Originally Posted by
Seraphix
Dropping Thalia from the main undoubtedly worsens your G1 combo matchups, but G. Teeg, Ooze, QPM, DRS, and Knight all provide some degree of interaction against various combo decks. And while its not what you want to be doing against combo, Punishing Fire always goes upstairs.
Having played a ton of Aggro Loam, Punishing Jund, and Punishing Maverick I can confidently say that Punishing Maverick is significantly more consistent than the other two.
In regards to the influx of BUG decks, I think any Maverick variant is well-situated against them (maybe its time to dust off the old Thrun or Wilt-Leaf Liege). I'm off fair Brainstorm decks right now because Leovold is so damn annoying and back on the Maverick train.