DRS = death rite shaman
and he's the main reason my lands deck is eating dust right now...a T1 deathrite is just too brutal against us and since they seem to be the flavour of the month (or a few months to come), its going to hurt a lands player bad.
Anyway was scrolling through the spoiler list and found thespian stage. I don't know if it could be an inclusion in our list. Probably not, but just want to throw it out there.
My post was primarily about Abrupt Decay and its effect on a Dark Confidant sideboard. People don't side out their Abrupt Decays because they kill our Ensnaring Bridges, Crucibles, Explorations, etc. and they are more than happy to use them on any creatures we've side-boarded in.Originally Posted by Anen
With respect to man-lands and Swords, the simple reality is that you don't always have an untapped Wasteland or Zuran Orb in play to protect them. Furthermore, you don't always have the luxury of letting your opponent's Jace keep adding counters. I frequently encounter games where I have to send a Creeping Tar-Pit on the attack with no protection.
Just because our deck is "supposed to" always be able to protect its man-lands, doesn't mean it always can.
Honestly, if people just run DRS and neglect real hatecards in their SB and think they can get away with it I'm perfectly fine with that. Between Explosives, Totem, enough ways to tutor for them, and also G2/3 Decay I haven't had too much trouble with DRS.
If you look at sideboards, people do actually pack additional graveyard hate. Only noob players think DRS alone is sufficient graveyard hate. Deathrite Shaman just happens to be maindeck card thats good in general, even if not used against graveyard decks.
So game 1 you don't actually have an auto-win. Yes we have cursed totems, engineered explosives (via tutor) and all that, but remember while you're trying to find an answer for DRS he is building his board position/screwing your hand/and doing whatever he needs to do to win.
and it gets worse in game 2 and 3 when their sideboard comes in. Seriously I'm not joking, DRS is a card that made my friend quit aggro loam altogether.
This is, indeed, true. Very true. While you put together all you need for totem or explosives you opo will take advantage. We need an opening totem or explosives to stop them consistently.
On grave hate I always run it even addittional cards if run hate card md already. Bad times for lands??
GC.
this is what i've been trying to explain. at least somebody understood :)
EDIT: at least until 1) DRS craze dies down or 2) we get some crazy awesome answer to DRS in dragons maze that blows my mind (read, it would take something really spectacular), like uh a land that takes control of target creature with power 1 or less. Idk. Shrug.
I'm thinking of building this deck, but before I jump in the deep end of the pool is there an optimal list for the deck?
Greetings. There is no optimal list there are enlightened tutor/intuition/ravens crime builds.
Do you have the staples already? It's not a cheap deck to buy into. Also, the current meta sucks for us.
Ive been playing a BUGr version of Lands with very good results against DRS. I dropped W because every DRS shaman deck, use abrupt decay. They have answer to Cursed Totem and lets face it.... it is a very slow answer. My version plays with Punishing Fire main. This new gadget gave me a better mana base (from 11 to 14) with Groves of the Burnwillows. You can get back your Pfires for any dredge you may have did. Also, it takes down Jace, DRS, a bad used Scavenging Ooze, etc.
Spells [24]
Engine [10]
4 Life from the Loam
4 Exploration
2 Manabond
Assist [7]
3 Intuition
4 Punishing Fire
Artifacts [7]
1 Ensnaring Bridge
1 Zuran Orb
1 Engineered Explosives
4 Mox Diamond
Lands [37]
Control Lands [12]
4 Wasteland
4 Rishadan Port
3 Maze of Ith
1 Ghost Quarter
Man Lands [1]
1 Creeping Tar Pit
Mana Source [14]
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
3 Tropical Island
1 Bayou
2 Taiga
1 Forest
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Windswept Heath
1 Misty Rainforest
1 Verdant Catacombs
Assist Lands [7]
3 Tranquil Thicket
3 Tolaria West
1 Glacial Chasm
Legendary Lands [3]
1 Karakas
1 Academy Ruins
1 The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale
Last tourney I went was a 4-Swiss Round... 3 of 4 matches I saw DRS. First game, this guy started playing like a junk deck.... deathrite shaman turn 1, bayou, horizon canopy, green sun zenith, etc! but it was an Elves deck. I burned everything down with Pfire. Take G1, lost G2 with a pendelhaven countering my Fires and no wastelands for me. It ended up on a draw.
Second Game... a real junk, i started with land, diamond, double manabond... discarding LFTL and PFire... GG. Second game, I got my LFTL extirpated... but my SB Crucible of Worlds took him down with explorations and ghost quarter.
Third game... was pretty long... end up 1-0 with a last turn strike. It was another DRS deck with relic of progenitus main and he fetched only for basic lands.... I managed to take his deathrite shaman down... and a EE for 1... when he took my GY away... i got back the EE to the top of my deck. Then I started to beat him down with Creeping tar Pit tapping his W sources.
Last game... it was a mono R burn deck... with a turn 3 Sulfuric vortex... took it down with EE... turn 4 another vortex.... GG... i managed to get explorations, zuran orb, glacial chasm, but it was too late. Second game, I started with a turn 2 intuition for zuran orb, glacial and trinisphere.... he gave me the 3phere and exile the other 2 cards with faerie macabre. AGAIN a turn 3 vortex... took it AGAIN with EE... turn 4 another vortex... I went down to 4 lives.... put a chalice on 1.... chalice on 2... chalice on 3.... trinisphere.... and I got fireblast on my face.... UNBELIEVABLE!
Well... I ended up 4th place sadly, but very happy because DRS isn't an issue for me anymore, neither an early dark confidant with all the advantage it generates. I really hope you can give it a shot to punishing fire...
Hmm, i like the thought of Punishing Fire in this metagame. I believe it was faulty to bring it up earlier when Goblins was the targeted enemy of it, but Deathrite Shaman is a completely different thing. Also, this is pretty okay as a finisher against most decks!
I wanted to try grove/punishing fire for a little while. What does your sideboard looks like ?
My SB changes between tournaments... but once I tried a really weird SB and it works PREEEETTY well.
4 Dark Confidant
1 Tormod's Crypt
4 Spell Pierce
3 REB
2 Trinisphere
1 Crucible of Worlds
3phere+counters was BRUTAL against combo... I lost every G1 against combo and won the next 2 games with this sideboard. Crucible of Worlds on SB acts like my 5th Loam when it goes extracted. I played against a Sligh on that tournament and I denied 2 price of progress and 1 sulfuric vortex.... pretty good for me. Against Omnitell, 3phere just shut him down... with ports and wastelands.... if he ever played a spell, i countered.
Now, since BUG is the new meta... I changed my SB to something more traditional.
4 Dark Confidant
2 Trinisphere
4 Chalice of the Void
2 Krosan Grip
1 Ancient Grudge*
1 Tormod's Crypt
1 Crucible of Worlds
* Could be replace for the 2nd EE
spell pierce in the first sideboard is pretty weird. we don't actually have that many blue sources to support 4 spell pierce i think?
as for BUG being new meta, you'll definitely need more ways to deal with deathrite shaman. Right now we have Cursed Totem and Pithing Needle. They die to Abrupt Decays though.
With Maverick having such a small role in today's metagame, is it time to change out the Totem with Pithing Needle? Or is elves to much of a player?
About spell pierce, we play around 10+ U sources (4 fetchs, 3 dual lands, 4 mox diamonds, 3 tolaria west, 1 creeping tar pit). I guess you play 3 intuition MD...so you dont have enough U sources to cast it?
7 Counters+2 Trinisphere against combo is just brutal. Spell Pierce is almost a definitive counter with Rishadan Ports and 3phere.
I wouldnt waste 4 slots on my SB to put 4 Pithing Needles, which can get destroyed pretty easily because we dont have many targets to abrupt decay. Lands was CREATED to win aggro or control matches... I took 4 spaces on my MD to beat my main problem, DRS! to keep my win rate against aggro or control MUs. Almost my entire SB is dedicated to COMBO... G1 is almost auto-loss, so I tried to get better chances in G2/G3, but giving 4+ SB Slots for something you can deal on MD, only makes your G1 worst against those decks, and very weak G2/G3 against combo.
Fair enough, how has spell pierce performed for you? Did you see it significantly increase your win rate versus combo in G2 and 3? Do you have any playtesting results/findings to back this up? I would love to hear more.
I tried Spell Pierce and REB on a big tournament, which was full RIP and Omnitells. Every combo match is complicated, so I start wondering... is chalice of the void enough? against show and tell or omnitell, RIP, the answer is NO. We have a heavy SNT Metagame here, but almost no Storm decks.
Trinisphere helps to gain time against these deck and you draw some cards before they got and answer, so backing it up with counters was just brutal. I dont have MD problemas against aggro decks, control decks, DRS decks, etc... so I dedicated my entire SB against combo.
-Chalice against SNT is almost irrelevant, just 1 show and tell and the game is over....
-I thought Ravens Crime was the answer, but it is TOO slow and a 2 card combo is pretty easy to hide away with brainstorms or just discard other useless cards like counters against Lands.
- Against combo... 3phere+port is BIG, 3phere+ports+counters... lock....
-Thalia, Guardian of Thraben is a really really good card, and I miss it A LOT but droping W was a good call for me, but I cant tell you that I'd play her. 3-of, +3 beater post sideboard, just excelent.
Another card I thought it was a good idea was KOTR... because post sideboard.... LFTL usually gets exiled.... so Bob would be my CA and KOTR would search for my Silver Bullets, but this was a catastrophic idea. KOTR is very susceptible to GY hate, so I took her out.
Now that my meta is infest of BUG... and I havent see much more Combo decks, I went back to Chalice of the void and trying to earn time on G2 and win just 1-0. Resolving every card individually, searching twice on my deck so Im not missing something, etc. Also, I resolve EVERY punishing fire individually and every life I give with Grove of the Burnwillows. Probably, this is just nonsense for you, but is just an edge we can manage to our goal.
In fact, on that tournament... I played against a Stoneblade deck. He had EVERY land on his deck on play... Im tapping his mishra's factory with ports, killed his jace with fire and maze to his batterskull.... then, with P.Fire.... he was writing down every point + and - haha just a few turns later he scoop and was pretty upset for every time I make him taking life down and up. This is just a way to make them go outside their comfortable zone.
if you have a strong SNT metagame (and not the omni variant) id suggest two ensnaring bridge in the sideboard.
or you can split bridge and gilded drake, like i did here: http://www.mtgdecks.net/decks/view/34683
if its the omni variant, id suggest 3, not 2 trinisphere. this lets you intuition in response to snt and screw them over.
also i prefer to have the crucible maindeck - it often saves you 2-4 or even 6 mana a turn, as well as doing what you said, in saving you whe loam gets extracted g2 and 3.
ever thought of flusterstorm over spell pierce? I was thinking flusterstorm was more versatile. Another card I used to have in this slot was mindbreak trap, but it's cold against S&T variants.
You do realize that this works both ways? That one of the main reasons that Lands doesn't consistantly do well in large tournament settings, is that if the opponent wins game one, it is insanely easy for them to at the absolute worst, force a draw? If they force you to to resolve everything individually starting in the first game, and don't establish a precedent for shortcuts, which any decent player will do once they realize what they are playing against, then you will be forced to do so in all the following games. So if they win game one, again, against a decent player who knows the matchup, it will be no problem for them to burn the clock enough to at least force the draw. They can sometimes even get out of a game one loss if they feel that they have enough speed to win game two, by forcing you through the motions, and conceding the second the realize they are unlikely to win that first game. Now if they do win game two, you will have zero time to win game three.
~ Team Unicorn Motto
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