[Deck] Merfolk

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Originally Posted by Tacosnape

Less than four Wake Thrashers is a mistake. Less than four Standstills is a mistake. That's about all I have to say about the above list. Merfolk is close to the best deck in the format as far as having superiority under Standstills. As far as I'm aware, the only thing it struggles seriously to gain superiority against under a Standstill is Ichorid.

Given what you played against, how was Stifle? I can't see it being better than a lot of other choices against the mirror, and I can't see it doing much against MUC except for possibly stopping Ancestral Visions, if it ran it. Would you have been better off maindecking Jitte?

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Standstills - yes you should always run 4. It's one of the most powerful cards in the deck from my experience.

Wake Thrashers - You never want to play 4. It's a 1/1 for 3 mana with an ability that's only relevant for attacking. It's nice to draw one in a game as a big beater, but 4 doesn't make sense. 3 maximum; 2 is a pretty solid number.

Spell Snare would be the best replacement for the Stifle slot IMO. I like 2 Snares and a 3rd Echoing Truth instead of the Stifles.

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Originally Posted by Tacosnape

Less than four Wake Thrashers is a mistake.

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Well, mogg fanatics were everywhere and they just take out the thrasher.
Also I've seen some Canadian Threshold players and losing wakethrasher and another 'folk to fire isn't all that sexy. Believe me, I would play 10 Thrasher if it ld be possible, but at the moment I can't find more space for them.

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Less than four Standstills is a mistake.

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Standstill while being a urgent necessity was cut for the 13th island.
In this aggro infested meta it just isn't that gamebreaking.
Zoo has 2-3 critters on board when you can bring standstill online and ll put you under such pressure that +3 cards won't help you if they burn you out.

For Goblins it's quite the same.
Lackeys and vial can sneak goblins in for them without triggering standstill and incinerators ll just burn your folks away and leaving you at a disadvantage.

Against combo it's a so so situation.
When you can place a t1 vial on board and follow with ss its obviously as good as game for you.
But if you don't have the vial, you can't build up enough pressure, which leads to them drawing cards for some turns, breaking you with duress and going off with nauseam.
Mostly I was dissapointed with ss against combo-decks.

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Given what you played against, how was Stifle?

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Stifle had it's moments.
Delayed vialing action in the mirror and gave me time against muc, stifling his visions / kegs.
On the other side, I don't know what Spell Snare would 've done in this matchups.
I usually don't want to counter the muc player's counterspell since I have the vials and I can't think of another muc-target.

Against zoo I can say, that being able to wreck their bad manabase is more important than countering one single goyf, since they still will continue to play cc1 critters and burn.

Against Goblins all that spell snare does is taking away their worst card, which is the piledriver. Stifle on the other hand, negates their cardadvantage engine in ringleader and rescues my folks against incinerators and fanatics.

I don't see where spell snare would be the better option.
Maybe you could come up with some points.

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Would you have been better off maindecking Jitte

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I just don't know.
While I see that it seems just all to gamebreaking against those aggro-dudes,
you have to keep in mind, that it's pretty chunky.
What will Jitte do if your creatures will be burned away?
Also against Goblins it won't give you much , since +4 life does not matters, since they can inflict heavy damage being so explosive and you often have to remove to counters to remove on gob.
Also with the rise of the chieftain jitte gets marginal worse.
Zoo creatures are as well often too big.

I would rather have stifles and jitte (out of the board) against goblins.
I also want to try playing 3 jitten in the board, but 2 wen't quite well for me that day.

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Originally Posted by EaD

Against combo it's a so so situation.
When you can place a t1 vial on board and follow with ss its obviously as good as game for you.
But if you don't have the vial, you can't build up enough pressure, which leads to them drawing cards for some turns, breaking you with duress and going off with nauseam.
Mostly I was dissapointed with ss against combo-decks.

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A considerable option to deal against comboish is going with Vendilion Clique. They can't Duress them out, and mostof the times your permission spells keeps you in the game since you have 3 lands on board; Vendilion gives you a chance that any other spell could, and is even a dead card in your hand because it did well against each deck.

I'v started play this deck packing Stifle as you did, and yes, sometimes it have his place. It could save some game or stop some early threat, but i find that Spell Snare and his chance to counter CB, or Standstill or Truth in the mirror games, or Tarmogoyf too most relevant. That's my actual build (i just t8ted a 64 people tornament)

12 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland

4 Reejerey
4 LoA
4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill
2 Vendilion Clique
2 Wake Thrasher

4 Ss
4 Vial
4 FoW
4 Daze
4 Snare


Sb

2 Echoing
2 Tormod's
1 Relic
4 BeB
2 Llawan, Cephalid Empress (seriously, this bitch rules the mirror match)
2 Jitte
2 Pithing (random/metaslots)

I did perfect the first 4 turns, winning each game 2-0, against Rock, Bant, DS and SurvivaL.deck, then going ID for the last 2 turns. The list seems pretty solid, but i feel that i'm going back to a couple of ET on maindeck...

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but i find that Spell Snare and his chance to counter CB, or Standstill or Truth in the mirror games, or Tarmogoyf too most relevant.

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Well CB, Standstill or Truth is in my opinion not worth the spell snare.
I mean, against cb we have vials and our own counters and against decks packing blue, we have a positive mu already. So why bother?
Standstill is not even a threat to us, since we can abuse it pretty good ourselfes and Truth will always bounce no more than one permanent when you play smart.
Additional lords also help against truth and you still can vial bounced creatures in.
The only threat to us is tarmogoyf and we can easily outrace and ignore him, when playing vs. blue.dec


€dit: Oh, and Clique is an awesome tip, I'll definitely try her. love that card.

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Originally Posted by Patrunkenphat7

Wake Thrashers - You never want to play 4. It's a 1/1 for 3 mana with an ability that's only relevant for attacking.

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You say "That's only relevant for attacking" like Merfolk doesn't generally want to attack. And that's not enough of a drawback to make a 3 mana creature that pitches to Force of Will and swings for about 6 on average not a 4-of.

Seriously? Thrasher can swing through everything in this format that you don't have to Stifle to get in to play. There's nobody better to be topdecking/drawing/playing on turns four and five. There's nobody better to Vial in EOT. And as Merfolk isn't a deck that ever has to leave mana, there's no reason that you'll ever start the turn with an untapped land. So the -smallest- that Thrasher's ever going to be, generally, is 4/4 to attack. This isn't counting an additional one for each Vial, and an additional one for each creature that attacked on the previous turn. I find Thrasher averaging between 5/5 and 7/7, and that's not counting Lord of Atlantis and Merrow Reejerey bonuses.

Wake Thrasher is the the second or third best pure beater in the format, and the best that isn't vulnerable to graveyard hate. I've won countless games by topdecking a Thrasher on turn 6 or 7, and several more than I've lost from having them clog my hand too much in the early turns.

The only problem I have against Wake Thrasher is the fact that he is at his worst in our worst matchups. That fact continues to piss me off. In the other 85% of games the card is chock full of win. It's hard to not like him when your opponents don't play Mountains.

EaD, wow, you won against a field that is not really this deck's best matchups. If I saw the same diet of Zoo and mirror all day I would have felt cheated. Of course that presumes that I don't go undefeated like you did.

Is it so crazy to think about maindeck red deck hate? Obviously, this needs to be something of the form that pitches to Force of Will, and the more general the better, but that shouldn't be too hard. I think that's largely the reason I've been going with Threads maindeck. It'd typically be a sideboard choice but it's just so good against my bad matchups. And even when it isn't, at least I can pitch it.

But I can also imagine maindecking submerge or mind harness. After all, many people already maindeck relic, which is essentially a sideboard card that cantrips. So why not mainboarding a sideboard card that pitches to FoW and provides some red hate?

If you want to mainboard something like Mind harness I'd go for threads of disloyalty. They do nearly the same in Aggro matchups which tend to be bad for merfolk and are in general less narrow because tarmogoyf is a 4 of in about a third of all legacy decks and it can take other creatures like Dark Confidant, Phyrexian Dreadnought, Painter's Servant (unless they name Red) as well and you don't have to invest mana in the card more often than once.

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So why not mainboarding a sideboard card that pitches to FoW and provides some red hate?

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Because it's pretty conditional and bad without force?
I want cards, that actually always do something on their own.
Also the deck is pretty tight packed as it is now.
Only slots I would give up under certain circumstances ( if I know the meta for example) are the ET's. Would swap them for jittes.
But md redhate just isn't worth it. The mu is pretty bad game one, and some jittes won't make a huge difference.
The addition of the new lords is just so good, also helps against those aggro dudes, so try to go with them, and they 'll convince you as they convinced me.
Since merfolk has it's good mu's against anything running blue, you often don't need to board anyting against them to steal g2 or 3 which allows you to pack more cards against aggro in the side. That was my thought when deciding which deck to play that day. And it worked.

And nice gimmick: An unblockable 15/15 Thrasher gets those pesky elfes down.

@ Finn: Thank you very much :)
Well, I was prepared to beat aggro since I knew the metagame and had to play against some familiar faces.
And beating zoo ist just manageable. Just try to run your gameplan against those decks and it's even possible game one.
Don't get too greedy and keep decent hands that contain nonbasic-hate.
After boarding it's usually yours with 11 cards out of the board, of which 5 are totally devastating for them.
At least, it worked for me.

Not so bad MDable red/green hate :
Consign to Dream => the only good card (I think I've just felt in love)
Hunting Drake
Ether Well

Consign to Dreams is an interesting choice, but it's still 3 mana for an unsummon (albeit one that puts creatures on top instead). Obviously submerge is infinite times better assuming you're playing against a green deck (3/0 = infinite). I don't think I'd consider boarding in Consign against a deck, so why would I run it maindeck?

Hunting drake is horrible.
Ether well is horrible.
Way too much mana for what they do!

I'd agree that threads is probably still general enough to fill this spot, and it 2/1's against many decks. Harness is still a pretty good card and applicable against a good portion of the field.

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Originally Posted by EaD

Because it's pretty conditional and bad without force

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Yeah, and Relic is pretty conditional and bad without 2 open mana... Yet some of the decks that have had the most success run it mainboard. Was just giving people something to consider.

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Originally Posted by EaD

And nice gimmick: An unblockable 15/15 Thrasher gets those pesky elfes down.

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Where are you pulling 15/15 thrasher from? I mean, that's a) kinda overkill, and b) nearly impossible to do.

tivadar : about Consign to Dreams, it's not an unsummon dude, it's a freaking boomerang. Not at all the same deal. It's a MD solution to everything (as well as echoing truth or rushing river). I've never understood how merfolk sourcers could possibly prefer ET to river in the first place. River and Consign to Dreams are real contenders for the universal bounce the deck needs MD.

The fact,Maveric,is that with Consign to Dream this deck would have way too many 3ccs. Reejerey, Thrasher, (Clique or Threads for someone), and now Consign to Dream.It would become really overburden in the 3cc.

And Rushing River is just better for that purpose.

I've been doing a lot of playing with this deck lately, and Wake Thrasher has been completely cut from my build. Here's the rub:

He's great on the attack. I don't think there's any question about this. In general, he's going to swing for about 6-8 every time you want to attack with him. However, this isn't really what you're looking for with the slot he employs. See, he's not really any different from any of the other merfolk in the deck in terms of his strengths - All of them are effectively vanilla beaters that turn sideways with no evasion when you're not facing Islands. He's strongest against our best matchups - control decks running few threats, where you can "Abyss" them with Thrasher until they can't stop him anymore. Unfortunately, he's clunky as hell in your worst matchups, where you need him to play defense. He's a three mana 1/1 on your opponent's turn - every time - and effectively much, much worse than even Cursecatcher is on defense, since at least Curscatcher provides disruption and costs a third of the mana - possibly allowing you to activate an untapped Mutavault with the mana saved.

In my experience with the deck, and with Thrasher in particular, it's come down to a matter of space. He'd be the first card added if there was a "Merfolk Matron" worth running, that would let me run him as a one-of "Piledriver-esque" tutorable slot. Until that happens, I don't plan to add him back to the deck.

For reference, the list I've been running -

4 Wasteland
3 Mutavault
3 Tundra
4 Flooded Strand
2 Polluted Delta
5 Island

4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Merrow Reejerey
4 Merfolk Sovereign

4 Aether Vial
4 Force of Will
4 Daze
3 Stifle
4 Standstill

SB
2 Relic of Progenitus
4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Disenchant
2 Absolute Law
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Sower of Temptation/Seasinger/Threads/Control Magic (Steal Shit Slot)

Running 12 Lords has been, in no uncertain terms, the absolute nut high. Literally every guy now Disrupts, Cantrips, or pumps the rest of your guys. This is the most explosive build of the deck I've ever seen. Typical hosers like Pyroclasm and Engineered Plague are shrugged off now, and you'd be amazed at how fast the damage stacks up.

I've needed to cut one of the colorless mana sources from the deck due to the addition of the Sovereigns, since the UU requirements are higher now. I chose to cut the Mutavault over the Wasteland due to the tempo advantages being more valuable than the additional threat. This is a fast deck. Much faster than it was even with Goyf. Stifle and Waste are pretty much just there to buy you the three or so attack steps it takes to win the game.

I recently played in the tournament in Vestil, New York. (I think)
I placed 12th in the main event which allowed for free entry into the side event, which I won for $150 in store credit.
For reference, this was the list that I ran.

12 Island
4 Mutavault
4 Wasteland

4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Merrow Reejerey
3 Wake Thrasher

4 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Standstill
3 Echoing Truth

4 Aether Vial
3 Relic of Progenitus

SB:
3 Hibernation
3 Back to Basics
3 Propaganda
3 Submerge
2 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Llawan, Cephalid Empress

Rounds went like this:
UW Landstill 2-1
Uwb Landstill 2-0
Aggro Loam 2-1
Ug Fish 0-2
Green Stax? 1-2
Something Else (Thresh maybe) 2-0

Side Event:
UB Reanimator 2-0
Team America 2-1
Solidarity 2-1
UW Landstill 2-0

Landstill matches were easy. I dropped the first game to it due to a lack of shuffling after writing up the deck list, and having to mull to five or six. Continued bad draws did me in.

Aggro loam was, of course, a difficult matchup. He was very surprised at the Main deck relics, and submerge + BtB from the board really shined here. Submerging a goyf in response to a fetchland being cracked is a great play. It didn't come into play here because I'd rather have him draw a goyf every turn instead of another Loam etc.

The Ug Fish player went on to place in the top 8. Seemed to be a typical list with goyfs and most likely sb green cards. I still can't justify splashing for Goyfs when we already have big guys that can just get bigger. Weakening the mana base just hurts too much. But he must have been doing something right. He was definitely a superior player. At one point, he had two wastelands out and 3 islands (one tropical) in his hand. He plays an island, dazes it himself and pays the 1 to bounce his only island to his hand. He had to LoA's in play.

Green Stax? Yes, I was very surprised at this. I assumed it was Survival with Natural Order/Progenitus after game one because I didn't see much other than Elves and Progenitus. Hibernation won the second game bouncing a Garruk, a token, a choke, and a Progenitus. He was running a Dryad Arbor which seemed really good as a one of since a bunch of players forgot about it when he attempted to natural order, sacking it. He posts as Hollywood on the forums I believe. Seemed like a really cool guy.

I'm pretty sure the last match was Thresh but I can't quite remember, I went into the tournament with no sleep, having to leave at 4am the day of the tournament, I decided to just stay up. I got about 30 minutes in the car. As for the deck, I didn't see much, or if I did, I don't remember it.

In the side event, Reanimator was first. Islandwalking, MD Relics, etc helped a lot. One time I didn't have the counter he brought back an Akroma instead of an Empyrial Archangel when I had leathel and Islandwalking on the table. Play mistakes helped here, but it would have only bought him one extra turn.

Team america. I've played against this a lot in my testing, so I knew what to do. I didnt recognize it at fist but luckily popped a Relic to draw into my second land the same turn he would have been able to drop a Tombstalker. It's almost an auto win for me, but in game three having the Submerge the turn he would swing for the win with Tomby won me the match. I seemed to have a lot of luck in the match.

Solidarity. I played against a friend of the Deck's creator. You know the guy? I didn't, but apparently he's semi-famous. Or used to be. Solidarity player wins game one comboing in my attack step the turn I would win. He mulls to five next game and I pressure a Wake Thrasher as a 6/6 Through for the win early. Final game he attempts to combo off but makes a play mistake, I force Reset that he had cast twincast on for the win. He was holding a Wish. He should have waited to see if I had the counter first. Sorry buddy! :D Lucky me, eh?

Last round, Landstill from earlier. Game one win on turn six or seven. Game two I drop Turn 1 vial, he drops a fetch. Waits till my turn to crack it for a tundra. Pauses... puts tundra into play after thinking if a basic owuld be better. I drop turn two wasteland. In response he brainstorms revealing to me 2 cards and an academy ruins. No land in hand. He scoops and extends the hand. Really nice guy though.

All in all I had a really fun day, and although I had just about no sleep, I still put forth a pretty good show.

Well, any comments please post.

DJ O'Hara, DeeJus.

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Originally Posted by DeeJus

Green Stax? Yes, I was very surprised at this. I assumed it was Survival with Natural Order/Progenitus after game one because I didn't see much other than Elves and Progenitus. Hibernation won the second game bouncing a Garruk, a token, a choke, and a Progenitus. He was running a Dryad Arbor which seemed really good as a one of since a bunch of players forgot about it when he attempted to natural order, sacking it. He posts as Hollywood on the forums I believe. Seemed like a really cool guy.

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Hollywood has a write-up in the tournament report section on his green stompy list, if you'd like to read it. It's an interesting list, and one that he says has a good matchup against 'folk, so you might want to take a look.

Thanks for letting me know. Yeah, it seems like he designed the deck with Fish in mind, so I don't feel so bad for losing to him. On top of that he has much more experience than I do. I'm just seventeen and have only been playing Legacy since about January of this year.

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Originally Posted by DeeJus

Final game he attempts to combo off but makes a play mistake, I force Reset that he had cast twincast on for the win. He was holding a Wish. He should have waited to see if I had the counter first. Sorry buddy! :D Lucky me, eh?

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Hmm, I don't believe that's a play mistake. When he casts reset, he then gets priority first. He can choose to either pass, or play his twincast immediately. If he passes and you pass (don't counter), reset resolves and he can't twincast it. The only way he can twincast is to cast it immediately, before you have a chance to counter, and then, of course, you can respond to that. Mind you, I don't know other board position info, but if he really needed to twincast his reset, it was the only way to go. Outside of cheating and pausing for a significant amount of time to see if you'll say anything.

I have been liking Sovereign as well. I think I would use 3, but I have been surprised how much I like him. Amazingly, I have even used his ability a few times. Nightmare, I really like your build. I am concerned about the 9 white mana sources though. I find that a lot of people on this site play too many basics and are content to be holding uncastable cards. I fear that you have done that. Tell me I am wrong here. I mean, is it so bad to just add two more Deltas for 11 White sources?

Anyway, I see something like this looking more like the way the deck goes.

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Originally Posted by tivadar

Hmm, I don't believe that's a play mistake. When he casts reset, he then gets priority first. He can choose to either pass, or play his twincast immediately. If he passes and you pass (don't counter), reset resolves and he can't twincast it. The only way he can twincast is to cast it immediately, before you have a chance to counter, and then, of course, you can respond to that. Mind you, I don't know other board position info, but if he really needed to twincast his reset, it was the only way to go. Outside of cheating and pausing for a significant amount of time to see if you'll say anything.

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I mean if he passes and I pass, reset resolves and he untaps his four lands, all which tap for UU at this point. He then has a wish, a twincast, and some other spell in hand. If he casts wish i have to counter it. If he doesnt cast twincast then, and I dont counter the reset, he is free to twincast my counter to counter it and complete his turn.