[Primer] Elves!

[tionaryfoo]

Hmm, I might be returning to Elves!. I have a lot of catching up to do though. And some brewing to do. Might want to test a build without Cradles (in favor of even more critters) and with a Vizier of the Menagerie.

that creature is some serious SPICE. it would be pretty awesome but for 4cmc it seems a little steep. you might want to cast business spells instead woth that mana, but nontheless its pretty sweet.

what would you run instead of cradles though??? pretty bold my friend. i would like to see your 75

[ParkerLewis]

Played my MKMS Frankfurt list in a League tonight, finishing 5-0. It's been a long while since I felt this confident in a list.

Anecdotal, but since the only fetchable basic is forest, have you ever considered a different fetch split, like 2 MR / 2 VC / 2 WF / 2 WH ?

Pros for keeping a 4/4 split :
- "less info for your opponent if he happened to know of one and you had to show the other", but with fetchlands this scenario seems extremely anecdotal
- being able to surgical oneself to thin the library...

Pros for going 2/2/2/2 (or something else)
- better resilience to needle effects, but who would needle a fetchland against elves (maybe T1 probe seeing a 2 land hand with two copies of the same fetch) ?

All in all this all seems quite anecdotal, but the question piqued my curiosity.

[mistercakes]

i prefer diversity with fetchlands for the edge case of them having surgical and you have a big fetchland draw. i don't really fear pithing needle, as you said...there's a lot more good options. (generally same w/ surgical, but i don't mind sharing info....most people should know these lists inside and out by now.)

[abombdiggity]

I prefer Heath/Foothills for aesthetic reasons in paper. It has never mattered that I haven't had a 2-2-2-2 split over the four or so years I've been playing the deck. It's more likely to be the correct choice to run 4 Verdant/Misty as those blind t1->forest-> deathrite plays could cause a player to mistakenly identify us as shardless/aluren/food chain and incorrectly ponder or deploy less effective threats, but I don't think it's a decision that matters. If a specific fetch breakdown makes you more confident in your list, looks better, or any other reason it's easily defensible- as long as you're running 8+.

[haganbmj]

Usually the gig is up when you fetch a turn one forest anyways, but I'd rather have the option to lay a Verdant/Misty and/or Deathrite and bluff BUG.
Pithing Needle/Surgical on my fetches comes up way less often than the information does.

[Julian23]

From my website's "Decklist" section:

On Fetchlands: I think you should run a mix of only Misty Rainforests and Verdant Catacombs, to disguise you being Elves for as long as possible. I consider that +EV over spreading your Fetchlands against niche interactions like Pithing Needle, Predict or Surgical Extraction.

It did matter for me at Eternal Weekend, where I went Misty Rainforest into Bayou+Deathrite Shaman on turn1. My opponent afterwards told me tha tit significantly changed the way he played his first turn.

[aceanddeuce]

From my website's "Decklist" section:

On Fetchlands: I think you should run a mix of only Misty Rainforests and Verdant Catacombs, to disguise you being Elves for as long as possible. I consider that +EV over spreading your Fetchlands against niche interactions like Pithing Needle, Predict or Surgical Extraction.

It did matter for me at Eternal Weekend, where I went Misty Rainforest into Bayou+Deathrite Shaman on turn1. My opponent afterwards told me tha tit significantly changed the way he played his first turn.

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.

[Echelon]

that creature is some serious SPICE. it would be pretty awesome but for 4cmc it seems a little steep. you might want to cast business spells instead woth that mana, but nontheless its pretty sweet.

what would you run instead of cradles though??? pretty bold my friend. i would like to see your 75

Here's the 60 I had in mind. I haven't looked at a potential SB yet.

4 Birchlore Rangers
4 Heritage Druid
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Quirion Ranger
4 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Elvish Visionary
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Viridian Shaman
1 Shaman of the Pack
1 Vizier of the Menagerie
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Ruric Thar, the Unbowed
1 Dryad Arbor
3 Natural Order
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Glimpse of Nature
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath
2 Bayou
1 Pendelhaven
3 Forest

[Darklingske]

Did a small tourney last sunday (+-60 ppl) with the elves (list like Julian). Went 3-3.
R1 against Eldrazi 1-2
G1 combo T3. G2 he dropped T1 CotV on 1, T2 Ratchet, T3 Smasher. Didn't win that one. G3 I went to 5 and got stuck on 1 land while the drazi kept comming.
R2 against Goblins 2-0
R3 against ANT 0-2
G1 he started and combo'ed on T2. G2 I mulled to 1 and just scooped. Each hand had no lands in it!!!
R4 against Junk 1-2
R5 against BUG homebrew 2-1
R6 against UWR 2-0

All in all pretty dissapointing. Especially the mull to 1 got me completely ticked off!! Onward to better results next weekend!

[cheerios]

I played this list in a small tourney:

2 Dryad Arbor
1 Birchlore Rangers
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Craterhoof Behemoth
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Elvish Visionary
4 Heritage Druid
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Quirion Ranger
1 Reclamation Sage
4 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Glimpse of Nature
4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Natural Order
2 Bayou
2 Forest
2 cavern of souls
1 pendelhaven
4 Gaea's Cradle
3 Windswept Heath
1 Verdant Catacombs
3 Wooded Foothills
Sideboard
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Cabal Therapy
3 surgical extraction
1 Progenitus
1 Ruric Thar, The Unbowed
1 Natural Order
3 Thoughtseize

Rd1: Dragon Stompy 2-1 W
g1: I die to chalice and jitte
g2: Progenitus wins
g3: Progenitus wins against chalice+moon

Rd2: Turbo depths 2-0. W We are just faster than them.

Rd3: Grixis delver 1-1 D
g1: I win through grind mode
g2: I mull to 3 and die
g3: We go to time

rd4: Turbo Depths again 2-0 W

rd5: UB Omnitell 1-2 L
How do we win against this?

Top8: BR reanimator 0-2 L
g1 and g2: I have no gy hate on mull to 4 or 5 hands and die on turn 1 twice.

I'll probably remove Ruric and the 2nd Cavern. Overall, the deck is still awesome. It just sucks that Reanimator and Show and Tell are rising in numbers as well.

[abombdiggity]

Played Julian's MKM list (-1 surgical +1 rec sage, just because I only own two surgicala) through about fifty or so matches over the past week, won probably 75%+ of them. List felt really good- the only matches I felt like I didn't have much of a chance were against TES, where I died T1 twice on the draw and that one local soldier stompy player who played t1 suppression field into t2 aven mindcensor.

Cutting all the frills from the maindeck and going to 4 natural orders is a great feeling (although having to track down a foil pendelhaven and 4th judge NO before Vegas not as much), and while I do really like the flexibility of the crop rotation package and the other various spice that helps reanimator/sneak etc being able to goldfish that much better really helps us out in those matchups about as much as dedicating 3-4 SB slots. I plan on testing out Dragonlord Atarka in the SB instead of Progenitus, just because I've died with Progenitus in my hand in my win-and-in rounds of multiple GPs/Opens, but Progenitus is probably still making the cut. If Vegas were this week I would probably shamelessly copy his list; it's about as close to a stock 75 we're going to get moving forward.

Really want the 2nd birchlore, but a 3/2 heritage/birchlore split is only preferable in postboard games and I don't think it's worth it?

[Julian23]

I recorded another Legacy League run with Elves on the weekend, check out the videos of it on my website!

[iyoque]

Hello! first post here, I'm trying to figure out how to deal with decks like Infect or Dragon Stompy.
Today I've faced an Infect player and he went:

T1 Glistener Elf
T2 Invigorate x2 + Berserk

And in the second match I put in Thoughtseize, Pithing Needle and Abrupt Decay, and all he had to do was to topdeck an Inkmoth Nexus out of nothing, and we have no way to deal with it if we don't draw the Needles.

I've read earlier in this post talking about the possibilty of adding a Silkweaver Elite, and I think it deserves a try.

Thanks in advance!

[Julian23]

The correct way to approach the matchup is to just be happy to lose to a turn2 kill out of Infect. In the grand scheme of things it's not worth trying to do anything about it. You'll lose more games because you slowed yourself down trying to prevent a turn2 kill than you will actually win by doing that.

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.

[toletole]

Julian thanks for the videos man, they are really instructive.
I'm still not sold on the Progenitus plan though... it seems to be counterintuitive in a meta that starts filling with fast combo and blue tempo/midrange decks. I mean Progenitus seems just worst than say Ruric (that I don't really like either).

My sideboard in the last weeks has been similar to yours:
3 Surgical
3 Cabal
3 TS
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Reclamation Sage (meta call, there are a few stompy decks in my area, sometimes getting early black for decay it's impossible otherwise it would be the 4th decay)

and the 2 slots left would be either 1 Jitte 1 WRP if I expect midrange decks to be predominant or 1 more Cabal Therapy and 1 Gaddock Teeg if I fear combo.

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?

[Echelon]

@toletole: Progenitus is very good vs. tempo and midrange decks. They usually have no way to get rid of it and you don't have to worry about Stifle. You could always run 1 Craterhoof and 1 Ruric Thar in your main deck and keep the Progenitus in your SB.

[blind]

Progenitus is very good vs. tempo

Natural Order isn't very good Vs Tempo Deck ;) Decay and Ooze it's what you want.

[Echelon]

Natural Order isn't very good Vs Tempo Deck ;) Decay and Ooze it's what you want.

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.

[iyoque]

The correct way to approach the matchup is to just be happy to lose to a turn2 kill out of Infect. In the grand scheme of things it's not worth trying to do anything about it. You'll lose more games because you slowed yourself down trying to prevent a turn2 kill than you will actually win by doing that.

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.

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?

[Whitefaces]

Here's the 60 I had in mind. I haven't looked at a potential SB yet.

4 Birchlore Rangers
4 Heritage Druid
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Deathrite Shaman
4 Quirion Ranger
4 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Elvish Visionary
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Viridian Shaman
1 Shaman of the Pack
1 Vizier of the Menagerie
1 Craterhoof Behemoth
1 Ruric Thar, the Unbowed
1 Dryad Arbor
3 Natural Order
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Glimpse of Nature
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath
2 Bayou
1 Pendelhaven
3 Forest

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

Also Reclamation Sage > Viridian Shaman.