[Deck] Canadian Threshold (aka RUG Delver, Tempo Thresh)

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Originally Posted by Drake0525

Yeah, I swapped out the Hydroblasts for Rough and Tumble. I feel like it will be relevant in more matchups. My local metagame is a lot of red, but Blood Moon can get countered, and Rough and Tumble will mop up most red creatures. So this is what I'll be running for my sideboard this week:
2x Submerge
2x Eidolon of the Great Revel
2x Rough // Tumble
1x Pyroblast
1x Null Rod
2x Surgical Extraction
1x Sulfuric Vortex
1x Ancient Grudge
2x Flusterstorm

Thanks a lot for the pointers! My last time out I took out Miracles with a Null Rod, and a really violent Nimble Mongoose. Canadian Threshold is a fun deck!

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Congrats Miracles if they're a skilled opponent is a really tough match up. I just played against a very good Miracles pilot tonight and got there in 3 (definitely one of the best players I know). Game 1 I got locked out pretty fast. I was OTD and he had fetched island top go. My turn I play out a delver with ponder, force, bolt, waste and some other lands in hand. Not a great hand but I'll take it. He tried to force my delver which I let resolve since ponder was my only other action and keeps my force live. He tried to play out counterbalance on his turn which I forced. Shortly after that though he played DTT found counterbalance and that was that.
Sb for both g2 and 3: +2 pyroblast, 2 flusterstorm, 2 eidolon, surgical, clique, sylvan, null rod, winter orb // - 4 daze, 2 goyf, 2 waste, 2 dismember, 1 bolt

Game 2 I kept a hand with an eidolon, null rod, delver and some other disruption in it. His hand seemed to be pretty reliant on his top since he led on karakas top most likely trying to save his fetch to decide if he could get away with just a basic or if he needed a dual. Delver got in for one hit then was swords the following turn. I landed Eidolon after that which tabled into null rod on turn 3 followed by wasting his karakas turn 4. He proceeded to not draw lands, but he did eventually get a snapcaster out to block eidolon. After that I dropped a goose and sylvan library which finished the game.

Game 3 I landed eidolon into a winter orb and things got real awkward really fast. He couldn't find an answer for eidolon at all and the winter orb was really messing with his mana. This game by itself sold me on how good winter orb is in this match up so long as you have enough pressure to go along with it.

*Note I have tried keeping dazes in even with winter orb. No matter what we just don't want this card against them it's so bad. Everytime I play against them they can usually play around it. That aside look at what else we're boarding in instead for countermagic flusterstorm and pyroblasts which are much better anyways.

Overall I'm really happy with this board I ended up going 2/2 at my weekly losing round 1 to D&T, won round 2 vs Infect, won round 3 vs miracles, lost round 4 to grixis mid range. I made one slight play mistake that probably cost me the last game vs grixis. I didn't daze his Pyromancer when he had 1 land up which allowed him to get 2 tokens off of it before he passed and I killed it on my turn. I was really behind that game having kept a hand of force, daze x 2, pyroblast, bolt dismember, fetch, but I never drew another land. It wasn't a bad hand just I didn't draw another land and he pyroblasted my one cantrip. If I had dazed his pyromancer though I would have been under a lot less pressure and probably could have salvaged the game or at least not died to 2 elemental tokens lol.

Md 54 core RUG Delver with 2 snare, 2 pierce, 2 dismember

The one thing I've noticed with my current sideboard is that it is fairly week to D&T:
2 pyroblast
2 flusterstorm
2 eidolon
2 rough
2 submerge
1 surgical
1 vendilion
1 sylvan
1 null rod
1 winter orb

Despite that one weakness I definitely like it. Since I have 2 dismember main deck it helps free up the sideboard artifact hate slots. By making the concession to deal with batterskull by stifle/dismember then you can run null rod as your one artifact hate. Aside from it dealing with all equipment (SoFI, Jitte and batterskull) it also turns off Vials which really help vs D&T since you shut off two crucial parts of their deck with one card. The other nice thing aside from D&T and maverick it also shuts off artifact mana from Storm and makes Miracles a nightmare to play. Just watching Miracles trying to rip lands while you have a null rod in play is amusing.

Eidolon has definitely earned his spot in my board dealing 18dmg to miracles over my 2 games and another 10dmg to infect before he ended up hydroblasting it after he realized his two noble hierarches weren't winning the life point race lol. It was amusing tonight my board against Infect was: OTD - 4 daze, - 4 goose, - 4 stifle, - spell pierce // + 2 pyroblast (deals with blighted agent), 2 rough, 2 fluster, 2 eidolon, 2 submerge, 1 surgical, 1 sylvan, 1 winter orb. I was surprised when looking at my board and realizing everything down to winter orb making inkmoth nexus act like a port on themselves was good against them. Even Surgical was good hitting his vines after his first one resolved (it blanked my submerge on his blighted agent which then got pyroblasted instead).

I would like to find room for a sulfur elemental, but I honestly don't think there is. Everything in the board is pretty necessary. I mean winter orb could get the axe I guess if it proves to not be useful against Omnitell (I haven't tested that match up a whole lot yet), but even then it was really good tonight against miracles. I think the few options would be going down one submerge or rough for a sulfur elemental, but those seem bad for multiple reasons. Going down to one submerge means my bug delver and shardless match ups become much worse. On top of that if I go down to 1 rough in favor of a sulfur elemental that's kind of counter intuitive since rough is already really good vs D&T. Aside from it being somewhat soft to D&T the board is still really good vs just about anything else lol.

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Originally Posted by Contract Killer

The one thing I've noticed with my current sideboard is that it is fairly week to D&T:
2 pyroblast
2 flusterstorm
2 eidolon
2 rough
2 submerge
1 surgical
1 vendilion
1 sylvan
1 null rod
1 winter orb

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i agree, since ive been seeing lots of that white mare lately, i myself might have to call back Sulfur from the bench.
been running this 15 lately and im happy with it, covers my bad matchups real well.

3 (1 surgical, 2 graf's) graveyard hate, i always hate losing to random dredge decks, surgical can come also vs combo decks, or i shld say any matchup.
3 (pyroblasts) vs any delver, tnn, miracles, omnis, combos...
3 (1 grudge, 1 kgrip, 1needle) anti artifacts enchantments that are so versatile
3 (submerges) bug.dec are still many in my meta, but this might be the flexslot if im changing any since ive got 2 grafs/roughs to strenghten my elf matchup
2 (roughs) any aggro or token decks
1 (sulfuric vortex) with lots of miracles too in my meta, this made a big difference for me to battle that matchup.

i might cut 1 submerge for a SULFUR.

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Originally Posted by poxy14

i agree, since ive been seeing lots of that white mare lately, i myself might have to call back Sulfur from the bench.
been running this 15 lately and im happy with it, covers my bad matchups real well.

3 (1 surgical, 2 graf's) graveyard hate, i always hate losing to random dredge decks, surgical can come also vs combo decks, or i shld say any matchup.
3 (pyroblasts) vs any delver, tnn, miracles, omnis, combos...
3 (1 grudge, 1 kgrip, 1needle) anti artifacts enchantments that are so versatile
3 (submerges) bug.dec are still many in my meta, but this might be the flexslot if im changing any since ive got 2 grafs/roughs to strenghten my elf matchup
2 (roughs) any aggro or token decks
1 (sulfuric vortex) with lots of miracles too in my meta, this made a big difference for me to battle that matchup.

i might cut 1 submerge for a SULFUR.

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Graveyard hate though is 99% of the time irrelevant I feel. Regular dredge is pretty easy to beat on the stack. Manaless dredge is the only real deck you need graveyard hate against and it's such a bad deck that nobody really plays it. I'm on the dodge it plan personally which is why I only have the one surgical and nobody in my meta plays dredge.

I actually never really liked three pyroblasts. They're not bad, but I always felt running two and then a flusterstorm instead of the third gave more flexibility. They're great against miracles and Omnitell, but even against omnitell flusterstorm is arguably better then pyroblast in most instances. Storm I always hated boarding pyroblast in against since it was so lack luster. I just think the only reason we would ever want three is to beat solely TNN which is usually ran as a 1 or 2 off right now out of grixis. Some of the UWR stoneblade lists have more TNN, but they're slower and easier to disrupt then grixis delver is. It just seems like a narrow margin to take up an extra board slot to beat TNN when we could run flusterstorm instead of the third which offers more options vs other decks.

Right now I'm pretty sure Grixis is the delver flavor of the week. All the more reason why I don't think we need three submerges right now. The only match ups we want it against are Bug delver and shardless bug. Sure there's Maverick/Jund which we need it against too, but they're less common than delver decks I think. That aside running at least one if not two dismembers main deck can help off set going down to two Submerges which let us have more sideboard options.

Having played both needle and null rod a fair amount I actually think null rod is strictly better. It deals with top which is one of the main reasons to play needle anyways. On top of that it also deals with fast mana from storm, ALL equipment and vials. Needle can hit stuff like JTMS, port, Deathrite, mom etc but a) most miracle decks side jace out and they run fewer of those in favor of DTT now and b) naming deathrite, mom or port with needle seems worse then just shutting off their entire stoneforge package + their vials. Null rod I think is just superior in every match up that you would want needle ie miracles, equipment decks and it has the added bonus of being a house against storm too.

I do think if you were to switch the needle to null rod you could probably cut the grudge for a sulfur elemental. Null rod deals with all artifacts in their deck and k-grip gives you an out to counterbalance / batterskull artifacts would be pretty much covered.

If there's a lot of miracles in your meta I would suggest trying the Eidolon tech against them. It's on par with sulfuric vortex against them. You lose the evasion factor, but it's also hitting for more like 4 a turn (so long as you keep it protected). Essentially you're trading the evasion for a faster clock. Vortex is great, but they get a lot of time to dig for answers. Eidolon constantly hits them and makes each additional threat or disruption that you play harder and more painful to deal with. The other advantage is eidolon is more flexible and some decks just might not be able to deal with it depending on how they board. For example, storm against us adds more mana like carpet and maybe some extra disruption to beat counters like xantid swarm or city of solitude. They usually don't add permanent disruption.

This sounds corner case utility, but is actually a very interesting concept I just learned. My friend Jordan explained it as so:
"Understand the 4 different levels to fight combo. Static on board answer, Hand destruction, on the stack and post resolution. "

Hand destruction is known for coming out of bug shells and esper shells. That's great for those decks because they attack combo on two angles the stack and their hand. Maverick and D&T deal with combo by static or post resolution like pridemage blowing up omniscience. I never thought about our deck dealing with combo other than on the stack until a) seeing Jordan's Eidolon tech and b) seeing Gerry Thompson's Null Rod and Winter Orb tech. To further explain this think about how every combo player perceives RUG Delver: We run efficient threats and a lot of counters. This is literally how every combo player I think has looked at RUG Delver for the past 3 years; no since the conception of this archetype.

Most of the time they board in some more counters, maybe some removal for the fast delver, and something to solidify their mana. By having a threat like Eidolon against Storm they're now under a lot of pressure. For starters, they have to deal with the threat on board which also makes all their cantrips free shocks for us while they try to dig for answers. Secondly, even if they get past Eidolon they still have to find hand disruption for our counters. When I played against Aluren despite him being behind Eidolon was the final nail in the coffin. It was out of left field he didn't see it coming and knew his combo deck and the sideboard decisions he made (force to protect vs stifle and scooze + bone shredder to buy time) couldn't beat it.

Even against Omnitell (which I actually haven't tested yet) they cantrip a lot. I mean every turn they're usually playing a cantrip until they combo. Even when I played Winter Orb against them it pressured his mana and deck in a way he didn't expect. His cantrips now he could only play one a turn effectively without "porting" himself. I think Eidolon would do something similar by making him think twice about each cantrip. Now when he combos he has to do the math of how much damage he will take:

Show and Tell, Counter then things get interesting. ~ minimum 4 damage
If they need to cantrip that means their combo is now at least 6 damage assuming they find emrakul with their first cantrip. ~ 6 damage total
Cunning wish now at best I think grabs fact or fiction. Fireminds foresight says take 2 - 6. Eldamari's call is another 2. ~ 8 damage total
Total damage for combo = 6 - 8 damage.

Again I haven't tested this but think about how much damage they're taking just when they combo. Assuming their at 18 just from a gix probe or fetch + force then that means we only have to deal 10 - 12. That is a huge jump from trying to get the usual 6 delver swings. This is also not taking into account any damage they might take while still assembling their combo with cantrips.

Most combo decks that have decay in the board are for Miracles since the 2 mana answer is not where you want to be against a mana denial deck. Combo decks would rather just max out on disruption and mana against us. Eidolon pressures all combo decks in a way that most people don't expect from RUG Delver. Not only does this surprise factor sometimes get your opponent it's also good vs miracles and slow stoneblade builds.

@poxy14 that's too much artifact hate for me

Cheers

This is my sideboard right now:

2 Submerge - BU(R)G, Elves and Knight of the Reliquary with AggroLoam having a revival of sorts
2 Rough / Tumble
2 Red Elemental Blast
2 Flusterstorm
1 Krosan Grip - Necessary out for those games you get locked out against CounterTop
1 Surgical Extraction - Better than the second Cage, since it has multiple applications, against Combo or Snapcaster for example
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Null Rod - I also agree this is better than Ancient Grudge right now
1 Arcane Laboratory - Omni and Storm
1 Sulfuric Vortex - Miracles, Stoneblade
1 Sulfur Elemental - D&T is still a threat

Also I play 54 + 2 Spell Pierce, 1 Spell Snare, 1 Forked Bolt, 1 Dismember, 1 Sylvan Library

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Originally Posted by Contract Killer

Congrats Miracles if they're a skilled opponent is a really tough match up. I just played against a very good Miracles pilot tonight and got there in 3 (definitely one of the best players I know). Game 1 I got locked out pretty fast. I was OTD and he had fetched island top go. My turn I play out a delver with ponder, force, bolt, waste and some other lands in hand. Not a great hand but I'll take it. He tried to force my delver which I let resolve since ponder was my only other action and keeps my force live. He tried to play out counterbalance on his turn which I forced. Shortly after that though he played DTT found counterbalance and that was that.
Sb for both g2 and 3: +2 pyroblast, 2 flusterstorm, 2 eidolon, surgical, clique, sylvan, null rod, winter orb // - 4 daze, 2 goyf, 2 waste, 2 dismember, 1 bolt

Game 2 I kept a hand with an eidolon, null rod, delver and some other disruption in it. His hand seemed to be pretty reliant on his top since he led on karakas top most likely trying to save his fetch to decide if he could get away with just a basic or if he needed a dual. Delver got in for one hit then was swords the following turn. I landed Eidolon after that which tabled into null rod on turn 3 followed by wasting his karakas turn 4. He proceeded to not draw lands, but he did eventually get a snapcaster out to block eidolon. After that I dropped a goose and sylvan library which finished the game.

Game 3 I landed eidolon into a winter orb and things got real awkward really fast. He couldn't find an answer for eidolon at all and the winter orb was really messing with his mana. This game by itself sold me on how good winter orb is in this match up so long as you have enough pressure to go along with it.

*Note I have tried keeping dazes in even with winter orb. No matter what we just don't want this card against them it's so bad. Everytime I play against them they can usually play around it. That aside look at what else we're boarding in instead for countermagic flusterstorm and pyroblasts which are much better anyways.

Overall I'm really happy with this board I ended up going 2/2 at my weekly losing round 1 to D&T, won round 2 vs Infect, won round 3 vs miracles, lost round 4 to grixis mid range. I made one slight play mistake that probably cost me the last game vs grixis. I didn't daze his Pyromancer when he had 1 land up which allowed him to get 2 tokens off of it before he passed and I killed it on my turn. I was really behind that game having kept a hand of force, daze x 2, pyroblast, bolt dismember, fetch, but I never drew another land. It wasn't a bad hand just I didn't draw another land and he pyroblasted my one cantrip. If I had dazed his pyromancer though I would have been under a lot less pressure and probably could have salvaged the game or at least not died to 2 elemental tokens lol.

Md 54 core RUG Delver with 2 snare, 2 pierce, 2 dismember

The one thing I've noticed with my current sideboard is that it is fairly week to D&T:
2 pyroblast
2 flusterstorm
2 eidolon
2 rough
2 submerge
1 surgical
1 vendilion
1 sylvan
1 null rod
1 winter orb

Despite that one weakness I definitely like it. Since I have 2 dismember main deck it helps free up the sideboard artifact hate slots. By making the concession to deal with batterskull by stifle/dismember then you can run null rod as your one artifact hate. Aside from it dealing with all equipment (SoFI, Jitte and batterskull) it also turns off Vials which really help vs D&T since you shut off two crucial parts of their deck with one card. The other nice thing aside from D&T and maverick it also shuts off artifact mana from Storm and makes Miracles a nightmare to play. Just watching Miracles trying to rip lands while you have a null rod in play is amusing.

Eidolon has definitely earned his spot in my board dealing 18dmg to miracles over my 2 games and another 10dmg to infect before he ended up hydroblasting it after he realized his two noble hierarches weren't winning the life point race lol. It was amusing tonight my board against Infect was: OTD - 4 daze, - 4 goose, - 4 stifle, - spell pierce // + 2 pyroblast (deals with blighted agent), 2 rough, 2 fluster, 2 eidolon, 2 submerge, 1 surgical, 1 sylvan, 1 winter orb. I was surprised when looking at my board and realizing everything down to winter orb making inkmoth nexus act like a port on themselves was good against them. Even Surgical was good hitting his vines after his first one resolved (it blanked my submerge on his blighted agent which then got pyroblasted instead).

I would like to find room for a sulfur elemental, but I honestly don't think there is. Everything in the board is pretty necessary. I mean winter orb could get the axe I guess if it proves to not be useful against Omnitell (I haven't tested that match up a whole lot yet), but even then it was really good tonight against miracles. I think the few options would be going down one submerge or rough for a sulfur elemental, but those seem bad for multiple reasons. Going down to one submerge means my bug delver and shardless match ups become much worse. On top of that if I go down to 1 rough in favor of a sulfur elemental that's kind of counter intuitive since rough is already really good vs D&T. Aside from it being somewhat soft to D&T the board is still really good vs just about anything else lol.

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Thanks for the game report! I think I got off easy against Miracles that time. I stopped counterbalance and established a clock very early in both games, even if he'd had a Jace in hand, he never had the mana to cast it.

I think my next step is to try out Winter Orb. Your insights into the applications of Dismember are interesting. I was never overly impressed with Forked Bolt. It is a good card, it hits a lot of targets, but I think running that card leaves us very vulnerable to threats with toughness 4 or greater - assuming our opponent manages to get a threat like that past our counter magic. Adding a maindeck answer to Batterskull means I can cut the Ancient Grudge from the board and add in Winter Orb.

I'd like to ask a question though: How badly do I need my Sylvan Library in the 75?

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Originally Posted by cheerios

@poxy14 that's too much artifact hate for me
Cheers

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lots of mud, dnt and sfm decks here : )
together with miracles and other control decks.

thanks for the very informative inputs CK! i might have to get 1 null rod very soon, shuts down random affinity decks too : )

i always divide well my sb slots and put a good number with 3 slots vs tier decks, and just reinforce them with versatile choices.

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Originally Posted by Drake0525

Thanks for the game report! I think I got off easy against Miracles that time. I stopped counterbalance and established a clock very early in both games, even if he'd had a Jace in hand, he never had the mana to cast it.

I think my next step is to try out Winter Orb. Your insights into the applications of Dismember are interesting. I was never overly impressed with Forked Bolt. It is a good card, it hits a lot of targets, but I think running that card leaves us very vulnerable to threats with toughness 4 or greater - assuming our opponent manages to get a threat like that past our counter magic. Adding a maindeck answer to Batterskull means I can cut the Ancient Grudge from the board and add in Winter Orb.

I'd like to ask a question though: How badly do I need my Sylvan Library in the 75?

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Forked bolt definitely has it's place in our deck and specific match ups. A lot of people who know what they're doing with D&T or elves can play around the 2 for 1 potential that card offers. Despite that the card is still good and if there's a lot of D&T, elves and/or Maverick in your meta then it might be better than dismember. Again it leaves you cold to bigger threats, but it's much better at controlling their early threats and you don't end up paying 4 life to kill a stupid mother of runes or deathrite even though you have to.

I would caution you about the possibility of getting blown out by cutting actual artifact hate by running the dismember + null rod in the board. My particular meta is chalked full of tier 1 or 1.5 decks. I know I can run into any number of different decks ranging from fair D&T, maverick to any variety of delver decks, miracles, stoneblade variants and combo like show and tell or storm. What I do know I won't be facing is decks that actually use real artifacts that need grudge to deal with aka tezzerator, mud, etc (even painter null rod shuts down). My board leaves me cold to resolved chalice on 1, ensnaring bridge (burn decks do run this), meekstone (sometimes elves runs this and even some grixis pyromancer builds use it). It's just a calculated risk I'm taking based on my particular meta which has definitely back fired on me.

I played against this deck recently:
http://www.pragueeternal.com/prague-...ay-legacy.html
and got locked out by chalice on 1. I powered through it and got game 2 with some goyfs and dismember/submerge/force as support, but still not an easy win by any means and I still lost the set. I definitely like my board because it sacrifices some niche scenarios like ensnaring bridge or chalice in favor of hating out other more prevalent decks like miracles, storm, stoneforge builds etc. Just make sure you don't take this to like a 12 man weekly thinking it will do well if you know there's a chance that 4 people are running pet decks like mud, tezzerator, junk chalice control etc.

As for Sylvan Library you definitely want it in your 75. It's one of my favorite sideboard cards and very useful. Against Miracles you can just out draw them. Being able to see 3 cards and draw into pierce + flusterstorm to accompany your force when playing against SnT or Miracles for that matter is priceless. At a time I was running this card main and despite it being bad in some match ups where it just got decayed on the spot it was still really good. RUG Delver has enough unique cards that one card might not get you out of a situation, but finding the stifle to accompany your daze could help counter spell x. You also want it vs fair decks like D&T, Maverick, Elves and even storm. In those match ups your life total does matter so you get less advantage off of it, but the filter aspect really helps finding specific cards for that match up whether that's rough or a flusterstorm as added insurance vs storm. It's really good and at least vs combo it may as well be considered a threat. It doesn't kill them but it draws you all the disruption and threats you need to kill them lol.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by poxy14

lots of mud, dnt and sfm decks here : )
together with miracles and other control decks.

thanks for the very informative inputs CK! i might have to get 1 null rod very soon, shuts down random affinity decks too : )

i always divide well my sb slots and put a good number with 3 slots vs tier decks, and just reinforce them with versatile choices.

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Null rod I've found to be very useful. It has broken at least a few miracle hands that were riding on top on upkeep to find more lands. To put that into perspective he surgically extracted his first flooded strand on turn 3 over the brainstorm in his bin just to shuffle. Even if that sounds like it was bad play I'm pretty sure it was right if he was drawing dead and going to miss land drops the next two turns. I've also seen a storm players heart sink further than I thought possible when playing it only to see him reveal his hand a few turns later when he's dead and it contains some number of LED/Petals that were crucial for going off. I haven't tried it against Affinity, but I'm pretty sure they just fold to it seeing as it turns off all their fast mana and half of their lands lols. I used to stick to a minimum of 1 grudge/k - grip effect, but I think null rod is just as good. The only downside is it has lost me some games where I needed hate for a chalice, but if the out is to draw 1 grudge/k - grip out of 40 some odd cards (without cantrips) I think it's already over. At that point I would rather sacrifice that slight edge of beating resolved hay makers like chalice and ensnaring bridge for more flexibility with null rod hating out multiple decks. Stuff like chalice and ensnaring bridge we can beat on the stack, but other decks like miracles or D&T that have multiple artifacts that we want to hate out (tops, vials, equipment, fast mana in storm) I think null rod is better suited for.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Contract Killer

Forked bolt definitely has it's place in our deck and specific match ups. A lot of people who know what they're doing with D&T or elves can play around the 2 for 1 potential that card offers. Despite that the card is still good and if there's a lot of D&T, elves and/or Maverick in your meta then it might be better than dismember. Again it leaves you cold to bigger threats, but it's much better at controlling their early threats and you don't end up paying 4 life to kill a stupid mother of runes or deathrite even though you have to.

I would caution you about the possibility of getting blown out by cutting actual artifact hate by running the dismember + null rod in the board. My particular meta is chalked full of tier 1 or 1.5 decks. I know I can run into any number of different decks ranging from fair D&T, maverick to any variety of delver decks, miracles, stoneblade variants and combo like show and tell or storm. What I do know I won't be facing is decks that actually use real artifacts that need grudge to deal with aka tezzerator, mud, etc (even painter null rod shuts down). My board leaves me cold to resolved chalice on 1, ensnaring bridge (burn decks do run this), meekstone (sometimes elves runs this and even some grixis pyromancer builds use it). It's just a calculated risk I'm taking based on my particular meta which has definitely back fired on me.

I played against this deck recently:
http://www.pragueeternal.com/prague-...ay-legacy.html
and got locked out by chalice on 1. I powered through it and got game 2 with some goyfs and dismember/submerge/force as support, but still not an easy win by any means and I still lost the set. I definitely like my board because it sacrifices some niche scenarios like ensnaring bridge or chalice in favor of hating out other more prevalent decks like miracles, storm, stoneforge builds etc. Just make sure you don't take this to like a 12 man weekly thinking it will do well if you know there's a chance that 4 people are running pet decks like mud, tezzerator, junk chalice control etc.

As for Sylvan Library you definitely want it in your 75. It's one of my favorite sideboard cards and very useful. Against Miracles you can just out draw them. Being able to see 3 cards and draw into pierce + flusterstorm to accompany your force when playing against SnT or Miracles for that matter is priceless. At a time I was running this card main and despite it being bad in some match ups where it just got decayed on the spot it was still really good. RUG Delver has enough unique cards that one card might not get you out of a situation, but finding the stifle to accompany your daze could help counter spell x. You also want it vs fair decks like D&T, Maverick, Elves and even storm. In those match ups your life total does matter so you get less advantage off of it, but the filter aspect really helps finding specific cards for that match up whether that's rough or a flusterstorm as added insurance vs storm. It's really good and at least vs combo it may as well be considered a threat. It doesn't kill them but it draws you all the disruption and threats you need to kill them lol.

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We have a fairly diverse metagame when turnout is good. Running into MUD or Painter Servant would be a rarity. It's not unheard of, but it is pretty uncommon. I'm willing to take the chance, especially if some other match-ups become stronger.

I'm not sure what comes out of the board for Sylvan Library, that'll take a little bit of thought. One change at a time, first I want to test out Winter Orb - I have a feeling it'll be really good in a number of match-ups.

EDIT:
I went to a small event at my LGS, went 2-1. I lost to Patriot Delver, but defeated Punishing Jund and Storm.
Unsure about Eidolon of the Great Revel. It could just be that it's bad against batterskull, but it really didn't do anything for me this time out. He didn't make an appearance during Storm, so I can't comment on his value in that match-up. Considering he does trigger against virtually our entire decklist, he is a risky play.

I actually rather liked Dismember. There was something comforting in being able to take down opposing goyf's and such. The life-loss could be problematic, but hitting the germ token out from under the batterskull was petty solid.

Didn't get the chance to try out the Winter Orb or Sylvan Library. Those, at least, will remain in the board until I can test them out.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Drake0525

We have a fairly diverse metagame when turnout is good. Running into MUD or Painter Servant would be a rarity. It's not unheard of, but it is pretty uncommon. I'm willing to take the chance, especially if some other match-ups become stronger.

I'm not sure what comes out of the board for Sylvan Library, that'll take a little bit of thought. One change at a time, first I want to test out Winter Orb - I have a feeling it'll be really good in a number of match-ups.

EDIT:
I went to a small event at my LGS, went 2-1. I lost to Patriot Delver, but defeated Punishing Jund and Storm.
Unsure about Eidolon of the Great Revel. It could just be that it's bad against batterskull, but it really didn't do anything for me this time out. He didn't make an appearance during Storm, so I can't comment on his value in that match-up. Considering he does trigger against virtually our entire decklist, he is a risky play.

I actually rather liked Dismember. There was something comforting in being able to take down opposing goyf's and such. The life-loss could be problematic, but hitting the germ token out from under the batterskull was petty solid.

Didn't get the chance to try out the Winter Orb or Sylvan Library. Those, at least, will remain in the board until I can test them out.

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Despite eidolon triggering against us it should be in our favor most of the time. Against the decks we want it for combo, miracles and stoneblade builds all have much slower clocks (stoneblade) or just don't interact with our life total in a way that matters (combo/miracles). With that being said even on the draw vs something like stoneblade if we bolt/snare their stoneforge and then land eidolon whatever they do next adds to our clock. Monastery mentor becomes worse if they pay 3 mana, take 2 and pass trying to just get a body on the ground to deal with Eidolon. If they try and swords it and a counter war ensues and we win they're probably down 4 life. If they have literally nothing other than cantrips then our clock gets a huge boost while they dig for answers.

Any threat of ours will be bad if batterskull has already hit the ground, but that's what stifle is for. Eidolon just plays really well into our tempo strategy of forcing their hand and stopping whatever they try to do. Think of it like our very own young pyromancer. Decks that utilize pyromancer are built around playing lots of spells to generate incremental value off of him. Eidolon does the same thing in our deck we gain incremental value off of stopping what the opponent is doing while beating them over the head with a threat also know as: tempo. Eidolon is just better with our game plan when our life total is less relevant since not only are we now stopping what they're trying to do, but they're taking 2dmg for each spell they're trying to play.

Dismember I've really enjoyed as of late. It's nice to not roll over to some threats, but the life loss does hurt. I think its a bit of a necessary evil right now with grixis delver decks on the rise. They have a lot of different threats including angler. Unlike goyf where we can set up a goyf stall and then kill theirs with a bolt we instead lose our goyf in the attack as well. On top of that we don't have submerge to help deal with angler either. With all that being said I think if we want any chance against Grixis delver we need 1 - 2 dismembers. Aside from winning the tempo game against grixis delver game 1 and then game 3 I don't see how we do well with them having angler + yp to clog up the board. Despite how much I hate the card I think we need the 1 - 2 dismember.

Trust me bring Sylvan in vs miracles, combo and stoneblade. Try to resolve it as early as possible without walking into a counterspell of sorts. The earlier it hits the better because it allows for more filter for us. This is really helpful for slower control decks or combo decks. The reason why I say this is because we're not under an immense amount of pressure against any of those decks. On top of that none of those decks have an answer for Sylvan. Since they don't have a clock it allows us to set up very strong combinations of cards:

wasteland pass + stifle
Stifle + flusterstorm expecting terminus to come down
Pyroblast + force
Spell snare + pierce

Our deck kind of works like a combo engine in the sense that it requires a lot of stuff to happen for the deck to come together. This usually involves slamming a threat, countering some spells and a stone rain along the way. Sylvan just helps speed up assembling that engine. It also makes sure we're always drawing live and gives added value to our fetches. It's kind of hard to explain the impact it has since at face value it is a 2 mana spell that doesn't impact the board the turn it comes in. Once sylvan tables though you get a huge advantage and definitely tips the scales in our favor.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Contract Killer

Despite eidolon triggering against us it should be in our favor most of the time. Against the decks we want it for combo, miracles and stoneblade builds all have much slower clocks (stoneblade) or just don't interact with our life total in a way that matters (combo/miracles). With that being said even on the draw vs something like stoneblade if we bolt/snare their stoneforge and then land eidolon whatever they do next adds to our clock. Monastery mentor becomes worse if they pay 3 mana, take 2 and pass trying to just get a body on the ground to deal with Eidolon. If they try and swords it and a counter war ensues and we win they're probably down 4 life. If they have literally nothing other than cantrips then our clock gets a huge boost while they dig for answers.

Any threat of ours will be bad if batterskull has already hit the ground, but that's what stifle is for. Eidolon just plays really well into our tempo strategy of forcing their hand and stopping whatever they try to do. Think of it like our very own young pyromancer. Decks that utilize pyromancer are built around playing lots of spells to generate incremental value off of him. Eidolon does the same thing in our deck we gain incremental value off of stopping what the opponent is doing while beating them over the head with a threat also know as: tempo. Eidolon is just better with our game plan when our life total is less relevant since not only are we now stopping what they're trying to do, but they're taking 2dmg for each spell they're trying to play.

Dismember I've really enjoyed as of late. It's nice to not roll over to some threats, but the life loss does hurt. I think its a bit of a necessary evil right now with grixis delver decks on the rise. They have a lot of different threats including angler. Unlike goyf where we can set up a goyf stall and then kill theirs with a bolt we instead lose our goyf in the attack as well. On top of that we don't have submerge to help deal with angler either. With all that being said I think if we want any chance against Grixis delver we need 1 - 2 dismembers. Aside from winning the tempo game against grixis delver game 1 and then game 3 I don't see how we do well with them having angler + yp to clog up the board. Despite how much I hate the card I think we need the 1 - 2 dismember.

Trust me bring Sylvan in vs miracles, combo and stoneblade. Try to resolve it as early as possible without walking into a counterspell of sorts. The earlier it hits the better because it allows for more filter for us. This is really helpful for slower control decks or combo decks. The reason why I say this is because we're not under an immense amount of pressure against any of those decks. On top of that none of those decks have an answer for Sylvan. Since they don't have a clock it allows us to set up very strong combinations of cards:

wasteland pass + stifle
Stifle + flusterstorm expecting terminus to come down
Pyroblast + force
Spell snare + pierce

Our deck kind of works like a combo engine in the sense that it requires a lot of stuff to happen for the deck to come together. This usually involves slamming a threat, countering some spells and a stone rain along the way. Sylvan just helps speed up assembling that engine. It also makes sure we're always drawing live and gives added value to our fetches. It's kind of hard to explain the impact it has since at face value it is a 2 mana spell that doesn't impact the board the turn it comes in. Once sylvan tables though you get a huge advantage and definitely tips the scales in our favor.

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Given what you described, I believe I badly misplayed the UWR devler matchup last night. Should I have NOT brought in the Eidolon in that matchup?

Either way, I'm not cutting Eidolon out of the board until I'm convinced it won't work. The sideboard still feels pretty powerful and versatile to me, so I see no need to tweak it yet.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Drake0525

Given what you described, I believe I badly misplayed the UWR devler matchup last night. Should I have NOT brought in the Eidolon in that matchup?

Either way, I'm not cutting Eidolon out of the board until I'm convinced it won't work. The sideboard still feels pretty powerful and versatile to me, so I see no need to tweak it yet.

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You definitely don't want him in any tempo mirrors. I have a friend who's also a really good player and said to bring him in otp in those match ups but I think it's still too risky.

Even testing him against shardless which he should be good he's too risky. Despite him triggering against most of shardless if they have drs + bear or worse yet a goyf then we're losing. Anything we do to interact at that point hurts us and they can just grind out with drs or win the race with a goyf that we likely can't trade with even with a bolt because it's a 5/6.

This is the same reason why I wouldn't board it in vs uwr delver. If they get a tnn out then our eidolon works against us since we have to overwhelm it with multiple Goyfs or a delver. In which case we need to be cantripping. Ideally otp it should be good in tempo mirrors but it's seems too risky if you ask me. There are too many scenarios where they can play a threat that extends the game and turns eidolon against us if that makes sense.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Contract Killer

You definitely don't want him in any tempo mirrors. I have a friend who's also a really good player and said to bring him in otp in those match ups but I think it's still too risky.

Even testing him against shardless which he should be good he's too risky. Despite him triggering against most of shardless if they have drs + bear or worse yet a goyf then we're losing. Anything we do to interact at that point hurts us and they can just grind out with drs or win the race with a goyf that we likely can't trade with even with a bolt because it's a 5/6.

This is the same reason why I wouldn't board it in vs uwr delver. If they get a tnn out then our eidolon works against us since we have to overwhelm it with multiple Goyfs or a delver. In which case we need to be cantripping. Ideally otp it should be good in tempo mirrors but it's seems too risky if you ask me. There are too many scenarios where they can play a threat that extends the game and turns eidolon against us if that makes sense.

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That does make sense given what happened last week.

So for a boarding plan against UWR Delver, maybe something like this?
-3 FOW, -3 Daze, +1 Sylvan Library, +1 Null Rod, +2 Red Elemental Blast, +2 Rough and Tumble

And also, is Winter Orb good in the match-up? It seems like they are slightly more mana-hungry with all that equipment.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Drake0525

That does make sense given what happened last week.

So for a boarding plan against UWR Delver, maybe something like this?
-3 FOW, -3 Daze, +1 Sylvan Library, +1 Null Rod, +2 Red Elemental Blast, +2 Rough and Tumble

And also, is Winter Orb good in the match-up? It seems like they are slightly more mana-hungry with all that equipment.

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Against UWR Delver I would do something like this:
OTP - 3 force // + 2 pyroblast/REB, null rod
OTD - 2 force, daze // + 2 pyroblast/REB, null rod

UWR delver plays similar to our deck usually running like 19 lands or so. It's still a tempo mirror so we don't want force since it card disadvantage. The only things we really need out of our board are null rod for artifacts and pyroblast for TNN. Despite force being bad in tempo mirrors because of the card disadvantage I think keeping the 4th in is better than any other marginal card in our board (unless you have the 3rd pyroblast). I mean you could bring in a singleton flusterstorm here or Vendilion to live the dream and rip an artifact in response to sfm. If you see some number of YP then bringing in a single rough might be worth it but most have a threat base of: 4 delver, 4 sfm, 2 - 3 TNN.

Winter Orb we really only want against decks that a) utilize their mana every turn and b) being down on mana won't effect us. Tempo mirrors don't fit that template. If they've wasted us then we're probably behind on mana which makes their dazes better. I think the only common match ups we would want winter orb are Miracles, Omni (still not sure if it's better than like a goyf here), UWX Stoneblade and Grixis control. All those match ups don't really interact with our mana at all. On top of that all those decks use their mana every turn and are very mana hungry.

I'm honestly not sure if Orb is worth the space in the board. It's really versatile against a lot of different decks and it plays to our strengths which is good. I'm just not sure if something like the 3rd pyroblast or a singleton vortex / K grip is better. I haven't had a lot of time to jam a bunch of games against all those decks that orb is good against. It's came up once against Miracles and it was great. I've had it twice against Omni once was with a turn 1 delver the other time I was on a mull to 6 and never found a threat so it was bad. The one time I had it against Grixis it really slowed him down as he kept trying to cantrip into a YP to fend off my goyf. All that being said it's still been a very small sample size and I'm just not sure if it's always going to be good or if there will be more times than not where it will be bad.

Hey RUG experts,

My metagame consists of Mentor Miracles, UWR Blade with a bunch of planeswalkers (Nahiri, Narset Transcendent, Jace, Elspeth Knight-Errant), Storm, and from time to time, Omnitell and other random decks. Very few if any other Delver players, but occasional midrange.

If you have any suggestions for my list per this meta, please let me know.

4 Delver of Secrets
4 Nimble Mongoose
4 Tarmogoyf

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Stifle
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Spell Pierce
2 Spell Snare
2 Dismember (Could be Forked Bolt, but Mentor makes me want to lean towards dismember)

Sideboard:
2 Rough/Tumble
2 Flusterstorm
2 Submerge
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Pyroblast
1 Null Rod
1 Ancient Grudge
1 Sylvan Library
1 Krosan Grip
1 Sulfur Elemental

Seem decent? Overboarded for Miracles? Just looking to take this list to my local events, for a larger meta I would diversify the sideboard a little more.

If you don't have anything but occasional midrange and no other Delver, is it worth shaving a Submerge? And you aren't overboarded for Miracles until you have at least 2 Null Rods and a Winter Orb alongside Sulfuric Vortex. Actually, Vortex is conspicuous by its absence.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by btm10

If you don't have anything but occasional midrange and no other Delver, is it worth shaving a Submerge? And you aren't overboarded for Miracles until you have at least 2 Null Rods and a Winter Orb alongside Sulfuric Vortex. Actually, Vortex is conspicuous by its absence.

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I could definitely shave a submerge for a sulfuric vortex. Vortex will do work against stoneblade too

Maybe try -1 Submerge, -1 Cage, -1 Flusterstorm, +1 Vortex, +1 Winter Orb, +1 Spell Pierce

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ironclad8690

Hey RUG experts, My metagame consists of Mentor Miracles, UWR Blade with a bunch of planeswalkers (Nahiri, Narset Transcendent, Jace, Elspeth Knight-Errant), Storm, and from time to time, Omnitell and other random decks. Very few if any other Delver players, but occasional midrange.

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i would then up my reb effects to 3, and instead of having graf's, i'll replace them with surgicals... i always love hitting opponents cantrips, to wreck em setting up,
sulfuric vortex is so good vs miracles, when uncountered, theyre only way out would be their 1-off jcouncil.

i just played a local legacy event and my two loses were both to omni tell in two games. absolutely destroyed me. I've been testing the MU with a friend and I didn't think it was too bad, but this was brutal.

How are you all feeling about this MU. I've noticed i don't actually have that many cards to bring in post board. What do you all think about playing arcane laboratory? too narrow?

Maindeck is standard 54 + 2 forked bolt + 4 pierce

sideboard is
1 flusterstorm
1 sulfuric vortex
1 pithing needle
1 dismember
1 ancient grudge
1 k grip
1 sylvan library
1 sulfur elemental
1 grafdigger's cage
2 pyroblast
2 submerge
2 rough

Quote:

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Originally Posted by eyeownyu

i just played a local legacy event and my two loses were both to omni tell in two games. absolutely destroyed me. I've been testing the MU with a friend and I didn't think it was too bad, but this was brutal.

How are you all feeling about this MU. I've noticed i don't actually have that many cards to bring in post board. What do you all think about playing arcane laboratory? too narrow?

Maindeck is standard 54 + 2 forked bolt + 4 pierce

sideboard is
1 flusterstorm
1 sulfuric vortex
1 pithing needle
1 dismember
1 ancient grudge
1 k grip
1 sylvan library
1 sulfur elemental
1 grafdigger's cage
2 pyroblast
2 submerge
2 rough

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Are you sure. On the other side of the field, I think rug is the harder matchups.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by KobeBryan

Are you sure. On the other side of the field, I think rug is the harder matchups.

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it could have been the possibility of my two opponents just having the nuts. Also one of my matches i drew double mongoose and couldn't get it to threshold. If that was double delver it would have been way different. But as far as i can tell, wasteland and stifle aren't very good against omni. I have the pierces, dazes, and forces obviously, but they seem to always have enough counter back up. Goyf is hard to tap out for because it cost two mana, plus goyf is usually just a 3/4 in the matchup.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by eyeownyu

it could have been the possibility of my two opponents just having the nuts. Also one of my matches i drew double mongoose and couldn't get it to threshold. If that was double delver it would have been way different. But as far as i can tell, wasteland and stifle aren't very good against omni. I have the pierces, dazes, and forces obviously, but they seem to always have enough counter back up. Goyf is hard to tap out for because it cost two mana, plus goyf is usually just a 3/4 in the matchup.

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I see your problem

Keep stifle and wasteland. It helps get rid of their duals and boseiju. If you keep them off red, they lose a valuable counter in REB. Boseiju is a must to keep off the board

I'm nt sure of your list, but things to go out are 2 spell snare, bolts, and goyf. In, reb effects, any additional counters, and MAYBE a krosan grip.

So what's our gameplan versus grixis delver? I feel like this is a horrible matchup and an uphill battle against deathrites, anglers, and DTT allows them to be way ahead of us. Thoughts?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Sunday Funday

So what's our gameplan versus grixis delver? I feel like this is a horrible matchup and an uphill battle against deathrites, anglers, and DTT allows them to be way ahead of us. Thoughts?

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I've been testing with a friend on grixis delver and while I think it is in their favor, it's not impossible. Our advantage we have is stifle. We really need to attack their lands while keeping DRS off the table. Angler is good against our deck but delver still has flying. Deathrite is their most important card against us. It kills our threshold and it allows them to play multiple things per turn.

Alot of times I've had them cast dig and it doesn't even matter because they either don't have enough lands to cast their spells to catch up to us or they are so low on life that they just die to our creatures.

I just finished winning my legacy gpt that got my byes locked in. It was a smaller tournament, but with a lot of the locals at eternal weekend I jumped at the chance to get my byes. Despite being a bit out of the way the tournament was great and I would like to give a shout out to Dylan Jupp owner of Geek Fortress for running a great event.

Main Deck (60)
Creatures (12)
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Nimble Mongoose
4 Tarmogoyf

Spells (30)
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
4 Stifle
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Spell Pierce
2 Spell Snare
2 Dismember

Lands (18)
3 Tropical Island
3 Volcanic Island
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
4 Wasteland

Sideboard (15)
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Surgical Extraction

1 Pyroblast
1 Red Elemental Blast
2 Flusterstorm

1 Ancient Grudge
1 Krosan Grip

1 Sylvan Library
2 Rough // Tumble
1 Sulfur Elemental
1 Vendilion Clique
2 Submerge


For starters I wasn’t really sure what would be at the tournament since it wasn’t my usual stomping grounds. I think this main deck configuration offers the widest coverage since the pierces/snares are good across the board. Dismember I thought would be the best choice since it really helps in tempo mirrors (goyf/zombie fish) and has its place vs Stoneblade, D&T and maverick as an answer to batterksull/knight/Brimaz.

As for the sideboard I thought there might be some dredge decks since it was probably going to be a smaller less competitive tournament. That’s why I was packing surgical and cage when I normally just go with surgical. My usual field is heavier on really competitive tier 1 style delver, miracles, stoneblade, omni, storm etc so normally I don’t worry about dredge. This time though I just didn’t want to come unprepared and lose to some random dredge deck lol

Sylvan I think will never leave my board that card is just a beast vs miracles, combo, stoneblade and other fair match ups.

Sulfur elemental I hedged on because I thought there might be D&T, Maverick, UWx Mentor Builds and it’s not horrible vs Miracles.

Grudge and Krosan Grip I don’t really like running at this point. At least running both I think is overkill when compared to a grip + null rod package. I think that’s the better configuration to prepare for miracles and stoneblade, but leaves you more vulnerable to actual artifact oriented decks like mud, tezzerator, chalice hate decks like aggro loam etc. I just wanted to play it safe and have the grudge + grip for chalice decks or something where I really want grudge.

The rest is pretty standard countermagic suite, submerge and rough since without those some match ups you just can’t win. I wanted a Vortex in my board to round out my Stoneblade and Miracles match ups, but I didn’t think they would be well represented so I gambled and left the vortex in my binder.

Now then onto the actual match ups.
Round 1 Mud 2/0
G1 OTP I kept a hand with goyf and some reactive spells. I played land go holding up a stifle. He led on cloud post go so I put him on 12 post and passed turn 2 holding stifle again for what I hoped be a misty instead he tried to play some broken artifact which I countered (I think it was trinisphere and I pierced). Turn 3 I landed goyf followed by wasteland turns 4 and 6 while countering some lock pieces along the way.

SB – 4 stifles // + grudge, krosan grip, sylvan, Vendilion
Stifle doesn’t do much in this match up to begin with other than protect our lands from waste and maybe get a kuldotha forgemaster trigger, but I think if they have 5 mana we’re losing anyways.

G2 I kept a mull to 6 of delver, waste, fetch, snare, pierce, Goyf I think. Turn 1 he led on cloud post again. I pass holding up the pierce and snare and his Trinisphere gets pierced. The following turn I rip a land off the top and play delver out with snare back up. His turn he tries to resolve a chalice on 1 which got snared. My turn I play goyf out and waste him holding a force at this point. After that I made short work of his life total.

Round 2 Burn 2/0
G1 OTP I kept a delver hand with some reactive spells. I play out delver pass. He plays chain lightning targeting me. Delver flips and starts to beat face. My opponent got really unlucky and didn’t draw another for the majority of the game. He got a few burn spells off on me but the ones hitting my delver I countered and won at 12 life.

SB – 4 stifles, - 2 dismember // + 2 fluster, 2 rough, vendilion, sulfur elemental
Stifle is just really bad here otd and I wasn’t even sure if he was running fetches. I’m also pretty sure dismember despite being removal just needs to move to the board in this match up.

G2 OTD I kept a really good hand with a goyf and goose. The first few turns I was getting beaten down by a Swiftspear which got bolted before it did any real harm. Once my threats got going though there wasn’t much he could do I was playing around price with my wastelands and had a fair amount of counter magic.

Round 3 Lands 2/0
G1 OTD my opponent is on a mull to 6 and leads mox diamond, land mana bond dump ghost quarter, maze, stage. My hand I kept had delver, delver, waste, 2 fetches and some other stuff. Anyways I lead on delver go my land gets ghost quartered. My first delver bricks but I play out my second one and brainstorm on upkeep in response to him porting me turn 3. Delvers flip and I waste his maze and start turning said delvers sideways. Shortly after that a bolt mops up the last damage I needed.

SB – 4 daze, 2 dismember // + 2 flusterstorm, Krosan Grip, Surgical, Sylvan Library, Ancient Grudge

G2 OTD I keep a hand of Force x 3, brainstorm, volcanic, goose. He tried to play out a turn 1 exploration which I forced. On my turn 2 I draw ancient grudge literally the worst thing I could draw there. I wanted to wait one more turn to before I brainstormed since I thought he might have a slow hand. He plays a port passes and ports me on upkeep I brainstorm into trop, delta, waste put back grudge, delta and then draw delta for the turn. I fetch up a trop play a goose and pass. He gambles on his turn for loam which hits the bin. I drew a second goose play it out and ponder seeing ponder, snare, waste keep since I needed a blue card to accompany my force and snare matches up well with loam. He tanks on his draw step and ends up drawing and then playing a land and passing. My turn I tank for a while with him at 18 since I can waste my second trop to go to threshold and put him on a 3 turn clock with his only outs being combo, tabernacle or bust. I go for it swing 6 pass. He draws a waste hits my last land plays a choke which I let resolve and passes. I draw my wasteland hit his port so that I could get some use with a land if I rip one and he falls to 6. Luckily he drew a bojuka bog here which bought him more time but the geese got there in the end. This was by far my favorite game of the day hands down.

We talked about it and when he was tanking about dredging loam he had put me on having some counters in hand which was absolutely right so just natural draw was the right way to go.

Round 4 Reanimator 0/2 technically I could have just ID, ID from here, but I knew what he was on it’s not a terrible match up and I wanted the higher seed for top 8. Regardless I was a lock for top 8 at loss then ID.
G1 OTD He entombs at my end step which I force and he forced back so that resolved. Then the next turn he reanimates while I look stupid holding up a land and spell snare. Not much really happened here this game just sometimes they get you.

SB – 2 dismember, 2 goyf, 4 bolt // + 2 flusterstorm, pyroblast, red elemental blast, sylvan library, vendilion clique, grafdigger’s cage, surgical extraction

I’m not 100% sure if bolts are better or worse here then pyros/rebs. Bolts do help goose grow and close the window for him to reanimate faster. Rebs and pyros on the other hand allow us to let him make the first move then have more countermagic to fight back with. I’m curious what your guys’ thoughts are here. I’m also interested in what you think is better to counter their entombs or reanimation spells? I think entomb is almost always the better counter target since they have fewer ways to bin a fatty than they do to reanimate one.

G2 OTP I play a land pass he entombs on his turn off of sea I pierce and he dazes already off to a bad start. My turn I do something mostly irrelevant and pass. He reanimates I force and he forces back. There really wasn’t anything I could have done differently either games he played tight and just had the combo + protection.

Round 5 ID with the other Reanimator player in the room.

Top 8:
1st Grixis Control
2nd Reanimator
3rd Lands
4th Me
5th Reanimator
6th Turbo Depths
7th Miracles
8th Zombardment

Quarters I play against the guy I drew with and I narrowly have better tie breakers at the 4th seed and him being at the 5th.

G1 OTP I keep a hand with goyf, goose, stifle, some lands and a counter or two I think. I play land go. He fetches turn 1 and I stifle which resolves and he didn’t seem that down so I thought he had more lands in hand. He knew what I was on so my worst fear was he kept a 3 lander and my stifle was just irrelevant. My turn I play out goyf pass. He moves to discard pitches a fatty. I play out goose pass he draws passes again. Goyf and goose start going to work on his life total. I get there but he said after the game his hand was fine since it was close to going off and had cantrips + combo just no protection. He could have easily found the protection and extra lands just the hand didn’t line up with stifle. That aside if everyone mulled hands that lost to stifle RUG Delver would win a lot more lol so I think it was a fine keep.

SB – 2 dismember, 4 goyf, 2 bolt // + 2 flusterstorm, pyroblast, red elemental blast, sylvan library, vendilion clique, grafdigger’s cage, surgical extraction
I’m pretty sure OTD we just don’t want goyf since reanimator is by far the fastest competitive combo deck and tapping out for a threat turn 2 seems really bad.

G2 OTD I mull to 6 and keep a sketchy hand of volcanic x 2, sylvan, cage, goyf, goyf. I think the hand is better than a 5 since it has a cage and with me being otd I have 2 draws to find a trop/cantrip. Anyways this game went south real fast with him decaying my cage turn 2 and going off the following turn with me having a hand full of green spells I couldn’t play.

SB – 2 dismember, 2 goyf, 4 bolt // + 2 flusterstorm, pyroblast, red elemental blast, sylvan library, vendilion clique, grafdigger’s cage, surgical extraction

G3 OTP I get arguably the best possible hand I could have asked for delver, force, stifle, brainstorm, surgical extraction, daze, fetch. I lead on delver go and he fetches and cantrips turn 1. Turn 2 delver flips and swings in I cantrip finding another land and a goyf and pass. He passes after playing his second land. I played out a goyf swung with delver passed. His turn he played out a hapless researcher passes. I swing in he blocks my goyf and then decays my delver which sets me back followed by him decaying my goyf on his turn as well. Luckily I ripped another goyf off the top. On his turn he plays another researcher to block and passes. I drew sylvan library swing and pass he tries to entomb which I pierce still having my surgical in hand but not wanting him to have another fatty in the bin as a backup for if he goes for it. I put him on baiting out my pierce since it had flipped delver but because of my surgical I actually wanted to pierce the entomb. He goes for it with animate dead I force he misdirects back I surgical and griselbrands go away forever. He then reanimates (at this point he’s at 5) his hapless researcher passes. I swing in for lethal now and he blocks sacks draws. He cantrips and then goyf goes in for the kill.
We talked about it afterwards and we both seemed to agree the matchup is somewhat roll dependent. Whoever is otp is definitely favored more so for reanimator than rug. If we’re otp then we can interact with their mana more if they’re otp then our countermagic may as well just be force, pierce, snare and daze becomes irrelevant. The other interesting thing apparently his entomb I pierce he just wanted for a shuffle effect for the brainstorm he just played. He still got a shuffle from my surgical, but I had put him on binning Ionna to lock up the board more so than griselbrand would or something like that.

Semifinals Grixis Control
G1 OTD Having played this match up a lot I think it’s heavily favored for RUG. Essentially all we need to do is stick one of our green threats and keep their young pyromancer and pyromancer ascension off the table.

He preordained turn 1 bottomed both pass. I led on goose and passed. I think he pondered or something on his turn I’m pretty sure that’s all that deck does is play 3 cantrips as its first spells lol. My turn I cantrip and pass holding up double pierce, bolt, dismember snare. He probes and therapies away my two pierces and then passes. On my turn I land a goyf and pass. He’s at 12 fetches, gitaxian probes falling to 9 and then therapies again I brainstorm in response putting dismember and bolt on top. His therapy misses and I reveal double force he passes back. I tank for a while looking at my board and thinking what he could possibly have. I waste his underground sea move to combat swing with goose + goyf check for blockers since he had 2 mana up and for all I know he could have snapcaster. No blocks I bolt and fetch to get to threshold with force back up putting his outs to something like force + pyroblast since I could pay for pierce. He didn’t have it and I got there.

SB – 4 daze, 4 stifle, 1 wasteland // + 2 flusterstorm, pyroblast, red elemental blast, sylvan library, 2 rough, vendilion clique, Krosan Grip
I think if we’re otd game 2 we should try and take the control role. They don’t have a clock really so we can just sculpt the early turns. Our clocks on the other hand goyf and goose at least they can’t interact with so just find a good time to jam one of them. Keep in mind if they have an active ascension out a goyf can still die with sorcery land in the bin because the copy goes on the stack targets the goyf hits the bin then disappears and goyf is still a 2/3 from sorcery/land and dies. I found that out the hard way at a weekly a while ago.

G2 OTD This game went pretty much the same as the last. I resolved 2 geese and slowly poked away at his life total while he cantripped trying to find something. I did pyroblast his brainstorm since that was the one thing he played at that point (turn 3 or 4 I think) that I actually cared about. The geese got there eventually and he revealed his hand of volc, bolt, bolt, pyroblast, pyroblast, force, force. He had just been drawing dead the past few turns. Well not dead exactly just nothing that interacted with goose. This match up I think is really easy just so long as you keep ascension off the table and young pyromancer.

Finals Miracles Luckily I have the higher seed so I get to be otp :D
G1 I got a really fast clock of turn 1 delver into turn 2 goyf followed by holding up countermagic. Turn 4 he finally found a swords for my goyf with him at 3 at this point which I let resolve since my delver was still lethal. He just couldn’t find the other answer to stabilize. I think this is one of the better hands vs miracles but it’s also very frail if they just draw well and get a terminus with countermagic. I definitely like these hands more than goose though were the first few turns you’re afraid of your best threat getting ambushed by a snapcaster lol

SB – 4 daze, 2 dismember, 1 waste, 1 goyf, 1 bolt // + 2 flusterstorm, pyroblast, Red Elemental Blast, Sylvan, Krosan Grip, Vendilion Clique, Sulfur Elemental
I usually board out 1 more wasteland, but he seemed to fetch duals more aggressively than most miracle players I’ve played against.

G2 I was on a mull to 5 I think and the game was over before it started to be honest. He resolved counter lock turn 4 I think and followed up with a mentor which made short work of my life total.

G3 I kept a solid hand with snare, pyroblast, goyf, some lands and a cantrip I think. I played out a land ponder and passed. He fetched up island top pass. I was really worried about getting locked out by counter balance so I played another land pass holding up snare pyroblast. He played a land and passed after that I had 1 more land so I planned to pass once more hoping he would jam counterbalance before I would try and play out a goyf. He did luckily and I won the counter war I snared he pyroblasted back and I pyroblasted his counterbalance. I played out goyf on my turn pass. His turn he played out a mentor and passed. I pondered into bolt for his mentor and then passed back. On my EOT he looked at the top 3 and flipped top followed by playing out another mentor and playing his top which I pierced this time around. My next turn I brainstormed and had the hand of force, delver, stifle, pyroblast, goyf, snare and put back stifle and pyroblast planning to play delver out that turn followed by playing goyf out the next turn with force + pyroblast back up and then so long as he didn’t terminus I would draw my stifle. It all worked out he was pretty much hell bent after I pierced his top. He tried to brainstorm on his turn which I pyroblasted. My goyfs and delver started to edict away his board of mentor and his snapcaster. In his darkest hour he did naturally draw the miracle terminus only to meet my stifle. It was definitely a close game.

Nice detailed report! I like your sideboarding explanations in particular.

grats contractkiller for an amazing finish for team RUG!

Great sideboarding plan and right way to play the different matchups!
One of the best post i've seen in the last times!

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Originally Posted by Contract Killer

Round 4 Reanimator 0/2 technically I could have just ID, ID from here, but I knew what he was on it’s not a terrible match up and I wanted the higher seed for top 8. Regardless I was a lock for top 8 at loss then ID.
G1 OTD He entombs at my end step which I force and he forced back so that resolved. Then the next turn he reanimates while I look stupid holding up a land and spell snare. Not much really happened here this game just sometimes they get you.

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I don't think it is correct to counter their spells to get fatties into the graveyard, but rather the reanimate spells.

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Originally Posted by echofish

I don't think it is correct to counter their spells to get fatties into the graveyard, but rather the reanimate spells.

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I don't know.

At least half of their reanimate spells cost 2, and he had a snare, so there's over a 50% chance that he can still counter it if he loses the first counter-war.

Also you wouldn't counter careful study? Draw 2 enablers, bin 2 fatties in your hand. Seems like countering would be better than countering their turn 2 reanimate, only for them to have drawn a second reanimate.

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Originally Posted by echofish

I don't think it is correct to counter their spells to get fatties into the graveyard, but rather the reanimate spells.

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Well let me rephrase that "do you think countering entomb is right if they don't have a fatty in the bin already? " It's the most direct way for them to combo off. If entomb fails then they have to careful study and have a fatty in hand or top 2 or worse yet thoughtseize themselves. There's also a good chance if you don't daze entomb they play reanimate turn 2 and daze is dead anyways.

I'm almost 100% sure this is right unless it's post board. Post board they might have brought in show and tell as plan b and could be baiting a counterspell. Main deck though it turns a two card combo into a three card combo:
entomb + reanimate vs fatty + discard + reanimate

Pyroblast I'm still not sure about in this match up. I think it might be better than bolt otd. Otp I think bolts are better than pyroblast if that's what's left to cut.

They usually have more ways of getting cards into the gy. Entomb, Careful Study, Thoughtseize and discard to hand size. Also, if you let the Entomb resolve and counter the reanimate spell, you have virtually 2-for-1-ed them, until they find another reanimate spell. And here in the mean time, you could draw gy hate.

The exception would ofc be that if you have Daze as countermagic. Then they could play another land and play Reanimate.

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Originally Posted by echofish

They usually have more ways of getting cards into the gy. Entomb, Careful Study, Thoughtseize and discard to hand size. Also, if you let the Entomb resolve and counter the reanimate spell, you have virtually 2-for-1-ed them, until they find another reanimate spell. And here in the mean time, you could draw gy hate.

The exception would ofc be that if you have Daze as countermagic. Then they could play another land and play Reanimate.

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I don't understand how you count letting entomb resolve and then countering the reanimation spell a two for one. They trade the card entomb to put a creature in the graveyard. If we counter the reanimate spell the creature is still in the graveyard. If we counter entomb then they have to still get a fatty in the bin.

Yes they do have other ways to get a creature in the bin other than just entomb. That's not the point I was trying to make. The main advantage to entomb is it fetches the fatty and puts it into the bin. To careful study or thoughtseize they still need the fatty in hand to set up their combo. Entomb is the most efficient way for them to get a fatty in the bin where as the others are more clunky requiring to have a fatty in hand in addition to careful study or thoughtseize.

I'm not saying that entomb is their only way to get a fatty in the bin. It's just if we counter entomb when they don't have a fatty already in there it slows them down a lot. Now they have to cantrip find a fatty, find a way to bin said fatty and have the reanimation spell. It gives us a huge tempo boost by setting their strategy back a lot. It also turns all of their reanimation spells into bricks where as if we let entomb resolve they have 8 live spells. The difference with countering entomb is they have:
8 live spells (careful study + thoughtseize) if the condition "fatty in hand" is met

If you make the comparison of reanimator to omnitell you can make this analogy. Entomb is the equivalent of a cantrip that gets omniscience in hand. Once that's complete they just need Show and Tell to go off. I don't see any reason we would let that cantrip resolve so they could make setting their combo up easier.

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Originally Posted by Contract Killer

If you make the comparison of reanimator to omnitell you can make this analogy. Entomb is the equivalent of a cantrip that gets omniscience in hand. Once that's complete they just need Show and Tell to go off. I don't see any reason we would let that cantrip resolve so they could make setting their combo up easier.

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Very nice comparison. I've always told people to go after the Entombs and Careful Studies, but haven't been able to explain it as well as you.

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Originally Posted by Contract Killer

If you make the comparison of reanimator to omnitell you can make this analogy. Entomb is the equivalent of a cantrip that gets omniscience in hand. Once that's complete they just need Show and Tell to go off. I don't see any reason we would let that cantrip resolve so they could make setting their combo up easier.

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So you counter all the cantrips when you play against Omnitell, instead of saving them for Show and Tell, which they have four of?

Your comparison goes in favor for my argument. You can't counter every cantrip from Omnitell, as well as it is useless trying to keep Reanimator's graveyard clean at all times.

Why would you care if they have a creature in the bin? It doesn't do anything. When they Entomb, they are one-for-zeroing themselves.

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Originally Posted by echofish

So you counter all the cantrips when you play against Omnitell, instead of saving them for Show and Tell?

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No, because unlike Entomb in this comparison, not all of Omnis cantrips draw a combo piece. You've missed his point completely.

Imo it's a bit more subtle than this. Main reason to go after the bin-creature plan rather than the reanimation plan is that we can't really let careful study resolve. Because we can't let half the bin-creature plan resolve, it's probably better to focus on hating this one. That's also why the pair of Show and Tell they are now playing is scary, makes their deck less easy to shut down completely.

Here's my take since I play Reanimator as well. Reanimator only had 8 cards to bin their creatures and had 9-10 cards to put their creature into play, barring the show and tell plan. Careful study also lets them dig hard for stuff.

Stopping the Reanimator player from putting stuff in the bin means they'll have to use two cards to go on their reanimation plan.

As a Reanimator player as well: Entomb is the best card in the deck. I will never be unhappy drawing it. It is an absolute must-counter. Careful Study is a bit more loose since it's still card disadvantage but it doesn't guarantee a fatty in the yard -- I'll often use it to bait out counters, and to ditch extra lands in my hand. It's not wrong to counter it, but your decision should be based more on the current gamestate rather than any hard and fast rule.

But seriously, very rarely should you ever be okay with Entomb resolving.

Edit: Here's another way of looking at it -- Study and Entomb will always be useful as the game progresses. Even if RIP is out I'll sometimes Entomb away a dead card to increase odds of drawing a Decay or S&T. However, Reanimation spells are outright useless without a target. If you deny the player a target, you make 18% of their deck dead draws.