[Primer] Elves!

[Lemnear]

That was a surprisingly mild response

It was an adequate one as you presented a valid line of thought to bridge your turn 2-4 with Remora to help drawing into MBT or Swan Song (if you keep that Tropical untapped to fool your opponent) and obviously thought of GSZ/DRS/Cradle to break the symmetry. At least I'm convinced you did xP

I know Mystic Remora from my time as a Vintage Player and how easily it was to play around that card unless your opponents deck is really packed with counterspells, which we can't afford here (google for Richard Shay's "Shaymora" deck for reference). If your opponent has only a limited number of counterspells to draw into with Remora on the table, combo players can get around that by a timed discard spell or FoW while you are locked into fetching the Tropical (and keeping the blue mana untapped afterwards to signal Swan Song rather than just MBT) and shelling out commulative upkeep without ever adressing the fact, that most combo decks are tuned to dismember pure reactice mechanisms like counterspells, as they can sculpt their hand unmolested to slice through your counterspells piece by piece or sidestep it with options like Xantid Swarm or Defense Grid.

Ergo unless you still mix your angles of disruption against combo or drastically increase your counterspells post-SB, the effect of Remora against combo is pretty weak and you can use all the slots required to play a mix of discard/counterspells from the start. The only application I can think of atm is against all the decks trying to aggressively cantrip into Treasure Cruise or try to deal with your board on spot-removal base. We however have already access to DRS/Ooze/WRP for those stuff *shrug*


P.S.: If you want to bait a more aggressive response, avoid constructive posts for at least 4 months and then come back a la "ZOMG! 4 Remora + 4 MBT + 4 Swan Song in the SB will make Elves unbeatable for combo! Muahahaha *JizzInPants*".




P.P.S.: misread your title as "Self-proclaimed Terrorist of Titania" XD

[Echelon]

It was an adequate one as you presented a valid line of thought to bridge your turn 2-4 with Remora to help drawing into MBT or Swan Song (if you keep that Tropical untapped to fool your opponent) and obviously thought of GSZ/DRS/Cradle to break the symmetry. At least I'm convinced you did xP

Haha, I'm glad you did.

P.P.S.: misread your title as "Self-proclaimed Terrorist of Titania" XD

I lol'd. Hard!

Edit: Fixed it for you

[Lemnear]

Groots!

[Echelon]

Thank you, thank you

[jim111589]

So whats the consensus on blue for swansong? Does it take discards place in the side board so its better to just run the pre-emptive plan? I'm still new to the deck so I'm wondering.

[Jo11ygrnreefer]

Swansong in elves? WTF! I would say no in general.

[Krasman]

Swansong in elves? WTF! I would say no in general.

I have fooled around with the blue splash of Swan Songs and Flusterstorm; it wasn't bad against combo decks, but there is more graveyard decks in my meta so I just run 3 copies of Faerie Macabre currently.

[jim111589]

s just to reactivly protect the combo. Just run 1trop and burchlores and we can protect NO and help agenst faster combo

[Echelon]

Swan song isn't that strange a card in the Elves! sideboard.

It's used mainly to improve the storm MU's, not so much to protect NO. That you do by baiting counters with Glimpse or your BFF engine until you are pretty sure it's safe to go off.

Admittedly, people have been running Gitaxian Probe to do a hard check to see if they can go for it or not. However disliked it may be here, you do have to admit that it works rather well with the Cabal Therapies we run in our SB. Ofcourse so does saccing a random creature to flashback the silly thing...

[Zombie]

Swan song isn't that strange a card in the Elves! sideboard.

It's used mainly to improve the storm MU's, not so much to protect NO. That you do by baiting counters with Glimpse or your BFF engine until you are pretty sure it's safe to go off.

Admittedly, people have been running Gitaxian Probe to do a hard check to see if they can go for it or not. However disliked it may be here, you do have to admit that it works rather well with the Cabal Therapies we run in our SB. Ofcourse so does saccing a random creature to flashback the silly thing...

I think I'd rather run hard discard maindeck than Probe. More SB space, better G1 vs. combo and the classic discard spell, kill you line are nice things if you ask me.

[Lemnear]

I think I'd rather run hard discard maindeck than Probe. More SB space, better G1 vs. combo and the classic discard spell, kill you line are nice things if you ask me.

That's for sure, but during a Glimpse chain, drawing a discard-spell is worse than drawing a Probe. The general Problem with MB discard in this deck is mainly that you want to spend your turns 1 & 2 of game 1 for developing your mana, rather than having to fetch a Bayou right in the face of Wasteland or looking at your Thoughtseize with Forests/Pendelhaven/Cradles in your starting grip.

[Zombie]

That's for sure, but during a Glimpse chain, drawing a discard-spell is worse than drawing a Probe. The general Problem with MB discard in this deck is mainly that you want to spend your turns 1 & 2 of game 1 for developing your mana, rather than having to fetch a Bayou right in the face of Wasteland or looking at your Thoughtseize with Forests/Pendelhaven/Cradles in your starting grip.

For sure.

One thing that just hit me is that with Delver decks turning to UR and their gameplay resembling Storm more and Storm gaining ground from lack of Spell Pierce and less discard. Thorn should start looking pretty rad again, maybe even against UR Swiftspear/Cruise decks?

[Lemnear]

For sure.

One thing that just hit me is that with Delver decks turning to UR and their gameplay resembling Storm more and Storm gaining ground from lack of Spell Pierce and less discard. Thorn should start looking pretty rad again, maybe even against UR Swiftspear/Cruise decks?

If you want to deal splash damage against TC and Storm, look at graveyard-hate to do that

[MD.Ghost]

If you want to deal splash damage against TC and Storm, look at graveyard-hate to do that

I vote for a 2nd Ooze as a Sideboard Choice, easy to cast, gains life (most of the time), prevents "Delve", grows out of Bolt/Red-Sweeper Range fairly easy.

I think against UR Delver he performes well enough, sadly UWR Delver also has Swords (and TNN, Equip etc.) and BUG has Decay for the little Slime - but overall i feel 1 MD Ooze and 1 SB Ooze a usefull choice in the current Meta.

[Julian23]

I've added a 2nd Ooze to the sideboard last week and have been pretty happy with it thus far. It's (almost) everything we're asking for against UR Delver. Given, almost every game it's too slow to prevent the 1st TC, but after that it blocks, gains life and prevents further TCs. Only thing it doesn't stop is Delver, which is an issue because the regular plan of "if you can't block them, race them" doesn't work out at all vs an army of 1/1s.

[Echelon]

Try a Dryad Militant as substitute for ScOoze number 2. You can GSZ for it for the same amount of mana it costs to normally cast ScOoze and as a kicker you do not have to invest mana into it to harm your opponents' plan, which to me is the biggest negative thing about Scavenging Ooze. With the Militant out, you can use your mana to keep developing your board state rather then to keep your opponents' graveyard in check. Combine it with a DRS to eat your opponents' lands and they'll have a hard time to cast their TC.

Sure, you can't grow it out of Bolt-range, but you can use it to slow down that first TC until it gets Bolted so you've had the time to get your ScOoze on the board.

[Julian23]

I'm not convinced. The biggest upside of Ooze is that it's just an overall very good card. It's great at blocking most of their stuff, gains life and helps stabilize the game. Dryad on the other hand does none of that. The moment you GSZ for Arbor, you're almost timewalking yourself as it just sits there, not attacking, not blocking. I think I'd rather develop my board for 1-2 more turns, then land Ooze and grow it out of Bolt range. But maybe I'm wrong, who knows?

[Echelon]

Ooze is great, but it's also rather slow. Also, a number of creatures have to die before you can grow it out of Bolt-range.

Looking at the other frequently played spotremoval, you have to admit the Ooze dies to Abrupt Decay and Swords to Plowshares the same as the Militant does, regardless of how big the Ooze might be at a given time.

Don't get me wrong, I'd never part with my one-off Ooze, but every now and again I want something with a bit more speed. It's fine with me that the Dryad just sits there staring into the abyss, since it's still doing it's job. Every turn it sits there is a turn I've had to improve my board on and on whilst hindering my opponent. See it as a mini 1 mana RiP with legs that you can GSZ. People never complain about RiP just sitting there. Ofcourse, RiP doesn't get Bolted or Plowed (1-up Ooze!) but still does die to Decay.

I do know the strength of the Ooze though. Somewhere I had a game where I couldn't get rid of my opponents' Chalice of the Void at X=1 and I just sat there casting my 1 mana elves, getting them countered and feeding them to my ever growing Ooze which my opponent couldn't StP because of his own Chalice. Needless to say Oozezilla won me that game as soon as my opponent ran out of creatures to throw in front of it and it's hungry... uhm... jaws..? Mandibles..? Good times!

I just feel that early game (T1/2) I'd rather have the Militant and that I'd rather go for Ooze on turns 3/4+. That's the main reason I'd choose to run the split rather then the 2 Oozes (Toozes?).

It is, as you often say, all about opportunities. When battling LED Dredge, for instance, Ooze is often too slow to prevent them from say Dread Returning Elesh Norn and just this one time you might not have drawn your DRS to exile that vile Cenobite or the Dread Return in time (damn you, summoning sickness). In this case, Militant might have saved us simply by sitting there, yelling "BOOOO Dread Return/Cabal Therapy/Faithless Looting". And that's what I like about it - it gives us more options then running Toozes over Militant + Ooze. But that's just me

[Zombie]

Ooze is great, but it's also rather slow. Also, a number of creatures have to die before you can grow it out of Bolt-range.

Looking at the other frequently played spotremoval, you have to admit the Ooze dies to Abrupt Decay and Swords to Plowshares the same as the Militant does, regardless of how big the Ooze might be at a given time.

Don't get me wrong, I'd never part with my one-off Ooze, but every now and again I want something with a bit more speed. It's fine with me that the Dryad just sits there staring into the abyss, since it's still doing it's job. Every turn it sits there is a turn I've had to improve my board on and on whilst hindering my opponent. See it as a mini 1 mana RiP with legs that you can GSZ. People never complain about RiP just sitting there. Ofcourse, RiP doesn't get Bolted or Plowed (1-up Ooze!) but still does die to Decay.

I do know the strength of the Ooze though. Somewhere I had a game where I couldn't get rid of my opponents' Chalice of the Void at X=1 and I just sat there casting my 1 mana elves, getting them countered and feeding them to my ever growing Ooze which my opponent couldn't StP because of his own Chalice. Needless to say Oozezilla won me that game as soon as my opponent ran out of creatures to throw in front of it and it's hungry... uhm... jaws..? Mandibles..? Good times!

I just feel that early game (T1/2) I'd rather have the Militant and that I'd rather go for Ooze on turns 3/4+. That's the main reason I'd choose to run the split rather then the 2 Oozes (Toozes?).

It is, as you often say, all about opportunities. When battling LED Dredge, for instance, Ooze is often too slow to prevent them from say Dread Returning Elesh Norn and just this one time you might not have drawn your DRS to exile that vile Cenobite or the Dread Return in time (damn you, summoning sickness). In this case, Militant might have saved us simply by sitting there, yelling "BOOOO Dread Return/Cabal Therapy/Faithless Looting". And that's what I like about it - it gives us more options then running Toozes over Militant + Ooze. But that's just me

GSZ=>Militant is too slow against LED Dredge. Here though I'd lean towards Crypt, Surgical or a second Ooze as GY hate. They're not as vulnerable to many removal like Gut Shot, sweepers etc and have broad applications against the stuff you expect to see - non-Dredge decks, primarily Storm and UR Delver.

If Dredge is a concern, I'd still rather play a Crypt or two. It's active from T1, the crucial period when DRS is helpless, doesn't die to Firestorm and can stop the whole dredging process cold before it bears fruit. Militant can hose DRS, but does nothing to Bridge+Dredgers and dies unceremoniously to Firestorm while being a relatively large mana investment. A simple Crypt on the board forces them to solve the Crypt while we can focus on building a board for a killing blow or go to town with DRS/Ooze.

[EluThingol]

I vote for a 2nd Ooze as a Sideboard Choice, easy to cast, gains life (most of the time), prevents "Delve", grows out of Bolt/Red-Sweeper Range fairly easy.

I think against UR Delver he performes well enough, sadly UWR Delver also has Swords (and TNN, Equip etc.) and BUG has Decay for the little Slime - but overall i feel 1 MD Ooze and 1 SB Ooze a usefull choice in the current Meta.

Ooze dies easily as others have pointed out, so the big drawback is having to wait until you can slam him and activate him for decent life gain and/or attack your opponent's GY. By that time, it's often either too late to impact the board or your board has been oppressed to the point that it's just hard to pull off for lack of adequate mana. Also, it's not all that great against Miracles if they're on DTT, since Terminus and Swords don't actually feed him at all.

Still, I've been tempted to add the second Ooze as well. For the moment I'm just running a Surgical as my extra SB hate, but it's not really adequate to the task. With Reanimator making such a surge lately, the pressure is on to find a serious answer for all the myriad GY shenanigans, and so far I haven't found anything I like a lot.