[Deck] The Rock

[defector]

Well done Matt!! Great games and a great finish!!

[Esper3k]

Congrats, Matt! I too have been recently brewing up Junk lists - we'll see how things go in my testing.

Now you've put the deck back on the radar and people will be more prepared for it at Denver, doh!

[Koby]

Congrats, Matt! I too have been recently brewing up Junk lists - we'll see how things go in my testing.

Now you've put the deck back on the radar and people will be more prepared for it at Denver, doh!

Denver? There's still SCG Vegas and the Invitational in LA coming up. Plenty of time to practice in the field!

[Esper3k]

Denver? There's still SCG Vegas and the Invitational in LA coming up. Plenty of time to practice in the field!

No, I want LESS people to play it, damnit! (Since I'm not playing in anything big again until Denver)

[Hapless Researcher]

Congrats, Matt.


I was wondering what additions/changes you would make to fight the combo match-ups? That seems to be the weak link from testing.

[sdematt]

Congratulations are in order! Good job Matt, it's a shame I didn't get to watch the matches live, but it turns out I was brewing Junky decks while you were fighting on air.

Excellent, I'm always glad to hear this! :)

Onto more pressing matters: how does a Maverick player transition into Junk to take advantage of the heavier disruption suite that Junk has to offer?

It depends, how deep do you want to go down the rabbit-hole? I mean, you can just splash for Thoughtseize/Inquisition if you want to, or you can go one level deeper. I've found Abrupt Decay to be simply astounding. Abrupt Decay pulled wins out of losses, and I'm not even kidding. I won matches where, previous to the printings of Abrupt Decay, I was struggling. You can even see this by my unfortunate Match Win Percentage. There's a lot of 2-1's, which I really didn't like, but I'll post why when I do a full report, which will be up (hopefully) by Wednesday, or even tonight (I'm still going from 5am yesterday, so bear with me).

Is there a recap of the GSZ / SFM sides? Does the deck perform better with heavier B or W or G base color?

Do you mean sideboards, or just the versions? I like a heavy black base for disruption and sideboard options. The deck is definitely Bwg, in that order of importance, depending on how you define important.

GSZ allows you to have a little bit more consistency and flexibility in your answers/threats, as you would know with your Maverick experience. GSZ was great all day, and I definitely would not cut the card in MY build. It allows you to run 1's and 2's of a creature, and still be able to get them with reasonable consistency. I like GSZ more against Miracles simply because I can fetch Gaddock Teeg. The nice thing about Junk vs. Miracles is that in Maverick, you do have situations where you have Knight + Mom, and you can go all the way with that until a Terminus strikes. In Junk, you can mash Tarmogoyf until the remove it, since you can apply pressure with a 5/6 beat-stick AND with your Knights, without having to overextend with Noble, Mom, etc.

SFM is definitely better in the tribal matchups, I'd have to say. My version is not the greatest against Tribal (especially Goblins). The life could also matter a bunch more in the RUG matchups (but you have to actually GET Batterskull into play and attacking). In creature combat, Equipment certainly helps, but I've found with all the removal we have (I'm running 9 pieces of creature removal), I don't find the combat step too terrible regarding Merfolk and other fairer decks, but in stuff like Goblins you need all the help you can get.

I think this split is a matter of personal preference and your meta. I'm not a huge fan of SFM because you're so invested the card, but you really have no way to protect it. SFM was good in 2011 because Mental Misstep mucked Swords to Plowshares, so you would always resolve and Vial in your Equipment.

Black offers Liliana and Hymn (and I'm almost certain Hymn is too over the top)

Hymn is most likely too colour intensive if you're running a Dark Maverick type build. I've been told Liliana is good, but I've never felt like I needed her.

Green offers GSZ and the associated creatures, but it doesn't feel to me like its taking advantage of the color wedge.

Essentially, green is only in the deck due to creatures, which is basically what the colour wedge is all about. Garruk Relentless pulls its weight, but for sure, beyond the creature base and Abrupt Decay/Deed, it's a pretty miserable colour.

White offers SFM and Lingering Souls, which to me seems like the best pairing with Liliana.

There was a Black/White deck floating around running SFM, Souls, and such. I think it finished just outside the Top 16. I think if you were wanting to run Liliana, a more aggro-Junk build or a straight BW deck may be better, especially when coupled with blocker and evasion for your Planeswalkers and equipment, respectively.

Are Mox Diamonds adviseable? 3 or 4 Deathrite Shaman?

Deathrite Shaman did so much work on Sunday it's not even funny. You can usually lock down combat by just running out big Knights and Goyfs, and then slowly pick away at them for 2, or just gain two life for value. I used Deathrite for mana probably, on average, 1-2 times per game when I did draw them early. It was nice to have the boost, but after the first bit, this doesn't matter. The fact that Deathrite then does something useful, and something that means something in multiples, is also good. Mox Diamond pitches a land out of your hand and does accelerate you. For sheer acceleration, Diamond is the best if you're running enough lands. However, for consistency and versatility, you want Deathrite Shaman. I ran 3 copies on Sunday and it felt just fine. You do board them out sometimes, but they were good all day at changing the math back and forth.




-Matt

[Koby]

@sdematt
Thanks for the feedback. Locally, as we were brewing, we discussed the possibility of a SFM/Souls swap with Goyfs/Hymns - effectively moving from Deadguy/G to Eva Green/W. I do enjoy the efficiency of discard + Goyf, so I'll test some versions out and report back within about a week. Thank goodness for Thanksgiving. Time's a plenty!

[Esper3k]

I've been really liking SFM + Lingering Souls myself.

Lingering Souls especially is a pretty tough card for the Uw Miracle decks to deal with, even if they're running RIP.

The SFM package is also very good against the Miracles decks while also helping a lot with those aggro tribal matchups from my testing.

[Mr. Safety]

What? His only sources of CA are higher cmc than bob, and both are spell-pierceable. Decay is good against RUG, but his list has literally 2 card filter spells. Good luck on the games where you need to dig with top + fetches in order to see a reasonable number of abrupt decay or plowshares. His list is also missing mox diamonds, so good luck "getting mana" with those 2 colorless lands, 2 tap lands, and only 1 LftL maindeck...

I agree that The Rock has gotten a much better matchup % against RUG with the printing of deathrite and decay, but his list is just missing too many of the important cards against tempo lists, namely top, bob, SFM, batterskull, and mox diamonds.

Haven't had trouble with stone blade or miracles...low creature count along with pw's usually works well. RUG hasn't been hard either...last I knew, targeted discard and hymn to tourach followed by a 9/9 knight is pretty good against tempo decks.

[Zeckk]

Haven't had trouble with stone blade or miracles...low creature count along with pw's usually works well. RUG hasn't been hard either...last I knew, targeted discard and hymn to tourach followed by a 9/9 knight is pretty good against tempo decks.

Because the RUG player never sees a daze, snare, or spell pierce, right? Abrupt decay does a ton of work, but you are simply running inferior cards that will affect your win percentage. The key to RUG tempo is getting above their soft-counters and sticking something big enough to black their soft removal, without dying to a delver or goyf first. The difficult part is the fact that you don't always see 5+ lands in a game against them, so making sure your card choices inherently blank some of their countermagic is extremely important. Just take a look at Matt's list from the Seattle SCG Open - low CMC, decent creature count, and full playset of Bob.

[ryn ball_2]

congrats matt!!

[sdematt]

http://www.twitch.tv/scglive/b/341250560

Here 'tis in case you want to watch.

-Matt

[Kyle]

Be like matt.

[sdematt]

And crush your opponents into the ground throughout the Swiss?

Report is being written now, will post when done.

-Matt

[stealth]

Good to see pimp getting some feature match action, well done Sir GG!

[Mr. Safety]

Because the RUG player never sees a daze, snare, or spell pierce, right? Abrupt decay does a ton of work, but you are simply running inferior cards that will affect your win percentage. The key to RUG tempo is getting above their soft-counters and sticking something big enough to black their soft removal, without dying to a delver or goyf first. The difficult part is the fact that you don't always see 5+ lands in a game against them, so making sure your card choices inherently blank some of their countermagic is extremely important. Just take a look at Matt's list from the Seattle SCG Open - low CMC, decent creature count, and full playset of Bob.

Bob's are on my list of things to get. Arena is a simple concession in order to make the deck playable. It stays on the field longer, but costs more mana. I know the right move, but I need to save my pennies so I can get the bobs. They still go for around $40 a piece.

I play around daze (gsz and death rite do that nicely.) most games end up by establishing parity, trading discard for counters, removal for threats, and then something like garruk, liliana, or knight gets there. Delver is the prime target for decay because the other threats can be outclassed or dealt with by using discard/swords. Maybe the folks I play against just aren't very good.

[Dyvith]

I've been really twisted and torn about my list lately. I've spent a lot of time working on my mana base, as well as the one or two flex slots that I seem to have.

For reference, here is my base:

4 Deathrite
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Dark Confidant
4 Knight of the Reliquary

4 Swords
3 Decay
3 Liliana

4 Thoughtseise
2 Inquisition

3 Sensei's Top
------------------------------- 35 Cards -------------------------

4 Wasteland
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Marsh Flats
1 Windswept Heath
2 Scrubland
2 Bayou
1 Savannah
1 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Karakas
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Mase of Ith

------------------------------ 22 Lands --------------------------

3 Flex Slots...

It's amasing just how much trouble three cards can cause...

This is my current idea..

1 Jitte
1 Teeg
1 Plains

Other maindeck cards I am considering are....

Mox Diamond
Thalia

As for the sideboard, that's a totally other story. I'm convinced that I'm going to be boarding out 4x Goyf vs white decks, so I'm boarded strangely for that because R.I.P. decks turn goyfs into pathetic mongos.

[Viridia]

http://www.twitch.tv/scglive/b/341250560

Here 'tis in case you want to watch.

-Matt

What's up with all the people putting your die on top of the Goyfs >.>
Also nice performance!

I keep thinking if i should pick up The Rock again, but somehow i can't settle on a list. I'm not very fond of Stoneforge Mystic so i suppose that leaves out Lingering Souls aswell.
How many Abrupt Decay and Deathrite Shaman do you guys feel is best playing around with atm? Also how good is Tarmogoyf here? Still very needed as a 2-4 off as beater, or not that important if you manage to get other finishers in?

[Koby]

Ok did some testing with my own take on GSZ based Junk with multiple goyfs last nite on MTGO.
About the only thing I can say for certain are twofold:

1. This deck has a tough time against monoblack Pox decks.
2. The MTGO casual testing room metagame is comprised of 100% monoblack Pox decks.

There goes that method to testing :\

I'm going to tweak the list a bit and run it in actual 2-man Prizes-on-the-line matches, since that's better testing than in the Tournament Practice room.

P.S.:
Turn 2 on the draw against me: Dark Ritual, Nether Void with Deathrite Shaman in play for me. I hate the people on MTGO sometimes.

[sdematt]

1. This deck has a tough time against monoblack Pox decks.
2. The MTGO casual testing room metagame is comprised of 100% monoblack Pox decks.

This read very much like an XKCD comic. I laughed here :P

---

Yeah, people wanted to keep putting die on my Russian Goyfs. I no-sirred that one pretty quick.

----

My favourite line from the tournament were these two:

Me: "Inquisition you."

Raid: “I feel so violated.”

Me: “Oh, just you wait…”

--

Feline: “So you’re the one with the black border duals! Suddenly my Candles seem less impressive…”

--

Me: “I couldn’t keep that one. I would've sat there like a limp starfish until you combo off on me.”



-Matt