[Deck] Nic Fit (GBx Explorer Zenith Control)

[Siiig]

In the mana base issue with scapeshift, I've very heavily considered trying out Crop Rotation main board, adding in Boseiju and Karakas tech.

I don't expect Hypergenesis to keep seeing a lot of play up at Jupiter, but since someone in my group is the one that CAUSE that influx, I still have to deal with it regularly.

Do I have to explain Boseiju? I don't think I need to explain Boseiju.

Anyway, the crop rotation idea lets us to faster "mini shifts" that often get described for fixing our mana. Could also put a use to double phy tower shenanigans.

My personal manabase for Scapeshift...

4 Taiga
2 Stomping Grounds
3 Badlands
2 Bayou
4 Forest
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
2 Phy Tower
2 Valakut

I find the deck goes through "fits" where the mana will suck for quite a few games. Obviously I know it's just bad shuffling / bad luck with the actual statistics, but I can still pretend this deck has a personality. My copy did this from round 4 last jupiter up until the middle of play testing with friends Tuesday night.

Although crop rot doesn't act as a fetch land, I often find I'd rather have exactly the land I need, rather than a better color. At that point I could easily justify bringing out a phy tower since I'll have a new method to bring it onto the battlefield.

[Arianrhod]

In the mana base issue with scapeshift, I've very heavily considered trying out Crop Rotation main board, adding in Boseiju and Karakas tech.

I don't expect Hypergenesis to keep seeing a lot of play up at Jupiter, but since someone in my group is the one that CAUSE that influx, I still have to deal with it regularly.

Do I have to explain Boseiju? I don't think I need to explain Boseiju.

Anyway, the crop rotation idea lets us to faster "mini shifts" that often get described for fixing our mana. Could also put a use to double phy tower shenanigans.

My personal manabase for Scapeshift...

4 Taiga
2 Stomping Grounds
3 Badlands
2 Bayou
4 Forest
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
2 Phy Tower
2 Valakut

I find the deck goes through "fits" where the mana will suck for quite a few games. Obviously I know it's just bad shuffling / bad luck with the actual statistics, but I can still pretend this deck has a personality. My copy did this from round 4 last jupiter up until the middle of play testing with friends Tuesday night.

Although crop rot doesn't act as a fetch land, I often find I'd rather have exactly the land I need, rather than a better color. At that point I could easily justify bringing out a phy tower since I'll have a new method to bring it onto the battlefield.

Have you ever seen footage of Kenny Mayer shuffling, especially when he's on Battle of Wits? If you haven't, I highly recommend it. Usually when I'm playing Scapewish I try to emulate that style as much as I can, and that seems to help with the pockets of mana that are formed just by Scapewish being Scapewish.

Why do you have the 2nd Phy Tower over the 3rd Bayou? Tower is legendary and requires a critter in play to make it powerful. Scapewish doesn't need the extra sac outlet as badly as Rector does.

Mini-shift is only vs certain decks, or as an act of desperation. Unless I'm in a really dire place, I never shift just to fix my mana (or vs certain decks, ie shifting for basics vs stax, or shifting for valakuts + mountains vs miracles). It's a really shitty mana fixer.

Crop Rot in general seems fine....but you'd be choosing it over the other options for the 3x slots (assuming 61), which some opt for Decay in, or Olivia/Blitz. Those are your Crop Rot slots. If you're okay with that, then go nuts. Of course, finding room for the specialty lands is another story.

While we're on the topic of specialty lands, consider trying this guy if you go Crop Rot: Lavaclaw Reaches. That thing could put down a -world- of hurt in the right situation.

Has the Ancestral Visions tech made its way to the regular BUG decks yet? If you're running running a consistent removal/discard package, it's the best card in the deck.

With Jace and Eternal Witness and Cryptic Command (and Time Warps!?) it's pretty easy to Time Walk 5-8 times in a row without ever using Panoptic Mirror. It'd be interesting to run a heavily blue Nic Fit that just meant to take lots of turns and maybe attack with some little dudes, but mostly just to take lots of turns. I'm working on a mod that doesn't need to go infinite turns (just squeaks out wins anyway).

I'm in agreement. Mirror might be better as a 1-of rather than basing the deck around it. At the same time, Mirror + Visions is one of the most straight-up busted things you can do in Chrono Fit right now, so I dunno. Mirror is both clunky and amazing at the same time, and it's annoying.

Its actually "Sher" as well :) Yours?



Honestly Recurring Nightmare has been a bit meh for me as well. Haven't used it much though, so I might let it stick around. The ramp is for G1 against decks you don't want to be ramping too much (i.e. Miracles, Elves Combo, SnT too perhaps). But its a flex spot. I don't like Liliana too much in this deck but I might try playing 1 in the MD. As for Garruk PH, don't have them yet, but will most likely do -1 Wall -1 Sakura for 2 Garruks.

I'm also thinking about getting +1 Skeletal Scrying in somehow...

Scrying is atrocious now, don't bother. Half the format is munching your yard with Deathrite and the other half is whoring Rest in Peace.

You're on a junk-ish/good-stuff style right now, Sherko, so Nightmare is definitely not where you want to be. Nightmare is good in Gifts versions and Rector versions, and that's about it. I mean, it's REALLLLLY good there, but you can't just jam it in whatever version of Nic Fit in general and call it good. I would 100% cut Nightmare. If you want a long-term recursion engine, put in Primeval Titan and go for Volrath's Stronghold + Phy Tower. Nightmare is more powerful than Stronghold, but it requires more specifics built around it.

@TheArchitect: I also noted that a third Bayou goes a long way to improve the chance of being able to play therapy and explorer. It also improves your opening hand. Shuffle effects are usefull but not necessary in this list in my opinion. The extra mountains are not only there for scapewish but also to go on a valakut plan if necessary.

/barn

I tweaked my SB for a tournament I will attend this saturday (I am not sure about Nic Fit or Esperblade yet) and it looks like this:


1 Abrupt Decay
2 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Extirpate
2 Duress
1 Thoughtseize
1 Memoricide
1 Tsunami
1 Tormod's Crypt
2 Oblivion Ring


I went for additional Surgical effects and Crypt over Nihil Spellbombs because of the new Balustrad Spy deck (I am pretty sure it scoops to extracted Moebas or poped Crypt in resp to library mill). I also took out a Memoricide for a Tsunami. The SB is calculated to replace the worthless mainboard cards for every unfair matchup. Decay and Pulses are my main Thoughtseize/Teeg replacements for fair matchups but I am seriously considering Lilies again somewhere now. Removal in the form of permanents is definitely where you want to be with Nic Fit.

Keep in mind that Spy often boards into Belcher postboard. The only hate that is both fast enough and truly effective vs both the Belcher and Spy plans, is Mindbreak Trap. Whether you want to go to that extreme or not depends entirely on how much storm presence/Spy presence you expect there to be. I've been liking the Traps so far, just because Nic Fit's one major achilles heel is t0/t1 combo, and Trap at least helps that problem. But, again, meta presence and all.

[Siiig]

Have you ever seen footage of Kenny Mayer shuffling, especially when he's on Battle of Wits? If you haven't, I highly recommend it. Usually when I'm playing Scapewish I try to emulate that style as much as I can, and that seems to help with the pockets of mana that are formed just by Scapewish being Scapewish.

No, I haven't. But I'm about to google it.

My choice for double Phy tower is just to increase the likelyhood of seeing it, but at the same time it's far from necessary. Bayou #3 doesn't exist simply because I only have two Bayous.

I mentioned using crop rot as a means of fixing/fetching, and I think this could warrant taking the fetch slots displayed in Architect's land base.

Sadly, taking that mana base means wasteland taiga -> surgical taiga is suddenly devastating to my alternate plan. The friends of mine who have realized that's a good play do serious work against me.


Lavaclaw Reaches...may be the card I've been searching for as a sick mana dump. Thanks for the suggestion, I'll be getting one tonight + crop rots if I can find them.

[sherko7]

You're on a junk-ish/good-stuff style right now, Sherko, so Nightmare is definitely not where you want to be. Nightmare is good in Gifts versions and Rector versions, and that's about it. I mean, it's REALLLLLY good there, but you can't just jam it in whatever version of Nic Fit in general and call it good. I would 100% cut Nightmare. If you want a long-term recursion engine, put in Primeval Titan and go for Volrath's Stronghold + Phy Tower. Nightmare is more powerful than Stronghold, but it requires more specifics built around it.

Yeah, I kinda figured that out after play testing with the other lists. Nightmare just doesn't fit in the pure GB Rock list. Guess its time to smash in the Walkers :)

Also currently added in 1 Obstinate Baloth in my SB. Seems to work great against a lot of decks in our meta (Burn, Jund, U/R).

For PWers in the GB Rock list, I'm thinking 2 Garruk PH 1 Lili 1 Vraska. Can anyone justify playing more than 2 Lili? Seems it is a bit antisynergistic with how the deck operates, no?

As for Vraska, I'm sorry I know she's not as good as the other 2 but damn I just wanna swing with that Ulti!

[Arianrhod]

Sadly, taking that mana base means wasteland taiga -> surgical taiga is suddenly devastating to my alternate plan. The friends of mine who have realized that's a good play do serious work against me.

This is EXACTLY why I don't like Evan's mana base. By cutting mountains for fetches, you improve your initial mana, but at the cost of stability and redundancy. It becomes very, very easy to shut off Scapeshift with a well-placed Sowing Salt / Waste+Surgical.

If you have 4 Taiga + 3 Badlands + 3 Mountains, let's say, and Taiga gets Sowing Salted/Surgicaled/whatever, you have 6 mountains left in your deck, which is the minimum allowed to Scapeshift. That means that you literally cannot draw a mountain or search for a mountain the entire game, if you want to Scapeshift, which also turns off all of your red cards. That's just wayyyyyyyyy too dangerous. I haven't been specifically coming out and pointing out that weakness because I know people from the Mythic playgroup read this thread, so I didn't want to give them ideas that could hurt Evan, but since you brought it up, I'll expound on it now.

[Star|Scream]

So is there a way to get reliable early access to black while maintaining enough mountains to support scapeshift?

[Arianrhod]

So is there a way to get reliable early access to black while maintaining enough mountains to support scapeshift?

3rd Bayou.

On a marginally more serious note, green is the critical color, because from green, all other colors stem. Green gives you Explorer, which gets you to other colors vs an aggressive deck. It gives you Zenith-> Tribe Elder, which gets you a basic swamp. If you're really heavy on non-black sources, you have Wood Elves as well, which can fetch Bayou.

You have 3 Bayou, 3 Badlands, and 2 Swamps, which gives you 8 black sources. Add on to that a Sakura-Tribe and the 2 Wood Elves, as well as 4 Zeniths, you get 15 "black" sources. + 4 Explorers is 19. Add in the tower as a half a black source.

That means you have a full 20 cards, or 1/3 of your deck, which either is directly a black source or can fetch a black source.

[EpicLevelCommoner]

Well our Legacy event didn't fire yesterday but I did play one match against UR Painter's Combo.

G1: Triple Cabal Therapy followed by beats and deeds wins me the game

-3 Vet -1 Damn -4 Troll/JMS/Skull +5 Extraction +3 Carpet

Misboarded most likely

G2: First legit win with my list encourages me to keep a no disruption hand. Die to Grindstone.

G3: This goes on forever, with me extracting both Servant and Grindstone. Unfortunately, a ton of misplays on my part (including said extraction of Servant and not Wurmcoil) I die to Wurmcoil + Transmute Artifact

So many punts . . . Didn't help that I was treating it as a friendly game and he wasn't. Good thing one of the guys who top 16 at Indy was there to give advice on my plays.

[Siiig]

Have you ever seen footage of Kenny Mayer shuffling, especially when he's on Battle of Wits?

Just watched him on SCG open at edison. Looks like he does multiple piles + a lot of chopping? It seemed silly to me at the time, but doing a double pile shuffle with some chops inbetween really seemed to help the feel of my deck last tuesday. It felt good enough where it will become my standard shuffle method between games.

[Wincheee]

Hey guys! tomorow i go to play Scapewish in a Legacy Open in Buenos Aires (im from Argentina) with this list:


4 Veteran Explorer
2 Thragtusk
2 Huntmaster of the Fells
1 Primeval Titan
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Eternal Witness
2 Wood Elves
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Dragon Broodmother/Blitz Hellion/Master of the Wild Hunt


4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Pernicious Deed
3 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Burning Wish
2 Scapeshift


2 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
2 Stomping Ground
3 Forest
3 Mountain
2 Swamp
1 Phyrexian Tower
4 Taiga
3 Bayou
3 Badlands
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Blood Crypt


SB: 3 Slaughter Games
SB: 1 Reanimate
SB: 1 Scapeshift
SB: 4 Thoughtseize
SB: 1 Damnation
SB: 1 Maelstrom Pulse
SB: 1 Pyroclasm
SB: 1 Cave-In
SB: 1 Hull Breach
SB: 1 Innocent Blood


Thoughts? i have a doubt in 2 slots,idk if better play 2 more creatures,like 1 ooze,and 1 dragon/blitz/master of the wild hunt,or just play 2 Abrupt decay in that slots..i feel i dont have instants responses early game,and abrupt decay is a beast,but in other hand,im feel a little safe playing 1 cementery hate maindeck(ooze) and another threat like Dragon Broodmother.

sorry for my english,and comments please! thank you!

[TheArchitect]

Yeah, I kinda figured that out after play testing with the other lists. Nightmare just doesn't fit in the pure GB Rock list. Guess its time to smash in the Walkers :)

Also currently added in 1 Obstinate Baloth in my SB. Seems to work great against a lot of decks in our meta (Burn, Jund, U/R).

For PWers in the GB Rock list, I'm thinking 2 Garruk PH 1 Lili 1 Vraska. Can anyone justify playing more than 2 Lili? Seems it is a bit antisynergistic with how the deck operates, no?

As for Vraska, I'm sorry I know she's not as good as the other 2 but damn I just wanna swing with that Ulti!

In GB, I personally really like Liliana, I run 3 of them. There is no reason to run her as less than a 3 of. You either want AT LEAST one of her every game, or none of her. Shes not like jace, where you play her and protect her till you win. You just play her and always get a 2 for 1, and if your lucky you can get a like a 5 for 1. Shes just a controlling 3 drop. Also, dont play vraska, she isnt very good. Karn however, is awesome in GB. Personally, I run 3 lily, 2 prime hunters, 1 karn. However if your not a fan of lily, just run 0.

Baloth seems pretty good in that meta!

For reference, here is my current GB, that I haven't used in anything more than a 5$ tourny in a while, but Ive tested it a lot and really happy with it:

3 Bayou
4 Forest
1 Phyrexian Tower
3 Swamp
4 Verdant Catacombs
1 Volrath's Stronghold
2 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills

4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Sensei's Divining Top

4 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Pernicious Deed

3 Liliana of the Veil
2 Garruk, Primal Hunter
1 Karn Liberated

4 Veteran Explorer
1 Scavenging Ooze
2 Sakura-Tribe Elder
2 Eternal Witness
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
2 Thragtusk
1 Primeval Titan

SB:
3 Carpet of Flowers
3 Extirpate
1 Ichneumon Druid*
1 Cranial Extraction
1 Memoricide
1 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Damnation*
3 Mindbreak Trap*

The SB is kinda meta dependent, the cards marked with * are just reflecting that I see a lot of storm based combo and random tribal/aggro decks that I dont want to lose to.



@ Surgicaling my taigas :(

I luckily never had that happen to me, but I think that is a risk I am willing to accept to improve my consistency. Adding 2 more Stomping grounds (To have 2 SG, 3 Mnt, 3 Badlands after losing tiagas is still only 7 lands, so you cant really play more than a few). However, dont forget that even if you have only 2 mountains left in your deck, if you have 4 in play, and 8 lands total you can still scapeshift for 2 valakuts, 2 mnts and just leave you 4 mnts unsacrificed. 12 Dmg is still alot after a grindy game of huntmasters, surgical extractions, thoughtseizes and fetchlands. Also note, I do normally run 4 basic mountains (which I suppose one could be a stomping ground) so I still have 7 non-taiga mountains. Most of the kind of decks that would be using surgical/extirpate we don't even need scapeshift against since deed, thragtusk and huntmaster are better than their whole deck (UR delver burn, jund, RUG, etc.). BUG control and esperblade, run those cards occasionally, but esperblade cant kill our taigas easily, and BUG doesnt use surgical nearly as often as the other mentioned decks.

I will be at mythic tomorrow btw, Im not 100% sure what list Im going to be playing though. Its definitely going to have veteran explorers in it though. I let you all know how it goes!

[slave]

Hi all,

Been loving this thread. Not quite all the way through it yet, but I'm getn there.

I have a few questions about this deck archetype.
Considering the popular variants of Nic Fit - GBw, GBr or simple GB;
What are the differences with respect to speed, flexibility, alternate win-con's etc.?

I'm a GB player mostly (competitively anyway) and already have quite a few of the NicFit staples, but just not sure which way I should go.
If you were starting out again in NicFit, which build would you persue?

Ta.

[Zombie]

btw, is ANT how much of a problem? Every time I play with the damn thing I'm so conscious of the fact that my deck has literally 3 cards that can win the game, max, if even that (G1 I literally lose to Extract) and that I'm packing Grim Tutors instead of Burning Wishes. That is to say, Sadistic Sacrament sounds sexy. Sadly it doesn't phase TES and it's ilk much.

[Zombie]

Hi all,

Been loving this thread. Not quite all the way through it yet, but I'm getn there.

I have a few questions about this deck archetype.
Considering the popular variants of Nic Fit - GBw, GBr or simple GB;
What are the differences with respect to speed, flexibility, alternate win-con's etc.?

I'm a GB player mostly (competitively anyway) and already have quite a few of the NicFit staples, but just not sure which way I should go.
If you were starting out again in NicFit, which build would you persue?

Ta.

Rector is fun. Though these people here don't follow the Righteous Path Of Eldrazi Conscription FTW, it can perhaps be forgiven because they're playing Rector ^^

[Petree]

Hi all,

Been loving this thread. Not quite all the way through it yet, but I'm getn there.

I have a few questions about this deck archetype.
Considering the popular variants of Nic Fit - GBw, GBr or simple GB;
What are the differences with respect to speed, flexibility, alternate win-con's etc.?

I'm a GB player mostly (competitively anyway) and already have quite a few of the NicFit staples, but just not sure which way I should go.
If you were starting out again in NicFit, which build would you persue?

Ta.

I would prefer Arianhood answering this because he's basically got this down lol

but IMO... GBW is the most flexible version, you can add and mix shit all over the place.... It's slower though, doesn't mean it's bad, it just means you play
board control and win late game. There's a crap load of win con.

GBR or if your talking about scapewish.... This deck is not flexible at all, it's very strict and as you can see from the previous posts that there's s
serious mana issue (but that can be said about nic fit in general). This deck is the fastest because it has scapewish combo, turn 3 or 4
is possible. And basically speaking it's your other win condition.

GBu i cannot speak behalf of bc i believe its still in development and I have never played it.

GB.... All I can say is why? It's simple but the tri color is much more powerful, the alternate color let's you decide to be aggressive or control base.


I used to play GBW style, not rector, and i will admit that the deck is very very powerful and even when you feel that you've ran out of shit to do, you can still do some random broken shit lol... I'm currently on scapewish and its da bomb. But it's like I said play according to and who you are or else you'll never know.... and you have to lose in order to learn how to win...

[EpicLevelCommoner]

My thoughts on Jace Fit and Scapewish;

Both are very similar in that both improve our topdeck game and provide alt win cons. But whereas Scapewish will Miracle wins with Wish or Shift, Jace Fit can both keep them in topdeck mode and keep us out of topdeck mode, all while building up to our alt win con.

EDIT: Also be forewarned that if you choose Jace Fit, games will grind out, and people will get annoyed with how long the games go.

EDIT: On an unrelated note, anyone going to SCG Cincy have 3 Thoughtseizes they can loan me for the event? I'm not sold on either Duress or Inquisition now that Elves is a DtB and ANT has such a heavy presence.

[anwei]

My thoughts on Jace Fit and Scapewish;

Both are very similar in that both improve our topdeck game and provide alt win cons. But whereas Scapewish will Miracle wins with Wish or Shift, Jace Fit can both keep them in topdeck mode and keep us out of topdeck mode, all while building up to our alt win con.

I'm tinkering around with BUG lists (no Gifts/Intuition/Time Warps) as I move into this deck and had a few "general" questions for non-sneaky-combo builds:
1. How many Green sources should one be running for potential T1 Explorer? (minimum and/or optimal?)
2. How many Sac outlets? (minimum and/or optimal?)
3. How does playing no ramp dudes/spells besides Explorer/GSZ (4-of-each) work out?
4. I'm planning on Primeval Titan and the 2 Towers, potentially with man lands as alternative late game plays. I've seen 2 Treetop Villages, EpicLevelCommoner has 2 Factories, and I've seen Titan with no man lands. I would have access to Creeping Tar Pit. Is running more lands a good enough fit with the Titan to overcome the CIP tapped drawback (of Treetop/Tar Pit)? Experiences with 1/22 tapped lands? 2/22? 1 or 2/ 23 lands?

For reference, here's where I'm starting:

3 Forest
2 Island
2 Swamp
4 Misty Rainforest
3 Verdant Catacomb
2 Bayou
2 Tropical Island
1 U Sea
1 Phyrexian Tower
1 Volrath's Stronghold
1 Treetop Village?
=22 Lands (14-15G, 12U, 12-13B)

4 Explorer
2 Strix
2 Eternal Witness
1 Ooze
1 Thrun
1 Thragtusk
1 Primeval Titan
1 Grave Titan
1 Simic Sky Swallower (or Hornet Queen or Deathrite Shaman)
2 JTMS
1 Lily (or 3rd JTMS)
=17 "Dudes"

3 Pernicious Deed
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Maelstrom Pulse
4 Cabal Therapy
2 Thoughtseize
=12 Removal/Disruption

4 Brainstorm
4 GSZ
1 Fact or Fiction
=9 Selection

Sideboard is thoroughly unfinished.

[Wincheee]

ok,thaaaaank you for your counsels and thoughts on my post.... ¬¬....

well,i made a nice top 8 of 87 peoples with Scapeshift winning vs elfball,affinity,Rug,BUG Agent,Spanish Inquisition,lost to RUG,id last round,and lose to Eldrazi UG in top 8.

Peace.

[TheArchitect]

ok,thaaaaank you for your counsels and thoughts on my post.... ¬¬....

well,i made a nice top 8 of 87 peoples with Scapeshift winning vs elfball,affinity,Rug,BUG Agent,Spanish Inquisition,lost to RUG,id last round,and lose to Eldrazi UG in top 8.

Peace.

Nice! goodjob.

Nothing to brag about, but I got top 16 at Mythic.

Dredge 2-1
Turbo Eldrazi 1-0-1
UR Omintell 2-1
Monoblack Pox 1-2
NO Bant 0-2
GW elves 2-0

Turbo eldrazi and omintell matches were incredibly fun and interactive compared to the usual way those matches play. One mistake I made, and learned from was I didn't scapeshift for nonleathal, when my turbo eldrazi opponent had glacial chasm in hand. I only had one turn to get the 18 damage in (putting him to 1) and I passed it up and then never dealt dmg to him for the rest of the game. This is price I paid for not having sowing salts in my SB that day. Against omintell, i survived an Emrakul attack and a hardcasted omnitell (lol!) and still won. The omnitell opponent was on MUD last month and beat me after I scapeshifted him for 52 and he DIDNT DIE cause he was at 56, so this was my revenge.

The other matches were all pretty boring/typical. Against bant my deck just crapped on me and I missed critical therapies both games.

My SB for the day was below. Wouldn't always look like this but at least 30% of the room was on combo and probably 15% of storm. And it was just that one guy on Turbo Eldrazi, and no one on MUD, so I didn't play sowing salts/pulverize. I wanted extipates in there, but mindbreak traps took priority.

3 Pyroblast
3 Mindbreak trap
1 Thoughtseize
1 Slaughter games
1 Pyroclasm
1 Perish
1 Damnation
1 Innocent blood
1 Maelstorm pulse
1 Scapeshift
1 Reanimate

[EpicLevelCommoner]

I'm tinkering around with BUG lists (no Gifts/Intuition/Time Warps) as I move into this deck and had a few "general" questions for non-sneaky-combo builds:
1. How many Green sources should one be running for potential T1 Explorer? (minimum and/or optimal?)
2. How many Sac outlets? (minimum and/or optimal?)
3. How does playing no ramp dudes/spells besides Explorer/GSZ (4-of-each) work out?
4. I'm planning on Primeval Titan and the 2 Towers, potentially with man lands as alternative late game plays. I've seen 2 Treetop Villages, EpicLevelCommoner has 2 Factories, and I've seen Titan with no man lands. I would have access to Creeping Tar Pit. Is running more lands a good enough fit with the Titan to overcome the CIP tapped drawback (of Treetop/Tar Pit)? Experiences with 1/22 tapped lands? 2/22? 1 or 2/ 23 lands?

1. 8 Fetches Minimum. 3 Duals Minimum. A Basic for each colored mana symbol you need (example: Garruk Primal Hunter = 3 Forest, JMS = 2 Island) plus more to taste. Personally, I run 8 Fetches that get green sources, 1 Bayou/1 Tropical Island, and 3 Forest. This makes for a grand total of 15 Green Sources, which is a very good number for such a green intensive deck.

2. 4 Cabal Therapy + 1 Phyrexian Tower + 1 Diabolic Intent is the bare minimum imo.

3. Depends on if you're against aggro, combo, or control. Aggro will trigger Vets just by swinging, whereas Control and Combo require some sac-effect to trigger Vet. I prefer Dryad Arbor, as while you're durdling you can always yank it out via GSZ or Forest-Fetch, and Deathrite Shaman, which can harass them.

4. Treetop Villages give you the most power for your mana, Mishra's Factories give you the convenience of coming into play untapped at the cost of producing colorless mana, and Creeping Tar Pit is awesome at killing Jace w/ blockers and acts as another dual land. Actually . . . might make an audible here: -1 Underground Sea +1 Creeping Tar Pit. It really depends on how much durdling you expect to do over the course of your games: a few top deck taplands won't hurt if you spend most of your time passing turns anyway.