For what situation?Originally Posted by uncletiggy
i was working my sideboard tech for my (wish) list post NPH and i came up with these 2:
Control Meta:
4 leyline of lifeforce
2 krosan grip
2 beast within
1 faerie macabre
1 bojuka bog
1 gaea's cradle
1 emrakul
1 regal force
1 joraga warcaller
1 phyrexian metamorph
Combo meta:
4 thorn of amethyst
2 krosan grip
2 beast within
1 faerie macabre
1 bojuka bog
1 gaea's cradle
1 emrakul
1 regal force
1 joraga warcaller
1 phyrexian metamorph
I change the leylines with thorns in a heavy combo meta.
only thing that worries me is that i cut viridian zealot from the side
and i play 1 in the main (to fetch with the tutors)
since i added 2 beast withins.
Maybe i swap joraga warcaller and bring him mainboard and put viridian zealot to sideboard?
I added phyrexian metamorph as a progenitus-emrakul-jitte answer and an answer to
random things that can happen.Ii think it deserves a slot.
Tell me what u think.
PS My list is similar to IBA's and David Yo's that toped4 scg Atlanta
i play 4 priests and 4 elvish arcdruid that means i have an alternative to glimpse and a strong aggro plan
and thanks to archdruid i can survive eng plagues.
Visionary is not cuttable. Do you know how much it increases your chances of not fizzling if you cast/tutor for as many of them as possible while comboing? The difference in the % of finished combos is not even close.
It is better to tutor for 1 visionary and from then on for wirewoods, because they give us even 3 cards instead of 2 and might be bigger manafixers if we have an active lord.
Indeed catmint after 1st visionary its better to tutor for wirewoods but that does not make the visionaries cuttable.
We need at least 3 visonaries.but tbh 4 is the way to go because we dont have better options either way
Visionaries let you activate heritage right when they come into play, if you tutor for a wirewood you need to play the wirewood, then bounce the visionary and then replay it, meaning you need to have 3 mana available instead of 2. When you are just starting to combo, especially if you have one nettle in play, it is very frequent that you will be able to continue comboing if you get a visionary since you have one spare mana, but do not have two spare mana to make the symbiote play.
This makes absolutely no sense. You're telling me that you absolutely need to go through 4 wirewoods and 4 elvish visionaries to not fizzle? WTF? Since you seem to have these magical numbers somewhere, can you also tell me the percentage of times you fizzle if you only go through 3 of them?
Provide some arguements because there's Definetly always options.
Again nothing wrong with them combo turn. But iafter 3 casted there is absolutely no way you're fizzling., I don't see the use of the 4th.
My point is not that you have to cast all 4. My point is that when you start the combo it makes an unbelievable difference whether or not you can cast a visionary to get over the first hump. Because of this, running 4 is optimal so that you can maximize the chances that you will have one in your hand in order to blast through the combo start. Casting as many as you can is usually a good idea, but I am not saying we should run 4 because you need to cast all 4, I am saying that we should run 4 to have the biggest chance of being able to cast 1 early on.
It's actually the opposite. Visionaries help you set up the combo turn. The best turn 2 play with a slow hand is to cycle Visionaries. In most situations infact it's better to just cycle Visionary than try to jam out a bunch of Elves; and setup a large combo turn. Playing out other key components earlier (heritage, Nettle) will leave them open to removal. This is of course different when Symbiote is also available. It's actually even better when you have Symbiote and Visionary prior to comboing off.
The few times I ever ran less than 4 Visionary was in k2thej's stream-lined list which ran enough 1drops to continue powering through a single Glimpse. Even then it felt like I wasn't drawing enough cards.
The other time was in Survival Elves, but that had a much more consistent engine.
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Serious question, then; if Visionary is one of your best cards going off, and it's worth running Pact over GSZ for its utility when comboing, why don't you run any copies of Multani's Acolyte to increase the number of Visionaries you draw?
For my confessions, they burned me with fire/
And found I was for endurance made
Because of the reasons Ruckus just posted. Visionaries other huge advantage is being able to play them on turn two, get an extra card, and up the elf count to combo the following turn. I've tested Acolyte before and while I was really excited about how it looked in theory, it just didn't work out in testing because of the echo.
On top of that, 4 Visionaries is a good number because you don't really ever get them in situations when you don't want them, such as when you are treading water mana-wise during a combo and need to keep seeing one drops to make it work. 4 has proved to be the perfect number, at least for my play style.
If they ever printed a cantrip one drop elf....oh man.
You orginally posted tutoring for them during combo turn, and thats what i was arguing against. Obviously casting them on turn 2 or as one of the first cards after glimpse is great, its just a hand with more than one is extremely slow and weak, and often to get over that "hump" youd rather have a 1 mana elf.
Ya when comboing if you don't have one, pacting for one is a really good move. That would be what I meant.
Well pacting for them makes the amount you have in your deck irrelevant haha :) But yeah I pact for one after a glimpse often as well, especially if symbiotes out.
If you run 3 then you have 4 chances with pact, if you run 4 you have 8. It's not irrelevant.
How did you go from run 3 = 4 to run 4 = 8 ??
Did you mean with pact if you run 3 visionaries you have 7 chances but if you run 4 visionaries you have 8 chances?
ya
I dont agree K2. Visionary used to be one of my favourite T2 play when I used your list, but now that I have 4 titania/4archduid I am able to setup a turn 3 win even without glimpse in hand, because it is so easy to cast a regal force with an active manalord. Test how often you win the game in turn 3 when you play turn 2 visionary as opposed to archdruid...
Your argument that visionary is so important to keep the combo going is just not right. I can provide goldfish results of starting and finishing more than 95% of the time with my list that runs only 2 visionaries.
Anyway I think there are more imporant things we can argue about.
I went to a local tournament and came out 7th (3 – 2) with 25 people in.
There were some good tier decks in the field except for storm but also some homemade/bad ones, so my aim was Top 4.
I was lacking 1 priest of titania and played only 12 forest and 1 cradle, which is probably not enough in real life. I had to take mulligan so many times because of 0 lands.
Here the list:
Creatures
4 Elvish Archdruid
3 Priest of Titania
2 Elvish Visionary
3 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Quirion Ranger
1 Regal Force
3 Wirewood Symbiote
3 Fyndhorn Elves
2 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Viridian Zealot
Instants
4 Summoner's Pact
Sorceries
4 Glimpse of Nature
4 Living Wish
1 Green Sun's Zenith
Basic Lands
12 Forest
Legendary Lands
1 Gaea's Cradle
SB
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
1 Heritage Druid
1 Regal Force
1 Wirewood Symbiote
1 Viridian Shaman
1 Phyrexian Revoker
1 Faerie Macabre
1 Karakas
1 Terastodon
3 Krosan Grip
3 Mindbreak Trap
1. vs. MUD: 2:0
G1: I win the dice and go off undistrupted in Turn 3
G2: he has 2nd turn metalworker, but I manage to play a lot of elves + archdruid + zealot to destroy his metalworker and went off turn 3.
2. Vs. UWB Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas : 2:1
(Affinity like list with slower clock but path to exile, ethersworn canonist MD and thoughtseize SB )
G1: He has 1st turn canonist. A very long game where he as Tezzeret out there to keep bombs coming. I manage to get 2 archdruid and a zealot for canonist .He has another canonist and kills me aggro.
G2: He keeps a bad hand but distrupts my T2 glimpse with a path to exile. I combo off again next turn.
G3: He starts with Mox diamond, land canonist. He follows up with toughtseize taking one of 2 pacts instead of wirewood symbiote and plays pithing needle for viridian zealot. I pact for the sided in viridian shaman and combo off 1 turn later casting 2 regal force with an active archdruid.
3. vs. dredge 1:2
G1: He won the dice and had a supreme hand. Played 2 cabal on turn 2 and returned a dude to destroy a land for a turn 3 win.
G2: I combo turn 2 for superior board and a turn 3 win.
G3: had to take mulligan and kept a hand with 4 forest and 2 priest of titania.
His hand is also slow, but he uses darkblast and cabal to disrupt me and got there faster than I did.
4. vs. red staxx. 1:2
G1: Mulligan to 4. Early trinisphere + lodestone golem with umezawa's jitte .
G2: He has another early trinisphere followed by lodestone golem to slow me down a lot.
Luckily I only draw lands and have 2 grip in my hands and a tutor for viridian shaman.
Finally it was so close. I grip trinisphere and golem but he also had 2 phyrexian revoker for my titania to hold me back, 1 etched champion to get me to 1 life + a ratchet bomb on 1 and a ratchet bomb on 2 as combo insurance. I have glimpse, quirion, visionary, nettle, pact in hand. I glimse and pact for heritage hoping that he would sac the ratchet bomb in response to me taking 3 mana. He did and I manage to find another one for the win.
G3: All the fight for nothing he starts with ancient tomb, spirit guide for trinishpere followed by 2 stone rain, lodestone golem and jitte.
5. vs a strange black deck someone tried out: 2:0
Played funny tech with buried alive and Demigod of Revenge and also hatred altough i did not see anything.
Basically watched me in my t2-3 wins. Only disruption 1 small pox in turn 2 where I already had 4 elves out.
His deck is probably not complete crap, because he beat my buddy 2:1 who is an experienced player and had a "fully equiped" UBR counter-top/painted stone list.
My findings:
Combo off with pact was very strong and saved my ass in ~2 games where GSZ would not.
Without pact I think the dredge matchup would be have been even worse.
I never died to pact, but it was close 2 times.
-> still a fan of pact over GSZ!
I will move back to 13 forest and see if I have less mulligans next time.
Imo bring 13-14 forests and put the gaea's cradle on the sideboard.
Do you really need it mainboarD?u have no way getting it.
But with living wish u have it when u need it to fuel pact(regal) living wish or GSZ.
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