May I ask what led you to remove top?Originally Posted by jobdevries
I never played sensei's divining top in the first place.. I don't think this deck needs it, since you are already able to search your deck for the appropriate card using GSZ, diabolic intent et cetera (and being able to retrieve them, using eternal witness, or GSZ into eternal witness...).
I think if you tested Top you would change your mind. Most people who play this deck find it very useful to run a couple. It helps you find the spells you need to win, and of course, plays really well with fetchlands.
I see more than others do because I know where to look.
Let's assume I would put top in 3-4x, what would you take out? Just out of interest, because I feel like my decklist is working very neat at the moment. But I could test it out I suppose.
At least IMO, I would try cutting one StP, one Diabolic Intent, and the Spike Weaver for three tops, or the first twp for two tops. I think you will find you want to leave them there.
I agree with this. I had 2 Tops in a long time ago, and they never did anything for me so I cut them. A few months later I realized that they're actually really important in smoothing out the early draws, since we don't have Brainstorm (well, most of us). I upped the number to 3 this time around, and they've been absolutely amazing. I'd second Eggo's cuts -- while it's true that Intent makes your list a bit more stable (assuming you have creatures to feed it), I feel that Top + Intent would actually be ridiculous. Try it and see what you think for yourself, though.
Thinking about it, I would probably take out the Weaver before the Intent for two tops. Shuffle effects are always better with a top around.
If I would play top, I'd play at least 3 I think. Thinking about it, spike weaver mostly isn't a winning card (although he does save me now and then). Being able to actually manipulate the top cards, makes you probably not even need the spike weaver to give you some extra turns. Besides, Nic Fit is already fairly good against aggro (pernicious deed). I'll try to fit 3 in, and see how it works! Thanks for your help.
Think I might cut 1 spike weaver, 1 duress, and 1 abyssal persecutor. I'm curious to see the results.
There is an edit button.
But in regards to SDT, you really should run it. From everyone I play, the card they fear the most in my deck is Sensei's Divining Top, with the amount of shuffle effects we have--if we need to find something, we can find it.
Diabolic Intent works here too, for sure, but we only really have a handful of creatures we don't mind saccing.
IMO there's enough I don't mind saccing to Diabolic Intent: veteran explorer, eternal witness (and then reuse her ability), zombie tokens, protean hulk, dryad arbor). Is that the reason you guys aren't playing any diabolic intents? Because it really feels like a solid card to me. Being able to sac your veteran on turn 2 to get any card in your deck seems very good to me. In that way you can spend the mana you're ramping ;).
It's an option that has been discussed, but I've so far never really needed a specific tutor like that. I tend to prefer to sac my early explorers to cabal therapies or phyrexian towers.
I've been trying your list, only modified. I have a single Maelstrom pulse (could be vindicate, but I don't own any) as an intent target. That seems to be my only out against jace (except maybe a sigarda). Is that why you have needles in the sb?
Indeed it is, Star|Screa. Might be a good idea to put in a single pulse.
I'm not sure about the tops (but needs a lot more testing). I don't like the way the deck slows down a lot because of it, I like to play it more 'aggressive'.
Edit: Star, how does the deck work out for you?
A turn 1 top doesn't actually slow the deck down much, after you ramp you need to be finding answers, top helps you do that.
It did feel slow to me, since you want to keep 1 mana open for the top itself. And I'd rather play a cabal/veteran turn 1.
Job:
Well I just had someone rage quit on MWS after GSZ a sigarda. He was playing BWG stoneblade and had goyf with a sofw&P out, 2 birds, and 2 sfm. I diabolic intented a zombie token to pull out a deed and popped for 3.
Edit:
I'm on the fence about the Hulk? Is there a combo I'm missing? I feel like if we have 7 available (or 8 for gsz) , that means we have 6 or 5 available for our other finishers.
Sigarda is just insane, I had my fair share of Rage quits myself since I am testing with her
@Star|Scream: Sun Titan and Grave Titan are not GSZ-able, and a while ago there wasn't a big green creature in my deck to search for. That's why I put Hulk in, which can tutor all the biggies for you (and bringing a dryad arbor with it, since it's cmc = 0). And often when both players were in topdeck mode (which happens a lot with this deck), a GSZ/hulk meant a win for me (in response to removal I could sac it with phyrexian tower, getting another threat). Now there's Sigarda... its value goes down, so it might be replacable.
Why not Fierce Empath, then, to make Sun/Grave GSZ-able?
Also, requisite questioning of why Grave Titan over Kokusho -- especially for your list, with the Intents....you can assemble Kokusho/Nightmare fairly easily, and that's vastly more powerful than anything Grave Titan is going to do.
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