True, I assumed Reanimate only worked with your graveyard. I also totally forgot about Skittering Skirge, one of the first cards I even played with when I started Magic. I'm surprised I totally missed that.
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With a Green Death deck playing very little spot removal, I'd assume that the creatures you're stealing from opponent have died during combat or been discarded? If so, how necessary is Reanimate? It seems "win-more", when you could just disrupt early, lay a Rancored fatty, then win. Why disrupt early, somehow get their creature in the yard, Reanimate it, then win. Seems like more work to me.
Because against control decks, Rancor blows ass, whereas against control decks, Reanimate is absolutely awesome and increases your threat density. Oh, and doing it to an opponent's Eternal Dragon is the absolute most badass play evarr.
...Personally I think you're all on drugs for playing either one, but just saying. And at least Reanimate can be accused of being win-anything, whereas Rancor's just lose.
I'm currently trying him out in my Black Knight slots just for drill. His drawback really isn't all -that- awful, especially if you only run 2-3 of him, and he's fantastic as about your third creature drop. 3/2 Flying beaters for :b::b: have potential. I doubt he'll make the cut with as many creatures as I run, as he's worse when there's more guys in your deck, but it's possible.
As for the previous list I posted, I'm changing the disruption package based on the feedback that actually made sense in terms of how the deck was playing...
The creature and discard base was absolutely perfect.
But I'm switching the utility base from...
//Utility
3 Rancor
3 Berserk
3 Reanimate
3 Ghastly Demise
To...
//Utility
2 Berserk
3 Reanimate
3 Ghastly Demise
4 Smother
It's a sucky movie when you run into noncreature based decks, combo decks, and the vast majority of control decks. But aggro decks seem to predominate and the extra creature kill is fantastic with them. Reanimate is golden against both control decks and aggro decks, but once again is worthless against combo. If you face combo, do not use this build, at all.
Jitte is an awesome card. I'm just hesistent to test it because it's slow, where as this deck is all about uber speed (hence the Berserk).
As for manabase, I'm squeezing in 3 Wasteland along with 2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth to compensate for that.
I'm playing also 3 Wastelands and 2 Urborg in my B/g Version
Wastelands help alot and with urborg they are just a little better then a normal swamp.
I'm testing with and without rancor, he helped me against some matchups but i also disgusted him as a topdeck in some matchups, where it better was if it was a creature that I topdecked because iI know only run 16 creatures 1 and 2 drops (i've cut hippie he was to slow, only good with T1 dark Ritual and hippie)
mayeb some artifact removal MB but thenwe go to the more controllisch version so I will test 2 or 3 Skittering Skirge out in the spot of rancor.
I can change this spot and will keep testing till I have found the best thing for this spot with all kind of different things
I'm not an advocate of the green splash in any way, but if you read the Green Death thread, I can at least acknowledge and undersand the logic behind Rancor + Berserk. I don't agree that that's the direction it should take, but that isn't the point. However, I do not understand the logic behind Reanimate in Sui Black, or it's variants. Sui Black, and it's variants, already have an excellent matchup against pure control decks. So to add another card that is a house versus control is just overkill imo, when that slot could go to balance out our maindeck versus problematic matchups, like pure aggro.
If the deck does splash green, I don't see why it can't just be for Goyf, then Grip in SB. Why the situational pump? Why Reanimate? Why only 8 discard spells when it should really run the full 12 suite?
reanimate became good once goyf took over the format.
the odds are in your favor that your opponent's deck plays goyfs.
you do as well.
you also play ways to discard their goyfs, and ways to kill their goyfs.
they play ways to counter and/or kill your goyfs.
all in all, a lot of goyfs end up in the graveyard.
Thus, reanimate is goyfs 5-8. It costs one mana less than goyf, but costs two life.
If your deck can play with 8 goyfs rather than 4, wouldn't you. That's why the deck plays reanimate.
I tested out Skittering skirge on MWS and he looks good in the spot of the rancor. I run 9 discard and its enough else you don't have much beaters and you can get stuck with no creatures. I'v tested different discard amounts and 8-10 is the best. If you topdeck one in midgame its a dead draw. If you run Hippie 8 will be enough if ou don't run him 10 is preffered, I run 9 because I wanted to test out Skittering Skirge and cut a Duress for it. Maybe Skirge as a 2 of, 3 seems to much, so I can run 10 discard again and have 18 creatures
Green for goyf and krosan grip is enough. Rancor has a great synergy with dystopia but you can use it also without rancor
on the reanimate question. It is good in green death but it needs playtesting in sui black. But what to cut for it, not discard, not removal so creatures and we need them so much
Read the text on Unearth. Unearth DOES NOT let you reanimate your opponents Goyfs. So those 50% of games you play where you never even draw and play your Goyf, Unearth doesn't get you the best creature in the game, Goyf.
Think about what decks use Goyf. The main culprit is Threshold. The only removal it plays is StP. This means that your goyfs and other creatures will never end up in your graveyard. But there's will, because of Demise and Smother and Thoughtseize and Hymn.
So where as Unearth sits in your hand doing nothing in that very important matchup. Reanimate grabs their Goyfs up to use on your side.
Once again, Unearth does not let you take your opponents Goyfs from their yard. No matter how you many times you claim that it does, that it is just as good as Reanimate, it doesn't make it true.
Also, I hear that stealing Mystic Enforcer after Thoughtseizing it or Hymning it to the yard ain't half bad. Can Unearth do that?
I'm not at all impressed by Snuff Out. Why lose FOUR life, just to save one mana?
Ghastly Demise does exactly what snuff out does. Yes it costs one more mana to do it, but it doesn't cost you four life.
If you don't like Demise, play Smother instead.
That four life will lose far more games than that one (or two) mana will.
I don't understand why you can get upset about losing two life to be able to steal your opponents Goyfs (an extremely useful ability), but don't get upset about losing four life just to save one mana?
Well Unearth is unlikely to be dead, but I guess if you need to win the Goyf war.
Hmm... interesting. But if you're banking on Reanimate to be relevant in the Goyf war, I assume you've left your Leylines in your SB for Game 2/3. How has your testing been with the dis-synergy of Leyline + Reanimate/Goyf. Or have you found Reanimate to be more of a, "oops, I win" type play?
I don't think you should be bringing in leyline of the void against tarmogoyf specifically. If it is a deck that uses life from the loam, sure, but it is not very effective against threshold anymore. Tarmogoyf still uses your graveyard. You should be packing dystopia out of the board for that matchup, which is also much more synergistic with reanimate.
Given your lack of draw Reanimate + Leyline OTV simply doubles your chances of drawing something good versus Threshold in your opening seven. Or, alternately, you could be siding out one for the other, whichever approach testing & personal plan dictate. In the world of all-Goyf, all the time, Reanimate seems like a good idea.
Why do you need a bomb in your opening 7 against threshold? Leyline isn't even that great anymore, especially with versions that play sea drake and tarmogoyf...you kind of neuter nimble mongoose. That seems poor for a card that is completely dead if you topdeck it after they have threshold. Are you going to mulligan to find it? If not you are risking dead draws when you could simply board in dystopia and wreck them. Besides, what would you cut for leyline anyway?
When did turn 0 Leyline of the Void stop being effective versus Thresh? Also, why not board in Leyline + Dystopia versus Thresh, instead of just Dystopia? What advantages are there of not boarding in potential turn 0 Leyline vs. Thresh?
Also, the point that I was making that mono-black Sui has zero dependancy on player's graveyards; none. With the green splash and Goyf', that changed ever so slightly. Now, with Reanimate as a maindeck answer to the Goyf war, you're relying more and more on each player's graveyards to win. You've now made your opponent's graveyard hate relevant (remember, before you were 100% immune to GY hate), as well as made your own graveyard hate less relevant (you want yards to stick around for Goyf food and Reanimate targets). I'm not saying that the change is by any huge margin, but it's something that I would like to hear how testing has gone.
EDIT: To comment on your above post, the vast majority of UWG Thresh decks still run Enforcer/Mongoose/Goyf as their creature suite. Sea Drake can be handled with your spot removal if need be, but I'd much rather be facing a Sea Drake than a Threshed Enforcer/Mongoose or 5/6 Goyf.
Once again, what do you cut against threshold for leyline? Leyline does not do enough to warrant it being completely dead in mulitples or if you draw it past turn 0. It does nothing to stop tarmogoyf, or the bigger problem for you, counterbalance. What is your plan against threshold post board? Just board in a bunch of cards that seem good against them? Do you cut disruption/threats/spot removal for leyline? How do you board for the matchup?
What do you do about counterbalance?
Leyline is very situational against Threshold and that's exactly what you don't want out of a sideboard card. You want it to help you in most situations not in only a few. Besides, Thresh can pump their Goyf by countering your spells and playing non-Thresh creatures like Sea Drake.