I think if the plan were for Needles, I would play 4 Foothills, and a 1/1/1/1 split of the 4 blue fetches. Obviously naming foothills will be bad, but it is probably the least played fetch in legacy right? Also that way you wont ever feel bad about naming a blue fetch because you only run it as a 1-of.Originally Posted by Bed Decks Palyer
Yeah naming lili, sfm (only if they've already fetched up bsk), sofi/jitte and deathrite are all much safer choices. Naming fetches is pretty much a crap shoot, but if you have perfect info it can be devastating. Just being able to name one of the known fetches in a BUG hand can sometimes force them to choose between g or b mana. Snare seems pretty good right now and cutting the third submerge is ok I mean you might get unlucky and run into Team America with goyfs and tombstalkers, but that's variance for you.
I did just look over about 5 top 8 deathblade builds and all have a consistent split of 4/4/2 on delta, strand, and marsh flats. While this might not always be true someone might try to skimp and save money by running 2/4/4, but you still know those are the only fetches they will be running.
I have also recently thought of, and tested builds with 2 or 3 maindeck pithing needle, 4 gitaxian probe, and 0 stifle. I can say that it can certainly lead to some killer starts if you have probe + needle and are able to name a fetchland in their hand (I play 4 wooded, 4 polluted). It is also very solid against deathrite shaman, sensei's top, and vial. On the other hand, it is next to useless against storm, reanimator, and burn. I lost twice to reanimator decks last weekend, in part because of the needles - you can name Griselbrand, but a resolved Griselbrand is still game over, so there is no point.
Some other considerations about needle: It isn't blue, and it is a permanent, meaning that it is harder to flip delver and dump 7 cards in the graveyard.
At this point it is my conclusion that needle should not be played as more than a 1-of in the maindeck or sb.
I really like gitaxian probe. Here's the list I'm testing at the moment:
54 Core Cards
4 Probes
1 Forked Bolt
1 Spell Pierce
Should I go up to 2 pierce? 2 forked bolt? Cut a probe for something else?
Honestly I don't even play probe, tried it out in a few tournaments and it always let me down, I personally play the 54 then 2 spell pierce, 2 forked bolt and 2 spell snare. I would play probe again if TES and SNT increase in tournament numbers. As of now I like 2 forked bolts to deal with DRS, MOM, Flickerwisp, etc. The format is full of creatures and knowing what's in there hand isn't really going to change the match-up greatly. If you play probe the options are rug, tes, dredge and I think that's about it. Now if you don't play anything they are going to play around stifle. It's just not worth the loss of 2 life in some races where that 2 life matters
I think needle has a lot of potential, but completely disagree with cutting stifle. The whole point is to up the disruption count and cutting stifle does the exact opposite. I'm running 54 core, 3 probe, 3 needle and have had no problem flipping delvers. It's still 27 instant/sorcery which is still better than BUG (25ish) and on par with American Delver. If it works for them it can work for us. There will be a very marginal amount of times that delver won't flip, but not a noticeable amount.
Goose getting to threshold asap isn't as much of a problem when you have perfect info from probe. With stifle and needle you can use the info to its full potential and keep the game in the early stages where we rule. At that point goose getting to threshold isn't as necessary. It also in an odd way improves goose's threshold rate by counter acting all deathrites not just one.
Sure it's useless against storm... our best match up oh well. If you have trouble beating storm with this deck you should probably be playing something else. It kind of bricks against burn outside of grim there's not much to hit. So that is an issue if burn continues to become more of a competitor, but a few months ago I would just disregard it as a cheap entry deck to the format (and still do sort of).
Reanimator is one of our worst combo match ups. That deck can consistently go off turn 2 and semi consistently turn 1. We know they have 4 delta and maybe hitting hapless research is worth while, but I haven't actually tested this match up. We still have a great boarded match up after bringing in x pyroblast, x flusterstorm, vendilion clique, etc. I do think that even if it's one of our worst combo match ups we still have the best game 1 against them in the format.
Despite bricking against those two combo match ups it still has good targets in SnT and back breaking against elves (I would think, but I haven't tested it). Elves rides to victory on the back of their Quirion and Symbiote triggers. Take both or even one of those away and I'm sure it would throw the best elf mages through a loop. I mean it's not even the produced effect of the trigger "untap target mana dork" that makes them so valuable. It's the fact that they can do stuff like "bounce forest untap dork play forest as land for turn etc" or "bounce visionary untap dork replay visionary make glimpse turn so much better".
That's just a meta call. Stephen Mann won at SCG Indianapolis with 4 probe / 2 pierce. If elves and D&T are popular in your meta forked bolt is probably right. If you want overall good cards against all decks spell pierce is the right choice. It almost never blanks against any one deck and is the best soft counter in the format.
On another note I just finished testing this needle build against Jund, Junk, Miracles and TES. Same 54 core with 3 probe 3 needle.
Miracles UWR Joe Losset version 3/1 mainboard | no sideboard games
Let me just say needle maindeck against miracles is stupid. So long as you resolve needle on top it becomes significantly easier. In addition by naming top you increase the amount of bricks in their deck by at least 6 probably 7. We no longer care about counterbalance resolving so it just becomes another brick along with their tops
. If you end up drawing a second needle or cantriping into one naming Jace is also really back breaking. At that point if we have needle on Jace and Top what form of card filter do they actually have left? Brainstorm and that's it really. Essentially Needle increases the amount of high mana bricks that suck early game by 7 when naming top. After naming top they have trouble even getting to their mid to late game where they get ahead.
To put it simply playing against miracles when you neuter there tops is a completely different game. The amount of miracle triggers they try to resolve goes down. There mana becomes worse. Our wastelands actually stick to some degree since they can't find land easily. Digging for answers against goyf in swords or terminus is much harder. They don't have a main deck combo that kills us. Think about playing against a standard esper control deck. Clunky bad card filter lots of late game bombs without a good early or mid game and that's essentially what you are playing against
Miracles UW Eruopean style 3/1 | 1/1
So essentially everything I said above, but add in stoneforge as a needle target.
Jund 3/2 | 1/3
Even our worst match up became better. There was at least one game where I completely demolished him by having needle on verdant turn 1 (off of probe) and Needle on deathrite shortly after. The other funny thing you can do here because Jund has no counters is force them to play into stifle.
When you probe pass with U up they play around stifle and do something like fetch pass or deathrite off of non fetch. If we have the bolt we kill DRS at their EOT. Now if you play out needle turn 2 and we didn't have bolt we name DRS. Then they're still forced to play out their fetch next turn. On top of that their fetch has no value if DRS is dead / in dispose. Either way it's a win win for us.
Better Wastelands:
Remember way way way back when wasteland was just "destroy target nonbasic"? Then DRS came into the picture and said "sure wasteland us we will still use the land" and essentially "countered" wasteland if you will, or at the very least numbed the pain of it. Now if you get needle on DRS it's essentially like the good old days Wasteland is back to what it was hahaha.
Another weird thing about this match up they run mandatory 4 verdants for their basic swamp and forest. If you can get a needle early turn 1 on Verdant then stifle can be saved for their other 4 - 5 fetches and the mana denial plans success rate shoots through the roof. More or less the needle here acts the same as it does in the BUG variants: mana denial plan gets better, deathrite is not an issue, liliana is less of a problem.
The first downside of needle so far:
This was one of the few matches that I wished needle was a forked bolt sometimes. Apparently aside from delver and goyf there's also another creature in legacy that doesn't use activated abilities that does need to be answered asap... bob lols. I almost forgot about this guy since you never see him in bug variants much and deathblade runs maybe 2 or 3 if that. This has been the one and only real let down of needle so far. I can't really think of many other threats (flickerwisp, serra avenger oh hey both in our worst mu) that forked bolt could answer and needle couldn't deal with.
TES 4/2 | no sideboard games
So yeah needle just blanks here. Don't worry though... it's one of our best match ups
. The only activated abilities they have are 4 fetches and usually their split up. Regardless I don't even care. Sideboard we bring in flusterstorm and we already have force + stifle.
I have looked at ANT TES' slightly slower, but more consistent brother. They run 6 fetches 4 of which are mandatory Deltas for their basics so it's a bit better in that match up. I would still probably just board them out because everything else in our deck is great against them. The other thing we just have better cards in the board than needle maybe hitting delta.
Junk 4/2 | no sideboard games
Essentially the same as any other BGx variant name deathrite or liliana. Some slight unique uses it can have here is naming Kotr which I never had to do oddly enough. It's amazing how much just naming deathrite improves our early game and dazes / other mana denial.
The more I test this build the more I like it. Needle acts I guess the best way to describe it as our own Abrupt Decay for one mana. We can deal with a large variety of threats and also use it offensively for mana denial. It's an out when others like pierce might come a turn after they play out lili or got Sword + thopter combo. This is assuming they only got one activation on either of these anything more and we probably still lose. It's just so powerful in what you can name. Even something like Imperial Painter I would think becomes less scary when we can name Grindstone hahaha.
I hope some more people will test this build. I'm definitely thinking about taking it to a tournament in a week or two. I want to try it out against a few more decks first though, like Elves, SnT, D&T and Deathblade.
Thanks a lot for very long and informative post!
I'm interested in your testing, and I hope we'll learn how you went during the tournaments you wrote about!
what are your opinions on follwing cards:
- scavenging ooze/green suns zenith in the main/sideboard instead of the 4th goyf.
- grim lavamancer insead of rough/tumble (-> remember that the little wizard shrinks goose)
and the general idea of cutting creatures from 12 to 10/11 to increase removal/countermagic like jona did during grand prix ghent. (he went 90 on day 1 with his rug deck which had just 2 tarmogoyfs but additional removal spells and 1 counterspell)
Playing too many reactive cards will get you behind against BUG delve, BUG shardless, Jund, UWR delver, DNT, REALLY fastwhat are your opinions on follwing cards:
- scavenging ooze/green suns zenith in the main/sideboard instead of the 4th goyf.
- grim lavamancer insead of rough/tumble (-> remember that the little wizard shrinks goose)
and the general idea of cutting creatures from 12 to 10/11 to increase removal/countermagic like jona did during grand prix ghent. (he went 9
Scooze and green sun seem beyond terrible, they seem very slow in a deck with 18 land/ and typically only 1 green source in play.what are your opinions on follwing cards:
- scavenging ooze/green suns zenith in the main/sideboard instead of the 4th goyf.
- grim lavamancer insead of rough/tumble (-> remember that the little wizard shrinks goose)
and the general idea of cutting creatures from 12 to 10/11 to increase removal/countermagic like jona did during grand prix ghent. (he went 9
Lavamancer seems fine but I like rough tumble to help me catch up from behind
Any tips on playing against BUG delver? I keep getting smoked by that deck.
Been playing 54+ 2 pierce 2 snare, 2 forked bolts
@Kobe: The MU is slightly in their favor, but it's not unwinnable. The biggest advice is kill/counter DRS ASAP, otherwise mana denial is your best plan of attack. Save burn for ground stalemates if you can, they can get a little gummed up. Submerge post-board is amazing, especially when you bury it into a fetch.
I've been running the standard 54 + 3 Spell Pierce, 2 Forked Bolt, 1 Spell Snare version and have really been liking it a lot. It's moneyed me at every Legacy FNM I've taken it to in the last 3 months (except the first time I played it) and I'll be bringing it to SCG Baltimore this weekend. Sideboard looks like this:
1x Ancient Grudge
1x Destructive Revelry
1x Flusterstorm
1x Grafdigger's Cage
2x Pyroblast
1x Red Elemental Blast
2x Rough // Tumble
2x Submerge
1x Sulfur Elemental
1x Sulfuric Vortex
1x Surgical Extraction
1x Vendilion Clique
It's been extremely solid, the only card I kind want to jam in there is a Pithing Needle or two, maybe for a REB effect, not sure. I feel totally confident against combo of all varieties, not bad against Miracles and the mirror, meh on the Team America matchup and very afraid of Maverick, D&T, and Deathblade. Any advice for those rough MU's, Deathblade in particular?
I think GSZ has use in the board against Miracles. Having a "fifth" goose against them or Goyf after they terminus seems useful, but I haven't actually tried it. Cutting the a goyf for a scooze just seems bad. I mean I tried 3 goyf / 1 sylvan when I was running an 8 bolt version which worked really well. The difference here is the library helped dig for more burn or was just absurdly good against combo. Using scooze as the 4th goyf is just bad though because it's worse and we only ever really have 1 green source in play. The other thing is it dies to all the same removal with the exception of bolt, but if you can hold up two green after casting it to play around that then we're already behind hahaha.what are your opinions on follwing cards:
- scavenging ooze/green suns zenith in the main/sideboard instead of the 4th goyf.
- grim lavamancer insead of rough/tumble (-> remember that the little wizard shrinks goose)
and the general idea of cutting creatures from 12 to 10/11 to increase removal/countermagic like jona did during grand prix ghent. (he went 9
Grim seems ok I mean it's worked in the past: http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...p?DeckID=64109 . I'm not sure how it compares to rough since I actually haven't used it myself. It might be better against D&T to shoot down pesky fliers or having reusable removal against mom.
I did recently take RUG Needle to my weekly tournament and it did really well 3/0/1. Oddly enough Needle never actually did anything hahaha.
RUG Needle:
4x wooded foothills
1x flooded strand
1x polluted delta
1x scalding tarn
1x misty rainforest
3x volcanic island
3x tropical island
4x wasteland
4x delver of secrets
4x tarmogoyf
4x nimble mongoose
4x ponder
3x gitaxian probe
4x force of will
4x daze
4x stifle
4x brainstorm
4x lightning bolt
3x pithing needle
SB:
2x submerge
2x pyroblast
2x flusterstorm
1x vendilion clique
2x grafdigger's cage
2x rough and tumble
1x sulfur elemental
1x ancient grudge
1x destructive revelry
1x seal of primordium
Not sure about seal yet. I'm testing it because a friend suggested it based on the idea that you don't have to worry about leaving up lots of countermagic when using our artifact / enchantment hate.
On to the actual matches now:
Round 1 ANT 2/0 | 1/0 Very useful testing the one deck that needle almost completely bricks against.
OTD Game 1 I get a solid turn 2 delver after turn 1 probe revealed:
3x lion's eye diamond
ad nauseam
volcanic island
cabal therapy
I probably should have lost this game, but this was my opponents first time playing the deck. When he decided to go off at 14 life he played ad nauseam, but cracked all 3 LEDs. He proceeded to go down to 2 life after hitting past in flames the first reveal and then 2 tutors. The problem was he couldn't empty his hand for his infernal tutor. There was probably some out to this, but I don't know storm very well and he was on tilt knowing I had the bolt in hand hahaha.
Game 2 This game he just hit stone cold nothing. He got off something like a turn 2 or 3 carpet of flowers and proceeded to play out 3 or 4 different can trips all of which apparently bricked for him. On my side of the board I got an early delver of secrets followed by a vendilion clique to make for a fast clock.
Boarding was something like - 4 bolt, 3 pithing needle // + 2 flusterstorm, 2 pyroblast, 2 grafdigger's cage, 1 vendilion clique
Round 2 NO BUG 2/1 | 2/0 Incase you're not familiar with the deck it's on par with Shardless bug in terms of difficulty for us. http://sales.starcitygames.com//deck...p?DeckID=67745
OTD Game 1 He crushed me here I was doing ok and then I punted swinging in with delver + goose thinking goose was threshed, but he had just tapped deathrite last turn. Despite that mess up I still had no countermagic for the NO that was going to drop the next turn.
Game 2 I got two delvers both of which were not cooperating when they were trying to flip. He was stuck on mana after I got a wasteland turn 3. Turn 4 I could have shuffled away a goyf with a fetch having both delver triggers on the stack, but I assumed he had an abrupt decay at that point. Unfortunately I was right and one delver met an untimely death. Shortly after though goyf and a newly flipped delver made fast work of him.
Game 3 I got a turn 1 delver here and for a change he didn't have Abrupt Decay hahaha. This game I got a really good rough after he had one shardless hit a brainstorm (which got dazed) and the second one hit deathrite. After the second shardless I roughed followed by playing out a 5/6 goyf.
Boarding - 2 pithing needle, - 2 daze // + 2 rough, 1 ancient grudge, 1 vendilion clique. Needle isn't great here it only really hits their deathrites so I boarded all, but one out which may have still been wrong.
Round 3 Mirror 2/0 | 3/0
OTD Game 1 I got a delver out and protected it was pretty much how this game turned out. He thought he was winning the race, but I had two bolts with force back up.
Game 2 This game we both got goyfs out and he was winning the race, but I proceeded to play out 2 geese. I was just able to play runner runner runner and overwhelm his one goyf.
He was a friend of mine and I knew he was running a 4/4 split of misty and tarn so I think I boarded something like: - 4 force, 1 pithing needle // + 2 submerge, 2 flusterstorm, 1 pyroblast. The other useful thing about needle here is it could if he starts the wasteland + loam plan just name wasteland and essentially time walk him for at least a turn.
Round 4 Esper stoneblade ID | 3/0/1
This was just a horrible match up when we played it for fun. It was a homebrew that was trying to play too fair for me. He had all the basics, back to basics, 2 supreme verdict and 2 flusterstorm all main deck.
Hopefully I'll get to test this against some of the match ups I'm actually interested in soon like Elves or D&T lol.
It's just a bad match up somewhere around 60% in there favor and highly die role dependent. They just have a constant stream of threats that we have to answer: Deathrite, Goyf, Hymn, TNN, Liliana, Abrupt decay (can't answer, but add it to the list of cards that make this match up bad). Your best bet is to be OTP and have a good stifle wasteland plan going. Goose is arguably the best threat here because their one answer is Liliana which we can keep them off of, but they still have goyf. Board out forces because they're horrible here bring in 2 submerge (unless you see TNN in which case pyroblast instead) and maybe something like Vendilion and a rough.
Creature [12]
3 Tarmogoyf
4 Nimble Mongoose
4 Delver of Secrets
1 True-Name Nemesis
Instant [24]
2 Spell Snare
2 Spell Pierce
4 Force of Will
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Daze
4 Brainstorm
4 Stifle
Sorcery [6]
4 Ponder
2 Forked Bolt
Land [18]
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Flooded Strand
4 Wasteland
3 Tropical Island
3 Volcanic Island
Sideboard
1 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Sulfur Elemental
1 RED
1 Pyroblast
3 Submerge
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Rough//Tumble
2 Sulfuric Vortex
1 Krosan Grip
1 V-Clique
This is the list I have recently changed too, and though I do like the extra bolts I have found myself doing poorly in the last couple of events. I might be in a rut, but I typical try to not put luck in as a factor. I have made some mistakes, but I feel like there is an error in my build. I have a pretty strong Miracles meta, and I was wondering if pithing needle was an option and what could be taken out? I am also wondering if I should have more side for artifact hate, (grude, DR etc). I went from doing well at scg events and mox events to 0-2, 1-2 dropping each event. Any help is appreciated
Your list seems fine. The 2/2/2 pierce, snare, forked bolt is a well tested and successful build. Regardless if you call it luck or not; variance is still a factor of the game. If we get no land hands that's what we get for playing a deck with only 14 "real" lands in it lol. If we play against BUG and they chain hymn into goyf into Liliana over the course of three turns it's not that we messed up it's that they have something like 12 cards that almost auto win against us main deck.
Pithing needle is really good against miracles. I posted on this page actually about my testing with my current build against miracles (3 needle, 3 probe, 54 core) which makes mainboard games significantly in our favor. You could use another piece of artifact hate in the board. Maybe shave the third submerge which from my experience has lost a lot of value as of late with TNN. The other card would be sulfuric vortex, but since you say there's a lot of miracles in your meta you will probably want to keep that.
As for what artifact hate good old grudge is one of the best especially against Shardless BUG when we want to kill/counter strix constantly and they pack a ton of discard. Since you have a lot of miracles though destructive revelry might be better. Overall I'm pretty sure you just want 2 artifact / enchantment hate in the board. The only reason why I have 3 right now is because I'm testing Seal of Primordium.
Needle or Null Rod. Stoneforge decks hate Null Rod.
What decks are giving you the most trouble? Since you've mentioned Miracles is a big contender in your area, maybe it has been giving you trouble? Forked Bolt is awful in that matchup (obv. very good elsewhere, I'm a fan) and Snare is basically an insanely narrow Pierce(hitting ~5 cards in their deck). Sylvan Library is a very strong card against them and it's definitely something you should look at as a sideboard card. Actually, it's probably just better than Vortex straight up since you can bring it against other decks like combo or D&T. It's also possible to play one in the maindeck depending on how much Miracles, Taxes, and combo you expect to face.
Team Hammafist-We don't take kindly to those who don't take kindly."Got any trade boogas?"
I'm not sure, I have always had trouble with miracles, and a lot of people I test with play the deck so I get some solid testing in against the deck. Library is good, but Vortex is such a killer in the miracles match up I can't cut it. Recently I lost to TES, which I presume is a great match up for us, he just had a good hand and I had a mediocre one. Reanimator has also been a problem, and Shardless. Overall I guess I have just not been on my A game lately, this deck is just the bees knee
Trying to deal with Miracles, I'd cut Forked Botls and add Needles. Their deck crumbles without SDT.
Any flash dudes are perfect, as you don't need to tap on your turn. I guess WOrb is fine, too.
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