Here's the rest for today, I'll finish the other half of Fish tomorrow and move on to stuff like Dredge, CT Bant, Landstill, Stax, Lands, Aggroloam. Probably not even going to bother with ANT, since you either draw a turn 2-3 combo or you don't. Maybe I'll try it with some Mindbreak traps in the side since somebody wanted that a few pages back, but I bet it's still awful.
Also, I know all of this is preboard, but I think some extensive testing of the preboard is needed before we can really say for certain what deserves to be in the board.
Regular Berserk Stompy with 2x Vines vs Zoo
1 – BS mulls to six. Zoo play a pair of Nacatls and sends them in until BS dies, using Bolt/Chain/Path removal as necessary. Zoo
2 – BS has a ton of extra pump in hand, baits a removal spell with Might, then uses Vines to force Zoo into a situation where they have to use a second removal or be low enough to die to the pump next turn. They use their second path, don’t draw into more removal and die the next turn. Score one for Vines. BS
3 – A large pile of Boggles and Ledgewalkers without pump doesn’t get very far against Goyf and Pridemage. An Inviorated Predator gives BS a chance for a turn, but eats a path and that’s game. Zoo
4 – BS’s first few plays die, Boggle shows up and combos out for lethal. BS
5 – BS mulls to five and can’t recover from the first two guys dying. Zoo
6 – Nacatl and removal go the distance, a Rancored Ledgewalker is a few points short of going lethal. Zoo
7 – Zoo does some stuff, Boggle goes crazy with Berserk. BS
8 – BS mulls to six, plays a bunch of guys who die and loses. Vines didn’t help, half because they had Lavamancer and half because it was the only pump spell BS had and using it to save a 2/2 against an army of Nacatl, Goyf, etc would cut off the combo finish as a possible out. Zoo
9 – Zoo mulls to six. Skulk and Elite get stopped by the Great Wall of Tarmogoyf. A second Goyf shows up, some removal fries BS’s creatures and the Great Wall of Tarmogoyf starts serving for eight a turn. Zoo
10 – Zoo runs out of removal, tries to race with a Goyf, a ‘zerked Boggle is faster. BS
11 – BS combos on turn four with Ledgewalker. BS
12 – BS forced on the defensive from a Nacatl and removal, a Rancored Boggle waits for some pump, but there’s not enough to be lethal. Zoo
13 – Double Predator get Invigorated when double Nacatl attack into them. Zoo tries to salvage it with a Lightning Helix and gets utterly blown out by Vines. BS
14 – BS has an amusing triple ‘zerk + Invigorate hand, but dies before it can find a third land. Zoo
15 – Same thing, only with two Berserks and no second land. Zoo
16 – Zoo mulls to six and fails to race double Rancor for double Boggle. BS
17 – Zoo has a bunch of Lavamancers, Ledgewalker treats them with a mild disregard as she goes over for eighteen. BS
18 – Zoo mulls to six. It was an interesting game because BS is stuck at one land, so Zoo doesn’t want to use its pair of Paths. By the time the second land shows up for BS it’s a little late and there’s not quite enough time to get a Ledgewalker into the air to do the last three points of damage. Zoo
19 – BS can’t find enough land to combo and dies. Zoo
20 – BS mulls below five looking for land, didn’t bother to play it. Zoo
Final Score: BS: 8, Zoo: 12
A full third of BS’s losses were to not being able to find enough land. I know someone is going to tell me to mulligan differently, but usually it’s something like I need to draw a second land in first four turns to have an auto-win on the combo. I’m willing to take those odds and I think it’s a part of playing the deck – you have to play to your strengths and having a shrouded 20 power dude is our biggest strength. Anyways, mana issues aside, Vines did steal a pair of games and was a lot better than Briar Shield. I'm not sure what the implications for switching it would be on some of the less removal-heavy matchups, but I’ll certainly give Vines that it was good against Zoo.
Classic Berserk Stompy vs Goblins
1 – Goblins gets in for about ten damage, then dies to about twenty power’s worth of Ledgewalker. BS
2 – Ground gets stuck while Ledgewalker goes over with Rancor for a few turns, then finishes wiht ‘Zerk. BS
3 – BS draws into a terrible 3x Predator with no Invigorate, but a Rancored Skulk just barely manages to win a race. BS
4 – BS mulls to six. A pair of 1/1 Elite jump in the way an Instigator, Kavu Predator hits too late and the Instigator dumps a million goblins into play. Gob
5 – BS doesn’t have enough pump to combo and throws Boggles and Ledgewalkers in front of a 2/2 Instigator until Goblins eventually alpha strikes for the game. Gob
6 – BS again draws a bunch of Boggles and Ledgewalkers, which get thrown under Piledrivers for a while and eventually BS runs out of chumps and dies. Gob
7 – Goblins can’t block Rancored Skulks and die. BS
8 - Goblins almost gets there with a Chieftain and a bunch of guys, but BS combos out on the last possible turn. Elite was amazing here, holding off a Chieftain and the Lackey he was boosting. BS
9 – BS can’t find the combo and trades guys for a long time. Goblins has just a few more guys and BS slowly bleeds life until it dies. Gob
10 – BS applying good pressure with a Rancored Ledgewalker and a Skulk, then a timely Incinerator allows Goblins to sneak through a Lackey and an Instigator. Way too many goblins hit play and it’s over. Gob
11 – Turn three for goblins involves attacking with Lackey, Instigator, Chieftain, and Piledriver, dumping Matron, Piledriver, and Ringleader into play. Not quite enough pump for Predator to combo and swing for lethal. Gob
12 – Matrons for Incinerators clears the way for Lackey effects, Siege-Gang ends the game. Gob
13 – Goblins plays some irrelevant guys while BS hits the early combo. BS
14 – BS combos on turn two. BS
15 – BS combos on turn three. BS
16 – BS can’t get off of one land while Goblins goes a bit too nuts with Vial. Gob
17 – Goblins doesn’t have a fast start and a gigantic Ledgewalker goes all the way. BS
18 – BS combos on turn three. BS
19 – Goblins mulls to six, then a bunch of stupidity ensues where Goblins is stuck at Lackey, Port, and Mountain and BS is stuck at Forest and Nettle. BS is locked out by the port, Goblins is locked out by using the port, and neither Lackey nor Nettle wants to attack. Eventually both decks find some more land, Goblins plays some irrelevant guys while BS combos. BS
20 – Goblins tries to clear the way for Lackey with some Incinerators, but Boggles mess up that plan. Eventually some Ledgewalkers get into the air and combo. BS
Final score: BS: 12, Goblins: 8
A few things to note:
-Boggle and Nettle Sentinel are amazing here. Nettle can hit past Lackey and then untap to block him, while Boggle can’t be cleared out of Lackey’s way by a Stingscourger or Gempalm.
-Kavu Predator wasn’t good or bad. He had his “lolwut huge combo” moments and ran over some critters for the kill, but he was never completely broken or completely dead.
-Goblins are great at gumming up the ground, Skulks and Ledgewalkers are great because they get their full Berserked damage through to the face.
-They’re extremely vulnerable to the combo, the only ways they can disrupt it are with a Gempalm or Vialed Stingscourger.
-This matchup is definitely good.
Troll Berserk Stompy vs Goblins
1 – BS mulls to six and tries keeping a 0-land, ESG hand on the draw. The hand had a Berserk and a bunch of pump with some critters, so I felt it was a fair gamble. Didn’t pay off, never found a land, though I think I’d still make the same choice rather than go to five cards. I don’t think the chance of finding a five card hand with guys, pump (including Berserk), and mana are better than finding a land with those six. Gob
2 – Both decks play a bunch of guys, they run into each other on the ground while a Pit Skulk and a Ledgewalker do twenty. BS
3 – BS mulls to six and has 3x Elite while Goblins drops a bunch of mountains and guys. Gob
4 – BS mulls to six. BS has way too many Rangers and Ledgewalkers, the 1/1 for 2 squad dies to a bunch of Chieftain boosted critters. There was a cool play with a flashed Ranger + BotH wrecking a bunch of Lackeys, but it didn’t matter enough. Gob
5 – BS gets Goblins pretty low and they struggle to keep chumping Trolls and die to fliers. BS
6 – BS has a slow hand of Ledgewalkers and a Troll, draws a ton of land and dies to a horde of Goblins. Gob
7 – BS has to play defensively against a Chieftain sending across Instigators and Lackeys, eventually runs out of gas when they cast a Siege-Gang. Gob
8 – Goblins mulls to six. Doesn’t have much action and gets run over by a Rancored Nettle and some other stuff. BS
9 – Guys trade back and forth until a ‘zerked Skulk ends the game. BS
10 – Goblins can’t get past three mana to really get going, while BS can’t find any pump to go with Berserk. A Ledgewalker squeaks out a point in the air for a few turns to get Goblins in range of alpha strike + berserk on 2/3 Skyshroud Elite being lethal. Yeah, kinda sad game. BS
11 – Lackey and Instigator can’t get through the wall of vigilant critters involving Nettle and Ranger. A bunch of trades later both decks are mostly out of steam and then BS finds ‘zerk and a Ranger gets there. BS
12 – Goblins mulls to six. They open with lackey on the play and BS doesn’t have a one-drop. A bunch of SGC and stuff later it’s over, BS had a bunch of pump to combo, but no Berserk. Gob
13 – Very close game, Chieftain-boosted Lackeys and Instigators trade with some guys while a Rancored Nettle takes chunks out of Goblin’s life. BS has just enough pump to kill with a Ledgewalker. BS
14 – Goblins mulls to five. BS leads with a Skulk then double Rancors it. Goblins tries to get in with Instigator + Chieftain, but BS chumps the Instigator every turn and the Skulk does his thing in the meantime. BS
15 – Goblins mulls to six. BS can’t keep up the trades when Goblins has double Vial and gets to cheat on mana. BS can’t find Berserk and it’s over. Gob
16 – Goblins forces through a Lackey with Gempalm, dumps a SGC in with a Chieftain ready to go next turn. BS untaps and Ledgewalker gets in for exactly lethal with Berserk. BS
17 – Goblins doesn’t have the fastest of starts and a Rancored Nettle gets in enough damage that BotH and Vines push through the rest. BS
18 – Lackey gets in because of Gempalm again, but Goblins doesn’t really have the gas to make it matter. Nettle gets in for around thirty. BS
19 – Turn one Lackey, turn two Instigator, turn three Stingscourger to force them through. BS has the combo, but can’t get it through the pair of Siege-Gangs sitting in the way. Gob
20 – BS spends a bunch of time chumping an Instigator with 1-toughness stuff like Ranger, Ledgewalker, and non-active Elite. Eventually it runs out of blockers and Instigator does his thing. Gob
Final Score: BS: 11, Gob: 9
Things of note:
-Troll is against Goblins what Predator is against Zoo. He’s too slow to do anything too slow and you can’t stall against Goblins, if you stall they overrun you with their massive card advantage suite. Zoo cares a lot about losing a Nacatl to a regenerating Troll, they have limited creatures. Goblins doesn’t care what they throw into him, there are always more goblins.
-The loss of Boggle makes it much easier for them to connect Lackey, which can be a problem.
-Even though this version is definitely worse against Goblins, it is still a good matchup. I had to mulligan more with this deck than the other one and this plays more lands, so that kinda sucked, and I still came up with 11 wins for BS. That’s not bad at all.
Regular Berserk Stompy vs Merfolk
1 – BS mulls to six. Fish puts down Vial, makes BS break Standstill twice. Fish crowd up the ground with a bunch of lords, BS chumps for a while and gets over with Rancored Ledgewalker, who barely wins race. BS
2 – BS can’t get enough early pressure, multiple lords take over the board and BS doesn’t have enough pump to combo. Fish
3 – BS trades for a while, comes down to a close race. If fish topdeck a merfolk so Reejery can tap a blocker, they win, otherwise Ledgewalker kills the next turn – they draw a lord. Fish
4 – Fish mulls to six, keeps a pretty mediocre hand. BS drops some dudes and they go all the way. BS
5 – Fish mulls to six. BS drops some early guys, Fish trades a few times and then draws a bunch of land and dies. BS
6 – Fish mulls to five (okay serious, what’s up with this?). BS sticks a Predator and Invigorate is game. BS
7 – Fish has to double Daze to get rid of Rancor, which sets it back a lot. A Skulk gets pumped a few turns in a row for the kill. BS
8 – Fish Forces a Rancor, but BS has a second one. Merfolk get thrown under the Rancor truck for a few turns and then the game is over. BS
9 – BS mulls to six. Fish covers the table in lords before BS can find enough pump to combo. Fish
10 – Fish mulls into oblivion and dies. BS
11 – Fish Forces some guys to try to get a window to land Standstill, but BS just keeps playing more guys. BS
12 – Fish almost gets twenty damage in with a pile of lords before a Rancor/2x Briar Shield Sprites goes lethal. Almost. BS
13 – Fish mulls to six. It doesn’t have a Force when BS starts piling Rancors onto a Boggle, which quickly ends the game. BS
14 – BS gets a fast start on the play, Fish doesn’t have guys until turn two, at which point the board is cluttered with little angry green guys. BS
15 – BS’s first Ledgewalker bit Daze, but the second one stuck and picked up Rancor. To be fair, Merfolk managed to keep up to speed with a Vial and even hit for 15. However, the Ledgewalker hit for 38 while playing around Daze. BS
16 – Fish Forces enough stuff to get Standstill off, then goes a bit crazy with Vial and dumps lords everywhere. BS comes up one damage short of comboing. Fish
17 – BS mulls to six, Fish mulls to five. BS gets its creatures countered and then can’t find anything while fish plays out a couple of guys that go the distance. Fish
18 – Both decks draw trash for a while, then fish put down a few lords and BS plays about ten little 1/1s and 2/2s. BS outraces by a little bit, gogo chumping power. BS
19 – Fish almost race, but BS throws enough guys in the way and trade with pump that eventually Fish stops drawing creatures and BS still has a couple left. BS
20 – Fish mull to five. BS plays some dudes and a Rancor, Fish has to make bad trades and dies. BS
Final Score: BS: 15, Fish: 5
Comments:
-It’s getting late and I think one or two of these got misplayed and Fish should’ve won. Also, they spent quite a few games mulling to death. So this matchup probably isn’t quite as bad for them as this made it look.
-BS has a bunch of huge advantages in this matchup. One, Force is a terrible card when none of your opponent’s cards are more important than the others. BS is a giant pile of mediocre creatures and redundant pump, not much worth the 2-for-1 of Forcing it. Two, Rancor is stupidly good here, they can’t win creature wars if you resolve it (so it’s their prime Force target if they know what they’re doing). Three, Standstill is very hard for them to use because BS usually dumps 4-5 power worth of guys onto the table by turn two and they have a Cursecatcher at best. Four, if they’re playing Stifle in the open slots (the most popular choice, I think), it’s almost completely dead against BS. It hits Kavu triggers, Briar Shield sacrifice, and Rancor recursion, that’s it.
-Shroud is nearly useless here preboard unless they’re playing a version with Echoing Truth, flying is much more important. Shroud sometimes gets better postboard because of Threads/Mind Harness.
And that's 120 games for today. Good night, folks -.-
Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin
Have to say, nice testing effort there! =)
Keep up the good work!
My consideration, although very fast since I don't have much time, is that the results are similar for the diferent versions, with few momets of glory for either kavu or troll... maybe run one as sideboard to the other? I mean, against Zoo, you can side kavu out, or the opposite for the oter matchups...
You said, somewhere in those big texts, that kavu is never "omgwtf nuts" but is also never dead... I like this kind of card for my aggro decks... Kavu is a "should-counter-or-kill" even wen we don't have the mini-combo, just because it can turn big from nothing...
About troll, troll shall be great against anything like zoo, or anything that run goyfs, sice it can block untill you can kill them, and it won't be easily killed.
Nothing more, Sweet testings ^^
If you fail to explain the reason behind your choice, technically, it's the wrong choice.
Zerk Thread -- Really, fun deck! ^^
I think it's only possible if you want to side out Kavu for Troll, not the other way around. Invigorate is pretty bad without the chance to use it with Kavu, so I would not run Invigorate with MD Troll. Anyways, at the end of this post I put an idea for an approximate list with boarded Trolls.
Yeah, but I'm also starting to think similar things about Elvish Spirit Guide. I'm equally happy to pitch it for mana or to just hardcast it lategame, it's about as much of a threat as anything else in the deck and works pretty well.
Yeah, once he gets down, not much gets past him. Almost none of the playable removal can touch him, it's basically just stuff like Wrath, Pithing Needle, and possibly something weird like Fleshbag from Survival.
Troll Berserk Stompy vs Fish
1 – Fish mulls to six. Scryb Ranger gets Forced, a Troll spends a few turns punching through lords while some Elites and ESGs chump. Troll gets double ‘zerked and wins the race. BS
2 – Fish Daze a Ranger and try to race a Rancored Ledgewalker, BS plays too many chumpers for it to work. BS
3 – Fish keeps a mana-light hand and is staring down a Troll before it can get going. BS
4 – Fish mulls to six. A Rancored Nettle takes gigantic chunks out of its lifetotal. Eventually some lords get the Nettle off the table, but Rancor moves to a Ledgewalker. BS
5 – BS has some early Ledgwalkers, but not enough pump to back them up. Lords overwhelm the board. Fish
6 – Troll can’t defend forever against two large Wakethrashers, BS doesn’t find Berserk. BS
7 – BS mulls to six. Fish can’t keep Rancor off a Skulk, almost races it, but Berserk finishes the game. BS
8 – Game draws out, Merfolk can’t break through on the ground because using Sovereign would tap out too many of their guys and leave them open to taking lethal back. Eventually BS gets there in the air with Ledgewalker. BS
9 – BS runs out of creatures, while Merfolk gets to land a standstill then dump down lords everywhere. Fish
10 – Scryb Ranger gets in the way of Fish’s guys, they have to use Sovereign to race, Ranger picks up pump and wins. BS
11 – When Fish counters a Rancor, BS gets a Ranger online and then finds another Rancor, the rest is a formality. BS
12 – Double Reejerey dumps fish into play at an absurd rate, but BS just combos. BS
13 – BS mulls to six. Again a pair of Reejerey dump a bunch of giant fish into play, BS can’t combo fast enough. Fish
14 – Fish mulls to six. Close game, comes down to BS throwing down Berserk so that Fish has to sacrifice Cursecatcher and can’t swing back for lethal. BS goes lethal the next turn. BS
15 – BS keeps trading guys with Silvergills while Fish starts piling lords down. BS can’t find enough pump to combo and dies. Fish
16 – Fish mulls to six. They draw a bunch of Stifles and Standstills and get wrecked by a large Ranger. BS
17 – BS can’t get off of one land and attempts to combo using ESGs get Cursecatchered, BS is one damage short of the kill when it dies. Fish
18 – Fish forces a second Rancor, then dies to a pair of Berserks. BS
19 – BS trades pump for lords and the board comes down to a Reejerey and Cursecatcher vs an Elite and Skulk. Fish draws some Wastelands and BS draws a Troll, which goes all the way. BS
20 – Vials pumping out Lords get BS to 1, but it swings back for lethal with pump on Ledgewalker and Troll. BS
Final Score: BS: 15, Fish: 5
Thoughts:
-This matchup is so good that Troll really didn’t matter one way or the other most of the time. He occasionally held off some lords or punched a hole in their defense, but the game was usually long over by that point.
-The Scryb Rangers were insane, not only do they wall fish all day long, but they’re another four fliers and flying is so good here.
Classic Berserk Stompy vs Geddon Stax
1 – Stax mulls to six. It proceeds to lose to itself from not finding a white source before BS combos on turn three. BS
2 – BS mulls to six. It drops two guys, then gets torn to shreds by Chalice at 1, Ghostly Prison, and a Baneslayer. Stax
3 – Both mull to six. Stax gets Prison out, while BS pays to attack with a Rancored Ledgewalker and draws a bunch of land. Stax finally finds a Smokestack, but BS combos. BS
4 – BS mulls to six. Stax Chalices for one, follows up with Prison, Crucible, and Geddon. Stax
5 – Chalice at one on the play leaves BS to try racing with a Predator and Ledgewalker. Stax plays more lock pieces and it’s over. Stax
6 – BS gets down two Nettles and a Rancor before Chalice hits and Stax can’t stop the pressure. BS
7 – BS mulls to six. Chalice leaves BS with only a pair of Predators to try to win, but Magus and Geddon remove them. Stax
8 – Stax mulls to five, still has turn one Chalice on the play. BS gets the beats on with a Predator and Ledgewalker, but the Predator gets O-Ringed. Ledgewalker pings away for a bunch of turns, then Stax finds a Baneslayer. Stax
9 – Stax Chalices at one, but can’t find a third land to get Prison active before getting run over by a large Predator. BS
10 – Prison slows BS to a crawl, Geddon with Magus follow-up is game. Stax
11 – Stax mulls to six, opens with Chalice. BS can’t cast anything and scoops when Chalice for two hits. Stax
12 – BS opens with Nettle, Stax plays Trinisphere to keep it tapped. Crucible and Geddon follow. Stax
13 – Stax Chalices, BS lands a Predator and double Invigorates it. Stax removes it with Smokestack and Geddon and follows up with Crucible for the lock. Stax
14 – BS slips in a lot of pressure before Chalice, but Magus slows it down for a turn and then Baneslayer hits. Stax
15 – BS leads with Nettle, Chalice blanks the rest of its hand. An O-Ring on the Nettle later and it’s over. Stax
Final Score: BS: 4, Stax: 11Chalice makes this matchup so horribly unwinnable that I’m stopping at 15 matches and doing some boarding, since boarding does considerably change BS’s options. Basically the whole board comes in, more Forests to survive Geddon/Prison, Shusher against Chalice, and Grip/Seeds against everything they play.
+4 Shusher
+4 Seeds
+2 Grip
+2 Forest
+1 Scryb Ranger
---
-1 Might of Old Krosa
-2 Scryb Sprites
-2 Briar Shield
-4 Boggle
-4 Ledgewalker
(Stax swaps 2 Wastes and 2 Smokestacks for their fourth Trini, a Tabernacle, and 2 Karmic Justice)
Boarded Classic BS vs Stax
1 – BS mulls to six. Stax leads with Karmic Justice, O-Rings BS’s first guy, and then locks them out with Smokestack. Stax
2 – BS mulls to six and gets a Predator down. Stax casts Trini and BS can’t find a third land before Baneslayer shows up and wrecks face. Stax
3 – Stax lands turn one Trini, BS finds three lands and blows up both Diamonds and the Trini, but not before Baneslayer hits. She goes the distance before BS can combo. Stax
4 – Stax has a slow start, Kavu Predator is one point short of comboing, so it just hits and waits a turn. Stax rips O-Ring and locks BS out before another critter shows up. Stax
5 – Kor Haven stops Predator from comboing out, but BS eventually just swarms it with guys. BS
6 – Stax stalls with O-Ring and Magus, then lands Baneslayer. Stax
7 – BS mulls to five looking for a critter. Stax plays a pair of Ghostly Prison and stalls forever till it sets up the lock. Stax
8 – Stax opens with Chalice, then Geddons before BS can get three mana for Seeds. Smokestack for the lock follows. Stax
9 – BS combos Stax down to two (it coudln’t wait, Kor Haven was about to come online) and can’t ever get a chance to finish the job after Magus + Geddon reset BS’s board. Stax
10 – A long game where Stax almost loses due to a lack of a second white source, but chumping with Factories buys it enough time to lock BS out. Stax
11 – BS mulls to six. Stax opens with a turn one Chalice with a Diamond, but can’t find another land to keep going. Seeds clears them both off and Predator goes to town before Stax finds more mana. BS
12 – Both mull to six. Stax has a turn two Chalice, but not before BS has three guys on the field. Stax can’t find a third land to Prison, BS gets a Shusher and forces pump through for the kill. BS
13 – Stax can’t find enough mana again and gets overrun by guys. BS
14 – Stax Chalices, but a Shusher forces some guys through it. Kor Haven tries to stop the bleeding, but BS swarms the field. BS
15 – Stax mulls to six. They drop double Prison, BS manages to Grip one, but loses a large Predator to Karmic Justice in the process. A Kor Haven and Factory stall behind the remaining prison until Baneslayer shows up. Stax
Comments:
Final Score: BS: 5, Stax: 10
-For boarding in almost everything, this did practically nothing. The deck no longer scoops to Chalice at one once boarded, but Stax has so many different angles of attack that it barely matters. The artifacts are a problem, the Prisons are a problem, and even the Baneslayers and Tabernacles are a problem. It’s so hard to answer everything (or just have the right answer in hand) that BS still pretty much only wins if Stax loses to its own draws.
-I really wasn’t happy with Seeds, half the time I was staring at Prison or O-Ring holding Seeds and the other half I was paying three mana to kill a Chalice at one. I wanted something a lot more versatile.
-How about Gleeful Sabotage? It can remove multiple targets, we certainly have the guys to conspire it, and as an added bonus the copy dodges Chalice at two and Counterbalance.
-This matchup is awful enough that I’m not going to bother testing the other version until I give Gleeful Sabotage a run in this one.
I’m going to go test both decks against Tempo Thresh now, but here’s my current idea for an update to the regular version:
15/2 Land Berserk Stompy
15 Forest
4 Skyshroud Elite
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Skarrgan Pit-Skulk
2 Scryb Sprites
1 Scryb Ranger
4 Kavu Predator
4 Silhanna Ledgewalker
4 Slippery Boggle
4 Might of Old Krosa
4 Rancor
4 Invigorate
4 Berserk
2 Vines of Vastwood
SB:
2 Forest
4 Vexing Shusher
4 Gleeful Sabotage
2 Krosan Grip
3 Troll Ascetic
What about Noble Hierarch? This creature makes a Silhana twice as big when attacking and putting a Troll Ascetic or playing a krosan Grip a lot more easy....I have not tested this yet, but I will do this tomorrow.
Definitely interesting, I'll try it too. Probably in the ESG slots in my Troll build, seems like the most sensible place. I really like that they could pump a flier or Skulk going over, then still be untapped to chump something.
Now for something weird. . . I haven’t had time to do the Troll test yet, but here’s the classic against Tempo Thresh:
Classic Berserk Stompy vs Tempo Thresh
1 – Both mull to six. A pair of Geese race a Rancored Ledgewalker, Thresh bounces the Rancor on the last turn to live at one and swing back for lethal. Thresh
2 – A Rancored Boggle gets in for a few turns, Goyfs show up on defense at 4/5. One of them takes a swing, BS takes a chance that Thresh doesn’t have Force and combos. It pays off, Thresh Brainstorms for a Force and can’t find it, which is game. BS
3 – BS mulls to six. Thresh can’t find enough lands, taps down to finally put a Goyf in the way, which gives BS an opporunity to combo. It isn’t lethal but flattens the Goyf and leaves Thesh at five. BS finishes the job with Ledgewalker. BS
4 – Thresh’s draw would have been insane if BS cared about Wasteland and Stifle. Thresh dies to a horde of guys. BS
5 – BS mulls to six. Thresh counters BS’s first couple of guys, then races a Sprite and Skulk with Goose and Goyf. Thresh
6 – Thresh lands a Goyf and Goose, has to trade them with pump and dies to a bunch of guys. BS
7 – BS mulls to five. BS gets a Rancor down on some guys and starts taking chunks out of Thresh’s lifetotal while they can’t find a red for removal. A Goyf dies to a Berserk and BS just keeps sending guys over while Thresh holds dead Wastes, Stifles, and Dazes. BS
8 – Both mull to six. BS has a Nettle on the play followed by Rancor with a mana open, while Thresh looks at a useless Daze, Spell Snare, and a pair of Wastelands. A 2/3 Goyf tries to block dies to pump. BS
9 – Thresh mulls to five. It can’t find burn and is forced to try to trade guys, BS trades pump instead and keeps attacking until it’s over. BS
10 – One of the single stupidest games of magic I’ve ever seen. The ground turns into a horrific stalemate between 2 Geese, a Goyf, and about eight random guys from BS. After about fifteen turns BS finds a Ledgewalker and wins. BS
11 – Thresh mulls to six, keeps a pair of Forces and Stifles with land. Forces the first two guys BS plays, then tries to throw a Goyf in the way and dies to ‘zerk. BS
12 – Spoiler: Stifle and Waste suck against this deck. BS
13 – BS’s plays all get countered, double Kavu runs into double Snare, Goyf takes it home with no opposition. Thresh
14 – Thresh dies a slow and agonizing death to a pile of Boggles that it can’t remove. Some Geese get in the way and trade with pump. BS
15 – Thresh kills most of BS’s guys, but still takes a lot of damage and ends up not being able to play offense with a 5/6 Goyf due to a couple of Boggles waiting to hit back. A Ledgewalker does the last few points. BS
16 – Thresh puts some Goyfs on defense and keeps losing them to Berserk and Vines, eventually it runs out of creatures and dies. BS
17 – Thresh mulls to six. It can’t get manage to get green, dies to a bunch of Rancored stuff before it’s able to play blockers. BS
18 – Thresh mulls to six. I’m getting bored of writing that Thresh killed some stuff, but there was too much of it and Thresh eventually died, but that’s pretty much what keeps happening. BS
19 – BS mulls to six. Thresh can’t find green for a few turns and by the time it can put Goyf down, there are a ton of guys on the table. BS
20 – Thresh mulls to six, the game drags out with BS having room to play around Daze since Thresh isn’t applying any pressure. Eventually Thresh runs out of steam and dies to a Rancored Ranger. BS
Final Score: BS: 17, Thresh: 3
Comments:
-lolwut? Perhaps Thresh misplayed a few of these games, but the matchup appears to be utterly terrible for them preboard. This seems to be largely due to how heavily tuned Tempo Thresh's main is to be good against legacy as an overall format. Their Stifles and Wastes are complete garbage here and Snare only hits the Ledgewalkers and Predators, neither of which are important in the matchup. That gives them 12 cards that are largely dead draws, so even if they manage to stall us for a while, BS can win the topdeck war.
-Also, normally they can get good mileage out of Geese against aggro since things like Zoo can't trade an Ape, Pridemage, or Lavamancer and a burn spell for one (or Goblins can't Incinerator them, whatever). BS's pump doesn't give a damn about the shroud and flattens Geese like they're nothing.
-Berserk isn’t used for comboing in this matchup, since they only have eight creatures. Just use it like the rest of your pump: for killing Goyf and Goose in a fight, you already play more random dorks than they can get rid of, so if you can just make your guys trade with theirs, you win.
-This matchup probably gets a thousand times worse after boarding, when they can bring in EE or Pyroclasm. It obviously needs testing, but I'm heading out for a while and felt like posting this now.
How do we fare against the Top 16 of the latest SCG Open? Here's my initial take. I don't have the required test results to use exact %'s (and suspect many people don't when they state them) and think they are overrated in their usefulness. I'm just going to use categories: good, 50/50, bad. Maybe as Otter does more testing we can get more insight here.
Good:
Threshold
Merfolk
Bant (?)
50/50:
Naya Zoo
U/W Tempo
Progenitus Countertop
Goblins
Bad:
Enchantress
Belcher
Aggro Loam
Eva Green
Dredge
Please tell me if you feel otherwise about a matchup and I'll edit this post. As it stands I can't justify playing this deck as much as I love Berserk.
Agreed that Thresh and Merfolk are good, I have no idea about that Bant thingy that Kibler played, will have to test it. There are so many versions of Bant too, CT Bant, Surival Bant, NO Bant, etc -.- *sigh*
I think that with a tighter Troll list and some good postboard mulligans I could bring the Zoo matchup into the positive range, but until then it does seem to be about 50/50.
I suspect that you're right about U/W Tempo being about even, they're basically Merfolk but with fewer dead cards like Standstill, instead packing removal like StP and Jitte. I don't really care enough to test it right now, though, until we see evidence that more people are picking it up. There's just too much other stuff that needs to be tested against.
Some testing against Goblins about two months ago showed the matchup to be like 2/3 wins, while yesterday was more like "slightly better than even." Not sure if anything relevant changed or if it was just the draws, I'd like to play it more and see which is the real state of the matchup.
Enchantress can be difficult because of Grass, but they're also a pretty slow deck for the first few turns. We have a decent chance to combo them before it's hopeless. Either way, not a matchup I'd like to see.
Not sure about Aggro Loam. It obviously sucks if they land Chalice, but I feel like the rest of their stuff is a bit slow and clunky, so we probably win if they don't. It's also dangerous for them to try Devastating Dreams, as a pump in response would be a total blowout.
Never played Eva, I'll get around to it soon hopefully.
This is my deck. I will test the Noble Hierarch this evening. I cut 1x Boggle, 1x Elite, 1x Nettle and 1x Forest for the Hierarchs.
16 Forest
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Slippery Boggle
3 Skyshroud Elite
3 Nettle Sentinel
4 Kavu Predator
4 Silhanna Ledgewalker
2 Tarmogoyf
4 Giant Growth
4 Rancor
4 Invigorate
4 Berserk
4 Vines of Vastwood
1 Bounty of the Hunt
SB:
2 Tarmogoyf
4 Hidden Gibbons
3 Pithing Needle
2 Krosan Grip
3 Tormod's Crypt
1 Relic of Progenitus
I have replaced the Might of old Krosa with the good old Gianth Growth because I want to use them against Zoo as a pump spell to kill attacking creatures. The 2 pump with Krosa is just not enough. When pumping a Bogle it becomes 3/3 with Krosa, to block a Nacatl and live through 3/3 is not enough. The 3 pump from Giant Growth compensate the Bolt and chain lightning. The Vines do the same for the StP.
Most of the time wen using Berserk, the damage was more then enough for the kill, so the replacement of the Growth for the Might of old Krosa should not be so bad. Maybe 2 of both is also ok.
The sideboard is with the Goyfs and the Gibbons is to give the deck more body. They can be used very often because of the many aggro decks around. The Gibbons have a casting cost of 1, so they can easy replace the sentinels/Boggle/Elite.
I will post tomorrow how the testing went.
Here's my attempt to work in Hierarch that I'll be testing today:
16 Forests
2 Noble Hierarch
2 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Skyshroud Elite
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Skarrgan Pit-Skulk
1 Slippery Boggle
4 Silhanna Ledgewalker
2 Scryb Ranger
4 Troll Ascetic
4 Berserk
4 Rancor
4 Bounty of the Hunt
3 Vines of Vastwood
2 Might of Old Krosa
SB:
4 Krosan Grip
4 Gleeful Sabotage
4 Vexing Shusher
3 Cold-Eyed Selkie
Overall changes are +1 Boggle, +2 Hierarch for -2 Scryb Ranger and -1 ESG. I wanted a ninth shrouded guy, so that’s the Boggle, though he’s also there for being another one-drop that can kill Lackey. It’s also three additional guys that can hit turn one to enable a turn two Skulk, who I really hate to drop without bloodthirst and the Troll list sometimes had to do that. There were also too many 2cc 1/1 fliers, so switching two Rangers for Hierarchs cuts the fliers down from 8 to 6, while increasing the power of those that still show up. As for why I’m not cutting the last two ESG for Hieararchs, I like that ESG has a 2/2 body that can contribute in a long game that turns into a ground stalemate, she also surprise-counters Daze, casts unkicked Vines out of nowhere, and is better at enabling turn two kills than Hierarch. That’s enough utility that I’m happy with keeping her for the moment and will be trying a 2/2 split.
(Also, ignore the 8x artifact/enchantment kill spells in the board, that number will go down. It's just four of each until I get around to figuring out what's actually needed.)
I agree with your logic about Giant Growth/Krosa. In the matchups where I used pump to kill opposing creatures instead of combo (Fish and Tempo Thresh), I was pretty disappointed about drawing it. I haven't been paying enough attention to how much the +4 mattered for actually finishing people, so I'm not comfortable swapping yet. What I'm going to do for a while is every time I draw Krosa, I'll make a note of whether I wanted Giant Growth, Krosa, or if it didn't matter. If the results come back decisively for one spell or the other, I'll play that one, otherwise I'll just keep being wishy-washy about it until something convincing comes up
On a random note, I wonder if there's a place for Elvish Archers somewhere. They might be pretty hot against Goblins and Fish, though they do die easily to Incinerators. The main problem is that those matchups are pretty good anyways, but it's still something sort of interesting to think about.
@Otter
Hmmm, although you got some pretty bad results against stax, we got two props on this matchup, which is:
a) It is never that much played (at least here), I mean, the never had cut to the top;
b) Our postboard is supposed to easily break them to pieces;
About the Kavu and Kavu-less tests, I aggre no kavu makes invigorate worse, but nevertheless it´s a great combo-card. Thats because it costs 0 and synergies well with Berserk. And the extra chance of +3/+3 when playing kavu is what makes all the thing worthy, I mean, more chances of faster knocking you opponent (even without the berserk combo actually)
And I have to add the "unexpected" as a pro to invigorate: I've killed a fair amount of goyfs by invigorating a nettle sentinel already... Not to mention when I run Vine dryad and create a 5/6 from nothing... But sure, if you are not playing kavu, maybe there's something else way better for you then. Maybe BotH or even Briar/Growth.
If you fail to explain the reason behind your choice, technically, it's the wrong choice.
Zerk Thread -- Really, fun deck! ^^
I agree that it isn't frequently played, but did you miss the fifteen games where I boarded in 13 cards and still lost horribly? I'm going to try it again with Gleeful Sabotage, but Seeds is awful and it doesn't bring the matchup up anywhere above completely unwinnable shit. The games I won after boarding were still mostly just games where stax lost to its own draws and didn't have anything to do with the boarded cards.
Unless you're Invigorating a Kavu, BotH gives you one more damage on Berserk. It also gives you +3 damage in a race, while Invigorate only gives you +1 unless you pay mana for it. If you're not maindecking Kavu, Invigorate is a worse card. I've played at least eighty games with the Troll/BotH version now and I think I've only lost like two games to not having a card to pitch for Bounty.About the Kavu and Kavu-less tests, I aggre no kavu makes invigorate worse, but nevertheless it´s a great combo-card. Thats because it costs 0 and synergies well with Berserk. And the extra chance of +3/+3 when playing kavu is what makes all the thing worthy, I mean, more chances of faster knocking you opponent (even without the berserk combo actually)
And I have to add the "unexpected" as a pro to invigorate: I've killed a fair amount of goyfs by invigorating a nettle sentinel already... Not to mention when I run Vine dryad and create a 5/6 from nothing... But sure, if you are not playing kavu, maybe there's something else way better for you then. Maybe BotH or even Briar/Growth.
Also, why would you ever want to play a Troll/Invigorate setup that boards in Kavu anyways? Troll has some matchups where it's clearly strong, so Troll in the board is an option I can see, but why Kavu in the board? You want to board out Troll against Goblins, but that doesn't mean you want to board in Kavu. If you wanted anti-goblin tech, you'd play Elvish Archers. I guess maybe it's good against Bant with War Monks, but that's gotta be it. Can't seriously be worth a board slot.
Last edited by Otter; 01-07-2010 at 07:17 PM.
15 Forest
Pump (21)
4 Berserk
2 Bounty of the Hunt
4 Might of Old Krosa
4 Rancor
4 Seal of Strength
3 Vines of Vastwood
Creature (24)
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
3 Scryb Ranger
4 Scryb Sprites
4 Silhana Ledgewalker
4 Skarrgan Pit-Skulk
3 Treetop Scout
2 Troll Ascetic
Yes, I cut Bogle!
Yes, he's untargetable, but without Silly's evasion or the Troll's regeneration and body, he just sits there facing some big dude and waiting for me to assemble the combo. I'd prefer a Thornweald Archer to that, as he takes that goyf or whatever with him.
Yes, I cut Invigorate and added 2 Bounty.
This is not tested yet, but I always felt like Invigorate was the false path, especially where I never played Kavu (simply had none, when I threw the deck together).
Yes, only TWO trolls!
They might become the full four, but until now I think two is enough of a stretch for the mana base. And I've come to prefer evasion over muscle.
Some other things I'm going to test in the future:
Deepwood Wolverine - the +2/+0 acts as pseudo-evasion and it MIGHT be a great help when comboing out. I mean a free +4 damage with one Berserk definitely sounds sweet.
Elvish Berserker - probably too bad, compared to dudes with real evasion. But I think it shouldn't go unpondered.
I'm also exploring non Kavu-based lists, instead trialing an amount of Talara's Battalion & BotH.
Anyways, just as a side discussion, assume you were going to include either Thornweald Archer or Deadly Recluse - which is better in this deck?
Both creatures trade with Goyf, however one pump spell means your Deadly Recluse is a 4/5, which would kill Goyf AND probably live.
Or does Thornweald get the nod because a Goyf-owner won't block it anyways; thus getting through and becoming a good Berserk-target.
Thornweald is just better. The whole reason this deck isn't has serious problems is that the creatures don't do enough on their own. If your draw isn't good enough, you get stuck with a bunch of shitty green creatures and die. A two-drop that might occasionally live through combat with something is not as beneficial to the "all creatures can hold their own weight" concept as a similar creature that will always die in combat, but provides double the clock. Also, take the example of Chalice of the Void: lets say your Stax opponent lands a Chalice at 1 and has taken two or three hits from their Ancient Tomb. If you play Thornweald, you have double the clock than if you play Recluse and have at least a slight chance at winnign the game before they find an answer. The Spider doesn't have a hope of winning before they find something.
Anyways, on to some testing: Out of curiosity, I goldfished 100 games of the Troll version and 100 games of the classic Kavu version to see what the average kill turn is. The rules were that I’m always on the play, regular mulligans apply, and the opponent always plays a non-basic on turn one for Skyshroud Elite.
Note: the ? column means the deck mulliganed into oblivion
Kind of odd really, they’re similar to the point of it almost looks like I made up the numbers. The differences between them are just statistical noise. While a lot of the 5/6 turn games from the Troll deck came from drawing a bunch of Rangers, Hierarchs, and Ledgewalkers (1/1s and 0/1s are the best clocks, surprisingly enough) , the Kavu deck got plenty of its own 5/6 turn games from drawing lots of Boggles, Scryb Sprites, and Ledgewalkers.
I know that goldfishing isn’t an incredibly useful metric for evaluating the deck, but it’s still nice to know that our undisrupted fundamental turn is generally 4 or 5, with 3 being an amazing draw and 6 being a terrible draw (2 and above 6 appear to be statistically unlikely enough to ignore). The similarities between the two sets of data also tells us that there’s a lot of room to screw with the cards in the deck. Since converting from the Kavu/Invigorate version to the Troll/BotH version did practically nothing to be basic premise of the deck, it seems safe to say that we should not consider any specific build “sacred” and that we should be open to investigating a lot of different directions.
Here’s my latest idea of the Troll version. I’m going heavy on the side of trying to improve the deck’s weaknesses and bad draws, while hoping that the core concept of the deck will hold together. Therefore I’m going along with the Might of Old Krosa -> Giant Growth change because Giant Growth is better as an instant speed and/or combat trick and that’s something we need more of, if it weakens the combo too much I’ll go back. I’ve taken out the 2 ESGs and 2 Scryb Rangers for a third Hierarch, two Elvish Archers, and a third Giant Growth. As much as I love ESG, it frustrates me how it’s not a more permanent mana source, so in the name of consistency I’m upping the Hierarchs. The pump count goes up by one simply because I’ve felt like I always wanted a little bit more, there are rarely games where I have said, “Wow I wish I drew less pump.” The Archers are an experiment in combat, with a Rancor tacked on they should kill almost everything in the format except Goyf and any of the other pump makes them kill Goyf. They also kill everything in Goblins, while at least trading with those Chieftain-boosted Instigators which were so annoying to defend against. They’re also nice because they’re useful creatures #5-6 that can be cast under CotV at 1, Rangers weren’t providing enough of a clock. I’m a little disappointed to go down to four fliers (Ledgewalker), but it was simply too awful to have a draw that included three 1/1s for 2. Even with BotH to pitch them, it was miserable.
Troll Berserk Stompy
16 Forest
3 Noble Hierarch
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Skyshroud Elite
4 Skarrgan Pit-Skulk
1 Slippery Boggle
4 Silhanna Ledgewalker
2 Elvish Archers
4 Troll Ascetic
4 Berserk
4 Rancor
4 Bounty of the Hunt
3 Vines of Vastwood
3 Giant Growth
SB:
4 Vexing Shusher
3 Cold-Eyed Selkie
3 Tormod’s Crypt
3 Gleeful Sabotage
2 Krosan Grip
Thornweald is definitely something I'm considering, but I want to try Elvish first.
BotH pitches a card. Maybe you didn't lose due to that, but the disadvantage of pitching a card on a deck that got no draw engine has to be considered. The possibility of only having another pump to pitch also counts.
If you are running a "combo-intense" version, with kavus, silhanas, bogles, and like 20~21 pumps with Krosa and Seals, every extra pump count, so that you can combo as often as you can.
And whenever (not saying it's always, but it sure is often) you got a kavu + invigorate, it's a +11 dmg for berserking. When you don't it doesn't pitch a card, giving plain +5 dmg for berserk.
If you had to pitch a pump, BotH would be greater, but would disconsider a possible +3 from a seal, or +4 from MooK or VoV.
It won't happen always, but magic is about probabilities, and the chances are that it will happen, and I particulary (personal opinion) don't like taking this chance when the other option don't need.
About the Stax, I might be wrong, but I remember that you sided in a lot of business against Stax, but sided out Creatures. That's the wrong plan. You should go more aggro than ever against control decks like stax. You could even side Berserks out since it'll be hard to play rightly. Side in Shushers, the lands (prevention from screw), and Krosan Grips/Naturalizes, let silhana, rancor, kavu and invigorate inside. I don't care if it's Bogle's 1/1, if you got creatures on the board, you got better chances against then.
About the Troll, you probably should try to use Silhana + Bogle + Troll, and go for a 20 pump build, with Seal, Briar and Krosa. Sure, pitch invigorate if you are not running kavu, although I think invigorate is better due to a thing I call Card Advantage. Troll's an excelent card to use with every pump, berserk included, and thus, you can tweak your strategy a little, sticking to a line and being master of something. But if you prefer going aggro, although troll is good against aggro, it's not an aggro card at all. It's slow, and is master in preventing, so, i would call him a control card. And control, as we know, can help combo to go off without problems.
Some final comment on Kavu, I think you should give Kavu a try on the Troll version. When it comes to the 5/5 trample guy, it's auto-win lots of times... and you don't need to save the invigorate for the berserk moment if you get a chance to deal all the 9 dmg (so that you get a +3/+3 enchant for free). And it fit's the "combo" strategy. EDIT: Second thought, it also fit's the aggro strategy. well, it fits the strategy.
Last, I'd like to say that we could use our versatility more often. We got a Aggro-Combo deck here, that can switch from combo stance (with lots of pumps and evasions) to aggro (with swarmish creatures). Although our aggro can't handle Zoo, it should handle stuff like Stax and MUC (not saying muc is common) that are high controlish decks and stall against aggro-swarmish decks. You asked me why whould I bother running Kavu as Sideboard? The answer is: Because kavu changes the game plan that way. I can go aggressive by adding Kavu + Vexing to a list with 20 creatures, and get really hard to hold.
But look: I'm not saying it's the right option, just mentioning that it's a possibility and that it's not a stupid one.
Last edited by Gui; 01-12-2010 at 07:58 AM.
If you fail to explain the reason behind your choice, technically, it's the wrong choice.
Zerk Thread -- Really, fun deck! ^^
I'll try playing the Stax matchup a bit differently for you, see how it goes.
You should make sure to read what I just posted above yours (I think I posted after you started writing your post). It kind of disproves the whole idea that the Invigorate + Kavu stuff is more "combo intense," considering it had practically identical goldfish turns to the Troll + BotH deck. Have you even played the BotH deck? I'm getting the distinct impression of no.
Look, I gotta be honest here: I'm getting kind of frustrated with this thread. I've logged a lot of hours testing this archetype. I've played the classic version and the Troll version in a lot of different matchups (I've posted over a hundred playtest games and two hundred goldfish results and I haven't even posted everything I have done). This is what I get back, a bunch of theory and garbage about what's a control deck and card advantage? Go spend a good couple of hours doing playtest games with both versions and then say what you think about Bounty. I'm just going to go test on my own and try to get a version of the deck that addresses the weaknesses and can actually survive on the worse draws while still comboing out quickly with the good draws. Those of you that prefer to keep the deck exactly as it is can enjoy doing that, at least it shouldn't be hard to prove that the matchups don't improve if the deck doesn't change, that doesn't take much testing. I'll be back either when I have a list that fixes the deck's problems or data that shows they can't be fixed.
edit -- for those of you that actually are branching out and testing things: thank you!
Read it.
I like Giant Growth, have used it many times instead of krosa and seals, it won't disapoint you. Although you don't care, it's more aggro-oriented, and so is Vines of Vastwood, and Rancor, so you should probably want some combo business of the sideboard if you want to follow that thought of mine:
Last, I'd like to say that we could use our versatility more often. We got a Aggro-Combo deck here, that can switch from combo stance (with lots of pumps and evasions) to aggro (with swarmish creatures).
I preffer Goyf over both Archers, and I don't like the Deathtouch one because it dies if you don't have a pump, and i'm not sure how it improves our badmatchs, but if you find out something, let us know.
EDIT:
I think some test is required here too. But I believe we can get Eva green at least to the 50/50 pile. Eva Green has some trouble with several guyss unless if they play contagion, which I don't remember they playing...
Enchantress is probably favorable in the post-board, specially if you run 5~6 naturalize/gleeful/krosan or few Reverent Silence. Considering both pre and postboard, it might not be that badmatch too.
Oh, and Goblins is goodmatch.
Last edited by Gui; 01-12-2010 at 12:38 PM.
If you fail to explain the reason behind your choice, technically, it's the wrong choice.
Zerk Thread -- Really, fun deck! ^^
I've tested Martyr of Spores a few times, and the results are positive from what I saw.
I was running a 20-pump Kavu based list with a 3/3 split of Krosa and Seal and 2 Vastwood, and to test the martyrs I did cut Krosa, since I wanted to make it easier to use Berserk with less mana.
Most of the games that I needed Martyr as a pump, it was +3/+3. I like it's versatility because it was used a few times as the 1st turn drop to help Skarrg second turn.
None of the games that I played I could use the possibility of pumping to avoid 2-to-1 removal on the attack phase, but I kind of expected that, since they know I would break him, and also, I did pump him only few times too.
A concern I had was about my list running Vine Dryads (which I run in the spot of Skyshroud Elite or Jungle Lion, keeping Nettle Sentinels inside) since it decreases the strength of martyr, but I practicaly didn't find that situation.
Once in a while I got both in hand, but i didn't need one or the other, so, can't say how they would affect.
Also, I was wondering that even if I used Bounty of the Hunt, there would be no problems at all, since you can use it before BotH for at least +2, and if you have a zerk, +3.
If you fail to explain the reason behind your choice, technically, it's the wrong choice.
Zerk Thread -- Really, fun deck! ^^
Hi there,
I have tested against Zoo again yesterday.
Vines of Vastwood are very very good as well as the free pump spells.
I played with the Kavu/Invigorate and 1 Bounty.
16 Forest
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Slippery Boggle
3 Skyshroud Elite
3 Nettle Sentinel
4 Kavu Predator
4 Silhanna Ledgewalker
2 Tarmogoyf
4 Giant Growth
4 Rancor
4 Invigorate
4 Berserk
4 Vines of Vastwood
1 Bounty of the Hunt
SB:
2 Tarmogoyf
4 Hidden Gibbons
3 Pithing Needle
2 Krosan Grip
3 Tormod's Crypt
1 Relic of Progenitus
You have to change strategy depending on your opening hand.
Sometimes my strategy was to block his creatures and use pump spells and VooV to save my creatures. This way I could finish the games with Silhana and Rancor.
When I saw Berserk in my hand, I saved the pump spells to do lethal damage with one creature.
Noble Hierarch is great to for having a mana open when they use Chain Lightning or Bolt in there turn. VooV saved my creatures a lot of times then!
One specific game I played first turn forest and Hierarch. Next turn another forest and Kavu, with Invigorate another pump and Berserk and VooV in my hand.
His turn he tried StP my Kavu wich I saved with VooV. My turn I went of......
I also lost some few games, most of them were because I had mana problems or to few pump spells. Then our creatures are just too small!
Last edited by swordoffireandice; 01-15-2010 at 10:18 AM.
Add Horizon Canopy and Pendlehaven. You get extra mana, reusable pump, and card filtering/draw...and I hope you're not running the 15 land version.
Seriously folks, running less than 17 land is wrong. You NEED 2 land in play to operate effectively. Sometimes you might get lucky with a one land victory but it's inconsistent as an old man on an all cheese diet. Consistency wins tournaments, not cutting down to 15 lands so that you can cram in some more pump spells.
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