[Deck] Countersliver (MeatHooks)

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[cheddercaveman]

Here's what I'd like to know. How is your Landstill matchup? I can't imagine that it really got any better. This build is resistant to the mass removal that they play I will give it that. However, it is EXTREMELY vulnerable to wasteland+crucible, or really just wasteland on its own. Your running 4 colors now, and I'm not sure how we're answering the problem any better than playing other/more white slivers (plated, sidewinder, talon, essence) or maybe bounce (chain of vapor seems like the play here or hibernation for the big effect). AND, with just the typical fetching/forcing life loss, what i lost hard to with the thresh game was being lightning bolted more times than not, and we've done nothing to help that either.

But back to my question, have you tested the landstill matchup? Multiple builds (U/W, U/B/W, U/R, U/W/B/G, U/B/G, etc)

[Volt]

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[Curby]

I lucked out by opening a Thoughtseize in the Prerelease I went to, but I think getting #2-4 will be quite a bit more painful. Until then, Duress will have to do. In the meantime, I'm mostly wondering what to do about my sideboard.

I really like Engineered Plague, as I'm more likely to face tribal here than Thresh (stupid wacky meta) which makes Perish slightly less widely applicable. EE is great for blowing up tokens, but Plague can also nullify Warrens Goblins and halve the power of Bridge Zombies (but I'd go for graveyard hate against Bridge). If Lorwyn gives Legacy tribes a boost, this will be extremely relevant. But is it better than Explosives?

Next, with Ichorid and Breakfast as such potent decks, some sort of Graveyard hate seems good. Between Leyline of the Void, Planar Void, Yixlid Jailer, Jotun Grunt, Stonecloaker, Tormod's Crypt, and Morningtide, I think Leyline is the best overall. Planar Void is better when it's not in the opening hand, but is more easily blown up by Deed and EE, and can get pulled by Duress and family before it's cast.

I'm also annoyed by a local BG Rock deck (possibly with other splashes, I forget). While he doesn't use recursion as much as the graveyard combo decks, this might have a place against him as well. Extirpate taking out slivers quickly gets out of hand, and unfortunately Planar Void actually works better in making Extirpate useless. This is unfortunate because Leyline is generally better, and because pretty much any Deed will kill Planar Void.

Harmonic Sliver is a must, and 3 seems sufficient.

With the 4 more slots, I was thinking of running the rather old-school Meddling Mage, but I have no room for his friend, Pithing Needle.

In the end, I'm up to something like:

4 Leyline of the Void
4 Engineered Plague
4 Meddling Mage
3 Harmonic Sliver

I think my love for Essence Sliver is a bit of a newbie flag, since newbies tend to gravitate towards life gain and big creatures. However, it so consistently wins games when it resolves that I'd love to find a way to put him into the side if not the main. Especially with the introduction of Hibernation Sliver and Thoughtseize, it seems that much more relevant. Volt's testing indicates that my fears are not justified and my reliance on life gain just shows a lack of experience with the deck, but our build is starting to look like Suicide Sliver with 16 sources of life loss, some of them recurring. How might you build a sideboard package with Essence against a pretty random but aggro-heavy, aggro-control-heavy, combo-light local meta?

Stifle was suggested by Volt's new side, and I'd probably use it over Mage if I had them to use. =) Any pointers (with or without Essence) would be most appreciated. Thanks!

[Volt]

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[Volt]

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[david_ir1]

Hi, this is my current decklist

LANDS: 18

4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
4 Tundra
3 Tropical Island
3 Wasteland

CREATURES: 15

4 Crystalline Sliver
4 Muscle Sliver
4 Sinew Sliver
3 Winged Sliver

SPELLS: 27

2 Spell snare
4 Brainstorm
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Sword to Plowshares
3 Sensei's divining top
3 Counterbalance
3 Stifle

SIDEBOARD: 15

4 Meddling Mage
3 Pithing Needle
3 Harmonic Sliver
4 Plated sliver
1 Stifle

I played this saturday a 24 people tournament in Madrid (Spain) and went 4-0, let's go with a small report:

Round 1: WWu, against a random guy

On game one I dazed a turn one Mother of runes he casted out of a tundra, wasteland on the tundra on turn 2 and he never got another plains, he only drew 2 wastelands and 2 Mishra's factories.
Game two: -2 spell snare +2 pithing needle. I had the nuts and just dropped turn one top, turn two counterbalance and he didn't resolve a single spell.

Round 2: High Tide, against my friend Joaquin Tejero, Spain's 2007 National Subchampion
Game one is easy, counterbalance does wreck his deck, he tries to go off, a well placed stifle on a cycled faerie prevents him to get a much needed card from the top of his library, he scoops.
Game two is a walk on the park, -4 swords to plowshares -3 winged sliver -1 muscle sliver +4 meddling mage +3 harmonic sliver (needed for revealing with counterbalance against mana shorts) + 1 stifle

Round 3: 4C madness survival

Game one I counter the following spells on turns 1, 2 and 3: Aquamiba, survival, wild mongrel. He runs out of gas and dies to 3 3/3 flying slivers
Game two: -3 stifle+3 pithing needle (tough decission, I don't know if it was the right one) I keep a hand with no counters but 2 lands and 5 slivers. I proceed to beat him down to 3 life, he gets control of the game with 2 more creatures than me and drops a wonder to his graveyard so I can't attack anymore. For the next 5 or 6 turns we trade spells, he gets his genesis to work and starts building an army, I start chumpblocking to prevent me from dying. When all hope is lost, next turn i'm dead, that's for sure, I topdeck a wasteland, destroy his only island and fly over his non-flying creatures for the win. Lucky me.

Round 4: Mono Blue, against a very good player

Game one he drops a turn 3 Back to basics, I Daze it, he casts Fow. A powder keg takes care of my 2 attacking slivers and it's GG for him.
Game two: -3 counterbalance, -4 swords, +3 harmonic sliver + 3 pithing needle, +1 stifle. He casts again a turn 3 back to basics but I'm not tapped this time and remove it with a Harmonic sliver. After that every sliver I cast destroys something, vedalken shackles, powder keg....
Game three: I lay a turn 2 Sinew sliver and hold back everything else he casts to remove it. I play more creatures, he counters them all spending his resources, and the sinew goes all the way knocking him down to 0 life.

And that was my saturday afternoon, please let me know what you think about my decklist and what would you do to improve it, please let me know as well what do you think about my sideboarding.

[Curby]

Interesting build. I recall that a tourney-winning countersliver deck on magic-league also used CounterTop.

It looks like UG or UGw CounterTop Thresh with different creatures. How would you compare the two? Judging from your meta, you feel that playing with all nonbasics is justified (especially without Vial)? I'm considering dropping basics out of my UWbg build.

I'm wondering how this build and the UWbg would perform in the same matchups against different decks.

[godryk]

(Enhorabuena)

I've tried to fit Counterbalance in the deck long ago. Besides the tournament report and your amazing results, I wonder if you had had any problems againt mana denial, with no basics and 3 wasteland, although, I supose that's what Stifles are for...

Interesting build anyway.

[david_ir1]

(Gracias!)

The only problem against mana denial is Crucible+wasteland, the stifles help in normal situations, and the Pithing needles in the board sure help, but if someone gets the crucible combo you'd better move onto next game. Luckily crucible is played only in slow decks like Standstill, and that shouldn't be a problem. This weekend Lorwyn becomes legal, let's see what happens with Thoughtseize, I think this card will change the metagame, and it's bad news against our deck.

[cheddercaveman]

I actually disagree, I don't think that thoughtseize changes the metagame hardly at all. The only potential change would be a resurgance of deadguy or deadgoyf into the metagame, and even that doesnt overly concern me. Beating those decks is basically as simple as just putting down guys and turning them sideways (countering or swords-ing bob along the way).

Now, on counterbalance ... I haven't played it I will say, but the thing that I see with it is that it takes 2 turns to setup and you can't even use it (for the most part) until turn 3. With this deck, by turn 3, I typically want to be turning creatures sideways for another 4-6 damage, not slowing them down. And against combo, I could see the point, but just playing medding mage in your sideboard would take up less space and probably do just as good.

However, there is a card that I am planning to put into this sideboard. If your running black it would be perish, however, I know there are a lot of people, myself included, that do not think a 4 color deck is advantagous. Therefore, I will be putting hibernation into my sideboard (either 2 or 3). I had another deck that I played it in and it was phenomenal. Takes care of lots of our problems with threshold. I do realize that in this deck it means that we might be putting our muscle slivers back into our hand too, but its probably worth it vs threshold, and we play it on their turn so we either attacked already or we can replay the sliver next turn and get in a big alpha strike still. Thoughts?

[david_ir1]

Now, on counterbalance ... I haven't played it I will say, but the thing that I see with it is that it takes 2 turns to setup and you can't even use it (for the most part) until turn 3.

You'd be surprised how efficient becomes when you play a turn 2 Counterbalance, without top the Counterbalance still triggers!!! Plenty of spells got countered this way, my friend!!!, and remember, you can let the Counterbalance trigger resolve and if the spells doesn't get countered and then play Daze or Fow. Believe me, best turn 2 play: Counterbalance. I don't know how to fit the 4th counterbalance, any ideas?

I know there are a lot of people, myself included, that do not think a 4 color deck is advantagous.

You're right, playing wasteland in any agro or agro control deck sounds great to me, so going 4C is too risky, check my report in previous posts from last weekeend tournament and see what happened to the 4C survival guy.

[godryk]

Well, considering Volt has opened a new thread for the new 4-color builds. I think we should keep this thread focused in UWg Counterslivers as it is what we usually call Meathooks.

I really like the Stifle+Wasteland suggestion (even if it weakens our mana base), although I'm not very fond of the Countertop idea, anyway I'll test it. But what I really like is that it only keeps the real 15 esential slivers to get much more room.

Anyway I'll consider a Stifle+Wasteland+Vial list, just in case, to not get slowed down against certain decks we must aggresively race.

[godryk]

(Sorry fordouble post, but I have changed my opinion)

I've tested with the Countertop list and I found it to be very strong. You can disrupt your opponentes starting mana base, drop a few creatures that can get destroyed/countered and then drop the countertop FTW, which usually wins you the game against all kinf of decks, from combo to Burn. Anyway, I found Spell Snare too redundant, because with countertop you won't easyly let CMC 2 spells resolve. I rather cut the 2 Spell Snare and another card, maybe a Winged ot someting else, because sensei's divining top isn't a real cantrip, and after a few turns we end up by just watching the top card of our library. I think sensei's gets stronger combined with more shuffle effects. eight fetchlands is ok, but with 11 shuffle effects I found the deck to do it great. And of course is necesary to the first turns mana fixing.

[kicks_422]

This weekend Lorwyn becomes legal, let's see what happens with Thoughtseize, I think this card will change the metagame, and it's bad news against our deck.

Actually, Thoughtseize is a much needed boost for the deck (and for any aggro-control deck with black, as a matter of fact) because the deck usually finds it hard to dig for those 4 StP's when needed, considering the lower number of cantrips that the deck has.

[Curby]

I think he meant Thoughtseize will be bad when used against us because people can pick apart our hand, i.e. the boost it gives decks against us is bigger than the boost it gives us against other decks. Not sure if this is true, but that seems to have been his intent.

I suppose it comes down to UWg with Countertop/Stifle/Waste for disruption, or UWgb with Hibernation and 'seize for disruption and tricks. I need to get some Counterbalance so I can test out both. =)

I rather cut the 2 Spell Snare and another card, maybe a Winged ot someting else

Cut for Ponder? Vial? You mentioned you'd try to fit Vial in; what does your list end up looking like?

[godryk]

Well, I basically left the Vial idea, since I played against some decks playing wasteland and didn't got manascrewed. Of course BwConfidant classical LD package or Wasteland+Crucible destroys us, but, what the hell, it already did. I found out that most of time I just needed to stay alive a few turns and get the countertop FTW. And top gets better with shuffle effects, we all know, and thought that Spell Snare was redundant, because I will be able to easy counter the 2 CMC in shory, even with random counterbalance revelations. Sure Spell Snare is great in the first few turns, but I usually preferred stifle or wasteland, and finally, things like ponder avoid mulligan.

The list I've tested is the one david_ir1 posted a few posts above with this changes:
-2 Spell Snare
-1 Winged Sliver (I'm not sure)
+3 Ponder (maybe portent, to rearrange the top cards of a shuffled library)

I found it's powerful get slower, play with your library every turn, and keep the real good slivers.

[david_ir1]

-2 Spell Snare
-1 Winged Sliver (I'm not sure)
+3 Ponder (maybe portent, to rearrange the top cards of a shuffled library)

I don't think removing slivers from the deck is a good idea, 15 creatures is the right number. Anyway I've tested spell snare this weekend and didn't work well for me, maybe I'll return to -2 spell snare + 1 stifle (4th one) +1 counterbalance (4th one).

[kicks_422]

I think he meant Thoughtseize will be bad when used against us because people can pick apart our hand, i.e. the boost it gives decks against us is bigger than the boost it gives us against other decks. Not sure if this is true, but that seems to have been his intent.

What I meant to say was that he was wrong. I think Thoughtseize would be a much bigger boost for MeatHooks than it would be a boost to other decks.

[cheddercaveman]

Well thoughtseize isnt really playable in the Meathooks deck because we don't have black. It is in the 4-color list though I believe already. Also, I need to get my hands on some counterbalances and I'll give it a shot.