[DTB] Team America (Aggro/Tempo Thread)

[catmint]

I can't get behind Grixis Tempo for the following reasons:

I don't think 8 rather fragile wincons are enough.

Delver is fragile because of its low toughness.

Tombstalker is fragile because its needs BB and some cards in the yard and can easily be sworded or beaten/outclassed by life total advantage or some other board presence that was achieved earlier.

If you compare that to RUG tempo which plays 12 creatures (4 of them having shroud), just the addition of discard cannot make up for the loss of threat density.

Comparing to TA, I feel the deck wins red reach, but looses it's most important defense with Goyf & Deed.

[Tombstalker]

I can't get behind Grixis Tempo for the following reasons:

I don't think 8 rather fragile wincons are enough.

Delver is fragile because of its low toughness.

Tombstalker is fragile because its needs BB and some cards in the yard and can easily be sworded or beaten/outclassed by life total advantage or some other board presence that was achieved earlier.

If you compare that to RUG tempo which plays 12 creatures (4 of them having shroud), just the addition of discard cannot make up for the loss of threat density.

Comparing to TA, I feel the deck wins red reach, but looses it's most important defense with Goyf & Deed.

I agree that 8 wincons arent enough but I think thats really the only thing holding TA back right now. Goose is sick no doubt, I ended a game yesterday with 2 geese and afterwards my bant opponent showed me a hand with 3 StP and 2 punishing fire he was wittling me down with lol, tombstalker wouldnt have survived that.
However barring shrouded nacatls the rest of RUGs wincons are just as fragile (delvers) or even moreso than tombstalker (goyf eats more forms of removal) and geese/goyfs all require grave presence too. Goyf is the creature I value the least in either deck though and ive even been toying with dropping down to 3 in CT since 12 threats can clog at times and another ground pounder isnt that welcome over more disruption/burn.

Back on topic though, post board UBr has some amazing SB answers to the top decks right now and maindeck hard removal like snuff out vs dismember is awesome against bant and maverick. The way I see it TAs main problem is that canadian thresh does tempo better than the current TA builds. If we change this than TA will unseat CT as a DTB. Am I mistaken here?

In theory if TA makes its curve as low/lower than CT, runs the same counter suite, same burn, free hard removal (snuff out) and packs bigger more resilient creatures that all have evasion plus better SB answers vs green it should be the obvious winner.

[wcm8]

I am playing 10 creatures in my current Grixis list, but really, these aren't the only win-conditions as the burn spells play a huge role in finishing games. The lack of reach is one of the biggest problems with UBG TA, since control decks have virtually more maindeck removal thanks to Snapcaster recursion.

Delver *is* fragile, but if he gets in for 6-9+ damage, he's done his job and then some. If he eats a Swords, that just means that they won't have it for your Tombstalker.

Basically, Team Grixis hybridizes RUG and TA and takes their strongest elements (black for disruption, red for efficient removal/reach and REB/Pyroblast) and drops their weakest point (the green creatures). I am keeping track of my performance with the deck and tuning it as I go, and so far I think it's more powerful in the current metagame than either of the parent decks.

Why do I say that green is the weakest part of the two decks?
-Mongoose's usefulness will be limited in game 1 against Esper Stoneblade as they can fog it nearly indefinitely with Spirit Tokens. In the SB games, UWx Blade will probably start to adopt more answers to the Goose via Perish and/or Engineered Explosives, making the shroud a non-issue. Not to mention, Mongoose is perhaps the WORST creature against combo and dedicated aggro decks and will often get sided out.

-Tarmogoyf is vulnerable to every non-red removal spell, is an obvious target to the ubiquitous Spell Snare, quickly gets outsized by the actual aggro decks in the format, and is green. Being Green makes it a liability to any deck running Submerge and/or Perish. The format has moved away from Tribal Aggro, which was where Goyf really shined. Right now, Tarmogoyf seems to be a solution looking for a [currently] non-existent problem.

-Neither of these creatures fly, which often leads to an awkward board state against a deck like Maverick where you couldn't race even if you wanted to. By having flying beats, you are more often in a position to race and completely ignore Mother of Runes.

-The main things I miss from Green are Sylvan Library, Life from the Loam, and Pernicious Deed. Deed was mostly for winning against random decks in tournaments, but you still have access to Engineered Explosives as an all-purpose sweeper. Loam and Library don't have any obvious replacements in Grixis, but even these weren't essential to the decks. Loam and Deed are probably better fits for a deck built further up the control spectrum rather than trying to shove them into a tempo shell.

Red helps patch up some of the weaknesses of TA, namely the aforementioned lack of reach and also the vulnerability to Planeswalkers. Bolts are simply the best form of removal for a tempo deck, and until they print a good one-mana black removal spell I don't think this will change.

Black helps patch up some of the weakness of RUG, which was mostly to big dumb green dudes. Perish, Darkblast, Massacre, Dread of Night, and other black removal spells are better at defeating Maverick than Submerge/Mind Harness. Thoughtseize also helps out a lot against control and combo decks -- not that these matchups were so bad before, but they are especially easier thanks to Thoughtseize.

I urge everyone to at least personally test my list before dismissing it due to any theoretical weaknesses.

[Borealis]

I'm just rejoining Legacy after a reasonably lengthy hiatus, having been focused a bit more on Modern, Standard, and life in general. I've collected just about all the cards for RUG tempo, and played it for awhile, but as with Standard Delver I always felt like I wasn't playing optimally and that my playstyle prefers a more powerful suite of cards. I loved playing Junk, and did rather well with it even while it was on the Tier 3 backburner on the bigger picture, so I've decided to come back halfway and build BUG.

Here is the list I'll be striving towards as I finish collecting the necessary cards. It's Alex Gonzales' 4th place deck from SCG St. Louis this past December:

Artifacts
1 Sensei's Divining Top

Creatures
4 Dark Confidant
4 Snapcaster Mage
4 Tarmogoyf

Enchantments
1 Sylvan Library

Instants
4 Brainstorm
1 Dismember
4 Force of Will
3 Ghastly Demise
1 Go for the Throat

Planeswalkers
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

Sorceries
4 Hymn to Tourach
2 Thoughtseize
1 Unearth

Lands
2 Bayou
3 Misty Rainforest
4 Polluted Delta
1 Riptide Laboratory
2 Tropical Island
4 Underground Sea
3 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

Sideboard:
4 Pernicious Deed
1 Ghastly Demise
2 Krosan Grip
2 Spell Pierce
3 Surgical Extraction
1 Vendilion Clique
1 Life from the Loam
1 Thoughtseize

I think this is exactly where I want to be right now, until I figure what kind of inbred meta I'll be facing here at the LGS. On the broader meta scale, this deck may not be ideal, since both RUG and the various StoneBlade variations could give it some hell, but I think a good player with a healthy understanding of the deck can still rip through a good-sized tournament in today's field.

I like a lot of components to this deck, but for starters the dream of:

4 Goyf
4 Bob
4 Tiago

....is pretty bloody awesome. I'll also be adding some number of Vendilion Cliques to this fleet in the place of Jace, to make Unearth better. Unearth might be better as a Reanimate in some cases, but for now I'll stick with Alex's build. Either way, that's another card I'm very excited to be using right now.

BUG is not RUG tempo, it's not meant to be. Previous to resurgence of RUG Tempo (or Canadian Thresh), BUG was filling in that niche. And yes, I do think RUG has been squeezing out Team America recently, but that doesn't mean we should adopt their strategy and jam in Stifle and Delver. If you want to win that way, Grixis or RUG are your best bets. If you like having a more powerful midgame, BUG is the place to be.

Also, WCM8 I wouldn't dismiss your Grixis build at all, I have a friend who did decently well with it for awhile. But, this is the BUG thread, and it looks like you have another page built for Grixis Tempo. While I do like the Grixis build, I fell that it's much closer to RUG than it is to Team America, and the bonus of BUG colors is that you can audible into a control deck more easily than the other two if the meta changes. Pernicious Deed, Sylvan Library, and Life from the Loam are all the reasons I want to stay in green, Goyf is just an added bonus. And sometimes, he still wins games all by himself after a timely Hymn to Tourach.

[catmint]

wcm8 I agree not having the option to burn the face is a weakness of TA. Pyroblast as well....

I don't agree on green creatures being the weakest part in tempo decks.

The argument you use that Nimble mongoose is not that strong in the Stoneblade matchup's are flawed imo. First you mention only Esper Stoneblade which is still a minority, but even in this matchup Nimble Mongoose is the best creature by far.

1) Every creature without trample can be chump blocked by lingering soul
2) Perish is strong, but it can be played around and disrupted. A nimble mongoose turn 2 with mana up gives Esperblade much bigger headache than a 5/5 flyer who comes down later.

Lingering souls is in fact an argument against tombstalker, because the tokens fly... Also they won't cast a jace before dealing with a 3/3 shroud for G and they love to cast a jace to bounce a tombstalker.

Evaluating green creatues not specific for the Esperblade matchup: what makes Goyf and nimble mongoose so strong is that they are super effecient. BB + 7 cards is in fact pretty expensive compared to a 3/2 flyer for U or a 4/5 for 1G. Goyf and Mongoose shine in different matchups. Mongoose in control and Goyf in Aggro and combo.

Grixis might be stronger than TA, but I am pretty sure it is overall weaker than RUG.

[Goddik]

Awesome work on the sideboard primer. I used to run a very extensive transormational sideboard plan against aggro decks but it seems like aggro nowadays is only maverick (if you can call that an aggro deck). With that in mind i would probably start any sideboard with 2 massacre and 2 perish or deed. It is pretty nice to not have to dedicate 9 slots to win against both merfolk and g/w.

I am currently a big fan of enginnered plague as a way to sweep lingering souls tokens which occaisionally gives you a free win vs goblins, elves or wizard.dec.

I haven't been super impressed with Team America lately, but maybe i just havent found the right version. Cutting the hymns and stifles and adding kiras might go a long way towards winning the stoneblade matchup. Tombstalker is certainly as awesome as he has ever been

On a related BUG note i feel like standstill is currently the nuts and i think deedstill is up for a revival if i can get the sideboard to beat combo

[wcm8]

stuff

Stifle and Hymn have been getting weaker lately in my estimation, I think cutting Stifle for Spell Pierce and Hymn for 1cmc targeted discard is the way forward for an aggro/control BUG list (for now -- things tend to loop back around as the metagame shifts). That said, RUG or Grixis seem to be the better colors for playing tempo right now.

I do think a 'Deedstill' type deck is the answer to the tier 1 metagame right now, but I don't think Standstill itself should be played -- Snapcaster is typically just better as a form of card advantage.

As for tuning the deck to beat combo, it depends on what combo you want to beat. Since so much of the main deck is devoted to beating creature decks, we can afford 6-8~ slots that are serviceable against the unfair decks. I would start with Spell Pierce and Vendilion Clique (not only for the disruption, but to put them on an actual clock). Extirpate is often just as useful against combo as it is against graveyard strategies. And we are already playing counterspells and discard in the main deck. A couple Tarmogoyfs in the SB doesn't hurt either.

A rough draft for a BUG control SB:
2 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Extirpate
2-3 Vendilion Clique
3 Spell Pierce
1 Perish
2-3 Tarmogoyf
1 Hydroblast
1 Raven's Crime

Against most combo decks you can then cut a lot of the removal for this, and play more like a Team America deck which naturally slays combo.

I think going forward for right now, Team America is the strategy you SB into from Deed-control, rather than the other way around.

[Goddik]

Thank you for the comments WCM, I have written out the list in the landstill thread (which i encourage you all to join ;), I intend to do better at BOM this year. The reason i want to play landstill is primarily that the current field is incredibly soft to standstill, the esper deck has no manlands and both RUG and Maverick have a very hard time beating ancestral recall. With a good build the 3 top decks should almost be byes. Innocent blood is also incredible against mongoose (as well as a million corner applications). The weakness to spell based combo decks is quite worrying in an open meta though, but i believe there must be a solution.

With regards to Team America it certainly feels like the format runs too many sword to plowshares to make the tempo version of the strategy viable. A casual glance through the thread and the success of its contributers at indy seems to confirm this. I would probably test some number of kiras to get through the stoneforge decks barage of removal or accept that we need to play a controlling version much closer to Nick Spagnolos invitational build if we want to suceed in the BUG colours.

The allegory of turning Team America into Deedstill and vice versa depending on matchup is quite awesome

[Goddik]

as a random side comment, have people experimented with adding the mongooses back in. I know they used to be terrible in TA, but times have changed and it may be worth it as a solution to the living hell of plows.

[GtF]

I think a more controlling version of the deck could be pretty good. I'd be tempted to still include a few tombstalkers though - they have great synergy with deed and also defend a jace well assuming they don't get removed. You'd have to run ghastly demises and maybe a go for the throat instead of innocent bloods but that seems fine. Innocent blood isn't always better and you'd stilll probably play 1-2 lilianas for the edict effect if you need it.
Mongoose and tombstalker really don't belong in the same deck. And if you're playing mongoose it just seems like the red is stronger than the black since you can fill your graveyard easier and send burn to the face.

[Goddik]

good point on the tombstalker mongoose interaction

[Goddik]

Check out this list, it is full of tech and gives me hope for the archetype:
http://www.mtgpulse.com/event/7352#101168

Edit: If you can't access above

http://www.planetmtg.de/articles/artikel.html?id=6133

[oRen]

Why is none playing UGb Tempo with Mongoose, Confi, Goyf (or maybe now Delver) anymore? Is RUG just THAT plain better?

[Goddik]

So here are some random comments based on a day of gaming with the deck and a short testing session against canadian thresh.

Hymn: Hymn is the nuts, it is pretty poorly positioned but when you play against a non-tier 1 deck and you hymn them, it feels like you are cheating. I think hymn may be key to a good version of Team America, but it definately feels like you should know when to board them out.

Daze: This felt very underwhelming without stifle in the deck.

Delver: I am really not a fan of this guy, but I realise that not running him necessitates some very creative solutions to keep all of your dudes from going plowing. The flying is definately relevant though.

The Canadian Matchup: Liliana and Tombstalker seems like the nuts, the major problem seems to be loosing to stifle+waste or a quick protected creature. If you can keep their t1 creature off the table and get a steady stream of land then it should be easy ride from there. It was definately favoured both before and after board though sideboarding helped him (submerge) more than me.

[Spike]

Thanks Goddik, I'm glad you like the list. The deck has been awesome during the tournament and theres nothing I would change atm. I talked a lot with Dan (nitewolf9) about the list during the last weeks (thanks again, Dan) and tried to optimize it for the tournament.

The plan is to play very aggressive during the first turns and to put the opponent under pressure early. Therefore the mana curve is designed to ensure that you almost alwas can tap out turn 1-3 (t1: Ponder, Preordain, Delver into t2: Hymn, Goyf, Library etc.) while countering their stuff for free with Daze and Force. Thats why I like Daze very much in this list. The same is true for Snuff Out which is a very strong card here cause it fits the game plan of the deck very well and often allows you to play 2-3 cards per turn. Also note that you can Ponder into it t1 and cast it immediately to kill a Mother of Runes for example.

The 'tap out aggro control plan' is also the reason why I don't play any Stifles cause you're always going to end up being in a predicament when you also have a Delver or a Hymn in hand t1/t2 for example.

I played TA last year at the Bazaar of Moxen and it looks like I'm going to play it again this year. The Matchup against Maverick is quite good (had to play against it three times and won all of them) which is very important for Annecy. Cavern of Souls is going to push this deck even more but with 7 additional removal postboard I'm very confident about the matchup.

[Goddik]

Hi Spike,

Awesome to get your input, i will be asking you a bunch of questions when I sober up. I will be going to BOM myself this year so if you are interested in tuning TA for it I am game.

[Partyplatypus]

Why do these decks with 19-20 lands that resemble RUG delver a lot, not run Nimble Mongoose?

[Goddik]

The problem with mongoose is that it doesnt play well with tombstalker. Tombstalker is currently the nuts.

so here we go,

Have you tested the Esperblade matchup, how difficult is lingering souls and snapcaster plow to deal with? Is it possible to close out games before snapcaster and jace takes over on their side?

Why no Massacre in the board for maverick? It almost feels too good not to play.

What is your sideboard plan against Maverick and Canadian? It seems like i want to board out the hymns against canadian (very unintuitive from having played the matchup with misstep).

Did you consider thoughtseize/inquisition? My immediate impression was to shave a force, a daze and something else for a couple of these, but then again it might be too much tempo disadvantage.

[Spike]

I've played a lot of games against Esperblade in previous tournaments and its definitely not a bad matchup. Preboard Swords to Plowshares + Snapcaster Mage indeed is a bit annoying but postboard its very hard for them to win. Grafdiggers Cages and Dread of Nights shut off their Souls and Snapcasters, Maelstrom Pulses take care of Jaces, Equipment and tokens and Spell Pierce helps a lot, too. This is how I board against Esperblade:

+ 2 Grafdiggers Cage
+ 2 Dread of Night
+ 4 Spell Pierce
+ 1 Ghastly Demise
+ 1 Maelstrom Pulse

- 4 Force of Will
- 4 Daze
- 2 Liliana of the Veil

Theres nothing you really want to force in this Matchup, Liliana obviously is mediocre against Lingering Souls and Snapcaster Mages and since the games usually take a bit longer, Dazes become useless quite fast, too.

Massacre is a very strong card against Maverick for sure and I've played some tournaments with it in my 75 but the problems are that it kills our own Delvers and that a good Maverick player can easily play around it. When I play against Maverick I want to kill their creatures immediately and therefore Massacre often is not the blowout you would expect it to be.

Against Canadian I board as follows:

- 4 Force of Will
- 1 Maelstrom Pulse
+ 3 Spell Pierce
+ 2 Ghastly Demise

And against Maverick:

- 4 Force of Will
- 2 Daze
- 1 Preordain
+ 2 Ghastly Demise
+ 2 Darkblast
+ 2 Dread of Night
+ 1 Maelstrom Pulse

I've also played Thoughtseize in my lists about half a year ago, but I've cut them a long time ago for another Pulse and the Preordain. It's possible to play two of them but they didn't really impress me. They're a bad topdeck lategame and the lifeloss is not irrelevant, too.

[wcm8]

I've been testing that 'tapout' build some and it runs quite beautifully. I think the SB could use a bit of tweaking depending on where the meta leads, but the main deck is really savage. Props to whoever developed that list. It's pretty similar to the build I ran to a first place finish at a side-event back at Grand Prix Indianapolis -- Delver of Secrets definitely belongs in any modern Legacy deck claiming to play tempo. I also agree with Hymn to Tourach right now, even though there was a period of time that I was advocating Thoughtseize over it (to be fair, Thoughtseize is arguably better against Esper and RUG).