[Deck] The Rock

[lavafrogg]

Not enough room?

I think the meta has moved past knight being good and is much more of a grind than it was last year when maverick was knight stomping all over the metagame. Goyf is just the goto beater in legacy and souls grinds out games much better. If the meta continues this was I will go back to cutting goyfs for SFM's but currently combo is too prevalent for SFM to succeed, she is about a turn too slow. Eventually a weenie rock list could be viable with SFM, Confidant, Souls and Shaman but it would be a dog to combo with no clock to speak of.

Ideally I would play knight, goyf, souls, SFM, confidant and shaman all together as one big family but we cannot have that. I am too happy with my non creatures right now to make room for so many creatures.

Current List:

4 Tarmogoyf
4 Dark Confidant
4 Deathrite Shaman
1 Scavenging Ooze

4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Lingering Souls
3 Thoughtseize
3 Cabal Therapy
1 Life from the Loam

3 Lilliana of the Veil

3 Sylvan Library

4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Abrupt Decay


4 Utility Lands (Dust bowl, wasteland, more basics, more duals, more fetches, volrath's stronghold, yavimaya hollow, cycle lands, horizon canopy)
4 Bayou
1 Savannah
2 Scrubland
1 Forest
1 Swamp
1 Dryad Arbor
6 Fetches

Sideboard:
3 Engineered Explosives
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Lingering Souls
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Quasali Pridemage
1 Mystic Enforcer
3 Pithing Needle
3 Umezawa's Jitte

The only white cards in the list are swords, souls and in the board. I am looking at changing the wasteland slot to something techie. Im currently looking at 4x horizon canopy as additional white sources and ways to get lands in the yard for shaman or the misers loam. If you hit a late game loam for 3 canopies you just win. I do not think that wasteland is pulling its weight in todays meta, especially without knight to chain them together in matches where it mattered.

[sdematt]

Not enough room?

I think the meta has moved past knight being good and is much more of a grind than it was last year when maverick was knight stomping all over the metagame. Goyf is just the goto beater in legacy and souls grinds out games much better. If the meta continues this was I will go back to cutting goyfs for SFM's but currently combo is too prevalent for SFM to succeed, she is about a turn too slow. Eventually a weenie rock list could be viable with SFM, Confidant, Souls and Shaman but it would be a dog to combo with no clock to speak of.

Ideally I would play knight, goyf, souls, SFM, confidant and shaman all together as one big family but we cannot have that. I am too happy with my non creatures right now to make room for so many creatures.

Current List:

4 Tarmogoyf
4 Dark Confidant
4 Deathrite Shaman
1 Scavenging Ooze

4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Lingering Souls
3 Thoughtseize
3 Cabal Therapy
1 Life from the Loam

3 Lilliana of the Veil

3 Sylvan Library

4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Abrupt Decay


4 Utility Lands (Dust bowl, wasteland, more basics, more duals, more fetches, volrath's stronghold, yavimaya hollow, cycle lands, horizon canopy)
4 Bayou
1 Savannah
2 Scrubland
1 Forest
1 Swamp
1 Dryad Arbor
6 Fetches

Sideboard:
3 Engineered Explosives
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Cabal Therapy
1 Lingering Souls
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Quasali Pridemage
1 Mystic Enforcer
3 Pithing Needle
3 Umezawa's Jitte

The only white cards in the list are swords, souls and in the board. I am looking at changing the wasteland slot to something techie. Im currently looking at 4x horizon canopy as additional white sources and ways to get lands in the yard for shaman or the misers loam. If you hit a late game loam for 3 canopies you just win. I do not think that wasteland is pulling its weight in todays meta, especially without knight to chain them together in matches where it mattered.

Enforcer seems like an interesting "go big" choice.

-Matt

[lavafrogg]

Enforcer seems like an interesting "go big" choice.

-Matt

Without threshold he is a non decay-able threat against jund and BUG that has random protection from all other black spells as well. With threshold he is a fucking nightmare for anyone across the table. A 6/6 flying pro-black beater is the largest thing in the skies in 95% of your matches (griselbrand is a 7/7 that cannot block enforcer) and is zenith-able like a boss. I bring him in against all of the new BG(r/u) decks that are running around that are not playing swords to plowshares in that they have no way to easily kill him(delver plus flashed in clique blocks, double bolts, triple fires).

Seemed like a good idea.

[damionblackgear]

On Enforcer - Pro black is irrelevant vs most of the format as the main targeting black spell is decay and the other is pulse/vindicate (played as a 2-3 of in some lists). So you're more-so paying 4-5 for a 6/6 flier when threshed. Playing it beforehand allows you to dodge Bob, Deathrite, and Sam Black's Zombies (honorable mention: Tombstalker). Not to knock it, just an observation.

Personally, I'd rather have Sigarda (at the premium) as she's pro swords as well as always flying.

I'm finally going to cut Mox and Mystic (at least for a little bit). I'll have an updated list later on. I'm not sold on Souls but only testing will tell if that's the right call or not.

[Sughayyer]

Thanks for the answers!
So based on what you said, I put together 2 different lists: one sfm+tokens based, the other with fat guys. The lists follow:

tokens:
3 cabal therapy
2 thoughtseize
2 inquisition of kozilek

4 stp
3 abrupt decay

2 sensei divining top
1 jitte
1 sword of fire and ice
1 batterskull

4 deathrite shaman
3 bob
3 sfm
3 blossom
4 souls

2 liliana

on the sideboard: zealous persecution, o-ring, and - tarmogoyf, for punishing fire and combo match up. Also some grave hate.

The other list:

4 thoughtseize
3 hymn to tourach

4 swords to plowshares
2 abrupt decay
3 vindicate

2 sensei divining top
1 sylvan library

4 deathrite shaman
4 bob
4 goyf
4 reliquary

2 liliana

on the side, pernicious deed, lingering souls, and probably o-ring...

The fisrt idea is to render most opponents cards useless via souls and blossom - I remember when I played deadguy a few months ago these were great vs jace and liliana.
The second idea is to GRIND (hence vindicate chosen over pulse, and the presence of hymn)

Is any of these a decent start or should I dismiss both?

Also it seems redundant to say, but I have no idea about the current meta.

Again thanks for the patience! :)

edit: what if I went full bg only splashing W for souls?

[Esper3k]

@Sughayyer: Your first list is pretty similar to many Deadguy lists as you mentioned. You may want to look at the 2nd place list from SCG Fort Worth - that's something fairly close to what you're running there. The second list you posted is a fairly traditional Junk list. Just the best big dudes, removal, and hand disruption (which is fine). Either list is fine although with the first list, you may run into some problems dealing with fast aggressive bigger dudes (since all your tokens will die in combat without trading).

[lavafrogg]

On Enforcer - Pro black is irrelevant vs most of the format as the main targeting black spell is decay and the other is pulse/vindicate (played as a 2-3 of in some lists). So you're more-so paying 4-5 for a 6/6 flier when threshed. Playing it beforehand allows you to dodge Bob, Deathrite, and Sam Black's Zombies (honorable mention: Tombstalker). Not to knock it, just an observation.

Personally, I'd rather have Sigarda (at the premium) as she's pro swords as well as always flying.

I'm finally going to cut Mox and Mystic (at least for a little bit). I'll have an updated list later on. I'm not sold on Souls but only testing will tell if that's the right call or not.

I'm not sure what you said here that is knocking on Enforcer, it has protection from pulse/vindicate was well as any terminate/dreadbore you might see. I do not want him against miracles where he can be removed because Teeg is a greater threat to them. Sigarada trades with a tombstalker which is something I have specifically targeting as a pain in the ass and I would like to avoid my over the top card losing/trading to theirs.

Again 4 vs 5 is a big deal when I plan on only having 3-4 lands(plus Shaman) out for most of the game ad forget about 6 to GSZ for her. In the matchups I bring in enforcer the extra mana will be hard to come by and Enforcer is the better card. Sigarada is better against Miracles but thrun is arguable better than Sigarada and he does not see much play currently(especially when some of us are splashing souls with jittes in the board).

[Arsenal]

With Team America gaining steam (DtB status), Enforcer also trumps Tombstalker. Just throwing that out there.

[Barbed Blightning]

The day dreadbore/terminate become legacy's commonplace removal is the day I'll quit the format. You can say enforcer has protection from murder and violent ultimatum, but that doesn't make it better than sigarda--a card I genuinely hate to see my opponent drop. She grants you immunity to lilly, can't be touched and flies. Try it before you knock it. I wish I could justify her in my 75

EDIT: Also, knight and wasteland and are still VERY good in a meta full of tricolor decks.

[damionblackgear]

I'm not sure what you said here that is knocking on Enforcer, it has protection from pulse/vindicate was well as any terminate/dreadbore you might see. I do not want him against miracles where he can be removed because Teeg is a greater threat to them. Sigarada trades with a tombstalker which is something I have specifically targeting as a pain in the ass and I would like to avoid my over the top card losing/trading to theirs.

Again 4 vs 5 is a big deal when I plan on only having 3-4 lands(plus Shaman) out for most of the game ad forget about 6 to GSZ for her. In the match-ups I bring in enforcer the extra mana will be hard to come by and Enforcer is the better card. Sigarada is better against Miracles but thrun is arguable better than Sigarada and he does not see much play currently(especially when some of us are splashing souls with jittes in the board).

I didn't realize Tombstalker was in your meta. I feel better about at least giving it an honorable mention. I haven't run into one for almost a year. It's been weird. The good thing about Tombstalker is that the decks that play her, don't play many creatures. So Liliana should be able to deal with the demon, without much help. Granted, some of the lists that use her are playing her as well (which it sucks for us to get stuck behind her too).

Mana costs are different for you and I. I tend to have that 4-5 land (I'm still on 23) so I can reasonably expect to cast/zenith her. I'm also planning on Maindecking her as a finisher, thus returning to a more traditional Rock build than previously. I'm also debating adding Spirit Monger or other More traditional finishers as well.

My reasoning for Sigarda - As mentioned, Thrun's (and Enforcer) susceptible to Liliana. Sigarda is not (I expect to see More Lili than TS). I hate seeing opposing Liliana (pretty much all of us do). Sigarda's great vs Bug (which is a deck we play against now) and backed with a stronghold, she's almost impossible for them to deal with (stronghold also creates a hindrance on the use of Shaman).

Our lists are different though, 5-6 isn't something that can be considered with 20 lands. It's almost out of range at 23 but I'll take the risk. Here's the list I've been working on:


3 Deathrite Shaman
4 Dark Confidant
1 Tarmogoyf
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Kitchen Finks
2 Knight of the Reliquary
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons

4 Swords to Plowshares
3 Abrupt Decay

1 Duress
4 Thoughtseize
1 Life from the Loam
2 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Green Sun's Zenith

2 Sylvan Library

1 Sensei's Divining Top

3 Liliana of the Veil

1 Marsh Flats
3 Verdant Catacombs
3 Windswept Heath
2 Bayou
1 Savannah
1 Scrubland
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Dryad Arbor
1 Karakas
1 Volrath's Stronghold
3 Wasteland
1 Forest
1 Plains
1 Swamp

59 Total
Sideboard

1 Duress
3 Surgical Extraction
3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
1 Gaddock Teeg
2 Golgari Charm
2 Tidehollow Sculler
1 Pernicious Deed

13 Total


There are 3 cards missing and I'm still going over their possibilities. The maindeck card's job is probably going to be to win (in which case I'm looking at an efficient creature like Goyf or Knight) or to draw (in which case I'd rather not go with Library#3 and instead Top#2). Both options may be entirely wrong and I may not need anything of the sort. I'm also testing the singleton Loam right now. I don't think it will stay but there are always possibilities and I'd prefer to try it and know if I like it, or not.

For the board, I'm thinking about alternative options to deal with Lingering Souls (either the card or the tokens). Having a blocker will be nice but I won't always have her out there to stop them. Scattershot Archer, Illness in the Ranks, and Raking Canopy have been the biggest ideas I've had regarding that front (I'd prefer something that's a 'permanent' solution). A small LD package may be a better idea though. Armageddon would be my first thought for those control matchups. Provided I can have a threat down, and a way to deal with any Jace that made an appearance.

If you're wondering why I'm using Duress over Inquisition or Therapy the answer's simple. I want to be able to cast it on turn 1 (fully blinded) and I need it to grab something relevant when I have to. There are a couple creatures that I may want to grab but I should have enough removal to deal with singles.

2 Knights - She's not the Swiss Army Knife she use to be. There are too many fronts to fight on and too many cards that now interact with her. I've got her for what I'm hoping is going to be a utility win-con slot. Although, utility is the priority part of that. In her place I'm using the third Liliana (Which can also deal with SnT but can't be put into play).

3 Thalia - There is a lot of more traditional Combo coming back and Thalia was the best answer to that. She's also useful against Burn. She's not the greatest vs the SnT decks but I don't intend her to be used against them or Miracles. Hand Disruption and Liliana should be able to take care of those.

Finks is a way to fight Liliana which can also be disguised as a Knight. Paired with the Stronghold, it's able to pseudo replicate the old Rock strategy with Wall of Blossoms.

[crow_mw]

Damionblackgear - Illness in the Ranks might double up as hate for empty the warrnes, but overall I think
Dread of Night is a better choice. On top of getting rid of souls it also has other minor impact, such as preventing Mystic from swinging with Jitte and also doubles up as great hate against Maverick. I do not know if your list isn't too heavy on white creatures for that though.

@all recent lists - I have been trying Matt's 3 swords, 4 abrupt decay and it has been working really well for me. I do however mostly play against decks where uncounterability is super important and I have not run into Tombstalker for quite some time. The fourth swords is in the board and comes in against aggro decks.

[dballard]

I think the variety of builds for Rock is both a curse and a gift. I love to see all the lists as it gives me different ideas about what may or may not work for me. Obviously we're all trying to find the right balance of everything and what works for one person may not work at all for another, based on play styles or the meta. Example - Sigarda is a great card but pulling off 5cmc or 6 with GSZ is asking a lot in wasteland heavy metas, don't think I could do it. I'm playing Thrun in that slot myself but he's pretty lackluster at times ... the search continues.

An aside - anyone buying a box of Gatecrash when it comes out? Any opinions on anything Legacy worthy in the set? Not seeing much myself.

[Barbed Blightning]

Extort seems good in sealed, but not in legacy. No cards like Deathrite Shaman or abrupt decay, but what can you do?

[Esper3k]

I think the variety of builds for Rock is both a curse and a gift. I love to see all the lists as it gives me different ideas about what may or may not work for me. Obviously we're all trying to find the right balance of everything and what works for one person may not work at all for another, based on play styles or the meta. Example - Sigarda is a great card but pulling off 5cmc or 6 with GSZ is asking a lot in wasteland heavy metas, don't think I could do it. I'm playing Thrun in that slot myself but he's pretty lackluster at times ... the search continues.

An aside - anyone buying a box of Gatecrash when it comes out? Any opinions on anything Legacy worthy in the set? Not seeing much myself.

I wouldn't waste my time with Gatecrash especially now that they've announced Dragon's Maze is going to have nonbasic lands (Guild gates / shocks / mythic lands) in the old basic land slot of boosters.

[dballard]

Has anyone looked at Nath of the Gilt-Leaf? The 5cmc is a bit much but those are Planswalker type abilities.

[sdematt]

What's Dragon's Maze?

-Matt

[coraz86]

What's Dragon's Maze?

The third set in RtR block.

I'm glad they're announcing there'll be non-basic lands in it; I was briefly concerned it would be Alara Reborn all over again. Although at least that gave us Maelstrom Pulse, which I guess isn't the worst thing that's ever happened to Rock players.

[Sughayyer]

I playtested today in the afternoon, and I really enjoyed the tokens route... Combat wasn't much of an issue since they fly and are often equipped with something, and our Rock shell deals well with aggro decks. I faced only one combo (ant) but the discards (and the goyf from sb) helped me get there. However I know the deck is vulnerable to deed, pulse (sort of) and cards like zealous, dread of night, etc. (that's a second reason I sneaked 3 goyf on the sb).
I'm inclined in using it as my comeback list, at least for a while.

[lavafrogg]

I playtested today in the afternoon, and I really enjoyed the tokens route... Combat wasn't much of an issue since they fly and are often equipped with something, and our Rock shell deals well with aggro decks. I faced only one combo (ant) but the discards (and the goyf from sb) helped me get there. However I know the deck is vulnerable to deed, pulse (sort of) and cards like zealous, dread of night, etc. (that's a second reason I sneaked 3 goyf on the sb).
I'm inclined in using it as my comeback list, at least for a while.

The token route is super grindy and bitter blossom fucks miracles a new one so in the right meta I can see the tokens list being super strong.

[sdematt]

I think if people are still playing straight up Miracles, then they're losing, so fucking them up isn't a bad thing.

I think most people are going to make the switch to the Helm version or to Esperblade, since they're that much better.

-Matt