[Deck] Aggro Loam

[birds of paradise2]

What is the opinion on Liliana in loam (in the MD that's it)?

[Megadeus]

What is the opinion on Liliana in loam (in the MD that's it)?

I think in the jund lists she is good. 4 color I don't think the mana base can support her without tweaking. I think she is great though I am biased since she is my second favorite walker only to garruk primal hunter

[Kich867]

Can you throw me your current list? I feel that Burning Wish is mainly to get GOOD stuff like Slaughter Games, Devastating Dreams, Life from the Loam and Tsunami. Thoughtseize/Duress are really weak targets.

// Creatures: 12
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Dark Confidant
2x Countryside Crusher
2x Terravore

// Spells: 23
4x Life from the Loam
4x Punishing Fires
3x Devastating Dreams
3x Abrupt Decay
1x Maelstrom Pulse

4x Chalice of the Void
4x Mox Diamond

// Lands: 25
4x Grove of the Burnwillows
3x Taiga
2x Badlands
1x Bayou
4x Wooded Foothills
2x Bloodstained Mire
4x Wasteland
3x Forgotten Cave
2x Tranquil Thicket

// Sideboard: 15
2x Slaughter Games
2x Nihil Spellbomb
2x Golgari Charm
2x Liliana of the Veil
1x Devastating Dreams
3x Thoughtseize
3x Hymn to Tourach

Fairly sure that's the list at the moment, I'm getting super consistent draws with it so far and it just feels great. And I tend to disagree with this:

I think in the jund lists she is good. 4 color I don't think the mana base can support her without tweaking. I think she is great though I am biased since she is my second favorite walker only to garruk primal hunter

Like ramping her out is cool and all, but what's she doing? Where does she go for instance, in the list above? I could probably cut decays or a punishing fire for her, but now that's straining the manabase and making Grove draws bad which seems awful, we don't need more removal and her +1 just isn't actually that great. I can test her out main-deck though tonight and see how it goes. She seems like she doesn't really add anything to what I want to be doing. The only upside is that we can profitably/negate her +1 regularly which is cool, but what's that really doing for us? That's not good enough against combo to get there and her removal isn't targeted. I tried to design my deck such that any card that isn't mox or land is high impact--sometimes Terravore just hits the field and one shots people, I wont at least 4 games yesterday that way against Deathblade, Chalice on one, Terravore comes down, and it's just too much damage.

[Aggro_zombies]

Like ramping her out is cool and all, but what's she doing? Where does she go for instance, in the list above? I could probably cut decays or a punishing fire for her, but now that's straining the manabase and making Grove draws bad which seems awful, we don't need more removal and her +1 just isn't actually that great. I can test her out main-deck though tonight and see how it goes. She seems like she doesn't really add anything to what I want to be doing. The only upside is that we can profitably/negate her +1 regularly which is cool, but what's that really doing for us? That's not good enough against combo to get there and her removal isn't targeted. I tried to design my deck such that any card that isn't mox or land is high impact--sometimes Terravore just hits the field and one shots people, I wont at least 4 games yesterday that way against Deathblade, Chalice on one, Terravore comes down, and it's just too much damage.

You have to build around Liliana. Not so much to break her +1 symmetry - you do that anyway - but to make her worth a slot in the first place. Slower versions of the deck will appreciate her for the same reasons they appreciate Burning Wish.

[Megadeus]

she is a fairly solid card vs storm and omni tell variants. also decent vs control. I'm not saying she is amazing but I could see her usefulness in this deck

[Kich867]

You have to build around Liliana. Not so much to break her +1 symmetry - you do that anyway - but to make her worth a slot in the first place. Slower versions of the deck will appreciate her for the same reasons they appreciate Burning Wish.

Sorry, what's that mean?

What version of this deck isn't slow--and what are you doing beyond breaking her +1 symmetry to make Liliana any better?

[Aggro_zombies]

Sorry, what's that mean?

What version of this deck isn't slow--and what are you doing beyond breaking her +1 symmetry to make Liliana any better?

A very control-oriented version of the deck, like Antonius posted previously, would love Liliana because it can leverage the card advantage planeswalkers provide as the game drags out. A more midrange version of the deck would be better served with another threat, or another way to immediately protect or clear the way for threats, since it is less primarily concerned with card advantage than it is with sculpting a favorable board state and holding it long enough to end the game. A control deck wants to do that too, to be sure, but the time frames they're operating in are different: a midrange deck wants to hold position for two to three turns while it piles in damage while a control deck can do so for longer while it runs an opponent out of resources.

Put another way: an aggressive midrange version of the deck doesn't need Liliana - you'd activate her +1 maybe a couple times and use her -2 to clear a blocker out and then your Crushers or Terravores end the game. A control version can use her +1 turn after turn to put the opponent into topdeck mode, using the -2 occasionally to keep a threat off your back, while it sets up P. Fires or Assaults.

[Antonius]

i went 3-0 at a legacy mini today playing this list. Beat junk deathblade, burn and enchantress

4 foothills
2 catacombs
1 forest
3 badlands
1 taiga
1 bayou
3 burnwillows
1 graven cairns
4 wasteland
1 volrath's
3 tranquil
2 barren moor
1 forgotten cave

4 Mox Diamond
4 Chalice of the Void

4 Dark Confidant
4 Countryside Crusher

4 Liliana of the Veil

3 Punishing Fires
3 Abrupt Decay

3 Loam
4 Burning Wish

Sideboard --
2 Maelstrom Pulse
2 Devastating Dreams
1 Thoughtseize
1 Slaughter Games
1 Loam
1 Dreadbore
4 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Trinisphere
1 Engineered Explosives

I decided to play chalice and burning wish for the first time in years to see why everyone's been switching over and was pleasantly reminded of how effective they can be. However, i didn't matchup against any of the blue-based tempo decks where both of these cards and the way they slow down the deck are liabilities. After the tournament was over, I played against jund and a four-color natural order homebrew, where I was once again reminded that it doesn't fucking matter how much goyf removal you run because nothing--and I mean NOTHING--can matchup against opposing goyfs quite like a goyf of your own. Playing against decks with 4+ goyfs (ie, the NO deck with zeniths...) with 0 goyfs is very unforgiving. The BUG delver and thresh matchups could be even more stressful, but only testing will tell. The NO homebrew ran like five mana dorks and two dryads and Jund is pretty good at crowding the field with dudes too. BUG/Thresh can't really do either of those...Still, after the tuning's all done I think i might have to run at least two of those dumb shitheads, which kind of upsets me.

part of me wants to say fuck it and just keep jamming my summer 2K11 lists, because despite all the new toys that have come out in recent sets those lists still feel powerful. I don't think I've had a good feel for this deck since innistrad, which is sad considering that it's the only deck i've really been playing for 3 years. I miss EE and Pulse and other amazing cards that have been displaced BECAUSE OMG YOU HAVE TO RUN ABRUPT DECAY IT'S ABRUPT DECAY.

[Aggro_zombies]

Firespout is a worthwhile Wish target against Jund/swarmy decks. Actually, Pyroclasm may be better because those decks tend to have a lot of x/2s and then some things bigger than x/3, so the mana efficiency might matter more.

EDIT: This is really just a suggestion for emergency situations when you can't Dreams effectively. Dreamsing vs. aggro decks is Easy Mode most of the time.

[Megadeus]

I think devastating dreams is good enough to deal with swarm style decks. if need to fire it off early it may be awkward but if you have loam you should be fine

[Antonius]

I think I would choose seismic assault over dreams because seismic is a lot better without loam and doesn't lead to blowouts when it gets countered.

[Richard Cheese]

@Antonius - You have to come back to Loam. We are all a little worse off without your tournament reports.

[Megadeus]

I think I would choose seismic assault over dreams because seismic is a lot better without loam and doesn't lead to blowouts when it gets countered.

If you suspect your opponent has a counter.then don't cast dreams. Itis more of a finisher. Ihave definitely used itto sweep away a pesky board state, but it even does a great job at getting tempo back. And if they sand bag counters for dreams you can just gain advantageby activating our attacking with a knight or something

[jhhdk]

@Antonious How often are you hellbent? I mean would Blood Scrivener be worth considering as 2/2 split with Dark confidant? I mean in theory it makes cycle lands twice as good in those situations. Not to mention life loss would be more predictable. If you are rarely hellbent I realize it would completely useless.

[Aggro_zombies]

@Antonious How often are you hellbent? I mean would Blood Scrivener be worth considering as 2/2 split with Dark confidant? I mean in theory it makes cycle lands twice as good in those situations. Not to mention life loss would be more predictable. If you are rarely hellbent I realize it would completely useless.

Not sure why you'd cut down on the card that always works to run a card that only works sometimes. Why not run Sylvan Library first?

[Megadeus]

library is very good. I love it. I don't top deck very often with this deck either. loam bringing lands back prevents this and having a hand full of cards is what you want when you cast devastating dreams

[Kich867]

library is very good. I love it. I don't top deck very often with this deck either. loam bringing lands back prevents this and having a hand full of cards is what you want when you cast devastating dreams

Library is the definitely the card I want most badly to run in this deck but can't find the space. I ran a list once with it, and it felt so damn powerful. Not to mention the -absurd- interactions with Loam it has (Dredging is not drawing, so you can dredge all 3 draws you get for the turn and put none back, since you have not actually drawn any cards this turn, you replaced them all with dredges). As well as letting you do nifty things like dodge Clique if you have a read on them (sandbag the card you actually want to draw this turn on the top of your deck, they clique you, after it resolves, cycle land!).

Not to mention, often the deck is just digging hard, and one great way to dig hard is with Sylvan Library--but it may be better in a deck that has a much greater threat density.

One change I'll be making to my list for sure, soon, is to run a singleton Volrath's Stronghold. Aggressively dredging loam with PFires feels so good, and having an option to start top decking bomb after bomb just sounds too spicy.

[Megadeus]

Library is the definitely the card I want most badly to run in this deck but can't find the space. I ran a list once with it, and it felt so damn powerful. Not to mention the -absurd- interactions with Loam it has (Dredging is not drawing, so you can dredge all 3 draws you get for the turn and put none back, since you have not actually drawn any cards this turn, you replaced them all with dredges). As well as letting you do nifty things like dodge Clique if you have a read on them (sandbag the card you actually want to draw this turn on the top of your deck, they clique you, after it resolves, cycle land!).

Not to mention, often the deck is just digging hard, and one great way to dig hard is with Sylvan Library--but it may be better in a deck that has a much greater threat density.

One change I'll be making to my list for sure, soon, is to run a singleton Volrath's Stronghold. Aggressively dredging loam with PFires feels so good, and having an option to start top decking bomb after bomb just sounds too spicy.

Library makes a somewhat threat light deck like ours find a threat. I think that is why I like it so much. and yeah volraths seems fun. sometimes I dredge a KOTR in 4 colorand wish that I could get him back

[Tyrio]

I run a Volrath's in place of the basic forest in Hoogland's list. He said it was win-more in already good match-ups but I've found it to be pretty invaluable for closing out games. If you dredge two of your Knights away and another gets killed/countered/exiled, how are you supposed to close out the game? Punishing them to death doesn't seem particularly viable and dredging Loam for cycle lands can easily just dredge away your last Knight and GSZ. I think making the manabase slightly worse (it's already terrible yolo all-in!) for some insurance is fine.

[Antonius]

I run a Volrath's in place of the basic forest in Hoogland's list. He said it was win-more in already good match-ups but I've found it to be pretty invaluable for closing out games. If you dredge two of your Knights away and another gets killed/countered/exiled, how are you supposed to close out the game? Punishing them to death doesn't seem particularly viable and dredging Loam for cycle lands can easily just dredge away your last Knight and GSZ. I think making the manabase slightly worse (it's already terrible yolo all-in!) for some insurance is fine.

nantuko first striking beatdown like a bizzoss. I want to run rager for the same reason.