[Deck] Merfolk

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Originally Posted by marcin

First and the most important - you assume you have time to be "playing Lords for the first few turns", while keeping blue mana open and/or using daze. Very often, you're limited by both available mana and available blue mana. And both Elves and Storm can win on turn three easily. If you drop Standstill on turn 5 let's be honest - you should have won by now. And if Standstill was another lord in this scenario, you'd have won.
Standstill is never really bad in any matchup (well, except dredge), because drawing 3 cards is never bad and in most matchup there will be board situations when you can drop it. But against Elves only good scenario is Standstill into FoW - everything else is avarage or bad. In fact, giving them time is often not really good here, even if it costs them life. Almost every card they draw is relevant, while you will be drawing much more lands and creatures (useless, because you can't cast them) than counterspells (and daze/pierce are bit weaker than usually in this situation).
Against Storm it's much better but again - you drop it and hope you draw something relevant. With Chalice of the Void they need to find answer without using cantrips and can't really win until they do. With Standstill, they can and will try to win - and you can always draw lands and creatures of it. And Storm can often break Standstill EoT with brainstorm and win next turn, using all land drops you gave them to cast discard.
Against RUG, I wouldn't ever side in Standstills, and might side out them acually. We're favored here and Standstill might be dead card if they drop delver turn one or very risky later (they are situations where you can't be sure you can protect your lords with standstill on stack, so you might find yourself in situation where Standstill is dead if you don't want to risk having to break it yourself).
There are matchups where Standstill is better card usually - Show and Tell or BUG for example - but you're bit favored in them anyway. I'd never say Elves are coinflip. For me, it's literally worst MU possible and even with CotV isn't really 50%.

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I'm not sure what I'm doing differently from you to make Elves a coinflip. I do play a red splash which gives me access to Electrickery (another card you can't play with Chalice) in addition to Submerge, but generally I find that once I blunt their first big spell (either with Force of Will or with Envelop or even Spell Pierce, depending on what the spell is), it's usually a few turns before they can get to another one, at which point they are being forced to throw Elves in front of my 3/3s. It's not a great matchup pre-board, but post board with the red splash it becomes great. I'd say it's a coinflip pre-board given my strategy, also given that I tend to win about half of my game 1s against Elves. I generally have no issues playing creatures and countering spells all at once. That's kind of the point of playing with Force of Will, Daze, Spell Pierce and Aether Vial.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

I'm not sure what I'm doing differently from you to make Elves a coinflip. I do play a red splash which gives me access to Electrickery (another card you can't play with Chalice) in addition to Submerge, but generally I find that once I blunt their first big spell (either with Force of Will or with Envelop or even Spell Pierce, depending on what the spell is), it's usually a few turns before they can get to another one, at which point they are being forced to throw Elves in front of my 3/3s. It's not a great matchup pre-board, but post board with the red splash it becomes great. I'd say it's a coinflip pre-board given my strategy, also given that I tend to win about half of my game 1s against Elves. I generally have no issues playing creatures and countering spells all at once. That's kind of the point of playing with Force of Will, Daze, Spell Pierce and Aether Vial.

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I have no idea how countering first big spell gives you few turns. Elves have at least 7 must-counter (Glimpse, Order, Packmaster) spells mainboard, and several better-counter-it spells (Zenith, Symbiote), can block your best creature for infinty using Symbiote, sometimes even drawing extra card in process. And only thing they have to do against mono blue version is to draw another must-counter spell, as you have no way to interact with their board.
I don't want to sound like a jerk because I have no idea about who you play against or playtest with but it's huge factor. You may simply be better than other players in your environment - I might have 55-60% matchup against weak Elves player (Elves are quite a difficult deck), but 20% against good one. And my only local Elves player happens to have multiple top8 on 200+ people tournaments ;)

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Originally Posted by marcin

I have no idea how countering first big spell gives you few turns. Elves have at least 7 must-counter (Glimpse, Order, Packmaster) spells mainboard, and several better-counter-it spells (Zenith, Symbiote), can block your best creature for infinty using Symbiote, sometimes even drawing extra card in process. And only thing they have to do against mono blue version is to draw another must-counter spell, as you have no way to interact with their board.
I don't want to sound like a jerk because I have no idea about who you play against or playtest with but it's huge factor. You may simply be better than other players in your environment - I might have 55-60% matchup against weak Elves player (Elves are quite a difficult deck), but 20% against good one. And my only local Elves player happens to have multiple top8 on 200+ people tournaments ;)

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It's possible that the Elves players around here aren't any good, but I've also played against many, many different Elves players over the years and the games always seem to play out the same way. The only card that 100% has to get countered in my normal gameplan is Natural Order/Craterhoof Behemoth. Perhaps that's where there's a difference. Glimpse is often neutered if not outright countered by Spell Pierce, and even if they get to Glimpse, the Elves deck isn't built around it like it was in the past. I haven't lost to a resolved Glimpse in a long time. Wirewood Symbiote buys them turns, to be sure, but there are only so many turns they can survive facing down 3 4/4s (and more creatures each turn) before they have to actually chump. I will FOW a Symbiote if I think the game is going to go short, but they really cannot grind forever since every turn that I get to attack while they are facing lethal, they are dumping creatures in front of Merfolk which also inhibits their ability to win. Again, it's not great, maybe 45/55 or somewhere in that range game one, maybe a coinflip, but I'm absolutely not losing 80% of my games against Elves. And it makes me question, if you are, why are you even bothering with that matchup? You'd probably do better to just write it off if even having Chalice of the Void doesn't get you to a coinflip. Or why aren't you playing something like Cursed Totem? That card wrecks Elves. I'm only splashing red because I like the deck more with a splash and Electrickery also has game against DnT, but there are tons of tools against Elves in mono-blue. Submerge, Jitte, Cursed Totem, Grafdigger's Cage, even stuff like Tidebinder Mage and Pithing Needle is useful.

I should read those 70/30, 9s and 4s, 40/60 and other numbers with a straight face?
Now all of the sudden you are playing red or black splash? Mono blue Standstill deck is not enough? Why not? You are missing something that you had to splash from another color?
I didn't double check those tournament results since legacy is played everywhere, not just USA. If I do, will I find black, red or mono blue standstill merfolk as the best?
Saying that Spell Pierce and Daze are relevant against Elves is... interesting.
Please, give us the decklist of what you think is the best merfolk deck. Tnx in advance.

Tournament results from large American tournaments are all that is relevant to me, given that I live in America and can only afford to make trips to large tournaments. By all means, if you see Chalice Merfolk winning in Scandinavia, go nuts and post some results. Until then, the numbers can speak for themselves. I've been playing a Red splash for the last month because 1) I like what playing with a splash does to my mana base and the relative land density in the deck, both in the opening hand and in late game and 2) it is basically free. If you don't like a splash, then you can play all the Islands you prefer. I will not say (and have never said) that my list is the best or the only one that should be played. Please do not confuse data analysis for subjective opinion. Here is my current list.


7 Fetchlands
2 Volcanic Island
4 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland
4 Aether Vial

4 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
4 Silvergill Adept
3 True-Name Nemesis
1 Phantasmal Image

4 Force of Will
4 Daze
3 Standstill
2 Spell Pierce
2 Vapor Snag

SB:
3 Submerge
1 Spell Pierce
1 Flusterstorm
2 Vendilion Clique
1 Red Elemental Blast
3 Electrickery
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Umezawa's Jitte


I have arrived at the numbers that I've stated through thousands and thousands of test games, both in the testing phase and in live tournament settings, over the last ~30 months. You do not need to take them at face value. It honestly does not matter to me whether you think I'm speaking honestly or just straight up making shit up. Really does not matter. I use them because they are convenient approximations and because they get my point across and are understandable to most Magic players. They ultimately mean nothing if you, like marcin, don't for instance know how to reliably beat Elves. Me telling you it's a coinflip for me piloting my deck means absolutely nothing. Now, him telling me that he can't call it a coinflip even with Chalice of the Void in the deck says an awful lot about what's going on when he plays against Elves. When I was testing Chalice of the Void, Elves was a joke.

2 Vapor Snag and 3 TNN?
I am sorry I wasted your time (and mine), it sure looks like we have nothing to learn from each other.

Sick burn, bro.

Marcin quite effectively broke down the issues with benthetenor's statements on the three matchups, but just wanted to accentuate that all of the scenarios you projected are best-case scenarios that seriously just never work as smoothly as stated.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

Elves: Play a few guys, counter their early "big spell" (usually Natural Order) and then drop a Standstill.

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Great! You countered their turn 1 play. they turn 2 two more 1 drops, then go off turn three. Your vial is at 2 and you can put in one creature! Nuts!

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

This deck is especially weak to Force of Will/

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Good thing your one FoW got burned on Llanowar Elf.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

Storm: Drop a moderate clock (4-5 power) and a Standstill.

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Even with Vial you can't even attack for four until turn 3.[/quote]

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

Build a hand of Counterspells and use Wasteland to keep them off of Red mana.

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This might work against TES if they don't get a mox or a petal, but you can never do this to ANT (and does nothing to ANT).

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

Each turn they face the decision of trying to go off against Spell Pierce and Daze or waiting a turn and losing a chunk of life closing the Ad Nauseam door, which is usually risky past turn three

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No they don't, they resolve a gitaxian prove/duress/cabal therapy which broke your standstill so they completely know that they have to beat 1 spell pierce and 1 fow (even if you counter the discard spell, which they are often fine with too). Ant more often wins with Past in Flames. Storm can consistently turn 2 against no disruption and turn 3 against minimal disruption. Hell, TES can turn 1 and resolve a discard spell to hit your FoW you were lucky enough to get.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

Delver decks (RUG in particular, I'm guessing): Force of Will Delver of Secrets.

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They daze or fow your force, gg?
They can also bolt your lords to outrace you and out tempo you.

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Originally Posted by benthetenor

My point is not really the sheer numbers, but rather that since Merfolk went from being a "Standstill deck" to a "Chalice deck", it hasn't won a tournament in America, and hasn't even come particularly close.

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I do think this is always worth considering. The issue is the deck is played so little and by so few top tier players, it's unlikely for it to finish highly. Oppositely, a deck like MUD in a similar place still has put up some finishes.

Marcin pointed out the ultimate issue behind benthetenor's thinking on Standstill:

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Originally Posted by marcin

you drop it and hope you draw something relevant.

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Elves cracks your SS, you draw: land, merfolk, vial. fantastic!

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Originally Posted by marcin

I have no idea how countering first big spell gives you few turns. Elves have at least 7 must-counter (Glimpse, Order, Packmaster) spells mainboard, and several better-counter-it spells (Zenith, Symbiote), can block your best creature for infinty using Symbiote, sometimes even drawing extra card in process. And only thing they have to do against mono blue version is to draw another must-counter spell, as you have no way to interact with their board.

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Exactly.

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Originally Posted by FANAttIC

Now all of the sudden you are playing red or black splash? Mono blue Standstill deck is not enough? Why not? You are missing something that you had to splash from another color?

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I also seriously can't see a good reason to splash. The cost is too high for such a stream-lined deck.

Hey folks! Ran this list at SCG Worcester for a 10-5 record which was good enough for top 64.

Really sad I couldn't win my last round to make top 32 so that it'd be posted on the site!

Creatures:26
4 Cursecatcher
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
4 Phantasmal Image
4 Silvergill Adept
4 True-Name Nemesis
2 Vendilion Clique

Spells:13
3 Chalice of the Void
4 AEther Vial
1 Daze
1 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Force of Will

Lands:21
3 Cavern of Souls
12 Island
3 Mutavault
3 Wasteland

Sideboard:15
1 Chalice of the Void
2 Flusterstorm
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Gut Shot
1 Pithing Needle
3 Relic of Progenitus
1 Echoing Truth
1 Sower of Temptation
1 Venser, Shaper Savant
1 Submerge

Would be glad to go further into it but here were my match-ups:

L : 0-1 : Greyhound bus (late to event!)
W: 2-0 : Dredge
W: 2-0 : Storm
W: 2-0 : Omni-Tell
W: 2-0 : Burn
W: 2-0 : Omni-Tell
L : 1-2 : UR Delver
W: 2-0 : UWR Stoneforge
L : 1-2 : Sneak & Tell

6-3 day 1 good enough for day 2:

L : 1-2 : Miracles - Theodore Jung
W: 2-1 : Infect
W: 2-0 : RUG Delver
W: 2-1 : Elves
W: 2-1 : Storm - Caleb Scherer
L : 0-2 : Omni-Tell - Rudy Briksza

4-2 day 2 was good for 44th place.

I'll write-up about the event as a whole somewhere else and link back to it, to explain how the matches really went.
The deck treated me well enough that I was able to play Magic most of the tournament.
The two matches I believe I could've turned around if I played better were the losses to UR Delver and Miracles.
The field wasn't particularly soft so despite being in the loser's bracket most of the tournament my opponents were competent. My burn, show & tell, and infect opponents felt particularly soft as opponents.
I'm watching through the coverage now but some talking points from the event I want to bring up that might not be seen by glancing at the top 32.
I talk to a lot of people so this is stuff I learned by observing the floor or talking to players, not just biased by my match-ups.

• Omni-Tell was the talk of the tournament.
  
  Everyone was scared of the deck and was prepared to beat it. A LOT of players were on it. The main reason I was hesitant to play Merfolk was that I felt Merfolk are not favored.
• It was a bad time to be playing Stoneforge Mystic.
  
  I'm not even sure if the UWR deck I played against was a stoneblade. 0 SFM were cast against me all 14 rounds. The Top 32 mostly reflects this as well.
• Miracles players are sold on Monastery Mentor.
  
  Not sure how this changes the Merfolk match-up going forward. My loss to Miracles was largely to my mistake g2, but also due to how many sideboard cards he saw and Snapcaster Mage 2 for 1's. I should be able to talk to Anuraag Das as he's from my LGS.

Of course those are all best-case scenarios. I was laying out the ideal plan to win each of those matchups. My point was not that Standstill Merfolk is so much better than Chalice Merfolk against those decks, it's that there still exists a reasonable gameplan that can and does beat those three decks all the time. I'd consider each of those matchups to be about a coinflip, depending on the relative skill levels of the pilots and the draws of the decks in question. I have sideboard cards for each of them so the matchup should and does improve in games two and three. The deck plays very, very differently with ten counterspells than it does with five counterspells and three Chalice of the Void, and the way that the opponents play against it is equally different.

I'm a little surprised that I'd need to spell out that those are all best-case scenarios for us, particularly since I'm describing opposing best-case scenarios. Also, I'm still not quite sure why I'd be using my Force of Will on a Llanowar Elves, or making a number of my plays that you're suggesting I'd make. As for the splash, there is no cost.

There is always cost, otherwise everyone would run it.

Splashing another color creates several risks:
1. It turns on the land denial plan from RUG and other delver decks.
2. It turns on wastelands. There have been plenty of times that I have been stuck on 2 lands and if one of those were wasted, GG.
3. Bloodmoon is a house against you. You only have 4 blue sources in your entire deck against a stompy deck. I would side bloodmoon against your deck
4. How impactful is Electrickery and a singleton red blast over simply streamlining the deck's purpose? If your purpose is to get the weenie decks out of the game, wouldn't Dread of Night and splashing black just make more sense? (Not supporting this change, simply throwing this out there).


Based on the answers to these questions, I prefer to run a deck that is more consistent that creates blank cards in opponent's hands VS actually being able to get the slight increase that I can handle a DnT deck. They just aren't a % of the meta to warp my deck's consistency.

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Originally Posted by JPoJohnson

There is always cost, otherwise everyone would run it.

Splashing another color creates several risks:
1. It turns on the land denial plan from RUG and other delver decks.
2. It turns on wastelands. There have been plenty of times that I have been stuck on 2 lands and if one of those were wasted, GG.
3. Bloodmoon is a house against you. You only have 4 blue sources in your entire deck against a stompy deck. I would side bloodmoon against your deck
4. How impactful is Electrickery and a singleton red blast over simply streamlining the deck's purpose? If your purpose is to get the weenie decks out of the game, wouldn't Dread of Night and splashing black just make more sense? (Not supporting this change, simply throwing this out there).


Based on the answers to these questions, I prefer to run a deck that is more consistent that creates blank cards in opponent's hands VS actually being able to get the slight increase that I can handle a DnT deck. They just aren't a % of the meta to warp my deck's consistency.

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There are certainly theoretical costs. What I am saying is that, in practice, I haven't found splashing a color to be difficult or even all that risky. Point by point:

1. There is some risk to this, assuming you're talking specifically about Stifle. However there are still 2/3rds of my lands that are not fetchlands, and playing around Stifle is something that is second nature to most veterans of the format at this point.
2. Wasteland has been far more often targeted at or saved for Mutavault than Volcanic Island, and in fact I welcome Wastelands targeting non-basics as it makes Daze, Spell Pierce and Cursecatcher more effective. I will often fetch a Volcanic Island against a Wasteland deck where I don't have any actual red spells in the deck to induce Wasteland and protect Mutavault, or to at least give them the idea that I may have red spells against their deck which gives them more to think about. Having an Aether Vial in play also makes Wastelanding me a very, very bad proposition for them.
3. Blood Moon could potentially be an issue if it were unexpected, but again, I'm not sure that anyone should bring in Blood Moon against me, particularly since my splash is red. Aether Vial and the presence of Islands (and against a Blood Moon deck, my first order of business is to fetch out basic Islands) all make Blood Moon a risky play. I can operate just fine off of two Island which isn't all that difficult to fetch out before Blood Moon hits. Spell Pierce is also a nice foil to Blood Moon.
4. Death and Taxes is more of a concern than a stompy deck by at least one order of magnitude, and Mother of Runes is problematic enough that it requires a response. True-Name Nemesis is decent, but against a deck that can both shut down Aether Vial (with Phyrexian Revoker or a Disenchant effect) and can use Rishadan Port and Wasteland, hard-casting a 3-cost spell is risky. Even in a mono-blue shell, I found I was often using Mutavault or Wasteland to cast the TNN, so Wasteland is still effective. And then it takes quite a few turns before the TNN can win the game. It's helpful but ultimately slow. A black splash for Dread of Night would do an even better job of fighting specifically Mother of Runes, but I like the fact that Electrickery also hits Phyrexian Revoker in that matchup and virtually every elf in the Elves matchup, as well as Dryad Arbor and all of them at once in the Maverick matchup. I chose the red splash because it creates the most efficient sideboard, as opposed to having to play a mix of Dread of Night and Perish and Engineered Plague. I'm using a light splash specifically because the red cards are powerful in the ways I want them to be, and in fact I'd probably be less inclined to splash if I had more off-color cards I really wanted to play.

I also happen to find that playing with Fetchlands makes the deck more consistent as you are more likely to draw an "Island" in the opening hand and less likely to draw an Island as the game progresses. It is a small percentage, but over the course of a tournament or even a match it adds up. Paying 2-4 life a game to increase the threat density of the deck is absolutely something I'm happy to do in all but the most extreme matchups (mostly just burn). It's one of the reasons why RUG Delver is so consistent, and I've seen subtle but unmistakable consistency gains just by playing fetchlands. It is for these reasons that I consider the splash to be "free", since I've even toyed with playing a mono-blue variant with fetchlands when I had Brainstorms in the deck.

Well done TrevaBlues!

Let us know when you've finished your report :)

Any changes going forward? Any matchup where you learned something new?

Thanks!

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Originally Posted by JPoJohnson

I'm surprised to see so much frustration towards the miracles match up. I've always felt EXTREMELY favored game 1. We're quick and have counter backup. Chalice stops their protection and digging.

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I agree with you JPoJohnson. Miracles doesn`t a problem for me since I put chalices in my maindeck.

Just test them and you'll see it. There's no discussion about it.

two merfolk decks in the top 16 of the scg super IQ last weekend (one plays vial, the other chalice)!

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck..._num=8&limit=8

I saw that. Certainly clears up the Chalice vs. no Chalice argument, lol. Both strong deck lists with each strategy though.

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Originally Posted by Pelpopayo

I agree with you JPoJohnson. Miracles doesn`t a problem for me since I put chalices in my maindeck.

Just test them and you'll see it. There's no discussion about it.

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Miracles shouldn't be a problem even if you don't have chalices in your deck. :rolleyes:

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Originally Posted by CptHaddock

Miracles shouldn't be a problem even if you don't have chalices in your deck. :rolleyes:

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You're right but with chalice is better. I've already tested both options in my deck.:wink:

Hi team I wrote up a tournament report from my Top 64 with Chalice Merfolk in the SCG Worcester Open.

It's a bit long because I write a little about each match... but maybe some of you will enjoy that!

Blogger Link

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Originally Posted by dinosaurus

Well done TrevaBlues!

Let us know when you've finished your report :)

Any changes going forward? Any matchup where you learned something new?

Thanks!

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General changes I want to fit in an Arcane Laboratory in the board as another tool against Omni-Tell and other combo decks (but maybe a second Venser is just better).

RE: Omni-Tell - just that you hope for your own average hand and that they have average hands. You just lose to their S&T, FoW, Flusterstorm hands.

RE: Miracles - the Snapcaster builds are more prevalent now and boy are they obnoxious. Still feels like a good match-up but Snapcasters are just such a beating.

thanks for the detailed report! are you definitely sold on wasteland by the way?

how would you guys board agains the snapcaster version of miracles? A couple of relics?