Yes especially the mirror will be an important factor in near times. Ive been durdling around with the thought to play another superior Show and Tell deck like HiveMind, which should beat SneakAttack easily, but is weaker to the rest of the metagame ofc but I think TtB is a decent SB-Upgrade for the mirror. As said, it might not be enough to put it into sideboards yet, in Europe, but soon it will.
Greetings
The Karakas in Eli's sideboard list here has got me thinking.
That SB is an utter mess...but regarding Karakas, it's cute, but why run it? How do you get it in your hand for it to be reliably effective? Ugh.Originally Posted by S1N1STER
Divert is an interesting alternative to White Leyline.
Through the Breach is excellent in any matchup where casting Show and Tell is dangerous. For instance, I played against a UW anti-Sneak and Show deck playing Humility, Ensnaring Bridge, Pithing Needle, and Enlightened Tutor. Casting a protected Show and Tell lost me the first game, so I sided them out and brought in Through the Breach. It is also great against Reanimator or any other Show and Tell deck. I also sided it in against UW Miracles to have more business spells and won because of it after my Sneak Attacks got Surgically Extracted.
My opinion on the sideboard discussion:
There is no "perfect" sideboard, since you have to guess the Metagame you are expecting at YOUR tournament.
But for a really big, important tournament, I would play the following cards for sure:
1. Blood Moon/Magus of the Moon (i prefer Magus, as you know). It is the strongest card Sneak Show can play in the sideboard. No discussion about this, please. It is the most diverse sideboard card we have. You don't have to name a card like with Needle, you just destroy a lot of manabases, especially Rug's and Bug's, both rather bad matchups.
2. Echoing Truth. Vs Hatecards, Dredge, etc, it can win us games that seem lost. Can also be used to bounce a sneaked Griselbrand after the attack.
3. Red Blast / Pyroblast. Against any decks with counters, these have to come in for Intuition/Petals.
Just my opinion. ;-)
What do you guys think about Vendilion Clique in the sideboard? It's strong in the mirror (in response to opposing Sneak Attack (while Sneak Attack is still on the stack, with the Clique trigger resolving first)), improves our combo/control matchup and can also be played in response to an Edict-effect.
Things I've heard thrown out as ideas include Trinisphere and Submerge. Submerge can get rid of a Knight before they can Karakas you, even if they put it in off your Show and Tell. Trinisphere can act both as defense against combo as well as a Defense Grid against control decks.
If this is a taboo topic in this thread, I'm willing to not discuss it, but I do not believe this question is nearly as cut-and-dry as you're making it, and I take the exact opposite position.
I believe RUG is a favorable matchup, and while BUG is unfavorable, I would rather have White Leyline. Blood Moon feels like a do-nothing.
Last edited by CephalidBreakfast; 05-28-2012 at 02:21 PM. Reason: Spelling
True, through the breach makes a lot of sense in Reanimator and the mirror.
I am testing to run 2 divert instead of 4 Leylines to free up sideboard slots. The clear advantage of divert is that you can board in as a 2 of in matchups where you would never board in leyline (i.e: esperblade). Sure Leyline is just freaking awesome versus Nic Fit, Junk and BW, but the question is how much of the meta is running it and how much of a game do we have without the Leylines. And therefore shouldnt we maybe play more sideboard slots for the mirror, reanimator, Humility decks or whatever?
It sounds like you are overusing Leyline a lot if you board it in against all the matchups you listed:
-) If you board it in against any deck running targeted discard (light discard aka just 4 thoughtseize) you are doing more damage to your deck than their discard spells would likely do.
-) you should never side it in vs. burn. They can easily killl you with creatures flame rift, price of progess,... while you are weakening your deck. 2 Divert are much better in this matchup. Invest U to 2 for 1 them and buy a ton of time. Anyway: Primary focus is keep deck clean for faster goldfish and if not counter some stuff.
-) Concerning Tendrils: Yes if they don't expect Leyline and if it's not a burning wish version. I would much rather have more counterspells and no dead cards instead of the leylines.
-) Brain Freeze: high tide "drawing its deck (including cunning wish)" generating so much mana cannot deal with 1 permanent?
So, only MUs where I think its correct to use Leyline are BW, Pox, Nic Fit, Belcher, Heavy Discard BUG control, UB ANT. The question is if you want to devote 4 SB slots for this or if you fight it of with the spell pierces/flusterstorms/misdirections/FoW + Divert.
Edit: I was missing some posts.
Magus of the moon is not an option for me. My experience is that RUG keeps in at least some number of ligthting bolt and I also saw STP (Maverick) and Edict, GFTT and a like postboard. I don't care if they get it wrong but reason enough not to run magus imo.
Submerge: Not an option because of this stupid white 1/1 that is never attacking.
Currently playing: Elves
I disagree re: Leyline vs. Burn. Sure, they can kill you with a Goblin Guide and Flame Rift, but it blanks their Lightning/Rift Bolt, Chain, Lavamancer (halfway), 40% of a Marauers, etc. That's a lot of damage it soaks up. Probably 20 cards.
- A deck running targeted discard, likely has more discard post board, black targeted player removal, and Liliana. So yes, it is relevant.
- Don't side it in against burn? Are you kidding me? No, really? Divert does absolutely nothing to stop their clock, their game plan is complelty unmolested. LoS wrecks them, giving you time to go off with impunity.
- Regarding combo (Feeeze/Tendrils) its irrevelvant that it stops those cards, the point is they must invest resources in removing it. Their combo is more intricate, ours is two cards....
- Your comparing apples and oranges. Divert is not a solution, it is situationally effective card that your opponent has the option to simply pay the 2. That is horrible. Divert is not Spell Pierce.....LoS has a concrete effect across a plethora of cards that directly effect us, and that is value, especially in a large meta game.
I tested Divert a while ago, it is worse than Leyline for sure.
No question that Leyline is better than divert. The questions I brought up for discussion is:
Sure Leyline is just freaking awesome versus Nic Fit, Junk and BW, Belcher,... but the question is how much of the meta is running these decks and how much of a game do we have without the Leylines. And therefore shouldnt we maybe play more sideboard slots for the maverick, rug, mirror, reanimator, Humility decks or whatever?
And Re: Burn.
Last 10+ Matches I played I did not loose a single one. Maybe a couple of game losses overall. All without Leyline. If you beat Burn also with Leyline, so be it. But that matchup is not relevant if to SB Leyline or not. Divert a bolt t otheir lavamancer/guide/marauder and tell me again it does nothing against burn.
Currently playing: Elves
That's one of the reasons to run Magus, if you ask me. :D Because a good player won't leave Swords to Plowshares in, against Griselbrand it is very bad and against Emrakul, it is dead. And the Magus is great vs Edict if we have a fattie in play next to him.
@ Jonathan (name brother): Of course its not taboo, I just think that Blood Moon (along Leyline of Sanctity) has the greatest impact on the game of all of our sideboard cards. And in the games we board it, our opponent will always have to find a way to counter or destroy it, making it easier to win with our combo.
And it's a opponent-does-nothing-anymore, so its a do-a-lot in my opinion.
Agreed. The Burn-MU is nothing we really have to worry about. But I was posting this post because you wrote something that's completly wrong.
You said:"- Regarding combo (Feeeze/Tendrils) its irrevelvant that it stops those cards, the point is they must invest resources in removing it. Their combo is more intricate, ours is two cards...."
It is just as wrong as you could get it. Let's take 2 decks - say HighTide and DoomsDay... Neither of these decks really care about bouncing eoT or putting a bounce into their pile. One Leyline costs us much more. It costs us a secure land-drop each turn. It costs us our whole consistent combo as we have to mull for it.
Honestly, I would never board in Leyline vs Combo. I might board it against BUG - but therefore we have BloodMoon right?
Greetings
Considering the fact that slamming a Blood Moon against BUG essentially means you denied on-color mana for the rest of the game for them, I hardly agree with you saying it's a do-nothing; it's basically a scoop for them unless they have an overwhelming board presence (which they probably won't).
I agree with your assertion that RUG is a positive match-up though, as long as you're careful about when you fetch and fetch basics unless absolutely necessary you do have a few rounds to dig for a bunch of counters and they can't really answer any of our beasts if it hits.
Regarding Leyline vs. Burn: I'd advocate boarding leyline against them for the reasons stated. 16 bolts are made useless, 4 fireblasts, 4 Lavamancers, 2/5 of the Keldon Marauder damage, Any Barbarian Rings, Magma Jets, Thunderous Wrath if they play a couple. Taking my Burn list as an example it blanks 30 cards. take 18 lands into account and I'd have 12 cards in the deck that did anything against you. Against Burn you'd also always fetch basics as getting Price'd for 6 hurts when you need to use Ancient Tomb. That leaves about 8 cards that will work at 100% capacity, for the investment I think that's pretty neat. Keeping some counters in will make those 8 cards a non-issue as well.
Those are my 2 cents in the Leyline vs. Burn debate anyhow.
I think people mull into Leylines too much. Board it in, if you have it in your opener it's great, if you don't but you still have a solid hand with an early combo, just keep and play your game.
I read some good content from a lot of (probably) smart people. And we all agree that Leyline is superstrong in certain matchups. But unfortunately nobody is talking about the "Gretchenfrage" aka crucuial question. Is it currently worth it to use 4 SB slots or should we focus on different things because we do have "ok" game anyway against the decks we board leyline.
Currently playing: Elves
Our storm matchup is ok (not that favorable though), but Leyline makes it a lot easier. It's not a mandatory sideboard card like Moon effects in my opinion, but it is one of the strongest we can play, because it protects us so well against Discard, and that hurts us a lot. And since we only drop it, if it's in our opener, it is better against BUG than Blood Moon, even though I would probably try to board 2 Moon, 4 Leyline vs them, siding out Petals and Intuitions or cantrips.
Not saying that I am going to be running it, but that it got me thinking. Thought about the games I have lost with a sneak attack out after swinging with an Emrakul where I was unable to find a 2nd creature in time (doesn't happen often but it has happened). Also thought about the time I cast T2 show and tell and put out Griselbrand while my opponent put out Emrakul.
And I imagine that with his 4x intuitions plus the noxious revival and snapcaster in his board he could just intuition for whatever he needed without having to worry about surgical extraction. Which while costing 5 mana, 2 life and losing your draw seems like a lot to me, I still found it interesting.
I rocked a list with Blood Moon at the GP Anaheim side event, and can safely say the deck is doing unfair things.
4 Sneak Attack
4 Show and Tell
4 Griselbrand
4 Emrakul the Aeon's Torn
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
2 Intuition
4 Force of Will
3 Misdirection
3 Blood Moon
4 Lotus Petal
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Polluted Delta
3 Island
1 Mountain
2 Volcanic Island
3 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
SB:
4 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Firespout
2 Pyroblast
2 Spell Pierce
2 Vendilion Clique
3 Echoing Truth
Round 1 - Dredge
Game 1, Blood Moon cuts him off from blue discard, and he never hits a dredger.
Game 2, topdecked Grafdigger's Cage forces the scoop on turn 1.
Round 2 - Bant
Game 1 - EOT Intuition for Show and Tell meets Clique, strips way to cheat fattie.
Game 2 - Sandbagged Karakas cancels any and all plans to cheat fatties into play.
FoW + Karakas + Knight is a tough matchup. Clique too.
Round 3 - Lands
Game 1 - Durdle around, then Show and Tell when he has no hand into Griselbrand. Drawing 14 cards is unfair.
Game 2 - Sneak Attack into lethal. Fair.
Round 4 - Sneak Attack
Game 1 - He casts Show and Tell, we do a dance and Emrakuls go shuffling. Sneak Attack into unfair stuff wins it later.
Game 2 - He casts Show and Tell twice. I boarded two out. (IDK why anyone would ever cast Show and Tell in this matchup...)
Round 5 - Elves
Game 1 - Turn 2 Show and Tell puts an unanswered Emrakul into play.
Game 2 - Force on Glimpse, then he goes for a risky Summoner's Pact. I untap and cast Firespout, forcing him to lose the game.
Round 6 - UW Miracle Control
Game 1 - I run him out of counters, then resolve Sneak Attack into unfair things.
Game 2 - I run him out of counters, then resolve Show and Tell into Griselbrand, and draw an unfair amount of cards.
Round 7 - UR Delver
Game 1 - I run Show and Tell #1 into Force on my turn 2. Then the next one gets Mana Leaked with 2 mana up... (WTF? Mana Leak in Delver?) Lose to Delver + burn.
Game 2 - Show and Tell resolves, I win with Emrakul.
Game 3 - Keep a hand with 2 cantrips, SNT, and counters, cantrip into more cantrips, but fail to find any business. Run out of cantrips then draw 3 straight turns of lands. :\
Ended up 5-2, and the only difficult matchups were Clock + FoW.
Blood Moon was interesting, but I think it's better in the sideboard. Eight cantrips isn't enough with only 2 Intuition. I'd prefer more cantrips to more Intuition, as you want to be casting unfair cards as early as possible. Sneak Attack was always the safer option given a choice. Sideboard could use a tweak - Cages were good, Firespout is fine but maybe Pyroclasm could be useful. Pyros/Spell Pierce is a good mix.
Here's what I'll be testing within the next week:
4 Sneak Attack
4 Show and Tell
4 Griselbrand
4 Emrakul the Aeon's Torn
4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
2 Preordain
2 Intuition
4 Force of Will
3 Misdirection
2 Spell Pierce
4 Lotus Petal
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Polluted Delta
3 Island
1 Mountain
2 Volcanic Island
3 Ancient Tomb
3 City of Traitors
SB:
4 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Firespout
3 Pyroblast
3 Blood Moon
3 Echoing Truth
Cheers!
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