[Deck] TinFins 3: Return of the Onion Burst

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Originally Posted by TinkerRobot

Firstly, I agree with the "be greedy" assessment; that's why we're playing Tin Fins, right?

Speaking of Greed, in my testing I've had the desire to go up to 4 Goryo's Vengence. I don't yet know if this impulse is irrational or not. There are times when the 1-of Reanimate is a real stinker because I want to draw all the cards AND attack the turn my Grizzie comes into play. Thoughts?

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Hell, go for it and see what comes of it. The big downside on Goryo's is the fact that it targets, and Reanimate on Griselbrand in certain match-ups will win you the game (Burn and Burn like decks, provided you do it early enough that the 8 life loss is a non factor). That being said, I have had a few games recently where I would have much rather had Goryo over Reanimate.

Test it and come back with some notes.

I have personally been testing +2 Silence -2 Thoughtseize (Adding Massacre and another bounce spell to the side) since I don't own Thoughtseize and am unable to borrow them regularly. So far, it's been working out great, but that's mostly because my local meta is either combo (Silence during their combo is fun) or control (I want more silence anyway) and minimal Aggro decks (maybe some Goblins). I think that Thoughtseize is necessary at a large event, but for my meta, Silences have been working fine.

That's one of the downsides of goryo's vengeance. The larger one, in my opinion, is that it any reanimate children of korlis. If you reanimate Griselbrand with Shallow Grave, having an extra spell left that can make Children is crucial - I would highly recommend against replacing reanimate with Goryo's Vengeance for that reason.

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Originally Posted by .dk

タチコマ歓迎!

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.dk-san こんばんわ＾＾

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Originally Posted by .dk

but I would highly recommend taking some time to read the past 30 pages or so - lots of good discussions in general.

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I'm catching up, 10 pages already :) I also watched Logan's SCG open videos.

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Originally Posted by .dk

Remember, even if they counter your self-thoughtseize, you effectively did the same thing as thoughtseizing them too since you wouldn't be taking one of their threats. That gives you the most outs off the top in drawing more discard to continue to self target, or an entomb.

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That's what I was thinking

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Originally Posted by .dk

If it is game 1 and you think you have an opportunity to cast Entomb (and believe that they are a discard heavy deck), you might want to just go for it and cast entomb, even if you don't have a reanimation spell. Don't give them the opportunity to strip it from your hand - Entomb is the weakest link in this deck.

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I saw Logan do this in one of his videos, and said to myself I got to play more to see those obvious things :)

Thanks for your advice !

I changed my build to include 3 Gitaxian Probes, and T1 killed a Canadian Tre shold online last night, which is always good for self-confidence :)
Post luck + Post side was another (sad) story ... still have to work :)
The probes are definitely a must though.

I just pulled Rite of Consumption from my first beta home made BG instant reanimator deck.

I can see several uses of it.
When you Shallow/Goryo Griselbrand, it avoids the exile, so that even if you fizzle after drawing you can start over next turn without needing an Entomb.
(+ if you swinged with Grisel + the Rite, your opponent is at 6 so one Grisel hit away ...)
It can help to gain 7 life for 2 mana in situations where you can't attack with Grisel and you are below the crtical 7 life.
It makes Emrakul a potential kill on its own (Swing for 15 + Rite of consumption = 30.)

Any thoughts ?

(Sorry if this card already has been mentioned somewhere in the 50 pages :)

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

I'm catching up, 10 pages already :) I also watched Logan's SCG open videos.

I saw Logan do this in one of his videos, and said to myself I got to play more to see those obvious things :)

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:cool: Although, I am slightly embarrassed about punting game 3 in the top 8, I should have changed my sideboard like I planned (I will always bitch about this).

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

I changed my build to include 3 Gitaxian Probes, and T1 killed a Canadian Tre shold online last night, which is always good for self-confidence :)
Post luck + Post side was another (sad) story ... still have to work :)
The probes are definitely a must though.

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Getting those turn 1 kills are always great, especially against TT, I love beating that deck with Combo.

I highly recommend adding a 4th probe, sitting at 61 cards is worth it for the information and potential for greed. Just my opinion though.

As for the Rite, I think we're a bit tight on space (although, you could probably swap tendrils for it), and would prefer to stick with what I have for wincons. Really neat suggestion though.

Hi There,

I'm back with a few more games and I have to say I'm really really liking the deck, now that I know how to play it.
I 400% agree with you, it's a really deck to be played "Cowboy Style" :)

First I went the Rite of Consumption route (replacing Tendrills) and I'm quite happy with the results :
- Most of the time it's equal to Tendrills : it sits in your hand while you Swing with Griselbrand + Emrakul :)
- Quite a few times the 2 mana cost really made a difference, for example against burn and aggro decks when your life total go low and you can't draw enough gather the petals or dark rit for the tendrills (I was surprised, but it happened several times), you play the rite, your opponent is at 6 or less, your life total is safe, and your Grislebrand is waiting in the grave begging to be reanimated and swing for the win next turn :)
- Only once it was worse, but it was in a situation I was going infinite anyway, so it just made the kill longer.
- I killed once with reanimated Emrakul alone + Rite (but yes, only once :)
- Nobody knows this card, so you surprises even those who know the deck, which is always fun :)

So yes it's not revolutionary, but it seems to be a valid replacement to Tendrills.
Of course "your mileage may vary", but it's definitely not worse, and I'll stick with it as my personal touch to this deck :)

Other thoughts
- Silence really rules, not only against combo/countermagic, but It can protect you against a surgical extraction in the middle of your combo too.
- Gitaxian Probe rules too :)
- I removed the Lim-Dul's vault, I'm always too short of mana for UB + it does not makes you draw, the only time I casted it was to put the five on the top almost in the same order :) ... if you really want some more draw, maybe Impulse is better ?
- I think 3 moxen is really a plus: I was surprised to find myself struggling to make the combo go on because one lacking petal/mox more often that I would have expected.
- Sideboarding is really tough ... the deck is really tighten up, Reanimate goes out first, then Probes although I don't like them out except when replacing them with Silence, and that's it, 4 cards only ...
I often ends up with a generic 2 silence/2 surgical extractions in, and go for speed.
That said my ass was saved several times by
- Needle against Deathrite Shaman
- Massacre against Thalia/Canonist (but not when Gaddock is there ......)
Never sided in anything else so far, but I'm still not very confident in my sideboarding choices in general ... any sideboarding experiences to share ?

Last tourney at my local store was better, still not terrific (2-2), but games I lost were often one draw away for the win :)
- Junk 2-0 T1 kill on game 2
- Show-Halls-enter-The-Infinite-Ants 0-2 but game 2 I was going infinite, forgot about him having a Leyline of Sanctity and ended up to loose on bad rule interpretation (that I'm force to target myself if I cast Rite of consumption, that if I cast it on myself I die before gaining the life ...) + I did a game 3 just to to see how it goes, and I won :((( (where is the smiley for "I hate myself" ?)
I also played 5-6 games against a friend with a Sneak and Show and we're definitely faster :)
- BUG shardless with a lot of discard 0-2 ... heavy discard+deathrite shaman+force of will = waaay to much, aggressive mulligan, aggressive play and speed seems to be only weapon there ..
- Burn 2-0 easy thanks to the Rite

Also any idea about how to deal with counter top ? I just lost to one online and don't see any option when counterbalance hits the table.
The only thing I see is Boseiju, Who Shelters All, but it comes into play tapped, which can be read as "comes into play wastelanded" ...

Well ... next tourney 3-1 that's my goal :)

Have a nice week-end

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

I'm back with a few more games and I have to say I'm really really liking the deck, now that I know how to play it.
I 400% agree with you, it's a really deck to be played "Cowboy Style" :)

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Absolutely. This deck is definitely closer to Belcher than High Tide on the ballsy-to-durdly spectrum.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

First I went the Rite of Consumption route (replacing Tendrills) and I'm quite happy with the results :
- Most of the time it's equal to Tendrills : it sits in your hand while you Swing with Griselbrand + Emrakul :)
- Quite a few times the 2 mana cost really made a difference, for example against burn and aggro decks when your life total go low and you can't draw enough gather the petals or dark rit for the tendrills (I was surprised, but it happened several times), you play the rite, your opponent is at 6 or less, your life total is safe, and your Grislebrand is waiting in the grave begging to be reanimated and swing for the win next turn :)
- Only once it was worse, but it was in a situation I was going infinite anyway, so it just made the kill longer.
- I killed once with reanimated Emrakul alone + Rite (but yes, only once :)
- Nobody knows this card, so you surprises even those who know the deck, which is always fun :)

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The first bullet is the reason I'm not a fan of Tendrils. There are definitely oddball scenarios where Tendrils can be useful if you happen to draw it, but pretty sure for every one time that happens, nine more times you draw Tendrils and it rots in your hand. Basically the only decks where drawing Tendrils is relevant are decks with Swords and grave hate - so the miserable Miracles matchup preboard, and other W decks postboard.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

- I removed the Lim-Dul's vault, I'm always too short of mana for UB + it does not makes you draw, the only time I casted it was to put the five on the top almost in the same order :) ... if you really want some more draw, maybe Impulse is better ?
- I think 3 moxen is really a plus: I was surprised to find myself struggling to make the combo go on because one lacking petal/mox more often that I would have expected.

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Seems like a step backwards. Adding LDV and cutting Chrome Mox were both changes that helped with consistency in making a Griselbrand, which is by far the most important thing to optimize.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

- Sideboarding is really tough ... the deck is really tighten up, Reanimate goes out first, then Probes although I don't like them out except when replacing them with Silence, and that's it, 4 cards only ...
I often ends up with a generic 2 silence/2 surgical extractions in, and go for speed.
That said my ass was saved several times by
- Needle against Deathrite Shaman
- Massacre against Thalia/Canonist (but not when Gaddock is there ......)
Never sided in anything else so far, but I'm still not very confident in my sideboarding choices in general ... any sideboarding experiences to share ?

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You're right that it's vital to keep a light touch. A total of 4 cards sounds about right for almost every matchup.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

Also any idea about how to deal with counter top ? I just lost to one online and don't see any option when counterbalance hits the table.
The only thing I see is Boseiju, Who Shelters All, but it comes into play tapped, which can be read as "comes into play wastelanded" ...

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Boseiju doesn't help Entomb, which is what the good players will counter anyway. It's also slow and Wasteable as you mentioned. I've pretty much written off the Miracles matchup. I've tested probably 50 games with different builds against a good player (alphastryk) and my percentage is like 20% at most. Of course, he always played a list with RiP and at least 3-4 hate bears in the sideboard, but his list wasn't especially inbred, that's just what he believed was optimal.
If your goal is solely to beat Counterbalance, splashing G and playing Abrupt Decay is very reasonable (and Reverent Silence is not unreasonable). The problem is you can't ever beat any 2 things that stop you (hate permanents, counterspells, etc). The only way to win is to ask if they have it turn 1.

Good luck, glad to see new interest in the deck!

Edit: just reread this:

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

Show-Halls-enter-The-Infinite-Ants 0-2 but game 2 I was going infinite, forgot about him having a Leyline of Sanctity and ended up to loose on bad rule interpretation (that I'm force to target myself if I cast Rite of consumption, that if I cast it on myself I die before gaining the life ...) + I did a game 3 just to to see how it goes, and I won :((( (where is the smiley for "I hate myself" ?)

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Wat. A) "Forcing" you to target yourself is wrong. If a spell is cast illegally (or an ability is activated illegally) for any reason (besides cheating of course) and it's caught within a reasonably brief window of time, the game is simply rewound to the last legal state (before casting the spell). This includes illegal targets, improper colors, not enough mana, etc. B) Both losing life and gaining life are part of the resolution of the spell. State based actions are checked only if a player would gain priority, not in the middle of resolving a spell.
Someone really screwed the pooch on that ruling.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

Hi There,

I'm back with a few more games and I have to say I'm really really liking the deck, now that I know how to play it.
I 400% agree with you, it's a really deck to be played "Cowboy Style" :)

First I went the Rite of Consumption route (replacing Tendrills) and I'm quite happy with the results :
- Most of the time it's equal to Tendrills : it sits in your hand while you Swing with Griselbrand + Emrakul :)
- Quite a few times the 2 mana cost really made a difference, for example against burn and aggro decks when your life total go low and you can't draw enough gather the petals or dark rit for the tendrills (I was surprised, but it happened several times), you play the rite, your opponent is at 6 or less, your life total is safe, and your Grislebrand is waiting in the grave begging to be reanimated and swing for the win next turn :)
- Only once it was worse, but it was in a situation I was going infinite anyway, so it just made the kill longer.
- I killed once with reanimated Emrakul alone + Rite (but yes, only once :)
- Nobody knows this card, so you surprises even those who know the deck, which is always fun :)

So yes it's not revolutionary, but it seems to be a valid replacement to Tendrills.
Of course "your mileage may vary", but it's definitely not worse, and I'll stick with it as my personal touch to this deck :)

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Good to see you had good results with it. I recently had a game versus UWR Stoneforge/Delver where I had to get him with a Tendrils kill (no reanimation shenanigans, just baiting him into casting spells and breaking fetches and playing all 7 cards in hand). I'll stick with Tendrils personally, but perhaps Rite might be worth testing some more.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

Other thoughts
- Silence really rules, not only against combo/countermagic, but It can protect you against a surgical extraction in the middle of your combo too.
- Gitaxian Probe rules too :)

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I absolutely love Silence and Probe, I have a hard time playing a combo deck without either.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

- I removed the Lim-Dul's vault, I'm always too short of mana for UB + it does not makes you draw, the only time I casted it was to put the five on the top almost in the same order :) ... if you really want some more draw, maybe Impulse is better ?

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LDV is a card that you should play more with. It's not used for draw, but to find that missing combo piece (or two). 2 mana to stack our deck is pretty awesome. I don't cast LDV often, but when I do, it's awesome.

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- I think 3 moxen is really a plus: I was surprised to find myself struggling to make the combo go on because one lacking petal/mox more often that I would have expected.

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I have this problem often, I struggle to seal the deal due to not finding that fast mana. It doesn't happen TOO often, but if I'm struggling mid combo, that's usually the reason why.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

- Sideboarding is really tough ... the deck is really tighten up, Reanimate goes out first, then Probes although I don't like them out except when replacing them with Silence, and that's it, 4 cards only ...
I often ends up with a generic 2 silence/2 surgical extractions in, and go for speed.
That said my ass was saved several times by
- Needle against Deathrite Shaman
- Massacre against Thalia/Canonist (but not when Gaddock is there ......)
Never sided in anything else so far, but I'm still not very confident in my sideboarding choices in general ... any sideboarding experiences to share ?

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Koby and I were having a small discussion about sideboarding on twitter last night, I think that discussing options and strategies on the thread might not be a bad idea in light of the new rules change. I almost always side out the Probes for whatever I bring in, since I'm not siding in more than 4 cards. Silence also goes out fairly often if I don't need it (Jund is the big one that comes to mind).

Sideboarding is a bit tricky, we want to bring in enough stuff to shore up those match-ups or to counter hate, but we don't want to sacrifice speed. If you don't have too great a grasp on sideboarding, I recommend not changing the board for game 2 (unless there's an obvious change like more Silences), and waiting until game 3 (if there is one) to make the proper changes. This assumes you won game 1, but that should be the case more often than not.

Pithing Needle is great versus Deathrite Shaman, I always bring it in versus DRS decks. It also hoses opposing Tormod's Crypts, Nihil Spellbombs, Sneak Attacks, Sensei's Divining Top, Liliana of the Veil, Karakas, and so on. A lot of applications, I like it as a 3 of.

Massacre isn't in my sideboard if I have access to Thoughtseize, but I think it's a lot better option over Pull from Eternity, which I'm still running (for some reason). Obviously great against Thalia and Ethersworn Canonist and other hatebears that aren't named Gaddock Teeg.

Chain of Vapor (and Echoing Truth) exist as general purpose anti-hate cards. If you expect some flavor of permanent hate, and either Needle can't hit it (or you don't know what to name), bring it in. Leylines of both flavor, Pyrostatic Pillar, Rest in Peace, Counterbalance (gl with that), Sphere of Resistance, Chalice, Trinisphere, Ensnaring Bridge, and so on.

Serenity hits all of the things I mentioned above, and is great to bring in against decks that utilize the above cards. I find that Serenity is better against Counterbalance decks, since the game is going to be slower, and Chain is better when you want to be speedy. Serenity is great though, and I think 2 is the right number.

Pull from Eternity- great against decks that are going to be exiling your reanimation targets. The problem is, is that you can play around exile effects by reading the proper signs and boarding in more appropriate cards, such as Serenity, Silence, or Chain of Vapor. It's not bad in a long game, in which you have to reanimate multiple times and need to "buyback" your Griselbrands, but those long games aren't in our favor. Probably not worth the slots, so unless you need filler, this could be replaced.

Silence exists in the sideboard in some numbers depending on your configuration (I have 3 main and 1 side currently, but if you have access to Thoughtseize, you probably have 1 main and 3 side). This almost always comes in against Force of Will decks and against opposing combo decks, and I usually side out Gitaxian Probes for them. If for some reason you are in a meta that doesn't need silence effects, you could always replace the Silences with more discard, but 4-6 mainboard discard effects should be enough.

Surgical Extraction is for Dredge and opposing GY strategies. You could also bring these in against combo decks as well. I like this as a 3 of, usually replacing Probes when I want them.

I think a solid sideboard would look like this:

3 Pithing Needle
3 Silence (assuming 1 mainboard; if you are like me, I have 2 Pull From Eternity and 1 Silence in the side)
3 Surgical Extraction
3 Chain of Vapor (could probably be cut to 2 if you wanted more Massacre, you could also have one of these be an Echoing Truth if you really want, but Chain should be the first choice)
2 Serenity
1 Massacre (or 2 if you want to cut a Chain)

Koby has been trying a 14 card sideboard (61 maindeck) so he can board out the 14th land against combo, but I personally like using all of my sideboard slots. Once again, YMMV.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

Last tourney at my local store was better, still not terrific (2-2), but games I lost were often one draw away for the win :)
- Junk 2-0 T1 kill on game 2
- Show-Halls-enter-The-Infinite-Ants 0-2 but game 2 I was going infinite, forgot about him having a Leyline of Sanctity and ended up to loose on bad rule interpretation (that I'm force to target myself if I cast Rite of consumption, that if I cast it on myself I die before gaining the life ...) + I did a game 3 just to to see how it goes, and I won :((( (where is the smiley for "I hate myself" ?)
I also played 5-6 games against a friend with a Sneak and Show and we're definitely faster :)
- BUG shardless with a lot of discard 0-2 ... heavy discard+deathrite shaman+force of will = waaay to much, aggressive mulligan, aggressive play and speed seems to be only weapon there ..
- Burn 2-0 easy thanks to the Rite

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Junk and BGx decks are surprisingly easy matchups. They lean hard on Deathrite Shaman, which is incredibly easy for us to beat.

Know and Tell, or whatever those kids call it, is a super easy match-up for us. We are their worst match-up- and it's all in that speed. They will bring in Leyline, but I never bring in bounce or Serenity, just Silence effects, and I've only lost 1 game to the deck, and have never lost a round to it. If we don't combo off first, a Silence in response to a Show and Tell is enough to buy us time. Also, you wouldn't lose to your own Rites. You lose the life, then gain it back before the spell finishes resolving. State based actions aren't checked here until after the card resolves. Another note, if you cast Probe versus a Leyline, you don't show them your hand, Probe says "Look" and not "reveal." I had a friend tell me about him falling for it, and I had to smack him.

BUG decks are the hardest of the BGx decks, but our speed is our resiliency here. Be aggressive.

Burn is just a slow combo deck. Easy wins for us, provided you aren't dumb and put yourself too low mid combo.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

any idea about how to deal with counter top ? I just lost to one online and don't see any option when counterbalance hits the table.
The only thing I see is Boseiju, Who Shelters All, but it comes into play tapped, which can be read as "comes into play wastelanded" ...

Well ... next tourney 3-1 that's my goal :)

Have a nice week-end

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Counterbalance is such a hard match-up. I'm pretty sure this is the only deck that I'm at least even with, if not a bit negative in w/l ratio against. Being aggressive is the best thing, just hope they tap out for something silly and don't have a Force (shitty advice, I know). I played against a Counterbalance deck the other day that brought in Tormod's and Surgical against me, but no Rest in Peace (he had Snapcaster). Needless to say, I lost when he went t1 Crypt and Top, t2 Counterbalance, t3 sit on a gorillion counterspells to counter my Serenity, LDV, and Pithing Needle AND keep a Surgical on top for easy access. That was the least amount of fun I had ever had with this deck. (In fact, a week later and I'm still mad about it :mad: ).

I saw Boseiju in a few lists earlier in the year, but the problem with it are: Comes into play tapped and produces colorless mana. I don't like it, but it might be worth consideration against Counterbalance.

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Originally Posted by phazonmuant

Seems like a step backwards. Adding LDV and cutting Chrome Mox were both changes that helped with consistency in making a Griselbrand, which is by far the most important thing to optimize.

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Yes I know, if I look at Logan's list, it goes to the opposite direction : 61 cards, less Griselbrand, less Mox, more lands, less discard, more library manipulation.
Based on the games I did so far, making a Griselbrand was very rarely a problem, the problem is more getting it through counter/exile/discard and getting it not to fizzle.
But based on your results against mine, I would say it's probably even more rarely a problem for you :)
I just seems counter-intuitive to situations I faced
- "I really want to draw a Griselbrand, because I have no Entomb but Cabal Therapy+Goryo/Shallow, what if I cut 1 ?"
- "I really want to have a discard to get rid of this FoW/Daze (which will turn into Fow/Daze/Pierce next turn after a brainstorm), but I have a LDV, what if I add another LDV and cut Thoughtseize ?"
- "I only have one USea, it's gonna be wastelanded next turn, I need my petal for Silence, I need to ponder/brainstorm to draw for the win, but if I do, no dark ritual or no silence ... I have lands in hand, I want a mox instead !"

I would say the LDV and the Mox cases are 2 different things
I can see how LDV can make the difference though ... just never was in a situation it did, maybe because 1 is too random ... I have to think about it and try more configurations ...
As for the 3rd mox, I just added it and I cut a land for it so it should not change combo consistency, so far it at least once turned a fizzle into a win, so i'll go for it.

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Originally Posted by phazonmuant

and Reverent Silence is not unreasonable

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Did not know this one (this is why I love Magic, soooo many unknown interesting cards :)
But still need the splash, which seems not reasonable at all considering how sensitive to wasteland we can be ...

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Originally Posted by phazonmuant

Wat. A) "Forcing" you to target yourself is wrong. If a spell is cast illegally (or an ability is activated illegally) for any reason (besides cheating of course) and it's caught within a reasonably brief window of time, the game is simply rewound to the last legal state (before casting the spell). This includes illegal targets, improper colors, not enough mana, etc. B) Both losing life and gaining life are part of the resolution of the spell. State based actions are checked only if a player would gain priority, not in the middle of resolving a spell.
Someone really screwed the pooch on that ruling.

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Yes the judge said exactly that afterwards, but what happened was :
- I played the Rite with an arrogant smile on my face
- I looked at his board seeing a beautiful foil Leyline
- My arrogant smile turn into a "I am the stupidest guy in the universe, but I played it ... anyway I'll win next turn"
- He said "wait you have to target something"
- Me : "uuh yes maybe ... so I target myself ? ok then what ? .... I'm at ... 9 ... I take ... 15 ... so I ...."
- He : "yes"
- My "I am the stupidest guy in the universe" turned into "If I had myself in front of me I would beat myself to death", then I was so angry, and wrapped up my deck, and the second I put my 30+ cards hand on top of my library, I thought .... hey wait ... I take 15 but I win 15 too !!!!
- We called the judge, he explained what you explained, but too late, I had "conceded" ....

Casual tourney player VS pro, isn't it ? ;)
At least now I know :)

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Originally Posted by Acclimation

Chain of Vapor (and Echoing Truth) exist as general purpose anti-hate cards. If you expect some flavor of permanent hate, and either Needle can't hit it (or you don't know what to name), bring it in. Leylines of both flavor, Pyrostatic Pillar, Rest in Peace, Counterbalance (gl with that), Sphere of Resistance, Chalice, Trinisphere, Ensnaring Bridge, and so on.

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Counterbalance no, Chain or Echoing Truth will be countered
Same for Chalice
Sphere of Resistance, Trinisphere and other mana denial thing, yes but you're likely to have to wait for more mana, and then get more denial than you can get around ...
But yes it's still useful in some cases, I just noticed those cases seems to be very rare though.

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Originally Posted by Acclimation

Serenity hits all of the things I mentioned above, and is great to bring in against decks that utilize the above cards. I find that Serenity is better against Counterbalance decks, since the game is going to be slower, and Chain is better when you want to be speedy. Serenity is great though, and I think 2 is the right number.

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Again Serenity has to go through Counterbalance, which is far from guaranteed ...
Am I traumatized by counterbalance ? well ... :)

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Originally Posted by Acclimation

Pull from Eternity- great against decks that are going to be exiling your reanimation targets. The problem is, is that you can play around exile effects by reading the proper signs and boarding in more appropriate cards, such as Serenity, Silence, or Chain of Vapor. It's not bad in a long game, in which you have to reanimate multiple times and need to "buyback" your Griselbrands, but those long games aren't in our favor. Probably not worth the slots, so unless you need filler, this could be replaced.

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This really seems a good but not "save your ass" type of sideboard card, which tend to lead it out of the sideboard ...
Each time I think about siding it in, I say to myself it's not better than what I have to remove.

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Originally Posted by Acclimation

Silence exists in the sideboard in some numbers depending on your configuration

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1 main, 2 side so far, 90% of the time 2 probes out 2 silence in, 90% of time useful
So yes having more of them main makes sense ... the only problem I had with silence is its whiteness ...again (wasted)land/petal/moxen story

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Originally Posted by Acclimation

I played against a Counterbalance deck the other day that brought in Tormod's and Surgical against me, but no Rest in Peace (he had Snapcaster). Needless to say, I lost when he went t1 Crypt and Top, t2 Counterbalance, t3 sit on a gorillion counterspells to counter my Serenity, LDV, and Pithing Needle AND keep a Surgical on top for easy access. That was the least amount of fun I had ever had with this deck. (In fact, a week later and I'm still mad about it :mad: ).

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You described exactly the games I had (including madness about it :)

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

Yes I know, if I look at Logan's list, it goes to the opposite direction : 61 cards, less Griselbrand, less Mox, more lands, less discard, more library manipulation.
Based on the games I did so far, making a Griselbrand was very rarely a problem, the problem is more getting it through counter/exile/discard and getting it not to fizzle.
But based on your results against mine, I would say it's probably even more rarely a problem for you :)
I just seems counter-intuitive to situations I faced
- "I really want to draw a Griselbrand, because I have no Entomb but Cabal Therapy+Goryo/Shallow, what if I cut 1 ?"
- "I really want to have a discard to get rid of this FoW/Daze (which will turn into Fow/Daze/Pierce next turn after a brainstorm), but I have a LDV, what if I add another LDV and cut Thoughtseize ?"
- "I only have one USea, it's gonna be wastelanded next turn, I need my petal for Silence, I need to ponder/brainstorm to draw for the win, but if I do, no dark ritual or no silence ... I have lands in hand, I want a mox instead !"

I would say the LDV and the Mox cases are 2 different things
I can see how LDV can make the difference though ... just never was in a situation it did, maybe because 1 is too random ... I have to think about it and try more configurations ...
As for the 3rd mox, I just added it and I cut a land for it so it should not change combo consistency, so far it at least once turned a fizzle into a win, so i'll go for it.

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The most important thing to realize is that "fizzling" still usually results in you winning. Really, how many times have you gone off with Griselbrand and failed to win? It definitely happens if you're too aggressive with life and they have pressure, or if they can drop Rest in Peace or something, but otherwise even when I fizzle, I just kill them next turn.

The Griselbrand count is definitely still in contention. Koby and .dk prefer 3 or 4 I believe, but I'm a fan of 2. Maybe I'm just the champ at drawing him in my opener on the draw, but every time I draw him and can't immediately draw-discard, it feels miserable. Against the difficult matchups, you can't really afford to use your discard on yourself anyway. Again, it goes back to my philosophy of minimizing dead combo pieces that you can draw.

For the second point, yeah sometimes you need a Thoughtseize. And sometimes you need an Entomb, and sometimes you need a Shallow Grave. The point is that LDV is a vampiric tutor.

We played 3 Chrome Mox for a while, then 2 for even longer. The number of times they were relevant pre-combo were few, and the number of times they were worse than a land were many.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

Did not know this one (this is why I love Magic, soooo many unknown interesting cards :)
But still need the splash, which seems not reasonable at all considering how sensitive to wasteland we can be ...

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The manabase I'd been toying with was this:
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Bayou
1 Scrubland
1 Tundra
2 Underground Sea
4 Polluted Delta
3 Marsh Flats

It was playing well, stable, and as long as you're smart about fetching duals when you actually need to fetch duals, produced all the colors when needed. I haven't played the deck enough recently to know if this is the correct manabase, but it's been fine so far.


About the Rite thing - oooooh, that sucks :(

My list (61/15) has not changed since Bazaar of Moxen (you can see it on my blog linked in the signature below). I have since cut a Surgical Extraction from the sideboard down to 14 so I can go back to 60/15 in some sideboard games.

I'm still on 2 Griselbrand, as I believe that is all this deck needs once LDV was added. The goal is always to maximize the speed of the combo. Adding more Griselbrand does add the density, but not the means of putting it into the graveyard.

On an interesting note, the new Legendary rules has made some funny and interesting interactions. In one game, I Reanimated Griselbrand, draw Children of Korlis right away, used it to regain all the life, then Entomb/Shallow Graved a second Griselbrand to be able to attack. Keep in mind that we have many more tricks available now.

I'm going to put together a walk-through guide with the deck against a few sample DTBs so we can get better idea of how to play this deck. Look for it in about 2 months. (time is limited for me)

I don't have a current list for this deck, but it would probably be very similar to Koby's. I'm definitely on 2 Griselbrand - I was playing around with 3-4 again a while back testing out Careful Study again. Wasn't good enough, LDV was better.

I hadn't really thought about this deck in relation to the M14 rules - Koby brings up some really good points that there are many more tricks available to us now. I'm rather interested to find them - unfortunately I don't think any of them help us in our ability to fight through 2 pieces of hate. :(

Hi, There

Just a quick report and thoughts out of may weekly local store tournament.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

next tourney 3-1 that's my goal :)

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And I ... failed .... 2-2 again :)
But overall It felt more consistent, no fizzle, just lost when my opponent had more answer/hate I could deal with.

For information, here is my 60 cards list as for now

3 Griselbrand
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 Children of Korlis
1 Rite of Consumption

4 Entomb
4 Shallow Grave
3 Goryo's Vengeance

4 Brainstorm
3 Ponder
1 Lim-Dûl's Vault
3 Gitaxian Probe

4 Cabal Therapy
3 Thoughtseize
1 Silence

4 Dark Ritual
4 Lotus Petal
2 Chrome Mox
1 Mox Diamond

// 13 Lands
1 Marsh Flats
4 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Swamp
1 Island
1 Scrubland
3 Underground Sea

//Sideboard
3 Silence
3 Pithing Needle
2 Surgical Extraction
1 Chain of Vapor
2 Echoing Truth
2 Massacre
2 Serenity


I forced myself to fit in LDV, even tested with 2 on cockatrice, never came except once: casted it, spent 4 life to stack for the win, then fetched .......
I can definitely see the potential, but I'm sticking to one until Wizards edits a better replacement that draws :)

Talking about cantrips, during the games I noted that Brainstorm got me to the win several times by getting me the missing piece + the missing way to cast/protect it right away (dark rit, petal/mox, silence/discard) in one draw. This + instant speed made me think it's a little more relevant than Ponder in our deck, but it's by no mean saying Ponder is not relevant :)
I'm also thinking about trying Sensei Top, as it seems to be the closest thing to a Brainstorm available (I like Mirri's Guile too, but it's green and lacking the draw ability, which makes it slower so probably not for us). Telling Time would be great if it did not cost 2 ...

Other minor notes on my list
- I'm going to change 2 Chrome/1 Diamond, by 2 Diamond/1 Chrome, those 3 definitely helped in preventing fizzling, and Diamond is way more flexible in those situation (and is usually as crappy as its Chrome friend early game, but still I somehow prefer to dump a USea which is going to be wastelanded anyway, than imprint a useful card like Cabal therapy/Seize ...).
I'm pretty confident about this Mox addition (replacing a 14th land)
- Removed the Tundra for an additional fetch (which happens to be a Misty only because I don't have 2 Flooded Strands and I want blue). Had problems with God Hands like Entomb+Probe+Discard+2 Shallow/Goryo+Dark rit+ ... Tundra few time, that's why. It can still happen with the basic Island, but I want to keep that Island, as my meta is a Wasteland field.
Any reason for that specific Tundra ? over a Scrubland or another USea for example ?
- On the side the 1 CoV/2 Echoing Truth should be 2 CoV/1Echoing truth, just don't have the second CoV right now :)
- Removed the Reanimate, so far never won me a game, never saved me. Of course there is the "Reanimate opponent's Snapcaster" case which is quite cool I admit, but how many times does this happens VS having it when a Shallow/Goryo is needed ?

The rest is Good ol' Stock list :)

Now the results
- Round 1 Junk super heavy discard. 0-2
Game 1 : Tough one .... I kept a hand with Cabal, Goryo, and Emrakul, I probed for his hand seeing "A fucking encyclopedia of discard" (Copyright Richard Cheese :), so I decided I had to Emrakul strike ASAP as T2, hoping it would slow him down enough so that I can reassemble another combo hand. It actually did, as he put a Shaman on, and had to keep his only green mana open for a long time fearing every single card I drew.
But those "Every single cards" were mainly lands and mox crap and, although going down to 1 life by himself, he recovered his discard abilities thanks to Top + Bob before I could assemble anything, I had so much mana acceleration I was able to hardcast Grizzle, but then came Liliana :( I eventually died by a late Tarmo.
Game 2 : I had to play around the Shaman again after a Decayed Needle, dodging the discard at the same time (well, not successfully dodging unfortunately), he just shut me down completely with a surprising Chains of Mephistopheles which happens to be a massive hate on Cantrips + Griselbrand at the same time ...

- Round 2 Weeny white with a bunch of soldiers backed up by Mother of Runes. 2-1
Thought it to be easy as my only fear was Thalia.
Game 1 : Thoughtseized looking for Thalia, found a maindeck RIP !! Then went of for the win some turns later.
Game 2 : Boarded in only CoV/Echoing. T1 Grafdigger Cage, never got the CoV, Game over.
Game 3 : He mulliganed to 4 hoping to get the T1 hate again, but didn't. T2 kill.

- Round 3 : Belcher 2-0
This one was quite fun, I never played against Belcher before.
Game 1 : I start with a simple fetch and pass, He smiles at me with what I assumes to be the typical Belcher player smile, and start throwing off a bunch of spells, then a Belcher. I ask "Am I dead now ?" "He says "You're lucky I can't activate it now but the clock is ticking" keeping his smile. I say "OK", Brainstorm and find the exact 2 cards missing for a T2 kill, I assume I had the same smile as he had :)
Game 2 : I keep a crappy hand with Needle and needles Belcher. it was probably the longest TinFins vs Belcher game ever (maybe 3 or 4 turns :), When he started smiling back, I got the discard for Empty the warrens, and went off the turn after.
We had the time to do 4 games after this one just for fun, I only lost one, so the matchups seems to be for us.

- Round 4 : Merfolk 1-2
Game 1 : T1 Kill on the draw
Game 2 : He was so scared to do anything and thus not being able to counter, I barely saw a single Merfolk before long, only a Mutavault.
I kept pressuring on his counters with discard which were all Pierced or Dazed, after 3 countered-discards in a row, I threw a Silence, which was FoWed and thought, ok he has 2 cards in hand, let's go ... Fow :( Then I had no more cards in hand, so he started beating me up with the Mutavault, soon backed up with one or 2 lords.
Game 3 : Had a T1 kill hand, Probed to see a FoW and a Surgical, went almost the same as G2, except that the Surgical gave him more flexibility so he started beating me up earlier, added a Jitte on top of it and I was not able to go off before dying.

Some sideboarding note:
- I'm starting to think that, in our deck, except against Karakas, CoV >= Pithing Needle 95% of the time. As we usually go off the turn after the hate leaves play, so shutting it off permanently doesn't really matter + it can get rid of non activated hate. I mean Needle is powerful, but in a "I can't side out more than 4 cards" situation, maybe CoV is a better choice.

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Originally Posted by phazonmuant

The most important thing to realize is that "fizzling" still usually results in you winning. Really, how many times have you gone off with Griselbrand and failed to win?

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I thought about this and really I have to say I don't remember a single game I fizzled and won after (except easy matchups which are defenseless against our combo). In my experience, in difficult matchups, wins are almost always sneaking in through a wall of hate/discard/counters or pressure. And the occasion only happens once in the game. The turn after you fizzle, that Shaman goes out of its summoning sickness, Thalia comes in (or any other hate or .... Counterbalance :), he goes out of Silence and brainstorms for this additional counter or get this additional mana which let him counter AND play, he Storms/Belchers/Enter the infinite or whatever combo he plays ... you name it ... That's again just based on my experience, you played way more matches than I did with this deck so I might be wrong.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

Talking about cantrips, during the games I noted that Brainstorm got me to the win several times by getting me the missing piece + the missing way to cast/protect it right away (dark rit, petal/mox, silence/discard) in one draw. This + instant speed made me think it's a little more relevant than Ponder in our deck, but it's by no mean saying Ponder is not relevant :)
I'm also thinking about trying Sensei Top, as it seems to be the closest thing to a Brainstorm available (I like Mirri's Guile too, but it's green and lacking the draw ability, which makes it slower so probably not for us). Telling Time would be great if it did not cost 2 ...

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Wait, Brainstorm is a good card? Whoah. :tongue:
I really can't get behind fewer than the set of Ponders. It's just so critical to finding the right pieces. I've already mentioned things I would cut in your list, so I'll refrain from reiterating.
Top has good synergy with LDV, but TinFins really doesn't grind well. I don't like Top in this deck.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

- Removed the Tundra for an additional fetch (which happens to be a Misty only because I don't have 2 Flooded Strands and I want blue). Had problems with God Hands like Entomb+Probe+Discard+2 Shallow/Goryo+Dark rit+ ... Tundra few time, that's why. It can still happen with the basic Island, but I want to keep that Island, as my meta is a Wasteland field.
Any reason for that specific Tundra ? over a Scrubland or another USea for example ?
- Removed the Reanimate, so far never won me a game, never saved me. Of course there is the "Reanimate opponent's Snapcaster" case which is quite cool I admit, but how many times does this happens VS having it when a Shallow/Goryo is needed ?

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The Tundra is a bit sketchy. I played it because I wanted 2 W sources and generally bias U in my combo decks, but Koby has played 2 Scrubland in the past.
It's won me several games and I've won games reanimating my opponent's man. You also didn't replace it with anything, which is a problem. Keep in mind traditional reanimator plays 10 outs. 10! Going down to 7 is a huge change in percentages.

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

Some sideboarding note:
- I'm starting to think that, in our deck, except against Karakas, CoV >= Pithing Needle 95% of the time. As we usually go off the turn after the hate leaves play, so shutting it off permanently doesn't really matter + it can get rid of non activated hate. I mean Needle is powerful, but in a "I can't side out more than 4 cards" situation, maybe CoV is a better choice.

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I agree. I had a pile of Needles in the board at SCG Atlanta, but CoV is more versatile. I like having 1 or 2 at most, but getting your Needle Decayed sure is embarrassing.

Someone at the tourney asked me "do you play Stifle ? You could stifle the EOT exile of Goryo/shallow grave !"

Keeping reanimated Grisel or Emrakul in play sounds quite a nice option...
I was asking myself if Stifle was a dead card except for that use ... Well it's a powerful card anyway but at first sight it does not fit the "proactive more than reactive" strategy of our deck.
But at the same time it can be quite useful against hate and break that Shaman, Karakas, Relic/Crypt that prevents us to go off and that Silence can't .. silence :)
And again when opponent keeps only that one fetch as a way to brainstorm/activate the shaman or whatever that prevents you going off safely ... Stifle can be very good.
+ it might have the "not expected" effect.

Maybe a sideboard option ? not sure ...
What do you think ?

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Originally Posted by Tachikoma

I forced myself to fit in LDV, even tested with 2 on cockatrice, never came except once: casted it, spent 4 life to stack for the win, then fetched .......
I can definitely see the potential, but I'm sticking to one until Wizards edits a better replacement that draws :)

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We can dream of a black version of Merchant Scroll, but for now, the closest thing to an LDV that draws is Peer Through Depths. It's been suggested and rejected as inferior many pages back, but feel free to give it a spin if you can't live without the draw.

3 Mox is nuts. It's been said before but worth repeating, making great hands better and average hands worse is not a recipe for consistency. I played 14 lands and 2 Mox early on (1 foil/1 not) and noted how many times I wish 1 was a land. It didn't take long to convince myself to drop down to 1 Mox.

As for the number of Gris discussion, I'm happy with 3 Demons, 6 (self) discard, 1 Careful Study, and an LDV. Maybe I'm lucky, but the miser Careful Study seems to come at the right time and be very welcome.

As for Stifle ... it's hard to say what it replaces, but I think it's worth testing.

The deck you're looking for is Next-Level Reanimtor: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...and-Reanimator

It's a ton of fun and I'd probably play it over traditional reanimator. Stifle fits pretty well as a card to pitch to Force and as a randomly awesome card. The deck's creator said that he had put it on the backburner to play more with TinFins, hasn't been much activity in the thread since. NLR is weird because it usually wins by going off multiple times - once you've resolved Griselbrand, it's hard to lose. There's also some cute interactions like reanimating Jin-Gitaxias at the opponent's EOT will mind twist them and also draw you 7 cards at your EOT.

It's going to be pretty much impossible to fit Stifle in TinFins. The deck is designed to kill in one turn so runs more fast mana, which takes up a lot of room. It just doesn't fit with the deck's plan.

I've began playing Tin Fins on MTGO again, to some moderate success. Checkout my stream for archived/highlighted reels. There was game three in the last match that really ended up interesting. I won't spoil, so look to see how you would have played it differently.