[Deck] Death and Taxes

[DavidHernandez]

...

Generally, deck was amazing, as always. Avenger is the MVP, stick a vial or mother T1 and you win, etc. Played a singleton Mirran Crusader that won me games vs BUG (delv), BUG (shardless) and Esperblade but I STILL did NOT like it very much, actually. It felt winmore in those situations, usually. But even worse than it were the Mindcensors... Sure, I could sneak it in against an unflipped Delver or to trade with a flipped one in some terrible situation, but I never really got to "get" someone with them and never really felt it was the right play anyway. I am thinking more and more that these should be 2 Mangaras. They are a main deck-answer to TNN + equipment, since this gameplan of TNN-decks take quite a lot of time (resolve SFM, resolve TNN and then equip - usually after killing a revoker) and Mangara can get some work done then. Besides, she's (he?) just so cute.

When it came to the sideboard I'm really starting to question the Cataclysms, but maybe it's just my metagame? I never play miracles, I felt no reason to board it in against ANY blade deck (SFM + TNN = they can leave TNN + equipment or whatever) and it was OK against Shardless once I got to resolve it. I mean, sure, we have a 12-post player, but come on... This opens up slots for answer to the problems we (or only I?) have most of all, the TNN + equip - thinking 1 Disenchant & 1 Manriki-Gusari! But I'm interested in all of youz tech, too.

P.S. Why have I not seen anyone play Sunlance anymore? Is it only for me this card is amazing?

My area still sees a lot of green in RUG, Elves, Nic Fit, so Mirran stays in my deck x2. I removed my Mindcensors completely and run 2x Mangara. I stopped running Cataclysms and Sunlance. I'm liking the 3 Avengers. They still can't come in until turn 3 with Vial....but 4 seems to be the direction everyone is going. Perhaps you can drop a Mindcensor for the 4th Avenger, and another for a Mangara. As a one-of, you can drop to 3 Karakas and maybe run a second Cavern of Souls...

Dave

[Mr. Froggy]

Anakyn, I want to thank you for your comments. I hope that you have not been scared off. When all is said and done, we may look back upon this as an excellent conversation. I have benefited by reading your perspective on facing this deck, and I hope to read more of it. This is ours:

I think a lot of D+T players cackle inside when we think about sticking it to all the powerful decks. I agree with you that this deck wins ugly. I thought a lot about your words, and yeah. I can see what you mean. D+T holds a deck back just enough to keep it from doing its thing. It must be annoying to face that. If you let powerful decks execute their plans without having a monkey wrench handy, they will certainly beat you. D+T has weak cards, after all. But it uses them to expose those decks for the houses of cards that they are. It starts with plenty of part-time mana disruption. But that can't last forever, so the deck has to back it up with other methods of keeping an opponent off-balance until it can sieze the upper-hand or force through enough damage in combat. When facing D+T:

Their cantrips are not assets.
They do not simply resolve Reanimate, Show and Tell, or Empty the Warrens and win.
A greedy manabase is no longer stable.
They can not include just the bare minimum of removal and expect their counterspells to pick up the slack.
Graveyards are not freely available.
...etc.

Most decks in Legacy live and die on assumptions about the environment that D+T alters. The best cards in the format are often terrible against D+T because it makes them that way on purpose. And yeah, when they are made to pay for those assumptions, it gets ugly. Don't count on those sorts of things and D+T can't hurt you.

Legacy is the best format because an anti-deck like this can exist and succeed in a field of overpowered stuff. I think that is beautiful.

Finn... Beautifully said!

[anakyn]

Anakyn, I want to thank you for your comments. I hope that you have not been scared off. When all is said and done, we may look back upon this as an excellent conversation. I have benefited by reading your perspective on facing this deck, and I hope to read more of it. This is ours:

[...]

Most decks in Legacy live and die on assumptions about the environment that D+T alters. The best cards in the format are often terrible against D+T because it makes them that way on purpose. And yeah, when they are made to pay for those assumptions, it gets ugly. Don't count on those sorts of things and D+T can't hurt you.

Legacy is the best format because an anti-deck like this can exist and succeed in a field of overpowered stuff. I think that is beautiful.

Hi Finn,

so I have the pleasure to talk to the Father of the Beast... well, I guess you can call me the Exorcist :P

Out of irony, don't worry: I'm pretty experienced in internet discussions, social interactions & netiquettes in forums and so on, so it's rare for me to be scared off in such a context. I'm also confident enough in my debating skills, and I have to say that the reactions of D&T posters to my comments was pretty cool in the end, so I'm enjoying being here.


Now let's talk about Death and Taxes.

If I had to summarize your words about "your" deck (or let's say the most famous among the decks you created), I'd say you consider it to "win ugly but smart", while its beauty lies in turning great cards (and decks) into bad cards (and decks), using worse cards than the ones you've just turned into ash.

Well, if you used the term "power" in place of "beauty", I couldn't agree more. Crushing many Tier 1 decks with a smile on your face is clearly powerful.
On the other hand, the concept of "beauty" is completely subjective, so talking in these terms of an MtG deck would be a bit meaningless.

I used the concept of "toxicity" regarding D&T and his impact on the legacy metagame.

I did because, in simple terms, I consider it to be one of the most frustrating deck to lose against, while I don't think it's that funny to play with. I'm pretty curious about this: do you enjoy the mechanics of this deck in themselves? I mean: tapping lands with Rishadan, tapping Moms to save your creatures, landing Thalias and Revokers to negate opponent's plans, flashing in Mindcensor to negate even fetchlands, and so on... is that "fun" to you, or it only feels strong? Again, that's an honest and not-provoking question: I've played D&T too and I never felt "excited", if you know what I mean.

I can only guess (because I never really "felt" it) that the most "fun" part of playing D&T is exactly what you emphasize so well: the intimate satisfaction of watching the "best decks and cards" crumble beneath the feet of your (apparently) "not-overpowered" stuff.

It shouldn't be a surprise that, while D&T players obviously enjoy this (slightly perverse) feeling, most of the other MtG players can find it annoying both win and lose this way.

I consider D&T absolutely unique under this perspective, and while I don't wanna talk philosophy, I can't avoid thinking about the fact that human art and intellect have such a variety of forms that sometimes we find ourselves loving the ones which express destruction and decay. After all, we can even feel attraction to the very concept of war, which is probably something to be ashamed of if we think about it for more than a couple of seconds.

So I shouldn't be surprised either, when someone tells me D&T is "beautiful". It's just part of the human variety.
It's only I have a different sensitivity about MtG decks, and that's all.

It comes now to my mind an example taken from music, which may further clarify my feeling about D&T: I'm always a bit irritated when someone tells me he considers the music band "The Queen" as one of the greatest in music history.
Of course I could be wrong on this matter too, but I consider "The Queen" to be a good music band, just very far from the highest expressions of modern music.
In a similar way, I think the way D&T is built should make him win specific matchups (= being "good"), but not to beat almost everything (= being "great").
After all, the fact it's great against the "best decks/cards in the format" is not entirely valid: truth is, it's great against many other decks/cards too!
It looks like a "fringe" deck and plays many "fringe" cards, but fringe decks usually don't have such a large range of good/great matchups.
D&T has an answer to pretty much anything, and that answer probably is cheap and maindecked. In a monocolor deck playing for the most part creatures and creatures enhancers, this looks insane.

Maybe that's what I call "toxic": the fact that it can accomplish the best results with the "worst" cards. It seems just... well, it seems unfair to me.
But again: that's the same peculiarity you are calling "beautiful", so we'll probably never agree on this.


But don't get me wrong: this deck is very solid, very strong and very smart built.
It's also one of the decks best supported by it's "community of players" (the thread on Mtgsalvation is simply great, something you should be proud of), which means he can adapt very fast and smoothly to any metagame shift, so I think it will be a dominant force for many years to come.
Of course you are more than happy with that, while I'm worried.


It's been nice talking to you guys, I'll probably lurk around here more often.

[Fry]

Hi Finn,
If I had to summarize your words about "your" deck (or let's say the most famous among the decks you created), I'd say you consider it to "win ugly but smart", while its beauty lies in turning great cards (and decks) into bad cards (and decks), using worse cards than the ones you've just turned into ash.

Well, if you used the term "power" in place of "beauty", I couldn't agree more. Crushing many Tier 1 decks with a smile on your face is clearly powerful.
On the other hand, the concept of "beauty" is completely subjective, so talking in these terms of an MtG deck would be a bit meaningless.

I did because, in simple terms, I consider it to be one of the most frustrating deck to lose against, while I don't think it's that funny to play with. I'm pretty curious about this: do you enjoy the mechanics of this deck in themselves? I mean: tapping lands with Rishadan, tapping Moms to save your creatures, landing Thalias and Revokers to negate opponent's plans, flashing in Mindcensor to negate even fetchlands, and so on... is that "fun" to you, or it only feels strong? Again, that's an honest and not-provoking question: I've played D&T too and I never felt "excited", if you know what I mean.

I can only guess (because I never really "felt" it) that the most "fun" part of playing D&T is exactly what you emphasize so well: the intimate satisfaction of watching the "best decks and cards" crumble beneath the feet of your (apparently) "not-overpowered" stuff.

It shouldn't be a surprise that, while D&T players obviously enjoy this (slightly perverse) feeling, most of the other MtG players can find it annoying both win and lose this way.

Maybe that's what I call "toxic": the fact that it can accomplish the best results with the "worst" cards. It seems just... well, it seems unfair to me.
But again: that's the same peculiarity you are calling "beautiful", so we'll probably never agree on this.


But don't get me wrong: this deck is very solid, very strong and very smart built.
It's also one of the decks best supported by it's "community of players" (the thread on Mtgsalvation is simply great, something you should be proud of), which means he can adapt very fast and smoothly to any metagame shift, so I think it will be a dominant force for many years to come.

I personally love this deck because it's full of tricks and it makes me think about how to respond to threats, or even neutralize them before they have the chance to become a threat. My list has always been different from the "typical lists" because I love Leonin Arbiter a lot...

Main Board:

4x Flickerwisp
4x Leonin Arbiter
3x Mangara of Corondor
3x Mirran Crusader
4x Mother of Runes
4x Stoneforge Mystic
4x Swords to Plowshares
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4x AEther Vial
1x Batterskull
3x Phyrexian Revoker
1x Sword of Fire and Ice
1x Umezawa's Jitte

4x Karakas
4x Rishadan Port
4x Wasteland
9x Plains

Side Board:

2x Burrenton Forge-Tender
3x Ethersworn Canonist
2x Imposing Sovereign
3x Leonin Relic-Warder
1x Thalia, Guardian Of Thraben
2x Wing Shards
1x Phyrexian Revoker
1x Sword of Light and Shadow

I've played this deck for several years and I did well with it the very first time I ever played it (First place at Jupiter Games a few years back, beat the only guy I lost to in the swiss for the first place finish who was on Turbo-Drazi, Rock Lee here on the Source)... I still find some new random trick here and there when I'm playing and it's great fun... I even ported the deck over to Modern and started the thread here for the Modern version, which mine has changed and is quite different from everyone else's (Big shocker there. lol)

The reason why I love playing MUD is the same as the reason why I love playing this deck. Both decks are full of tricks (I do Forgemaster over Stompy because of the tricks) and decks like that make me think and not get bored while playing in a larger tournament. These decks make me think and exercise my brain (I also enjoy playing Nic Fit from time to time as well) with when to hold something back, not necessarily to keep from over extending, but to save the trick for a few turns down the line.

I love having AEther Vial one two and just screwing with people so hard with in response Revoker or Arbiter is even better... Vialing in Arbiter in Response to a fetch or Stoneforge is always a lot of fun to me ^_^ I love the "little" creatures that hate on people and how they get exponentially better the more different ones you have in play.

I certainly understand how annoying this deck can be to play against, to the point where most of my friends don't even want to test against it since they simply hate it so much, at least my list and how I play it. lol

~Fry~

P.S.
~I'm happy to answer any questions about my card choices if there are any that have constructive criticism, or else they will be ignored.

[Barbed Blightning]

I personally love this deck because it's full of tricks and it makes me think about how to respond to threats, or even neutralize them before they have the chance to become a threat. My list has always been different from the "typical lists" because I love Leonin Arbiter a lot...

Main Board:

4x Flickerwisp
4x Leonin Arbiter
3x Mangara of Corondor
3x Mirran Crusader
4x Mother of Runes
4x Stoneforge Mystic
4x Swords to Plowshares
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4x AEther Vial
1x Batterskull
3x Phyrexian Revoker
1x Sword of Fire and Ice
1x Umezawa's Jitte

4x Karakas
4x Rishadan Port
4x Wasteland
9x Plains

Side Board:

2x Burrenton Forge-Tender
3x Ethersworn Canonist
2x Imposing Sovereign
3x Leonin Relic-Warder
1x Thalia, Guardian Of Thraben
2x Wing Shards
1x Phyrexian Revoker
1x Sword of Light and Shadow

I've played this deck for several years and I did well with it the very first time I ever played it (First place at Jupiter Games a few years back, beat the only guy I lost to in the swiss for the first place finish who was on Turbo-Drazi, Rock Lee here on the Source)... I still find some new random trick here and there when I'm playing and it's great fun... I even ported the deck over to Modern and started the thread here for the Modern version, which mine has changed and is quite different from everyone else's (Big shocker there. lol)

The reason why I love playing MUD is the same as the reason why I love playing this deck. Both decks are full of tricks (I do Forgemaster over Stompy because of the tricks) and decks like that make me think and not get bored while playing in a larger tournament. These decks make me think and exercise my brain (I also enjoy playing Nic Fit from time to time as well) with when to hold something back, not necessarily to keep from over extending, but to save the trick for a few turns down the line.

I love having AEther Vial one two and just screwing with people so hard with in response Revoker or Arbiter is even better... Vialing in Arbiter in Response to a fetch or Stoneforge is always a lot of fun to me ^_^ I love the "little" creatures that hate on people and how they get exponentially better the more different ones you have in play.

I certainly understand how annoying this deck can be to play against, to the point where most of my friends don't even want to test against it since they simply hate it so much, at least my list and how I play it. lol

~Fry~

P.S.
~I'm happy to answer any questions about my card choices if there are any that have constructive criticism, or else they will be ignored.

Hey man! We played the mirror a while back at Jupiter. Still rocking the Arbiters I see. Tested against Elves much with your list? Looks like you actually stand a chance with Arbiter.

I pretty much agree with your reasons why you love D&T, especially the lack of boredom when playing.

[berry]

snip

DavidHernandez:
In that meta, I could understand it. Although while Mirran Crusader is not bad against Elves I have felt it really doesn't stop them from winning and is just "another" evasion creature, like any of our fliers. If evasion is our only plan we tend to lose that game, anyway. Our plan (game 1) must generally be to find an equipment and Revokers as fast as possible to disrupt, disrupt, disrupt. I have felt like the two BUG-decks are the only time my Mirran has been absolutely wonderful. But I will probably keep 1 in for now. I am currently only running 3 Karakas anyway, but 1 Horizon Canopy over 2nd Cavern of Souls. Not sure I want another Cavern.

[Penguinizer]

I just got back from the Finnish Legacy Championship 2013 where I went 2-3-2. This is a very short and concise report of how it went. I ran the following build:
Lands: 22
4x Karakas
4x Wasteland
3x Rishadan Port
3x Flagstones of Trokair
8x Plains

Creatures: 27
4x Mother of Runes
4x Serra Avenger
4x Stoneforge Mystic
4x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4x Phyrexian Revoker
4x Flickerwisp
3x Mangara of Corondor

Spells: 11
4x Aether Vial
4x Swords to Plowshares
1x Umezawa's Jitte
1x Sword of Fire and Ice
1x Sword of Light and Shadow

Sideboard:
3x Rest in Peace
2x Aven Mindcensor
2x Oblivion Ring
2x Ethersworn Canonist
2x Cataclysm
2x Wilt-Leaf Liege
2x Fiend Hunter

Overall, I was happy with the deck but in the future would change Aven Mindcensor for something else. I played against (in no particular order): Foodchain, Bug, URW, Monored Painter, Junk, Jund, BG Spanish Inquisition. I lost to Bug because I sideboarded badly, Jund because I got outplayed and URW because I got outplayed/didn't draw an answer to Grim Lavamancer. I beat the combo decks and tied with Painter/Junk. Most of the losses/ties were extremely close games so I'm happy anyways.

The only match that I should have lost was the Junk matchup, simply because my opponent completely forgot to use karakas on my Thalia/Mangara to stop me from doing tricks to keep Batterskull from combat. (Attack, get blocked (baited him to put it in play), Karakas, hardcast. On his turn when he attacks me, block and vial in another one to sac the one that's in combat.)

[Quasim0ff]

I just got back from the Finnish Legacy Championship 2013 where I went 2-3-2. This is a very short and concise report of how it went. I ran the following build:
Lands: 22
4x Karakas
4x Wasteland
3x Rishadan Port
3x Flagstones of Trokair
8x Plains

Creatures: 27
4x Mother of Runes
4x Serra Avenger
4x Stoneforge Mystic
4x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4x Phyrexian Revoker
4x Flickerwisp
3x Mangara of Corondor

Spells: 11
4x Aether Vial
4x Swords to Plowshares
1x Umezawa's Jitte
1x Sword of Fire and Ice
1x Sword of Light and Shadow

Sideboard:
3x Rest in Peace
2x Aven Mindcensor
2x Oblivion Ring
2x Ethersworn Canonist
2x Cataclysm
2x Wilt-Leaf Liege
2x Fiend Hunter

Overall, I was happy with the deck but in the future would change Aven Mindcensor for something else. I played against (in no particular order): Foodchain, Bug, URW, Monored Painter, Junk, Jund, BG Spanish Inquisition. I lost to Bug because I sideboarded badly, Jund because I got outplayed and URW because I got outplayed/didn't draw an answer to Grim Lavamancer. I beat the combo decks and tied with Painter/Junk. Most of the losses/ties were extremely close games so I'm happy anyways.

The only match that I should have lost was the Junk matchup, simply because my opponent completely forgot to use karakas on my Thalia/Mangara to stop me from doing tricks to keep Batterskull from combat. (Attack, get blocked (baited him to put it in play), Karakas, hardcast. On his turn when he attacks me, block and vial in another one to sac the one that's in combat.)

Mindsencor is really strong vs ant/tutor based decks, though.

[Barbed Blightning]

Mindsencor is really strong vs ant/tutor based decks, though.

Ehhhhh. He's OK vs tutor decks, certainly not better than canonist or Thalia vs Storm. His only real application is against Elves, honestly. Even then, because he costs 3, he's always a turn too late.

@ peguinizer: cool list, very old school. Question: where is the 4th port?

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[berry]

I agree that the 4th Rishadan Port is critical and even more so the Batterskull (but I think I read somewhere that you have not found one to get yet?)

Besides that you really should just cut those Flagstones for Plains (or singletons Horizon Canopy/Cavern of Souls/Eiganjo Castle after taste... but max 2 of the 3 Flagstones, imho.)

That meta of yours seems very wild, but I would still consider artifact/equipment-hate in the SB instead of those Fiend Hunters. But if your meta is not as overrun with SFM as the rest of the world (it seems) then maybe not.

[Penguinizer]

Ehhhhh. He's OK vs tutor decks, certainly not better than canonist or Thalia vs Storm. His only real application is against Elves, honestly. Even then, because he costs 3, he's always a turn too late.

@ peguinizer: cool list, very old school. Question: where is the 4th port?

I agree with you on Mindcensor. It's just a bit on the slow side and is too easy to get rid of. As for the 4th port. It's stuck in limbo like the Batterskull I should have. I always forget to get one until right before a tournament and then can't get one on time.

[Finn]

Folks, Mindcensor is a sideboard card.

My beef with it now is that I find myself unhappy to bring it in against the True-Name Nemesis decks. It is not a natural fit there. I have it in my sb still because it comes in against combo - and it flies. So I thought I would be bringing it in against True Blade decks. So now I am about ready to cut it.

[from Cairo]

Folks, Mindcensor is a sideboard card.

My beef with it now is that I find myself unhappy to bring it in against the True-Name Nemesis decks. It is not a natural fit there. I have it in my sb still because it comes in against combo - and it flies. So I thought I would be bringing it in against True Blade decks. So now I am about ready to cut it.

There's a lot that's not perfect with Aven Mindcensor. I have a hard time viewing it as a SB card because it is slow, often indirect, and other than against NO inefficient hate. I'm almost never going to feel great about bringing it in. Against Stoneforge Mystic and Infernal Tutor based decks I think his tax comes online too slow of the most part. Against SFM/TNN decks it's still nice to have the evasive threat and the inconvenience against their fetchlands, but probably doesn't line up with hating out their most important Library search in SFM; Games 2 and 3 I would prefer a Disenchant effect to attack these decks rather than drawing into Mindcensor after they've searched up Jitte. Against Infernal Tutor decks the fact that it interacts at all is enough to make it more desirable than 1/3rd of our deck, but falls short to Ethersworn Canonist as direct hate. Against Intuition, Green Sun's Zenith, Natural Order and Goblin Matron it's more on-speed. Intuition shows up in some of the Sneak and Show lists, some OmniTell lists, and often out of Lands variants. In these match ups I feel it's appropriate hate. Thalia is more powerful against Show and Tell, but curving into a Aven Mindcensor against a Intuition or even just as a Sinkhole against a Fetch is great. Green Sun's Zenith and NO are obviously present in Elves - interacting with Natural Order is worth it's weight in gold in this match up as we're so cold to early Craterhoofs and Progenitus. Nerfing GSZ is not irrelevant against both Elves and Maverick - limiting or perhaps blanking their tutor options at a given CMC. Hitting a Matron in Goblins, could potentially mean they lose their card advantage - there's a good 18ish lands, and 2-4 Vial that could be in their top 4, but keeping them off the Gempalm, Ringleader or Krenko that they really want is significant and having an on-board flier to equip up against Goblins is exactly where this deck wants to be.

This for the most part just addresses the card for half it's rules text: "If an opponent would search a library, that player searches the top four cards of that library instead." The other half of Aven Mindcensor is 2W 2/1 Flash Flying - on the proactive fliers at 2-3 mana after Serra Avenger and Flickerwisp what options are really available? The cards that come to mind are: Stonecloaker, and Kor Skyfisher; having Gatherer searched not much else pops out as providing an evasive body without a drawback, much less a semi-relevant tax.

I think the card fits well in a TNN metagame where Mangara inevitability is less guaranteed. Both cards are soft to -1/-1 effects, both cards at 3 mana are somewhat slow and are likely high on the chopping block for Games 2 and 3, looking for more efficient options post-board. Mangara probably provides better inevitability if games are going long, where Aven Mindcensor addresses an important problem match up for the deck. The fact that the tax, while frequently a turn slow, does attack Stoneforge Mystic is also relevant. Often opposing decks will get their search in before Aven Mindcensor hits the field, but even if it's not likely the fact that the card can limit access to opposing Jittes means it addresses one of Death and Taxes' biggest weaknesses.

[klaus]

I'm pretty sure Thorn of Amethyst has been discussed several times before. In the wake of the predicted rise of Combo & Miracles I wanted to re-evaluate it again real quick anyway. Thalia is by far the most valuable Combo hate imo. Thorn does the same minus the 2 dmg/turn. I get that a protected Canonist is superb as well and sweet against Elves (though it does not add up in multiples), however the prime reason Thorn could actually be cool is Miracles going 2/2 on the Supreme Verdict / Terminus split and Entreat the Angeles being their only real threat. Extra taxing EtA and Verdict with a permanent that does not get hit by Terminus, Dread of Night, Massacre (Combo), etc. looks very appealing to me, which is why I'll be testing a 2/2 split among Canonist and Thorn for a bit.
Thoughts?

[Penguinizer]

Thorn of Amethyst could work. I may end up giving it a shot in my SB over Aven Mindcensor. However, I'd much rather try to have some sort of answer to True-Name Nemesis that isn't something silly like Holy Light or overly niche like Runed Halo. Not having a proper answer for it was one of the most frustrating things I found. Luckily I only had two matchups with it and both decks only ran 3 (I think) I think. I only had to face down one at a time so I could just Revoker Jitte and race it, but if he had gotten two or stuck an equipment I'd have been dead.

[Barbed Blightning]

Why would we want to run Thorn when we already have Thalia? Miracles isn't that hard of a matchup, especially if you have a needle on Top, and the extra tax will accomplish jack over the long game, where they shine anyway. In my boarding, I do:

-4 StP
-2 Mom
-1 Jitte

+2 Cataclysm/Seal of Cleansing
+2 Canonist
+2 Liege
+1 Needle

It's the goblins strategy--overload on dudes and don't overextend into a board wipe.

Though thorn cannot be killed by a board wipe or massacre, Thalia usually can be bounced back and revialed after the coast clears. DoN is not common in SB's right now, since Golgari Charm also hits TNN and E Plague is more flexible


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[Kl'rt]

After posting earlier I went on to start the 40-something (let's say 45 for good measure) tournament 4-0 (won against Team America, Shardless, UR & Affinity) only to get paired down and have to play against UWR Delver which I lost terribly to a TNN with an equipped Jitte x2. Drew into top8 and lost in the quarters to eventual winner playing Esperblade in a tight game 3, but again TNN + batterskull did the job for him.

Is it safe to say this deck has trouble vs the TNN+Stoneforge decks then? I was looking to build a new deck that is competitive in the new TNN meta (without playing combo or TNN myself), but I'm not sure about this one anymore. I read in here that one of D&T's equipped flyers can try to outrace a TNN, but I'm not so confident in this plan. I haven't done any playtesting yet, but I imagine a Jitte equipped TNN just wrecks D&T. Am I wrong?

[Barbed Blightning]

Is it safe to say this deck has trouble vs the TNN+Stoneforge decks then? I was looking to build a new deck that is competitive in the new TNN meta (without playing combo or TNN myself), but I'm not sure about this one anymore. I read in here that one of D&T's equipped flyers can try to outrace a TNN, but I'm not so confident in this plan. I haven't done any playtesting yet, but I imagine a Jitte equipped TNN just wrecks D&T. Am I wrong?

You're right, but a Serra Avenger equipped with SoFI will wreck a TNN deck just as savagely. And something like a singleton Spellskite main can just negate a jitte--in addition to Revoker and Needle.

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[Havoc]

ive changed my build to have more flyers and am running 2 moats. so far the match ups have appeared favorable so long as they dont land a delver or clique early. i can usually ride the moat and a avenger with a sword or jitte and a mother to victory

[from Cairo]

ive changed my build to have more flyers and am running 2 moats. so far the match ups have appeared favorable so long as they dont land a delver or clique early. i can usually ride the moat and a avenger with a sword or jitte and a mother to victory

What constitutes "more flyers"? Also what are "the match ups"?