Pitching the extra artifacts to Waterfront Bouncer works too, but Ensoul Artifact could be an interesting idea.
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Pitching the extra artifacts to Waterfront Bouncer works too, but Ensoul Artifact could be an interesting idea.
(Edited) I'm going to throw out something that is also probably entirely ridiculous, but...
With all of this talk of CotV, has anyone considered the crazy idea of introducing sol lands into Merfolk? Not something I'd do personally but hey. It would allow for T1 CotV for 1. Of course, it has terrible synergy with a lot of other cards (playing a sol land means no turn 2 UU, means we can't afford to run mutavault, makes daze infinitely worse) but you know, a better deck builder might be able to do something better with it.
Daze works terribly in a deck like this... so I'm ditching it for Gitaxian Probe to smooth out our draws for no mana cost. It is unfortunately a 1cc spell, but the good news is we can go probe then chalice on T1 with a sol land. I'm also running 22 land since there is no vial and to give us 14 blue sources (too few?):
//Creatures:
4 x Cursecatcher
4 x Silvergill Adept
4 x Lord of Atlantis
4 x Master of the Pearl Trident
4 x Phantasmal Image
4 x True-Name Nemesis
//Instants & Artifacts
4 x Chalice of the Void
4 x Force of Will
4 x Gitaxian Probe
//Lands
4 x Ancient Tomb
4 x City of Traitors
4 x Cavern of Souls
10 x Island
~2 Flexi spots in the main there.
I don't know it is a janky idea but one that might spark some less janky ideas or even just be a fun brew to play a your LGS! A T1 chalice vs. Elves, delver, burn, affinity, reanimator etc sounds like a lot of fun :laugh:
Or here is a Lotus Petal alternative which lets us keep our manlands:
//Creatures:
4 x Cursecatcher
4 x Silvergill Adept
4 x Lord of Atlantis
4 x Master of the Pearl Trident
4 x Phantasmal Image
4 x True-Name Nemesis
//Instants & Artifacts
4 x Chalice of the Void
4 x Force of Will
4 x Lotus Petal
//Lands
4 x Cavern of Souls
4 x Mutavault
12 x Island
~4 Flexi spots since Gitaxian Probe would be less necessary to smooth out our land draws since we'd have access to blue. I think I *kind* of prefer this build, but it has access to less explosive draws. But it fits much better with our fish plan. How often do we draw petal AND chalice, though? Maybe we hedge our bets with a set of 4 sol lands as well :tongue: still just 20 lands since we have Lotus Petal. Though you could always eat into your ~4 flexi spots for blue land sources.
//Lands
4 x Cavern of Souls
4 x Mutavault
4 x Ancient Tomb
8 x Island
Definitely worth testing imho, why not? :) I just don't know what you'd take out. People have been taking out the vial to run chalice, so you'd need to be running both AND Ensoul Artifact. That is a total of 12 MD slots dedicated to 8 artifacts & Ensoul Artifact.Quote:
Originally Posted by FANAttIC
I considered Chrome Mox but then thought no. It is just painful card disadvantage IMHO.
Maybe if you wanted to run Ensoul Artifact... you're looking at a deck like this (continuing the crazy train here):
//Creatures
4 x Silvergill Adept
4 x Lord of Atlantis
4 x Master of the Pearl Trident
4 x Phantasmal Image
4 x True-Name Nemesis
//Instants, Sorceries & Artifacts:
4 x Chalice of the Void
4 x Force of Will
4 x Aether Vial
4 x Ensoul Artifact (too many?)
//Land:
4 x Ancient Tomb
4 x City of Traitors
4 x Seat of Synod
2 x Cavern of Souls
6 x Islands
~4 Flexi spots
T1: Ancient Tomb, CotV for 1.
T2: Blue land, Ensoul on Chalice. Attack for 5.
I'll admit it seems really janky though because it starts to make you wonder: why are you even playing Merfolk at this point? Ensoul artifact feels jammed in there. I also wouldn't feel comfortable playing Cursecatcher because I don't think we could afford to run a full set of caverns to get around chalice, but hey I could be wrong there. And again, no manlands. Of course you could always just remove the sol lands and replace them with manlands instead.
I don't want to Stifle anyone by saying that these artifact heavy brews are not where the deck ought to be headed, but I do have my reservations. My two cents about it all are that you really do want to minimize the number of one drops that you cannot force through chalice for 1. Before you edited your post you had a u/b list up with brainstorms and thoughtseizes -- glad you pulled that out. =P Anyways, I'll leave discussing those aspects to the rest of you and when you make the next awesome rogue brew, you can shove it in my face. Lol.
What I wanted to talk about were the tweaks that I have made from my previous list as I continue to prepare for this weekend's spellslinging.
4 Cursecatcher
3 Cosi's Trickster
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
4 Lord of Atlantis
3 Phantasmal Image
4 True-Name Nemesis
1 Thassa, God of the Sea
1 Sygg, River Cutthroat
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Force of Will
3 Daze
12 Island
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Mutavault
1 Mishra's Factory
Sideboard
2 Dismember
2 Submerge
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Flusterstorm
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Manriki-Gusari
1 Cursed Totem
1 Pithing Needle
1 Echoing Truth
1 Misdirection
So overall, this is what I did
MD
Minus 1 Negate
Minus 1 Cosi's Trickster
Plus 1 Daze
Plus 1 Sygg
SB
Minus 2 Relic of Progenitus
Minus 2 Swan Song
Plus 2 Flusterstorm
Plus 1 Tormod's Crypt
Plus 1 Misdirection
So, four Tricksters is probably too heavy. Its still a bomb one drop on the play versus many decks, but I really like the card advantage Sygg can generate. He also has UU in his cost so that helps Thassa out (Niche, I know). I cut negate for daze because having Daze lets you more reliably jam Chalice on t2 against the other decks with Daze (and Force). In the board, I cut the relics entirely because they do not synergize with Chalice. 3 gravehate cards seemed high, so I went down to just 2 -- Tormod's and a Grafdigger (soo good vs elves). Next, even though Swan Song is a hard counter, I cut it for some recently acquired Flusterstorms because, with Chalice for 1 out, the storm copies do not have a cmc of 1 and thus are NOT countered! :-D Lastly, I really missed the Misdirection, so that's what the second Relic became.
I really want to prepare the deck to be at its best for the following match ups
Delver variants (In order of how popular I expect them to be: U/R, UWR, BUG, RUG)
Stoneforge Decks
Elves
Reanimator
Miracles
I feel pretty good about having access to good cards that help in these match ups, and will perhaps later go into more detail about the specifics of which cards I intend to use for which match ups, but for now, I'll just leave it at that. I'd like to hear what y'all think about the changes I've made, how the main looks, and if things seem properly prepared for Sunday. Thanks for looking!
I like what you've done a lot. Looks very solid. I expect TC to fuel fetching in decks where Trickster will be better more often than not now.
In my experience, against a dedicated graveyard deck (like Reanimator or Dredge), with a standard build of Merfolk you really want 3-4 graveyard hate spells if you need to see them consistently. If you genuinely don't believe that those decks (or ANT or Jund for that matter) will be around, then you probably can get away with shaving on them, but I just don't like the idea of losing to a deck that is so easy to beat with the proper sideboard cards. It's almost (almost) a waste of sideboard slots to have just two of those kinds of cards, particularly when you don't have Brainstorm or Standstill or any supplementary card draw to dig towards them.
The other question I have, and it's one I have with any sideboard that's not a combo player, is what is the Echoing Truth for? I think there could be good reasons to play it, I just often find that when I see a generic bounce spell in a sideboard, there are cards that are stronger and more specific that would do whatever it is that you're wanting Echoing Truth to do, depending on what that is. It's not bad to have flexible cards in the sideboard, but I often find that playing generic bounce spells in this deck gives you a lot of excuses to do too much sideboarding since you could justify bringing it in against almost any deck. So what is your specific reason for playing Echoing Truth?
I have the same kind of feelings about Dismember; what decks/cards are you bringing those in against? In a lot of ways it's a very generic card that can be brought in in almost any matchup, so I'm just curious about what decks, specifically, you're going to be bringing those in against, and why?
Hey, I appreciate the insightful post. You definitely have me considering the third graveyard hate card, but I'll explain what led me to my current conclusion. Reanimator is actually not a terrible match up. Post board we have a lot of counterspells for them to contend with, so the Grave hate functions as another card that they have to deal with. Dredge is one that I haven't come up against in a tournament setting yet, but I'm thinking if we counter the dread return, we got 'em, right? (Unless we get beat down by Ichorids and Zombie Tokens -- echoing truth, anybody? =P ) So, same idea there, I guess. We'll see how things pan out. Additionally, we actually do have some ways to dig for cards in the form of Silvergill Adept, Thassa, and Sygg River Cutthroat. Its just not very reliable digging, heh.Quote:
Originally Posted by benthetenor
Echoing Truth made it in after I had critical losses to resolved ensnaring bridges in back to back tournaments. Lol. I did not like the feeling of knowing that I had literally ZERO outs to it. Not only that, however, it is good against all the tokens that pop up out there -- Goblins from storm, Elementals from Young Pyromancer, and Angels miraculously appearing out of nowhere. While I did explicitly state that I am tuning this for the SCG open, I will say that in my local meta, the ET is good because I am regularly paired up against the Turbo Dark Depths player in the weekly tournament, and its quite fun to bounce his Marit Lage. :) Lastly, I do think its worth it to ET a flipped delver. Buying a turn or two as they recast, flip, and then swing with him can be all the time you need.
Moving on to Dismember, it functions as a blue removal spell and is pretty much our only removal spell -- making it quite critical. I'd bring this in against the Delver decks, the stoneforge decks, elves, and DnT. Fannatic suggested running it in the main, and if this deck had some way to mitigate it being a dead card versus combo, I'd likely have it there. Not that its super common atm, but Goblins is a very real deck, and a very real nightmare for Merfolk. Their two biggest impact creatures -- t1 lackey and the notorious Goblin Piledriver -- both meet an ill-fate at the hands of dismemberment! :) So, those are my reasons on that. What do you think?
And more generally, I'm thinking about posting my rough sideboard plans -- all sideboarding subject to on the fly changes, of course ;-) -- would anybody be interested in that and/or willing to provide some feedback about it? thanks
So I decided to type up some of the sideboarding strategy that I've come up with so far. My intentions here are two fold -- to stir up some discussion on the topic and to practice what I may do on Sunday, as this current list (both the main and board) have tweaks and subtleties differing from my previous lists.
As always, I realize that sideboarding is not something you ought to go into having 100% settled based on generic match ups. Its something that you have to feel out and adapt to the situation, with many variables such as your opponents specific take on an archetype and his or her playstyle.
The match-ups I hope to discuss are U/R Delver, UWR delver, Miracles, Elves, and Reanimator. I'd re-post my list, but it feels like spamming since its the same as the one I submitted yesterday..lol
So, lets get the big one out of the way, U/R Delver -- I haven't been able to play any sideboarded games versus this one, and honestly do not have all the experience I'd like going in to Sunday, but here's what I think I'd do.
On the Draw: -3 Daze, -3 Phantasmal Image, - 1 Mishra's Factory, +2 Flusterstorm, +2 Dismember, +2 Jitte, +1 Echoing Truth
On the Play: -3 Phantasmal Image, -1 Mishra's Factory, -1 True Name Nemesis, +2 Dismember, +2 Jitte, +1 Echoing Truth
So the creature hate comes in, and our weakest creature in the match up comes out. Daze is notoriously bad on the draw and is replaced by Flusterstorm (which on paper seems good vs. them, right?). Mishra's factory is good vs board wipes and not needed here, and TNN is a little slow and one can get shaved out. Thoughts?
Next up is UWR Delver, an entirely different beast. I think the key to this match up is to push the aggro, while not letting batterskull hit the field. I have a handful of tournament pairings versus this deck, but only one since the printing of Treasure Cruise (For the curious, it went to 3 and I lost both games that he resolved Treasure Cruise, heh).
Quick note -- is it right to leave Cursed Totem out in this instance? Seems like it could come down a turn too slow on the draw, at the very least. Preventing Germ tokens from entering the battlefield is a critical part of this match up, however, so I'm wondering if I should be bringing in all the help i can get. It also would be good if they have grim lavamancer.
On the Draw: -3 Daze, -1 Mishra's Factory, -1 True Name Nemesis, -1 Thassa, God of the Sea, +2 Dismember, +1 Umezawa's Jitte, +1 Manriki-Gusari, +1 Pithing Needle, +1 Cursed Totem
On the Play: -1 Mishra's Factory, -1 True Name Nemesis, -1 Thassa, God of the Sea, -1 Sygg, River Cutthroat, -1 Daze, +1 Pithing Needle +2 Dismember, +1 Manriki-Gusari, +1 Cursed Totem
So here again I shaved out a TNN -- we still have the three, so we can still get one to close out a damage race, potentially, and I was really having a hard time figuring out what else to board out.
I'm pretty sure Thassa has to go since they have StP, and Sygg is a flex slot and okay to go in order to make room for the s/b. (This is a bad idea on one hand, since him drawing would be good and let you get to more bodies/hate cards/etc, but Sygg synergizes with TNN, so shaving the TNN could help justify this decision. Again, looking for feedback here.)
Well, that actually took a lot longer than I expected to type out! I'm going to call it quits for now and if there is interest, I'll get into those other match ups some time tomorrow. If you have some thoughts on how you'd board for these or any of the other archetypes out there, I'd love to hear it! Thanks for reading.
Your reasons are kind of what I thought you'd say, so just a few thoughts on those. These are all opinions (obv.), even if they sound like gospel. I'm not trying to say that this is how you have to play or sideboard, just explaining myself:
For Dismember, I don't really like playing that card in most matchups. It's possible that it's a necessary evil, but I often find that the life cost is way more than I'm comfortable paying, and I don't like the fact that, the time when you would need a removal spell the most also happens to be the time when you're least likely to be able to pay 4 life without dying. In the Delver matchup, for instance, I find that it often comes down to a racing situation, and paying 4 life to kill a Delver is something that sometimes you have to do but it's never a good feeling.
I think, in general, in the blue creature matchups (Delver and Stoneblade mostly), there's much less of a need to actually remove cards like Stoneforge Mystic and Delver of Secrets if you're in a position to race them since most of the time, your creatures will be unblockable, which your deck is actually much better at doing than mine is since you have many more creatures. Particularly with Chalice of the Void against most of those decks, it seems like you could just play creatures and shut off their removal spells and there would be no way for them to beat you quickly besides an early flipped Delver (which could likely be taken care of with FOW) or a very fast Batterskull/equipment game. I don't really like Pithing Needle in the sideboard because, like Echoing Truth, it gives you lots of excuses to board it in when it's honestly fairly lack-luster, and the fact that it always does SOMETHING makes it difficult to justify not running it or boarding it in. I just find you need to be vigilant about whether or not the cards you're bringing in are actually doing what you want them to do, and for that to happen you need to make sure you have a solid plan for how the game is going to play out. For instance, I'd be fine with having Pithing Needle in the sideboard if you see it as a card to deal with Deathrite Shaman, Mother of Runes and Grim Lavamancer specifically, that can also hit a Liliana of the Veil or Umezawa's Jitte in a pinch, but like it would be unclear as to whether it's even better than just having more creatures against UWR Delver and Miracles. It all depends on what the winning plan for that matchup is.
I feel like I need to post my current SB, even though it's based off of a white splash and a Brainstorm and Standstill in the maindeck, but maybe it will help illustrate some of the things I'm talking about. Right now, it's:
1 Spell Pierce (2 in the main)
1 Divert
1 Blue Elemental Blast
1 Standstill (2 main)
1 True-Name Nemesis (3 main)
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Disenchant
2 Swords to Plowshares
1 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Rest in Peace
1 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Umezawa's Jitte
...with me being open to the idea that ANY of those cards is just wrong.
So with my board, against UWR Delver or Stoneblade or any matchup that I would classify as an "equipment" matchup, I've got Disenchant and Hurkyl's Recall to bring in as reset buttons, and if I feel like playing the equipment game I can bring in Jittes of my own with the 4th True-Name Nemesis. Alternately, if I want to play a more aggressive game, I can board in Divert, Swords to Plowshares and the Artifact hate (and maybe Spell Pierce and BEB to fight removal) so I can keep Batterskull off of the board and just race them, which is I think the slightly better plan against most of the decks that try to beat us with TNN + Equipment. But in my build, the Swords to Plowshares are strictly for utility creatures (Mother of Runes, Deathrite Shaman, Stoneforge Mystic, Grim Lavamancer) that can in a pinch deal with something bigger that somehow slipped through the cracks and have become relevant over time (flipped Delver, Tarmogoyf, Batterskull token). But my main point is, rather than a very generic bounce spell, I can afford to play a very specific one in Hurkyl's Recall to deal with equipment (all at once!) and Ensnaring Bridge, and because of how I've ordered my sideboard it means I don't have to draw an Echoing Truth against a U/R Delver opponent or a Pithing Needle against UWR Delver.
With your sideboard plans, I'm not sure I like anything that you're bringing in against U/R Delver. I mean, I can see them all doing something, but I don't know if, for instance, Jitte is a realistic plan, given that they have many burn spells and Jitte costs 4 to get going in a matchup where they are already trying to out-tempo you. If the card you're losing to pre-board is just Treasure Cruise, it would be much better to bring in cards that stop that card from happening, rather than anything else. I'm not sure what those cards would be, given that the way you've build the deck excludes cards like Wasteland and Spell Pierce which I've found to be dynamite against all Delver decks, but it's probably bad to board in cards that don't advance the gameplan that you will win with. I would not bring in Tormod's Crypt, for example, but if you were playing something more substantial that they had to use a card to get rid of, or something that replaced itself (Rest in Peace or Relic of Progenitus, respectively), those would be okay at stalling out a Treasure Cruise without really losing a card. Jitte may still have to come in if their deck is more burn and less tempo oriented, and then it would be fine, but I don't know if Dismember is a card you want against a deck with Lighting Bolt. But then, I don't play with Chalice of the Void, so maybe I'm too worried about that.
Take-home message: sideboarding is an art. You should sideboard however you want to, and however makes sense with your deck, and with whatever cards you want to play, but the one thing you must do is develop a plan in post-sideboard games, and then construct your sideboard so that the cards you're taking out and putting in are all advancing that plan in games 2 and 3. You need to make sure you're not boarding out cards for cards that are either weaker for your plan (very bad) or equally effective (wasting sideboard or maindeck space). There are a lot of variables to keep in mind in both construction and in playing, but take comfort in the fact that most people don't pay enough attention to those games, which is crazy given that at least half (and almost always, more than half) of your games use the sideboard.
Hello everyone,
I finally top4'd a 50-person tourney this Sunday with the following list (I had recently finished in 10th at 4-2 and 9th at 4-2 again with a slightly different list):
4 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Phantasmal Image
4 True-Name Nemesis
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
2 Stifle
4 Aether Vial
12 Island
2 Cavern of Souls
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland
Sideboard
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Pithing Needle
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Chalice of the Void
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Hydroblast
2 Spell Pierce
3 Swan Song
http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f3...ps9028ce28.png: this is the tournament report.
My reasoning behind the list: I thought I would face a lot of lists featuring fetches and treasure cruises and that people would get greedy with manabases again (and I was right). Also trickster was such a terrible topdeck last time that I sincerely did not want to run it again (though with the increased number of fetches I could see people feeling otherwise depending on their respective meta). Instead of running 21 lands (13 U, 4 cavern, 4 mutavault), I went up to 22 (12 U, 2 cavern, 4 mutavault, 4 wasteland) and added 2 stifles instead of cosi's tricksters. Boy did that overperform (I am also guessing that the surprise factor was key here).
Let me go through the tournament quickly:
Round 1: Pox W 2-0
not much to say here. I turned 1 vial both games and flooded the board before he could do anything. Quick games and not much interaction.
Round 2: 4-color delver draw 1-1
first treasure cruise opponent. He won game 1 after cruising a couple of times late game, and I won game 2 on the back of a true-name equipped with Jitte. Sadly back to back golgari charms prevented me from riding true-name to victory in game 3, so we drew. The black splash is slightly annoying I have to say.
Round 3: Infect W 2-0
I forced a berserk game 1 and sided in pierces and swan songs game 2. 2 quick games and a nice victory on a match-up I didn't have a lot of experience with. By the way he had treasure cruise too...
Round 4: RUG delver W 2-0
3rd treasure cruise opponent (don't fear the cruise too much). That was a quick one too. I won an interesting game 1 thanks to wasteland (and a nice stifle) to cripple him from red and lightening bolt. I had chalice with force back up after board...that was that unfair.
Round 5: BUG control L 0-2
an opponent with a very nice control list (and treasure cruise of course). He drew too many decays and pernicious deeds game 1 and finished me off with JTMS. I needled a deed and he eventually found a decay for it thanks to a resolved top that I fought but landed anyway, and I had done the stupid overextension with a couple of true-names. Skilled opponent with nice all-black bordered cards, he also gave me lots of tips on the matchup afterwards. I also countered aggressively a brainstorm at some point to prevent him from finding the decay but that was right before he could land the top...he tricked me nicely there.
Round 6: UWR delver W 2-0
playing for top8 after narrowly missing twice was a nice feeling against yet another TC opponent. I was however once again on the draw (I repeatedly lost to the dice yesterday). I could race a delver game 1 after dazing a lavamancer thanks to wastelanding aggressively (wasteland was a close mvp for me yesterday). I copied a SFM game 2 to find Jitte and equipped a caverned true-name game 2 FTW.
Yes! I finally top8'd a legacy tournament after narrowly missing twice on breakers. :D
Round 7 (quarters): MUD W 2-0
I got very lucky here because he was 2nd seed and I was 7th. I flooded the board with lords game 1 after a turn 1 chalice on 1 off of ancient tomb (he did not know what I was playing luckily). He then added a 2nd ancient tomb to help me in my task... Game 2 was a succession of bad draws for him. He landed a wurmcoil but by that time I had like 12+ power on the board so I won. He mulliganed too if I recall correctly. Anyway, semifinals were there :D
Round 8 (semis): UR control with Dig through times L 1-2
That was an insane battle and I am still a bit salty on the outcome which revolved around a series of topdecks that he won with a nice crowd cheering (the atmosphere in the shop was super nice though). His deck was awesome and he came up with it by himself. He crushed me game 1 and I won game 2 on the back of wasteland on volcanic island (I must have wastelanded at least 7 volcanic islands throughout the course of the tournament + a couple of underground seas and miscellaneous). Game 3 he drew, when on the ropes, 2 Engineer Explosives (to be fair he had 3 after board to fight true-name) on nearly back to back topdecks (after I forced a dig through time). And I had played my first true-name on turn 4 with pierce backup and after the first explosive I played a 2nd one that I had sandbagged that brought him down to 2 before he explosived yet again (people went crazy just looking at my face...). He finished me off with Mishra's factories...
I was a bit salty but my opponent played very well and was a nice guy so all in all it was an awesome tournament.
And top4 meant I got a volcanic island (Revised, EX)! Yeah!!! (the legacy tournaments we have over here have nice prizes...)
Anyway, hope that helps and if you want I can go over my sideboarding.
I will be running the same main deck with some sideboard modifications next tourney (Nov. 16th).
Take care,
Congrats on your finish! :)
It would be great if you can share your sideboard plan.
That's awesome, great job! I always liked Stifle in this deck, I just usually find that the card it's competing with is Spell Pierce and most of the time I find Spell Pierce to be more versatile, but I like tons of stuff that Stifle does in a deck with Wasteland and Daze (and even Cursecatcher).
Good job, but how the hell did you lose to BUG
not very relevant, but I guess variance, a better player than myself and enough decays and deeds as I wrote down in my report...Quote:
Originally Posted by KobeBryan
I guess it should be a good matchup for us but even if it is 70/30, you will still lose some from time to time. I won against MUD which was unexpected if you want to go down that road...
Not an insult. It was strange to lose 0-2 to BUGQuote:
Originally Posted by nafshot
I guess a better answer would be that at first I mistook his deck for a BUG delver list and made a series of suboptimal plays and overextended a bit into deed. On the second game he clearly outsmarted me into making several bad decisions for him to be able to land that key sensei's divining top. There were close enough games since after checking on my notebook I see that I took him down to 4 life game 1 and 2 game 2...Quote:
Originally Posted by KobeBryan
I don't play Merfolk but I have helped my buddies develop a Merfolk list that we are very happy with. My thinking going in was always that Merfolk is just a mono blue tempo deck that lacks the good draw spells the other tempo decks have. So our list addresses the card advantage issue and tries to stay as close to its tempo heart as possible. Without further ado our list:
Merfolk
By: The Dojo
3. Phantasmal Image
4. Curse Catcher
4. Lord of Atlantis
4. Master of the Pearl Trident
2. True Name Nemesis
4. Silvergil Adept
3. Tidal Currier
4. Force of Will
4. Vapor Snag
4. AEther Vial
4. Cavern of Souls
4. Mutavault
4. Flooded Strand
4. Polluted Delta
4. Island
The 2 unusual card choices being Tidal Currier and Vapor snag. Vapor Snag gives the deck soft removal buying a little time which is usually all the deck needs to progress the board to a winning position. Tidal Currier has been amazing it can fill your hand up after a board sweeper, counts as a Merfolk. We put it in just to try it out and in all honesty the card has totally out performed our expectations. One of our favorite plays has been to cast it off uncounterable mana from Cavern then copy it with Image from a vial and reap the rewards of drawing all those cards.
Hey all, thought I'd check in and report how SCGMINN panned out for me -- obviously not as good as it did for my buddy Anthony. Props to him for taking it down! :) Another guy from my LGS was in the top 8 too, so that's cool. But that's enough beating around the bush -- I went 3 - 5- 1. At one point I was 3 - 1 and hoping I could at least finish in the money maybe, and then got my ass handed to me five rounds straight. I didn't take detailed notes, but here's the quick version of my matchups and the s/b I ended up using.
Sideboard:
4 Submerge
2 Flusterstorm
2 Dismember
2 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Manriki-Gusari
1 Cursed Totem
1 Pithing Needle
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Echoing Truth
Round 1
Loss to Junk Deathblade (1-2)
Mulled to five in game 1, not how you like to start the day, plus its a nasty match up having to fight Batterskull, Liliana, AND abrupt decay. With no island walk cheating. Its match-ups like this that help justify the 4 submerges in the board, and it was double submerge in game 2 that got me that game.
Round 2
Win versus Burn (2-1)
Notable here from game 2 -- I casted Umezawa's Jitte while he had double Eidolon of the Great Revel out. FTL, lol. IDK how to explain that one, just a mistake on my part since I was so focused on trying to get that thing online and gaining some life. Chalice in game 3 got me the round.
Round 3
Win versus R/W Painter (2-0)
So I was actually paired up against a friend in this round and we had playtested the match-up the day prior. He runs two ensnaring bridge in the main and one in the board and knows its a house in the match-up. I kept it off the table in game 1, but we had an epic game 2 where he got an early grindstone, but I kept the Painter off the table thanks to counters and dismembers. He then resolves a bridge and eventually is double grindstone-ing me every turn. Each card I flip and hope its not my one out -- echoing Truth. Maybe 10 turns into the lock, i double mill, draw my card...and it's the Echoing Truth! Send lethal. Pretty fun match, definitely could have ended differently.
Round 4
Win versus U/R Delver (2-0)
Game 1 he had Delver but wiffed on flipping him for a couple turns and fishies got there on damage. Game 2 I think he kept a cantrip heavy hand that didn't lead to much and I had double TNN.
So here I am at 3 - 1. Its about to get ugly folks, heh.
Round 5
Loss vs Bug Delver (1-2)
Now before I get too much heat for losing to BUG delver, because I do agree that it is a FAVORABLE match up, I have to say that this one had another sweet finish that just wasn't in my favor. Its game 3, I had a handful of fish out, I think it was like TNN, Lord, Silvergill and he had Tarmogoyf and Deathrite who was putting pressure on my life total. I thought I crunched the numbers and had it all figured out, so I sent it in, thinking that even if he attack with 'goyf and shocked me, I'd be at 1. What I failed to realize was that if he top decks a sorcery, he can cast it, grow Tarmogoyf by 1 and send the perfect amount. Well, for the first time ever perhaps, the words "Ponder for lethal!" were uttered at a Legacy tournament.
Round 6
Draw versus Punishing Jund (1-1-1)
Its hard to remember all the details here, but you can probably imagine how this all played out. We ended up going to time in game 3 as he was cleaning up shop with punishing fires, so this probably would have been a loss overall if we hadn't run out of time.
Round 7 and 8
Losses vs DNT (0-2, 1-2)
That's right people, back to back matches versus another absolutely craptastic match up. First guy I had to mull to 5 in game 1 and mull to 6 in game 2. So I feel like that's enough said there. All I remember is getting my ass brutally beat in these matches, lol. Thalia is pretty mean versus us as an early drop because her first strike stops everything until you have double lord or TNN. Batterskull is obviously a must stop, and since I'm on chalice fish, no vials, their mana denial strategy is rather effective. I brought in Manriki, 2 jitte, 2 dismember, and pithing needle, taking out 4 Lord of Atlantis and 2 cursecatcher. Pretty sure that's what I did, at least.
Round 9
Loss versus ELVES (0-2)
And at this point I'm pretty tired and feeling rather defeated. I come up against an acquaintance and we both know we're just playing for fun, so we have a good match. Game 1 we battle it out, but he ends up pulling off a Natural order for Progenitus. In game 2 i kept a hand with chalice and lords. On the play I rolled with it. He had an answer for the chalice and proceeded to Craterhoof me to death.
And that's the recap. My overall thoughts about it are that I definitely give props to all my opponents, including the ones who beat me. They all played good games and I enjoyed my day of magic. I think that I definitely got bad match-ups and could have had better draws at times, but hey, that's the game sometimes. Its funny with this deck, it feels like when you are winning, you tend to win more because you get paired higher and face a higher concentration of blue decks. I've played variations of Merfolk off and on for years now, and there are certain things about the deck that I honestly am a little sick of. It gets into awkward situations a lot of the time. Just to throw a few things out there:
If island walk isn't on, you have to actually be able to beat the opponents creatures. Pretty much only TNN/Jitte can help you do this, and you get in weird situations where its like, ok, I have to keep TNN back as a blocker and wait until I top deck another Image or TNN. Meanwhile your opponent is continuing to advance their strategy. Not good.
Compared to most other creatures you face in legacy, yours aren't so good. (As in, if they can block, your guys will likely trade, and a lot of the time won't even trade. Prime examples include Batterskull, Deathrite shaman laughing at your 1/1s and of course Tarmogoyf)
Speaking of that nasty five drop, I'm having a devil of a time beating Batterskull, regardless of the deck its in. I've beaten in circumstances where I have islandwalk, but w/o it, the damage race seems unwinnable. I've also beaten it by getting Needle early and naming Stoneforge. What are people doing to beat SFM -> Batterskull? Do you leave forces and other countermagic in to try to stop the SFM? The Manriki in the board has done it for me a few times, so getting that going has been part of my plan lately. One thing with that though, is that you do need a creature besides the Phantasmal Image that tutored it up in order for it to kill the batterskull. Furthermore, that creature has to survive until it no longer has summoning sickness. I recently lost to Esper Deathblade with Manriki out because I couldnt do that, so I'm kind of on the fence about it.
Lastly, I hate the opening hands full of Phantasmal Images and Silvergill Adepts. Please, could it get any more awkward?
IDK, with the open over, I'm no longer as serious about tuning the deck so I'm feeling much more experimental. I'm thinking about abandoning the Merfolk ship and making a mono blue brew called "Cruise Control" -- mostly just because its a sweet name. I haven't made that yet though, so I ran pretty much the exact 75 that Nafshot posted on here and I went 3 -1 at my local LGS this week (including wins vs DnT and White Weenie -- how come it couldn't be that way at the Open?). I gotta say, I really had fun playing it like this and I forgot just HOW damn fast vials are in this deck and the pressure they help you put on. I top decked one late one game and remembered how crummy that can be as well, but I think that's a part of the trade off. The two stifles were awesome and I liked getting back to the roots of the deck with the mana denial and daze strategy going as you vial things out. With that in mind, I have a couple of questions for you -- since Chalice seems good enough to me to run game 1 against the field (for the most part), I have a tough time thinking about when NOT to bring it in (save for, of course, the obvious match ups like MUD or other chalice decks, etc.). What decks do you bring in Chalice for and what do you take out? Secondly, what is your strategy for beating the Stoneforge Mystic decks that bring out that stupid battering ram?
Well, that's all I have for now. Thanks for reading!
I will be play testing your exact posted build on Saturday at a local Legacy tournament. I would very much be interested in how the deck sideboards and what plans you have to modify the sideboard for SCG NJ on Nov 16th.Quote:
Originally Posted by nafshot
The sideboard has to be specifically tuned to your meta of course, but I'll go over what I usually face at tournaments:Quote:
Originally Posted by monobluetown
my last sideboard:
1 Surgical Extraction (for reanimator, combo such as painter with welder, Loam Lands which I face often here, and Canadian threshold because it is insane after wastelanding either a trop or a volcanic island)
1 Pithing Needle (control such as BUG, miracles, and painter combo)
1 Grafdigger's Cage (elves, reanimator, MUD with kuldotha forgemaster)
1 Relic of Progenitus (anything that uses its graveyard as a resource, either to delve or to make Tarmo or Mongoose bigger, very versatile card that I neglected in the past, I will now always have at least 1)
2 Umezawa's Jitte (elves, and against anything that plays stoneforge mystic, you can probably go down to 1)
2 Chalice of the Void (burn, various builds of delver especially UR which is extremely popular at the moment)
1 Hurkyl's Recall (MUD and affinity, you can cut it but it is also nice to have a silver bullet against ensnaring bridge)
1 Hydroblast (lots of red spells at the moment in my meta, replaceable if not)
2 Spell Pierce (against combo, delver, miracles and when I do not want daze on the draw)
3 Swan Song (against combo such as ANT, TES, sneak & show, show & tell, miracles, and infect of course where it really shines)
I used to always find spots for submerge, but fair green decks are less popular now and I have accepted that I can only win against elves if I have a nutdraw and/or if I draw at least 2 submerges which is highly unlikely, also I'd rather have 2 chalices and 2 jitte and a cage that are very useful in other matchups to have the smallest chance...
I was contemplating cutting a swan song before the tournament but a lot of people play combo (which ignores treasure cruise), miracles and infect currently over here, and it is your best card against those...
The hydroblast is pretty situational so you might let this one aside.
2 Jitte might be too many for you so you can also find another spot here.
Then, you could probably add another relic and another chalice instead.
As for cards to replace,
Stifle is insane game 1 (max surprise factor coming from merfolk) but if they have seen one, I almost always side them out (unless I play against threshold, or to fight SFM, germ tokens and Storm triggers).
If they have a lot of spot removal I cut down on PI, and I usually remove dazes on the draw not to fall too much behind.
Facing a bad matchup, when I want to get lucky, I also remove a vial from time to time (don't get me wrong, the velocity of the deck comes from them, but they remain a heartbreaking topdeck).
Here are the basics, if you want more specific plans, I'd advise asking a more competent player than myself :D
Hope this helps,
Best,
Well, seems we have a new little threat we'll need to have to think about...
Quote:
Containment Priest
1W
Creature - Human Cleric, 2/2
Flash
If a nontoken creature would enter the battlefield and it wasn't cast, exile it instead.
http://mythicspoiler.com/c14/cards/c...entpriest.html
This thing hits a lot of things in Legacy, Including our Vials. Expect to see it in decks running white.