no better than Duress so far. The best you can get out of it is to play an initial ritual with 1 mana floating to have it Pierced, and respond with a Dark Ritual, which gets Dazed or Pierced, to which you respond with ESG --> Veil. That play has yet to come up though. We'll see though after I have more extensive playtesting with it. What are other people's experiences with Veil?



Also, I wouldn't play with 61st cards if I were you. Its a draw dependent deck. Even by thinning the deck with Pacts and Land Grants, you are still trying to draw consistently and 61 cards can throw off the math a little. As for D7SI, I've been trying on and off to make it work. At the moment, I think that SI-TES is the best build for supporting Burning Wish. Its still a great deck but its not going to have the turn 1 potential that Pact SI has. I recall DireLemming having a list that tested quite well, 70% turn 1's in 50 games of testing. Its difficult to play though. I'd say SI-TES is easier to play though as if you don't have to do tricks with Pacts and find Tinderwalls to play Burning Wish into Diminishing Returns, and you still have the option of playing D7's via Burning Wish in SI-TES.


Less serious.. I've been thinking about throwing 1 or two Leyline of Anticipation into my list for kicks and see how it goes. How hilarious would that be.. I mean the deck already mulligans quite a bit anyway and post-board you can practically cast it off Carpet. Winning in response to the opponent with LEDs I find exceptionally hilarious.

EDIT:
Excellent line of play I had against BUG Control the other day, forgot to mention it. This was the first game of the pre-board, he won the roll.
My hand is:
Chrome Mox, Bayou, Elvish Spirit Guide, Culling the Weak, Infernal Tutor, Cruel Bargain, Infernal Contract
I draw Lotus Petal

I play Bayou, ESG, IT --> Chrome Mox, Mox imprinting Culling, Mox imprinting Contract, Cruel Bargain, Spell Pierced. I try for a few more business spells and eventually land Belcher and activate on the following turn. 3 perpetual mana sources over 2 was huge because I could literally just cast my business in topdeck mode. I consider this line of play a more subtle trick for beating slower control decks. Keep it in mind.

Hey thanks for the deck list to compare and reference and I 100% hear you on D7 SI being a tad unstable and tough to play. I am taking that route as I thought it might better prepare me to play into almost any version of the combo, and although the learning curve was/is steep, I have found it worthwhile to me. Your version without burning wishes etc is very stable from what I see: and I agree that 19 business spells is most likely the optimal count. I also agree that 60 is almost always going to be better than 61, I just have not figured out what to trim. Maybr PiF is the week link in the D7 version but there are times that it is golden.

I also really appreciate the sb info: I don't see enough post board games since "player lost" seams to be the trend when testing on the net and executing a turn-1 combo ftw. But, I think I would possibly trim some duress for natures claim as it has been a bomb for me at times (burning wish has some advantage here obviously).

Anyway, thanks again and I will let you know how it goes if I get some more serious testing/gaming in.

I have done the infernal -> chrome mox line of play before, I haven't done it with carpet (yet). I love having 2+ mana available at the beginning of each main phase, and chrome mox is basically a land in our deck while providing storm and getting us closer to being hellbent for IT.

I wouldn't cut PiF for IGG. IGG is a fine card, as it is essentially an easy button assuming you know how to play storm and all you need is double LED to just make IT -> IGG GG's. While past in flames isn't always like that, as you need to have generally 3 rituals in your graveyard to make it work if you cast it with only B floating unless you have threshed cabal rit's or you can actually flashback culling the weak sacking a dude (I've done this line of play probably a grand total of one time, while goldfishing PSI.) If I were to cut a card for IGG it would be slithermuse most likely, as IGG is generally a guaranteed kill assuming they lack interaction while slithermuse in the later turns or against an opponent who mulliganed a lot is the nut low. Although drawing 7 off of it is nice, it's never good when naturally drawn while a naturally drawn IGG can provide storm or win you the game on the spot. And it's one more black card to pitch to chrome mox, as I occasionally have the rare case where I can't imprint a black card on chrome mox without fizzling because of it.

I've had the ESG -> Veil in a few games actually. I also love it for that reason, as it provides a use for that annoying green mana that I sometimes can't use. I also love how it's an instant, so you don't cast it until your opponent casts a force of some hard counter and they just lose unless they have another piece of countermagic, usually FoW. But I'm fine when I have 2 cards forced typically because that lowers the number of cards in my opponents hand to an incredibly low number, increasing my chances the next time I attempt to combo. The only reason I won through triple force against spiral tide was because my opponent had to pitch tons of relevant cards away, so he couldn't combo out himself since his hand wasn't THAT stacked.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vacrix

This is my current list:

Pact SI:
Business -
4 Cruel Bargain
4 Infernal Contract
4 Infernal Tutor
4 Goblin Charbelcher
2 Tendrils of Agony
1 Past in Flames
1 Slithermuse

Mana -
1 Odious Trow
1 Wild Cantor
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Summoner's Pact
4 Culling the Weak
4 Dark Ritual
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Lion's Eye Diamond
4 Lotus Petal
4 Chrome Mox
4 Land Grant
1 Bayou
1 Dryad Arbor

SB
4 Carpet of Flowers
3 Autumn's Veil
2 Xantid Swarm
4 Duress
2 Deathmark

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Basically the list I just adopted. After a dismal 2-5 drop in Indy with my artifact-based SI, I've been changing things up. Traded my janky MUD and Dredge decks for the cards to build Esperblade, and decided to build Pact SI since it's faster and seemingly more reliable than my previous version.

I knew you'd give up on Witness tho ;-P

Only things I changed from your list:
-1 Tendrils MD for +1 Grapeshot

And since I've sold my Xantids:
4 Veil, 4 Carpet, 4 Duress, 3 Slaughter Pact

Also, I can't wait to test Leyline of Anticipation. LOL
It could turn out to be Leyline of Broken, but will most likely be Leyline of Great Expectations.

Leyline of Anticipation is a nice idea; but it won't fix what you draw, etc... it will just allow you to cast underneath more things (which is good). I don't think it is a bad card; but I think that it is less of a card than anything you remove to fit it in.

As you will need 4x to have chance to even use it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by SupREME-10

Leyline of Anticipation is a nice idea; but it won't fix what you draw, etc... it will just allow you to cast underneath more things (which is good). I don't think it is a bad card; but I think that it is less of a card than anything you remove to fit it in.

As you will need 4x to have chance to even use it.

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Those are effectively the disadvantages of running the card, for sure.

Other than the obvious advantage of dropping art/crt/sor on the opponents turn, there's another one I find very interesting.

On the opponents turn, they are the active player, meaning they gain priority first after something is added to the stack. And, mana abilities don't use the stack. See where I'm going with this? Cast Infernal or a draw4. If opponent counters it, you don't have to use LED. If they don't, they don't get another chance to counter it after you decide to crack LED. That's just one example.

I can't imagine what you would cut for that leyline.
It doesn't seem worth it at all.

Leyline was lulzy. I played it against a dude who was playing Diviner's Witch and Paradigm Shift into... Laboratory Maniac. So the situation was already hilarious enough to warrant throwing it around. It wasn't good. I'd recommend trying it for kicks though if you are just fooling around.

@DarthVicious
What's up with a singleton Grapeshot? Is there a time you'd play it for 20 when you wouldn't just find another win condition. :confused:

@DarkRitual
I'm going to start playing IGG again for something just because I've had the line of play come up often where I have a bunch of black mana and a natural IT (no LEDs) into.. what? I need red for PiF and I need blue for Muse so its nice to know you have a 3rd purely black option. Besides, I don't want to leave out the black guy. :P


Aside.. I've been pretty good, for whatever reason, at predicting this set that's coming out. I correctly called TM within one U of the cost, and I called 2cc Planeswalkers. I anticipate we'll get something for SI. Likely a utility green creature from Pact. I was thinking the other day that a creature like this would be nice:

Creaturelingthing G
Creature
Sacrifice: Effect.
When its put into the graveyard, at one mana of any color to your mana pool.
1/1

Likely the effect would be good if it were something like Scry 1. Either way, the point is we could sacrifice it to Culling the Weak AND glean one mana from it to play something else. That would be an excellent Pact Target for situations where you need to cast Slithermuse from your hand without LEDs or Petals. Its also within the scope of things wizards might print. The only other thing we could possibly ask for is a green kobold to replace Odious Trow. A green creature with a CIP effect would be nice though..

Creaturethingaling 1G
Creature
When ~ comes into play, your opponent cannot counter spells this turn.
2/1

Seems decently costed at 1G. If it costed G though.. we'd go fucking nuts with this deck.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DarthVicious

On the opponents turn, they are the active player, meaning they gain priority first after something is added to the stack. And, mana abilities don't use the stack. See where I'm going with this? Cast Infernal or a draw4. If opponent counters it, you don't have to use LED. If they don't, they don't get another chance to counter it after you decide to crack LED. That's just one example.

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nope

Quote:

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116.3c If a player has priority when he or she casts a spell, activates an ability, or takes a special action, that player receives priority afterward.

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you might have mixed it up with

Quote:

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116.3b The active player receives priority after a spell or ability (other than a mana ability) resolves.

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DerFern are you still playing SI? Just curious you used to be pretty active in the thread.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DerFern

nope

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On that note, I won't be testing Leyline of Great Expectations. Thanks for the correction.

Anyway, Grapeshot might become something else. I like having multiple MD Tendrils. Drawing into them is so key sometimes in this deck.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vacrix

DerFern are you still playing SI? Just curious you used to be pretty active in the thread.

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I actually played it at ~5 tournaments lately. Overall I went quite positive, but the last tournament was a really bad result. However, I guess SI is well positioned in a meta like the one we have right now. All those RUG decks are not THAT bad of a matchup, especially since people start dropping Stifle off their lists.

Lately my list ran 1 Tinder Wall instead of Wild Cantor (mana +1), but I also had 2 Manamorphose, which I really like with PiF. Sideboard was rather boring with 4 Swarm/Carpet, 2 Nature's Claim, 2 SPact und 3 Belcher.

I often find Wild Cantor so good that I'd like a 2nd.

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Originally Posted by emidln

I often find Wild Cantor so good that I'd like a 2nd.

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Maybe if it was a different version of the card like one with a CC the same as Trow or the theoretical card mentioned earlier. Beyond that what could you cut for it?

I can't see myself playing Cantor x2. The best application I can think of for the second one would be if you are PiFing off from your graveyard and need Pact--> ESG, Pact--> Cantor to get the initial black to go off from purely 4R mana (say a LED and 2 floating). That line of play is rather uncommon.



New idea:

One thing I have never tried is Carpet of Flowers in conjunction with the man plan. It could actually be pretty fucking savage. The advantage of playing Carpet is that you will almost certainly be able to cast whatever creature you top deck. D4's still be good because you can unload a bunch more Demons and Phyrexian rapists onto the field. What do you guys think?

I'll be testing a board today and this weekend and see how it goes (against BUG Control).

SB
4 Carpet of Flowers
4 Tombstalker
4 Avatar of Discord
2 Tomb of Urami
1 Death's Shadow

Not to say it will become a stock board but it could surprise a local meta that expects a bunch of 1cc protection spells into Belcher. Pithing Needle is pretty good against our stock board. :/

Tested against CounterThopters today with a man-plan board. Wasn't impressed, but then again its Counterbalance so how good can it get?

I went 3-3 Preboard. Pretty happy about that actually. He had Force in 4 games. I managed to pull myself out of one of them. The rest, I ran into Counterbalance pretty quickly. He played a countersuite of 4 Snare, 4 FoW, 4 CB.

I went a shitty 2-5 post-board with the man-plan. I could have gone 3-4 but I was talking to someone in between turns and I just passed and forgot to make the play I was going to make. I played Tomb into Dark Ritual into Negator. I could have played out the rest of my hand into LED to activate the Tomb on the following turn. I would have had 2 creatures, which was extremely relevant given that he dropped Jace and continued to bounce by Negator until the Jace died. Then he got CB online and I died several turns later. I was kicking myself after that game. I was getting extremely unlucky all night, especially in the post-board. Way too many mulligans that didn't go well.

I don't think I'll be running Negator again. Tombstalker, on the other hand, was the fucking TECH. For BB its a fantastic threat. It dodges Pierce, usually Daze, and Snare. If only we had another creature to run along side it, the manplan might actually be viable but I think we have to wait for WotC to print something else. Tomb of Urami is great but its still not enough.


I'm pretty sure I'm taking PSI to a 50+ even this weekend. Not sure what the metagame is like but I'm thinking about picking up a playset of Slaughter Pacts.



EDIT:
I'm also finding that 2nd Cantor plays come up often, namely when PiF is involved and you need an initial black to resolve your entire graveyard from Dark Ritual. 2 Pact --> ESG/Cantor gets there but sometimes you need a 2nd one. I'll be testing that tomorrow in depth.