What? What does a old PM have to do with mulligans?Quote:
Originally Posted by Lemnear
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What? What does a old PM have to do with mulligans?Quote:
Originally Posted by Lemnear
Probably. I mean I think I'm pretty loose when it comes to keeping hands, but I think that with no IMS I am mulling unless a single IMS will just win me the game. Usually I think about it like: How many pieces do I need? If I just need a single piece then Ill almost always keep. Two or more and it depends on what they are. But then again I love keeping 3x Gitaxian Probe Hands because I love drawing cards for free (Protip: 6 life =/= free lol)Quote:
Originally Posted by phazonmuant
Being posterchild-conservative. I rather cantrip for 1-2 turns than mulligan in most casesQuote:
Originally Posted by phazonmuant
Played TES for the first time in awhile tonight. Beat UR Delver, Death and Taxes, UW Miracles and then ID against Stoneblade. Beat Sneak & Show and then split with Stoneblade again (Time). The list is still awesome.
And I STILL suck with it. I was having trouble beating the new mono blue Show and Tell deck earlier tonight in testing. I cant tell if it is a bad MU or Im just bad.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bryant Cook
Nah, it's a strong deck. Just managed to beat it with multi Silence lately. Close gamesQuote:
Originally Posted by Megadeus
Don't miss on your therapies.Quote:
Originally Posted by Megadeus
Glad to see you back on the Source! I was wondering if you had sold your collection or something.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bryant Cook
Edit: tournament report!
Won $35ish splitting Top4 of my weekly local on Wednesday. Turnout is still low with only 16ish people, but at least we had 4 rounds this time. Here's a quick summary:
Rd 1 - alphastryk with UWr RiP Miracles
Wonderful, we drive out an hour just to play against my roommate. I have a near-perfect tournament record against him though, so I can't say I'm displeased :tongue:
G1 stalls out after a couple of discard spells. I'm trying to empty my hand and find fast mana to play Silence + IT -> AN, but at least I know he has garbage. I finally draw a Dark Ritual and Silence is enough to let me AN for the win.
-1 Silence, -1 Infernal Tutor, -1 Empty, -1 Chrome Mox, -1 Ponder, +3 Abrupt Decay, +1 Cabal Therapy, +1 Chain of Vapor (I know he has a hatebear sideboard)
G2 I keep a slower hand with lots of disruption. After Abrupt Decaying a Meddling Mage, I'm stuck with a Petal, Volcanic, and 2 Gemstone Mines with one counter each in play, and a clunky hand with a Chain, a Wish, a Silence, and I think a ritual or something. He drops Counterbalance and I draw Abrupt Decay, but can't kill the CB because I don't have the kill in hand and both Mines would die. Eventually he gets greedy and taps out to play and activate Helm of Obedience (RiP already in play). I Decay the Counterbalance, Chain the RiP, hit pretty good off Brainstorm, then manage to resolve Diminishing Returns (2 floating) and Force-Check him successfully to Wish for the Tendrils.
1-0
Rd 2 - Justin with UWr Hawk Miracles
I love Squadron Hawk so much. Awesome to see someone still rocking them.
G1 I cantriped and Duressed him a couple of times. He got Batterskull online and swung in, then I found the mana for an Ad Nauseam from 15. Flipped Empty and a bunch of not-mana. Died.
Same boarding as before.
G2 I had an opportunity to IGG-loop for the kill with no protection on my turn 2 after he passed with only a fetch up, but didn't see it and didn't take it. He dropped Canonist into Meddlng Mage before I could Grapeshot the Canonist and locked me out. After the game we talked about it and it definitely would have been correct to just go for it on my turn 2. Miracles tends to have trouble with fast starts.
1-1
Rd 3 - Eric with 4c Seismic Loam
G1 was over quickly with a natural Tendrils kill on my turn 2.
Boarding -1 Empty, -2 Silence, -1 Infernal Tutor, +3 Abrupt Decay, +1 Cabal Therapy
G2 I expected Chalice of the Void, but kept a strong no-land hand that could win turn 1 if undisrupted. He used Mox Diamond to power out Raven's Crime then Inquisition, and finally played a Chalice on 0. Ouch. The game dragged out painfully long with him retracing Raven's Crime at every opportunity, but despite several mistakes with colors count, manacount, and Wish choices, I was able to Wish for a Past in Flames and an Infernal Tutor over subsequent turns and then Tutor for a third Rite of Flame and Wish up an Empty for over 20. I had therapied his Dreams earlier, and he didn't draw another in the one turn.
2-1
Rd 4 - Steven with Junk Depths
We drew, but decided to play out the match for fun.
G1 I won through a Thoughtseize on turn 2.
Don't remember exact boarding, but likely -1 Empty the Warrens, -1 Silence, -1 Infernal Tutor, +2 Chain of Vapor, +1 Cabal Therapy, maybe an Abrupt Decay or 2.
G2 He mulliganed to 5 and had nothing but a couple of Knights in hand the turn before I went for it. Unfortunately I went for a Diminishing Returns instead of an Empty for 16, he Extirpated my LEDs and I bricked and he drew well. Definitely a mistake.
G3 was over quickly as well. He mulliganed into a hand with a Living Wish and a GSZ and an Extirpate, but I killed him before he could deploy either.
2-1-1
Quarters - Morgan with Pox
G1 Morgan had an awkward draw with no black sources but a Wasteland and a Mishra's Factory. He didn't draw a black source in the 2 turns or so I gave him and killed with Empty.
No boarding. Or possibly -1 Silence, +1 Cabal Therapy.
G2 He disrupted me heavily with some discard spells, but only had 1 swamp in play. I Emptied for a measly 6 tokens, but I thought that would be enough given his light threat-density and lack of removal postboard. I knew he had a Engineered Plague in hand, but I had the Therapy for it next turn. Unfortunately, he drew Dark Ritual and then a couple of lands and Liliana to seal the game.
G3 Was a brutal turn 1 Ad Nauseam. Easily won.
3-1-1 overall
Split the prize money and went to get delicious Pho. Mmm.
I'm feeling good about playing this list at SCG Nashville this weekend. Keep an eye out for me!
i top4'ed yesterday in a 99 men tournament with the same 75 on the op -1 duress +1 cabal therapy maindeck. the list is a blast, and ill gotten gains won me 2 games, i won a candelabra of tawnos, so im happy, but i missplayed on top 4, so i lost
SaberTooth - congrats! The deck is very rewarding - keep practicing!
Wrote a little tournament report for SCG Nashville: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...h-TES&p=725734
I didn't do great in the event, but hopefully you guys can get something from it.
Did you play the 1 Therapy - 2 Duress Main List or the 3 Duress Main List?Quote:
Originally Posted by Bryant Cook
The list on the opening post was outdated. I've been on the single Therapy for months.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pelikanudo
Do you guys usually brainstorm eot or main phase with this deck? I know brainstorming main phase allows you to dig one card deeper but it also sets you back by one mana. What is the correct play here?
Free yourself from the concept of "usually" with this deck. It's impossible to answer such a question without further knowledge of the gamestate/cards/turn/opponent. The only thing I can tell for sure is that's "ok" to Brainstorm end-if-turn if you have 2 brainstorms in hand and an untapped U.Sea/Volcanic. For Gemstone/City of Brass you have to evalute the damage/countersQuote:
Originally Posted by mike1987
Thanks. Been trying more of TES than ANT recently. Find that TES is harder to play than ANT as there are much more decision trees to make but helluva more fun as well cause ANT is just trying to go PIF PIF PIFQuote:
Originally Posted by Lemnear
ANT isn't bad by any means but much more limited in it's options and angles which makes it less of a blast to play than TES. TES provides more miraculous comebacks and insanity but is less forgiving which makes ANT the superior choice for most players.Quote:
Originally Posted by mike1987
I doubt there are more than 100 players worldwide which can pilot TES to it's full potential
I built T.E.S. in December and have studied the thread and storm hands and goldfished over and over, but last night marked my first games with T.E.S. vs live opponents.
Rd 1: vs Sneak & Show.
I lose game one to Emrakul so quickly I can hardly remember.
In game 2 I Brainstorm and Ponder assembling a hand to go off, but don't pay enough attention to protection. I get the cards to go off, but it'd be on an all-in IT popping LED and I'm pretty sure he's holding Force of Will. A Probe drawn next turn reveals he has Force, Force, a soft counter, and Griselbrand. He soon drops G, draws approximately 28 cards, and kills me before I can find a way through.
Moment of the match: one of my Ponders revealed Silence, Chrome Mox, and Petal. I shuffled and drew since I still had a Brainstorm in hand. I think it was the call, but not finding any more protection or a Wish for Therapy really stung.
0-2 loss
Round 2: vs UWr Stoneblade
Moment of the match: I remember finding myself with 3 lands in play and a hand of LED x3, Dark Ritual x2, and IT x2. I'm getting hit by Batterskull, and my Probe has seen Force, Snapcaster, Brainstorm, and a Sword. He may have been tapped out. Is there some way to push this through that I'm missing, or is it just sit and wait to draw protection?
0-2 loss
Round 3: vs Esper Stoneblade
G1 he discards my LED and I rip EtW off the top and have Rites and such to pop out 12 goblins with Silence still in hand for future aid. They get there so quickly that I'm still not sure what deck he's on.
G2 no memory, except that he won.
G3 comes down to extra turns with me making him tap out to counter one spell of my chain, and then gambling that the 4 cards he's still holding don't include Force (and blue card) for my Tutor. He isn't, and I find Wish into Tendrils.
2-1 win
The bad:
- I made so many misplays that, had he been watching, Bryant would have needed surgery to separate his palm from his forehead. I came away feeling that this was the worst Magic I'd played in years.
- Only won 2 of 7 games.
- I need to play more patiently. I lost one game by starting to combo off a turn earlier than I should have.
The good:
- When I went for it in g3 of the final round, I had the awareness to read my opponent's body language as he Spell Pierced an earlier spell, and was 99% sure he wasn't also holding Force of Will. (I would have gone for it anyway because I like to make them have the answer, but it meant less stress to my heart!)
- T.E.S. is almost unknown in my area and some people think I'm on ANT.
- Lots of room for improvement! :-)
Note to self: Rite before Ritual.
A few notes:
- write down your starting hands; I can't comment decisions without knowing your hand.
- game 2, I have no idea why you wait past turn 3 with this hand. You have 16 (!) mana here for no reason.
- Don't durdle around with cantrips vs S&T decks. If you have to waste time doing so, prevent S&T/SneakAttack/DreamHalls with Duress, Wish->Therapy or Silence
Goldfishing only goes so far in terms of getting you ready to play live opponents. I'm guessing that maybe you don't have many opportunities outside live opponents to test? If you want to keep practising solo, you might want to test against different scenarios. For example, you can try the following hypotheticals:Quote:
Originally Posted by Sockosensei
Test against an opponent who will deal 1 damage to you on turn 1, 2 on turn 2 and so on, (you can vary the damage if think some other pattern is more realistic.) This can be helpful in terms of getting used to Ad Nauseum at lower life totals.
Test against an opponent who will always cast Hymn to Tourach on turn 2. This can help you think about using brainstorms/ponders to work around discard.
Test against an opponent who will always go turn 2 Stoneforge (for Batterskull), activate it turn 3 and always has FoW and a blue card (you can duress/therapy those cards.) This can help against permission with a clock.
These are really really crude approximations and this is no substitute for actual opponents. However, if you can only practise solo then I'd suggest mixing things up a bit.
Your "moments of the match" are rather puzzling. They both seem to follow from key decisions that have already been made in previous turns, rather than being key moments. The first is impossible to evaluate without knowing what other cards are in your hand. The second, there may have been an opportunity to go off earlier on, but we can't tell. If you probed turn 1 and saw FoW + blue card, and only ever drew mana + 2/IT, then I'm not sure if there's any way out of that. It might have made sense to cast a non-hellbent IT to bait FoW. Otherwise, there was quite possible a point where you should have just gone for it and hoped the opponent didn't have FoW.
You say that you need to play more patiently, and in one game you started comboing off one turn too early. If you mean that you didn't have enough mana then yeah, that's a problem. But, if you are talking about trying to play around permission, then you need to be really careful. Waiting longer isn't necessarily the right call. Combo decks with FoW are quite capable of drawing into their win conditions and just killing you if you wait too long.
Thanks for the replies.
I don't have friends nearby who play legacy so my only chance to 'test' is by actually bringing the deck to my local shop for legacy night, which is what I did. I'd rather fail hard and learn than leave the deck on my shelf.:smile:
Anyway, I'll test the hypotheticals you posted, sconnell.
I apologize for my vague write-up. We play 40-minute rounds and I'm still not as comfortable with the deck as the rest of you so my 'notes' were really sparse. Lemnear, I don't think I'll get to your level of thoroughness in my match reports, but I'll work harder at it.
My opener was something like Dark Rit x2, LED, IT, Gemstone, Gemstone, Ponder on the play. Keep.Quote:
Rd2, g2: If you probed turn 1 and saw FoW + blue card, and only ever drew mana + 2/IT, then I'm not sure if there's any way out of that. It might have made sense to cast a non-hellbent IT to bait FoW. Otherwise, there was quite possible a point where you should have just gone for it and hoped the opponent didn't have FoW.
Opponent snap keeps looking smug. I figure there's no way he keeps like that on the draw unless he's holding Force, so I don't risk the T1 all-in play. Perhaps he was tricking me, but I don't think he's the type to risk it.
I ended up drawing more mana and Tutors, and a probe around t3 or 4.
Once I drew the second IT, I actually did try baiting a counter with a non-hellbent IT. He thought about it but didn't bite. In retrospect, I probably needed to do it more confidently, so I'll add that to my list of points to work on.
What in the hell? 40 minute rounds? If anything, legacy matches tend to go longer because there's true grindy decks and lots of shuffling. I'm probably one of the 10 or 20 most experienced TES pilots in the US and I still go to time more often with TES than with any of the durdly BUG control decks that I love to lose with - twice at SCG Nashville, twice at SCG Atlanta. At the end of the day, TES is hard, there's a lot of decisions, and I've personally noticed that I do win more when I let myself take time to consider all the options.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sockosensei
Lemnear's thoroughness is impressive, but he's noted that his opponents are courteous enough to let him take a while to write notes and the rounds are untimed.
About baiting with tutors - that's super important. I swear, people freak out when they see Burning Wish or Infernal Tutor. I can't even count the number of times when someone has Forced a Wish that was just going to get a Therapy anyway. More experienced players will tend to let them resolve though.
You bring up a good point, attitude is such an important but little-discussed component to winning with Storm. The fact is that storm kills out of nowhere, typically has a grip full of cards, and most people are intimidated by how "hard" it is. Storm is frightening for most players. If you can make the really feel that you are the scary player in this round, they'll tend to play worse. They'll play defensively when they can't afford to or just slump or look dejected when they don't have anything.
I don't know if this is a typical thing but I suspect it is: I play really, really poorly with storm when I feel intimidated by my opponent. Some people just feel alpha and for whatever that social pressure makes me make worse decisions so I will lose even to good matchups. When I'm on my game, that doesn't happen. With most decks you can accidentally win, but not with storm, not usually.
I can agree with most of the stuff snipped. For the quoted, it's maybe teutonic thoroughness lol. It's true that I annoy my fellow playpartners by constant writing some stuff on a sheet, but because I'm able to write in stenography it's not that I drag the match to an hour or such. It's mostly irritating to watch only. We have untimed rounds, that's indeed a fact and based on the relaxed nature of the tournament series.Quote:
Originally Posted by phazonmuant
With storm you have to be the aggressor at the table, not only on the battlefield. Acting confident or maybe even cocky will indeed intimidate a lot of opponents which is a huge advantage playing Combo because it provokes mistakes and snap reactions like countering blank-Infernals as Phazonmutant mentioned
Edit: The change to the legendary-rule is potential a big one for TES and not only for Elves and Jace-wars bacause of Mox Opal. It's now a much better possible replacement for Chrome Mox which deserves another look at
This definitely is an interesting development. I'm not very familiar with old builds of TES, is there a place where I can look at them? Was Mox Opal ever discussed in the past?Quote:
Originally Posted by Lemnear
So one consideration is replacing Rite of Flame with Mox Opal as our +1 ritual. I don't like that because there's a ton of times where Infernal Tutoring for Rite of Flame allows me to win, and it makes Past in Flames weaker. It's possible that it could be a ritual that replaces Chrome Mox, but I'm not so sure how often metalcraft will be active with only 12ish artifacts. It's not out of the question though.
So those are the easy replacements. Maybe the correct solution is a split of Chrome Mox and Mox Opal, although I feel like if Mox Opal is good, then we should be playing 3-4. The biggest problem is that there's just aren't too many slots to play with unless we cut Probe, which just seems dead wrong.
My attention is splitted between TES, ANT (with Tops, Opal Moxen) and Elves (4 Cradle, 3 Crop Rotation) atm.
I don't know how deep Opal ever dive into the TES cardpool. Maybe Bryant can recap some of his thoughts back then. I'm not sure if Mox Opal is good enough to rebuild parts of the deck to make it tick
I guess Mox Opal only competes for the Chrome Mox slot, which is the only manasource that's clunky sometimes. So this week, when you guys draw a Chrome Mox you can ask yourself if you'd rather have Mox Opal or not.
Next to that, greetings fellow Storm Troopers. I've been goldfishing this deck for a year and played two tournaments with it. I love the deck!
Tom
I don't think TES can activate mox opal consistently enough with its artifact count. If we could use the ABU moxes, that might be a different question...
Just drew a few random hands (of 6) and imagined the 7th was a chrome mox / mox opal. Except the nutty hands which pretty much gets you a t1 kill you rather have chrome over opal. This is mainly because most of our artifacts are single use so you can only pretty much tap opal once before it does nothing. Also you're not guaranteed to always get 3 artifacts, and I guess double opal hands without other artifacts are just as bad, if not worse than double chrome mox hands.
The problem with Opal is the Metalcraft, we actually don't play too many artifacts (11).
On a different note, with the rules change (correct me if I'm wrong), with the new sideboard rules. You sloppy players who forget to put Past in Flames or Tendrils back in your sideboard after casting Burning Wish for it in a previous game will no longer receive game losses. Those cards would now be considered sided in.
About the Legendary Rule,
I'm quite impressed by the Opal iteration.
I'm not sure if playing full of Opal moxen in conjuntion to senseis and maybe artifact mana will increase the deck's speed enough to start leaving playing TES instead of a Mono Black Storm Deck...
I don't hope so...
In TES I would not play Opal, as we'll need to change lot of things...
But maybe we recoup DD - ANT!
For the purposes of learning the deck, you might want to try just going for it with hands like this more often. You're on the play, and as soon as your opponent gets a turn that opens up Spell Pierce, Flusterstorm and so on. Your opponent might have snap-kept a hand with spell pierce and other good stuff but not FoW, which would be really good as long as you don't have a turn 1 kill (and, as far as your opponent knows, you probably don't have a turn 1 kill.) If you do go for it with that hand, you most likely win if the opponent has FoW and most likely lose if they don't. But, if you don't go for it and they do have FoW, they get several more turns to set up more disruption on top of the FoW.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sockosensei
It's quite simple to use Mox Opal in SI with 8 artifact creatures and Vault of Whispers, it's likely terrible in anything else resembling Storm combo.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pelikanudo
I agree here. This deck requires the balls to throw a game right into a Force of Will, shrug and try again next gameQuote:
Originally Posted by sconnell
If your hand allows it and you dont have protection or ways to get protection you go all in and hope your opponent didnt draw it. Thats my plan most of the time anyway.
Exactly.Quote:
Originally Posted by Final Fortune
SI loves this change, but to make Opal work consistently in T.E.S. would require enough other changes that you'd end up with a different deck--and probably not a better one.
I struggle with it but you'd be amazed how few of the Japanese players go to time, and hardly any play aggro!Quote:
...40-minute rounds...
Anyway, I'm just happy the shops now offer weeknight Legacy twice each week. Until this January we were lucky if there were two legacy events a month in the entire city!
I'm more used to playing SI, where we've got less game 1 protection than T.E.S. and NEED to be the aggressor.Quote:
...playing aggressively...
Having just rewatched Bryant's win in the DC finals where he won vs a stacked blue hand, I kept reminding myself that it's sometimes okay to be more patient with T.E.S.
Still, perhaps I gave my opponent too much credit in that game you're referring to.
The 'attitude' will come with experience.
You're right, but as much as TES rewards aggression, there is a limit. Like. If I have a strong read for Force, usually I'm right. Your mileage may vary. That's by far the hardest skill for storm combo - when is the right time to go for it?Quote:
Originally Posted by Lemnear
Good point. There's no reason to just give up hope, and it's certainly realistic to win a long game. Happens all the time.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sockosensei
You're right about the attitude. It's taken me years and I'm very positive that more success at these tournaments is strongly correlated to developing my mental game.
You have to be a jackass playing this deck successful and win the all-deciding mental game behind all physical interaction, period.
You can't be "everybody's darling" at the table while grapeshooting faces in 7-minute show-offs.
I am currently making a list of the deck Im debating playing at GP Washington in November.
T.E.S. is on top of the list.Im aware that the deck might/will change in the meantime, but, the core should stay the same.
Im still learning the deck, since there is so many different lines of play. It's been now almost 2 months since I've put the deck together and Im still not as confidant as I should be playing it. Like Lemnear said, the deck needs to be the aggressor in the matches. Hopefully, with the help of m1n1l337, I'll be able to master that wonderful stack of card and aim for a Day 2 or more at the GP.
Anybody else plans to travel to the GP and pilot TES?
With all due respect, if you can master TES before November, you should be hitting the poker/blackjack tables instead.
I'm hoping to be able to make it to the GP, but my schedule is somewhat up in the air. TES is a strong consideration, but I might be playing lejay's Infinite Cunning deck. Testing will tell.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kayradis
How crazy am I for cutting 1 silence and adding a second Cabal therapy? I have been liking it in my testing as of late.
I did cut 2 Duress for 2 Therapies, liking it so far.Quote:
Originally Posted by Madmankevinx