I ended up cutting the Jace for the 3rd Misdirection, will cut a Needle for Cage.Originally Posted by Rood
Also: i've been watching your older games with Steam Vents...do you think the bolts are worth the lifeless? I could play a list with 2x vents and switch over to Scalding Tarns, if you think its worth the risk. I have the red cards for the sideboard (pyroblast, abrade.)
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
fuck the needle....this is a combo deck, stop being slow and drop both needles. What are you scared of anyways? Griselbrand? Jace? teferi?
Just counter and blast those things.
Lol, ok. A resolved Jace/teferi is brutal against Dreadnought, especially if i spent a stifle to do it. I think Needle is worth its slot. If needle deals with the pw my countermagic can be used elsewhwere.
What would you suggest to replace the needles?
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
Solve the problem with your fists: Cursed Scroll!
Yup. Pound his face inSolve the problem with your fists: Cursed Scroll!
Three rounds of Legacy for me yesterday; I went 2-1: BG Turbo Depths (2-0), Mono-R Goblins (1-2 - third game was very close, with a Mulligan to 5 for both of us, and him drawing the better mix of Ringleaders and Piledrivers, which my Scroll of Fate couldn't keep up with sans Dreadnoughts), Dredge (2-1). I dropped Vantress Gargoyles for Brazen Borrowers, which is the shit - and I mean in a good way 8)
Nice work! Was this with the list that had Counterbalance in it?
Also, nice win vs. Dredge. Any particular things to note for that match?
On the mechanical finesse side:
-Stifle is fairly backbreaking for them against Cephalid and Narco
-Suicide Noughts murder Bridges
-If on Factory, self-Waste can exile bridges
-If playing Surgical, hold up Stifle for Wraith cycling
-Surgical target optimization is usually one of three things. 1) hit single dredger. 2) Hit Ichorid +/- Narco as well. 3) hit Bridge.
As a very loose rule, it is generally better to counter LED than non-Breakthrough looting spells. That rule will change fairly significantly based on your hand's plan, and whether or not you have FoN for Faithless. I myself rarely counter draw 2 discard 2 effects. If you opt to let LED resolve (and don't have FoN), you're likely better off countering the back end of Looting if they've left LED uncracked. There's not really hard and fast rules vs Dredge b/c you're weighing two decks tempo statuses to decide on how to spend resources.
Yes, that is my otherwise unchanged list with 4x Counterbalance. I only had it on board twice yesterday, and it wasn't game-deciding then.
Dredge wasn't very exciting - opponent won game one on turn 1 (I was on the play and conceded with an Island on board). He had Gemstone Mine, LED, LED, Grave Troll, another Dredger, and a Breakthrough in their starting hand, which was too much for my single Daze to handle. Post-sideboard, I won by countering his key spells and interacting with Surgical Extraction, whilst in G3, I also had a Grafdigger's Cage on board. He never managed to get himself in a threatening position in either game, and Pyhrexian Dreadnoughts (one Scrolled in, once "hard-cast") walked it home quickly.
Not going well...5 rounds i'm 1-3 going into round 5. My losses were to Food Chain, Bomberman, and Burn (close games that ended with double fireblast in both losses.)
Ended up 1-4, lost r5 to Rug delver. Frustrating, but enlightening, day of magic.
Last edited by Mr. Safety; 10-26-2019 at 05:02 PM.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
Just luck man...counter magic and control play should have beat those 2 first decks. You just race the third deck and rug is beatable
2-1 today, 8 decks in the room: BUG Delver, 4c snow Wrenn & Strix, 4c snow Wrenn Oko, B/R Reanimator, Abzan NicFit (Carnage Tyrant, Archon, Meren), UW Taxes, Punishing/Blood Sun/Eldrazi, and myself on manifest destiny.
Round 1 vs BUG Delver (1-2): Game 1 lock him out with Karn; opponent concedes to Coating on Blossom -> animate Blossom -> Verdict to kill Bitterblossom + Gurmag + faerie rogue token. Game 2 navigate opponent down to 2 cards in hand and make a Nought; their hand was Goyf and Pierce, they topdeck Decay after a Nought hit, and have Pierce for Teferi preventing death to own Blossom (they win at 1 life). Game 3, just run into land issues.
Round 2 vs NicFit (2-0): Game 1 keep them on low lands (Stifle + Wasteland) into a Karn. Coating discards the Decay they have in hand, and followup Crucible locks them down onto 2 basic Forest, they concede in next few turns. Game 2 the first few turns are silent so I begin the process of wearing them down: Teferi = lose your next turn and discard Decay, Ashiok = discard Decay, Stifle a Nought in, Stifle E-Wit target Decay, and lastly Stifle Deed.
Round 3 vs B/R Reanimator (2-0): Game 1 their opening hand has Daze Angel + Looting and discard, but needs to draw into a Reanimation effect. I open with Wasteland target Badlands, and by the time they get a Grisel I have Scroll in play, which makes a 12/12; they end up dying to Karakas + 12 dmg. Game 2 they have another slower hand end up playing draw-go (with some discard) into a turn 3 Ashiok (discards Decay) into a turn 4 Karn. Karn grabs Ethersworn (Ashiok hit a Massacre), but opponent has found Massacre #2. Second wish is for Liquimetal, and through it opponent is able to bin an Ashen Rider with Therapy, but runs out of mana (Karn vs Petal, Karn vs Coating'd Bayou). I'm going to stop here and tell you the situation to see if you can find the winning line:
Opponent life: 14
Opponent hand: Reanimate, Animate Dead, Lotus Petal, Elesh Norn
Opponent board: Swamp, Bayou, Petal
Opponent yard: no Looting, 1x Ashen Rider (no other duders), 1x Therapy
Edit: above is what opponent is passing with. below is what you've drawn & untapped with. It's your turn now, find the win.
My life: doesn't matter (probably around 18)
My hand: Plow x3, Dreadnought, Snare
My board: 5 lands (2 of these are not summoning sick Factory, other lands are Plains, Island, and Tundra), Karn (2 Loyalty), Coating
SB wish targets: Torpor Orb, Ratchet & Keg, Cursed Scroll, Crucible (no Waste in yard)
I really enjoy the thinking UW makes you do; as the record implies, the opponent conceded the next turn.
Side note: in case you were wondering - yes, the BUG Delver pilot did run into Plague Engineer at the top table; and yes, TNN and Blossom are Rogues.
Last edited by Fox; 10-26-2019 at 10:01 PM.
Bummer man. Always next time.
Assuming this puzzle starts after your draw, and I didn't know what my Reanimator opponent's hand of 4 was, I'd probably go:
1. Let Karn die, fetching Torpor Orb
2. Play Orb, nullifying the Rider I know about and enabling Nought.
3. Play Nought, leaving up Plains and Tundra.
My reasoning:
- I have Snare + 3x Swords. If they Reanimate Rider (14 -> 6 life), I don't care bc I can run him over with trample for 7 and he dies.
- If they go for Reanimate Dead to avoid paying life, I have Snare.
- They have four mana next turn, but I feel confidant with 3 swords. Even Entomb -> Iona on W, they go down to 5 and Nought still runs them over.
EDIT: 4 mana up, worse-case scenario. This is based on old knowledge of Reanimator so I'm not really up to date on popular targets/supporting cards they run.
No idea how sound or poor my logic is, just what I would do.
Some things to consider is that you have 3 Plow and they have Therapy in yard; but an Ashen Rider would make a trigger giving you a window to Plow. If all this happens you would lose Karn to the trigger, which would unlock their Petal in play and in hand. Also, Karn would also have killed himself to going -2 at 2 loyalty.
The winning line has more to do with turning every card in their deck into a dead draw. The issue with Torpor Orb is that they could topdeck a kill spell for Nought, then steal it for 1 life. You do have Plows and you should be fine, but you would have given them much more time. If you know their maindeck and allow for them to draw any sideboard card they might regularly run (or draw any card of their maindeck) - there is a line there that beats anything they could realistically draw.
Their dead topdecks include: Dark Rit, artifacts, any card with a color req not green or black, any land, Entomb, any Reanimate effect (1 or 2 mana), any fatty, and any discard [so like, their entire maindeck]. Among SB cards, they could draw, cast *& resolve* include: Decay or Rev Silence, Coffin Purge, Surgical, Massacre [which means they'd be playing 3 in the board, highly unlikely]...and that's pretty much the entire list of possible. The best line doesn't care about any of these off the top.
I was unfamiliar with Food Chain, which likely led to my losses. He was playing Astrolabe and mostly basics, which left my Wastelands stranded. He was also a great player, putting me in spots where i coudn't counter all the key spells and i didn't have enough pressure.
Bomberman was for real a tough deck. It had both Cavern of Souls and Chalice. I squeeked out one game due to Force-ing a Chalice and getting a t2 Dreadnought. The other games ended with an uncounterable Salvagers and a win on the spot with LED.
Burn games were close. I won one game easily, the other two were super close. I made a big mistake by not blocking a Goblin Guide while i was on 12 life. I had Dreadnought, a win on the following turn, and an unflipped delver that i really didn't need. Bolts would have really shined in this matchup to relieve creature pressure in case i can't combo.
Fun day, learned a ton (i'm not usually a blue player, and it showed lol), and i'll work towards getting the Volcanic.
My list changed at the last minute: i dropped Echoing Truth for Brazen Borrower in the board (very good card, possibly maindeckable in mono-blue.) Then i dropped the Needle for Jace. Scroll of Fate was incredible, easily the best enabler for dreadnought and added pressure.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
I'd probably turn Karn into a 4/4 here (Coating & +1 on himself) and swing for 8 w/ Karn & the Factories, turning off Reanimate while holding up Snare for any other reanimation spell. They'd need both access to a second Animate Dead/Exhume AND 4 mana to cast them to avoid dying to my next attack. If they draw Abrupt Decay they can kill only the Coating and get to live for another round, still with no outs (I could Wish for Cursed Scroll instead of attacking with Karn in that case, but it doesn't even matter)
Well done!
The most important things in that scenario are their life total, the cmc of Ashen Rider [Reanimate], and Karn shutting them off mana.
Last edited by Fox; 10-27-2019 at 12:17 PM.
Dang, nice. Was hoping no one else would have answered and I just pm'd Fox before checking here in case someone did. My PM had me swinging in for 6 with double Factory and Coating; I didn't take into account I could Coat Karn and get a 4/4 instead of another 2/2 with Liquimetal.
That being said against Miracles last week, I DID use Coating on an opposing JtMS to shut him down with my Karn in play and that was pretty funny.
EDIT:
- Haven't played against Food Chain, so I can't comment much on that. Feels like Doomsday in the sense that if they can't get FC going, it doesn't seem like they can get much going but that's just my gut reaction. Borrower looks like it'd be nice here to bounce FC, as would Spell Snare for Manipulate Fate/Return to Nature.
- vs. Bomberman, Fox had some great advice on how to play around their shenanigans here, though from the perspective of UW. Wasting their Caverns, Engineered Explosives for Chalice, Needle on Ballista, and Negation on LED all look strong here.
- vs. Burn, it feels like you want to mull for a "hardcast" Nought if you're on MonoU since you have no Bolts or StP on Nought to slow them down. They'll more or less need the nuts to race your T2 Nought, and that's without you countering critical Fireblasts and such.
Glad you're able to view all the matches as learning experience :)
Last edited by crispymelee; 10-27-2019 at 02:25 PM.
Thats all great advice, but variance can really mess that up. I can't have everything all the time. I think Ponder maindeck, Standstill sideboard might be the correct path for mono-blue. The hate is much more specific so i need cheap ways to find it.
In a lot of games i was thinking: my kingdom for a Brainstorm! Playing only 4 cantrips just seems incorrect.
Brainstorm Realist
I close my eyes and sink within myself, relive the gift of precious memories, in need of a fix called innocence. - Chuck Shuldiner
When every card combos with every other card in your deck, you have less need for Ponder. The issue with mono-U remains that it's not a functioning deck if the opponent can either lock-out Scroll or remove Dreadnought (either from the deck or from being relevant); building up <<< building sideways. Cantripping deliberately towards either of those two opens up loss to Narset/Leo, and there is no compensation in terms of alternate play patterns unlocked.
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