[DTB] Team America (Aggro/Tempo Thread)

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Originally Posted by Scordata

Against blue decks with daze and force: A turn 2 hymn is probably your strongest play here. The following will occur:
They force your hymn - result: that's awesome! They are down a counterspell, 2 cards, and life!
They daze your hymn - result: that's awesome! They are down a card, and on tempo, because they have returned a land to their hand.
The Spell Snare your hymn - result: OKish. One for one trade. Make sure you don't lose on tempo here.
Hymn Resolves - result: that's awesome! You are probably going to win.
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They force sinkhole: awesome, they are down 2 cards and have less answers for your real threats!
They daze sinkhole: awesome, they lost tempo
They spell snare sinkhole: 1-for-1 trade
Sinkhole resolves: awesome! They lost tempo, are potentially cut off a color (removal color?), and are a turn further from ramping into relevant colors! Follow up with stifle, wasteland, and/or more sinkholes and they can't play anything in their hand.

The cards are both great, it's just that when sinkhole is good, it's absolutely brutal. Hymn also had the disadvantage of being trumped by brainstorm. Sinkhole is oftentimes more of a 'must answer', what with all the greedy legacy manabases. Also, when you tap out for sinkhole, your opponent's follow up turn is more likely in Daze range.

This deck is not made for under-developed metas. In a developed meta, I'd rather be using sinkhole vs rainbow-colored counterbalance decks.

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Originally Posted by wcm8

This deck is not made for under-developed metas. In a developed meta, I'd rather be using sinkhole vs rainbow-colored counterbalance decks.

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By the same arguement one could say Hymn's better if one's "developed meta" features Vial decks and Storm combo. They're both good cards. If your meta is one that features a lot of land drop dependant decks (CBT, Lands, Landstill) Sinkhole will likely shine; if one's meta features a bunch of decks that can cheat mana costs, are monocolored or run low curves: Vial decks, Goyf Sligh/Fast Zoo, Storm - Hymn is probably going to be more effective.

I prefer neither, but if I had to choose I'd probably go with hymn. It seems to have had more success overall.

Seems like this thread gets no love it deserves :P For anyone inetersted I've just posted a short tournament report here : http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...982#post521982

What do you guys think about Maelstrom Pulse vs Pernicious Deed in this deck?

Addresing recent discussion - personaly I've alwayes preffered Hymn, as it is the only card in the deck that is always 2 for 1, and is much better than sinkhole against our worst matchups like merfolk and burn. Sinkhole feels like a dead card to me way too often, and is the worst topdeck mid to lategame.

@wcm8 - I disagree, that Hymn is trumped by a Brainstorm, as they're always down two cards. Sinkhole indeed makes your Dazes more effective late game, but I don't find this alone to be worth it. Also the fear of losing important cards to hymn puts a pressure on your opponents, often making them play their threats too soon, so they can't protect them, walk into daze or overextend into Deed/Perish.

What is TA's strategy? I think in essence, it is to Disrupt the opponent, drop a fattie, and beat face.

If this strategy is indeed still viable (and I think it is, given the deck's continued performance record), we next need to identify what cards enable us to execute this strategy the best in the current metagame, while still keeping basic deck-building principles in mind (i.e. we want to avoid the danger of cool things). I think we also need to acknowledge that certain strategies are bad vs. other strategies, and that by diluting a list by trying to have an answer everything, we end up with a deck that is really just weaker overall. This is where the sideboard can come in, but let's just focus on the main deck for now.

In matchups where Sinkhole is really bad, often Stifle and Wasteland are also really bad. But in such cases, is it really a slight vs. Sinkhole specifically, or is it just an admitted weakness of using land destruction in general against certain matchups? A resolved Aether Vial makes Wasteland and Stifle almost equally bad. If land destruction in general is a bad strategy, then perhaps stifle and Wasteland should be replaced with hard counters and a more stable manabase of our own. But I don't think that this is where this deck should go.

Both Sinkhole and Hymn to Tourach are bad late game. TA in general is bad late game. That isn't where the argument should really be focused, because both cards are trying to serve the execution of the game plan. The question should really be, which is more disruptive on turn 2/3, and helps you enable your own game plan the best, ASSUMING that the opponent's deck is not capable of just ignoring your strategy? Alongside the rest of the card choices, I would argue that Sinkhole is. Both cards aim to hinder the opponent in the short term (or at least long enough to ride a fattie to victory), I just think that an opponent can usually more easily recover from a resolved Hymn than from a resolved Sinkhole. They can always topdeck a Swords/Path to deal with your creature, but they can't cast it if you are putting constant pressure on their ability to get white mana.

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Originally Posted by wcm8

I just think that an opponent can usually more easily recover from a resolved Hymn than from a resolved Sinkhole. They can always topdeck a Swords/Path to deal with your creature, but they can't cast it if you are putting constant pressure on their ability to get white mana.

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Actually I think it's exactly the opposite - the odds of them topdecking another source of white mana are much higher, than that they find another swords/path.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by wcm8

In matchups where Sinkhole is really bad, often Stifle and Wasteland are also really bad. But in such cases, is it really a slight vs. Sinkhole specifically, or is it just an admitted weakness of using land destruction in general against certain matchups?A resolved Aether Vial makes Wasteland and Stifle almost equally bad.

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The point is Sinkhole is the only card that can be completely dead in given scenarios/matchups. Stifle is very versitile card and always has some use, at the very worst it can delay vial for a turn or you can pitch it to FoW; wasteland at least gives mana, while Sinkhole in the late game is usually BB:opponent does'nt care. Throwing Hymn at your opponent before dropping a fatty is equally effective on turn 3 as it is on turn 13.

Grats Dan on winning SCG DC. I was watching the Emrakul play I couldn't help but be happy you pulled it out after game one. Good stuff man looking forward to a report.

Darkblast/stifle ftw!

With such a huge uptick on noble hierach decks, I think this is poised to do some face-smashing.

Dan, thanks for the evidence, and congratulations!

I only caught the last few seconds, what did he stifle?

-Matt

What didn't he Stifle? Lol. He destroyed Doomsday/Show on Shelldock Isle.

I don't know, I didn't watch the match, Rodney.

I'm assuming he stifled the Hideaway trigger?

Great job on beating those nasty storm-combo decks!

-Matt

Fantastic finish!

Here's the list he played for reference:

Team America

Maindeck:
2 Engineered Explosives
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Tombstalker
1 Sylvan Library
4 Brainstorm
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
2 Go for the Throat
2 Predict
2 Snuff Out
4 Stifle
3 Hymn to Tourach
4 Ponder
1 Bayou
1 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta
2 Tropical Island
4 Underground Sea
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

Sideboard:
1 Engineered Explosives
3 Pithing Needle
1 Darkblast
2 Dispel
1 Ghastly Demise
3 Krosan Grip
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Consuming Vapors

Has some card advantage with library and predict. Overall seems like a very strong list (onbviously, the results speak for themselves).

I'd like to see what he played/tournament report. Not sure, but is Dan the handle Nitewolf?

-Matt

I hadn't even heard of this deck until tonight. His list looks strong and I like the playstyle a lot, I'll have to mess around with it and see if it fits me.

It runs Stifle so that's like +1000 bonus points :eek:

Dan Signorini is my hero. Way to take it down. The crowd wants a tourney report.

Thanks everyone, and omg what a stupidly ridiculous punt in that first game of the finals. So embarrassing. In my defense I was exhausted, but that's what they all say. Note to self look at life totals before making combat decisions.

I'll try to scrape together a tournament report tomorrow at some point. List was solid all around except I was very underwhelmed with Needle. Consuming vapors was awesome, and predict is insane.

Congratulations Dan! I was rooting for DD and TA lately. So nice to see them in the finals. Can't wait for your report.

What did you board in consuming vapors in against? I'm assuming Zoo and other green midrange decks? That card seems really sick in some matchups.

Congratulations for the result. TA is one of my favorite build and it is always nice to see it performing !
I just would like to get some informations about your choices :
> why EE over deed ?
EE is as well a very strong card in that build, but deed is also working well especialy with tombstalker but does not interact with planeswalker.
> how was go for the throat ?
I'm used to play 4 snuff out md as well, and sometimes I sb in smother in when dealing with black creatures. Althought I think that go for throat is most of the time better than smother in the sb, but I'm curious to know how it works MD. Didnt you have mana availability issues ? Did you feel it more efficient ?

gl & congrats again

Grats on the finish, I was watching coverage of your round 7 match against zoo, and was impressed by how you still almost managed to stablize game 3 after being stuck on one land for several turns despite casting brainstorm and two ponders (the zoo pilot punted twice, helping it a little though). As many others in this thread I'd love to read your report, looking forward to it!

Also having played various builds of Team America for quiet some time myself, I have a few questions regarding your decklist;

- First, why did you choose to run Jace in the board rather than maindeck over, say Sylvan Library? The Jace is never really a bad card, at worst being most-expansive-brainstorm-ever, but still I alwayes found that good enough to have it maindeck and keeping my sideboard slots for other cards.

- Why so many Krosan Grips? Coutertop is favourable matchup anyway, and I like Maelstrom Pulse in this slot a lot more, as for giving up instant speed and split second you get extra flexibility (and ability to deal with a resolved jace, wich this deck really lacks)

- Can you recall how many times did you cast Consuming Vapours (and what creatures did it get?) I've been testing Vapours in this deck a while ago, and decided to cut it, as I just found it way too slow, but might actually give it anther shot. (I'm always running at least two Perish in my side for decks like zoo, bant and new horizons and I just find it much more reliable)