Eh. Things change when you know what your opponent is on. ELC had asked about blind therapies.Originally Posted by Ayotte
If you know your opponent is on High Tide, and you are:
On the play in g1. You name Brainstorm. Brainstorm will mess up any future Therapies, and future Therapies is your only hope of beating him g1.
On the draw in g1. You Therapy, he Brainstorms. Obviously he's hidden anything important to his combo, like a High Tide or a Time Spiral. Merchant Scroll is your best name in this scenario, followed by Cunning Wish or Turnabout.
On the draw in g1. He's tapped out from a Ponder. You Therapy. He doesn't have the ability to tuck with Brainstorm up, so you call High Tide. High Tide is what's necessary to make his combo go quickly. If he doesn't have one, you have at least another turn or two, where you can hopefully flashback your Therapy.
On the play in g2/3. You name Time Spiral. High Tide players traditionally sideboard out 1x High Tide (to Cunning Wish for) because they're scared of Surgical/Extirpate. As such, Time Spiral is a much more attractive name because it still cripples them when you Extirpate it, it's still a reason to keep a hand, and they're more likely to have one in hand (it's still a 4-of in their deck).
On the draw in g2/3. You Therapy, he Brainstorms. Again, he's hidden anything important. I still like the Merchant Scroll name here, but if you've already done this song and dance, mix it up a little and either call Ponder or Turnabout.
On the draw in g2/3. He's tapped out from a Ponder. You Therapy. You still name Time Spiral here.
Special case: If you're trying to resolve something devastating, like a Cranial Extraction or a Nether Void, and they are:
Tapped out, you name Force of Will.
Not tapped out, you name Flusterstorm (if Extraction) or Pierce (if Void/other enchantment-based hate).
Also, always remember that Therapy -> Brainstorm in resp. -> Extirpate on Brainstorm is a free Hymn to Tourach. It strips their most powerful cantrip, and it forces them to shuffle away their two best cards (that they had hidden with Brainstorm). Very powerful trick.
Priority Extirpate targets in descending order of importance: Merchant Scroll, Brainstorm, Ponder
Priority Cranial Extraction targets in descending order of importance: Time Spiral, High Tide, Cunning Wish
If you have the ability to Extirpate Time Spiral, Cunning Wish, or High Tide, by all means take it. But that really only happens when you hit a Therapy. The above priorities are assuming that you can't take one of those "Big Three."
Hope that helps =)
That's great. Thank you. I might just print that out and bring it to the store this week
I disagree with this. I changed from BG Nic Fit to BUG Fit when the meta switched from Maverick/RUG to Sneak Show/Reanimator/RUG/Maverick (AKA: the Griselbrand era) and had very positive results against Hypergenesis, Reanimator, Sneak Show, OmniTell, and High Tide. The combo decks that I didn't do so well against were the faster ones such as Belcher and ANT because you don't always get a chance to interact with them. Boarding 4 Thoughtseize, 4 Negate, and 2 Extirpate against most combo decks is almost a transformational sideboard where you have enough disruption and answers to constantly keep your opponent in check when coupled with Therapy, Witness, GSZ, Jace, and Lily.
On a different subject, I have recently picked up a pair of Rectors and my blue duals are all used up by my Waterfalls (RUGb Cascade) deck so I intend on building Rector Fit and give Recurring Nightmare another try. The recent additions of Armada Wurm, Rest in Peace, and the coveted Sigarda has me sold. From all the discussions we've had over the past few months, it is obvious that Rector Fit has a different game plan than BUG Fit where ramp plays a bigger role since the deck tries to achieve a prison-like state. For example, in Rector Fit, discard and removal acts as a speed bump for your opponent while you attempt to resolve a game-breaking enchantment and then proceed to beat your opponent down while BUG Fit has a more constant flow of answers while it attempts to finish its opponent. This notable difference arises in part because enchantments replace Planeswalkers.
Here is my first attempt at Rector Fit:
Creatures (15)
4 Veteran Explorer
2 Sakura-Tribe Elder
2 Eternal Witness
2 Academy Rector
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Thragtusk
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Armada Wurm
Spells (23)
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
2 Innocent Blood
2 Vindicate
3 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Pernicious Deed
1 Recurring Nightmare
1 Phyrexian Arena
1 Faith's Fetters
Lands (22)
2 Phyrexian Tower
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath
2 Bayou
2 Savannah
1 Scrubland
3 Forest
2 Swamp
2 Plains
Sideboard (15)
2 Thoughtseize
2 Extirpate
3 Swords to Plowshares
3 Carpet of Flowers
1 Rest in Peace
1 Humility
1 Nether Void
1 Curse of Death's Hold
1 Harmonic Sliver
I don't think Rusalka, Baneslayer, and Moat belong in this deck. Rusalka is a terrible card on its own, Baneslayer isn't worth 3WW, and Moat isn't worth building around with the current card pool. I would like to avoid any non-GSZ-able creatures as much as possible. Any suggestions or cards I am missing?
Do you know what assuming does? It makes an ass out of you and me.
Get it...? Ass, u, me?
... ffs I was trying to be funny...
I do not agree with this statement. Moat on its own will win many games against aggro decks. Moat makes baneslayer even better than it already is. Do not underestimate the flying/lifelink and as I have found out protection from demons has won me a game in the last big tournament. Rusalka has been discussed several times. It seems to be a love it or hate it card, but it is a great zenith sac outlet. I often found it very usefull. Rector and veteran only work well if you have sac outlets so so far Rusalka is in for me.
Of course it all comes down to personal preference. The nice thing about magic is that the only way to play it right is the fun way because so far I cannot make a living out of it
Currently Playing: Scapefit , Shardless BUG, Team America,
@Qweerios
I like you deck. Having gaddock teeg/ooze and some extra discard MD increases our chance to win against unfair decks
Personally I really like Baneslayer angels/Sigarda and Moat in rector. This package is really good against all aggro decks and flyers(fliers?) is a good answer to delver and other flying creatures that might cause problems. Not to mention the lifelink from baneslayer that can be crucial against burn decks. What I don't like about baneslayer is that you can't gsz for it and it's really weak against removal.. perhaps there are some other flyers that we could play in this deck I'm gonna find out. (Maybe I just really want to Moat to work beacuse I just acquired one, and it would make me sad to already put it in the folder)
Also I'd probably cut recurring nightmare since you're not running yosei
When do you bring in the swords from your sb?
That would be me I guess, see p.145 for my list.
I play only 1 Rack, virtually 2 with E.Tutor. And yes, you need to activate it only once to get rid of Omniscience. Even if you do not have it in hand, it is a great draw machine given you have some fetch on board.
However, as good as it can be, I am still wondering about shifting it for a Top, as I pack a Pattern of Rebirth as a B plan, which works whether or not you still have Omniscience in the library or not.
About Elspeth in BGw builds
I would never cut Elspeth. On my BGw list I used to play 2 of her, but now 1 Elspeth and 1 Sorin. The reason is not about synergies, as I do not think Nic Fit lists need *more* synergies. I mean Therapy, Veteran, Rector, Nightmare do pretty much a lot of stuff. But even with all the raw power you develop is ridiculous in front of that damn Jace TMS, since Terminus. And you don't rebuild your hand as fast as Goblin would do.
So ok PW such as Eslpeth and Sorin are not really synergic with the core list (Garruk Relentless in another story), but they compensate for the lacks of the list. I mean: they KILL Jace. I do not need any other reason to have them in my 61 MD.
@Qweerios -- Do me a favor. -Try- a pair of Baneslayers for one local event. If you still hate them, I won't give you any shit for cutting them. But trust me when I say that they are -much- more impressive in play than they look on paper, especially if you run into some poor fool running RUG or BUG Delver. I have won a disproportionate number of games on the wings of angels. At least try them.
Nightmare is fine in that deck -- you still have Tusk, Witness looping, and Armada Wurm looping to abuse with it. I do think it would be better with a Yosei, but /shrug.
As for any cards you're missing -- you have fewer creatures than I do, so you probably don't want Diabolic Intent. That's the only thing I can think of maindeck that you're missing, really. You could experiment with Trostani if you want, since you have Tusk and Wurm, but that's probably best left for a more focused list. Sideboard....it depends on your meta, honestly. What's your expected meta, and I'll tell you if you're missing anything. There's a ton of really, really random enchantments that can do work that most people don't bother to know exist.
@Vilnico -- I think that I would agree with you if Miracles was more of a thing. Around my area, it's largely died out, so I don't have as pressing of a need for the planeswalkers. If you have a lot of Miracles in your area, though, Elspeth, and to a lesser extent Sorin, are definitely still very serious contenders, since that's your primary way to keep up with the constant Terminuses and board control.
------------
I'll be taking a bit of a vacation from Nic Fit this weekend, as I'll be playing something with 0 Veteran Explorers in it at Mythic....and, oddly for me, 0 green cards in general. It'll probably end in disaster, but I feel like doing something different, so /shrug....no report from me for this weekend.
Indeed, Miracle is a pain in the ass in Europe ^^
That's certainly fair then. Miracles was big around here for a while, but now it's receded to basically just those players who legitimately enjoy the deck. I think too many people got frustrated with constantly going to time.
If I end up playing Rector at the SCG Open in Baltimore in three weeks, I'll probably have a couple planeswalkers in my board just in case the SCG Open brings an influx of Miracles players from outside the immediate area. I can't fit them maindeck anymore, and I really only want them vs Miracles and maybe Stoneblade anyway.
@Arianrhod
Since the printing of Thragtusk, I believe it is impossible to lose against RUG with a Nic Fit deck. A singleton Ooze and Thragtusk is enough life and body to hose the matchup. This has been confirmed to me in countless tournaments. Adding Rector and Faith's Fetters to this mix is already a boon. If anything, I would play more Thragtusks before any Baneslayers (and Baneslayer is a real pet card for me too). I find Decay and StP to be more impactful for this specific matchup as well as many other legacy decks than any Angel ever printed. I think it's important to note that I never used any Carpet of Flowers against RUG, ever, and my record against this archetype with Nic Fit is near perfect. To quote one of my opponent in the finals after having plowed through 5 RUG Decks out of 9 rounds: "This is so unfair, it feels like I am playing a Draft deck against a Legacy deck"
Concerning "silver bullet" enchantments, would you mind stating a few? I don't have any experience with the less obvious ones. For instance, what are the major benefits of Nether Void vs. Leyline of Sanctity? What about Rest in Peace vs. Leyline of the Void? As for Raking Canopy, I don't think it's good enough... Deed seems like it could do the same Job. Why no more Curse of Death's Hold? It looks like a great prison piece against any Tribal deck post-Deed. My meta contains every DtB and Established decks. There is more SnT decks than Maverick or RUG for sure, and a good amount of Tribal. Dedicated control decks are also everywhere: Lands (3 players out of aprox. 25 own it), UB Tez, Loam, Miracle, Blade Control, BUG Control, a couple of Pox and I've seen a couple of Nic Fitters out there too). The high presence of blue decks keeps the number of Combo decks in check. There are always a couple of SnT and a Reanimator or two, but Storm based decks rarely make it through.
Do you know what assuming does? It makes an ass out of you and me.
Get it...? Ass, u, me?
... ffs I was trying to be funny...
/shrug. I just say what works for me. Our lists have always been very different, and I think that the fact that both options work highlights just how absurd Nic Fit in general is against RUG. I don't think it even matters what the Nic Fit deck is doing, per se -- just the fact that it's Nic Fit in general seems to be enough.
I don't even really know where to start RE enchantments. I literally have something like 5-6 pages of 1-of enchantments in my binder, so I have specific tools on hand for any matchup.
Nether Void vs Leyline of Sanctity is weird, because they don't really do the same thing, even if they both attack storm decks. Void is good vs any stack-based combo deck, and useful vs Omniscience, although it's not a cure-all there the way it is vs stack-combo. Leyline, however, is good vs decks like Burn and Pox/Deadguy, where Void does next to nothing. In the end, I tend to favor Void heavily because decks like Burn/Pox/Deadguy are already good matchups, and Void also protects itself from bounce, which Leyline can't stop. Most storm decks are so land-light that they can waste half the game just getting to the point where they can even cast their cantrips....3U for a Ponder is HARSH for a deck with like 10 lands in it.
RIP vs Leyline is awkward. I THINK that if you want one option or the other, RIP gets the nod because if you Rector into it, it Crypts everything that's already present, which is a big deal. It -does- shut off a lot of the rest of your deck, however, including future Rectors which could tutor up a Deed to sit on in case he Claims the RIP and then starts re-going off. I personally opt for neither. This can make Dredge a little questionable, but we have a strong Dredge matchup naturally anyway by the sacrificial nature of our deck. Reanimator is awkward, but g2 I'd rather be Rectoring a Humility anyway (if you live that long). Rectoring an RIP is useless because it shuts off your Therapy flashbacks, and they can still Show and Tell on you.
Canopy is better with Moat. It's obviously primarily for Miracles, but it has uses vs RUG as well. Combined with Moat, you can lock your opponent out combat. Locally, I have a Stoneblade player who has adopted Restoration Angel as well, so it's good vs him....but that's a local concern that I doubt you have to deal with. I like it vs Miracles, because they -have- to solve it before Entreating. Deed does the same thing, but between O-Ring/D-Sphere/Disenchant they can often remove one problematic permanent without too much difficulty, then they EoT Entreat and you're dead. In that light, I like having multiple lock permanents because it provides another layer that they have to fight through. That being said, I still say that the #1 target for Cranial/Memoricide is Entreat in the matchup, which then makes Raking Canopy a dead draw, but you can't rely on those spells resolving. I do think that going forward, I'm going to put more planeswalkers in my board for the Miracles matchup, which will probably come at the cost of Raking Canopy. That said, if you have an above-average Miracles count, then I'd probably advocate keeping it alongside the planeswalkers, as it has done good work for me.
Curse of Death's Hold suffers from a very serious problem: a lot of the tribal critters it wants to kill are either naturally or artificially 2/2s. Most Fish are 2/2s by default, and stuff like Elves usually has an Archdruid floating around somewhere. It can make their lives a little annoying, but I think that E.Plague is better in the slot since it comes down sooner, before the tribal deck in question has established too much of a board presence for it to do anything. Also, keep in mind that I'm on the Moat plan. If I run into Goblins, I don't care about Cursing them -- I'm just going to get Moat, and they're just going to sit there wishing they had wings. Same thing with Merfolk -- suddenly the only fish I care about at all are the Coralhelms, which actually a lot of fish decks have been cutting down on in the first place. Elves is obviously still the scariest tribal deck, but that's -definitely- a scenario where I'd suggest E.Plague instead. Curse is a very good card and definitely an option to keep in mind for the future -- especially in case some kind of Faeries deck appears, which has been fringe playable for some time now. If it ever gets the push to become a real boy, it could be a good reason to bring back the Curse...something with like Faeries of various types, Snapcaster, and Lingering Souls, for example. Right now, though, that deck doesn't exist yet, so I'm fine leaving the Curse on my page of playables.
Lands mirrors :X
So yeah -- some examples:
Chains of Mephistopheles -- only really good vs High Tide; has largely been replaced by Nether Void. HOWEVER, it does still -wreck- Glimpse decks.
Circle of Protection: Red -- burn, goblins, Progenitus
Phyrexian Arena -- Additional copies of Arena in the board can shore up the dedicated control matchups. Decks like BUG can Decay it now, which sucks, but then they'll struggle keeping up elsewhere, and if you even draw 2 cards off of an Arena, they'll have a hard time recovering.
Asceticism -- the literal boss if Stoneblade if your disease. Also good vs Maverick (regeneration for days/stops Swords and Maze of Ith), Miracles (forces them into Terminus as their only out; also, you can regenerate out of Supreme Verdict).
Humility -- Go-to vs Show and Tell. Wrecks us, but wrecks them harder. Never board it in vs anything not named Show and Tell or Reanimator (or similar bs decks). Boarding it in vs something like Maverick is a HUGE mistake, because your creatures are better than their creatures. Boarding it in vs like 12post or MUD is perfectly acceptable, just be careful about when you get it. Generally, the goal vs a deck like that is to sit with a Rector in play and an instant-speed sac outlet, like Rusalka or Tower. Then you can go beatdown until they do something stupid, at which point you grab Humility and shift gears. Watch out for Karn Liberated from MUD.
Kismet -- Sauce vs Sneak Attack. Also useful vs any Storm deck or Elf combo, since LEDs/Petals/Moxes have to tap to make mana, and Elves need to have their guys untapped for Heritage Druid. It's not a lock vs these decks like it is vs Sneak Attack, but it can buy you precious time. It's never really -bad-....but it's also only situationally -good-.
Presence of the Master -- got any enchantress players locally you want to troll? I do, and it's hilarious. Their ONLY out is to let all their shit get countered and then resolve a Replenish.
Conversion -- this has some issues. My favorite use of it is vs Blood Moon decks, like Imperial Painter. This is a layering trick. When Moon and Conversion are both in play, a dependency system overrides the timestamp system. Conversion relies on Moon being active, so Moon is applied first. AKA: all non-basic lands are Plains, not Mountains. I'm not going to defend this as being great, but if you have an issue with Dragon Stompy or Imperial Painter, this is where you want to be. As awkward at that is.
And so on. I don't haul many of these out very often -- most of the ones I use commonly can be seen in my various sideboards, although some of them, like Asceticism, are meta-dependent. Six months ago, when Stoneblade was huge, Asceticism almost never left my sideboard. Now, though, it hasn't seen the light of play in a few months. But it's also always worth remembering. I'll check through my binder when I get home and see if there are any outstanding selections that I missed...I'm sure there are, but I can't remember every card I own when I'm at work, sadly =(
@Arianrhod
Just started playing scapeWish and had a few questions for you.
1.) Why the change from 1 Wood Elves to 1 Tribe Elder? Is it because the Elder can be GSZ at 2?
2.) How important are the Toughtseizes in the board? Currently I only have Duress?
3.) What are some general sideboarding strategies?
I believe we have common friends in JC and Steve.
Yup, we do.
1) Pretty much, yeah. Elder also brings a very slight edge in the Dredge matchup, since you can Zenith him and he self-sacs to kill Bridges (and get you closer to combo-kill land). They're functionally the same card, although I still like Wood Elves a bit better since the land comes into play untapped (and it can fetch duals). Having the Zenith@2 is situationally good, though.
2) Uh....questionably. They're primarily for the combo matchup, so Duress is probably fine. However, Thoughtseize does have a few advantages. With Thoughtseize, you can BW -> TS for any card in their hand. Corner, of course, but corner cases add up really quickly in Nic Fit. More relevant is if you run into Show and Tell. You want to be able to take their dude in hand, if they have, let's say, 2x Show and 1x Griselbrand. Obv. taking a Show won't do anything, so Duress is very sad in that instance. Also, considering that the deck doesn't run fetches, the 2 life from Thoughtseize is inconsequential. Most legacy decks do 2-4 damage a game at least with fetchlands, so Thoughtseize just "balances the scales," so to speak. So.....Duress will work, but if you plan on sticking with the deck longterm, I'd say it'd be wise to invest in Thoughtseizes.
3) Due to the nature of the wishboard, sideboarding is minimal. Sometimes you board in a few wish targets, just to improve your maindeck if you have dead cards. Sometimes, it's really obvious -- if you're vs High Tide, you swap 3 Deeds for 3 REBs, for example. The Thoughtseizes are a weird situation. They come in and stay in vs combo decks. Otherwise, they usually only come in on the play. Think of them like black Dazes. They're good on the play, but shit on the draw. Usually, I use a shaving style of boarding with Scapewish. There are rarely cards that are just straight up bad, which is both a good and bad thing. 1 Huntmaster frequently gets peeled out, sometimes an Explorer comes out if the opponent has a lot of basics....sometimes 1 Deed, etc. Put it this way, these are the cards that are sacrosanct and are almost never cut:
2x Veteran Explorer
1x Sakura-Tribe Elder
2x Wood Elves
1x Eternal Witness
1x Huntmaster of the Fells
2x Thragtusk
3x Cabal Therapy
4x Green Sun's Zenith
3x Burning Wish
2x Scapeshift
3x Sensei's Divining Top
I would never drop below those numbers. One exception: if you're playing vs Miracles, it's usually wise to board out all of the Burning Wishes, and board in all of the targets. The targets are higher CMCs (frequently 4), and are thus much harder to CB.
Hope that helps. If you have any more questions, just ask and I'll respond as I'm able =)
Quick question on BGr Scapeshift version:
Has anyone considered playing PW in that version, in addition to Primeval Titan ?
By PW I mean particularly Garruk (Lorwyn), and Koth.
I mean, Koth ultimate seems to fit as a nice be plan if Scapeshift were somehow to be ruined.
But the question is, is there a need for such a B plan ? Are the aggro (Huntmaster) good enough for that purpose ?
Big problem there: space. ScapeWish is actually ludicrously tight. Louis asked me last night what he could cut for a pair of Abrupt Decays main, and it was with great reservations that I told him one of the ramp creatures (Wood Elves/Sakura-Tribe) and one of the Huntmasters. I personally prefer those cards and believe that they are right for the deck as a whole, but there is literally nothing else to cut. I don't know where you could fit planeswalkers in. Koth would likely get the nod over Garruk, although Garruk Primal Hunter might be better than either of them.
Personally, I don't believe that there is a need for the planeswalker plan in Scapewish, though. Its aggro plan is actually a -lot- stronger than it really seems like it should be, and it is almost impossible to shut down the Valakut win. The deck can get rid of almost any obstacle that is stopping it from Scapeshifting off. Teeg? Virtue's Ruin. Leyline of Sanctity? Maelstrom Pulse. Aven Mindcensor? Let me count the ways. And so on. The best you can do is slow down the Valakut kill. You can't stop it. And if it's been slowed down, or the deck just isn't drawing into Scapeshifts or Wishes, your aggro plan is more than capable of carrying a game. Like, against U/R Delver I actually board OUT the Scapeshift kill and just go full retard with the aggro plan. That deck can't beat Thragtusk, it can't beat Huntmaster, and it can't beat Eternal Witness for any of the above. It can Price of Progress you if you Scapeshift into a pile of mountains. That's obviously an extreme corner case, as nobody is even playing that deck anymore, but the point stands. 2 Witness, 3 Huntmaster, 2 Thragtusk, and a Primeval Titan is a very serious beatdown package, composed of threats that legacy as a whole is very ill-designed to fight.
@ Arianrhod
Thank you for the help.
I also like the idea of cutting a Wood Elves and the third Huntmaster for a pair of Decays.
I don't think cutting ramp from the Scapewish deck is a good idea at all. I gotta say that having at least 3 Elders/Elves is necessary as you always want to see 1 in your opening game, sometimes two. Cutting a Huntmaster is probably alright, I cut 1 from the main to shave the deck down to 60 cards and haven't really looked back.
With that said, has anyone else tested Persecute over a Seize? Or an Overmaster? I have been really happy with the Overmaster vs U-decks honestly, since we all know what happens when Scapeshift resolves.
With a FLOOD LOAD of u/w miracles and esper blade in my meta, I have swapped off 1 stomping ground off Arianhod's list to a Boseiju, Who Shelters All and it is my primary tutor target for primeval titan
updated Dig Fit List
http://www.mtgdeckbuilder.net/Decks/ViewDeck/312247
@Arianrhod: I don't remember seeing any info on why the Bonfires were added and how they performed. Could you elaborate a bit?
"We are goblinkind, heirs to the mountain empires of chieftains past. Rest is death to us, and arson is our call to war."
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