[Deck] NLU_Extended Port GP Chicago Winner

[gamegeek2]

This thread really needs a better name. CounterTop, Next Level Blue, Legacy Blue, somethin like that.

[Jeet]

I've been running this list lately and it's been pretty successful so far. Here it is:

// Lands
4 [A] Island (1)
4 [A] Underground Sea
4 [ON] Flooded Strand
4 [ON] Polluted Delta
4 [A] Tropical Island

// Creatures
4 [RAV] Dark Confidant
4 [FUT] Tarmogoyf
3 [ARB] Lorescale Coatl

// Spells
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [MM] Brainstorm
4 [LRW] Ponder
4 [CS] Counterbalance
4 [CHK] Sensei's Divining Top
3 [NE] Daze
3 [DIS] Spell Snare
3 [ARB] Maelstrom Pulse

// Sideboard
SB: 4 [UL] Engineered Plague
SB: 2 [TSP] Krosan Grip
SB: 2 [FD] Trinket Mage
SB: 2 [FD] Engineered Explosives
SB: 1 [ALA] Executioner's Capsule
SB: 1 [ALA] Relic of Progenitus
SB: 1 [DK] Tormod's Crypt
SB: 1 [A] Blue Elemental Blast
SB: 1 [IA] Hydroblast

I'm trying not to splash white only for swords since black has removal as well. I'm not so sure about Maelstrom Pulse but it's been good up to now. It dodges counterbalance most of the time and kills annoying stuff like Moat, Tombstalker, Shackles, etc. The downside is that you don't want to use it if you have a permanent with the same name.

About Ponder, I see no reason to play 4. It helps find answers when you need them including an early Top or Counterbalance.

Lorescale Coatl has also been great so far since I can protect it with 10 counterspells and Counterbalance. It finishes games fast as it is usually bigger than Tarmogoyf. It gets huge with the 12 draw spells I'm running.

The curve for Counterbalance is 15 1cc, 15 2cc, 6 3cc and has been good.

Do you think the loss of Sower and Shackles is important? Sower is easily taken care of with all the spot removal every deck runs and Shackles can be really slow especially if you can't get your land drops in time.

[majikal]

You must not have any aggro in your meta to not run Swords. I find the 1cc to be invaluable. Sower I find to be subpar -- it's really strange actually. It seems it would be very good with all the Goyfs and Tombstalkers and Coatls running around, but at the same time everyone is kind of going crazy with the removal at the moment, so you more than likely won't get one to stick.

I'm sticking to 2x Shackles currently and it's been great so far. I'm running 20 lands in my build, and between Top, BS, Ponder, and Bob I hardly ever miss a land drop until I've hit 4-5 lands.

Here's my list:

4x Tarmogoyf
4x Dark Confidant
3x Lorescale Coatl
2x Vendilion Clique (although Kira, Great Glass-spinner seems really good here)
2x Vedalken Shackles

4x Brainstorm
2x Ponder
4x Sensei's Divining Top
4x Counterbalance
4x Force of Will
3x Daze
4x Swords to Plowshares

4x Polluted Delta
4x Flooded Strand
4x Underground Sea
3x Tropical Island
3x Tundra
2x Island

[Team-Hero]

My SB is:
2 Counterbalance
3 Relic of Progenitus
1 Kira, Great Glass-Spinner
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Dueling Grounds
1 Propaganda
1 Llawan, Cephalid Empress (for Merfolk and Faries)
1 Spell Snare
2 Annul
2 OPEN

I like how the Looters work for me. They ping the opponent early while making my Lorescales bigger. They also ditch cards I do not need. I want to squeeze in an extra Jitte just for them. The Lorescales, for me, are just that good. Most of the time I wish my Tarmogoyf was a Lorescale. I've attacked several times with an 8/8 through 12/12 Lorescale on it's first combat swing.

Lorescale 2/2: Attack with Looter.
Lorescale 3/3: Draw. Use Top to draw. Use Brainstorm. Cast Jace, draw.
Attack with a 9/9 Lorescale, end turn with a 10/10.

If you get the Top engine going, it helps too. The Lorescale IS good. People I've played against can vouch that they rather deal with a Tarmogoyf than with Lorecale.

But I am going to try to squeeze in at least another Counterbalance and 2 Shackles, once I get them, in the deck.

[from Cairo]

This thread really needs a better name. CounterTop, Next Level Blue, Legacy Blue, somethin like that.

Next Level Blue (NLU) and Baseruption are the names I hear it referred to most as. I wouldn't pick anything new that just seems like it would be even more confusing.

Also I agree with Gekoratel, most of these new "innovations" seem worse than the Chicago lists.

[Enigma]

GP versions are really CB-hated oriented. In a more aggro meta, I would change those lists for sure.

P-M

[Sage]

GP versions are really CB-hated oriented. In a more aggro meta, I would change those lists for sure.

P-M

Would you mind elaborating on the changes you would make to Probasco's/Nassif's lists for an aggro meta?

[Gekoratel]

I don't know what kind of drastic changes would be made to the deck for an aggro meta but I could see cutting the 2 Krosan Grip for spot removal in the form of Lightning Bolt. But if Goblins is a large portion of that aggro meta Krosan Grip is pretty solid in that matchup since its hard to beat an active Vial. In the board you get access to Firespout and BEBs so which should help turn out the aggro matchup substantially.

[jimirynk]

What type of aggro?
Brassmans MD is pretty strong vs. the aggro matchup besides merfolk..

[Taurelin]

What type of aggro?
Brassmans MD is pretty strong vs. the aggro matchup besides merfolk..

Actually, I find Goblins, for example, a rather challenging MU with Brassman's deck, at least pre-board. You have no answer to Lackey apart from FoW (which you don't always have). G2 and 3 it becomes much better with Firespout, but only if they don't play / if you can shut down Wasteland.

If you play in an aggro-heavy environment, wouldn't Firespout be maindeck material, possibly instead of 2 Grip, 1 Needle? Or at least some more copies of EE could be handy.

[jimirynk]

I had 1 ee extra in the board for a while but I decided against it.
I agree firespout is good.
but you just said you don't have an answer for turn one lackey and firespout doesn't really help that.
I say know on cutting the needle from the md their is always a time in a game were your going to wish you had it in, plus its a good turn 1 answer to their turn 1 vial.
Just remember brassmans list is so strong due to its topdecking+counter top strength.
Don't weaken the deck with bad top deck spells.
I will post more in some time I have to go pickup my gf.pc

Btw this is the list I ran for a sapphire and went undefeated untill I gave the win in t8 to my teammate who won the torn.
http://www.deckcheck.net/deck.php?id=25624

[Taurelin]

but you just said you don't have an answer for turn one lackey and firespout doesn't really help that.

Well, Firespout answers a 3rd turn army. And sometimes that really helps.

Additionally, Firespout is not only good vs Goblins, but against other aggro decks as well, obviously.

Don't weaken the deck with bad top deck spells.

I won't. But depending on the meta, a Grip might be a worse top deck than creature removal.

I say know on cutting the needle from the md their is always a time in a game were your going to wish you had it in,

Agreed!

Btw this is the list I ran

Err, looks pretty much identical to the original list to me. Which is perfect, of course!

[blueneverfails]

This is the list I'm running, is pretty much the same as Mr. GP Chicago winner. The only difference is my meta is not countertop heavy(which means me and maybe 1 other person will have countertop) So I decided to take out the predators(hardest thing I've done since the day I left affinity.) and the single krosan grip to try out 3 lorescale coatl's and soooo far I have loved it, there has been many times where I would prefer Coatl over goyf, and the only reason it hasn't replaced it yet is because it costs three and plus I can run both.


2 Vedalken Shackles
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Ponder
4 Force of Will
3 Daze
4 Counterbalance
4 Brainstorm
4 Tarmogoyf
3 lorescale coatl
2 Sower of Temptation
4 Dark Confidant
4 Underground Sea
3 Tundra
3 Tropical Island
4 Polluted Delta
2 Island
4 Flooded Strand

Sideboard
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Engineered Plague
1 Energy Flux
1 Darkblast
1 Burrenton Forge-Tender
1 Blue Elemental Blast
1 Hydroblast
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Krosan Grip
1 Perish
1 Planar Void
1 Relic of Progenitus
1 Threads of Disloyalty

I'm still messin with the sideboard, I've tried to put logic beside and work with this but, I truly just don't understand it. But I'm trying


Personally I love shackles(moving from ITF to this) and would never take them out or go down to 1. The one thing I would like to do is stick in 1 more ponder somewhere for more consistancy, but hey I can't have everything What do you guys think?

[Anusien]

My problem with Coatl and similar things is that they can't block Piledriver. What about maindeck Firespout instead?

[aTn]

Additionally, Firespout is not only good vs Goblins, but against other aggro decks as well, obviously.

In my opinion, Firespout is not that hot against Merfolk (and Enigma and I have been playing that MU since GP: Chicago). Knowing you're going to board Firesoupt in, the Merfolk player can board in BEB and you'll have to go through a counter-wall before you get to resolve it.

Matters get even worse when you replace Merfolk with the new Wizards deck (i.e. they play tons of daze effects which basically make Firespout not so hot).

In all these match-ups, I think the deck could benefit from spot removal.

From my point of view, Brassmann NLU was built to wreck CB-decks, so if your meta shifts to contain more Merfolk, etc. and less CB, I think it's time to modify the list (in particular some MD choices like 2 x Grip). I say this based on experience, i.e. having played Brassmann's list each week in 25+ player Legacy tournaments and playtesting, I noticed my results went drifting when the meta in my area shifted to more Merfolks, less Threshold, more Elves, more UW-Landstill, etc..

My problem with Coatl and similar things is that they can't block Piledriver. What about maindeck Firespout instead?

I was actually thinking about it (maybe -2 Grip, +2 Firespout), but I'd rather have spot removal (I'll test it anyhow).

[blueneverfails]

unless I'm reading firespout wrong, why would I want to add red into the deck when there are already 4 colors? Personally I think that is crazy. There has to be a lot better options than adding red, and if your going to do that, just run pyroclasm.

[aTn]

unless I'm reading firespout wrong, why would I want to add red into the deck when there are already 4 colors? Personally I think that is crazy. There has to be a lot better options than adding red, and if your going to do that, just run pyroclasm.

We are talking about Brassman's list which plays red. I'm currently doing a split between Firespout and Pyroclasm in the board. Pyroclasm is not that good sometimes because Elves and Merfolk play lords (and other guys, in the case of Elves) which boost their creatures out of pyro range.

[Nihil Credo]

From the last DTBF update:

A second important change involves how Threshold decks are counted; in the last year the archetype has evolved to the point that the old categorisation by their splash colour (or lack thereof) makes little sense.

Today, the one clear split is between decks packing the maindeck Counterbalance/Top combination and those favouring an aggressive, tempo-driver approach with Daze, Stifle, and Wasteland. The latter decks are quite well established, with only a few secondary choices being discussed (mostly additional threats such as Dreadnought or Alara Reborn creatures) and splashing exclusively either Red or Black.

Counterbalance decks, on the other side, exist in a continuum, from the classic Mongoose builds to the Chicago lists to those incorporating additional tricks (Survival, Natural Order, etc.); they also exist in pretty much every possible colour combination that includes Blue and Green, from two to four colours.
If some clear division in approaches emerges, this will eventually be adopted in both thread organisation and tournament tallies. For the time being, all CounterTop decks that do not fall into any established category, i.e. that follow the game plan of "establish the Balance soft-lock and play good creatures", will get dumped into one format-leading cauldron.

In accordance with the above, this thread is being locked and will eventually be archived. You may continue your discussion in either the CounterTop thread or the Tempo Thresh thread, as appropriate.