[Primer] Elves!

[Eternal]

To give you a sense of the metagame in Paris and because it can be instructive, here's the meta on a trial BoM :)

5 UW Miracle

2 Elves
2 Jund
2 Bant
2 Patriot
2 Enchantress
2 Tin fins/ Reanimator
2 Death and Taxes
2 Mono Black

1 Mono Red Sneak Attack
1 Sneak Show
1 Omniclash
1 Rock
2 BUG Delver
1 BUG Shardless
1 BURG Cascade
1 High Tide
1 WBR Stoneblade
1 Tempo *****
1 ANT
1 TES
1 Nic Fit
1 Merfolk

BTW versus Miracle I feel Null rod is better. Obv, each side depends of the local metagame.

But does Null Rod do enough against them?

Totally worth it. On the board, the card is a pure massacre for any Storm player. Of course he can kill you without Led/Petal but the purpose of this card is to save time to get NO/Ruric.

[danyul]

Gotcha. That makes sense.

Now that you have me thinking about it, Null Rod does seem like a very attractive target. It has applications against Storm, Miracles, and Stoneforge decks. I do like the versatility of Needle, though. But you have me second guessing that choice. This will need some testing.

[yaWgnorW]

Been playing some daily's, running some different board variants (getting ready for new year). Thanks for the advice on Meekstone guys. For now, my board is the following


2 Pithing Needle
2 Meekstone
4 Cabal Therapy
3 Abrupt Decay
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Natural Order
1 Ruric Thar, the Unbowed
1 Progenitus


Just to explain, I'm currently back to 60 cards main deck, just because I felt I was having less progression with 61 than with the traditional 60. Don't get me wrong, this is just me going back and forth at the moment. If I go back to 61, its between MD Ruric or MD Ooze. I was running with Ooze as a result of the gyard reliant decks/RUG delver meta I've been seeing locally. Obviously either of the two will be a meta call.

I dropped from 6 discard to 4 because I want Meekstone. In the most recent MTGO daily, the 4 decks I played all had TNN and Meekstone did great. Pithing Needle is also staying, its so diverse and I think with the resurgance of blade decks, even Merfolk, and of course Miracles its pretty essential. About the discard, at first I tried Thoughseize but I think due to its nature in the board Cabal is superior for combo mu's. Progenitus I hate, so so much, but there's little that's better. I draw this guy so often (as discussed a few pages back). I've actually seen him less now that I am back to 60 (weird right).

Not sure what I would add if I went back to 61 MD though. I've tried 3 Meekstone, it felt clunky but I would find it each time in tempo mu's. 4th decay to combat the loads of Engineered Plagues I forsee coming? Hmmm

EDIT: Null Rod is interesting as a Needle replacement. 1 cost higher, adds to the Storm mu, still hits Top, equipments, any artifact based board wipe I think...hows it doing? I suppose we have to ask what are some things that Needle can hit that Null Rod can't?

EDIT 2: following up that question, I know Needle helped with Oops All Spells, its a thing online but not so sure about how much in a local meta. It also wouldn't hit Planeswalkers, but honestly any time I could hit a Pwalker its likely to have a Jitte or Top behind it anyway. Sneak Attack (not sure how relevant this is either). Mutavault? I dunno, just what I could think of without diving deep into it.

[danyul]

Yeah I think for now I prefer the versatility of Needle. But I'll keep Null Rod in mind when I'm boarding to see if I ever find myself wishing I had it.

On an unrelated note, I went undefeated at my weekly after watching Elf. And then another elf pilot told me they went 3-1 after watching Elf as well. There might be something to this. I'M JUST SAYING. Give it a try. It couldn't hurt.



Have a good holiday everybody!

[yaWgnorW]

Yeah I think for now I prefer the versatility of Needle. But I'll keep Null Rod in mind when I'm boarding to see if I ever find myself wishing I had it.

On an unrelated note, I went undefeated at my weekly after watching Elf. And then another elf pilot told me they went 3-1 after watching Elf as well. There might be something to this. I'M JUST SAYING. Give it a try. It couldn't hurt.



Have a good holiday everybody!

Watched it a week ago...went 3-1 some point after. hmmmm

[Tormod]

Yeah I think for now I prefer the versatility of Needle. But I'll keep Null Rod in mind when I'm boarding to see if I ever find myself wishing I had it.

On an unrelated note, I went undefeated at my weekly after watching Elf. And then another elf pilot told me they went 3-1 after watching Elf as well. There might be something to this. I'M JUST SAYING. Give it a try. It couldn't hurt.



Have a good holiday everybody!

That makes me want to get the deck altered to reflect the characters and scenes from the movie.

Sleeves with the movie poster as art would be hilarious.

[danyul]

We need to see pics if you ever do that.

[yaWgnorW]

Versus ANT what do you guys prefer to name first with Cabal Therapy?

Dark Ritual
LED
Infernal Tutor
something else?

[Dice_Box]

LED. It's both a mana source and a way to get tutor online. Don't forget that without it, every land they draw is another turn they have to wait to get to Hellbent.

[yaWgnorW]

LED. It's both a mana source and a way to get tutor online. Don't forget that without it, every land they draw is another turn they have to wait to get to Hellbent.

Yeah, this is what I've been naming. Looks like I shouldn't change that then.

[Lemnear]

Versus ANT what do you guys prefer to name first with Cabal Therapy?

Dark Ritual
LED
Infernal Tutor
something else?

LED without the slightet doubt ... a +3 mana source that turns on Infernal Tutor which is otherwise a crappy card

[Infinitium]

Turn 1 on the play I'd name LED (as have been mentioned, it's their MVP for the most part). Turn 1 on the draw assume they've played out potential acceleration and either go for Infernal Tutor unless they have access to U, at which point I'd strongly consider playing a creature instead to circumvent brainstorm. If you can hit them twice without passing the turn name Brainstorm to ensure that the second Therapy connects. If they brainstorm in response to the first therapy just name some Ritual and hope for the best (since competent players will hide away their money cards unless they smell Surgical Extraction). Of course, if you do happen to have extraction on hand feel free not to name brainstorm and see if you can force them to shuffle away their business.

Don't let it's reputation intimidate you; Therapy is a fairly easy card to utilize efficiently even with a modest amount of metagame knowledge. Name the cards you lose to in any given matchup early on, then reactive cards they're likely to hold on to (brainstorm, removal, counters).

[Echelon]

Concerning Peedle/Null Rod:

I prefer the Peedle, since it can also be used against some important non-artifact cards (Goblin Sharpshooter, Mother of Runes to prevent nasty recurrable targeting tricks with Spellskite opposing our Viridian Shaman, Grim Lavamancer, Gempalm Incinerator and planeswalkers in general).

I'm deliberately not naming SFM, by the way, since Null Rod will stop anything it puts on the battlefield.

Besides, I also feel that most decks you'd use Null Rod against often only have 1 or 2 different threats that would be affected by the Null Rod and often might be handled just as well by the Peedle for 1 less mana (yes, there are exceptions ofcourse, like the aforementioned LED or the Affinity/MUD MU in general which is already quite favorable for us) or could be destroyed with our Viridian Shaman.

I think the Null Rod would be best in a meta where you'd expect a lot of Storm/Dredge since, like Eternal mentioned, it stops LEDs/Petals. I also agree that it'd be better against the UW Miracles MU, since it dodges the Chalice for X = 1.

[Alexeezay]

Miracles doesn't play Chalice :D Nonetheless I would like to test Null Rod

[Mammutti]

Miracles doesn't play Chalice :D Nonetheless I would like to test Null Rod

I believe by Chalice on 1 he meant CB Top combination, virtually a chalice.

I like the idea of Null Rod tho. Needs some testing. However, my gut tells me to stick with the Needles. Namely because of Sharpshooter, Deed and PWs. If only could Needle stop Punishing Fire. Do you guys find PF to be troublesome? The only place where I would want the Rod instead of Needle is against decks packing Jitte and EE. (And LED decks, sure.)

[Echelon]

I believe by Chalice on 1 he meant CB Top combination, virtually a chalice.

I like the idea of Null Rod tho. Needs some testing. However, my gut tells me to stick with the Needles. Namely because of Sharpshooter, Deed and PWs. If only could Needle stop Punishing Fire. Do you guys find PF to be troublesome? The only place where I would want the Rod instead of Needle is against decks packing Jitte and EE. (And LED decks, sure.)

That's very kind of you, but I didn't mean that - that was just me mixing up 2 entirely different decks.

Punishing Fire can be tough when they can deal with your first few guys through a couple of Lightning Bolts and then quickly getting the engine online. If it takes them a while or they're a bit tight on mana, you often have some time to draw into a NO.

[Eternal]

Needle versus Miracle is not enough versatile in my opinion. Lock Top OR EE, while Null rod lock these 2 things in one card. Same versus Esperblade, instead of naming one equipment like Jitte or SoFI (or EE !), Null rod locks all these crappy cards in one time ! It's really an important advantage.

But in my great regret, Rod is useless vs S&T. Naming Sneak attack or grisel with needle was pretty good.

PS : Pithing locks Jace too, but this guy is not decisive vs Elves.

[Zombie]

Needle versus Miracle is not enough versatile in my opinion. Lock Top OR EE, while Null rod lock these 2 things in one card. Same versus Esperblade, instead of naming one equipment like Jitte or SoFI (or EE !), Null rod locks all these crappy cards in one time ! It's really an important advantage.

But in my great regret, Rod is useless vs S&T. Naming Sneak attack or grisel with needle was pretty good.

PS : Pithing locks Jace too, but this guy is not decisive vs Elves.

Rod also locks Helm of Obedience vs. Miracles. I think the main question is which hurts Storm and other combo decks more - Rod or Thorn. Because if the impact is good enough, Thorns can just be replaced with Null Rods for nice gains in many matchups without the loss of Pithing Needle vs. Sneak and Show.

[Eternal]

I never liked thorn, because I have the impression that it's absolutely not decisive. This card get a really good value only against storm. We need versatility.

If sideboards could contain more than 15 cards, am sure thorn will be on the "reserved list".

I feel Miracle is our worst match up, more than Storm or Sneak and show (anyway, that's subjective). From there, Null rod is better than any other "lock-card" like thorn or pithing.

[Dice_Box]

Maybe I am in a minority, but with Decay, Shaman and Discard, I have found Miracles to be painful but not as bad as ANT or other hyper aggressive Combo decks.