[Primer] Elves!

[Echelon]

I don't see why you wouldn't play Gaea's Cradle in this?

Also Reclamation Sage > Viridian Shaman.

Yeah, the Viridian is a typo.

As for Cradle - you simply don't need them, you've plenty of mana. And more creatures > w/ Glimpse, Vizier and SotP.

[Whitefaces]

Yeah, the Viridian is a typo.

As for Cradle - you simply don't need them, you've plenty of mana. And more creatures > w/ Glimpse, Vizier and SotP.

The card is completely busted in elves, you're just handicapping yourself by not playing it. If it's for budget concerns and don't own them fair enough, but if you do I think it's a mistake.

[Echelon]

The card is completely busted in elves, you're just handicapping yourself by not playing it. If it's for budget concerns and don't own them fair enough, but if you do I think it's a mistake.

I don't own any, so there's that, but I'm unsure of what I'd cut to accomodate them as well. I've been playing Elves! since at least 2013, without Cradles, and the deck still runs admirably.

[AznSeal]

I don't own any, so there's that, but I'm unsure of what I'd cut to accomodate them as well. I've been playing Elves! since at least 2013, without Cradles, and the deck still runs admirably.

Running admirably and running optimally are different. Elves without cradles CAN work, similarly to how miracles pre-ban was able to run with no dual lands. However in terms of optimal play, I really think cradle is the best land.

There's a reason people joke that Elves is busted because we get to run 4 Tinker, 4 Ancestral Recall, and 4 Tolarian Academy. We don't have the card selection of blue so we make up for it with explosiveness and consistency.

[danyul]

wrt your sideboard, I have -1 Quirion Ranger and +1 Scavenging Ooze main, so I am unsure what my last sideboard card should be. I have been waffling between Pithing Needle, 4th Surgical Extraction, Mindbreak Trap, and Umezawa's Jitte. Unsure where to go.

Totally depends on what you're trying to beat. Locally I'm seeing lots of randomness with a slight leaning towards combo so I'd lean towards the 4th Surgical. If you can't decide, then Pithing Needle offers the most flexibility.

It's a weird concept to feel comfortable with, especially as a beginner, but playing Magic - especially Elves - is just like playing Poker: you're not in it to win every single game, match or tournament; you're in it to always make the correct play and see where you end up.

Fantastic advice. I've been losing some games lately due to rust and my opponent's have been stopping me saying "I had XYZ so it wouldn't have mattered anyways" and I'm like "Bro, I don't care what you have, I'm just trying to minimize my mistakes". It doesn't really matter if you win or lose as long as you made the correct choices on your way to that result.

Also I would like to ask you I was sideboarding against storm something like this:
-2 Visionary
-3 Symbiote
-1 Craterhoof
-3 Natural Order

+3 Surgical
+3 TS
+3 CT
(if I have 1 CT and 1 Teeg i would cut 1 Visionary and 1 Glimpse)

I feel like going for NO is usually very hard since they will almost take it from your hand before you can go off and your CT flashbacks sometimes doesn't allow you to have a board presence to finish the game quickly. I don't like Glimpse but the value if drawing that extra disruption spell I feel like it's worth. What do you think?

I personally cut all Glimpses in this scenario. They don't play well with discard, especially Cabal Therapy. CT wants you have bodies on the board. Glimpse wants you to have bodies in hand. Also an early NO to put them below 10 life is sometimes enough to make their Ad Nauseam really bad. You don't always have to kill them right away.

I agree that we cannot win every single game, but there are some slots that can be fix after the end of Miracles. I don't know if we really need those 4 decays in this new metagame. I have also thought in adding Fatal Pushes in those slots (maybe 3-1, or 2-2), even with the lost of power against BloodMoons and Chalices of the Void.

Now my side is
4 decays
3 Thoughtseize
2 Therapy
2 Surgical
1 Gaddock
1 Progenitus
2 Pithing Needle

But I think I'm gonna try 2 decays 2 pushes, as I have the rec sage md.

What do you think?

I'm also going to try 1-2 pushes. But only because I've been seeing an uptick of Meddling Mage and I want to diversify my answers. It's not bad vs Delver either.

[abombdiggity]

Thoughts on how we sideboard against The Epic Storm compared to ANT? Our GY hate isn't as impactful and I'm finding it a little more difficult as well because their fundamental combo turn is usually a turn or so quicker than ours, however we can often steal game one if they don't identify us as elves and just dump a bunch of goblins and can't therapy us to oblivion. We're obviously just dead to the nuts tendrils draws.

SB VS ANT: -1 Reclamation Sage/3 Visionary/3 Symbiote/1 Heritage(or grindy flex spot if you have one, or Q. ranger, depends on preference)
+3 Therapy/3 Thoughtseize/2-3 surgical/scooze

Against TES I would usually bring in the same, although hold off on the scooze because they typically don't utilize PiF or need threshold. Surgical in particular is what I'd like some input on, sometimes it's just a dead card but in conjunction with discard it will often be incredible. Without boarding in surgical, though, it would allow us to goldfish faster and more consistently by keeping in a few more 1cc dudes. I feel like it punishes their weaker hands when we bring it in, and they do get slower as well as they at least dilute their deck with some number of grapeshot/echoing truth(for teeg) in place of chrome moxen, but if they have a good hand I find that trying to glimpse and drawing into a few dead cards really blows if we're in a race.

[blind]

Works fine in conjunction w/ Cabal Therapy and other discard. Between 8 fetch, 2 Bayou, 4 DRS, 4 GSZ and (at least in my case) up to 4 Birchlore Rangers you have plenty of black mana available.

Just don't be an idiot and cast it blindly. Bide your time.

Echelon genius lolilol

You are totally misunderstand the Tempo Mu if you think run 6 discard and Progenitus is a good idea. We can talk together but you show you can't talk safely. Tempo deck run Wast, mass removal, Daze, Fow, Pierce Vs your Natural Order.

Your main plan must be good when it works.

And a decklist is always 75 cards. A Maindeck without SB is nothing and a miss building even more with this deck.

[tescrin]

And a decklist is always 75 cards.

Julian's is 76 :p

[blind]

Yeah me too :p

But one thing at a time for Echelon

[Echelon]

Echelon genius lolilol

You are totally misunderstand the Tempo Mu if you think run 6 discard and Progenitus is a good idea. We can talk together but you show you can't talk safely. Tempo deck run Wast, mass removal, Daze, Fow, Pierce Vs your Natural Order.

Your main plan must be good when it works.

And a decklist is always 75 cards. A Maindeck without SB is nothing and a miss building even more with this deck.

Yeah me too :p

But one thing at a time for Echelon

Now I know why I stopped bothering with this board. I'm glad to see someone's finally able to tell me what these silly tempo decks do, though. It's not that I've ever faced any of these over the last 4+ years or that my regular sparring partner has piloted pretty much every URx version under the sun for that same period of time. Thank you for finally coming along and enlightening me with your wise words, oh wellspoken one.

[tescrin]

Fantastic advice. I've been losing some games lately due to rust and my opponent's have been stopping me saying "I had XYZ so it wouldn't have mattered anyways" and I'm like "Bro, I don't care what you have, I'm just trying to minimize my mistakes". It doesn't really matter if you win or lose as long as you made the correct choices on your way to that result.

I agree with this sentiment, and would further it. I hate it when I'm like "ah man, I should've done [X]" and the guy says "I mean, then I just would've done [Y] or [Z] and the result would be the same"

This bugs me for something subtle that it implies: That me losing was somehow the result of me *playing perfectly*; that at no point did I make any possible mistake I could learn from and that despite any impact some of the plays could have. They may well be correct that merely changing a single action wouldn't auto-win me the game, but we could probably both agree that it was a mistake, or could talk about the merits of the decision; rather than the inevitability of their purely genius deckbuilding that can counter anything you do no matter what set of decision paths you take.

I give that a Grumble/10

[danyul]

^ yup. Exactly. That shit bugs me as well. As if having FoW in hand means all of my decisions are moot. Get outta heaaaa.

In other news, are y'all testing any sweet tech for GP Vegas? Or are you just trying to get reps in?

Should we all meet up and whip out our Cradles for a group photo?

[AznSeal]

^ yup. Exactly. That shit bugs me as well. As if having FoW in hand means all of my decisions are moot. Get outta heaaaa.

In other news, are y'all testing any sweet tech for GP Vegas? Or are you just trying to get reps in?

Should we all meet up and whip out our Cradles for a group photo?

Because of all the fair decks, I was thinking of some less-than expected tech.

I really want to test Thragtusk. It doesn't seem impressive on it's own, but i've had situations where I didn't have 9 mana for GSZ or NO in hand. 5 life is huge vs fair decks, it trades with a creature, and then leaves behind a 3/3.

Caller of Claws may be good if we expect sweepers now. Plus it's an elf.

Worldspine Wurm may be ok if we're expecting a lot of SnT. Elderscale may be ok if we expect a lot of Eldrazi type decks.

Overall, theres a lot I want to test, but most of it just seems too cute.

[mariobross]

Hi Julian,

I'm playing your list at this time, and I'm really happy with this but I'd like to ask you something against gryxis delver and the other delver deck ... how do you make your side-in and side-out?

Thank you for all your advice!!!

[danyul]

Because of all the fair decks, I was thinking of some less-than expected tech.

I really want to test Thragtusk. It doesn't seem impressive on it's own, but i've had situations where I didn't have 9 mana for GSZ or NO in hand. 5 life is huge vs fair decks, it trades with a creature, and then leaves behind a 3/3.

Caller of Claws may be good if we expect sweepers now. Plus it's an elf.

Worldspine Wurm may be ok if we're expecting a lot of SnT. Elderscale may be ok if we expect a lot of Eldrazi type decks.

Overall, theres a lot I want to test, but most of it just seems too cute.

Cute is the name of the game! However I'm not sold on Thragtusk.

Elderscale Wurm is definitely a great card. In addition to helping vs Eldrazi, it gives you game vs Burn and Lands.

I've messed with Caller before but it can be tricky to hold up GGG sometimes. Scavenging Ooze can serve a similar role. Or you can play Golgari Charm out of the SB.

[resum]

Hi Julian,

I'm playing your list at this time, and I'm really happy with this but I'd like to ask you something against gryxis delver and the other delver deck ... how do you make your side-in and side-out?

Thank you for all your advice!!!

Not Julian, but from his sideboarding with previous versions of the deck, I would expect -3 NO, -1 Craterhoof, -1 Rec Sage, +4 Decay, +1 Ooze.

[abombdiggity]

Not Julian, but from his sideboarding with previous versions of the deck, I would expect -3 NO, -1 Craterhoof, -1 Rec Sage, +4 Decay, +1 Ooze.

I may be a little more conservative than I need to be, but I would keep in Reclamation Sage. I've faced down my fair share of Grixis players with Jittes in the 75, as well as pithing needles/cages/baleful strix. While decay does hit them all, I'd rather be left with a 2/1 body and keep a decay in hand to deal with flipped delvers or ensure we have the deathrite advantage. My cut would probably be the 2nd dryad arbor if we're taking out all our natural orders.

[resum]

I may be a little more conservative than I need to be, but I would keep in Reclamation Sage. I've faced down my fair share of Grixis players with Jittes in the 75, as well as pithing needles/cages/baleful strix. While decay does hit them all, I'd rather be left with a 2/1 body and keep a decay in hand to deal with flipped delvers or ensure we have the deathrite advantage. My cut would probably be the 2nd dryad arbor if we're taking out all our natural orders.

This is the list with 4 NO main, keeping 1 NO in.

[tescrin]

I think Elves have enough "cute" dudes to fetch at this point that searching for more beaters seems meh. You can Chaos them out, you can get recurring enchant/arty hate, you can create loads of wolves, you can make a 10/10 ignore everything but Liliana, you can (untargetted mind you) Drain 4+ a turn with spammed DRS, and you can hoof for nigh-infinite damage. If that's not enough options, I don't think anything ever will be.

[resum]

seems like elves won the legacy challenge this weekedn