My issue with Vesuvan Shapeshifter is it's only an answer, with a cute trick (Fathom Seer) which you'll most likely never have time to use. Whereas Juxtapose is both an answer and a threat, against Inkwell Leviathan I'd much rather stealing it and winning rather than having to race a much more aggresive deck (Reanimator).Originally Posted by stuckpixel
Morphing a Fathom Seer on turn four and then trading it for a fatty seems alot more potent than wasting tempo with a Shapeshifter.
Question after GP Madrid:
Playing against ANT your hand:
Tundra
Fetch
Fetch
Wayfarer
Brainstorm
Force of Will
Ethersworn Canonist
You start, play wayfarer, he on his turn draw, play a land, and casts Orims Chant.
Question is To FoW or Not to Fow?
From a combo players perspective, you should FoW it. A resolved chant is a green light to win, If you force the chant, you can bluff the daze or FoW.
Why wouldn't you force it?
Even if the Chant is a bluff, you've got turn 2 Canonist.
I have bet it was a bluff, and didnt force it.
Will learn my lesson for life ;)
Let's look at this. He has 6 cards in hand with no open mana. In order for him to win, he will need to cast a lotus petal (5 cards left) or a chrome mox(4 cards left). Next he will need a way to get to 5 mana(without LED) in the case that he has Ad Nauseam (unlikely) or 2 mana then 5 mana if he has an infernal tutor. For the first situation, he will need 2 dark rits, or a dark rit and 2 cabal rits, meaning that all the cards have to be relivant in his hand without any can trips. In the second situation, he will need atleast 1 dark rit and then a comination of 2 leds or another dark rit and another rit. Best case scenario involves having 1 card that is not relevant in his whole hand.
Perhaps I'm looking at it the wrong way, but I would think this chant is to get off a tutor or possibly to bait out counter magic. I probably wouldn't waste 2 cards and a life to bluff that I might have more counter magic, and rather save it to protect the cannonist.
Thought same way, actually he had petal, two dark rituals and ad nauseem ;)
It'd be retarded to chant, as an incredibly high bluff cost from his perspective for low gains (+1 W mana later.)
You know he's got the win if he chants.
Another disappointing finish at weekly friday tournament - 1-3
Won round 1 against BGW rock (2-0) in a nice fashion. Then lost to the nuts draw from gwb fish 0-2, then lost 0-2 to Zoo (flooded game1, overwhelmed G2). Then I even managed to lose to Tempo Thresh 0-2 (mull to 4 with no lands, then stuck in g2 with Island/Plains along with 3 Avengers Got beaten by two 1/1 Mongeese).
I just lost really badly 3 games in a row to WUBG landstill.
This kind of landstill is a worse matchup than landstill with fewer colors actually, which you can still wasteland, but 4 color has access to running a ton of removal.
UW could run a lot of removal, but what allows WUBG to do it at a lesser cost is that deed and EE both kill other kinds of permanents besides creatures, so they have applications outside of straight aggro matchups, whereas it would be retarded for landstill to run 4 WOG, 4 swords, 2 PTE, 2 humility or w/e.
I actually didn't open with wayfarer, and instead opened with hands like triple mom, forcing me to go all in aggro. In any case, the idea is to open with wayfarer. If you don't, you probably win about 1/3 of the games, and if you do, you might hope to bring it up to like 70%, so on average it's probably about a 50% MU. Regular landstill against a good player probably is 60-65%.
I'm still actually learning how to play against landstill, despite my experience with 3-4 color landstill. It's clear to me that mulliganning for wayfarer is retarded, but games that you get it are hugely different from games where you don't.
Jeff, please record some games vs Zoo. I've lost like 4 tournament matches in a row to zoo, and I'd like to know, if I'm doing something wrong. This match just seems to be so horrible! They have a metric ton of creatures which are generally bigger than ours, they have a lot of removal, Qasali is pain in the ass, and I just seem to be overwhelmed every time if they get creature heavy, or they plainly burn your creatures and simply race with nacatl/goyf/etc if they go burn heavy. Not to mention library is a beast.
Lol, Jeff doesn't even know how to download Camstudio, let alone record a game.
Although we're working on it. I think we're going to record a couple games from both people's perspectives.
k lol I know how to download like anything. I didn't know how to record a game though it's not like I couldn't have read a manual. Do you not know what it means to be lazy? Anyway a few updates:
Matt and I have lately been looking at sideboard changes, as well as one maindeck change. Matt's advocating 3 grunts in the main, since KOTWO has been unimpressive lately, due to the decline of goblins, which was making a huge contribution to the power of KOTWO.
I'm kind of on the fence. We've considered vesuvan shapeshifter at length, and decided it just wasn't going to make the cut. We both like how it handles reanimator and nullifies exhume, however.
The sideboard changes are we have cut an AOS in favor of enlightened tutor. If grunt is moved maindeck (We're not adding a grunt, we're considering moving it to the main) then we will add 1 ET and cut 4 BFT, adding 4 perimeter captain.
In testing, we found that the steppe lynx zoo matchup wasn't great. It was like 45-50%, but with PC a major change should be observed, since it sits outside of burn range and obviously having it eat a path is great, especially early.
For the more analyzing among you, you might realize that it's kind of an inconsistency that we would move grunt maindeck but not move KOTWO to the sb. If KOTWO was really second best, why isn't it being moved to the sideboard, and if it wasn't second best, why was it in the list in the first place? A simplistic model is that the best 60 cards in the format should be maindeck, and the next best 15 should be in the sideboard. However, the nature of the sideboard cards is different because the percentage that you draw them is adjustable, and so it's possible (and in fact the case) that although grunt and KOTWO might even be equally good maindeck that I am effectively freeing a sideboard slot, since KOTWO would be a bad sb choice. The other possible objection is that if the nature of sideboard cards is essentially different, how can we justify moving a card from it to the maindeck?
I think the answer to this is that if Matt and I were infinitely vigilant, we might've considered changes like this a while ago. We're still not sure it's quite correct, but more consideration should give the correct answer. In any case, we're both excited to see if PC turns zoo from like 45-60% to a rather favorable matchup, while we keep our ichorid matchup essentially constant in the last few changes, trading 4 BFTs (which fulfill a roll that most of the creatures can fulfill, albeit more inconveniently) with 2 ETs. To post my updated list:
(Matt's might differ by like +/- propaganda and 1 other card or something:
// Lands
4 [ON] Flooded Strand
4 [A] Tundra
3 [ON] Windswept Heath
3 [TE] Wasteland
2 [9E] Plains (1)
1 [BD] Island (3)
// Creatures
4 [ON] Weathered Wayfarer
3 [CS] Jotun Grunt
4 [DD2] Fathom Seer
4 [UL] Mother of Runes
4 [TSP] Serra Avenger
2 [WWK] Stoneforge Mystic
// Spells
4 [BD] Brainstorm
4 [AL] Force of Will
4 [OV] Swords to Plowshares
2 [BOK] Umezawa's Jitte
3 [DS] AEther Vial
3 [NE] Daze
2 [ZEN] Spell Pierce
// Sideboard
SB: 2 [10E] Aura of Silence
SB: 1 [LRW] Thorn of Amethyst
SB: 1 [FNM] Tormod's Crypt
SB: 1 [ALA] Relic of Progenitus
SB: 4 [MI] Enlightened Tutor
SB: 1 [SHM] Wheel of Sun and Moon
SB: 1 [ALA] Ethersworn Canonist
SB: 4 [WWK] Perimeter Captain
It would be nice to replace the 3rd grunt with a blue creature that does something decent. Both aven mimeomancer and vendillion clique are below the requirements for making the list, as is spellstutter sprite. Some other suggestions that might be made are ninja of the deep hours, cloud of faeries, etc. I remind you we're not a fish deck. If you have suggestions, they are welcome but please ensure they are backed by well thought out logical reason.
So now I've argued for the configuration above.
I actually think that KOTWO is a slightly better maindeck choice, but for the reasons posed above, grunt carries a virtual sideboard slot with it. (I've already addressed possible "conservation law" type arguments that you might try to bring up to say why I can't create a virtual sideboard slot by a change like this.)
One thing I would like to improve UWT's matchup against is decks running lots of removal. More fathom seer type cards here are helpful. (Although not vesuvan shapeshifter because it depends on seer not being removed, as well as sets up for 2-3:1 unnecessarily, almosts as blatantly as how mom does it.)
But I'm not too desperate to improve landstill. Nonremoval heavy is virtually impossible for the other guy to win, and removal heavy is still about a coin flip, because you can still get a wayfarer to stick for the near autowin, which accounts for at least 15% of games that don't even really develop, with UWT just winning right out the gates. (And then some of the 85%, your wayfarer got forced which is a huge advantage to start with.)
I will start to do some commentaries, and you will get to see a second perspective of the deck, as well as some commentaries from the player playing against UWT. But I won't post as frequently as Matt, at least I envision.
EDIT: I thought about it a bit more and realized that such "conservation" type arguments actually do work. I don't want to discuss the right way to argue a proof for this, but basically it's still consistent to put grunt main as long as we either say we made a mistake before, or the metagame changed, grunt is actually better than KOTWO as maindeck choice, etc.
Have you considered Azorious Guildmage?
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Ca...iverseid=97077
@Forbiddian:
I just saw the game against Solidarity (the second one) and by the time you vial the Ethersworn Cannonist into play he has lost the game. If he plays Meditate he has only 3 mana and he needs to find a Reset in those 4 cards. Since he didnt find a Reset he lost the game. He can play another High Tide, but then he has only 4 mana left to play another cc1 or cc2 cantrip to get a chance to play a Reset. He couldn't do shit by that time. It would have been interesting to know, which card he drew off the top to know, why he didn't go for it at the end of your turn.
Overall i would say that the matchup for Solidarity isnt that bad against UW Tempo as long as the UW Tempo player doesnt get an Ethersworn Cannonist into play. If you are really going to play Solidarity these days, you really need to include Mindbreak Trap over Disrupt in the sideboard, since it makes counter wars so much easier to win.
The MU from solidarity's perspective is terrible; it's actually surprising that the matches made it seem as if we were neck and neck.
You question why I didn't go off at the end of Matt's turn. I don't see a strong incentive to do so. If it's just to avoid letting him have a draw step, it's probably a terrible idea, because then I can't use reset.
It almost seems like you're making a hindsight 20/20 argument.
Nah. You tried to go off at the end of his turn. He answered with a counter. Then you canceled your attempt, took your own turn and passed it. I'm wondering why you didnt go for it at that moment, because i don't know which card you drew in your own turn after that. That's what i was asking.
I dont think that the matchup is terrible. Counter's dont matter that much game 2, if you get a Mindbreak Trap, which is very likely with a deck full of cantrips. But an Ethersworn Cannonist is neckbreaking for Solidarity.
Uh, watch the game again, the key question is whether he Forces back with the Twincast or if he gets greedy and Twincasts my Force. If he Forces back softcast, then he probably wins (assuming I don't draw something relevant in my draw step).
Game state:
Him: 7 lands, Force, Twincast, Meditate, High Tide
On top: Meditate, High Tide, Remand, Land, Turnabout, Remand, Peer Through Depths, Brainstorm (yes, he got EXTREMELY lucky).
Me: Force of Will, Daze
He casts the High Tide, either upkeep or draw step (probably draw step is better -- it's fleetingly unlikely he can go off without using a Reset since he still needs Storm count @ 15 to pull it off, and changing steps costs all the floating mana).
If I Force, he should Force back. I went over how if he Twincasts back, he doesn't have enough mana leftover.
This leaves him with 6 islands untapped. He uses 2 land (floating U) to Meditate. That draws him into the first group of 4. He High Tides again with the floating mana, so he has 4 islands left (12 mana). With 3, he casts Meditate again, then he casts turnabout targetting himself and floats 5, untapping all 7 lands (now he has 26 mana to work with.
He needs to find more draw material in the Peer Through Depths + Brainstorm he has left, and eventually he needs a BF and another Turnabout to tap my dudes before he dies. But the storm count is already at 6 and he has effectively infinite mana. It's at the point, actually, where he should Remand his own Brainstorm to draw an extra card.
He can still cast High Tide in your upkeep before you draw. He can't Reset yet, but it's easier to resolve the High Tide this way. Then, he can go off later (in your draw step or whatever); High Tide lasts the whole turn.
Also, at the end another draw spell isn't necessarily needed. Brain freeze targeting himself finds Flash of Insight, and more than likely wins assuming a Cunning Wish/Turnabout and a Remand/other Brain Freeze is left still.
Yeah assuming you dont draw that Cannonist, he will most likely win the game. I was talking about the time, when the Cannonist was on the stack. By that time he had lost the game, since he cant combo out on top of the stack, since he didnt find the relevant stuff in his Meditate to do so.
I was just wondering if the material in his hand 2 turns earlier in your end step wasn't enough. You countered his attempt to get into the combo. Then he took his own turn, drew 1 card and passed to try it in your draw step, where you drew the Cannonist. He had basically 1 card less in hand by that time. I would love to know which one it was to get a clue wether it could have been good to go on or not.
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