Grims are better in matchups where I can't out tempo opponents and I have to grind out my wins. This would apply to most mid range decks like bug, Jund, blade mirrors etc. Grim is a x for 1 while bolt is a 1 for 1. I also feel that 8 1 for 1 removal spells is too many. Bolts went to the board to replace Lavamancer. I'm not sure what else is needed in the board to be honest. Extra bolts would probably be good against elves.
I played some games against sneak and show and went 5-6. I sideboarded like this
-4 Stp
-4 Bolt
-1 Jitte
+ 4 meddling mage
+ 3 REB
+ 1 wear//tear
+ 1 SoFaF
Oh and by the way, I think the opening post needs an update.
I like 3 Grim Lavamancer quite a bit, but I prefer cutting STPs over Bolts and then just dealing with Tarmogoyfs post-board with Rest in Peace.Originally Posted by ivanpei
Keep the Bolts and board the Nemesis out. I also think that Wear/Tear is too weak against them.
WantToPonder
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I think wear//tear is ok because in a counter war, you can daze them to keep them off their last mana then wear//tear on your turn. That happens enough to be relevant. Yea I've been thinking about the removal split, should it be 4 bolts/2 Stp or 4 stp/2 bolts. Stp is only for goyf and batterskull since we don't see as much Kotr these days. Sb duty it is for Stp.
Also have some game play options. Say you are playing against creature based midrange like Jund or stoneblade, do you go for jitte or batterskull? I've found that I like jitte more in general as it just takes over once you get a few swings in. However, I've had problems where I spend too much tempo casting and equipping jitte only to lose my creature to removal. It's brutal on tempo and that's usually gg. If sfm is my only creature I normally go batterskull and if I have multiple carriers I go for jitte. That's my personal rough guide but I'm unsure if it's correct.
2nd question is do I go aggro all the way with delvers and sfms or should I leave spell pierce mana up? I feel that against grindy mid range we are forced to go aggro all the way, or am I playing it wrong? I depend on daze/force early and spell pierce later to nab later bombs like Jace and Liliana. I also find that 4 spell pierce is quite alot. I find that I draw too many spell pierce at times and the timing is not quite right to cast them.
I'm thinking of dropping to 3 Spell Pierce so I can run 4 bolts, 2 grim and 3 plows main deck.
1st Q: I grab the batterskull if I have no other creatures or even ONE other non tnn creature. With creature heavy draws i like jitte for those matchups.
2nd Q: I like to play in a way that i can get the most out of my pierces so they can be effective. this dissension can be very game dependent, are you hitting your land drops? are they wastelanding? are you wastetlanding? do you have force of will? daze? that could slow you down. if you feel that you are going to have three mana avilable turn three then you can leave one untapped when you cast sfm. if you get wasted or daze and lose some tempo, it may not be good to wait. In that spot, i would tap out to cast stm. turn one i will always tap out for delver out the gate the clock delver provides is great.
On pierce i went down to 3 for a minute, but missed it vrs. combo and tempo decks so i think 4 is the correct number
The enemy of the best is the good. If you're always settling with what's good, you'll never be the best.
-Jerry Rice
Yea in g1 I'm having a tough time against combo already. It's a hard call. Anyway cheers for the comments.
Spell Snare seems to be decent these days. Would it be a possible option in place of pierce #4?
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Hello everyone!
Today was my first day playing this deck and it was quite interesting. I have played esperblade for about a while and figured it would be time to try a more aggro approach. I played against my friend and went against burn 3-0, Shardless BUG 2-0, Dredge 2-0, Counterbalance 2-0, Rug Delver 3-2.
I was hoping someone could help me out because I think I was playing it a bit wrong or might be trying to go about this the wrong way.
My list was the same as Owens except I cut a land for a MD Grim who was MVP in every single match. He really helped me seal the deal in a lot of games.
I also tinkered around with two lists from MTG TOP 8 which didn't run any SFM and focused on more Grim's and added Young Pyro. By no means am I try to start an argument on which one is better or anything like that. However, instead as I mentioned before about playing the deck wrong, I felt that I was less of an aggro deck but had all the right cards of an aggro deck as I was playing. I always hated opening up with an equipment in my hand or seeing numerous SFM because with Owens list I felt that 10 creatures never gave me what I needed to get there. Yes, equipment won me games where I most likely would have lost or would have at least durdled around longer but, so did Young Pyro (house against rug).
I guess what I'm getting at is what is the right line of play? I've been a control player for a while now so this is all new to me so I apologize if I'm making any ignorant remarks. I'm just very excited about this kind of deck and would love to get better at it but I feel like I'm looking at this a different way than I should have been playing it. Also, it is important to note that all this testing was done pre SB. I wanted to get a feel for the deck itself first before I bothered with a SB.
Thank you all very much and I hope to contribute with testing!
I'm having the same issues with the deck. Owens list is not quite aggro and not quite control. It's sort of like bant, where its a 50/50 sort of deck. I think the key is planning what route to go against different decks. Against say Jund where I am cold to punishing fire, there is no choice but to straight up aim for a fast aggro opening to try and finish the opponent up before the engine gets going. Against say maverick or the blade mirror, you can afford to play conservatively and attempt to outlast the opponent.
I've actually won by casting and recasting batterskull multiple times until I exhausted my opponents removal. I feel that this deck is really strong with the right pilot because you can switch gears between aggro and control to match your draw or matchup. Sometimes against Jund or say uw miracles, even a decent hand but zero creatures means a mulligan because you must apply pressure from the start.
However, I would be happy to keep a answer heavy hand against other aggro decks because I can outlast them with a Grim or sfm. This is one of the harder decks to play as deciding which route to play is very important.
When you do that, cast Batterskull over and over again, don't you worry about it getting countered?
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Its been my experience with this deck that im usually on the aggro side of things. Thats why I like to play it very aggressively and try to close-out games early. That means sometimes I may FoW a t1 ponder/brainstorm/library manipulation against someone in the hopes to get a free-win; Against an unknown opp I go for delver over ponder and very rarely do I prefer to keep counter-magic up rather than play a creature. Getting to be the aggressor is also one of the reasons I prefer bolt over Grim for that extra reach and Geist of Saint Traft over the third TNN.
Here are some frequent lines of play I think have been useful to me:
-T1 Delver over Ponder, Ponder over brainstorm
-Unless I have a bolt in hand I fetch only tundras.
-Against combo in t1 or t2 I prefer to wasteland their land than to keep counter-magic up.
-If opp has Tarmos, I rather take a couple of hits from a lesser creature than StP it and have them drop the aforementioned lhurgoyf the next turn and not have an answer for it.
-I get Jitte over batterskull most of the time, 2/3 atleast, if I believe my stoneforge will die. With Jitte even if SFM dies you can still play it next turn and have all your creatures be significant threats.
-I dont use my ponders or brainstorms to setup my delvers as they die to often in the current metagame(Owen T's article explains it better). One exception is when I have multiples out, I will brainstorm to flip them.
-Against burn I dont put more than two lands in play unless theyre fetches to play around Price of Progress.
-In the TES matchup the first meddling mage names Tendrils of Agony, the second one names Abrupt Decay.
-Also in the TES matchup if its game1 and you have the ability to counter an artifact in t1 or t2 before they get to 4 mana do so. Going for an early ETW is usually how they win game1s. Game 2 they dont go for the ETW plan as we have Batterskull which trumps it.
-Against decks that have Islands/blue mana that may or not play vendilion clique, activate SFM when they cant cast it. That means sometimes main phasing it.
I would love to read if you guys have a few mental shortcuts or frequent plays you guys make that have been consistently successful.
Naming Tendrils vs TES is a big error, they've still got Goblins and Grape Shot.
I disagree, if you read bryant cooks posts you will notice he deslikes etw in the matchup. An early batterskull can race an etw pretty easily. Nevertheless, if you feel like its not correct you should name burning wish. Which is what I name if I dont have a sfm in hand.
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That's my point, why wouldn't you always name Burning Wish, which is 4 cards in his deck, as opposed to Tendrils, which is one card in his SB?
I agree with Final Fortune. I have played TES before and naming burning wish is a huge pain in the ass because it takes away tendrils and limits my win condition to just empty.
And for what it's worth I typically name Lion's Eye Diamond, Dark Ritual or Silence because the redundancy of the deck prevents you from naming any single card and disabling their ability to win outright, it typically depends on what counter I'm holding in the event I'm holding any counters at all.
Anyway back to lists, has anyone tried a list that spends less time on cantripping and swordsing and more time on peeking and burning?
This really struck me as an interesting list,
4 Force of Will
4 Spell Pierce
4 Daze
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Brainstorm
1 Vendillion Clique
2 True Name Nemesis
1 Batterskull
1 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
8 Blue Fetchlands
3 Volcanic Island
3 Tundra
1 Island
4 Wasteland
and then basically SB RIPs and Stifles and Pyros and various other goodies. It tried to just ride the beat down plan as hard as possible with Delver and ignore resolved Tarmogoyfs. I really think there's a certain amount of unnecessary tention between Bolt and Plow and Probe has been very useful at letting you know whether or not you should bother fetching Island, playing Delver, holding up Pierce etc.
I usually name Wish too, because the last time I named tendrils, they wished for Pyro and just wiped my board. I'm liking my current list of -2 STP + 2 Grims. Also I've changed my strategy to go for Batterskull first against anything that isn't Elves even with multiple creatures in hand. This forces my opponent to immediately remove my threat and not wait until I equip a dude. If SFM dies, so be it, I move on. If I fetched Jitte, a well timed removal spell just totally messes up my tempo and costs me the game (2 mana for SFM, then a turn casting Jitte and another Turn equipping, if SFM dies in response to equip, I lose 3 turns of tempo), especially Abrupt Decay because that shit is uncounterable.
I thought that was the standard play, the only reason I'll grab Umezawa's Jitte is if I have True Name Nemesis in order to form Voltron i.e. Stoneforge for Jitte, cast True Name Nemesis then cast Jitte and equip it. Who cares if you're stuck with Batterskull in hand after a Lightning Bolt, 5 mana is easily obtainable by the mid-game.
Also can anybody explain to me why the hell nobody plays Island?
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