Hi Guys,
I just bought all cards for Reanimator and I can't wait till I start playing it properly. Despite all the hate cards, this deck is still strong and a lot of fun.
2 questions however:
1) what is good about grave titan? Should I include it in the MD?
2) Why do I always see Tidespout Tyrant over ashen rider MD? I think Ashen Rider is somewhat better since it REMOVES the problematic permanent IMMIDIATELY, whereas with Tidespout you need spells which you might not have atm + you reanimate Tidespout and are probably tapped out, and the problematic permanent is still in play.
Give me your insight please.
Grave titan is popular becase it is the fastest clock the deck can produce and is good against edicts. I don't play it in my 75, but others swear by it, only way to find out if you like it is to play it yourself.
As far as Tidespout vs. Rider. If you land tidespout early, without using too many resources, rather than getting rid of one permanent, which may or may not win the game (usually not) you get to get rid of all permanents. He is also much, MUCH more powerful after a Griselbrand D7. Also, if you are using animate dead, tidespout has built in protection from removal as long as you have instants. Most of the Non-Griselbrand creatures in reanimator are not there to win all games on their own, they are bullets that help in specific matchups. For example, Elesh is good against Dredge and Elves, but AWFUL against Miracles. Tidespout is great against anyone trying to play fair, but pretty abysmal against combo. Iona crushes burn and some combo, but is less good against DnT, Maverick, etc. Part of the reason Griselbrand is so good, aside from the obvious, is that he allows you to have a big, starting body, and then go find the bullets that are good in the matchup in following turns while providing counter backup.
Hope this helps!
Thank for the info. I will try both tyrant and titan.
I don't understand this, however :
Originally Posted by Stryfo
He means that you can play a brainstorm in response to a swords to the tyrant, to trigger tyrant's hability and return the animate dead to your hand so the tyrant will go to your graveyard (and you'll be able to animate it again next turn).
Oh yes, I also figured that out right after my post :)
A nice trick.
Also guys, do think Sire of Insanity should be somewhere in the 75? If reanimate it turn 1/2 it should be an out win I guess. What are your thoughts?
hello everyone. i got 9th place at the portland open last weekend. if you want to watch me get massacred on camera then share the URL here because i cannot find it. i am here to dispense some KNOWLEDGE of questionable merit.
you are correct, when the opponent has a chains of mephistopheles you can not only draw a card and bin your fatty but also set up your next two steps and even shuffle, and those are things that hapless researcher cannot do. ponder isn't that great in the deck, but i would still play 3-4 in addition to 4 hapless.
to answer a question above, when i played with petals i lost to counterspells and mulled a lot and couldn't put creatures in my graveyard. so i switched them to researchers? here's the thing, g1 isn't as good as everyone says, so i think 4 griselbrand 1 iona 1 norn 1 sphinx is best in my meta, for example -- no screwing around with horrible inkwell leviathan or tidespout to "gain g1 equity against D&T" or whatever. but this also means g2 and g3 are far better than expected, so there's no need to be too afraid of hate -- the plan of going under with petals is overreacting.
i don't get the point of grave titan when it can't beat a plow and a batterskull, a flipped delver, etc.
sire of insanity is bad
ashen rider does nothing
aetherling is probably bad because containment priest means we can't do it vs. stoneforge decks, dunno if i want it for just 1 matchup where i just get a griselbrand anyway because they never pressure my life
md duress is interesting, empyrial archangel as well. can someone describe where angel or duress would be good?
does anyone else get griselbrand like 90% of the time?
Empyrial Archangel trumps both Sphinx and Inkwell in damage prevention/evasion. Being able to soak up damage, block fliers while staying untouched by Swords, Jace, etc is huge whereas Sphinx (and Sire of Insanity) fails this test.
Ashen Rider is a silver bullet, it lets you deal with permanents like Esnaring Bridge, it gives you an option to not just lose against anything random. Better than Tidespout Tyrant in my opinion because it does not require anything else to remove stuff and it actually exiles. So those 2, Griselbrand and Iona make up the top 4 creatures for me.
I usually use Empyrial Archangel in Miracles or decks packing white where I'm expecting swords/targeted removal and if I manage to bin it in burn. I don't MD duress I prefer just my three thoughtseizes. Maybe I'm an outlier I do not bin for Griselbrand most of the time, I'll get Griselbrand/Elesh Norn depending on my life totals during a delver matchup. Delver especially UR cannot compete with that card quality anyway.
Aetherling is the only threat in the deck that can actually kill a miracles player after turn 4, that is why it is important. If your argument is that it cannot beat a stuck containment priest in play, well guess what? If they have a priest in play we are DEAD anyway. Duress was just good for the projected meta of the gp that week, and while i am still playing it, i don't know if it is necessary atm. Very good v ur delver and other matchups where you are out counter magic'd, and you only need a one turn window to resolve a spell/dodge rip/counterbalance etc. Anyway, i only bring in archangel against burn, ur delver, and D&T. Its important there because it is very difficult to race, cannot be swords'd, and is Karakas-proof.
Congrats on the finish, and can you please explain to me why hapless researcher is playable?
Thanks, Jake.
Had to respond to a couple things. Ponder is amazing in this deck, I have set up so many turn twos finding the second part of the combo, so I finally found room to up my count to 4.
Tidesprout is a MD card. It pitches to force, can on super rare occasion be hard cast, owns DnT, owns SnT and Emrakul decks, owns Lands and dark depths decks, basically is really good when it is good. It is only really not good against plow decks when you have no instants in hand. Even bouncing a couple lands by brainstorming and maybe dropping a petal can usually buy the time to win.
Ashen Rider is good and deserves a SB slot. I used to not play it, but recently put it back in my SB and have been very impressed, it has won me quite a few games against karakas and Emrakul decks.
Aetherling, I need to try. Miracles is hard but Iona on white has gotten me there most of the time.
Empyrial archangel is also very good as a last ditch effort in lightning bolt matches. You can reanimate here where you could usually not risk going to such low life.
Went 3-1 again yesterday with my list, I think Reanimator is in a great position in this meta. And People dropping RIP for containment priest is great for us.
Last edited by cogitoergosum; 12-11-2014 at 08:40 PM.
is hapless good? sure, if we should be playing 4 or more careful studies.
you can get miracles with a draw 7-14, and since a lot of them aren't playing karakas (or just 1) i'm pretty sure this is the right plan. you'll have needles in for top anyway
sometimes other decks will draw containment priest after we've stuck our fatty. which is better, the one that doesn't win the game in that situation or all of the other ones
archangel is sweet think im gonna try it friday
above post makes a good case for the tyrant, though i cannot hardcast it
the whole "can't beat a containment priest" mindset is, i think, costing this thread a lot of equity in postboard games
i made a bunch of errors on my camera match, im not sure if i should keep the 6 game 1 and game 2 had i boarded into Sphinx of the Steel Wind i could have raced with ease. i'm not sure if i'm supposed to have sphinx against maverick, but, eh, why not. make them have the plow. seems way better than inkwell
i'm wondering if the cases where jin is better than griselbrand are rare enough that he belongs nowhere. jin is pretty good postboard if they've taken out their plows
I just happened to hard cast Tidesprout once and it felt amazing :) but yeah it doesn't really happen.
On Jin, he is also likely GG against storm, which is worth considering. I know it is a pretty good matchup for us, but it can also be really swingy.
Edit: But I'm pretty confident that griselbrand is just better.
Edit: Also, Blazing Archon is still a creature I consider in the SB. It stops dredge, stops TES/ storm on the empty plan, stops emrakul, stops dark depths, stops elves/ tribal, dodges karakas, and pairs well as a 2nd target to finish out griselbrand games.
The Hapless Researcher versus Careful Study debate comes up a lot, and most people's instinct leads them to believe the extra draw + discard is more important. Researcher has a lot of upsides that get ignored, like chump blocking, conserving mana, and being a looter that can rise from the grave. I'm just saying Researcher isn't solely Studies #5-8 since we play with our own life totals like a kid with a lighter.
Aetherling matching up poorly with Containment Priest is relevant, but I'd love to hear of any better silver bullets for Miracles since the matchup postboard can be pretty tough. Iona loses to Karakas and Jace, and I'm shocked to learn that not all builds run Karakas (Griselbrand was printed awhile ago and Wasteland isn't that prevalent right now). Inkwell loses to Terminus. I think Aetherling is the best we've got, just board in Massacre if you need more removal for the Priest.
And I'll echo the sentiment earlier about Priest: people dropping RIP is a good thing for us! Priest lets us prep our graveyard while digging for removal, so let's show those delve players just how many cards you can draw on T2 using the graveyard.
Regarding Hapless, I think he is better in meta with more DRS, i.e. Bug and Jund decks. I'm not sure if he is worth the slots currently, just my opinion.
Also, couldn't stinkweed imp be potentially better in this slot because it serves as a discard outlet, and is not susceptible to blasts? When I tested hapless it was most often to pitch a fatty in hand, not trying to find one. But I guess it doesn't pitch to FOW.
Ah you mean Putrid Imp. I haven't played him but he's certainly an option. Seems worse against removal; Mr Hapless can just fall off a tall bookshelf and he won't go farming. I don't worry about blue count or blast effects with combo pieces.
Am I an idiot if I consider splashing a Tundra in my manabase for Serenity?
Abrupt decay is much better than serenity for us imo. Also, engineered explosives seems better.
Im also wondering, for those or you packing sb counterspells, what matches do you like to side them in?
I only have a single flusterstorm. So I bring them in decks I'd expect a counterwar like RUG Delver, Miracles, and other blue decks. I also board it in against storm, which helped once since my opponent did a diminishing returns but it resulted in me getting flusterstorm in my hand allowing me to counter his fatal tendrils.
I thought about serenity because it nabs black leylines, all the artifact hate at once, and against matches with tons of hate like MUD or Stax it demolishes their entire board.
About counterspells, I pack FoWs and Dazes maindeck, sideboard flusterstorm is always nice against Belcher, Spanish Inquisition, T.E.S., ANT, and quick combo-decks. They are very handy, never left my SB.
I think Therapy is just strait out better then Hapless Researcher...Sure you get to see that one extra card but I'd rather be
destroying someone's hand and still have the ability to pitch a Grisel to my yard with it. Not to mention the insane synergy with Ashen Rider.
UR Dreadstill creator and BRx WGD Combo Pioneer
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