[Primer/Deck] Nic Fit

I played the Sneak Attack list today, five round tournament with cut to top 4.

4 Veteran Explorer
1 Deathrite Shaman
1 Sakura-tribe Elder
1 Tireless Tracker
1 Fierce Empath
1 Eternal Witness
1 Meren of Clan Nelson Toth
1 Thragtusk
1 Sidisi, Undead Vizier
1 Primeval Titan
1 Inferno Titan
1 Griselbrand
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

4 Cabal Therapy
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Sneak Attack
3 Punishing Fire
3 Sensei's divining top
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Pernicious Deed
1 Toxic Deluge

1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Volrath's Stronghold
3 Grove of the burn willows
4 duals
6 basics
7 fetchlands

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3 Carpet of Flowers
2 Thoughtseize
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Slaughter Games
2 Golgari Charm
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Pithing Needle
1 Gaze of Granite
1 Massacre

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Round 1: UG Infect
He makes some guys and I Punishing Fire them for several turns. Eventually he untaps with Agent + Heirarch, swings in - I hold Fire in case he has Vines, then kill it postcombat. I untap and Emrakul him with an Inferno Titan to clean up with.

Game 2 he draws quite a few lands, and I kill him with spaghetti again.


Round 2: Metalworker
I choose to Zenith up an Explorer on turn two rather than leave Punishing Fire up, after my opponent makes turn 1 Chalice. He proceeds to untap and make Metalwork, give it Lightning Greaves and make a Wurmcoil. I try to get to 4 to Sneak Attack, but he makes Kuldotha Forgemaster into Sunderland Titan and I die.

Game 2 is pretty similar, I get a Veteran exiled by Warping Wail, make another one and a Deathrite, and lose all my stuff to Ugin. He follows up with a Sundering Titan and I pick up my cards.

Round 3: 4 Colour Loam
He makes a Bob, I make Veteran and sweep with Deluge. He has a Liliana and spend several turns ticking her up, and dredging Loam to draw a load of cards. I eventually Zenith up a Primeval Titan, finding two more black sources to hardcast the Griselbrand in my hand. He chooses to - 2 Liliana to kill Primeval, and I top deck Sneak Attack, make Griselbrand, draw 14 more cards, find Emrakul and kill him.

Game 2 he makes a KOTR or something, I end up making Sneak Attack (first one ate Grip), Zenith up Empath and spaghetti him.

Round 4: Painter
Game 1 he assembles the combo after some grinding, and mills me. I shuffle back in from Emrakul and we standoff for a while. I make Thragtusk to prevent his Jaya + Painter beat down, and he drops Ensnaring Bridge. I Deed for 3 (Jaya pops Thragtusk in response) and we both have nothing - he makes Blood Moon, but I have some basics, and eventually get Sneak + Empath and spaghetti him out.

Game 2 he plays land - go after mulling to 6 - I name Blood Moon on therapy and see nothing much. He rips blood moon (from his mull scry), slams it, and I sit there and do nothing / get beaten to death by Jaya + Painter + Recruiter.

Game 3 I Decay some of his stuff. He has Grindstone but no painter, and I know he has Surgical for Emrakul in hand. Eventually I make Sneak, Zenith up Empath and kill him.

Round 5: ID

Top 4: Jeskai Stoneblade
I mulligan to six and see Deed, three lands, double Sneak. I keep it, since I know he isn't super fast. He makes Stoneforge into Jitte, I Deed which he Dazes. I take a hit, and make Sneak into Force. He makes a second Stoneforge for SoFaI, I make another Sneak and swing with Griselbrand. He shrinks it with Jitte, taking 5 and putting me to 15. I choose to draw 7 and hope he doesn't have Bolt, rather than pass and have one card to draw gas. He has Bolt. (my top card was Emrakul. I think I made the correct decision at the time though).

Game 2 we trade removal for ages (I kill a Stoneforge with Decay, a Meddling Mage with Massacre, and a TNN with a Witness-ed Massacre). Eventually I'm two lands off casting the Griselbrand in my hand, and he's managed to stick a SFM through my hate. I top deck a land, go to 11 - one draw off - and die to stoneforge attacking for 5 and double Bolt.

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Overall the deck seems pretty good - only once did I ha e trouble with multiple Sneaks and I wanted to top deck one a lot more than that. Primeval Titan was the least impressive fatty, but being green is really handy. I didn't get that much use out of punishing fire, but I think that's just the match ups I played. The manabase felt mostly okay, though getting BBBB for Griselbrand was difficult a couple times. I don't think there is enough flexibility to reasonably plan to splash W for Nahiri.
Meren did nothing all day - never Zenithed for her or drew her. Sidisi I played once, just as a straight diabolic tutor (for Sneak).

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Originally Posted by Navsi

Meren did nothing all day - never Zenithed for her or drew her. Sidisi I played once, just as a straight diabolic tutor (for Sneak).

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I agree on Meren, definitely a slot I would look to cut. Sidisi I liked enough that I want to use it elsewhere. Depending on the rest of your curve, I think it's a straight up better Diabolic Intent.

I think you're right about Sidisi. To be honest I'm tempted to drop Meren and a single Sneak Attack for a second Fierce Empath and a Tasigur. Maybe fit a Diabolic Intent in there somewhere.

Since the Sneak Attack list ended up not working out for me, I went back to my usual build. Looking to finalize my list for a 10 week league. Trying to strike a balance between what works, and throwing in some random stuff I might be interested in. I've only done one other league in paper before, and that was sealed... and it fell apart after a couple weeks, so I don't have much for comparison. What I do know is this one is allowing proxies, but you get a few extra match points if you own your deck.

What this translates to, to me is a good field for Nic Fit, as it leads to a bunch of people proxying tier decks that lack basics, and use mainstream choices for Therapy names. Of course it also means, a bunch of Miracles players running around with Moats.

Here's where I'm at right now, but I'm starting to go a little too deep on the Humans side I think (over preparing for everyone to be on FoW, Counterbalance, Daze, etc) so I could use a sanity check. Listed are the competitors for the slots

Creatures 21
1 Endless One or 1 Hangarback Walker or 1 Mistcutter Hydra
1 Sylvan Safekeeper
4 Veteran Explorer
2 Deathrite Shaman or 1 Deathrite Shaman, 1 Noble Hierarch
2 Dark Confidant
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Courser of Kruphix
2 Tireless Tracker
2 Monastery Mentor or 2 Siege Rhino
1 Eternal Witness
1 Ranger of Eos
1 Meren of Clan Nel Toth
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons

Land 22
2x Bayou
1x Cavern of Souls
1x Dryad Arbor
3x Forest
1x Phyrexian Tower
2x Plains
1x Savannah
1x Scrubland
1x Swamp
4x Verdant Catacombs
1x Volrath's Stronghold
4x Windswept Heath

Spells 19
2x Abrupt Decay
4x Cabal Therapy
4x Green Sun's Zenith
3x Path to Exile
2x Pernicious Deed
4x Sensei's Divining Top


Sideboard 13
1x Carpet of Flowers
1x Deathrite Shaman
1x Noble Hierarch
2x Faerie Macabre
1x Gaddock Teeg
1x Scavenging Ooze
1x Shriekmaw
1x Swords to Plowshares
2x Tidehollow Sculler
1x Knight of the Reliquary
1x Cavern of Souls

This comes to 62, so I need to identify one cut here. I lean towards a Deed because they hit a lot of my own cards here. But I really like Deeds ability to answer boards that nothing else can answer. The Mentor plan is still untested, so I figured I'll just force the issue and try it out here. Either it will be fantastic or I can SB them out every game.

The sideboard still has some room as well. In the SB ramp plan when vets come out, I'm looking at Noble Hierarch. It's a little easier to cast with a Cavern, so that adds some resiliency, and it adds to board presence. It's effectively only 2 colors though. Leaning towards some Sorin LoI's as the final 2 slots, but I'm not sold on that plan yet. They're best against Miracles, but I think this build is already respecting Miracles enough.

Knight is the big SB option I wanted to talk about though. Like the Ranger of Eos package it's a big body, unlike the Ranger package I can get it off of GSZ. And it's able to power itself up, it's also able to recur itself with the Towers or to set up a Cavern to resolve anything problematic. Seems like it might work well here. Also, I can feed it into the CA package when paired with Tracker, improve it with fetches, and like I said, turn it into a card quality engine with the Towers. I think there's some room to try it out.

Anyways, any thoughts on the potential cut, or the SB adds?

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Originally Posted by Navsi

I think you're right about Sidisi. To be honest I'm tempted to drop Meren and a single Sneak Attack for a second Fierce Empath and a Tasigur. Maybe fit a Diabolic Intent in there somewhere.

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I'd trade in a P. Fire and Meren for Empath #2 and Tasigur (although Angler might be better. You'll won't be using Tasigur's ability much and being legendary can come back to bite you in the ass. That has been my experience, at least).

@Brael: Have you seen matt's list on the previous page? That might be right up your ally. Runs a shitload of CA/card selection. 3 SDT & 2 Sylvan Library and 2 Painful Truths (amongst other things), if I remember correctly.

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Originally Posted by Brael

Has anyone had some experience with Nylea, God of the Hunt in a Junk build? I'm looking for an alternative 4 drop to replace my lone Rhino, at a minimum in SB games. I see it being pretty solid against Miracles if I can sneak it in but at the same time I'm concerned that it requires 2 cards to work while Rhino can beat face all on his own.

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I had.

Let me draw a quick picture as I have tried Gods in some builds:

- You need a good card advantage engine because Gods do not impact the board at all. Yes they are difficult to be dealt with but still they do not provide any impact when you play them.

- Nylea is nice but from experience, I found Xenagos to be better. Yet the Red mana is an evil constraint.

My two cents,

Ralf

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Originally Posted by Echelon

@Brael: Have you seen matt's list on the previous page? That might be right up your ally. Runs a shitload of CA/card selection. 3 SDT & 2 Sylvan Library and 2 Painful Truths (amongst other things), if I remember correctly.

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Yep, I liked the list. I think there's a lot of draw to the CA focused builds, just trying to find something to push it over the top. The main idea of what I'm trying to do, is to avoid the usual ramp deck weakness where your deck just does nothing if you fail to ramp. I'm doing that by lowering the curve, including a lot of CA, and then adding in optional ways to use the mana, or using that ramp mana on card quantity rather than quality.

I've never been comfortable with relying on the strength of the Delver and D&T matchups to make the deck choice good for a tournament though. Ideally I would like one more favored T1 match. Miracles is the one I'm hopefully targeting, but Eldrazi could be good too if you go in another direction.

I had an interesting Miracles game last night online. I'm really liking the sneak list against them, so far the matchup seems like the best one I've seen for nic fit.

Game 1 I blind Therapy on the play and hit Brainstorm :tongue: and then the next turn take out 2 Ponders from their hand. Game then was me drawing two Sneak Attacks and seeing them all countered on turns 4 and 5. Then GSZ for Witness to get one back and manage to stick it. Sneak in Primeval Titan, they answer with Terminus. Next turn I sneak in Empath, sneak in Emrakul for a concession. So far I've had a couple of Miracles games like this, where it seems to basically come down to sticking a Sneak Attack game 1.

Game 2 I land a Dearthrite and they play a Top. I have the chance for a T2 Slaughter Games, but that would involve playing a Tower and sacrificing the Deathrite, and I think I can eak out DRS advantage for one more turn (I'm ok losing the Deathrite against Miracles, the guy never seems to live long anyway due to Swords/Terminus so at most he usually accelerates for only a couple turns). So instead I just GSZ for 2 for some mana acceleration Steve, but it gets countered. I'm happy about that, they probably thought I was grabbing a hatebear. Next turn the opp draws with Top and taps out for Mentor. I'm a bit gleeful as I Slaughter Games naming Top, which grabs the one in hand and I see that they only have 2 Wear/Tear's in hand. The rest of the game is just me smoothing draws with my own Top and attacking with little guys until I draw into P Fire and also have the mana to hardcast Inferno Titan.

This deck, so many angles.

Having a hard time against Loam/Depths decks and my Delver matchups also seem to be struggling, but I've only done a few games with P Fire/Groves so we will see how those go with a larger sample size.

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Originally Posted by square_two

Having a hard time against Loam/Depths decks and my Delver matchups also seem to be struggling, but I've only done a few games with P Fire/Groves so we will see how those go with a larger sample size.

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I had the same issue with Delver, just out of curiosity which Delver are you struggling with? Grixis is what gave me problems. I think Punishing Fire should go a long way towards fixing the matchup. Basically what shut me down was that Grixis was very effective at turning off the decks ramp. I could never get above 5 mana.

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Originally Posted by Brael

I had the same issue with Delver, just out of curiosity which Delver are you struggling with? Grixis is what gave me problems. I think Punishing Fire should go a long way towards fixing the matchup. Basically what shut me down was that Grixis was very effective at turning off the decks ramp. I could never get above 5 mana.

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Another point in favour of Carpet of Flowers out of the sideboard.

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Originally Posted by Brael

I had the same issue with Delver, just out of curiosity which Delver are you struggling with? Grixis is what gave me problems. I think Punishing Fire should go a long way towards fixing the matchup. Basically what shut me down was that Grixis was very effective at turning off the decks ramp. I could never get above 5 mana.

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Both RUG and Grixis. I've never played a deck more hurt by Stifle. The last matchup in particular, the opp just had a brutal sequence of topdecks and answers at the right time. Stifle a Vet trigger, Invasive Surgery my Pyroclasm, etc. I'm still working on mulligan decisions and it seemed like I had a lot of outs, but I thought I'd have an easier time.

Does anyone bring in Carpet of Flowers against delver decks? I'm thinking that any cheap way to get a bump in mana would be nice to have.

Edit: Heh, Navsi agrees.

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Originally Posted by Navsi

Another point in favour of Carpet of Flowers out of the sideboard.

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I agree with that. What do you take out though? My usual strategy is to swap Explorers with other ramp, but taking Explorer out here seems wrong.

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I've never been comfortable with relying on the strength of the Delver and D&T matchups to make the deck choice good for a tournament though. Ideally I would like one more favored T1 match. Miracles is the one I'm hopefully targeting, but Eldrazi could be good too if you go in another direction.

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Originally Posted by Navsi

Another point in favour of Carpet of Flowers out of the sideboard.

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That's exactly why I moved to Sylvan Safekeeper, and more long term threats in the main. Double Batterskull, 2 control walkers, and Safekeeper do a fine job of controlling the Miracles matchup, especially in Game 1. One could argue playing another Sylvan. I think I'm going to end up cutting SFM again since I don't need to tutor the Batterskull hardly ever, and replace it back with a Teeg (again, Miracles), and perhaps some other general spice, which perhaps opens more slots from the board to board against Combo/Eldrazi/etc.

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Originally Posted by Brael

I agree with that. What do you take out though? My usual strategy is to swap Explorers with other ramp, but taking Explorer out here seems wrong.

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I did have difficulty working out what would come out. This is what I sided yesterday:

Infect:
-1 Meren
-1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
-2 Abrupt Decay (not killing Inkmoth is sad times)
-1 Tireless Tracker (too slow)
-3 Veteran Explorer

+1 Pithing Needle
+2 Thoughtseize
+3 Carpet of Flowers
+2 Golgari Charm

MUD:
-3 Punishing Fire

+1 Reclamation Sage
+1 Pithing Needle
+1 Gaze of Granite

Loam:
-3 Punishing Fire
-1 Sneak Attack

+2 Surgical Extraction
+1 Pithing Needle
+1 Gaze of Granite

Painter:
-3 Punishing Fire

+1 Reclamation Sage
+1 Pithing Needle
+1 Gaze of Granite

UWR Delver:
-1 Meren
-1 STE
-1 Toxic Deluge
-3 Veteran Explorer

+3 Carpet of Flowers
+1 Gaze of Granite
+1 Massacre
+1 Reclamation Sage

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Originally Posted by sdematt

That's exactly why I moved to Sylvan Safekeeper, and more long term threats in the main.

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I'm trying something similar, just with some different cards. Right now I'm really high on the idea of Ranger of Eos as a 5th way to get Safekeeper, and a more preferable way for that matter since it then saves a GSZ for something else.

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Originally Posted by Navsi

I did have difficulty working out what would come out. This is what I sided yesterday:
UWR Delver:
-1 Meren
-1 STE
-1 Toxic Deluge
-3 Veteran Explorer

+3 Carpet of Flowers
+1 Gaze of Granite
+1 Massacre
+1 Reclamation Sage

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Interesting, 3 Carpet. Has it caused you problems in the Miracles matchup? It has been my experience that Miracles is very good at playing around Carpet. They can wait for a long time cracking fetches, and they can operate well with just one blue source, it's really white that's key to their deck. A T1 Carpet will often times not generate mana until T3 and when it does, it's only 1.

My recent and most succesful build

4 Vetern Explorer
1 Deathrite Shaman
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Eternal Witness
1 Meren
2 Huntmaster of the Fells
1 Broodmate Dragon
1 Thragtusk
1 Dragonloard Atarka

1 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
1 Arlinn Kord
1 Garruk Relentless
1 Chandra, Flamecaller

4 Cabal Therapy
4 Green Suns Zenith
1 Toxic Deluge
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Kolaghans Command
1 Painful Truths

3 Tops

3 Pernicious Deed

2 Bayou
2 Badlands
1 Taiga
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Swamp
2 Forest
2 Mountain
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Volraths Stronghold
1 Kessig Wolfrun

SB

2 Pyroblast
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Thoughtseize
2 Blood Moon
2 Golgari Charm
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Boil
1 Ruination
2 Slaughter Games


What do you think?

The Chandras are very good. I suggest everyone to try out. So are Arlinn and Atarka.

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Originally Posted by Brael

Interesting, 3 Carpet. Has it caused you problems in the Miracles matchup? It has been my experience that Miracles is very good at playing around Carpet. They can wait for a long time cracking fetches, and they can operate well with just one blue source, it's really white that's key to their deck. A T1 Carpet will often times not generate mana until T3 and when it does, it's only 1.

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If they don't make a second Island, they can't cast Counterspell, Counterbalance, Clique, Venser or Jace, and I'm pretty much 100% okay with that.

Most Miracles lists only play a couple of Plains and maybe a Karakas. I've found that they will always fetch for duals since they want to keep their basics in their deck for Veteran Explorer triggers.

Most Miracles players around me are not on the Nahiri plan, which I imagine is a bit less blue-heavy, so maybe that makes a difference. I've always found Carpet to be excellent against Miracles - usually eats a Force or a Wear/Tear within a turn of being played, which is also just fine.

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Originally Posted by Navsi

If they don't make a second Island, they can't cast Counterspell, Counterbalance, Clique, Venser or Jace, and I'm pretty much 100% okay with that.

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They'll get a second eventually, but if they're on the play they won't get them until they actually need the mana which is kind of slow. Against Miracles I bring in one Carpet, 3 just seems to me like it slows you down too much. Maybe that's ok though.

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Originally Posted by Brael

They'll get a second eventually, but if they're on the play they won't get them until they actually need the mana which is kind of slow. Against Miracles I bring in one Carpet, 3 just seems to me like it slows you down too much. Maybe that's ok though.

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Even if Carpet only give you one mana for a couple turns that's generally fine. If you have Veteran Explorer, even the fastest non-Tower play lines (Therapy) give us 0-3-5 (native draw) or 0-2-5 (Zenith) in spare mana, whereas Carpet gives us 1-3-4 (assuming Miracles doesn't get a third island) which is still just fine most of the time. By the time Miracles hits 4 mana they probably want a second island, let's be honest, and I'd rather force them to find nonblue sources than have them make a Jace on turn three.

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Originally Posted by Navsi

Even if Carpet only give you one mana for a couple turns that's generally fine. If you have Veteran Explorer, even the fastest non-Tower play lines (Therapy) give us 0-3-5 (native draw) or 0-2-5 (Zenith) in spare mana, whereas Carpet gives us 1-3-4 (assuming Miracles doesn't get a third island) which is still just fine most of the time. By the time Miracles hits 4 mana they probably want a second island, let's be honest, and I'd rather force them to find nonblue sources than have them make a Jace on turn three.

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I've found it's more typically 1-2-4-6/7 because of when Miracles chooses to crack their fetches. If they don't have a top to play, they can choose to not crack on T1 in order to delay Carpet a turn. Usually you have time against Miracles but the delay on Carpet can give them time to stabilize against us.

Anyways, I'm pretty interested in Carpet against Delver, they don't have the luxury to put off getting Islands. I think the same logic holds for Shardless BUG which is something I always bring in Carpet against.