[Deck] Countersliver (MeatHooks)

[Hof]

2x Merfolk (WIN and WIN)

One would think that opposing Mutavaults would be slightly annoying, being Slivers and all. Was that ever a problem?

[Curby]

Thanks for the info, folks. Re: bad opponents, I wasn't trying to accuse you of anything. Just wanted to reiterate that as a sanity check. =)

Have you not found yourself wanting another Winged Sliver? When I used to play Meathooks I ran the then-accepted 3.

I'm interested in the Merfolk matchup. Crystalline should be largely moot against them (reduces the utility of Reejery and Jitte, but they have no dedicated removal). That leaves them with more useful lords, including the deadly LoA. We've got some card advantage in the Brainstorm/Fetchland engine, but they've got single-color consistency and Wasteland against the 3-4 color manabase. Bad opponents aside, do you have any thoughts on this MU? Do you think it would have been so easy against better pilots?

What specifically is your concern with Daze? It loses a lot of power after the first few turns and whenever you're on the draw, but landing that Vial can be so important to the deck, especially when you go four colors with only 16 color-producing land and 4 cantrips.

EDIT: Also, old tech from Volt: change a fetch, Tundra, or Sea to Scrubland. Trop and Scrubland lets you cast any sliver with only two land.

[Warma]

I'm interested in the Merfolk matchup.

Yes. The Merfolk matchup is way uphill. Lord of Atlantis is so ridiculous here, and you lose any opposing mutavault fights. I have no clue how he won those, as I arrived late into the scene. In my experience, the only thing that Slivers has going for it is, that it runs removal. You can ocassionally get a lord advantage that way.

Someone said earlier that Merfolk is essentially like Slivers, except better, and I'd say that he is pretty much correct. Against some decks (Burn, any that run Lavamancer, Affinity, Enchantress), Slivers have an advantage through Crystalline/Harmonic, but Merfolk is much more stable. I don't know whether the stability is really worth losing to Lavamancer, though, as he is played in a lot of decks nowadays.

And yes, I know that Burn is not a deck, but you face it ocassinally anyway.

What specifically is your concern with Daze? It loses a lot of power after the first few turns and whenever you're on the draw, but landing that Vial can be so important to the deck, especially when you go four colors with only 16 color-producing land and 4 cantrips.

I've noticed that the manabase screws you over less often than expected. Even if Daze is very good in the first few turns, it becomes completely useless quickly. Considering that everybody here plays these stoneforge/jace piles, games go long and you end up having a few extra blanks in your deck. I'd much rather have more removal, answers to removal or simply creature replacements.

Of course, this is in Finland. Your meta may be different.

EDIT: Also, old tech from Volt: change a fetch, Tundra, or Sea to Scrubland. Trop and Scrubland lets you cast any sliver with only two land.

I used to have a Scrubland, but removed it for some reason. Don't remember why. Have to think about this.

[Curby]

I used to run 18-19 color-producing land back before Mutavault, and I was still mulling a lot because of unusable hands. Perhaps the net increase in land is able to offset the reduced number of color producers, but I'm still a little surprised if you're starting with a lot of usable openers. (Perhaps because of that experience, I now run decks with 22-25 land, heh.)

[grafflo]

Hello

i want to know what you think about my List, i removed green, so that it is 2colored and take use of the some new cards.

// Lands 21
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
3 Savannah
4 Tundra
1 Island
1 Plains
4 Mutavault

// Creatures 21
4 Crystalline Sliver
4 Sinew Sliver
4 Adaptive Automaton
3 Winged Sliver

3 Phyrexian Metamorph
3 Phantasmal Image

// Spells 18
4 AEther Vial
4 Force of Will
3 Spell Pierce
4 Brainstorm
3 Swords to Plowshares

So we have 14 Lords and flying and shroud for all.

[Curby]

Why get rid of green (and why are Savannahs still in the list)? Just about the only good reason to run Countersliver over Merfolk is if you can take advantage of its colors*. In addition, Muscle costs less than the Automaton and Metamorph, isn't susceptible to targeting like Image (you don't always have a Crystalline), and keeps your Vial at 2. You may still want to run some of the pseudolords and clones, but start with the real ones.

* Crystalline is great, but Merfolk has a ton of other tricks as well as Kira. You've got flying, but Merfolk has Islandwalk, flying, and unblockable via Sovereign. Aside from Merfolk having about twice as many real lords, the only real difference is the colors. Having more colors increases your possibilities, but it also handicaps your consistency. Without green, you might as well splash white into Merfolk for StP and call it a day.

[Purgatory]

I think you should actually test the list a couple of times on MWS/Cockatrice, or at least enough to realize that the 3 Savannahs do not belong in there. Overall, I think the list looks kinda iffy, and I can imagine that many starting hands will be awkward with any number of Automatons and Clones, but no real Slivers to go with them. Automaton overall is slow, and doesn't fit into the curve, you'd never want to tick a vial to three in the deck.

I think it's best to stick with green, though if you really want to add non-sliver creatures, I'd probably only stick to Image. I haven't played this deck for a long time, but (since we're pulling lists out of the air), I think I'd start with this:

4 Crystalline
4 Sinew
4 Muscle
3 Winged
4 Image
X Plated (if you feel that there are too few Slivers)

4 StP
4 Brainstorm
4 Mental Misstep
4 Force of Will
4 Aether Vial

and then the correct number of lands, filling up with Mutavault before even considering Wastelands.

[Jeff]

Decided to take Bant countersliver to a small 4 round legacy tournament last night, went 3-1 beating NO RUG, Enchantress, and Mono Red Burn, losing to Merfolk.

I was running 15 colored sources, 3 Mutavaults, and 2 Wastelands, and the merfolk matchup was just awful. I mulled to 4 in game 2, so that was a big part of the lost match, but we played a few more matches afterward, and it was really horrible. His mutavaults were amazing, and I couldn't really ever do anything against him. Since Merfolk is really just a better version of this deck, it makes the mirror match awkward.

Has anyone had any success beating merfolk with slivers? The only thing I could really come up with would be siding in Essence Sliver is racing situations, where I seriously doubt they'd ever be able to keep up. I'm also probably going to be bringing Plated Sliver back, since we're losing misstep and I have a little more space, and goblin lackey might be showing his face again.

J

[Curby]

Since Merfolk is really just a better version of this deck

Every so often I chime in to say the same thing. The question is: why not just play Merfolk? You own every expensive card in Merfolk if you already play Slivers.

I was running 15 colored sources, 3 Mutavaults, and 2 Wastelands

Your proposed manabase will lead to a lot of dangerous or unkeepable opening hands. Two colorless lands is an auto-mulligan. Savannah + colorless land is terrible. Tropical Island + colorless land is slightly less terrible, but still terrible. You'll end up keeping a lot of hands with Tundra + colorless land, and praying that your opponent doesn't rout you with a single Wasteland. It is absolutely vital to our strategy to play Crystalline Sliver on turn 2 as often as possible. Merfolk can generally afford to be a little more patient with getting Lord of Atlantis into play, as it is often played as an enabler for a finishing strike (similar to Winged Sliver in Meathooks).

To answer your question about the mirror, there's Llawan and there's extra removal. If you find yourself trading alpha strikes because of evasion, Ensnare gives you a free attack. But really, just play the better deck.

[Jeff]

Every so often I chime in to say the same thing. The question is: why not just play Merfolk? You've already got every expensive card in Merfolk if you already play Slivers.

Heh. I'm actually just a Team America player taking a week or two off to play something silly. The answer to "Why not just play merfolk" is "Slivers makes me smile, and I was happy all night to be casting Slivers". I'm not at all making any claim that this is better than merfolk, nor am I making any attempt to make this a competitive deck. I just want to play our weekly 4 round legacy events with something silly when there isn't a major tournament coming up, and Slivers is my silly deck of choice.

Yesterday my board had 1 Llawan, 1 Essence, and 2 Eladamri's Call which all came in against Merfolk, but as I said in the only post board game I mulled to 4 so I wasn't really in it. Will Llawan really be all that good in a world without Misstep to stop their Vial though? I feel like I could play llawan and everything gets vialed back in, and bringing in Harmonic for this matchup isn't really realistic. That's why I was considering going to 2 Essences and ditching Llawan.

The other thing I had yesterday was additional Wastes in the board, taking me up to 4 wastes post board, to deal with mutavaults, but I didn't play enough matches to find out if that was relevant. Not sure if that's the right call but losing to incredibly badass mutavaults seems rough.

EDIT: Also, I'm pretty sure I'm cutting some number of colorless sources to get more colored mana in the deck, but I haven't decided on what exactly yet. Losing Vaults seems like it hurts with the low sliver count, but losing wasteland means i'm just gonna get killed in the merfolk match.

J

[Curby]

This is what fighting an uphill battle is like. If you have a bad matchup, either devote more of your sideboard to it or consider it an autoloss and devote the board to helping your other MUs.

Re: Llawan, they might have a Vial but bringing in one creature per turn still gives you breathing room to go in and do damage.

As for the colorless land, it's hard to say. You can't run four of each and Merfolk can, so is this a battle you'll ever win? Note that if you try Wasting their Mutavault and you have a Crystalline out, all they have to do is turn it into a creature and your Waste was wasted.

[Jeff]

I'm perfectly content to devote more of my sideboard to it, I'm just trying to figure out exactly HOW to devote more of my sideboard to it. I guess the question at this point is: If I was willing to devote all 15 slots in my board to beating merfolk, what would I bring in?

I'd like to start there, and then work back to find the most effective way to do it with fewer cards. I honestly don't feel like the deck needs that many sideboard slots for most matchups, so I'm comfortable devoting significant space to beating merfolk, but I'm not certain what the appropriate cards to actually accomplish that would be.

EDIT: Re: Wasteland, does it make sense to cut waste and then just bring in more removal to combat them? I'm maindecking 4 Swords, but I could bring in Paths if I felt it was necessary, and that might be better because sometimes it'll be able to kill mutavault the same way a waste would, but sometimes it'll actually kill a lord, which would be nice.

I really want Fire Imp the Sliver, can we arrange for that?

J

[Curby]

At once point Volt had 4 Swords main and 2-4 PtE in the side for times when you need more. That's an option, though I'd also make sure you stick a Llawan on the field. You can swords/path the single guy he Vials out every turn, but you need big moves to get back when you're behind. You can also consider Pithing Needle (on Vial) in conjunction with Llawan. Surgical Extraction on their lords may help, but in a deck with exile effects it's hard to land something in the yard.

[Tru3z3rox]

I've personally been running a more AGGRO control version of slivers with sidewinder sliver as my 1 drop. He is a pseudo evasion in his own right next to winged as most will choose NOT to block a double flanking dude.

The extra dudes and the bit of removal as well as perhaps talon sliver (first strike) help this deck get there against merfolk. I devoted a lot of time trying to improve that MU. Also slivers is quite better against zoo than merfolk as well as other aggro decks. In addition mirror entity is a beast and can get there on many occasions thanks to lord of atlantis. It is true that opposing mutavaults are tough...

[Warma]

Has anyone had any success beating merfolk with slivers? The only thing I could really come up with would be siding in Essence Sliver is racing situations, where I seriously doubt they'd ever be able to keep up. I'm also probably going to be bringing Plated Sliver back, since we're losing misstep and I have a little more space, and goblin lackey might be showing his face again.

Even though I consider the MU bad, I've won it more than lost. The trick is that (this was before Mental Misstep, which is analogous to the present situation) my sideboard had these cards:

4x extra unconditional removal (I ran Journey to Nowhere because of Emrakul, but Smother/Path will also do).
3x Engineered Plague

My plan in the MU was to side out all of my countermagic and put in plagues and removal. Force sucks here, as does daze, so why not replace them with cards that actually do something after turn 1. Merfolk is often MonoU, so it cannot side in anything relevant, and your MU improves while theirs does not. 1-2 Harmonics replace the last daze and something else in case they have a sword or Jitte.

Doing this, you usually end up keeping more threats in the table than they do, while your creatures still nullify their spot removal. The same actually applies to all other creature-based matchups.

[Curby]

That's a good strategy. Totally plays to:

Just about the only good reason to run Countersliver over Merfolk is if you can take advantage of its colors.

[0dysseus]

Mr. Warma. That is most interesting. Journey to Nowhere > Emrakul, I hadn't realised that. I think Dismember could be better than Smother. Could you please post that list of yours?

Have you guys used Landstill or Horizon Canopy in this deck of late, or space is that tight? A more aggro approach seems intriguing.

I have a casual version of this deck, but generally I'm interested in playing slivers. Any current competitive lists with more ideas, especially about fighting combo and Show and Tell strategies would be appreciated.

[oblivion4560]

Alright guys, here's the deal. I went to SCGO in Indy a few weeks ago. This is the Slivers deck that made 33rd (1 place below prizes ;w;) out of 289-ish. I got a lot of support from people I've never met, and even Gerry Thompson liked what I was doing. I played like shit, though, on account of little food and 4 hours of sleep.

Lands 19
4 Flooded Strand
3 Windswept Heath
3 Tundra
1 Tropical Island
3 Wasteland
3 Mutavault
1 Island
1 Plains

Creatures 19
4 Crystalline Sliver
4 Sinew Sliver
4 Muscle Sliver
4 Winged Sliver
3 Phantasmal Image

Spells 22
4 Force of Will
4 Brainstorm
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Aether Vial
3 Daze
3 Spell Snare

Sideboard 15
3 Relic of Progenitus
3 Pithing Needle
3 Path to Exile
4 Spell Pierce
2 Llawan, Cephalid Empress

My loses were Reanimator twice and Little Zoo. Reanimator should be a piece of cake, but sometimes it is simply too fast to keep up with. Daze didn't do enough, as people quickly learn to play around it. I'm probably going to go -1 Daze +1 Tundra. I never needed color fixing, but the majority of my mulligans were from not having colors at all (Mutavault and Wasteland).

[lebarion]

oblivion4560 ,congratulations on the finish!

I really like your list, but I'd cut the Wastelands - not that they're bad, but I think running 6 "brown" lands in a 3-color deck without a very high land count would indeed cause colored mana problems.

Against what archetypes did you win?

[lebarion]

oblivion4560 ,congratulations on the finish!

I really like your list, but I'd cut the Wastelands - not that they're bad, but I think running 6 "brown" lands in a 3-color deck without a very high land count would indeed cause colored mana problems.

Against what archetypes did you win?