[Deck] Solitaire (Enchantress)

[ESG]

Lignify is good, therefore Journey to Nowhere must also be. I'll be including one in the sideboard and probably one of either in the maindeck.

Congrats on your good finish. Journey to Nowhere serves a similar purpose but has the drawback that it can be Stifled, whereas Lignify has the drawback of pumping Tarmogoyf if it's destroyed. My question to you would be: When would you rather have Journey to Nowhere over another Oblivion Ring? And under those circumstances, would Soul Snare or Spirit Link be better, the same, or worse than Journey to Nowhere?

In my view, the main thing Lignify has going for it is that it provides a good out to Iona on white.

[Jak]

Lignify can't answer Emrakul, if I am not mistaken. Seems much more prevalent than Iona.

[caiomarcos]

Congrats on your good finish. Journey to Nowhere serves a similar purpose but has the drawback that it can be Stifled, whereas Lignify has the drawback of pumping Tarmogoyf if it's destroyed. My question to you would be: When would you rather have Journey to Nowhere over another Oblivion Ring? And under those circumstances, would Soul Snare or Spirit Link be better, the same, or worse than Journey to Nowhere?

In my view, the main thing Lignify has going for it is that it provides a good out to Iona on white.

I see Lignify and Journey to Nowhere having a completely different role from Spirit Link. They are here mainly to answer creatures with abilities like Ethersworn Canonist, Gaddok Teeg, reanimator targets etc. Of course dealing with beaters like Goyf is really good, but the deck already deals confortably with the combat step. So, against O. Ring, being 2 mana instead of 3 makes a huge difference (just like Mirri's Guile vs. Sylvan Library) when you have to deal with early pounders like Piledriver while at the same time developing your game.
The best part of Lignify is it being green. It dodges Iona on white (I believe that was the reson it was added to the deck) and is on your main color, but I think today Journey to Nowhere stands out because it deals with Progenitus and Emrakul and equipment.

[Sevryn]

The primary benefit of Lignify is that you can cast it with Iona on the table (set to white). It's good to have some split of Lignify and Oblivion Ring (or Journey to nowhere).

[ESG]

@ Jak: You are correct: By being a colored spell, Lignify can't enchant Emrakul whereas the ability of Journey to Nowhere will remove Emmy (abilities vs. spells). I agree that there will usually be more Emrakuls in a given tourney than Ionas, although some of those Eldrazi will probably be hardcast, in which case, neither option helps us. Personally, I dropped Lignify from my list a month ago and added another Oblivion Ring, which I prefer over Journey to Nowhere at the moment.

@ caiomarcos: Journey to Nowhere can't hit Progenitus due to his protection from white. I generally don't feel this deck should have problems with Progenitus, since we have Elephant Grass, Solitary Confinement and some us have Moat and/or Worship. Your reasons for wanting Journey to Nowhere are all good, and I think it will perform well for the purposes you listed. As I mentioned to Jak above, I'm running an extra Oblivion Ring in that slot for now and have been happy with the greater flexibility it provides. If I desire more speed over that flexibility, I'll probably move to Journey to Nowhere.

[Fjedsen]

Hey Guys,

After investing some money and time in Modern I saw Enchantress on SCG yesterday.
As I looked through my cards I looked down at my Torpor Orbs.
What do you think ? Are they good in Legacy ? I thought about Stoneblade which gets lot of value from its creatures (Stoneforge Mystic, Snapcaster, Vendillion Clique).

[DrHealex]

Actually, Lignify can deal with emrakul, it just involves more hoops to jump thru than it is worth since it involves casting a replenish and the lignify being in your graveyard (can also deal with untargetables).
Although lignify off a show and tell vs reanimator could be relevant (since its sided in that matchup anyways) but you cant enchant the card they drop off show and tell :(

[Pienterekaak]

They indeed shut down the abilities of those cards. But in order to play those, we would need to take out protection cards (which are enchantments that give us card draws). which means that we will be protected against the abilities of the creatures, but not to the actual creatures themselves. And while those abilities are very good, it is not something this deck cant handle without this card. Thus, i would rather play enchantments against the creatures, and the fact that they give me carddraws against the abilities of those creatures.

[aahz]

There was a ton of Enchantress (relatively speaking) at SCG Sacramento. I think there were at least 4 versions of the deck (3 of which Top 32'd) all with quite different card choices. In nearly every single round, my opponent had to stop and read what at least one card did.

We had a little pow-pow of the Enchantress players after the last round to compare decks and sideboards. Unfortunately, for one of us (Shane, I think), there did not seem to be a single Words of War at the whole event (that wasn't already in an existing Enchantress deck). If any of you are here on the Source, it was nice to meet you (I was the guy playing the alpha/beta duals and Lotus Petals).

One thing that did come up on Sunday was all the damn flying creatures these days (flipped Delvers, spirit tokens, etc.) that just go right over Moat. I think I might start running a singleton Downdraft in the side for them. You can spend mana to lock down flying creatures under Moat or you can use it as a sweeper for aberrations/tokens/clique. I'm not sure it's actually needed (in fact, I'm almost certain it isn't), but those flyers were quite annoying and who doesn't love playing with obscure cards. Thoughts?

[ESG]

Interesting find. A heavier green build like mine might find some use in that card in a Delver-heavy field, although I played against Delver twice last night (both packing CounterTop sideboards) and went 4-0 in games against them. It's good to know that card exists, though.

@DrHealex: I think I had heard of that once before but forgot it. That's one Replenish trick I've never had the opportunity to pull off. Maybe one day ...

[Freggle]

With all of this Emakrul, Progentius talk AND hearing Moats current issues with flying creatures why aren't these decks running Humility in the Moat slot and "answering" them all with a bang?

Edit: Well that was dumb. Sorry. It shuts off Argothian Enchantress ...but you still have Enchantress's Presence though.

Also I have seen a few lists running Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and no Defense of the Heart. I assume it's to hard cast it off of the copious amounts of mana many enchantress builds can make, but is that right?

I have been fiddling with a rouge enchantress build of my own for a while (never ran it at a tourney yet) of enchantress that run Natural Order and Progenitus. Since you Sacrifice a green creature you can sac Argothian, it works better than I would have imagined, but I'd have to admit it would be a lot more fun triggering a Defense of the Heart and slamming a Progenitus AND an Emrakul, the Aeons Torn into play.

Anyone else try these ideas?

[Nonex]

@ Downdraft: While it's quite curious of a card, unless you face opposing Emrakuls on a regular basis, Raking Canopy does the same and doesn't require a constant mana input.

[SpatulaOfTheAges]

Energy Storm is better against Delver, which is what the concern is.

[anonymos]

I like Energy Storm as an idea. I'm having trouble finding a non english one for my deck in paper.

I've been playing the deck on MTGO lately. I've been looking for a solid answer to the Bob/Liliana decks more so than delver (availability of FoW changes what's an issue). Thalia becoming popular in Maverick worries me as well. Strangely enough, I'm looking at going a little bit heavier into red to make our deck viable again. Guerrilla Tactics is something that I've stumbled onto that could fix the Liliana problem. Seal of fire seems to be my overall answer though along with MD ground seal for snapcaster and half the reanimation package. My whole list is being reworked to deal with the current meta. It's probably going to end up closer in line with the more combo oriented lists Spatula has been advocating for a while now. I'll be back in a while with more info once testing is beyond the initial theory stages.

[Freggle]

Strangely enough, I'm looking at going a little bit heavier into red to make our deck viable again.

If you wanted to splash a color what else do you gain in red outside of Words of War?

Have you considered a blue splash? You gain quite a few powerful tools.

Mark of Eviction
Seal of Removal - Emrakrul who? ...Thalia
Energy Field - an excellent way to buy time with (Wheel of Sun and Moon)
Words of Wind a very strong disruption / ultimate lock/win with Exploration.
Veiled Sentry
Wind Zendikon
Ancestral Knowledge - a good dig spell
Counterbalance
Spreading Seas - plays better than you would think.
Chill - SB hate
Mystic Remora
In the Eye of Chaos

...and my personal favorite card to run in blue builds Erayo, Soratami Ascendant ...once flipped it's nutz.

Also, from my testing any list that runs Green Sun's Zenith and no toolbox (Dungroves...) should consider Defense of the Heart in it's place for 1 more mana. It triggers very easily in Legacy with no Forbidden Orchard support. ...but you could run Orchard anyhow because Enchatress builds are designed not to care about the board state too much.

You wouldn't even need to run an Emrakul or other fattie (but I still would.) If it triggers and you pull up 2 Argothians as opposed to GSZ-ing 1 AND you get the enchanty draw. Unless you are about to die I do not see an enchantress deck with 2-3 Argothians in play loosing to easily less a board wipe.

If Thalia proves to be too much the deck can run an e tutor package for an o-ring, or a Karakas or blue for all the enchantment bounces.

[SpatulaOfTheAges]

The only useful things blue gives you are WoWind, Seal of Removal, Chill, and In The Eye of Chaos. Red gives you WoWar, Seal of Fire and Blood Moon.

Both have pretty limited application outside of the kill itself; blue is one more slot than red, however.

Defense of the Heart is terrible; it doesn't curve into turn 2 and it's easy for the opponent to play around.

[Julian23]

What Spatula said. Also:

[...] should consider Defense of the Heart in it's place for 1 more mana. It triggers very easily in Legacy

No, it doesn't.

[...] you could run Orchard anyhow because Enchatress builds are designed not to care about the board state too much.

Enchantress actually cares a lot about its lands being basic. I'd run GSZ over DotH any day of the week.

[caiomarcos]

The only useful things blue gives you are WoWind, Seal of Removal, Chill, and In The Eye of Chaos. Red gives you WoWar, Seal of Fire and Blood Moon.

Both have pretty limited application outside of the kill itself; blue is one more slot than red, however.

Defense of the Heart is terrible; it doesn't curve into turn 2 and it's easy for the opponent to play around.

There's also Immolation in red that kills 90% of hatebears (Teeg, Thalia, Pridemage and whatever).

[wcm8]

There's also Immolation in red that kills 90% of hatebears (Teeg, Thalia, Pridemage and whatever).

Seems like Seal of Fire is just better if you want that effect.

[caiomarcos]

Seems like Seal of Fire is just better if you want that effect.

True, but still an option. I just don't like the idea of blue having more options than red because I just don't like blue Enchantress.