[Deck] Aggro Loam

[apocolyps6]

A bit of an update, I ended up chickening out and going with 4c loam with a modified sideboard

3x thalia
1x Tabernacle
1x smallpox
1x maelstrom pulse
1x reverent silence
1x toxic deluge
1x dreadbore
1x devastating dreams
1x slaughter games
1x Life From the loam
1x Ravens crime (felt strong to wish for)
1x Green sun's zenith
1x Mindsparker ("red thalia")

so after all my efforts to improve my matchups against known decks, I avoid most of em

round 1 vs Miracles:

g1:
I have a hand that is something like dryad arbor, burning wish, mox, wasteland, wasteland etc.
My opponent is borrowing miracles and picked it up roughly yesterday. Playtesting last night (before I knew she would be playing here) has taught her to fetch for basics and play around the right stuff. She lands t1 top into t2 counterbalance. I'm forced to wish for reverent silence in turn 2 and she forces my silence, forces the play after that and starts floating 2s on top. I can't find a live spell, she can't find a win con. I beat down with dryad arbor. The game takes forever and she eventually kills me. I should have surrendered much earlier.

g2:
Time is called as we start, we get an extension for starting late or w.e. I keep a better hand, burning wish for Ravens crime and make her discard some 10ish cards over the course of the game. On turn 0 I find an abrupt decay for her RIP, waste my badlands and hit with knight, villiage and arbor for 8or9, then kill her on turn 2 to tie the game.

round 2 vs Hivemind:

G1. Small confession, I don't often play in tournaments (with time limits) so I play this game a little too fast. I keep something like mox, wasteland, GSZ, tranquil thicket, treetop villiage, loam. My opponent starts with volcanic island pass. I put him on not having enough mana to fight through wastelands and waste his volc he brainstormlocks himself in response. here I should have played a mox dropping village to GSZ for arbor to wasteland off of loam on t2 as well. He plays ancient tomb into grim monolith an complains about colored mana. I wastland lock him, land a knight and then a bob.

G2.
I go t1 bob into loam->waste, into Mindsparker. my opponent show&tells i have knight in case he has emrakul. he has hive mind and 2 pacts.

G3
I mill to 5 and keep a hand with thalia, thicket, forest, chalice and something not great. He has an early show n tell. I show thalia and he can't pact me that turn. I land a chalice on 0 and proceed to ride thalia to victory.

round 3 against TinFins
g1 I assume the guy is on DDFT because nothing has stopped him from losing with that deck for over a year now. I have a turn 1 teeg. he has a turn 1 shallow grave'd griselbrand 8+storm and a tendrills in hand. I make the mistake of not keeping up wasetland in case he fetched a non-basic and he brainstorms off Usea and has exact mana to throw an emrakul at me.

g2 I mill to 6 and keep based on maze of Ith thinking that maybe denying him 7 cards would be good enough to live a little rather than risk not getting a mox in my 5 card hand. he attacks with a griselbrand and an Emrakul and i fog griz. I'm at 5, he is at 3 and i play dryad arbor pass. he value tendrills me.

There is no round 4 because of some tiebreaker stuff.

conclusion1: don't play loam against these people unless you can sneak 8 moxen into your list somehow.
conclusion2: Mindsparker needs to see play in something.
conclusion3: time to move my burning wishes to TES for a bit :/

[Tyrio]

FYI, Chalice on 0 doesn't stop Hivemind at all. Chalice will counter their Pact, but Hivemind will still make a copy for you and kill you with it.

[apocolyps6]

Yeah, I figured that out after the fact. My opponent had a slaughter pact for thalia and didn't know this tho.

It was my first time playing against the deck

[Megadeus]

FYI, Chalice on 0 doesn't stop Hivemind at all. Chalice will counter their Pact, but Hivemind will still make a copy for you and kill you with it.

I was thinking this. Glad I was right. Oh well.

Mindsparker is interesting. I think it would be better in a more aggressive version however

[apocolyps6]

I mostly just wanted another thalia against high tide, but it isn't horrible against anything that plays 8 cantrips.

[sdematt]

I'll be trying this:

4 Tarmogoyf
4 Countryside Crusher
3 Terravore

3 Diabolic Edict
4 Life from the Loam
3 Seismic Assault
4 Mox Diamond
2 Devastating Dreams
3 Sylvan Library
4 Punishing Fires
2 Intuition

4 Grove of the Burnwillows
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Verdant Catacombs
2 Taiga
2 Badlands
1 Bayou
1 Kessig Wolf Run
1 Volrath's Stronghold
4 Wasteland
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Forest
1 Mountain
1 Tropical Island

I'll be trying this. I was playing Entomb for the longest time, but sometimes, just grabbing 3 lands to bin 2 isn't bad either, or just getting Triple P. Fires to ramp up the damage. Triple Edict and no Abrupt Decay is likely a mistake, but you ways to answer everything through Fires or Assault unless it's a TNN. TNN sucks for us, that's also why triple Terravore. Wolf Run is also there for Crusher to go over something if need be.

Yes, deck loses to Rest in Peace as always and needs Decays. Any other thoughts about Intuition? I know we had discussed it ages ago, but I figure it might just be better than Crop Rotation/Entomb here.

-Matt

[Aggro_zombies]

No DRS? Especially with your curve basically starting on two, it seems worth trying.

[sdematt]

Devastating Dreams no bueno with Deathrite Shaman. I mean, I like the guy, but I don't like nuking myself when I don't have to.

-Matt

[Aggro_zombies]

Devastating Dreams no bueno with Deathrite Shaman. I mean, I like the guy, but I don't like nuking myself when I don't have to.

-Matt

Is Dreams still worth it in a meta with a lot of blue and TNNs? I wouldn't mind trying DRS over it in the main and running Dreams in the sideboard.

Then again, I don't know how fast the format is right now. Turn one "land, go" might be completely fine.

[Richard Cheese]

So I threw Loam back together and went 3-0-1 this weekend, partially off the back of some real bad draws my my opponents. I went the DRS/PFire route, and while DRS is super versatile, I still missed diamond against Pox/Moon decks. DRS still ended up pulling his weight, but Diamond would have been a lot safer. I'm actually thinking of something like a 3/3 split if I can find other stuff to cut, since the two actually work pretty well together. Another strike against DRS is that the grove manabase doesn't leave a ton of room for fetches, and I kept finding that my turn 1 shaman wasn't good for anything until turn 3-4.

Also, I really like Punishing Fire because of how synergistic it is, while still being a reasonable card in the face of grave hate postboard, but .dk brought up an interesting point. If I went back to Seismic with a very mountain-heavy manabase and diamonds, postboard I could conceivably switch gears to some kind of Koth/Moon/Chalice control against opponents with RiP. Not sure if it's any good in practice, but sounds fun in theory at least.

[sarahiscute]

hi, i dun noe whether this belongs here. this is a BG deck using loam and dark depths:

//Lands (33)
4 Bayou
4 Dark Depths
1 Forest
4 Rishadan Port
2 Volrath's Stronghold----------helps facilitate creatures from graveyard
3 Maze of Ith
3 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
4 Thespian's Stage
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Wasteland

//Spells (20)
3 Crop Rotation
4 Entomb
3 Life from the Loam
2 Manabond------------fast mana
4 Exploration------fast mana
4 Mox Diamond

//creatures (8)
4 Vampire Hexmage-------no need to reply on thespian stage too much. have first strike
4 Dark Confidant-------less graveyard hate

Total: 61

//Sideboard
SB: 2 Thorn of Amethyst
SB: 1 Bojuka Bog
SB: 3 Defense Grid
SB: 4 Sphere of Resistance
SB: 1 Ray of Revelation
SB: 3 Krosan Grip
SB: 1 Primeval Titan

not sure about the side board: should i put in pernicious deed? abrupt decay, surgical extraction, extirpate???

[Megadeus]

Someone on Salvation posted awhile ago that I just ready. I remember always wondering what GY hate spell should be played in 4C loam SB to wish for. He said you could wish for Sylvan Scrying, then use scrying to find your MB Bojuka Bog. Seems narrow. But probably better than Morning Tide.

[apocolyps6]

does the grave hate have to be wished for? We usually arn't fast enough to wish for relevant hate against the graveyard decks it seems.

Wheel of Sun and Moon and Leyline of the Void seem okay.

[apocolyps6]

So I’ve been screwing around with the 4 color loam list a little bit and have come to a list I think is worth talking about. Basically I cut black for blue and made red a splash. I’ll give a deck list with some explanation.


5 wastelands. (1 ghost quarter) - many of the TNN decks are 3 colored, if we keep them off 3 mana then we keep them off TNN. quarter eventually becomes stripmine
4 Mox Diamond - no-brainer. free acceleration.
4 Life from the loam. - no burning wish. more on this later.
4 Impulse - ‘replacement’ to burning wish. Instead of a sorcery speed tutor that gives us sorcery speed answers to all our problems at 2 extra mana, Impulse gives us a lot of dig (esp for sideboard cards), ‘shuffles’ for Library, and consistency.
2 engineered explosives - our mainboard TNN killer, and to some extent a replacement for abrupt decay. powerful flexible tool.
1 Academy ruins - recursion for explosives, value from diamonds when loaming, and extra copies of …
4 chalice of the void - still the strongest hate against every deck not playing chalice at such a small cost to us
4 knight of the reliquary - win con and repeatable tutor.
2 tarmogoyf - backup boots on the ground
2 green sun zenith - more big dudes. Racing TNN is a thing too.
2 sylvan library - loam tricks, card selection, card advantage. no need for an introduction
2 punishing fire - splashing red (4 sources) for the ability to grind out most fair games
1 intuition - triple demonic tutor, don’t mind if I do. would play more if the shell could support 2
1 dryad arbor - primary win con of most loam decks :p
1 treetop village - backup win con of choice.
4 tranquil thicket - colors are hard and I want 4 cycle lands
1 horizon canopy - it draws cards. thats a good thing, right?
1 maze of ith - knight tricks and fogs
1 karakas - because griselbrand should go away.
1 flex slot - used to be a teeg but I realized how bad he was with 8 X spells in the deck :/ maybe an intuition

1 wonky manabase :
4 windwept heath
1 plateau
1 tundra
2 tropical island
2 grove of the burnwillows
1 taiga
1 forest
1 savannah

So this deck is probably worse against rip without the 3 abrupt decay (preboard), and i’m sure the miracles matchup takes a hit unless we can strip-mine them off of basics with ghostquarter, a real thing if they play around wasteland. Counterbalance flipping a counterbalance forever is less of a hard lock against us. It feels like they ways it is worse is that it is 'slower'.

What it loses there it gains in being better against combo. Enter, the sideboard:

2 Thalia - Thorn of amethyst on legs, yes please
2 Meddling mage - flex slot. could be any other hatebear or even leyline of sanctity/Solitary Confinement/armageddon
4 Mindbreak Trap - yep. This badboy wins against storm decks and is castable on turn 3 for value against decks with things we wanna counter.
3 tariff - edict that hits exactly grielbrand/TNN/bigproblem when we want it to, and can take out most creatures most of the time.
1 tabernacle - could be a tariff but I have wet dreams of striplocking my opponent off of creatures with it.
3 krosan grip - hits RIP and Counterbalance etc.


The deck is definitely not perfect; the numbers are wrong, and I haven’t yet been able to get too much testing in, and it is tuned to a midrange and combo heavy metagame (altho it shouldn’t have trouble with tempo), but I think it has potential. I might be over-optimistic but nothing else I’ve tried has been able to give me that 4C loam feeling. It is also a 3 color deck if you don’t like punishing fire in a matchup :p.

Edit: blue - bad idea. Trap - good idea. I can elaborate but the reason is "slow".

[Manipulato]

Hi,
Niklas Kronberger just took down the BOM 2014 in Annecy France (535 Players).

Heres the list he played:

4*Chalice of the Void
4*Mox Diamond
3*Liliana of the Veil
3*Abrupt Decay
3*Punishing Fire
3*Life from the Loam
2*Green Sun's Zenith
1*Sylvan Library
1*Gaddock Teeg
1*Tarmogoyf
1*Scavenging Ooze
4*Knight of the Reliquary
4*Dark confidant
4*Verdant catacombs
4*Wasteland
1*Karakas
1*Dryad Arbor
1*Urbog, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1*Horizon Canopy
2*Barren Moor
2*Tranquil Thicket
2*grove of the Burnwillows
1*Maze of Ith
2*Taiga
2*Bayou
1*Savannah
2*Scrubland

Sideboard
2*Choke
2*Golgari Charm
1*Thrun, the Last Troll
3*Ethersworn Canonsit
4*Leyline of the void
1*Gaddock Teeg
1*Anciant Grudge
1*Qasali Pridemage

*By the way, he was there for modern only ;-)

Greetings

[Megadeus]

Sweet list. I always wanted to fit in Liliana into the 4 color shell. It is a bit creaure heavy. Losing burning wish is interesting as is losing Devastating Dreams. That card literally singlehandedly won games for me. Not sure if I could ever cut it.

[conboy31]

Assuming that you are using the 75 card list that won the BoM, how would you SB vs. any of the 3 miracles lists that also top 8'd?

I have not played this time of deck recently and as a thought experiment was curious what ambassadors of this archetype propose. My first inclination was that maze and arbor are insignificant in the grand scheme of things. From here I felt like I wanted every draw to either be a threat, answer CB/RiP, and address Jace. This lead me to consider dropping the 4 mox diamonds with the concession of no t1 Bob, t2 lilly lines. So I came up with -4 mox, -1 maze, -1 arbor. +1 thrun, +1 pridemage, +1 gcharm, +2 choke, +1 teeg. Is this a defensible sb strategy vs. miracles?

[OlegtheSuper]

After games the winner told that he have change 2 choke and thrun to 3 slaughter games to makes games with miracles much better.

[Megadeus]

I'd go

+2 Choke, +1 Thrun, +1 Pride Mage
-1 Maze of Ith, -1 Scavenging Ooze, -1 Tarmogoyf

And just go up to 61 Post Board. Would take out Dryad Arbor. Last time I played this deck vs miracles, I did 9 damage with the 'ole Arbor.

[Megadeus]

After games the winner told that he have change 2 choke and thrun to 3 slaughter games to makes games with miracles much better.

Also agree here, Slaughter Games is the fucking Tits in this deck. WOuldnt leave home without at least 2.