[Deck] Dreadstill - Enter the Fist

[Yan]

Faerie Macabre wrecks Reanimator's plans. It's a bit more narrow than other graveyard hate, but if Reanimator is a big problem, consider using a couple of them in the board. I see you've considered them, but they really do work fantastically.

I know they do :D I just think there's no room in the board for them without weakening some other matchups. I could see them replacing other graveyard hate but I fear they are too narrow against other decks for Dreadstills purposes. Have to test it out. For sure Macabre is the best card against Reanimator. We even have EE for Reanimators Needles on Macabre...

[Rood]

In terms of Crypt/Relic I actually prefer Crypt more because of how much faster it is to be Trinket Maged. I feel in alot of matchups the extra speed really does come in handy.

[Yan]

Tested today against Reanimator with this sideboard:

4 Faerie Macabre
3 Pyroblast
3 Lightning Bolt
3 Firespout
1 EE
1 Crucible

I sided in ofcource the macabres, EE (for needle on macabre) and couple of blasts. Out came atleast all of the mages and something random. It was certainly a lot easier than without Macabres... It's still not an auto win or anything like that but atleast it becomes more or less an even fight.

So I thought about why I was even running Relics or Crypts? True, that they can be tutored with mage, but at the time you can play mage, against most of the graveyard decks it is already too late. Macabre isn't much worse in many of the other matchups either. Loam is just one card problem so Macabre handless it nicely. Ichorid has never been a real problem for me with this deck, so where do we really need mass graveyard removal? We also have 'a really large beatstick' in the deck so I'm not really that frightened about goyf or knight or what so ever. Only con I could really think of was the fact that Firespout was really nice with Relic against those graveyard based creatures... Please enlighten me more?

[Van Phanel]

Relic deals with Goyf (also Knight of the Reliquary when coupled with Bolt or Firespout). That's why I personally prefer it to other graveyardremoval. As long as don't mind that Explosives is your only answer to a resolved big creature, there's nothing wrong with running Faerie Macabre.

[The Atog Lord]

While I applaud the vigorous discussion of Dreadstill, I fear that much of the present discussion misses the most pressing concern for modern builds of the deck -- fast aggro. Dreadstill is excellent as dispatching other blue decks, and can be made strong against combo decks. I believe that, if pressed, Dreadstill could be given a favorable matchup against ANT, Reanimator, and Merfolk. But those are not the issues.

The problem with Dreadstill is actually Zoo. Dreadstill can easily halt a single Ad Nauseam from resolving, and can prevent the opponent from assembling intricate contraptions. Steppe Lynx, on the other hand, is quite difficult to stop. If the opponent opens with that cat, and Dreadstill doesn't have a Force in its opener, things become rather bleak. Trinket Mage isn't large enough to stop anything in Zoo, short of being a chump blocker. Engineered Explosives is slow against a first-turn threat, and Zoo staggers its mana costs.

Worst of all, Zoo has evolved such that our old means of dealing with them are no longer nearly as effective. Dreadnought runs into the wrong side of a Pridemage or an STP/PTE. And they all board right into a handful of Krosan Grips. Tarnogoyf, which I started running years ago in Dreadstill to combat aggro, has lost some of his luster. Exalted, in particular, lets the opponent crash his Goyf right through yours, rather than letting you enjoy the extra time as in the past.

The old strategy in the matchup was to buy enough time until Dreadnought arrived. Given how easily he is dispatched, the no longer works. Instead, the matchup now seems to involve treading water while trying to mount an offense through a huge pile of disruption -- not a winning plan.

And as long as Zoo is a horrible match for Dreadstill, I have serious concerns about sleeving it up for a tournament.

[Rood]

True statement by Rich the harder MUs for this deck are the faster aggro decks like Zoo. Perish is definetally solid against Nacatl, Pridemage, Goyf etc. EE has been the best card for me at least at handling this MU...along with Spout. Let me know how you guys feel about this MU?

[Muradin]

I feel comfortable playing against zoo with a standard Ur Dreadstill list and I believe this matchup is slightly favorable for Dreadstill both, pre and postboard. You just mustn't let them 2-1 you early on and play the control route postboard. My sideboard has 4 Lightning Bolts, 1 Engineered Explosives and 2 Firespout to bring in for this matchup so postboard it basically plays out like Ur Landstill against Zoo which is indeed favorable.
I come to this conclusion because I win about half of the games where I play against Zoo and both players are in the game. But there are another 10-15% of games where I manage to completely manascrew Zoo and thus I believe this matchup is indeed favorable after having played it on tournaments about 15 times. Still Zoo remains one of the harder matchup for this deck as well as Merfolk running Spellstutter Sprite, Ubr Tempo Faeries with Tombstalker, UWg Landstill and Suicide style decks.

[pippo84]

I think that zoo is a favorable MU poastboard with Firespouts and Lightning Bolts coming from the board.
The first game though is in their favour. Anyways It's a playable match where the opening hand and mostly player skills are very important to win.

[dsck]

What do you think of running 2 Mystical Tutor in place of 2 Trickbind and using Not of this World as 1-off target?

[neckfire]

True statement by Rich the harder MUs for this deck are the faster aggro decks like Zoo. Perish is definetally solid against Nacatl, Pridemage, Goyf etc. EE has been the best card for me at least at handling this MU...along with Spout. Let me know how you guys feel about this MU?

this is why i have actually switched to a bant deck.
I still have a bant natoural order deck that uses a painter grindstone kill in it.But with zoo still running around dreadstill is not a good deck unfortunatly.I dont know about you guy's but i dont like being on the defensive the entire time.
Also if your going to run perish run 3 you WANT to see them...

[dorsch]

Hi,
I am new to this deck and still learning how to play it properly. Even though I did a lot of research in this thread and via google, I was not able to find information on proper sideboarding.
So I think I’ll post boarding plans, as far as I’ve figured them out, and you guys correct me when necessary.
I’ll use this list from Simon Ritzka, second at Bazaar of Moxen


4 Phyrexian Dreadnought
3 Trinket Mage

4 Brainstorm
3 Daze
4 Force of Will
4 Spell Snare
4 Stifle
2 Trickbind

3 Counterbalance
4 Standstill

1 Engineered Explosives
3 Sensei's Divining Top

2 Flooded Strand
4 Island
4 Mishra's Factory
2 Polluted Delta
2 Scalding Tarn
1 Underground Sea
3 Volcanic Island
3 Wasteland

Sideboard:
3 Lightning Bolt
3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Firespout
2 Perish
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Tormod's Crypt


Zoo:
-4 Standstill, -1 Trinket Mage, -1 Daze, -1 Dreadnought, -1 Trickbind
+ 3 Lightning Bolt, +2 Firespout, +2 Perish, +1 EE

Merfolk:
-4 Standstill, -4 Spellsnare (Daze?, Trickbind? I guess keep Daze on the Play)
+3 REB, +2 Firespout, +1 EE, +1 Crucible, +3Lightning Bolt

Canadian Thresh:
- 1 Dreadnought, -1 Trinket Mage, -1 EE, -1 Trickbind, -1 Standstill
+3 REB, +2 Perish

Bant Survival:
-3 Daze, -1 Dreadnought, -1 Standstill
+3 REB, +2 Perish (Lightning Bolt? Firespout? EE?)

Bant CB/NO
-3 Daze, -1 Dreadnought, -1 Standstill
+3 REB, +2 Perish (Lightning Bolt? Firespout? EE?)

Reanimator:
- 4 Standstill, -2 Trickbind, -1 Dreadnought, (Spellsnare?)
+1 Tormod’s Crypt, +2 Relic, +3 REB

Landstill/Walker
-4 Standstill
+3 REB, +1 Crucible

ANT without red
-4 Standstill, -1 EE, -1 Trinket Mage
+3 REB, +3 Lightning Bolt

ANT with red
-4 Standstill
+3 REB, +1 EE

If you have to correct me, please add an explanation.

[neckfire]

dont side out standstill vs ant
side out a mixture of noughts and trickbinds.

[Rune]

@dorsch

I'll try to give some input based on my experience with the deck:

Against Zoo and Merfolk you should consider taking out FoW sometimes. It's too much card disadvantage and it's better to just trade cards 1-for-1 or 2-for-1 them with mass removal. You don't really need to force anything Zoo plays (except for Path, but it's CB's job to take care of that), and the only thing you want to force against Merfolk is Vial (Standstill gets Snare'd/REB'd). Having FoW on the play against Merfolk is probably acceptable, but I think it sucks on the draw where you can potentially get blown out by first turn Vial + Daze on your FoW.

I think you should board out Daze in most matchups when you are on the draw, it's too much of a tempo-loss. It should stay in vs combo.

Against Canadian Thresh and BantSur you should board in some relics.

I don't think you should board out Standstill against ANT. If you have Standstill in play against them they can't sculpt their hand with cantrips and they will be drawing random cards off the top (which is very bad for ANT) and they will be forced to discard while you will be able to abuse SDT and find infinite counterspells. If it's DDANT (plays 4 SDTs), then it's probably correct to board them out. EE doesn't do anything against ANT, unless the opponent is really stupid and passes priority at the wrong time with LED in play or something.


Against Landstill and Walker, I think Dreadstill operates better under Standstil and you shouldn't take it out. Those decks rarely play SDT, but you have 3, meaning you can dig for Wastelands and Factories while they draw random cards. The only scary thing they can do under Standstill is cycle Decree of Justice but it takes a long time to set that up, and a bunch of 1/1's don't block huge factories very well)

[dsck]

I went 6-2 (lost twice to Death&Taxes), and placed top 4 in a tournament for Tabernacle. There were 30 participants, mostly Merfolk/Loam/Zoo, I think.

I played 2 Not of this World in SB and they won me top8 game vs Dark Zoo. I also played 2 Explosives (+1 maindeck) in the SB and they worked very well and blew Vials and other stuff all day.

Can someone give some tips vs DnT?

[Rood]

DnT is kinda brutalizing matchup for dreadstill. Best strategy is to ride out Firespout and just play almost pure control route. Since they run Wastes/Ports it's normally hard to operate under a Standstill vs them. They don't run the most removal in the world, so if you get a chance to Dreadnought with one counter backup I'd take it.

[pippo84]

After some matches I think that a small black splash is mandatory for Perish. Just to beat Pro Bant.
Also played against Zoo and Merfolk and had no problems with them.

[BKclassic]

Illusionary Mask seems better than Trickbind. Thoughts?

[Tammit67]

Illusionary Mask seems better than Trickbind. Thoughts?

Dreadstill doesn't run enough creatures to make use of mask, not to mention it shuts down mage. Trickbind, however, has uses without nought.

[Vacrix]

Illusionary Mask seems better than Trickbind. Thoughts?

Eh IDK about that. Trickbind can interact with the opponent AND turn on your nought.

[jazzykat]

I've posted a little bit earlier in this thread but for the benefit of everyone I will mention that grim lavamancer MD has had a little succes. Cut down to 3 noughts, no trickbind and a card of your choice then just up the volcanic count to 4. UW tempo, D&T, and surprisingly Bant becomes much easier. It also provides heavy support vs Merfolk and makes Standstill better vs. just about everyone.