[Deck] Deadguy Ale (B/w Confidant)

[rsaunder]

E arly game I wanted edict, in almost all cases, but mid-late game, wretch was my weapon of choice, choking them off of thier final resource.

[SuckerPunch]

In Shugyoso's tournament write up I noticed that he played against a Pikula deck running Rack.

I was wondering if that option was tested at all.

I note that a ton of the games I play, I have my opponent at 0 cards in hand, mainly bc they're afraid holding back threats will cause them to lose them to hymn.

I also hate how the duress's and hymn and verdicts you draw mid game all become dead cards.

The Rack would serve as a recurring source of 3 damage most of the games I've played with this deck. It would basically be lightning bolt ever single turn for only one mana total. If my opponent holds back cards because of it, it would make my hymns, verdicts and duresses worthwhile again.

Do you think it's worthwhile?

4 funeral charm

I can name six cards that I personally think would be far stronger... Swords, Diabolic Edict, Engineered Plague, Contagion (you always have useless discard lategame in your hand and Contagion often takes out or neuters two creatures and really screws with all their combat calculations, if you're running two, the odds of drawing it off of Confidant are next to nil), Smother and The Rack.

[Drathro]

the U/G/w Gro decks I've been playtesting against have been tossing out creatures left and right from turn 2 on

I can honestly say I haven't played any Thresh with as high a threat density as you describe. That would make things much tougher.

Mongose is what this deck really has a hard time with. You need a shade to outpower it, otherwise you have exactly zero answers that don't involve having your sparse creatures 2-for-1'ed.

My experience (based on a build including Wretches) vs Thresh is that if you manage to draw their opening-hand removal/counter (usually with a Wretch), you have a chance to out-creature them with an active Confidant, but it's still a tricky situation. On the other hand, if the Wretch sticks, you have a good chance to break them early.

2nd and 3rd games, I always board in Dystopia, which makes things much more difficult for UGw Thresh. Against UGr Thresh, you have to save your LD for the red sources. Stupid Fledgling Dragon.

Oddly enough, I almost never end up attacking the graveyard games 2 & 3.

[rsaunder]

2nd and 3rd games, I always board in Dystopia, which makes things much more difficult for UGw Thresh. Against UGr Thresh, you have to save your LD for the red sources. Stupid Fledgling Dragon.

Dystopia is a really good answer, which I wish I had heard of in time for the draft. That being said, I have a playset now

@Suckerpunch: The exact same thing I said on starcity:
Did I say that they turned out to be the best choice? Swords, I've found out, doesn't handle your main problem which is mongose. The life gain also isn't something you want to be promoting, slowing your clock down further. Engineered plague is in no way stronger. With goblins declining in popularity, and combo getting more popular, it is obscenely frequently a dead card. Also, charm allows you to handle turn 1 lackey, something that this deck was utterly incapable of before. The reason I like, and chose to run charm, was the fact that it is always useful, in every situation. Plague is just far too narrow right now. Contagin is interesting, but why? It doesn't kill bear or touch mongose, it 2-for-2's goblins, assuming you have a card you're willing to pitch. And, as my problem always is with cards in this deck, it's useless against combo. Smother is a decent choice, although I'd run edict over it, hitting mongose and all. The rack is interesting, but my problem with it is that played early game, it essentially time walks your opponent. I'd much rather spend the early game disrupting, and have my kill conditions further disrupt him from recovering.

[DeathwingZERO]

I agree with The Rack not being needed for playtesting, even in my best games I'm not keeping the opponent's hand dead the entire time, it'd rarely hit up for damage enough to bother dropping it.

As for the Thresh decks I face against, they're all U/G/w, and are relatively close copies of the one Bardo has on here. It's got a minimum of 14 creatures, of which they see very regularly against me. The last time I played a few matches I'd seen 5 of his creatures by turn 6, and two of them were 'Goose, the other two Mages, and the last Enforcer.

As I said before, the problem this deck has with getting rid of their creatures ahead of time is your relying solely on Hymn and Verdicts, which is only 6 cards, and typically turn 2 casts (in fact Verdict is never faster than turn 2). Once they hit table, Mage names Vindicate, and it's typically GG for your removal. You either have to hope to find a Cursed Scroll and keep your hand size tight, or have Swords maindecked.

My question, why don't we attempt running Ostracize or Cabal Therapy in the board instead of removal post-drop? Adding them in gives us a 40% chance of getting them turn 1, and it's additional removal before the threats actually drop. I'm going to see if they actually do any good when I playtest more, I'm still thinking there's some slots not necessarily earning their keep in the board.

[SuckerPunch]

I keep my opponent out of cards most of the games I play. Esp if there's an active Confidant, they quickly realize that if they don't play their cards asap, they lose them.

Does anyone else have any input on The Rack?

Contagion I can attest is incredible (in my sui black deck). I run 4 copies of it there for the same reason I want to run 2 here. Because I always have a dead card in hand midgame, either a dead sinkhole, duress, hymn or dark ritual. Contagion by letting me throw away the dead card to take out two creatures/goblins is practically like 2 for 1ing.

I actually tested Engineered Plague in it's slot in Sui Black before settling on Contagion. I found it every bit the card that plague is against golbins, and unlike plague, it was free to cast and was awesome against any aggro deck, not just goblins.

The -2/-1 counters stay in play forever, so it makes angel stompy's 2/2s 0/1s permanently, or can make exalted angel a 0/3 essentially neutering the cards even it if doesn't kill them.Of course that deck ran more threats so combat was a lot more prevalent, and messing up combat calculations consistently won games, but I think 2 copies could work here very well.

The best part is, it supplements Shade since it has 1 power more and lower toughness so you can save it in combat situations more easily.

Revealing it with Confidant doesn't come up very often at all. I only recall it happening a few times with my Sui Black deck (though I am running a full playset), and I only recall it costing me one game out of close to a hundred.

I think it could work even better in Deadguy since you have Swords/Vindicate to deal with big creatures, so Contagion only has to deal with weenies, which is where it shines. Bluffing that you have a contagion usually works wonders too.

[rsaunder]

The more I think about it, the more contaigin seems like an underpowered funeral charm. The charm takes out weenies, and is somewhat lesser in that regard to contagin, but the problem I have with contagin is the problem I have with all removal spells I try in this deck: They're dead half of the time.

Perhaps as a 2-of, as the thought of utterly neutering an exhalted angel sounds awesome, but I'm not convinced.

[Phantom]

In what spot would you run the Rack?

The problem as I see it is that The Rack is no good by itself. It needs other cards to function. In more specific terms, it sucks against two out of the top three decks in the meta (Solidarity and Goblins) and completely goes against our Land Destruction strategy.

Basically, if we've stripped them of all the cards in their hand, we are either winning or losing on the board and The Rack is not going to change that (unlike some of the cards it might replace). Basically, it seems like a win more card in a deck that's packed with quality cards.

@ Contagion: We've already clashed on this card so I'll leave it alone lol, but I was curoius, were you going to run it in the Scroll spot?

@ Ostracize/Therapy in the board: I see no reason to run Ostracize in the board over Swords (except maybe to grab Mongoose, but that's a one drop). Therapy is a quality card, but I'm not crazy about it here because our threat count is so low.

[NANTUKO_SHADY]

... Cabal Therapy would definetely not be a good choice in this deck. Like Phantom said, our threat count is waay to low to even consider running Therapy. In addition, each one of our creatures is very crucial and powerful to the deck. I can almost see no situation when it would be worth the flashing back of Therapy in exchange for one of your creatures.

@ Ostracize, fun card, but it should see no play in this deck. I would much rather have STP in the board than Ostracize. Not to mention, this card is a socery so it cannot be manipulated as well as STP. Also, ok it may take out goose, but lets be realistic folks, our matchup against Threshold is pretty decent to begin with. No sense in running a sub-par card in order to hate a deck we are already capable of beating...

[f|i[p]]

Since people seem to think that the rack does not fit deadguy, has anyone ever tested Nezumi shortfang?

It adds to your threat count, provides instant discard and becomes the rack that beats down (3/3) mid to late game. I personally think nezumi shortfang would do alot better than the rack in the deck. Although I dont have copies of him yet, I do plan to get a couple and test him. I was just wondering if anyone has ever tested the rat?

[SuckerPunch]

That's a great suggestion. Shortfang is better. Instant speed discard rocks, and a 3/3 beating rack rocks as well. I'm confused about the wording, do you always have to pay atleast 1B to flip him, or does he automatically flip if your opponent has no cards in hand.

[Lego]

That's a great suggestion. Shortfang is better. Instant speed discard rocks, and a 3/3 beating rack rocks as well. I'm confused about the wording, do you always have to pay atleast 1B to flip him, or does he automatically flip if your opponent has no cards in hand.

The flip clause appears at the end of the ability, so whenever you use the ability, once it has resolved, it checks to see if your opponent has an empty hand. If he does, Shortfang flips. You will always have to use the ability for Shortfang to flip, but your opponent does not have to have a card in hand for you to use the ability. If you use it while your opponent has an empty hand, it will simply flip Shortfang.

I remember some friends trying Shortfang in here for a while, but he seemed to be far too mana intensive, and encouraged poor choices. He didn't put away any games that would not normally have been won, but often he ensured that your opponent would not come back from the early game barrage. In the end, he simply didn't seem to improve any matchups significantly.

[dre4m]

Shortfang is far too slow to warrant a slot in this deck, and this is capped off by the loss of his discard ability once he is flipped. If he stuck around as a constant "In your draw step I reduce your hand size to zero" creature, he would be better, but no.

[The Marco]

Shortfang is far too slow to warrant a slot in this deck, and this is capped off by the loss of his discard ability once he is flipped. If he stuck around as a constant "In your draw step I reduce your hand size to zero" creature, he would be better, but no.

I could'nt agree more,

The card seems interesting, but in tesing I found it to be less then satisfying. The card is decent until it becomes flipped, at which point I found it pretty useless (in most situations). Even before it becomes flipped it requires a lot of mana to use.

[DeathwingZERO]

In regards to Therapy, I would say it should very, very rarely to be something needing a flashback, as none of the other discard effects we have can do it anyways. My biggest argument for either Ostracize or Therapy in the board (in addition to StP, not in place of it, I'm actually consdering taking out E.Plague completely since we're only seeing maybe one gobbo player at most), is the fact that it ups our disruption, and in Therapy's case, has the opportunity to 2-1 in card advantage, and late game can be called back if absolutely necessary to get rid of a potential threat you happen to know the opponent has (re: Wish targets, etc). Plus, unlike Duress, it hits creatures, and if your going first, this is your only opportunity to take out the decks worst nightmare: Mongoose.

Just the idea of your opponent having yet another reason to show their hand early game seems to be a good enough reason for this deck, even if most of the time the first one is basically a "guess and check" sort of play. In the same regards, so is Duress in a lot of matchups, and I've seen plenty of games vs aggro decks such as Gro and Goblins that I wish I had Therapy first turn over Duress, just because I knew the possible threat wouldn't be handled by Duress.

Also, this is one of those disruption spells that's never considered a dead card (unless your capable of keeping your opponent at 0 cards for turns on end, which I've pulled off on an average of less than 1/3 of my matches), and in a lot of cases it'll be the silver bullet you were hoping for, being your choice for the discard, not your opponents. I just suggest maybe we take a look back to the card for what it does initially, as all discard spells we have do, and just forget it has flashback unless it seems worth the sacrifice.

I will playtest this one a few more times, 2 in MD and 2 in SB (in place of E.Plague), and give some results once I can get a friend or two meet up with me so we can playtest some top decks against it.

[Lego]

I know that Cabal Therapy has been tested with some success by a few in the Train Wreck board, and that deck has even less ability to flash it back then you do here. Personally in Deadguy I wouldn't flashback Cabal Therapy unless I would lose the game if I didn't, or win the game if I did, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't play it. It's great against Solidarity, possibly providing that little extra punch that you need to win that matchup, and can come in for Duress against random aggro if you've got nothing else useful to board.

My main problem with it is that it can whiff completely very easily. Duress almost always hits something, and Hymn and Vindicate always do. Ignoring the flashback, Cabal Therapy is a disruption spell that can potentially do no disrupting. That doesn't take it out of contention for me, it just means that it has to supliment the other disruption, and can't take the place of any of it.

I've never tested it in Deadguy, but in several other decks, one of which I also never payed the flashback, I found that often times there would only be one key threat I needed an opponent not to have, and Therapy took care of that. In the past I didn't feel like more hand disruption was needed in Deadguy's board, but with the shift in the meta it seems like Therapy can justify a spot in the board more and more.

[dre4m]

Counting the spectres, B/w has a total of twelve discard spells, maybe fourteen, if you still play Verdicts, which is very adequate in any matchup in which you want discard. Adding more discard in the form of therapy, especially in the Scroll slot, would be a huge mistake. I would always prefer the recurring source of damage than a dead late-game discard engine. I believe we need to keep the threat density up rather than pack in yet more discard.

[NANTUKO_SHADY]

Counting the spectres, B/w has a total of twelve discard spells, maybe fourteen, if you still play Verdicts, which is very adequate in any matchup in which you want discard. Adding more discard in the form of therapy, especially in the Scroll slot, would be a huge mistake. I would always prefer the recurring source of damage than a dead late-game discard engine. I believe we need to keep the threat density up rather than pack in yet more discard.

QFT. This deck has enough discard spells in it, and adding more would just result in you drawing them late game when they are not relevant. I played this deck for a few months and I ran 14 discard spells including the Verdicts... and almost every hand I had discard on turns 1 and/or 2. I don't see the logic in adding more discard into an already tight build. If anything, add more threats, as a low number of threats was always the issue for me.

[The Marco]

QFT. This deck has enough discard spells in it, and adding more would just result in you drawing them late game when they are not relevant. I played this deck for a few months and I ran 14 discard spells including the Verdicts... and almost every hand I had discard on turns 1 and/or 2. I don't see the logic in adding more discard into an already tight build. If anything, add more threats, as a low number of threats was always the issue for me.

Completely agree, the deck runs enough discard to destroy most hands, I have not played the deck much, but the main issue has always been the lack of threats. Most of the deck creatures can be easily dealt with.

[rsaunder]

As for the lack of threats bit, I've been trying out these changes to the deck (from my list) :
-4 charm
-1 shade
+3 wretch
+2 jitte

And I've also been considering cutting 1 jitte for either another wretch or another shade.

This works very well, as wretch has single handedly been able to hose a few decks I've tested against, such as tog and golden grahms. It also helped an abysmal landsill and loam confinement matchup.