[OLD] UGw Threshold

[Shugyosha]

Back to Basics is no Blood Moon for sure but its still better than Armageddon.

Decks you board your anti-land plan in usually play more lands, can usually recur lands and play Wastelands/Manlands. BtB costs one less and with basics fetched out you can still operate quite normal because your deck needs only 3-4 mana. Landstill on the other hand is severely crippled for at least some turns and will have to play slower than usual. BtB also shuts down his Mishra win condition. With crucible he can begin to waste his lands to recur them untapped but needless to say that it is slooow.

Geddon destroys your precious (basic)lands and your opponent will be more likely recover earlier than you. Crucible also makes Geddon a dead card while BtB is still good. And to use Geddon to full effect you need a beater out. BtB does not depend on other cards.

[Goblin Snowman]

Decks you board your anti-land plan in usually play more lands, can usually recur lands and play Wastelands/Manlands. BtB costs one less and with basics fetched out you can still operate quite normal because your deck needs only 3-4 mana. Landstill on the other hand is severely crippled for at least some turns and will have to play slower than usual. BtB also shuts down his Mishra win condition. With crucible he can begin to waste his lands to recur them untapped but needless to say that it is slooow.

Back to Basics does not prevent Fetchlands, and a standard WUB Landstill deck will have 6+ Basics they can nab. This is in addition to Back to Basics being removed via Cunning Wish for Disenchant. Armageddon is a much better card in this matchup due to the high chance at winning outright if it resolves, Crucible in play or no.

Geddon destroys your precious (basic)lands and your opponent will be more likely recover earlier than you. Crucible also makes Geddon a dead card while BtB is still good. And to use Geddon to full effect you need a beater out. BtB does not depend on other cards.

Again, Landstill is fully capable of running on 4ish Basics fetched/Plains Cycled out until they feel the need to Cunning Wish for Disenchant. Crucible does negate some of Armageddon's damage, yet it will still take Landstill a good number of turns to reach a safe amount of mana. Back to Basics does not preform amazingly against Landstill, even if it's not dependent on other cards. Against Loam varients, Back to Basics is far more relevant, however.

[Omega]

here is my sidebord

4 beb
2 COP red
2 krosan grip
3 pithing needle
2 jotun grunt
2 tormod's crypt


It's been like the third or fourth time i lose to Mono red burn. COP are usually not in my SB, but i went spying just before the tournament and saw alot of Red deck, so i put two of them in.
I feel that BEB are poor sb card against Red Burn. They dont give you any advantage, its a 1-1 trade and he is most likely going to draw another one. COP red can be game for them, but 2 is low. I dont like the idea of playing more because they are dead cards against the other deck in my local metagame

any suggestion? I want to improve my burn matchup, while keeping a good sidebord against the rest of the field

my meta is (its usually a small 30- person tournament) :
3-4 Aggro/control (ThreshThreshThreshThreshThreshThreshThreshThresh, fish, Deadguy)
many T2 upgraded deck
3-4 BURN
2-3 Zoo
1 Fetchland tendrils
1-2 Standstill
1 Slide
ichorid
1-2 belcher
1 cephalid breakfast
1 survival
aggro deck

thank you

Robert

[Citrus-God]

Back to Basics does not prevent Fetchlands, and a standard WUB Landstill deck will have 6+ Basics they can nab. This is in addition to Back to Basics being removed via Cunning Wish for Disenchant. Armageddon is a much better card in this matchup due to the high chance at winning outright if it resolves, Crucible in play or no.

Dont forget Eternal Dragon. That grabs either the 3rd Color for EE or a Basic Plains which can be used later.

[ParkerLewis]

any suggestion? I want to improve my burn matchup, while keeping a good sidebord against the rest of the field

If you run the countertop engine, the matchup should be very favorable, or there's something very wrong.

[b4r0n]

any suggestion? I want to improve my burn matchup, while keeping a good sidebord against the rest of the field

I'd make sure you have access to 4 Counterbalance post-board. CB is amazing against burn (since basically everything costs 1 or 2), especially in conjunction with BEBs. Other than that, you should be fine... the key to winning the matchup is either assembling Counter-Top quickly or dropping a fat Goyf and racing them.

[Mister Agent]

One of the main components that makes UWb landstill a strong contender in the current environment is the deck's manabase. A compotent landstill player can just bypass bloodmoon and back to basics with no problem at all. I'd feel much better casting a armageddon instead if I was the threshold player.

Armageddon reverses the whole philosophy on how landstill is played by maintaining or increasing a edge by playing more lands. While back to basics and bloodmoon can only reverse it halfway against the 3c landstill builds generally.

[Adan]

Thank Gob Snowman, Anti and Agent Funk for confirming that Geddon > B2B debate.

They don't even need Cunning Wish for Dismantling Blow/Return to Dust since they will have enough Basic Lands to operate normally (like using EE as sweeper, casting WoG, Humility, Wish for random stuff).

The argument that Back to basic slows down Landstill is somehow senseless since Armageddon does exactly the same thing as described in the B2B scenario except that it destroys the basiclands as well. So the board will usually end up like this:

You both 0 lands, you have threats, he doesn't. And he's not able to operate well when he's shortened in his mana resources, but you are still capable of operating the deck with all teh cantrips which generate CQ. Sounds fair, doesn't it?

Back to Basics might be a savage tech against the mirrormatch for sure, but only against people like me, who play a maximum of 2 basic Islands (I do currently because the Delta vanished into my Highlander xD).

But against Clemens I believe it would be useless since he plays 10 fetchland which easily allow him to fetch together his basiclands within a few turns.

[Citrus-God]

The argument that Back to basic slows down Landstill is somehow senseless since Armageddon does exactly the same thing as described in the B2B scenario except that it destroys the basiclands as well.

Adan is right; B2B may slow Landstill down, but Armageddon is an insta-win against Landstill if set-up properly.

So the board will usually end up like this:

You both 0 lands, you have threats, he doesn't. And he's not able to operate well when he's shortened in his mana resources, but you are still capable of operating the deck with all teh cantrips which generate CQ. Sounds fair, doesn't it?

They might even drop a Counterbalance down just to keep you from playing your EE with only 2 lands available to you. Does it still sound fair?

[Adan]

They might even drop a Counterbalance down just to keep you from playing your EE with only 2 lands available to you. Does it still sound fair?

Of course. Even if the reach 3 Mana to avoid EE being hit by a CC2 spell from the top, after Armageddon resolves, Daze becomes a mighty mighty hardcounter again.

[Shugyosha]

Adan is right; B2B may slow Landstill down, but Armageddon is an insta-win against Landstill if set-up properly.

How come that nobody is talking about set-up and that it is neccessary when comparing the two cards...

[Adan]

How come that nobody is talking about set-up and that it is neccessary when comparing the two cards...

Setup of Back to Basics:

Fetch Basic Lands, play/have threats, defend it. Your opponent can still operate and cast WoG, himility, an EE which avoids CBalance and whatsoever.

Setup of Geddon:

Have 4 Lands (no matter which ones), have threats, force it through. You get X Time Walks. You opponent is under big pressure since he usually can't reach 4 mana after a resolved Armageddon, which leaves him only EE and StoP as outs which can be hit by CBalance and/or Daze.

[Shugyosha]

Have 4 Lands (no matter which ones)

If you don't want to loose your basics you cannot fetch for them but as you usually don't know if Armageddon will show up you will need to fetch one or two basics which you will loose with Geddon. If the Geddon plan fails (no beater, Counter, Sword on beater in response, recovers quickly) you've lost valuable basics.

have threats, force it through.

You have to force through a threat first, the opponent should better not have a Swords for your Goyf (Nimble is another case), shouldn't have a Crucible and you still have to get the Geddon through, too.

You get X Time Walks. You opponent is under big pressure

I've never doupted that. I killed Landstill decks with it myself. Nevertheless BtB don't need setup. It concurs with your strategy to fetch basics and then stop getting further lands. It is not as devastating as Geddon but it buys a great amount of time.

[Goblin Snowman]

Whether or not Back to Basics requires as much setup is irrelevant, as the card simply does not do much. Landstill, unless they're 4C (which is far less common in most metagames, from what I've heard) has far more Basics than you, roughly the same amount of fetches and Eternal Dragon. Their plan won't really change after you drop Back to Basics unless they were forced into tapping out on their turn for some reason, and had drawn/fetched no basics. Not only that, a huge amount of Landstill lists run Engineered Explosives, which easily removes Back to Basics. Armageddon, even though it requires setup (i.e., a creature on the board, so very little setup) generally nets 5-6+ of their lands, which a card and tempo swing they are not likely to be able to recover from.

If you really hate Armageddon for some reason, try Winter Orb, which while inferior in my mind, is better that Back to Basics.

[Adan]

If you really hate Armageddon for some reason, try Winter Orb, which while inferior in my mind, is better that Back to Basics.

Good point, Winter Orb was played in UGr Thresh in the old builds with Dragon (not MoonThresh) and the BTS-builds. But know Blood Moon was established.

And black has got a way different way to disrupt controldecks (Thoughtseize-Extirpate, CBalance. Or Stifle-Waste-Extirpate-Spellsnare).

But Winter Orb is indeed a very useful card.

[undone]

4 Nimble Mongoose
4 Tarmogoyf

4 Brainstorm
4 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Predict
2 Repeal
3 Swords to Plowshares
4 Ponder

3 Counterbalance
2 Hoofprints of the Stag
1 Threads of Disloyalty
2 Pithing Needle
2 Sensei's Divining Top

2 Flooded Strand
1 Forest
2 Island
2 Polluted Delta
4 Tropical Island
3 Tundra
3 Windswept Heath
Sideboard:

3 Jötun Grunt
4 Hydroblast
3 Krosan Grip
3 Stifle
2 Armageddon


I really like this deck but am concerned about the ichorid MU. I really dont want to punt the random ichorid MU. although it may be unavoidable.

My sideboard is really set in, I want to keep geddon, stifle grip blast and grunt. They all work well I just need them to beat the landstill MU.

Grunts are there for lands.dec anything running loam+ mirror.

[Jaiminho]

If you replaced Jötun with Crypts, you could enjoy that few extra time you'd have against Ichorid to find some Engineered Explosives or to beat their face. That said, I'd stick 2 EE maindeck. It's useful basically against everything, so why wouldn't you run it?

[godryk]

I do agree. I also run two MB EE and I've always liked it, never found it disappointing, and I found it to be the key in the Ichorid matchup, allowing me to win some Ichorid matchups. It can also provede card advantage.

Well, after some time seeing similar lists I want to ask you all about this kind of builds:

http://www.deckcheck.net/list.php?ty...&format=Legacy
http://www.deckcheck.net/deck.php?id=15117

I've seen a lot of top 8 placings with similar heavy-permanent lists and I have to start thinking this can be some good. Those lists may look a little odd, but I sometimes find Nimble Moongose a little disappointing in a CB build, by removing Nimble Mongoose we don't care about Threshold anymore (Mystic Enforcer comes later), but I don't know if the deck becomes too Tarmogoyf dependant in the early game... What are your thoughts?

[MeddlingMage001]

Your second link shows a list from my teammate.. because of the high permanent count they cut the mongeese and replaced them with grunts and hoofprints and it works very well. This list top8'ed a few times at Dülmen and Iserlohn.

[FredMaster]

oO
Because of the high permanent count you swapped Mongoose with Grunt?
Grunt needs the graveyard as much as Mongoose does, or did I miss something?