[Deck] Deadguy Ale (B/w Confidant)

[Leto]

for me Grunt played out very well as a 2-Off, but my meta is heavy with *****, so he has enough food to stay long enough. He eventually kills the opponent not, but he cripples him enough to loose

Edit: Stars are T.h.r.e.s.h O.o

Thought my english was decent, why the heck got that censored?

[bokwinkle]

Personally, with my luck, if I put situationally good cards in my deck I will only see the situation where they are bad - for whatever that's worth. I dunno, there are just too many match-ups where this guy is simply dead.

I look at it this way - we are all looking for a creature that can agressively end the game for us when he hits the table (aka a finisher). Having a creature that cannot be played immediately means that you may not be able to finish quickly...or maybe at all - or essentially it gives your opponents more time to have the exact top-deck they need, or do that last few points of damage to you that you simply cannot recover from. Fast opponents are when we need a cheap & big body, and we need them to come down fast - waiting for graves to fill up isn't going to get there. For instance, I keep hearing people say that he's good against Zoo because he avoids bolt and is bigger than many of their creatures....but you'll be dead by the time he can actually stick around because of his own limitations!

Time is a pretty precious commodity here. Bottom line, I don't see this guy as a finisher because when I tested him he couldn't come down when I needed him to, he's more utility or a sideboard card...and that isn't a guy that's worth the finisher spot. There may be a way to make this guy a gold-mine, but I haven't seen it yet.

[bokwinkle]

for me Grunt played out very well as a 2-Off, but my meta is heavy with *****, so he has enough food to stay long enough. He eventually kills the opponent not, but he cripples him enough to loose

Edit: Stars are T.h.r.e.s.h O.o

Thought my english was decent, why the heck got that censored?

You're english wasn't great, but I wasn't going to say anything since it's obviously not your native tounge...lol (and there are very few with perfect command over english anyway). As far as the sensor - maybe a mod disliked that particular deck enough to put it on the sensor list, how funny would that be? It may have something to do with the fact that it's also a video game unrelated to magic, but it seems unlikely. I dunno, funny stuff though.

[Spacemagic]

has anyone ever tried ghost council of orzhova as a finisher?? not saying it would be good, just curious. its a 4/4 with an annoying ability, and a nice interaction with karakas...

[Ja-Boo]

Whats about Phyrexian Crusader? I know, we are not playing infect but with any equipment he becomes a 3 turn clock. Maybe add inkmoth nexus for more infect

[maximumcarnage]

Looks like we're gonna be getting a R/W sword in New Phyrexia.

The rumored name I've been seeing for it is Sword of War and Peace.

Seems pretty exciting. The protections are good, hopefully the abilities are too.

[ivanpei]

You're english wasn't great, but I wasn't going to say anything since it's obviously not your native tounge...lol (and there are very few with perfect command over english anyway). As far as the sensor - maybe a mod disliked that particular deck enough to put it on the sensor list, how funny would that be? It may have something to do with the fact that it's also a video game unrelated to magic, but it seems unlikely. I dunno, funny stuff though.

Your command of English isn't great either. It's CENSOR, not sensor.

[ivanpei]

You're english wasn't great, but I wasn't going to say anything since it's obviously not your native tounge...lol (and there are very few with perfect command over english anyway). As far as the sensor - maybe a mod disliked that particular deck enough to put it on the sensor list, how funny would that be? It may have something to do with the fact that it's also a video game unrelated to magic, but it seems unlikely. I dunno, funny stuff though.

Your command of English isn't great either. It's CENSOR, not sensor. A German guy spells better than you do, and you bash him for not having good English? I find that incredibly ironic.

Edit: some other spelling and gramatical corrections are in order-
1) Tounge-> Tongue
2) Perfect command over English-> Perfect command of English

[Parax]

If you really don't like Grunt, is Knight of Meadowgrain not a good supplement? 2/2 not the biggest, but the first strike at least makes it fearsome. It was awesome in standard back when, and if you put a Jitte on it, or even a SoFI or SoLS. It could be a decent creature for the deck.

[ForlornEgoist]

Not that I would personally run it, but if you're opting for Knight of Meadowgrain, Student of Warfare might be a better selection. Granted you lose lifelink, but you get an extra 1/1 for the same mana and since it's leveler you don't absolutely need the WW to cast it, and you can always level it to for the Double Strike later in the game (y'know, with all that white mana you aren't using :P).

Forlorn Egoist

[K1w1]

Hey guys,
this is inconsequential, IMO.
I think it would be better to discuss about the deck and not grammatic or something else. Im german, so i hope you can understand my english :)

Firstable,

Currently I run something like this
4x Ethersworn Canonist
3x Engineered Plague
3x Perish
2x Disenchant
1x Diabolic Edict
2x Phyrexian Revoker

Im currently running Mr. Safety's decklist and there are 4 Phyrexian Revoker in...so what would you prefer to take in? Im thinking about 2x Tariff in sideboard.

Secondly,

i dont like to play a 3 color deck like this with green. For me, it isnt deadguy with green in. It's more like zoo. And if you want to play green instead of white it takes a nice removal like StP and if you're playing it : Vindicate.
Sure, on the other hand, you've got K-grip, but you can also play disenchant.

[BlindMage]

I would just rather play a reliable creature like Goyf every single time. The downside of having a third color is more than made up for in the reliability of Goyf and the additional Green cards you pick up. I don't want creatures I can't cast on turn 3 and have a shelf life. I want good creatures.

I have to disagree with you about Grunt. While I don't usually use him when I play deadguy, I routinely use him in another (homebrew) w/x midrange/tempo deck and he is always amazing. I do think that most people don't take the right approach to playing him, though. I see a lot of lists with Grunt as a 2-of where he's not doing what the list wants. I think that in order to take full advantage of Grunt, 4 is the correct number.

You don't want to be waiting for stocked GYs to play grunt, you want to play him as early as possible. Your scenario from a few posts up is a perfect time to be playing grunt if you're facing down goyfs or KotRs (or even nactyls and kird apes), because it puts your opponent in an awkward position. They can use removal on a creature that is going to die in 2-3 turns by itself anyway, or they can try to wait it out. I find that many opponents will try to wait it out, which gives you the run of the board (and a chance to do some damage) for several very crucial turns early on. If your hand has anything else going for it, which it should if you didn't mulligan, it's easy to parlay this time into a huge advantage. It's even better if you have two that you can play back to back this way. The fact that he doesn't suck as a topdeck later in the game is just gravy. 1 grunt may not seem like much, but playing 2 or even 3 over the course of a game is very powerful.

I do agree that Grunt is bad against some decks, especially affinity, and that it is not the powerful finisher deadguy seems to be looking for.

EDIT: grammar fix

[Parax]

Not that I would personally run it, but if you're opting for Knight of Meadowgrain, Student of Warfare might be a better selection. Granted you lose lifelink, but you get an extra 1/1 for the same mana and since it's leveler you don't absolutely need the WW to cast it, and you can always level it to for the Double Strike later in the game (y'know, with all that white mana you aren't using :P).

Forlorn Egoist

How often will you really be dropping 7 mana into a student of warfare? It seems to be a long shot to drop that many into it without it hitting some sort of removal. I think at that point you might as well play Mirran Crusader :P (Full loop?)

[Derm]

Hey guys, so there was a discussion about this earlier in the thread, but it was WAY earlier in the thread (like before Eventide came out) so I thought I'd bring it up again:

Bitterblossom.

It has been discussed as an answer to aggro, but I think that ignores the true potential. The Stoneforge Mystic, 3 equipment configuration that has been showing up a lot seems correct. This is, at least partially, an equipment-based deck. An endless stream of 1/1 fliers seems like a great way to use Jitte/Swords. Just one successful attack can really swing the game. Especially if it's SoFI. God, that card's good.

It's an enchantment in a creature-heavy deck, so it kind of diversifies your threats. It's easy to cast, it comes down quickly, and it seriously alters the game. The 2cc slot is kind of perfect for it. Every game you drop a turn 2 must answer threat in either Bitterblossom or Bob? Sounds good.

As for the life loss...Vampire Nighthawk! All the lists have been running him anyway. He's awesome. I know it's foolish to think that 3 Nighthawk all of a sudden makes up for the life loss of 4 Bob and 3 Bitterblossom, but it certainly helps. That along with Jitte and SoLS should be fine. And if the deck leans over into suicide-type strategies a little bit, then so what? Look at it. In no situation was this going to be a control deck, anyway.

[bokwinkle]

Your command of English isn't great either. It's CENSOR, not sensor. A German guy spells better than you do, and you bash him for not having good English? I find that incredibly ironic.

Edit: some other spelling and gramatical corrections are in order-
1) Tounge-> Tongue
2) Perfect command over English-> Perfect command of English

Did you really just reply to the same thread 4 times (and delete 2 of them) to attack grammar on a post that was obviously meant to be sarcastic, and even said "I realize english isn't your first language" and "Noone has perfect command of english"? I'll conceede that I'm not perfect with english (especially when posting to an internet forum), again. It was a joke...move on.

Not that I would personally run it, but if you're opting for Knight of Meadowgrain, Student of Warfare might be a better selection. Granted you lose lifelink, but you get an extra 1/1 for the same mana and since it's leveler you don't absolutely need the WW to cast it, and you can always level it to for the Double Strike later in the game (y'know, with all that white mana you aren't using :P).

Forlorn Egoist

I think both fall in the same category (for me at least) in that they are really aggro cards - both of those cards were good in standard when they were paired with several other similar cards. I just don't think we are there - we can't apply the constant pressure that aggro decks can (like zoo).

...running Mr. Safety's decklist and there are 4 Phyrexian Revoker in...so what would you prefer to take in? Im thinking about 2x Tariff in sideboard.

Secondly,

i dont like to play a 3 color deck like this with green. For me, it isnt deadguy with green in. It's more like zoo. And if you want to play green instead of white it takes a nice removal like StP and if you're playing it : Vindicate.
Sure, on the other hand, you've got K-grip, but you can also play disenchant.

As to the board question - Tariff seems fine, hate for Emmy is a good plan these days. It would largely depend on your meta though
As to the adding of green - I don't think it's fair to classify the deck as zoo with the addition of green. Even with green it still keeps it's disruption spells (StP, Vindicate, Discard, etc) and it still runs bob. Basically, (and they can correct me if I'm wrong) I think people that are splashing for green are just looking for finishers - not necessarilly trying to change the deck to aggro.
As for the substitution of Green for White - I'm not going to spend a lot of time getting into the exact nuances of playing one over the other because I don't think this is the place for it. However, I will say that K-Grip and Disenchant are very different spells, and the un-counterable K-Grop is a pretty powerful tool for any deck.

I have to disagree with you about Grunt. While I don't usually use him when I play deadguy, I routinely use him in another (homebrew) w/x midrange/tempo deck and he is always amazing. I do think that most people don't take the right approach to playing him, though. I see a lot of lists with Grunt as a 2-of where he's not doing what the list wants. I think that in order to take full advantage of Grunt, 4 is the correct number.

You don't want to be waiting for stocked GYs to play grunt, you want to play him as early as possible. Your scenario from a few posts up is a perfect time to be playing grunt if you're facing down goyfs or KotRs (or even nactyls and kird apes), because it puts your opponent in an awkward position. They can use removal on a creature that is going to die in 2-3 turns by itself anyway, or they can try to wait it out. I find that many opponents will try to wait it out, which gives you the run of the board (and a chance to do some damage) for several very crucial turns early on. If your hand has anything else going for it, which it should if you didn't mulligan, it's easy to parlay this time into a huge advantage. It's even better if you have two that you can play back to back this way. The fact that he doesn't suck as a topdeck later in the game is just gravy. 1 grunt may not seem like much, but playing 2 or even 3 over the course of a game is very powerful.

I do agree that Grunt is bad against some decks, especially affinity, and that it is not the powerful finisher deadguy seems to be looking for.

EDIT: grammar fix

You have an interesting perspective - admittedly I did not think of my opponent's responses to the creature, only the difficulty with playing it. It's a good point, but ultimately you're giving your oponent a choice - basically if they have the removal (this seems to be a pretty big if these days) and you run him out there they have a choice - kill him now (if they have to) or leave him there (if they don't have to). You're essentially letting them hold their removal for your next threat. Personally I'd rather them not have a choice, I'd like to them to just immediately realize - "ok, I have to deal with this or I die"

The more tourny's I'm at (local or otherwise), the more I realize that people simply do not pack enough removal because it makes for too many dead cards against all of the combo that is currently saturating the field - this is even more relevant because of the ammount of targeting discard that so many of us run. So, as a result of this meta-game shift it seems counter-intuitive to run a creature that answer's himself.

...Bitterblossom...

It could get there, I won't deny that - it's a very powerful card that could definately find a home in this deck. Personally, I'm not going there. It's too slow for my taste. Also for people running Vial, it has poor interaction there as well. I feel like I already have one finisher that takes 3 turns to develop (Stoneforge Mystic) I don't really need another one. Plus I already run Bob, Thoughtseize, and a bunch of fetches - add bitterblossom to that and anything that can apply a clock would be aweful. I could replace thoughtseize with IoK I guess, and add some more focus on life gain...but generally I just don't think that get's there.

[CorpT]

This is what I played yesterday:

4 Aether Vial
4 Thoughtseize
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Vindicate

4 Tarmogoyf
4 Dark Confidant
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Stoneforge Mystic

1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Sword of Light and Shadow

4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Marsh Flats
4 Scrubland
2 Bayou
1 Savannah
1 Swamp
1 Plains
1 Horizon Canopy
4 Wasteland

Sideboard:
3 Kataki, War's Wage
3 Tormod's Crypt
2 Duress
2 Path to Exile
3 Engineered Plague
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Karakas

The deck performed very well. The downside to this list with 4x Knight and 4x Vindicate is that Bob definitely did more damage. This was somewhat mitigated by the fact that I could kill quicker and had more versatile removal, but it was still much more painful than was used to. I liked it, but it is something to consider.

4 Round tournament:

Round 1: UW Thopter Tempo
Thoughtseize, Hymn and Bob all get there very quickly. He just can't keep up with those. Game 2 wasn't really fair as I turn 1 Vial, turn 2 Hymn, turn 3 double Thoughtseize and vial in Bob. Total removal deal with: 3 Swords via Hymn and TS.

Round 2: Tez Affinity
Game 1 he wrecks me with 4 0 drops and a signal pest.
Game 2 - 4 I wreck him with Kataki 4 games in a row. We just kept playing as he's a good friend. Even with all of his Kataki hate, he still couldn't beat me.

Round 3: Weak Burn deck
Games 1 and 2, Jitte wrecks him. His deck wasn't very good though. If burn gets more popular, this could be a problematic deck. Plenty of good SB possibilities, but probably not worth the slots.

Round 4: PainterStone
Game 1: I kept a shaky hand and shouldn't have. He turn 3 kills me.
Games 2-3: Lots of discard and removal get there. Kataki was solid as well as it tied up his mana for long enough for me to disrupt him. Big fan of Kataki.

This was a sort of experiment. But I really liked it. It was very versatile but still very powerful. I will continue to experiment with variations on this but so far I have not found a good reason not to run Green. Rishadan Port is the only possible reason I can think of.

[Mr. Safety]

I read a bunch of posts, and somewhere Bokwinkle was saying that the reasons for playing white are getting slim. I agree with that...unless you play with the sliver mentality (each creature played makes the other ones on the table better)

Example: How good would Jotun Grunt be with Flickerwhisp? Definately better, and a 3/1 flyer for 3 mana isn't anything to sneeze at. I think this is probably the better choice than Squadron Hawk. If he only had flash, he'd be epic. Without flash, he's simply good. I like him for re-setting Grunt, and there may be other applications as well, especially if there are some EtB-effect white/black creatures. I would say re-setting Sculler seems risky, but it's possible to get another look at your opponent's hand. Again, flash would make the guy (Flickerwhisp) insane.

Deathbringer Liege is a little pricey, but does what you want by boosting your dudes and providing good abilities. Dark Ritz makes him possible, but that 5 mana cost is just gruesome, lol...

Baneslayer Angel is a great threat, again the only drawback the mana cost. For that matter, Exalted Angel is pretty decent, and Guardian Seraph seems to have a decent ability for the cost (4 mana)

I think the key is flying (well, evasion) along with a good efficiency of cost/power. That's why I like Flickerwhisp, and to a smaller extent Exalted Angel and Guardian Seraph.

I like creatures with built in grow-effects, too...which makes me think 'why has Cenn's Tactician never had much love? Spare white mana essentially turns into 'W, tap this creature, put a +1/+1 counter on it'? I think it's similar to a Figure of Destiny type of creature, or any other level up creature (like Student of Warfare). The good part: unlike FoD, you don't need WWW or WWWWWW to make him useful. The bad part: same inherint risks, as in pay mana and POW, in comes removal. I like the idea of Tactician in Deadguy because of all the targeted discard/mana denial.

[CorpT]

Seriously? No offense, but those are some terrible ideas. Flickerwisp is ok, buy you realize Bob is in the list, right? Start running 5 CMC and you can kiss Bob goodbye.

White has:
Swords
Vindicate
Stoneforge Mystic
Tidehollow Sculler

Sideboard:
Path to Exile
Ethersworn Canonist
Kataki
Gaddock Teeg

I can't imagine cutting White.

[bokwinkle]

I've been debating how long I should hold off on saying more about cutting white - or if I should ever talk about it again since this is a thread about a black/white deck with Bob - but it seems that I can't avoid it.

My primary problem with white is that it offers very little that black doesn't already provide, or couldn't be easilly replaced by simply better green spells.

For example, while StP is a fantastic piece of removal (arguably the best in the game) in most cases it is functionally similar to Go for the Throat, or some other piece of targeting removal available in black...in some cases, even Innocent Blood or Deathmark are sufficient, or even superior.

The other example is stoneforge mystic - a good finisher, downright fantastic really. But he's very slow. He's better in a deck that's trying to dodge countermagic - but I feel like our discard is already getting us there against control of that sort. He's also better in a deck that is already applying a clock without him...something we don't do well. Generally I feel that 'Goyf, tombstalker or Abyssal Persecutor are just better finishers than SfM.

Vindicate is obviously a pretty key card in the deck, but if Maelstrom Pulse was used instead we could see significant advantages against decks that vomit their hands (aggro). Obviously we loose the land destruction ability, but it's not the end of the world in 95% of the matchups, especially when you consider that most of us don't run sinkhole anymore anyway...land destruction just isn't what it used to be in legacy...especially 3cmc land destruction.

Sculler is just another discard spell, if we weren't so dependant on SfM and equipment then the need to have bears to equip wouldn't be as pressing. Frankly there are plenty of games where he is more of a liability than an IoK or Duress would be, and he's so quickly outclassed as an attacker that his upside can dissapear fast in the games you need him most.

In the side, I feel that Green is generally just as deep as white, if not deeper

We gain Pernicious Deed and Krosan Grip against affinity, and k-Grip also fills a much needed void against SneakShow, decks that run LED, and Painter/Grindstone....and deed is pretty good against some of those decks too in addition to being very good against aggro. I think that Kataki is one of those cards that seems like a beating, but all it does is buy time while leaving everything that is needed to kill you on the board - personally I'd rather just get rid of stuff that is going to kill me.

Path to exile is good removal (especially in legacy with the lack of basics in many decks) but black is very deep in removal spells, so I don't think loosing PtE is that big a deal - especially considering so few people run it in their board anyway.

Cannonist and Teeg are solid white answers to a variety of decks - they are generally unique in nature and are hard to develop direct replacements for, but neither is absolutely required for ANY matchup. Typically, if you have a matchup that you are worried about there should be something in black or green for it.

Again, I'm not saying that everyone should trade their scrublands for Bayou's now. I'm just saying that I'm having significant issues with trying to develop the deck into what I think is it's next level utilizing white. Everytime I feel like I find a white gem that will make the deck hum I am dissapointed. I keep looking at my 3-equipment/3-SfM and saying to myself:

"Why isn't this 4 'Goyf and 2 Jitte again?"

Because I feel that white is so easilly replacable with green and/or black cards it often comes down to the choice of 'Goyf vs SfM - and honestly IMHO it's not even a contest.

I don't want anyone to feel the need to justify going white - I know it's good, I've been playing it (with decent success). But I'm having clock issues that I'm actively trying to solve...and I'm having very little success because of the limited types of threats in white. I feel this is the single issue that is making my tourney showings 3-1's and 4-3's instead of 4-0's and 6-1's. It's not that the deck is bad by any stretch of the immagination, it just needs a little adjustment to push it from a good deck to a great deck - and I'm having trouble finding that adjustment within white.

All of that being said, there is a high probability that I'll never reach that next level of play with this deck regardless of color because of the caliber of opponents that i'm facing, and my generally poor play...this is one of the primary reasons that I've been trying to avoid persuading people to go from white to green.

[CorpT]

I still don't see how this is a debate between white and green. Run both. It's really not hard at all. You get the power of Swords and the power of Goyf.