Took 3rd/4th at Jupiter today with Scapewish. Report to follow probably sometime on Monday, along with updated decklists. My matchups on the day were Esperblade (w), Burn (w), Junk (l), RUG (w), Junk (w), Junk (w), ID, Top 8 TES (w), Top 4 TES (l).
So, some questions again now that I threw something together out of what I have, GBw of course:
- I was trying Sun Titan and Grave Titan as well as Kokusho, The Evening Star and Yosei, The Morning Star. How do you find them at the right time since you can't Green Sun's Zenith into any of those? It seems like we run all these one-of bombs but we can't tutor them up. How do you deal with that?
- I only have a single Sensei's Dividing Top so I threw my single Sylvan Library in there since I could Academy Rector into it. Is that okay or am I way off?
- The Phyrexian Tower, Volrath's Stronghold combo with either Yosei or Kokusho is amazing. But how do you tutor them up when you only have the single copies again? What am I missing there?
- I have Vindicates. Why does everyone run Maelstrom Pulse? Vindicate seems better since you can target a land in a pinch. Am I missing something there?
- Lastly, how important is life gain (other than Kokusho)? Is a Thragtusk or Kitchen Finks kind of a must?
Thanks for the help guys.
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Dredge / Hive Mind / Belcher / Sneak-Show
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Originally Posted by TerribleTim68
Is running Visara, the Dreadful in this deck a bad idea?
@Viridia
You're running both recurring nightmare and moat. I think yosei deserves a slot in there.. the yosei loop is just too good
I'm not sure if it's needed, it's really good and cool, but i'll have to test :)
Played Rector at a GPT this weekend. I will be playing in Denver the hard way: no byes.
R1: BUG: Lost to a Tombstalker I couldn't find an answer to in time.
R2: BUG Control: Baneslayer + Sigarda are HOUSE!
R3: Show & Tell - Hive Mind: Ugh!
R4: Show & Tell - vanilla: Ugh!
R5: Show & Tell - Sneak Attack: Memoricide S&T is sweet.
I never want to see Show & Tell again. Few things are as frustrating as a T2 Emrakul when you drop a Sigarda. It just doesn't matter. You get hit on the first attack, have to chump the second attack and then get pasted on the 3rd.
Slik -- what did your board look like, out of curiosity? Also, man up. I had to play against -5- Emrakul decks in a row one event. Fun experience, isn't it? /sarcasm. The day they ban Show and Tell is the day I weep tears of joy for at least an hour. (Disclaimer: I think that if they were going to ban it, it would have been banned over the summer when Show and Tell was ERRWHERE. Now, not so much).
I'll be working on a massive post this morning, with my tournament report from Jupiter, as well as updated lists for both Rector and ScapeWish. Should be up in a few hours.
Also, if Chris Higashi wanders through (or anyone attached to him), does anyone know what he was playing at the SCG Open yesterday? I checked the pairings in like round 7 looking for a friend of mine, and I caught his name at table 4. Then, round 8 he was at table 20, so he obviously lost in r7. The west-coast legacy opens never put up lists past top 16, so I'm curious if he was still on straight G/B, or if he'd switched it up a little.
Visara is a dreadful idea.
Sorry, I had to.
Everyone's pretty much responded to Tim already, but I'll toss out there that Faith's Fetters can enchant lands. So if an Academy Ruins or Maze of Ith or something is being obnoxious, you have both a Vindicate and a Fetters to shut it down. That doesn't seem like a lot, but when you get a deck with this many shuffles and some Sensei's Tops, you'll be able to find it -- especially since either of those lands are going to be found in decks that are aiming for the long game: which is exactly where we shine. Note, also, that Yosei-locking with Nightmare is an acceptable answer to problem lands.
Sup guys,
Just wanted to pop in to say hello. I finally decided to move to a good deck (from Berserk Stompy), so most of Kich867's NicFit deck is now my ScapeWish deck =P
To Arianrhod specifically, thanks for all your writing man! It's made learning this super complex deck much easier. Looking forward to your post about Jupiter today.
I am with you on the tears of joy. Sometimes you get there when you hit w/ a therapy and they just don't draw into a new S&T in time, but otherwise it just sucks. I hate combo in general (it is just not at all how I want to play the game, and that goes for playing against it too) but S&T really rankles me. It's so CHEAP. High Tide takes some work on their part at least. But S&T? 3 mana? Lets go! And half the people playing it are seemingly giant d-bags. That doesn't help my opinion any.
As for my board, I decided to give your tech a crack. (All credit for NO tech goes to Arianhod.) I drew an NO once w/ an abundance of mana and a Veteran on the board. Ran it out there, got hit w/ a straight up Counterspell. The next turn I Witnessed it back and tried again only to run into FOW.
3 Natural Order
1 Progenitus
1 Memoricide
1 Cranial Extraction
1 Nethervoid
2 Extirpate
1 Humility
2 Carpet of Flowers
1 Raking Canopy
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
1 Harmonic Sliver
(The last three were concessions to the Miracles and Esper Stoneblade decks we saw present when we walked in the door.)
I guess I should mull more heavily to find Humility in these S&T games. I usually will keep a hand if it either A) has Therapy or B) Memoricide/Cranial + a Veteran or a sac outlet. Probably should throw those back if they don't have both Vet + sac outlet though. Of course, Humilty does nothing against Hive Mind.
I was talking with a friend on the car on the way to/from the event and he had a couple ideas for cards to give a shot to. Not sure I will (especially since I'm unlikely to get much play time between now and the GP) but I'll throw them out there for some thoughts: Steel Hellkite, Spine of Ish Sah, Sundering Titan. (No, he is not a MUD player.) Hellkite seems like it might be okay if you're on Fierce Empath. The Spine I don't like because of the lack of a way to tutor it (Angel of Despair is better since I'm running both Eledamri's Call and Fierce Empath). And Sundering Titan is in conflict w/ Explorer. 8 CMC is also rather huge even for us. The basic notion though, is that we aren't going big enough. My lizard brain likes that notion, but my rational brain thinks it's wrong :)
The weekend wasn't a total wash though. These were actually my first matches against BUG and I have to say it wasn't the Shaman induced nightmare I had feared, so that's good at least.
Okay. Here we go.
First up, the list:
4 Veteran Explorer
1 Sakura-tribe Elder
2 Wood Elves
1 Eternal Witness
3 Huntsmaster Of The Fells
2 Thragtusk
1 Primeval Titan
1 Terastadon
3 Pernicious Deed
3 Sensei’s Divining Top
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Green Sun’s Zenith
4 Burning Wish
2 Bonfire Of The Damned
2 Scapeshift
4 Forest
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
4 Taiga
3 Badlands
3 Bayou
2 Stomping Ground
2 Phyrexian Tower
SB:
3 Red Elemental Blast
3 Slaughter Games
2 Infest
1 Thoughtseize
1 Scapeshift
1 Sowing Salt
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Innocent Blood
1 Perish
1 Natural Order
Saturday morning we were planning on roll out at 8am, but a Junk-playing member of my car was running behind, so we ended up not getting out of Williamsport until 830. We made our way north, grabbing Steve along the way, and finally reached Jupiter's venue at like 10:45 (the event "started" at 11), after going at least 10 over pretty much the whole way to make up that half hour. My nerves were still slightly aflutter for the first round as a result, but I quickly settled in and got down to business. We picked up some orders, distributed some cards to friends in need, and then the pairings were live.
Round 1: Adam with Esperblade
I note as my opponent sits down that I've never seen him before. Now, in at a venue like Jupiter, where basically the entirety of the ringers in the Northeast regularly show up, things get pretty tight-knit. I personally feel that I'm on good terms with at least half of the room on any given day. For me to -not- recognize someone means that they're either a new player, or they came from very far away. Jupiter held a PTQ on Sunday, and I quickly decided from my opponent's mannerisms that he was a PTQ grinder who decided to come up a day early and play some legacy for the hell of it. He was frenetically precise in his announcement of triggers, and he seemed very uptight and nervous in general. Which, given that I suspect he borrowed his deck from a friend who was watching him basically the entire round, is not surprising...especially in as formidable of a venue as Jupiter.
Anyway, we exchange some pleasantries, gripe about how cold it is in the venue (the heat hadn't really kicked on yet), and do the whole shuffle-each-others-deck-thing. Except that he somehow misses a shuffle, and half of my deck goes sailing onto the floor. I'm not sure whether he got any information out of that or not. I remember I looked down and all of the cards that I saw him pick up were face-down, but it's entirely possible a Bayou or something could have tipped him off. But it was okay, because that gave me the "nervous" tell, so I got some information, too. I proceed to lose the die roll, which would be a recurring theme on the day, and Adam leads with a Flooded Strand which fetches an Underground Sea and Thoughtseizes me. This means that he's either Esperblade, or he's a combo deck trying to mindfuck people. I decide that he's on Esperblade, because that's the kind of deck a PTQ grinder would play. My hand is pretty slow, with some number of lands and large-mana-costed things. He durdles for a turn or two while I casually play lands and ship the turn. Eventually he goes for a Stoneforge, fetching Jitte. On my turn, then, I Burning Wish for Thoughtseize, and make him discard the equipment. I also see a Vindicate and a Snapcaster. He goes on Stoneforge beats, and I drop to 13 before Scapeshifting him for lethal with angry mountains. He doesn't understand how the Scapeshift combo works, so I explain it to him and multiple people sitting next to us confirm it -- in addition to my perfect willingness to call Caffrey over (who was judging the event). He was dumbfounded for the rest of the match that something that powerful is actually legal.
I board in the REBs and nothing else.
G2 starts off fairly similarly. He sends an Explorer farming, and I get off a Therapy seeing another Swords, a Surgical, a Counterspell, and a Force. My flashback off of a 2nd Explorer takes the Force. Then it's just a simple matter of drawing out his counterspell, and then introducing him to the furious mountains once again. Easy game.
Round 2: Jeremy with Burn
I've seen Jeremy before, but I can't remember what he played. I thought it was something red. Sure enough he leads off Mountain into Figure of Destiny, which is one of the more obvious opening starts in the game. I Therapy him naming Chain Lightning, hitting one and seeing Spike, Hellspark, Mountain. He Spikes me and punches with a level 2 Figure, putting me to 13. I think I just play land. He neglects to drop a third land, which means I'm probably dead. The only way Burn beats Scapewish is when they have 1-2 lands and no more. If they draw more lands, they usually die. Anyway, he drops me to 11, then 6, then I cast a Huntmaster to go to 8. I have Thragtusk and a land in hand ready to go, so I'm hoping against hope that he can't do 8 to me in one turn. Unfortunately, he draws Fireblast off the top of his deck to go with the Flame Rift in his hand. Awkward.
No boarding here.
G2 He makes some burn spells. I make a pair of Thragtusks. One of these things is better than the other.
G3 is NUTTY for both of us. He keeps what I think would be a shaky hand against anything that isn't giving him 2 Mountains into play untapped. He does like, Mountain + 3 damage. I can't remember which 3-damage spell it was. Anyway, I go land, Explorer, pass. I -think- he bricks on land? Either way, next turn I drop Turm von Phyrexia, saccing Explorer for two black. I use one of that black to Therapy him, which he then bolts me and Fireblasts me in response. I call something, and brick, seeing Flame Rift, Price of Progress and I think a Spike. I drop a 2nd Explorer, flashback the Therapy. He Pops me for 4, and I take his Spike. This is because I'm on the Scapeshift plan, and I'm actually counting on him to unload that Rift so that I can kill him with mountains. I Burning Wish for Scapeshift, pass the turn, and stare ferociously at my opponent.
He draws, and looks really sad. I feel better, and poke him: "Mountain?" He replies that no, it is actually a burn spell. My heart flutters. He casts his Flame Rift, and tanks. Shaking his head, he determines that there is no way to win, and scoops after showing me the Rift Bolt he drew. I take a long, deep breath. All he had to do here was not cast that Flame Rift and he won. If he just dropped the Rift Bolt, he would have been at 19 life (Explorer beat), and I couldn't have Scapeshifted him with 7 lands in play. Then on his next turn, he Rifts and either he wins (if I was stupid and didn't put him to 1 life), or he draws and we got to game 4. Or, you know, he draws the 2nd Rift Bolt that was underneath he first one and just kills me. I dodged a hell of a bullet here. I don't like it when Burn has multiple 1/2-land hands when I'm playing them. Shit's scary.
R3: Eric with Junk
This guy top eights, but loses to Henry Decker with his baby, Big Red. I also didn't recognize this guy, but he was chatting very amiably with two guys that I do know who were sitting by him, so I assume that he just doesn't get to come often, but does actually know what he's doing.
Game one he makes a fast Liliana, and I can't get out of it for a while. I eventually Wish for and Pulse the bitch, leaving him with just a Tarmogoyf. Unfortunately, my deck draws lands for 3 turns in a row while said Goyf pushes my face in. I am actually furious this game that I decided to take Reanimate out of my sideboard for the Natural Order. Those two things need to be played side-by-side, not in place of one another. His Liliana made me discard Terasty Nasty, while I had Burning Wish and three mana. I could have easily Wished for Reanimate, brought back The Don, blew up Liliana and two of my lands, and proceeded to PunchHimInTheFaceBig. But noooooo....Reanimate's bad now, clearly. I'm a dumbass. That happens again like 3 more times over the course of the day, by the way. :|
I board in the Innocent Blood and the Natural Order, boarding out I think one Bonfire and one Cabal Therapy.
G2, I only remember one thing. I kept a really shaky hand on a mull to 6. It was a hand like I hate to keep and sometimes am forced to: Basic Mountain + Top. I know how important Top is in this matchup, especially since I'm on the play so he can't make me discard it. He's on 7, and looks confidant. I decide that gambling that six is better than gambling a mull to 5, which I think is correct. Anyway, the situation progresses such that I have a strong hand but am crimped for mana. I drop an Explorer, and pass. He frowns, and avoids attacking with his Goyf, makes land, and passes. I draw land for my turn, and play it, which puts me to three lands. Now, I could do the exact thing that I purposefully set up by boarding out the 1x Cabal Therapy. I could Wish for Therapy, Therapy him, then flash it back, strip his hand bare, and get two more lands (and a shuffle for my Top). With my hand, I would have then easily been able to push it to g3.
Instead, I frown, remembering that I boarded in my Innocent Blood, and pass the turn. Call me Charlie Brown, cause I'm a MASTER at punting. He draws a Swords to Plowshares, and pushes my face in with large green and black creatures.
Later on in the day, a friend of mine tells me that he overheard the guy slamming my deck, saying that it was a free win (and some other stuff). Yeah, that's why I made top 4 and you lost in the top 8. Jackass.
Round 4: Paolo Cesare with RUG
I smile as soon as I see the pairing. I have a lot of respect for Paolo, and he's a great guy -- but he's a RUG player. That means I get a free win.
We sit down, chat for a while, and begin our match. I have an Explorer, he has a Goose. Awkward for him. I hit a Therapy, strip his hand, ramp, ramp some more, drop a Thragtusk to scare off his 4/5 Goyf, and then casually Scapeshift for an arbitrary amount of damage while I sit at 27.
I board in the REBs. I don't remember exactly what I boarded out. Probably Nasty Terasty, I think a Green Sun and a Burning Wish. Not 100% on that.
G2, he never touches my life total this game. The only change in my life was +5 from a Tusk. At one point he does have a scary board, but I drop Pernicious Deed. He Forces. I shrug. I drop another Pernicious Deed. At one point he dropped a Delver, to try to fly over my board. I REB it. He shrugs and drops another one. I play Witness, and REB that one too. Such is the RUG matchup. He eventually dies to beatdown. (3-1 on the day now)
Round 5: JC with Junk
I'm sad about this, because it's a teamkill. JC's a good friend of mine from Ithaca. I'm also sad about this, because fuck Liliana. Skank.
Game one goes for a good long while. He has a fast Liliana, which I eventually kill with Huntmaster. Multiple Deeds, multiple Wishes for stuff, multiple Bobs, Goyfs, Knights on his end, tons of removal....it's a slugfest. The last life total I have written down is me at 1 with him at 5. Doesn't get much closer than that, though he does pull it out.
Same plan as above: I board in Blood and Order.
In game two, I have the fast Pulse for the Liliana, so it doesn't do much damage. He spams +2 life on Deathrite Shaman to try to stay out of Valakut range. After multiple Hunts and Tusks, I'm sitting at 33 life. He's at 24. I draw Scapeshift. The mountains are FURIOUS, and I nuke him for at least 36 damage.
G3 needs to be on a new sheet of paper, because the first two took that long. He Extirpates my Cabal Therapies, Burning Wishes, and Pernicious Deeds, although thankfully I got to use two of my three Deeds first. However, he pays the price of hurting my deck -- because Extirpate isn't a business card by itself. Top helps me find successive Green Sun's, which in turn finds successive Huntmasters and Thragtusks. He dies to beatdown.
Round 6: Ryan with Junk
Hey look, this guy is in my car. And I helped him build his deck for the day.
Technically we would have drawn this match, but he scooped me in because a draw there meant both of us were likely out.
I win game 1 fairly quickly through unknown means. Ryan's version wasn't running Liliana of the Veil, but it was running Green Sun. As a result, I was more comfortable, but at the same time Ryan's deck was also putting out threats a lot more reliably than the other two lists had been doing.
Same boarding plan is the same.
G2 Ryan drops a turn 3 Hero of Bladehold (Junk mirror tech that I'd suggested). I Natural Order the Don, and blow up three of my lands. My thought process was that Hero of Bladehold needs to die. I know he has a Swords in hand, so the Don is going away. Unfortunately, he has 2 Abrupt Decays, too. I eventually die. If I'd had one more land, I would have been able to kill him. I conclude upon talking with him between games that blowing up 2 lands would have been correct. That way I could still have double-blocked, but I'd have a little bit more resources to work with, because I did get a little mana screwed after triple stone raining myself. 2 would have been okay. 3 was not.
G3 is a derpfest. I have him pretty close to dead, and he casts Armageddon because he wants to say that he cast it once on the day. Okay, sure. I have a Witness and a Wood Elves in play going beatdown. He's at like 4. He draws his card for the turn: Deathrite Shaman.
So yeah. This drags on for -actual- ever. I recover eventually, and he's flying by the seat of his pants using Deathrite to gain life every upkeep so his Bob doesn't kill him. I think that if we had played it the rest of the way out, I would have been okay, but we didn't have the time for it.
So, after he scoops me, I'm at 5-1, with one round left. ID time!
Round 7: ID with Ning
Top 8: Ning with TES
We actually have to play now. Storm is not something that I look forward to playing, but I can beat it.
Game one I keep a fairly strong hand. Ning leads with a land into a Duress. He takes my Cabal Therapy so that I can't get double value out of it (I have the Explorer to go with), and then plays an LED from his hand, presuming that I would name it with Therapy. I drop the Explorer and flashback the Therapy. My choice is between Infernal Tutor or Burning Wish. I decide on the Tutor, since he has to work harder for a Burning Wish kill, whereas Tutor can just go into Ad Naus and kill me. I hit 2 Tutors, and leave him with a Burning Wish (lol), a Gemstone Mine, and a Chrome Mox. He plays draw-go for a few turns while I play mountains, getting up to 4 in play. I Burning Wish for Slaughter Games and remove his Burning Wishes from the game. Then I drop Primeval Titan, and proceed to quickly kill him from there before he can recover.
I board in the REBs and 2 of the Slaughter Games. I know the Don came out. Not sure beyond that.
Ning mulls to 5 before getting an acceptable hand. He goes ballsy and Wishes for Time Spiral early in the game, but can't get up to the point where he can, or wants to, Spiral. It's okay, though, because I don't hit a Therapy for a while. An Explorer, Wood Elves, and Huntmaster eventually beat him to a bloody death.
Top 4: Bryant Cook with TES
Because I really wanted to play against this deck again.
I mull my 7 in game one looking for a Therapy, which I don't find. My 6 has a Zenith, a couple lands, and a Pernicious Deed. I know that Bryant usually goes for the Empty plan game one, so I keep it. I go land-pass, he makes 14 Goblins on turn 1. Shocking. Unfortunately, there was also a Duress in there, so my Deed poofed. I Zenithed out Explorer and passed. He puts me to 7, I get two lands, and he doesn't cut me to a Deed, Burning Wish, or Bonfire. 8 chances to win the game....just didn't happen.
Game two I put up slightly more of a fight. I kept another Therapy-less hand, but it was one of those hands where it goes stone nuts if I hit one. It also had double Red Blast. Anyway, he Duresses one, then Therapies the other, so that didn't matter. I'm going beatdown with two Explorers, meanwhile, and his City of Brass is helping with that. I can't find any hate to save my life, nor like a Huntmaster or Thragtusk to make his life more miserable. I do have a Deed in play, though. He eventually finds what he needs, going to 7 in the process. I make a slight misplay here, but Bryant and I agree afterward that it wouldn't have mattered. he had double LED, and he'd played one out the turn previous in case I therapied him. He led with something inconsequential, into Dark Ritual, with two cards in hand. Now, I actually thought that he had 3 cards in hand, so that was my mistake. But, regardless, I should have Deeded for zero THERE, rather than trying to hold it for his 2nd LED. I thought that he had LED, [uncastable card], [tutor], when he only had LED, [tutor]. He goes into an Iggy loop and I die from there. But yeah. Even if I had Deeded at the correct time, he still had the mana to win -- he just would've had to work slightly harder for it. Maybe if I saw something resembling business sooner. But, oh well. I still walked out with a set of Trops, which means that I get to be lazy and leave my Trops that are in my vintage deck alone now whenever I want to use Trops in legacy.
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Now, my thoughts on the list.
First of all, Reanimate needs to be there. That was a huge oversight in Liliana-of-the-Veil.format.
Infest was decidedly meh. I also didn't play against Elves, Goblins, or DnT, which it was meant for. I think that cutting 1 Infest for Reanimate is perfectly reasonable.
The Natural Order plan was entertaining, but mediocre. I didn't get to Wish for it all day, and while The Don is as potent as ever at solving problems, he didn't solve the problems that I needed solving. He also LOVED to get drawn, which is just my shit luck and shouldn't be held against him. But seriously, that thing was in so many opening hands =(
Bonfires have actually been being fairly poor for me lately. The meta has moved from largely copious small creatures to fewer, larger creatures. Additionally, Jace is proving to be less of an issue as time moves on because of Slaughter Games, and Scapewish has REB anyway to help out. Now, there are a few ways I could take this.
I'm going to take out The Don, because the NO package sucked. I'm also going to take out the Bonfires. That means I have 3 spots to work with.
The number of things that those three spots could be is astonishing. They could be more ramp. They could be Pulses or Decays. They could be more dudes. They could be something that we haven't seen yet (Gatecrash is coming soon, and it's bringing the Red/Green guild with it).
At this point, I'm probably going to try something like +2 Olivia Voldaren, +1 Wood Elves. I've wanted to get a pair of Olivias in the deck forever now. They'll improve the deck's Show and Tell matchup a good bit, I'd imagine, and stealing Junk's Goyfs and Knights is perfectly acceptable. She also dodges Abrupt Decay. I've missed having the 3rd Wood Elves, although the Tribe-Elder has been quite good as well. so I'm going to put that up as my suggested starting point, and test from there. I'm also going to alter the wishboard a bit. That update will go live to the list in my sig sometime this afternoon.
As for Rector...well....I'll keep you waiting a bit =) I'll put up another post this afternoon with my thoughts on Rector at the moment, as well as the updated lists. For now, I need a break.
In the list I've been messing with I ran woodelves up to 3 over Elder (mainly because I just don't have one). Do you think the added mana ramp is worth having? Just looking at the list it seems like it would help smooth out some 2/3 mana stuck situations.
I really like the looks of Olivia, I'm just curious how that would help us for SnT? Love the high slaughtergames count. I'll have to pick up a few more to replace inquisition.
Congrats on the success at jupter!
Ive been finding bonfire really lackluster lately as well. Ive been playing with -1 HM and -1Wood elves for a while in place of 2 Aburpt decays, so I might just try using those spots to add the HM and elves back in. I have been liking the decays alot though and wouldnt take them out.
Reanimate is awesome against all the lily decks, you just have to have other creatures out, or a decay to deal with lily when you reanimate or they will just -2 your reanimated target.
Thanks for the comments guys. I'll see about getting a Thragtusk and swapping Kokusho out for him. I had overlooked the Green Sun's Zenith into Fierce Empath into what ever fatty we want route, that clears up what I was missing there. As for the singleton lands, I'm still digging for them too often, especially the Phyrexian Tower. The Volrath's Stronghold is nice, but that Tower is way more important it seems. I also find myself overlooking the Recurring Nightmare plan which is cheaper to get a better Yosei loop going than using the Tower/Stronghold method. Again, thanks for the comments there too.
I think my biggest problem is that Thragtusk costs roughly $25 and the Tops cost roughly $16. To me, $75 is a lot of money all at once, so I have to figure out how to spread it out over time. If you could only buy a sinlge card, what one would you go after first? Should I work on getting the set of Tops (I only have 1) or go after the Tusk first? A Moat is out of the question for now, so not doing that.
I'll try to post my decklist later and you guys can give me some pointers, keeping in mind I'm working with what I own and my budget is an issue.
I play Legacy because I owned cards from way back when, so if you see expensive cards in my decks, it's because I already had them from the days of pulling FoWs and such from packs.I stopped playing all together in Invasion block and just recently came back to Legacy only since I had cards to do that. So things like Jace, Goyf, Moat, Candelabras, etc are just out of reach for me these days. I was shocked when I came back to the game at some of these prices. And my current situation is such that $25+ cards are a stretch. Especially when you need 4 of them.
Currently Playing:
Dredge / Hive Mind / Belcher / Sneak-Show
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Well, the deck needs tops to function, IMO, and while Thragtusk is one of the best dudes to get with a GSZ, there are other dudes that you can get.
For the same shot of money he could also finish his top set (just about) which would give you full function on that front.
Thanks! I missed seeing you there (and at Mythic, too). Christmas break, I'm guessing?
I'm really depressed about the Bonfire situation, actually. Bonfire was soooooooo amazing just a few months ago, and now it's just trash. I'm definitely hanging on to my copies, for future meta shifts may well necessitate them once again. But for now, I may as well have two Emrakuls in my deck for all the good they're doing me -- although Emrakul might actually be better =/
Decay is something I've certainly considered. They're the "boring" answer. I always like to experiment with random things on the chance that they work better than the baseline. Throughout my experimentation, if none of my attempts work, I'll probably fall back on a pair of Decays. But I'd like to try some stuff first (see later in this post).
I can certainly understand that. A question: what do you have that's old that you could sell? If you're just an acquirer of cards, then that's fine too -- but a lot of times, if you played back during that era, you very well might be sitting on a stockpile that you don't even know about, which you could then transmute into some of the newer staples like Tops.Thanks for the comments guys. I'll see about getting a Thragtusk and swapping Kokusho out for him. I had overlooked the Green Sun's Zenith into Fierce Empath into what ever fatty we want route, that clears up what I was missing there. As for the singleton lands, I'm still digging for them too often, especially the Phyrexian Tower. The Volrath's Stronghold is nice, but that Tower is way more important it seems. I also find myself overlooking the Recurring Nightmare plan which is cheaper to get a better Yosei loop going than using the Tower/Stronghold method. Again, thanks for the comments there too.
I think my biggest problem is that Thragtusk costs roughly $25 and the Tops cost roughly $16. To me, $75 is a lot of money all at once, so I have to figure out how to spread it out over time. If you could only buy a sinlge card, what one would you go after first? Should I work on getting the set of Tops (I only have 1) or go after the Tusk first? A Moat is out of the question for now, so not doing that.
I'll try to post my decklist later and you guys can give me some pointers, keeping in mind I'm working with what I own and my budget is an issue.
I play Legacy because I owned cards from way back when, so if you see expensive cards in my decks, it's because I already had them from the days of pulling FoWs and such from packs.
To answer your question: I would definitely get the Thragtusk. Top is really important too, obviously, but there are two dynamics at work here:
-Thragtusk is a Zenith target. This means that, on a per card basis, you're going to see that Thragtusk more often than you're going to see Tops. Each is capable of winning games on their own, but I think that I would err on the side of the tutor target. Tusk is also the single best thing we can do against a lot of the decks in the format, like Miracles, where another option like Finks wouldn't work. There are a few passable substitutes for Top. None of them are -amazing-, but they'll do while you work on getting Tops.
-Top is a legacy staple, and has been for a very long time. If you're at a legacy event, you'll be around other legacy players. There is a decent chance that one or more of them may have Tops available for you to borrow. Legacy players will almost certainly not have Thragtusks for borrow.
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Okay, here's the updated list for Scapewish:
Note, the list up above, which I copied from Jupiter, is incorrect. There was only 1 Tower, and 2 Valakuts, not 2 Towers.
4 Veteran Explorer
2 Sakura-tribe Elder
2 Wood Elves
1 Eternal Witness
3 Huntsmaster Of The Fells
2 Thragtusk
1 Primeval Titan
3 Pernicious Deed
4 Sensei’s Divining Top
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Green Sun’s Zenith
4 Burning Wish
2 Scapeshift
4 Forest
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
4 Taiga
3 Badlands
3 Bayou
2 Stomping Ground
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Volrath's Stronghold
2 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
SB:
3 Red Elemental Blast
3 Slaughter Games
1 Pyroclasm/Infest
1 Reanimate
1 Thoughtseize
1 Scapeshift
1 Tsunami/Sowing Salt
1 Maelstrom Pulse
1 Innocent Blood
1 Virtue's Ruin
1 Damnation/Perish
The left-hand options in the wishboard are those which I will personally be using a larger percentage of the time, but the right hand options are viable as well.
A few notes.
Upon consideration, I have decided that I want a second Tribe-Elder over a third Wood Elves. Elder being a 2-drop is the deciding factor. I want an 8th ramp source, and I think that a 2-drop one is better for the way the deck is currently set up than a 3-drop one. Against the fast decks, the 2-drop increases your odds of being able to Wish+Pyroclasm on turn 3, for example. In some matchups, that one turn difference decides the match.
4 Tops. Scapewish cares about Top a lot more than the other versions of Nic Fit, especially in an era of BUG and Junk, where he who has the Top quicker wins the game. This is subject to change in the future, pending testing. But for now, at least from a theoretical standpoint, I want Top more often than I don't want an extra Top.
Volrath's Stronghold. I've gone back and forth and back and forth on this card. When I've run it in Scapewish in the past, I always found myself aggravated because I couldn't make good use of it. I've determined, however, that the meta is ripe for this card to shine once more. This seems strange because of the amount of graveyard hate that is present within the format. However, a lot of that is either RIP (which we don't especially care about), or Deathrite Shaman (which we just kill). In the attrition mirror, having a Stronghold is a good thing, especially when we can access it easily off of Primeval Titan and form the Two Towers engine with it. Rector, obviously, still doesn't care, because Recurring Nightmare is better than Stronghold will ever be. Time may prove me wrong here.
Pyroclasm over Infest, because Virtue's Ruin. If you don't have Ruin, you want Infest. You NEED to have a reliable answer to Gaddock Teeg, especially since Junk is running like three copies of the Kithkin Asshole in their sideboard. Your Green Suns are better than theirs, and your Scapeshifts are almost always lethal. You don't want Teeg around. Junk doesn't have Mother to protect him, of course, but Maverick still does, and Mom-protected Revokers out of Death and taxes can be annoying, too. But yeah. There's the decision tree for that choice. You want -either- an Infest or a Pyroclasm, depending on your Virtue's Ruin ownership status.
Tsunami over Sowing Salt. An exception to this is if you're playing in the extreme Northeast, like in the Connecticut region, for example. From what I've heard, there are multiple 12-post decks up there, as opposed to just Jeremiah and his friend Scott who make the trek down to Jupiter sometimes. If you have 12-post, you need Sowing Salt to deal with them. Sowing Salt has some other corner-case applications, but generally speaking Tsunami is almost always going to be better. It's still the shit.
Damnation/Perish depends largely on whether you want a backup to Virtue's Ruin or whether you want to have a guaranteed sweep that hits every creature deck in the format and asks questions later, but is slower to do so. You can make really good arguments for either right now. I had the Perish in my board at Jupiter, and was sad it wasn't a Damnation one or two times -- but then there were times where it being 3 mana was also a lifesaver. I THINK that the flexibility of Damnation edges out the power of Perish, but it's close. Season to taste.
If 4 Tops pisses me off, and/or Stronghold proves itself less useful than I'm hoping, Olivia is the next thing on my list to try (x2). She's more than capable of taking over a board state entirely by herself, she has evasion, and she interacts favorably with decks that have more mana available than they really ever should. Top and Stronghold still get the first nod, though, on the "to be tested" list.
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Now, for Rector.
As most people in here are aware, Academy Rectum has a secret weakness that a lot of legacy players aren't aware of. In the past I've tried to keep this hush-hush so that any errant readers of this thread wouldn't use that knowledge against us. Two things have changed with regards to my policy therein: Rector OmniTell got more coverage than it really deserved (which showed people on the SCG stream how to beat Rector as a card), and Deathrite Shaman is a 4-of in two of the best/most prevalent decks in the format.
Rector's weakness: if you exile her in response to her trigger, the trigger will fizzle and you won't get the enchantment. There are a number of mind tricks you can do to get around that, to varying levels of scummy behavior, but the bottom line is, if you run into someone who is competent in legacy and who knows that trick, you need to have ways to deal with it. Ooze wasn't enough to force my hand. Shaman, unfortunately, is.
The response from Nic Fit is to adopt a Natural Order package in the sideboard. I had Steve test this out at Jupiter, and Slik was using the NO tech at the same time for his GPT, since he'd PM'd me asking for advice against Shaman. Preliminary results from Steve, at least, were positive. The Deathrite decks he played against had no idea what to do about Progenitus, who summarily dispatched them. Unfortunately, Steve got shitty matchups otherwise, and tilted a fair bit too, so he finished outside of the top 16 (and thus, the money). However, the tech did work for what it was supposed to do.
To wit, the updated Rector list:
4x Veteran Explorer
1x Starved Rusalka
2x Sakura-Tribe Elder
2x Eternal Witness
1x Fierce Empath
3x Academy Rector
1x Thragtusk
1x Sigarda, Host of Herons
2x Baneslayer Angel
1x Sun Titan
1x Yosei, the Morning Star
3x Pernicious Deed
1x Moat
1x Phyrexian Arena//Recycle/Null Profusion
1x Faith's Fetters
1x Recurring Nightmare
4x Cabal Therapy
3x Green Sun's Zenith
1x Vindicate
1x Maelstrom Pulse
1x Diabolic Intent
3x Sensei's Divining Top
3x Bayou
2x Savannah
1x Scrubland
3x Verdant Catacombs
3x Windswept Heath
3x Forest
3x Plains
2x Swamp
2x Phyrexian Tower
//SB
3x Carpet of Flowers
1x Memoricide
1x Cranial Extraction
1x Nether Void
1x Humility
2x Leyline of Sanctity
1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant//Natural Order
1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant//Phyrexian Arena (if not main)
3x Natural Order
1x Progenitus
And, again, the explanations of changes:
The only maindeck change is a concession to Tao, who says that Null Profusion/Recycle is the stone nuts. I haven't had a chance to test either yet, personally, nor have I come up with a compelling reason for one option over the other, other than that Profusion can be foiled and Recycle can't. But Recycle's art.....HRNNNGH.
I believe that Recycle/Profusion would go in the Arena slot, although having one of those effects out with an active Arena would stop you from getting hardlocked. If you opt for Recycle/Profusion, I believe that the Arena then goes into the sideboard, to be moved in at the expense of the Recycle/Profusion slot vs the discard decks. I'm not sure. Testing needs to happen on that before I make a final decision one way or the other.
Now, for the board.
The 3 Natural Orders + 1 Progenitus, for the BUG/Junk matchup, aka Deathrite.dec. The only outs these decks have to Prog is Liliana of the Veil, which is not run as a 4-of (when it is run at all). If you want, you can try to run the full 4 Natural Orders, but I -think- that 3 should be sufficient since the decks we want it vs are slower, grindier decks. A few tricks. Game one, ALWAYS ALWAYS try to run Rector into a Deathrite Shaman, if the situation presents itself and you can afford to do so. Don't chicken out. More players will not know the trick than players that do, and you can use all kinds of little tricks to sneak it through, such as explaining Rector's trigger for any curious opponents as "when this dies, I can exile it and search for an enchantment." There's nothing wrong about that statement. It's actually pretty close to the oracle text. But, it gets it into the opponent's head that this is not a trigger that they can respond to. Subtle wording means a lot for Rector. I always answer all questions directed my way truthfully, by the by. If someone then asks me if they can respond to the trigger by exiling her, then I explain everything and and 100% candid. But I'm not going to volunteer information, and neither should you. Just don't ever lie about it. It's not worth crossing any lines for.
To refocus: it's usually a good idea to fish for knowledge game one. If they don't respond to Rector, it's probably best not to board in the NO package, although I'm not 100% on that since it's so new and untested overall. However, vs Junk at the very least, Moat is a HUGE asset vs them. If they don't know about Rector, I suspect it wiser vs Junk at the least to leave Rector+Moat in. BUG has a fair number of flyers anyway, and Jace TMS, so Moat is a liability there anyway. As a result, you probably just board in NO and be done with it. Again, testing is needed.
Don't forget that you can Therapy yourself. If Progenitus gets stuck in your hand, Therapy yourself to discard him, then shuffle your deck.
Against blue decks, it's entirely possible to hard-cast him. You just need two Carpets, and they have to have at least 2 Islands, in order to make the Red and Blue mana. Likewise, don't forget than you can Green Sun him. This is made easier by Carpets as well, obviously, but is possible without Carpet.
The 0-2 Elspeth slots are primarily for Miracles, but also are solid against BUG/Junk.
2 Leyline of Sanctity is additional insurance against the Liliana of the Veil decks, while being useful vs Storm-based combo, and vs Burn, which I expect to see a resurgence to prey on BUG.
Note: this configuration does leave you somewhat vulnerable against U/W RIP Miracles. The lack of Golgari Charms, Krosan Grips, Qasali Pridemage, Harmonic Sliver, Abrupt Decay, and so forth may prove to be a problem if the RIP Miracles variant grows stronger. If it does, then the Leyline spots are probably the weakest overall, and those two slots likely become Abrupt Decays, which are useful both vs Miracles and vs Liliana decks. Sliver isn't at the top of his game right now, nor is Qasali. Grip is always fine, but OmniTell isn't a presence lately....just Sneak. If Omni pops up again, then Grip is probably the best way to go. If you are more worried about tribal, then look at Golgari Charm as a flexible option.
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Okay. I'm going to update the links in my signature to these two lists. While the full range of changes present within are largely untested and there is some variance to be found, I do endorse both of these lists as what I would play, were there another Jupiter this weekend. I'm going to have a bit of a legacy drought here for a few weeks, so hopefully some of you can get some testing in for me with these changes and we'll see if they work. My next major legacy event will be SCG Columbus, and I hope to see some of you there, at least.
I'm as accessible as always -- if anyone needs advice on anything, by all means post here or shoot me a PM, and I'll do what I can.
Thanks a lot Arianrhod for your report and explanations.
Personally I have had very good experiences running Bonfire. It has won me at least one (possibly 2) game my last tournament. With all those Lilli's about I would like to fit in abrupt decay MB.
I am very much surprised you included Volrath again although you used to advise against it not so long ago.
Is the extra ramp really neccessary for this deck? I might prefer a decay to an extra sakura.
SB: 3 elemental blast: I exchanged one with a pyroblast to annoy people who try to extirpate my REB
I will be testing your alternatives and might be able to give a more informed opinion in a while.
Currently Playing: Scapefit , Shardless BUG, Team America,
I thought about doing that, but I haven't had anyone Surgical/Pate my REBs yet, so /shrug.Thanks a lot Arianrhod for your report and explanations.
Personally I have had very good experiences running Bonfire. It has won me at least one (possibly 2) game my last tournament. With all those Lilli's about I would like to fit in abrupt decay MB.
I am very much surprised you included Volrath again although you used to advise against it not so long ago.
Is the extra ramp really neccessary for this deck? I might prefer a decay to an extra sakura.
SB: 3 elemental blast: I exchanged one with a pyroblast to annoy people who try to extirpate my REB
I will be testing your alternatives and might be able to give a more informed opinion in a while.
Volrath is very much on probation right now. I'm cautiously thinking that this meta is the right meta for it to be good, but if I try it even once and it sucks, it's back on the bench until I feel like giving it another chance.
Like I said before, switching out Bonfires for Decay is perfectly reasonable. I want the extra Sakura-Tribe just to have an extra earlier mana source. It isn't so much that I want more ramp, as that I want more lands without raising my land count. Usually turn 2 without Explorer shenanigans is pretty boring for this deck, so I think that adding another "mana source" in the form of a 2nd tribe elder is a good idea. It makes more 2-land hands keepable, for example.
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