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Some interesting things going on there, but I can't really parse them with just a list. I wonder if there is any video of his matches. What kind of event did this originate from, and where did he place?
Hi there, that is my list :)
I wanted to try few things in preparation of a bigger tournament. In particular, I wanted to see if cards usually played in the sideboard are maindeckable. That is why I included canonists and surgical in the main. I usually play aether vial maverick and I wanted to try also GSZ. As for the tournament, there were really strong players but also others that are not used to the format. No videos.
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One thing that jumps out at me very quickly is how few fetchlands he's running. 6 is quite low, though I suppose the extra Horizon Canopy does let him get another land into his graveyard with some regularity.
I think that running the least possible number of fetchs is the way to go. This is because playing against stifle becomes easier and not having fetchs in you hand do not put you in the position of playing around stifle when the opponent has no stifles in the deck. Also playing fetchs to feed your (and opponent's) shamans has no sinergy with knights. However, GSZ lists are weaker against blood moon effects and in this case fetchs are good.
With 6 fetchs + 3 shamans + 2 birds + 2 black lands I have 13 black mana sources for just 2 black cards that is not a low count.
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There are some other strange one-ofs as well, like Phyrexian Revoker, that seem like ideas stolen out of Death & Taxes.
I recognize that Revoker is an error in this list. I usually play aether vial maverick where having a pair of revokers is often good. Here, it is not and I would replace it for an extra multiland. In fact, the biggest problem that I had in the tournament was mulligans. I took an avarage of 2 mulligans for match that is quite bad (most of them because I had issues with the starting mana).
Also sigarda is questionable.
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I could see an argument for 3x of some staples in order to squeeze in a given hatebear for a specific meta, but that list appears to take the concept too far. ALL of the staples are 3x, and things like Revoker and Canonist cannot be dug out of the deck reliably via Green Sun.
I actually think that standard GSZ maverick has a weak game against combo decks because it relies too much on searching hate with GSZ. Without mana dork this is a turn 3 play were you are likely already death against ANT. Against Omnitell this is a turn 4 play since you cannot activate qasali which is not good either. Also Elves is a turn 2/3 combo. This means that to fight combos GSZ maverick has to start with manadork + GSZ or a turn 2 hate card in your hand. Canonists and thalia both improve your chances of stealing the first game which is very import when playing against combo. What is more interesting is that accordingly with my test canonists are maindeckable. Against non combo decks they are a weaker version of Thalia but almost always they are annoying for your opponents. In addition, canonist do not hurt GSZ and decays.
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I assume the choice of Birds over Hierarch is a result of the lower fetch count making black sources a higher priority, but that also cuts off Green Sun -> Hierarch for surprise exalted triggers.
In every deck with 2 swords of X and Y I would play birds over hierarch. In addition, flying means that they become good blockers when you have mom (see 20/20 tokens, delvers, equipped avengers, etc). They also fix your mana better than hiercarchs. I dont think that GSZ for hierarch is a good play, however you have the same effect paying one more mana. Without birds I would play a green sword instead of solas to tramp green creatures.
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If I were going to try to jam Canonist into the main, it would have to come at the expense of a non-green target. That means Thalia without affecting the curve, and I could see a reasonable justification for a 3/1 split if there is room for Sylvan Library. I don't think it is right for an unknown meta, but if you're going up against Elves, Elves, Belcher, Elves, Storm, then Canonist is probably going to do a lot more work.
Canonists are usually played in punishing maverick because you cannot use Thalia. I wanted to try how good they are in the main and I think that they have passed the test. The surgical is probably wrong but I did not draw that in the whole tournament. Against delver it helps at screwing their mana if you have also a wasteland, against midmiracles getting swords is good but overall it is a high variance card only good in early game.
Despite I did top 8, I did not like this and I would not play GSZ anymore. Aether vial seems too much better to me because it is faster, it reduces the number of mulligans AND the number of lands you need to play, it helps a lot against counters, it bypass chalices blood moon and it encorages you to play more hate bears that is the core of this deck.