[Deck] Merfolk

I've been playing a list very similar to the one listed above and have been having a good amount of success locally (Chicago).
Last night I beat BUG Delver, Manaless Dredge (relic+pithing needle on phantasmagorian is basically a hard lock), and RUG Delver, losing to Esper Deathblade after splitting the finals (actually lost to my own mulligans).

My meta is largely fair decks (tempo, stoneblade) with a smattering of combo (dredge, storm, mud, etc). Most people have multiple decks, so it is hard to know what exactly to prepare for week-to-week, which I think is actually a good thing in terms of preparing for larger events. It keeps me from warping my list, and demands a well-rounded 75. Here is where I'm at currently:

12 Island
4 Wasteland
4 Mutavault

4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill
4 Lord
4 Master
3 Phantasmal
4 TNN


4 Vial
4 FoW
4 Daze
3 Standstill
2 Spell Pierce

In my mind, this is a fairly stock maindeck at this point, though I see a lot of people still playing Reejerey. I just can't envision the deck supporting so many 3 drops and TNN is so ridiculously more powerful than Reejerey. Why cling to the past when the future has arrived?

I could see trimming a standstill, but don't know what I would add in that spot. Standstill is one of the more generically powerful cards in the deck and isn't terrible against too many matchups.

Another point of divergence recently is the trimming of colorless lands to fit in Caverns. I think I understand the appeal, of getting around Dazes and Forces, but aren't the decks playing these counters already good match-ups for us? I don't see how a deck playing Daze and other soft counter effects should ever trim Wastelands. I guess the real appeal of Cavern is being able to cast TNN without fear, but this seems like a sort of training-wheel mindset to me. I'd love to hear arguments to the contrary.

As for the sideboard, I've been relatively happy with the following, but am not 100% on the last couple slots:

3 Submerge
3 Relic of Progenitus
2 Pithing Needle
2 Dismember
2 Kira
2 Swan Song
1 Jitte

I'm not completely sold on the 2nd Kira or the 2nd Swan Song. Kira just seems so great against Delver decks' spot removal, but going up to six 3 drops against them seems fundamentally flawed. As for Swan Song, I think I prefer it to Flusterstorm, Hydroblast, or more Pierces as weapons against combo, but am eager to hear arguments otherwise. Maybe its just a matter of which combo you expect to play most commonly. Swan Song is sweetest against SnS, Fluster against Storm, Pierce is the middle ground.

I also saw the recent tech of Carry Away, but am scared of REB's out of UWR Delver as a major blowout. Pithing Needle has served me well as a catch-all answer in many matchups, and also neuters jitte/stoneforge wonderfully. That said, Carry Away seems like it'd be amazing if Esper was by far the more popular flavor of Stoneforge deck (having no REB's).

I'll be playing this list (give or take a card or two) at the SCG in Indy this weekend and hope to do the Lord of Atlantis proud. I'll try to report back with anything useful I learn.

I agree with you regarding the Merrow

But I play 2 cavern.. No more than two .. If for some reason I can't play the vial I like to avoid to be worried when I cast a TNN or maybe the Lord that could let me win the game.

This is my list:

11 island
4 waste
3 mutavault
2 cavern

4 vial
3 standstill

4 fow
3 daze
2 spell pierce
1 fluster storm

4 cursecatcher
4 silvergill
4 lord
4 master
4 TNN
3 phantasmal

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Side:

2 relic
1 flusterstorm
2 dismember
2 swang song
2 pithing needle
2 cursed totem
1 llawan
2 back to basic
1 Jitte

I am really curious to try the Stifle next week..

-2 spell pierce
-1 flusterstorm
+3 stifle


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Looks like I am taking a different path from the rest of you. I have a 27 creature list that's more or less all or nothing Aggro. I have 8 counters main and 3 more in the side, but mostly I am just trying to overload the board as fast as I can and drive the win home.

Local torny this Sunday, I am taking fish. My build has changed since the last time I posted it and the sideboard has been ripped apart and rebuilt. If I do well I will put up my thoughts on it. Last night it did well against RUG, Painter and a home brew land disruption deck so I am hoping it can go all the way

The very Aggro version seems to be the most reliable one at the moment so I would suggest you to go forward with that list :)

I play a more tempo-like version because I am a more tempo-player, that helps me in a lot of matchup but at the same time brings me a lot of problems with other matchup (for example Elves).

How is your list going against combo?


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Game one? Shit. That's the sorry truth of a list that wishes to run an Aggro out. Against some decks it can feel like I am playing Zoo. The thing is, there is the 8 counters plus the 4 Curse so I can hold my own. Islandwalk is a Bitch. Still I have not got the same power that the extra counters and Standstill can offer. That really can hurt.

Games 2 and 3 are a very different story. I have a lot of two of's, but they overlap. Cage slowes elves, hoses Dredge and smacks down Reanimator. I run Relic too and while it's effect on elves is limited, it can win you a game against Loam or RUG.

I can post the full list once home if your interested.

Happy to read your list.

I am particularly curious about the sideboard.

How is the matchup with show and tell decks (sneak, omni, etc)?

Regarding Elves Dredge and reanimator, My tempo version:

Vs elves: difficult, a bit better with the cursed totem

Vs dredge: honestly I plaid against a dredge just a few times, can't judge even if I think that is not that bad

Vs reanimator: I like this matchup :) especially if I have a lovely phantasmal image in my hand


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Quote:

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Creatures:
4 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
2 Phantasmal Image
4 Silvergill Adept
3 Sygg, River Cutthroat
2 Merrow Reejerey
4 True-Name Nemesis

Spells:
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
1 Dismember

Artifacts:
4 Æther Vial

Land:
3 Mutavault
4 Wasteland
13 Island

Sideboard:
3 Flusterstorm
1 Dismember
2 Misdirection
2 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner (or Chill if meta requires)
1 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Umezawa's Jitte

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The main is relativity simple. If I turn up and 25 people are shuffling Blade decks, I will move the second Dismember back to the Main.

On the side. I feel like I am too weak to Green. Goyf will be a pain if I see him, I play Elves myself so I know exactly how weak I am to them too. The thing is, I expect to only see a small number of Elf decks locally. If I do not lend mine out (and I want to win so I wont) there should only be 2 in the 45 people that will play. I will take those odds. The weakness I have opened to Green has meant a strengthened Blue match. Llawan is almost a Mandate right now, Fluster does its thing to make sure you get the last word in counter wars, Misdirection is in here as Force number 5/6 but it holds another benefit. I know there will be two Painter decks locally, I would love to Misdirect a Grindstone. Also, in the age of TNN and removal, sending someone's own TNN into Exile off their own Swords is a trick I wish to see.

Cage has replaced 2 of my Relic. I got Pithinged against Reanimator when using Relic, killing the card. Cage solves that issue while also forcing them to have an answer to it. I do not need to crack it, its just going to do it's thing. But I do not like the idea of sitting on a card that can be destroyed and then I instant lose. So for that reason I like the two Relic as the One Two punch. The two in combination can just break some decks. Also I learnt long ago, 4 grave hate or no grave hate. Nothing in-between. I am going with the grave hate.

Jitte I swear is the weakest card in this list. If I did not know that there will be a good amount of Red showing up and I may need the life gain or control against Goblins, I would pitch it in a heartbeat. I know there are games it just wins, but that does not change that its slow, its cumbersome and its not all that effective against Blade as they run 5 copies to our 2. Still until Lighting Bolt is printed in Blue, (come on, we know its going to happen) I will keep my spot removal. The card is on thin Ice though. I feel its increasingly taking up space in my board I could use for other, more useful things.

Kira vs Chill is a question I am asking myself a lot. I will decide on the day but right now I am running Kira. Decay defence is good, but I honestly expect more Esperblade. If Punishing Jund arrives you can guess which of the two I am going with.

Just a quick touch on the Main, the reason for the 2/2 split on PI and Ree is that I just like 10 lords. If they print another 2 drop Lord I will sing to the heavens but until then I am going to go with Ree. If TNN had not have been printed I would throw in Inkfathom Infiltrator just to be an ass. Might do that later. But that will be on a Tuesday night, not a night where Hundreds of dollars worth of cards is up for grabs.

I took out a Dismember for the 4th TNN main. The reason being I see TNN as far more useful against an unknown first game and I would rather have him over the possibility of two dead cards.

The Lands are new as well. 3 Muta, 13 Islands. I have decided to go with this because while I have more grey mana symbols than ever before, Sygg is a vitally important part of this deck now as well as the lords. I can not risk them being stuck in my hand.


So yea, if you have anything you want to suggest I am all ears, but as it stands this is the list.

Dice.

@Dice: how do you deal with sneak and show?


Also are cavern of souls worth including in 2 off?

To me it seems a solid good list.

I like your idea to play the cage, I could add one on my sb, maybe removing the Jitte.

Honestly I think that Jitte is really too slow for this deck. I played 2, main, a few times and I practically never used them.

I am interested regarding Sygg... I tried Thassa, I tried the Cold eye selkie but I have not tried Sygg yet, could it replace standstill ?


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Originally Posted by Dice_Box

Misdirection is in here as Force number 5/6 but it holds another benefit. I know there will be two Painter decks locally, I would love to Misdirect a Grindstone.

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Misdirection can be used with Grindstone. I have recently built Painters to play it and know who to beat it with merfolks, and seems a dificult matchup. Most of us have replaced Spell pierces in the SB with Swan Song, and that means no extra counters in the SB for this matchup. They play 8 REB, normally 2 in the SB, so they have even more counters than us. Fortunately it's not a very popular deck (yet?).

I having more trouble against white (without blue) than green. I can't beat D&T, I have played thousands of times and it's just imposible. Maverick is a bit easier and so is Jund thanks to TNN.
I haven't tested a lot against Elves, almost never shows in my meta, but I'm also building it. Any advice, Dice_Box, to what should we counter or which are their weakness?

I played against painters a few times. I would say that is ok as matchup but I play with 10 counter maindeck plus 4 cursecatcher plus 3 in the sideboard.

D&T can be difficult, it depends a lot from TNN, if I draw at least one is not that bad, otherwise D&T has really a lot of tricks. I don't like to see the Sword of fire and ice for example.

Against elves well.. Natural Order and Green Sun Zenith are usually what you don't want to see casted.
The craterhoof is usually the winning card against me. any advice is good because honestly I always find difficulties when I play against elves.


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Originally Posted by Zorker

@Dice: how do you deal with sneak and show?


Also are cavern of souls worth including in 2 off?

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Game one if I don't know what I am against, I just try and ham on the pressure. Game too I am looking for a hand with at lest on good counter or Wasteland. If I can waste their first land drop, that's often all I need to gain the tempo needed to run away with the game.


Elves is a deck you need to play to know well. See you might Fear a Glimpse, but a good amount of players these days run it out as kind of a green Recall. It's just a draw spell now, not really the win. The meat of the deck is Natural Order. It is not something you want to see resolve. Remember that they can crack a fetch to gain an extra creature to Sac for NO. So if your doing the math on if they can kill you, add that to your calculations.

Best answers are Cursed Totem and Cage. Again that's not an auto win either because the deck can still just Aggro out. If you have Stifle, this is the match to use them. They play Ham with Hoof.


DnT is not the best Match in the world, a good reason to keep Jitte now you mention it, but they have a larger dependence on Vial than any other Vial deck does. I would fight over the Vial before I looked at anything else. The rest is a slog match that ends with one of you Breaking the other. If you run Spreading Seas, it makes this match funny.


Mavick is dead. TNN based Blade just kind of ate it. I expect to see not a deck. If I do I will just take it. That's the price I will pay for not being ready for it.


Sygg is a replacement for Standstill, but you need to be all in on the Aggro path to make it work. I have had good luck with him in the past, the combo with TNN or Islandwalk is just nuts.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dice_Box

I know there will be two Painter decks locally, I would love to Misdirect a Grindstone. Also, in the age of TNN and removal, sending someone's own TNN into Exile off their own Swords is a trick I wish to see.

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You can't Misdirect a Grindstone and you can't Swords their TNN because Misdirect would need to target his TNN.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dice_Box

Kira vs Chill is a question I am asking myself a lot. I will decide on the day but right now I am running Kira. Decay defence is good, but I honestly expect more Esperblade.

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What Decay defense? They both die to single Decay.

I am personally going to play 3 TNN main and 1 side (they could be slow and we are not equipment.dec).
To cast new 3-drops my Wastelands are in a danger zone right now (Mutas can't be touched).
I am not cutting Wastes altogether, 2 or 3 will remain for now.

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Originally Posted by FANAttIC

You can't Misdirect a Grindstone and you can't Swords their TNN because Misdirect would need to target his TNN. What Decay defense? They both die to single Decay.

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Ok 2 out of 3 ain't bad. Your right on Decay and Grindstone, your wrong on Swords. You target the Swords only picking the new target. This means TNN is a legal target for their own Swords. Misdirected does not care about TNN, only that Swords last a "Target". You can pick that target and it will resolve as if they had Swordsed their own TNN from the start.

Thanks for your assessment Dice Box, your posts have been very helpful to me :)

Right now, I've got a legacy tournament coming up, and this will be the list I'm thinking of taking:

Main Deck

4 x Cursecatcher
4 x Silvergill Adept
4 x Master of the Pearl Trident
4 x Lord of Atlantis
4 x Phantasmal Image
4 x True-Name Nemesis
3 x Sygg, River Cutthroat

4 x Aether Vial

4 x Force of Will
3 x Daze
2 x Dismember

4 x Wasteland (easily pick wasteland over mutavault)
3 x Mutavault
13 x Island

Sideboard (designed for MY meta)

3 Grafdiggers Cage
1 Tormod Crypt
1 Dismember
2 Jitte
1 Spell Pierce
2 Flusterstorm
1 Vendilion Clique
4 Steel Sabotage

Strongly debatable points: firstly, my meta is very very low on combo, outside of Reanimator. We have no show-and-tell. Hence, that tech is mostly in the sideboard. I've gone down to (gasp) 7 counters in favour of dismember, because a lot of (luckily usually blue-based) fair decks are run. Dismember is flexible and hits a lot. I'm expecting storm to be the only other combo run, I have no experience with it. I'm mixing up my strategy with Flusterstorm and Vendilion Clique.

Sygg: glad to hear that Dice_Box is running him well but I'm a bit more skeptical because no one chooses to run him. I'll see how he performs. In a combo-meta I would go -3 Sygg, -1 Dismember, +3 Standstill, +1 Spell Pierce.

No Merrow: he just always underperforms. I feel like I need to be faster, at least in my meta. Phantasmal image IS faster. It can create inconsistent draws. Will test if inconsistent draws are worth it vs. the power/speed it brings.

Steel Sabotage: have considered this point a lot. I know there'll be at least 1-2 (in my 16-man tournament) affinity and this will aid in not making it a complete bye. It doesn't get rid of equipment forever usually against blade decks, but it does give us a tempo swing which is (hopefully) all we need. Will also bounce vials. What should I take out against blade decks to bring in my + 4 steel sabotage?

Interesting list and I am curious about Sygg too.

Regarding the sideboard, I would play Chalice of the Void instead of Steel Sabotage... Against Affinity is amazing and you can still play it against other decks (removing things like bolt, sword to plow., ponder, brainstorm, etc)


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Originally Posted by comix84

Interesting list and I am curious about Sygg too.

Regarding the sideboard, I would play Chalice of the Void instead of Steel Sabotage... Against Affinity is amazing and you can still play it against other decks (removing things like bolt, sword to plow., ponder, brainstorm, etc)


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Chalice would be very nice... if I had room :wink: unfortunately though, I don't. Steel Sabotages primary purpose as tech is to hate against equipment. They play their TNN, then play + equip and attack me with it. I bounce their equipment, take 3. I then next turn play a bunch of merfolk, and (hopefully) get out of SoFI range - and slam them for damage. Next turn, they have to play/equip it AGAIN, meaning they don't get to play their planeswalker. I hopefully win the race.

This thread chronicles my consideration for hate :wink: I used to run pithing needle. It is still a consideration, because it does shut down whatever they fetch for, AND it hits a lot of things, it is a great catch-all. It is less devastating than Steel Sabotage though because I have to play pithing needle immediately after they fetch their equipment and name whatever they find before they equip it. It deals with the threat indefinitely, but it doesn't slow them down the same way that Steel Sabotage does by almost time-walking them (especially if you can wasteland them down to 3 land) which I think is probably better for us.

I also like Steel Sabotage for D&T. Bounce/counter their vial, and bounce their equipment. Bouncing a vial after a turn or 2 basically nullifies it.

I could modify the sideboard to be 2 Steel Sabotage, 2 Pithing Needle. But if I can get away with running 4 and not need the pithing needles in my small pod... I will :wink:

I'd love to fit Kira in the 75 somehow to deal with decks that have lots of spot removal like threshold and deathblade, which will be there. But right now it isn't a priority as I am running 3 dismember and 4 TNN in my 75, with 2 in the MD to help with the first match.

In testing, I am finding 4 PI to be a pain when running 4 Silvergill. There are issues where I can drop anything other than silver (Say I need a lord) and then it just ends up trapped in my hand. A deck I feel should not have a set of 8 of these cards. Also that's with 27 total creatures.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Dice_Box

In testing, I am finding 4 PI to be a pain when running 4 Silvergill. There are issues where I can drop anything other than silver (Say I need a lord) and then it just ends up trapped in my hand. A deck I feel should not have a set of 8 of these cards. Also that's with 27 total creatures.

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You are right that it does create awkward situations like that. However, the addition of Sygg IS significant. Consider that previous to TNN, you played with 20 Merfolf maindeck. With the addition of TNN + Sygg, my decklist runs 23 Merfolk MD. That actually IMPROVES my chances I will have something to show. If we played Silvergill in that deck, I don't see why we wouldn't now.

I think the real problem is that Phantasmal Image does not combo well with Cursecatcher and Sygg. How often do you want to copy a Cursecatcher? Almost never unless desperate, and you can't copy Sygg. On the other hand, it gets you raw speed and power. It helps shore up my matches against Reanimator with an out, which is rampant in my meta. It is a lets-pray answer to Emrakul (not relevant in my meta though). It can be play for 1U, highly relevant in our crappy mana base. We can copy our opponents creatures (Delver giving you problems? Especially with a vial out, copy and block). Against dredge (a potential threat here), we can use it to deal with bridges. It even works well against control decks, because we can copy our 3 mutavaults.

I love the sheer power of this, but I'm also skeptical of dropping Reejerys altogether. What is better: deck as is, -1 PI +1 Reejery or -1 Dismember -1 PI +2 Reejery? I know I'll chop/change until the final day :wink: I've even updated my sideboard to:

3 Grafdiggers Cage
1 Kira, the Great Glass Spinner
1 Dismember
2 Jitte
1 Spell Pierce
2 Flusterstorm
1 Vendilion Clique
4 Steel Sabotage

Gone -1 Tormods Crypt, +1 Kira to help out in removal-heavy matches. I'd love to fit another Kira in there but don't see a better card to remove, given my meta. The Clique might be too slow against Storm as well.

Not sure, that I think is a personal thing. What I was testing was my current build with -2 Ree, +2 PI. I do not think that, even with 23 fish, a build with 4 image and 4 Silvergill is smart. I get that I can copy the other players stuff, but that's not always useful to my own game plan. Maybe side in two PI?