[Deck] Merfolk

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Originally Posted by Avatar of Shadow

I need to stop reading posts on MTGsalvation.

some of those people there are putting in 1 of brainstorm, 1 of stifle, jace the mind sculptor, and delver of secrets.

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Originally Posted by zulander

Brainstorm > stupid 2/1's

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It appears bad players are not confined to Salvation.

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Originally Posted by CorpT

It appears bad players are not confined to Salvation.

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Agreed... the posts in this thread recently make me wonder how many of the people posting have actually played this deck.

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Originally Posted by zulander

Here's my list, and I don't care if you don't like it, jerk.

Mana: 21
4 Fetch
8 Island
3 Waste
4 Mutavault
2 Cavern of Souls

Creatures: 22
4 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Coralhelm Commander
2 Phantasmal Image

Other: 18
4 Vial
4 Brainstorm
4 Force
3 Spell Pierce
2 Cunning Wish

Boomshakalaka

Brainstorm > stupid 2/1's
Spell Piece can also be daze, either or no problems.

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I don't like it. You are taking the best fish out of the deck so you can play brainstorm?? And all you have are 8 islands.

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Originally Posted by Sturtzilla

Agreed... the posts in this thread recently make me wonder how many of the people posting have actually played this deck.

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Let me rank the fish in order from best to worst.

1) Silvergill adept

Cheap? Check. Cantrips? Check. Once it hits, basically can swing without a care? Check.

2) Rejerrey

Lord + Psuedo removal + lets you activate vial more than once for turn. I have untapped with rej + cursecatcher + adept and two islands and swung for 15+ a lot.

3)The rest

Some days, I can't keep a guy on the table, and Coralhelm is what I need (or adept to grind). Sometimes I'm against combo and I need disruption that clocks them, and cursecatcher is what I need (or adept). Sometimes I need to island walk all over a stalled board state, and I need LoA or Image.

Your mileage my vary, but having played merfolk for successfully at 100+ person events, this is what I find.

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Originally Posted by Avatar of Shadow

Thats insane right there.

I think the only way to balance the amount of 2U creatures is to up the island count to 13, with 3 mutavaults, and 4 wastelands. I even want to drop the mutavault count to 2 if need be. But more playtesting needs to be done.

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I was thinking of the following

//Land - 21
14 Island
3 Mutavault
4 Wasteland

//Creatures - 26
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Cursecatcher
2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
2 Merrow Reejerey
2 Phantasmal Image
4 Silvergill Adept

//Spells - 13
4 Aether Vial
3 Daze
2 Dismember or Vapor Snag
4 Force of Will

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Originally Posted by lyracian

I was thinking of the following

//Land - 21
14 Island
3 Mutavault
4 Wasteland

//Creatures - 26
4 Coralhelm Commander
4 Cursecatcher
2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
2 Merrow Reejerey
2 Phantasmal Image
4 Silvergill Adept

//Spells - 13
4 Aether Vial
3 Daze
2 Dismember or Vapor Snag
4 Force of Will

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you know what you can do? drop the kiras in the main, up the reejerey to 3 and up the dismember/vapor to 3.

Bring in chalice in the board to fight the annoying 1 mana removal. Thats how i'm going to work it.

I see Merfolk going down two viable branches. One eschews Wasteland for Aquatect's Will, running the full gamut of islandwalk lords to push for a very fast kill. It needs more islands to be able to vial and cast the 2U lords, and may cut Reejerey, as the fish can just avoid blockers. LoA, MotPT, and CC can all push the quick islandwalk kill, and Aquatect's can get that island into play and disrupt (in many cases) the opponent's land. With so many 2U costs, Wasteland may have to go. I'd rather keep Mutavault over it, as it at least provides another aggressive body to attack. I'm going to take a crack at developing a good build for this plan.

The other viable build will likely send Phantasmal to the board as a legend-killer, as you get a great effect for essentially the same cost with MotPT. Phantasmal won't need to copy lords as you now have another great lord.

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Originally Posted by cartoonist

I see Merfolk going down two viable branches. One eschews Wasteland for Aquatect's Will, running the full gamut of islandwalk lords to push for a very fast kill. It needs more islands to be able to vial and cast the 2U lords, and may cut Reejerey, as the fish can just avoid blockers. LoA, MotPT, and CC can all push the quick islandwalk kill, and Aquatect's can get that island into play and disrupt (in many cases) the opponent's land. With so many 2U costs, Wasteland may have to go. I'd rather keep Mutavault over it, as it at least provides another aggressive body to attack. I'm going to take a crack at developing a good build for this plan.

The other viable build will likely send Phantasmal to the board as a legend-killer, as you get a great effect for essentially the same cost with MotPT. Phantasmal won't need to copy lords as you now have another great lord.

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Image only get's better as there is another good 2 mana target to copy, reducing the chance it get's stranded in your hand. The card to shave a bit off is coralhelm commander i think, it's just quite manaintensive and with so much islandwalk you won't need it's evasion as often anymore.
Aquitect's will looks like a decent sideboard card for a couple matches. It can provide that evasion you might need, maindeck it's hardly ever needed though. Ofcourse the only popular deck you probably want to enable that islandwalk for is maverick which might be better to use the black splash for.

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Originally Posted by Marke

Image only get's better as there is another good 2 mana target to copy, reducing the chance it get's stranded in your hand. The card to shave a bit off is coralhelm commander i think, it's just quite manaintensive and with so much islandwalk you won't need it's evasion as often anymore.
Aquitect's will looks like a decent sideboard card for a couple matches. It can provide that evasion you might need, maindeck it's hardly ever needed though. Ofcourse the only popular deck you probably want to enable that islandwalk for is maverick which might be better to use the black splash for.

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Why does everyone talk about shaving? You cannot touch silvergill, you should not touch coralhelm commander, and you should not make sushi out of reejerey.

You just have to play 25 creature build (with 2 images or kiras), 20 lands, and 12 others and 3 flex slots build.

I like the idea of never having to ramp my vial past 2 (Kira from board but still) so I'm also considering replacing Reejerey with Master instead of making room for more guys.

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Originally Posted by Avatar of Shadow

Why does everyone talk about shaving? You cannot touch silvergill, you should not touch coralhelm commander, and you should not make sushi out of reejerey.

You just have to play 25 creature build (with 2 images or kiras), 20 lands, and 12 others and 3 flex slots build.

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What is this for silly contradiction. Of course you have to shave if you stick to 25-26 creatures. Of course you don't touch silvergil and i would probably not touch reejery either but dropping some coralhelm is just the logical choice. Replacing others requires you to play more islands, and all other merfolk are just better then coralhelm. Coralhelm is great to fly over the top and dump some mana but it's also slow and the evasion isn't really needed if you have islandwalk.

I think that I will be takign this route when the Master of the Pearl Trident is released.

15 spells
4 x AEther Vial
2 x Dismember
3 x Daze
2 x Spell Pierce
4 x Force of Will

25 creatures
3 x Coralhelm Commander
3 x Cursecatcher
4 x Master of the Pearl Trident
4 x Lord of Atlantis
4 x Merrow Reejerey
3 x Phantasmal Image
4 x Silvergill Adept

+ Land package 12-4-4

I have been running the deck lately on MWS etc (-4 Master, +1 Pierce, +1 Image, +1 CC, +1 Catcher) and it actually runs really well. The synergy between Reejerey and the Image can be insanely powerful and I agree that Reejerey should not be cut in the deck. 3 drop or not, he gets the deck past grinds into wins.

I don't have a Salvation account; but that was interesting reading back there guys.

I also don't think Standstill is the right card for the deck right now, Stifle in the SB might be good depending on your meta, CotV in the SB is a great idea for my area, Kira can go tot he SB as far as I am concerned, and Dismember could also easlily be Vapor Snag if that is your sctick.

So no love for Augur of Bolas?
Can't help myself pondering whole different core:
4 Augur of Bolas
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident

Then add another lord of choice, most likely Merrow Reejerey (vs Commander) to avoid too many UU's in casting costs. Or maybe Cursecatcher, but how good is he anyways in current meta? Have to admit, it's been while since last touched this deck.
Ofcourse, running AoB needs some tweaking in spells, but core there could be something like:
4 FoW
4 Daze
3 Pierce
3 Stifle
3 Vapor Snag/Echoing Truth

Adding Repeal and Disrupt in some amounts could also be neat if one want to push even more CA here. Also been amusing my self with idea adding Curfew here :) Bouncing cantripping fishes and replaying them though Vial seems good to me.

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Originally Posted by Horto

So no love for Augur of Bolas?
Can't help myself pondering whole different core:
4 Augur of Bolas
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident

Then add another lord of choice, most likely Merrow Reejerey (vs Commander) to avoid too many UU's in casting costs. Or maybe Cursecatcher, but how good is he anyways in current meta? Have to admit, it's been while since last touched this deck.
Ofcourse, running AoB needs some tweaking in spells, but core there could be something like:
4 FoW
4 Daze
3 Pierce
3 Stifle
3 Vapor Snag/Echoing Truth

Adding Repeal and Disrupt in some amounts could also be neat if one want to push even more CA here. Also been amusing my self with idea adding Curfew here :) Bouncing cantripping fishes and replaying them though Vial seems good to me.

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You should test it before making decklists. or just post it in mtgsalvation, since everyone there does that.

Now, with 8 islandwalk lords... playing spreading seas, in SB versus non-blue deck, as a mini-wincon//mini-land disrupt, becomes a viable strategy?

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Originally Posted by Anfylion

Now, with 8 islandwalk lords... playing spreading seas, in SB versus non-blue deck, as a mini-wincon//mini-land disrupt, becomes a viable strategy?

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I'd just run Sea's Claim at that point. The cantrip on SS is nice, but a single U could make the difference with animating Muta and such.

Would be interesting to see some mono blue LD haha, Stifle + Waste + Enchant.

I'm torn between Sea's Claim and Aquatect's Will. They're both U, but only Claim completely changes the land. Will, more often than not, will net you a card. I'm leaning towards Will; I just can't discount the card advantage.

If I was going to play that game, I think the creature serves the most purpose while still providing the utility

here is my list.

4x cursecatcher
4x lord of atlantis
4x master of the pearl trident
4x coralhelm commander
4x silvergill adept
2x phantasmal image
4x merrow reejery

4x FOW
4x Aether vial
3x daze
3x spell pierce

14 island 4x wasteland 2x mutavault.

Let me know what you think. In testing so far it is pretty strong.

We know it seems strong. You are sticking with something close to tried and true, and the manabase looks sane. The question is whether the new lord does something to make this deck useable now where it was not a week ago. Does it now beat Stoneforge Mystic - Merfolk's undoing? Keep your eye on the ball or your testing will not be useful.

On that note, I can't for the life of me uderstand why anyone is posting lists with Brainstorm or random crap. Builds with Brainstorm are unmanageable while keeping the deck's focus on tempo. Just stick with something similar to what Timmy has here or you are going against literally tens of thousands of hours of testing and a freaking novel of exchanged words figuring it out in the first place.