[Primer] Elves!

[toletole]

I would cut a Cavern over an Arbor for a fetch. Having Arbor accessible via fetch or GSZ is often pretty clutch. Cavern isn't as needed now that Miracles is gone.

I think 3 Abrupt Decay is probably fine for now. Not a huge fan of Umezawa's Jitte in the SB. No way to fetch it, and we rarely need it to break stalled boards. I haven't played Packmaster but it seems good against Midrangey Uxx decks, which will probably be coming back. I'm not sure if a planeswalker (Garruk Relentless or Nissa) isn't just better though.

Sounds like there is a consensus on running Progenitus in the board. Does that warrant the 4th NO?

I'm keeping the Caverns just for the eventual stax/eldrazi where I play.

The thing with NO and Progenitus... wasn't the plan cutting off the NO against blue based decks? I know miracles isn't a thing right now but that fact hasn't changed IMO. I can see myself adding a NO to the side for Ruric Thar, but not really sure about Progenitus. Also Delver decks I assume are going to be pretty popular right now and they usually bring additional counters from the side in the form on Invasive Surgery and Flusterstorm.

[catmint]

Since people expect elves and TNN to make a strong impact I think it is fair to assume that there will be a good amount of rough tumble, toxic deluge, pyroclasm,...

I would like to test 2 Caller of the Claw from the board... Does anyone have experience with that card?

... Cards like Leovold, Grafdiggers Cage and Engineered Plague might also be present a lot... and in general vs. Delver and Chalice Decks Decay is super important so in my boarding plans I have 4 Decay for sure against certain matchups!

[JermStudDog]

@toletole

Cutting NO revolves a lot around being able to fit it in the deck once you have the SB cards you need. There was typically 0 room for NO vs decks like Miracles, but it was somewhat common to leave 1 or more NOs in the deck as a check against BUG style value decks since they don't necessarily want to be sitting on FoWs all game long.

My understanding of the logic - they definitely don't want to die to a NO into Hoof, so they will keep FoWs in their deck for G2, but if they see 0 NOs during the course of that game, they would often cut most or all of the FoWs out of their deck for G3 to make more room for good cards. So there are two ways to work around this as the Elves player. 1) take all your NOs out for G2 and try to out-value them, then add some number of NOs back in for G3 after they've pulled their counters out. 2) remove most, but not all of your NOs for both G2 and G3.

Obviously different strengths and weaknesses to the two strategies, but NO has never been BAD against FoW. At worst, it's a 2-for-2 and at best, it wins us the game on the spot.

[abombdiggity]

@toletole

Cutting NO revolves a lot around being able to fit it in the deck once you have the SB cards you need. There was typically 0 room for NO vs decks like Miracles, but it was somewhat common to leave 1 or more NOs in the deck as a check against BUG style value decks since they don't necessarily want to be sitting on FoWs all game long.
Obviously different strengths and weaknesses to the two strategies, but NO has never been BAD against FoW. At worst, it's a 2-for-2 and at best, it wins us the game on the spot.

To me it always depends on how I'm expecting them to sideboard against us. Most of the delver lists bring in like ~2 invasive surgeries, in which case I like having natural order to both play around them exiling half our engine and because it overloads their countermagic. I'll typically shave one, sometimes two, but I've found that these games can get grindy and we want to be setting the tone vs delver- them getting a delver to flip early and do delver things is how we lose- if we don't have a critical mass of "I win" cards we can put ourselves in a situation where we're letting them dictate the flow of the game, which we do not want. In the current post-ban meta (which I admit I've only played about 40 matches of)- we are usually going to want to be the beatdown, and natural order puts us firmly in the position to do that. Like you said- if they have FoW we maintain card parity and if they don't we're going to win.

[toletole]

To me it always depends on how I'm expecting them to sideboard against us. Most of the delver lists bring in like ~2 invasive surgeries, in which case I like having natural order to both play around them exiling half our engine and because it overloads their countermagic. I'll typically shave one, sometimes two, but I've found that these games can get grindy and we want to be setting the tone vs delver- them getting a delver to flip early and do delver things is how we lose- if we don't have a critical mass of "I win" cards we can put ourselves in a situation where we're letting them dictate the flow of the game, which we do not want. In the current post-ban meta (which I admit I've only played about 40 matches of)- we are usually going to want to be the beatdown, and natural order puts us firmly in the position to do that. Like you said- if they have FoW we maintain card parity and if they don't we're going to win.

We have tons of "I win" engines. Glimpse, Cradle, Visionary+Symbiote, Deathrite Shaman+Quirion Ranger, late Scavenging Ooze, Packmaster... I feel like we might fall behind too much if they counter a NO, specially with something like Invasive Surgery.
We'll see how the meta adapts to this big changes.

[Flutschi]

If you play leovold could you also play the new nissa?
its just so freaking amazing... im thinking about coiling oracle too since it isnt affect by an enemy leovold...

Not sure if its elves without NO thou...

[SteB]

I finally had a reason to make an account in this forum after all those years since i bought into this deck after the miracle menace is banished.
I have played variations of Elves decks in various formats (including Lorwyn Block Constructed :>) but i have never played with the Craterhoof Versions.
Are there any updated SB guidelines, since all i can find are either unspecific or outdated by at least 2 years?
I assume the basics haven't changed much but with the drastic metagame shift that has to be expected in a post miracle world i assume that sbing could also change.

Finally, I had the following hand in a legacy league today.
Is this a keep?
We are in Game 1 and don't know what the opponent is playing.


I did keep it, with the prospect of a turn three, or maybe even two depending on the draw, combo turn fueled by multiple Cradles.

[mistercakes]

i recall someone mentioning during MKM (paris) that there was a blood elves deck that did well. did anyone ever get that list? i still enjoy playing elves, but i think i've grown a bit tired of the black sideboard, and would like to start casting blood moon and ruric a bit more.

-rob

[AznSeal]

Here is an elves list I've been testing. It runs ok, but I feel like it ends up being bad because it's slower than traditional elves and a worse grinder than BUG opposition,

Deck: Legacy Elves BUG.dec

Counts : 60 main / 15 sideboard

Creatures:31
1 Dryad Arbor
2 Birchlore Rangers
4 Deathrite Shaman
3 Heritage Druid
3 Nettle Sentinel
3 Quirion Ranger
4 Wirewood Symbiote
2 Coiling Oracle
4 Elvish Visionary
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Leovold, Emissary of Trest
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Shaman of the Pack
1 Craterhoof Behemoth

Sorceries:8
4 Glimpse of Nature
4 Green Sun's Zenith

Others:2
2 Nissa, Steward of Elements

Lands:19
2 Bayou
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Forest
4 Gaea's Cradle
1 Pendelhaven
2 Tropical Island
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills

Sideboard:15
3 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
2 Flusterstorm
2 Surgical Extraction
3 Abrupt Decay
2 Mindbreak Trap
1 Garruk Relentless

[Julian23]

There was no Blood Elves list in Paris. The TO announced it but that was a mistske.

I went 7-0 in the Grand Trial at MKM Frankfurt yesterday and usually kept 3-4 NOs postboard. I did run a super straight forward list with 4 Heritage, 1 Birchlore and Ooze only in the SB. Also Progenitus which was great. More during my report next week.

[Lord_of_Rivendell]

Way to go, Julian. I'm wondering if you ran into a higher than normal percentage of sweepers? Our star should be rising now and I anticipate that we'll be seeing more low cc sweepers in others' sideboards just for us.

[mariobross]

Hi julian,

First of all congratulations on the result at the MKM

I wanted to ask you on behalf of the entire elf players community if in your tournament and sideevent report, if you could write your side in and out side. I think this might be a beautiful and interesting discusse for all of us. Thanks for your help and commitment ...

Congratulations !!!!!

[Doneval]

I played Elves at a 160-person tournament this weekend and unfortunately didn't do well at all (2-4). I've had some surreally bad hands (mull to 5 against D&T, play 2 Sentinel Elves and draw all lands), but I didn't play 100% either.

There's one situation I keep going back to, and I'd like to ask for your opinion:

It's game 3 against RUG Delver (with Stifles). I'm on the *draw*. My hand is something like this:
- Bayou
- Cradle
- Quirion Ranger
- Deathrite Shaman
- Deathrite Shaman
- Wirewood
- Visionary

Keep or mulligan? How would you have played the hand?

I know it's a very good hand. I think he sided in Dazes in the play, and it can even deal with a Daze, but it's a dead hand against Bolt + Wasteland. Still, I couldn't bring myself to mull to 6.

The game went something like this:
- Volcanic + Delver
- Bayou + Quirion (to protect the Bayou)
- Flip delver. Bolt + Wasteland
- No land. Pass.
- Whatever
- Fetch forest. Deathrite.
- Submerge!
- Replay deathrite
- Submerge!!!!

Clearly, no matter what I did, I couldn't win that game. I retrospect I would have mulled to 6, but without knowing the hand he had, was that the correct thing to do?

[mistercakes]

I played Elves at a 160-person tournament this weekend and unfortunately didn't do well at all (2-4). I've had some surreally bad hands (mull to 5 against D&T, play 2 Sentinel Elves and draw all lands), but I didn't play 100% either.

There's one situation I keep going back to, and I'd like to ask for your opinion:

It's game 3 against RUG Delver (with Stifles). I'm on the *draw*. My hand is something like this:
- Bayou
- Cradle
- Quirion Ranger
- Deathrite Shaman
- Deathrite Shaman
- Wirewood
- Visionary

Keep or mulligan? How would you have played the hand?

I know it's a very good hand. I think he sided in Dazes in the play, and it can even deal with a Daze, but it's a dead hand against Bolt + Wasteland. Still, I couldn't bring myself to mull to 6.

The game went something like this:
- Volcanic + Delver
- Bayou + Quirion (to protect the Bayou)
- Flip delver. Bolt + Wasteland
- No land. Pass.
- Whatever
- Fetch forest. Deathrite.
- Submerge!
- Replay deathrite
- Submerge!!!!

Clearly, no matter what I did, I couldn't win that game. I retrospect I would have mulled to 6, but without knowing the hand he had, was that the correct thing to do?

when he bolts your ranger you have to return the bayou to your hand. the cradle isn't adding any mana if you play it the following turn, so nothing to lose there. you can always run the cradle out the following turn. then if he doesn't waste the cradle, you can play your bayou on turn 3 and cast 2 guys. then hope he just doesn't have more answers. that's what i would do.

[mistercakes]

There was no Blood Elves list in Paris. The TO announced it but that was a mistske.

I went 7-0 in the Grand Trial at MKM Frankfurt yesterday and usually kept 3-4 NOs postboard. I did run a super straight forward list with 4 Heritage, 1 Birchlore and Ooze only in the SB. Also Progenitus which was great. More during my report next week.

bummer. thanks for the update on that. i was wondering in those grindy matchups (when they have bolt, snapcaster, command, and counterspells) would bloodbraid elf be a reasonable sb card? it seems like it would be great outside of hitting GSZ.

[Doneval]

when he bolts your ranger you have to return the bayou to your hand. the cradle isn't adding any mana if you play it the following turn, so nothing to lose there. you can always run the cradle out the following turn. then if he doesn't waste the cradle, you can play your bayou on turn 3 and cast 2 guys. then hope he just doesn't have more answers. that's what i would do.

That makes sense! That would have helped a lot. I still have a long way to go learning this deck. Thanks!

[Julian23]

Made Top8 at the ~450 player MKM Frankfurt Legacy and won the MKM Legacy Super Finals. Insane weekend. Report will follow next week, but this weekend just felt amazing with Elves. 19-3 overall.

[prdgchild]

Made Top8 at the ~450 player MKM Frankfurt Legacy and won the MKM Legacy Super Finals. Insane weekend. Report will follow next week, but this weekend just felt amazing with Elves. 19-3 overall.

thats awesome m8, way to stick it to them! with top banned everywhere i look i hear the same thing, elves is the new deck to beat. two things, do you think this is true and second do you think this is good for elf players? the deck was never fringe but i did pride myself in playing a deck of 1/1 dorks that many players never took serious until it was over

[danyul]

Julian is on a rampage again! D-d-d-d-DOUBLE KILL.

[Oshikuru]

Went 4-2 on a 53 player tournament

My two losses were basically non-games where I mulled to 5 twice and found a chalice for 1 on t1 gainst eldrazi.
The second loss was to BUG Leovold who won the tournament.

I was expecting lots of grave combo, Grixis and DnT, so I played a Leovold and Ooze MD. Leovold overperformed and ooze was almost a blank.

R1: 2x 0 Grixis
R2: 2x 0 Grixis
R3: 2x 0 Infect
R4: 2x 0 Grixis
R5: 0x 2 Eldrazi
R6: 1x2 Bug Leovold - I found this match quite fun to play, despite my mull to 5. Progenitus was quite effective in this match and almost won me the 3rd game- Race against 2 TNN+ jitte =~~

Decay was my most played SB card.

I can post here our local metagame if you want.