Its an old list.Quote:
Originally Posted by Windmill
Not gonna be playing merfolk since i don't wanna open my Mindseize
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Its an old list.Quote:
Originally Posted by Windmill
Not gonna be playing merfolk since i don't wanna open my Mindseize
It is more forgivable, but you lack tutors to go get that Bob to abuse him. On a quick glance, looks like the list ran black for E.Plague, but there aren't many tribal decks to use it on.Quote:
Originally Posted by benthetenor
Man, this is getting me excited. I really want to run this list :smile:
MAIN BOARD
4 Underground Sea
4 Fetches
8 Island
4 Wasteland
4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
4 Phantasmal Image
4 True-Name Nemesis
3 Dark Confidant
1 Vendilion Clique (local meta choice - flexi spot, or 4th bob?)
4 Force of Will
4 Daze (or 3 daze/1 1cc counter)
4 Aether Vial
SIDEBOARD
2 Grafdiggers Cage
1 Tormod's Crypt
4 Toxic Deluge
1 Vendilion Clique
4 Thoughtseize
1 Flusterstorm/other counter
2 Submerge
The Vendilion Cliques are a meta choice. You could replace them with counters. They're awesome against Omnishow which is rampant here in the South Island of NZ. Damn, this is one expensive list. I'd love to run it, but I just don't have the pieces. If it worked I'd get it though, fuck, I'd buy this bad boy. I feel like this has game against everything, and once you SB in it preys upon everything.
Adding black is not worth losing Mutavault, in my opinion, it has been a deciding card in so many games for me. Bob and Thoughtseize are great, but I'm not sure they're the tools that Merfolk needs.Quote:
Originally Posted by Windmill
Oh that isn't why I ditched Mutavault, I'm just tired of playing with 8 colourless sources. It is either play black, or play CoS for me. I am poor so I'll play CoS, but I think that this list looks bloody amazing.
Personally I like the 4 Mutavault / 4 CoS manabase. I see there's a lot of debate on whether it's worth dropping wasteland for CoS, but I think more testing is needed. It's probably more of a meta call.Quote:
Originally Posted by Windmill
Don't just splash for the hell of it. I splashed cuz i didn't face too much punishing decks, otherwise i'd get smoked. THe only reason i splashed was during the combo meta, elves, and tempo meta and BUG control. I needed a way to keep the engine going.Quote:
Originally Posted by Windmill
WIth so much stoneblade in the meta, its not worth it at this time because you still can't answer artifacts.
The cards you see that i'm running are tidebinder, misdirection. Its to really deal with the goyfs, RUG and abrupt decay.
Isn't thoughtseize an answer to artifact? They fetch for it, we discard it.
You can't do it reliably. I would play disfiguredQuote:
Originally Posted by Windmill
You could always play 2-3 carry away as well? I prefer that over the destroy equipment hate you used previously. Brings the tempo boost to us, and we get to swing with our creature the turn we cast it, and if we have four Mana we can equip it too.Quote:
Originally Posted by KobeBryan
There is no way I can afford this anyway. I figured out that I would only need to spend another $250 on cardboard with some cuts and borrowing underground sea. But like hell I can afford that. I have car payments. Sigh :P
Isn't there an instant black card that gives everything - 1/-1 that was 2cc? Or am I just dreaming? If there is that might be better than Toxic Deluge. This black version is eating into our life a lot. You didn't find that Bob killed you against fair decks?
if you must splash, this is what I would do
4 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
2 Misty Rainforest
4 Wasteland
3 Mutavault
3 Island
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
4 Cursecatcher
4 Phantasmal Image
3 TNN
3 Dark Confidant
4 Force of Will
4 Daze
4 AEther Vial
4 Silvergill Adept
2 misdirection
SB: 4 Thoughtseize
SB: 3 Engineered Plague
SB: 2 Relic of Progenitus
SB: 1 Tormod's Crypt
SB: 3 disfigure
SB: 1 Toxic Deluge
SB: 1 smother
I've been looking at Greg Hatch's list from the Invitational more and more lately, and I have to say I love it.
20 LANDS
12 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Cavern of Souls
29 CREATURES
4 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
4 Silvergill Adept
4 True-Name Nemesis
3 Merrow Reejerey
3 Cosi's Trickster
3 Phantasmal Image
8 INSTANTS and SORCERIES
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
3 OTHER SPELLS
3 Ęther Vial
SIDEBOARD
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Pithing Needle
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Spell Pierce
3 Submerge
4 Swan Song
1 Vision Charm
1 Llawan, Cephalid Empress
1 Umezawa's Jitte
Reejerey cannot be replaced under any circumstances. It's a very vital part of both growing your fish and manipulating board states if need be; True-Name Nemesis is also an obvious inclusion. Phantasmal Image is also very versatile in that it's True-Name Nemesis 5-7, and can also copy whatever else is out that can help you get ahead.
I also prefer Cavern to Wasteland greatly. The current meta (at least around here) is strewn with countermagic and you want to make sure your fish actually hit the field. It's not synergistic with a turn one Daze, but it's much better beyond that if it comes to it.
I'm still on the fence with Cosi's Trickster though. It's obviously great on the play, but not as much on the draw. Since his list does have 29 creatures in it, I think I would rather trade the three Tricksters for Standstills, but that's just me. I do like the Vision Charm in the sideboard, since it can handle Batterskull and turn lands into islands to go in for the kill.
I can't think of an instant. There are sorceries: Shrivel or NauseaQuote:
Originally Posted by Windmill
Dark Confidant with x4 Force of Will and x2 Misdirection seems like a good way to kill yourself. That being said, I'm not a fan of splashing black anyway. While Dark Confidant is a great card, it's a little slow and I feel like you'd be better off just sticking more fish and adding to your clock. You don't really want to play a 2-drop that you're afraid to attack with.Quote:
Originally Posted by KobeBryan
Ah yes, I was mistakenly thinking of Shrivel.
But yeah, I think for now I will stick to trying Sygg, and wait for others to pick up Gregs list and learn more about it first. I am truly not sold on Reejery, TNN has been doing wonders for me.
Black isn't the right color to slash anymore. It was when tribal decks and zoo were everywhere, but that's not the case anymore. Red is much better: we get sudden Denise for a 1 sided swiper, red blasts for anything blue, and great artifact removal for stoneforge. That's pretty much everything merfolk is really weak, tribal, aggro, and, stoneforge, and red answers them all.
I don't know if it's worth to splash or not.
We have to ask ourselves some questions:
1. Is Dark confidant really that powerful? If he was blue, would we be playing him as a four-of? My personal opinion without much testing is Yes. I can't think of a deck which can benefit more from card advantage than us. He is good against combo, no doubts. A must kill for control, helps us recovering. Against aggro-control and mindrange decks is a silver bullet, we win those MU's by developing a better board position. (I didn't consider aggro, obviously he's bad there, but it's not very popular right now, yes, I'm not counting elves) Having one more lord is normally the diference between siting back and losing against 4/5 goyfs or attacking with some 5/5's. A lost creature by a removal spell in the combat phase can mean a 2-3x1 for the opponent. Bob helps us in that very eficiently.
2. Do our manabases get worse? Yes, definately yes. But remember most of us have already cut the Wastelands. Imagine: We are running 20 lands, would changing the 4 Wastes for 4 Undergrounds make the manabase worse? No, it would make it even better. Does also adding 6-7 fecthes make it worse? I don't know. I really don't know. Stifle is not even played today. I really think if we cut the wastes we can afford another color, but we probably also want to run 2-3 Cavern... Not sure
3. Is black the best color to splash? If Confidant works as expected proabably yes, at least maindeck. White has much more interesting answers in the SB (RIP, Swords to Plowshares, Disenchant (?)) Maybe even Sygg in the maindeck the one who gives protection?
Perish and Thoughtseize are nice SB cards, but not very impressive nowadays... If there's a reason to splash black would be the Confidants, and if it was one reason to do so with white, SB options
To sum up, I think or manabase can handle another color, but we have to test it to see if it's worth it. Don't say ''We should never add an extra color even for StP/Confidant'' and try. Most of us thought Wastelands were absoltely necesary, and it's not the case. Give it a try.
What I suggest is that if some people have the time and can test some splash versions without Wastes it would be very appreciated. I'm testing the black splash with 4 confidants mainboard. I will post results and thoughts.
Great write up, I really enjoyed reading it. I would rest but I don't have the time, nor am I skilled enough to do so. I look forward to your results.Quote:
Originally Posted by BVB09
Like i said, i haven't tested this deck in a LONG time.Quote:
Originally Posted by CaptainTwiddle
Well, if you guys want a color to run, Red is best choice IMO.
Blood Moon screws those weird decks with greedy mana bases. Barely impacts you since you run Vial.
REB/Pyro blast help you fight TNN and SnT along with winning counter wars. Can also do other fun stuff like blow up Delvers and Jaces
Razorfin Hunter gives you reach for pinging any X/1 creatures while also being a Merfolk. (yes I shared super secret tech, be grateful).
Thanks Windmill, but anybody can help. If some of us go in the same direction and try things we will develope the deck which a higher posibility of success. Any thoughts are apreciated. :)
I'm not sure if red is as strong as Black/White is.
I don't think Blood moon would work as most islands are non-basics and we'll lose islandwalk.
I agree on Lightning, artifact destruction and maybe Sudden Demise been powerful. But is that better than RIP and StP? And better than Dark Confidant, Perish, Thiughtseize and Disfigure?
I honestly don't know, but in my testimg red splash wasn't as good as expected.
Confidant is proving to be great, but the life loss is a real pain, is much higher than expected, and that plus the fechtlands can be problematic. I'm going to try Disfigure in the SB, it's not StP, butkills most of our common enemies (Mom, Grim, Thalia, SFM, Bob, Delver ...) not Goyf, but he is normally in blue decks anyway
Also not giving life to our opponents is quite important, as well as being able to kill an own Bob on will
However I don't want to rely too much on black mana, amd my SB is more black than blue right now... Bob can be vialed or even cast eith Cavern on Wizard. The lifeloss is being a bigger problem than the manabase right now...