I'm hearing an echo in here.Originally Posted by FANAttIC
More generally, some guy I know once said:
Whether Standstill is useful depends mostly on the game state when you cast it, pretty much regardless of the MU. Standstill does not in fact make things still. Instead, it's a way for the dominant player to extend either the duration of their lead, or extend the magnitude of their lead (by drawing 3), or both.
Chalice is also somewhat dependent on game state, but the point is that a Merfolk deck can be built and played in such a way that it matters less to it than to most other decks.
Neither a topdecked Chalice nor topdecked Standstill will by itself be a threat that can win the game, but a Chalice is likely to be effective disruption against many Legacy decks regardless of when it's drawn, whereas a Standstill must always be carefully timed lest it backfire and give the opponent a +4 card swing (+3 for them, -1 for you).
It's not hard to think of situations where a Chalice would be a blank, but I imagine it's much easier to find situations where Standstill should not be played: start with whenever Merfolk is behind.
Most people blindly suggest new cards for decks. True contributors also suggest what to remove. It's not about what's good, but rather what's better than the current selections.
Cards that matter in the Miracles Matchup:
That Chalice stops:
Swords to Plowshares
Red Elemental Blast (Mostly post-board)
Sensei's Divining Top (that hasn't been cast yet)
That Chalice does not stop:
Terminus
Jace, The Mindsculptor
Entreat the Angels
Council's Judgement
Force of Will
Counterbalance
That Spell Pierce stops:
All of the Above
It's not a question of Chalice vs. Standstill. It's a question of Chalice vs. Standstill, Spell Pierce, Wasteland and 1-mana cards from the sideboard like Envelop and Pithing Needle. Chalice of the Void has a very high opportunity cost, meaning that there are a bunch of 1-mana cards that you can't play because you want to play Chalice, and most of the 1-mana spells are pretty good in Legacy. And on top of that it's slow and vulnerable to soft counters. Chalice does nothing against a resolved Top, which is most of the time given that Top costs 1 and Chalice costs 2. Similarly, tapping out on turn 2 to play a Chalice on 1 is hit-or-miss against combo decks, and I'd much, MUCH rather have Spell Pierce and Wasteland against the format. Spell Pierce costs half as much and can even hit spells that don't cost 1! I'd rather spend my two mana doing literally anything else against Miracles than casting Chalice of the Void. Casting guys, casting Aether Vial, casting Standstill, activating Mutavault, leaving up Spell Pierce. Even using Wasteland. Literally anything. Pithing Needle is better by far against Top than Chalice of the Void. And as a bonus Wasteland even cuts off Red Blasts from Miracles. The synergy! But as I said, it's all silly, given that my Miracles matchup is so good that I actively try to avoid cards in my sideboard that are good there because there's basically nothing in my deck that I want to take out.
Your statistics are....interesting? but mean nothing since you just kind of made them up on the spot. The average goldfish for me is presenting lethal turn 4-5 with Daze, Spell Pierce and Wasteland up and throughout, which I'm guessing is comparable to yours (except without Spell Pierce available). The average actual game for me goes about 5-8 turns, and Spell Pierce and Daze are generally live throughout. Most decks want to cast multiple cards in one turn once they have the lands to, so Spell Pierce and Daze will still often trade with something, even in situations where they have six or seven lands. They even pitch to Force of Will when they're actually dead, unlike Chalice. The fact is that traditional Merfolk (which is what I play) can go quick or late depending on what is required, and having access to Standstill lets me keep the opponent out of the game long enough to win. It's good when you're ahead on board or on an empty board, with Vial, with Mutavault, even with just the threat of drawing Mutavault. It's been a very, very long time since I've had a Standstill sitting in my hand all game long and never cast it, and I have never, repeat NEVER, over thousands of games and 2+ years, had to break it myself. I almost never find myself playing from behind with this deck, probably because what this deck is designed to do is play a bunch of creatures which tends to put you ahead, and when I am behind on board it's never for long since the threat-density of Merfolk is much, much better than a Delver deck or something like that. If they drop an early Delver or Tarmogoyf, it's pretty easy to play two or three Lords and then drop a Standstill. Suddenly I can Islandwalk over their guy and they can't attack into mine. Or if they do I win the race. It's so rare that I really can't even imagine a situation where I'd be behind, given that Goblins doesn't exist anymore.
Seriously, do you guys find yourself playing from behind throughout a game with Merfolk often? I can't remember the last time I've been behind all game.
I can appreciate it if you think that Chalice is just the bee's knees in Merfolk. But please do not talk to me about what my deck does when you do not play it. It's really just kind of embarrassing.
Embarrassing? Ok, I'll play.
Miracles decks that expect a lot of blue in the meta run maindeck blasts. Regardless, I'd expect to finish more postboard games than preboard games. In other words, I expect to see more 2-1 and 1-2 results than 1-0-1 and 0-1-1 results (with 2-0 and 0-2 results being a wash between preboard and postboard).
If you're successfully Spell Piercing a Miracles player's Terminus, I imagine they've made a pretty grave mis-play. Honest question though: has this ever happened, and under what circumstances? Did they cast another spell like Jace that tied up their mana, then attempted to Terminus with under 3 total available mana?
He actually kind of knows what he's talking about, despite him being so embarrassing.
http://boardgames.stackexchange.com/...ur-opening-han
http://www.kibble.net/magic/magic10.php
Most people blindly suggest new cards for decks. True contributors also suggest what to remove. It's not about what's good, but rather what's better than the current selections.
The 40% isn't inaccurate, but the idea that you have to go turn 1 Aether Vial into turn 2 Standstill for the cards to work well together is silly. When you give yourself many more drawsteps (and silvergill cards) the probabilities go up.
If he's expecting to tell me how fast my deck is when he doesn't play it, then yes, that is embarrassing. And yes, I have successfully Spell Pierced his Terminus. Usually after I cast Force of Will and he fought back. Or when I had a Cursecatcher and a Daze up as well. It happens, and it's good.
Two cents, but all of the Legacy pros here in Japan have regularly (I am friends with one) say that if they were running Miracles, they fear chalices. Stopping brainstorm, reb and stp is, apparently huge, especially when they are trying to stack the top of their deck to manipulate a miracle.
I don't want to nitpick here, but Jace, Fow and counterbalance are really non-factors in the matchup (many of them are boarded out for sure).
Chalice is good against miracles. Better than spell pierce, better than wasteland, maybe even better than standstill. It makes them play without cantrips and point removal. And if you think pierce is better against storm than chalice, you really need to test this matchup - daze and pierce are mosty irrevelant in this mu, unless you have fast hand with multiple lords and vial (in this case you have like 1 counter)
Still less experienced with Merfolk than y'all but...
I love the Wasteland & Mutavault in the board... but gosh slots are so contested.
Same boat. Clique is fantastic in this deck in so many ways. I like running 21 lands anyway and this clique build enjoys the 21st.
Thanks, I'll keep that Factory idea in mind. But where I'm at with my list the 26th creature is Sygg. love that lil guy.
I want it because of its broad application. It is definitely not a card you have to make your game better against miracles, but really it still does plenty in that match-up.
That is definitely the power of Standstill against control decks: the ability to extend your build without playing into a wrath. And it's practically irreplaceable, definitely not by other creatures.
Second this opinion and has been my experience as well as my friend.
Chalice stops Brainstorm which puts Terminus back or allows instant speed casting of it, don't leave it out on purpose.
And Jace, Force and Counterbalance are not important in the matchup. If you managed to Spell Pierce a Terminus that says a lot about your opponent.
I am playing Wasteland.
Pierce also has high opportunity cost, you need to leave blue mana open which is not easy if you are also developing board and playing lands that can't cast it like Cavern, Wasteland, Mutavault (Factory?).
I Bolded your sentence which is why I am playing Chalice.
Tapping out against combo decks for Chalice is like playing two or more Pierces in advance. That thing will negate a couple of cards in hand (and possibly 50% of all the cards in his library) for sure. Storm deck that won is playing 27 one mana spells in his main, while second place Delver has 28.
You mention Pithing Needle is better than Chalice. You play that in the main? If not, I am also packing Needle in my side.
Not my statistics, didn't made those up. Inform yourself before insulting people.
You played thousands of games with this deck over 2+ years? Unless you have MTGO or counting kitchen table magic, this is complete lie.
I am playing merfolk since Silvergill Adept got printed (7-8 years) and I am not close to those made up numbers.
If you are almost never behind with your deck that means your metagame has no capable Elves player. I envy your meta.
I qualified for my first Worlds playing merfolk with:
4 Ancestral Visions
4 Silvergill Adept
3 Sages Dousing
4 Cryptic Command
I am aware what grinding merfolk build or card advantage can do.
I also played Standstill build, that card can't compare to Chalice's bee'e knees level.
I don't have infinite time to quote everything but first you are calling "my" numbers and thoughts as "interesting", silly and embarrassing, then you get links which prove those numbers, so your response is that they are not inaccurate?
...I'm starting to remember why I don't post on here anymore.
Your statement that we're ~40% to start with at least one Aether Vial or Standstill in the opening hand (Assuming 4 of each in a 60 card deck and a 7 card opening hand) is not inaccurate. The actual probability of drawing between 1 and 4 of a 4-of in a 7 card hand of a 60 card deck is .3995 by the Hypergeometric distribution. That part is correct. What you do not understand, or perhaps are choosing to ignore to further your point, is that it's neither necessary nor really all that important to have both an Aether Vial and a Standstill in the opening hand to get the most out of it. I play 4 and 3, respectively, because that reflects the optimal order of drawing them. I'd rather slam a Vial turn 1 then develop the board (with Wasteland, with Spell Pierce and Daze, with a Silvergill Adept or something) over the next few turns and draw a Standstill eventually, maybe playing it turn 4 or 5 to seal the game. Standstill isn't only good in the opening hand. It's good any game where you have an active Vial or a strong board in general. That makes it very flexible and virtually never dead when the entire point of this deck is to develop a dominant board position and coast to victory. All that means that, if you're not counting on drawing both Standstill and Aether Vial in the opening hand, the probability of drawing them both over the course of a 5-8 turn game are much, much better than you're giving credit. In practice, I find I draw both of them a bit more than half the time, and draw one or the other close to every game. I can actually compute those numbers if you'd like.
Tapping out for a Chalice on 1 against a blue-based combo deck (Omnitell is the most popular one now) means you probably just lost the game when they slam a Show and Tell. It's good against Storm, average to poor against Show and Tell variants, and too slow for Belcher and Oops, All Spells. Does nothing against Dredge, decent against Reanimator but also pretty slow in most games. Does nothing against Aluren or Food Chain, sometimes effective against Painter/Grindstone depending on what they've already gotten on the board. Destroys Elves. I think those are the combo decks. That's what the term "hit-or-miss" means. I'd rather have Spell Pierce against the field because it means I never have to tap out if I don't want to. If you think it's difficult to keep a blue open for Spell Pierce while you're trying to develop the board (another strong point for Aether Vial), I'm not sure why you think it's fine to take an entire turn off to play an artifact that may crush them or may do basically nothing.
I have played thousands of games over the last 2+ years against Miracles. I've beaten it dozens of times in tournament play. You guys don't test?
Last edited by benthetenor; 05-19-2015 at 05:46 PM. Reason: fixed probability
I thought that the printing of Deathrite Shaman and Delver took a little luster from Standstill, as such strong early drops made the race for early board position a bit more difficult to have Standstill be as good as it once was. But if you feel you can outrace them drawing 3 cards is nice. Also drawing into a Force or Daze or Pierce with a Standstill to counter the spell that broke it is weakened a bit when it is an Abrupt Decay that breaks it, unlike the old days but again, drawing three cards is always nice. I do like how you are keeping with the tempo roots of the deck. Has Standstill been of much use against DnT if they drop an early Vial themselves? Chalice is a bit mediocre in that matchup too if it doesn't catch the early vial.
To be honest, I hope you continue to post. It's useful for people to present and defend different takes on running a deck, even if the majority seems to disagree with them. Stagnation is what happens when everyone just agrees with the status quo. Hopefully we can keep things focused on the cards and not play "who's the noob" and similar games.
To bring this back around, I don't think anyone's saying that Merfstill builds are actively bad, either against Miracles or against the larger meta. I'm not discounting the success you've seen with more counter-heavy Standstill builds. I certainly think that Chalice builds can be better, both against Miracles and against the larger meta, but that's just me.
While I don't get a lot of opportunities to play Merfolk, Fanattic claims to have tried both Standstill builds and Chalice builds, which led him to prefer the latter. Have you done similar objective testing of these different strategies, with results pointing you back to Standstill? Magic is heavily influenced by a pilot's playstyle so I'm not too surprised. If that's the case, then by all means both strategies should be developed to see which finds more success. Variety and multiple paths of evolution are good for a deck archetype, and avoids the stagnation that leads to irrelevance.
Most people blindly suggest new cards for decks. True contributors also suggest what to remove. It's not about what's good, but rather what's better than the current selections.
On the surface it would seem that what you're saying is true, but in practice I've found that Standstill is actually a pretty good trump for Deathrite Shaman, assuming it comes down early enough. Deathrite Shaman is at it's best when you're churning through cards and filling graveyards, and the play patterns that a Standstill tends to produce are really not what a Deathrite Shaman likes to see. Similarly, Delver that flips can be an issue, but as I think I've said here before, if the board were Vial vs. Delver, I'd slam the Standstill in a heartbeat because in most situations an active Vial can race even a Delver that flips on turn 2. The real issues with Standstill is, as you've pointed out, when the opponent has a Vial as well, which is something that's actually much less likely than it was even two or three years ago when Goblins was actually a deck. As for DnT, I pretty aggressively counter their Vials since, Standstill aside, if they are using their mana to cast their creatures then they can't use it for Rishidan Ports and Wastelands. Much like Merfolk and Goblins, DnT looks a lot less impressive when it doesn't have active Vial. But for that matchup, the plan is to contain Aether Vial and Mother of Runes, at which point they're just a bad white weenie deck that can't beat an army of 4/4s. But I can see Chalice being pretty bad there too, given that they're going to either cast Mom or Vial on turn 1, at which point you're in trouble.
Not really sure why we have a pissing contest everytime we have the chalice vs standstill debate. Both are good, it just depends on your playstyle.
Disclaimer in advance, i'm someone who plays a standstill merfolk list. I'm honestly curious though what matchups are you actually suring up with chalice where you aren't getting the same effect with standstill? Ideally lists with either card should do good against anything play blue and non-blue decks can still be a problem.
And there are also the versions that have neither Chalice nor Standstill that still get good results as well.
@benthetenor I see what you mean about DRS now. I suppose he is not as much a threat as Delver under a Standstill.
@ Capt. The backbone of Legacy remains 1cc spells. That is why Mental Misstep was banned so quickly. Merfolk are OK with Chalice because there are no good 1cc Merfolk besides the sometimes Mediocre Cursecatcher. The problem is our key card Vial is 1cc so you are hoping to drop it soon as usual.
Elves, Storm, tempo versions of Delver.
I'm surprised to see so much frustration towards the miracles match up. I've always felt EXTREMELY favored game 1. We're quick and have counter backup. Chalice stops their protection and digging.
“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle".
- Albert Einstein
This in indicative to me that you don't really understand how to use a Standstill, or that you're trying to just jam it whenever you have two mana available. If that is your plan, it's pretty clear why you like Chalice of the Void better. But when you are playing Lords for the first few turns, each of those decks can only win by continuing to play spells, which is exactly what Standstill prevents.
Elves: Play a few guys, counter their early "big spell" (usually Natural Order) and then drop a Standstill. Their army of 1/1s can't stand up to even a Lord and a Cursecatcher, let alone a Mutavault or a second Lord. They will be forced to break the Standstill as your guys start to Abyss them out of the game. This deck is especially weak to Force of Will, making Standstill a strong card for rebuying the card advantage lost. Postboard Submerges make Standstill even stronger, and cards like Envelop and Jitte all contribute. A black or red splash (which is my current preference) also helps here if you're worried about Elves in particular.
Storm: Drop a moderate clock (4-5 power) and a Standstill. Build a hand of Counterspells and use Wasteland to keep them off of Red mana. Each turn they face the decision of trying to go off against Spell Pierce and Daze or waiting a turn and losing a chunk of life closing the Ad Nauseam door, which is usually risky past turn three and useless past turn 4. Postboard graveyard hate and additional counterspells creates a lock. Standstill here punishes them for trying to win the game, draws additional counterspells or blue cards to pitch to Force of Will, and ensures that if they do not beat you when they break it, they will lose to the extra creatures you've drawn.
Delver decks (RUG in particular, I'm guessing): Force of Will Delver of Secrets, drop guys and Aether Vial and Standstill. This is a pure race, which you win with active Vial under a Standstill or with a few creatures with a Lord under a Standstill. You will draw more creatures than them (because you have almost twice as many) and their removal becomes useless at a certain point. You have a stronger mid-game and inevitability in the matchup, so simply survive to turn five or so and it becomes very difficult to lose. Standstill helps you use Force of Will aggressively and gives you more insurance against Lightning Bolt and REB. Once again, Submerge post-board makes this matchup a cakewalk and further solidifies Standstill.
Each of those decks can be beaten with a Standstill build, and each are not worse than a coinflip without Chalice of the Void depending on how you build your sideboard. The issue I have with Chalice is not that it is a bad card, it is that you take a deck that has dozens of close matchups across the board due to having lots of flexible spells and the ability to change gears on the fly, and turn it into a deck that has a few close matchups but many that are either 70/30 or 30/70 and can pretty much only jam creatures and Chalice of the Void and hope it's good enough. You gain points against Elves, Storm and Delver strategies. You lose points against big-blue combo decks and midrange decks. You still beat some of the decks you're supposed to (Miracles and Deathblade) but you start losing more to Abrupt Decay decks, both with and without Blue. Your theoretical win percentage against the field may be similar to a Spell Pierce-based list (depending entirely on what metagame shows up to the tournament), but you are introducing lots of variance by having cards that are either 9s or 4s depending on the matchup, which means you both have to draw that card against those decks and also actually play against those decks to have a good tournament. Merfolk with Standstill and Spell Pierce is a deck that is 40/60 against a few decks, a coinflip against a pretty large number of decks, and a heavy favorite against the top tier (basically anything with Islands). Merfolk with Chalice gives up a lot of those coinflips to polarize those matchups and improve some of the weaker ones, but then loses some percentage points against decks with Islands in them. You may not harm your numbers against the field, but by giving up percentage points against the top tier and against "random" decks, you hurt your conversion rate and damage your ability to actually win the tournament. The numbers back that up:
Since January 1, 2013 (also basically the birth of Deathrite Shaman, though the date is arbitrary), there have been only 5 decks with both Silvergill Adept and Chalice of the Void to top 8 a major American Legacy tournament (IQ or better), all of them between May and September of 2014, as compared to 27 total Merfolk decks over that time. Only 1 of those 5 had Chalice of the Void in the maindeck. None of them made it past the first round of the Top 8. In the same sample, Merfolk with Standstills got 10 top 4s, with 5 finals appearances and 1 win. Standstill Merfolk made the Finals as often as Chalice Merfolk made the top 8 in this sample.
My point is not really the sheer numbers, but rather that since Merfolk went from being a "Standstill deck" to a "Chalice deck", it hasn't won a tournament in America, and hasn't even come particularly close. It has throughout this sample size been right about as successful throughout (using the DTBF numbers from 2013-present, it's always on the list, never higher than #13), so it's roughly as popular then as now. There are three possible reasons that I can see for not winning tournaments: 1) the top-tier metagame has shifted violently against Merfolk, 2) the average player playing Merfolk is worse now, and 3) Chalice makes the deck worse at winning against the best decks, and therefore worse in general. Option 1 seems really, really unlikely, given that the top tier in 2013 involved Jund and Maverick and Miracles was often an afterthought. If anything the top tier metagame has only gotten more Merfolk-friendly as the combo decks have pushed out the valuetrain midrange decks and the blue control decks have in turn feasted on the less resilient combo. Option 2 is possible, but basically since Mental Misstep was banned Merfolk was never a "deck to beat" so there's no logical basis to conclude that option 2 is true. If anything, there's some evidence to suggest that if fewer people are picking up the deck, the average skill level of a player playing Merfolk is probably higher than it was in 2013. That really only leaves option 3, unless you can come up with some other reason why Merfolk suddenly can't make it to the Finals of a major tournament.
First and the most important - you assume you have time to be "playing Lords for the first few turns", while keeping blue mana open and/or using daze. Very often, you're limited by both available mana and available blue mana. And both Elves and Storm can win on turn three easily. If you drop Standstill on turn 5 let's be honest - you should have won by now. And if Standstill was another lord in this scenario, you'd have won.
Standstill is never really bad in any matchup (well, except dredge), because drawing 3 cards is never bad and in most matchup there will be board situations when you can drop it. But against Elves only good scenario is Standstill into FoW - everything else is avarage or bad. In fact, giving them time is often not really good here, even if it costs them life. Almost every card they draw is relevant, while you will be drawing much more lands and creatures (useless, because you can't cast them) than counterspells (and daze/pierce are bit weaker than usually in this situation).
Against Storm it's much better but again - you drop it and hope you draw something relevant. With Chalice of the Void they need to find answer without using cantrips and can't really win until they do. With Standstill, they can and will try to win - and you can always draw lands and creatures of it. And Storm can often break Standstill EoT with brainstorm and win next turn, using all land drops you gave them to cast discard.
Against RUG, I wouldn't ever side in Standstills, and might side out them acually. We're favored here and Standstill might be dead card if they drop delver turn one or very risky later (they are situations where you can't be sure you can protect your lords with standstill on stack, so you might find yourself in situation where Standstill is dead if you don't want to risk having to break it yourself).
There are matchups where Standstill is better card usually - Show and Tell or BUG for example - but you're bit favored in them anyway. I'd never say Elves are coinflip. For me, it's literally worst MU possible and even with CotV isn't really 50%.
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