I remember one guy who went top 8 in a pro tour once with a uw blade list, and I've always wanted to try it. How is your match ups against the mentioned decks?Originally Posted by wasabizod
Has 21 lands been enough for you? I'm not sure I like 5 TNN/Geist, would probably cut at least one. Also there should really be a Karakas somewhere. Otherwise this looks similar to what I'm sporting atm.
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I think 2 TNN is enough for the UW list. 4 TNN is just too much and I think Geist is not necessary any longer.
Maybe you can add a second Clique.
21/22 lands are fine but as mentioned there really should be a karaks, 2-3 mishra's factory and a moorland haunt
There actually was an undefeated day 1 deck of GP Kyoto that ran 4 TNN. They're terrible in combo but in fair matchups the card is bonkers. In all honesty I can't condone UW all that much. Even just a light splash (like 1 Usea and 1 Scrubby) of black for better EEs and thoughtseizes makes a world of difference. Otherwise you're kind of making sub optimal choices.
What do you guys think of E tutor? I'm currently of the opinion that it's not worth the card disadvantage.
Thanks everyone for the feedback so far. The lack of Karakas and any black cards are mostly financial at this point, so I realize I'm starting with a bit of a sub-par list. That said, really appreciated all the feedback - I hadn't thought of Wasteland (though I use it in Merfolk), Moorland Haunt, or Factory. Seems like swapping Geist for any of those is a good idea, and I may drop down to 3 TNN, but I've rarely been sad to draw one.
Also going to swap SoFaF for SoFaI.
Elspeth has definitely been helpful, especially if I need to buff SFM and swing with both a mystic and TNN (which has happened a few times).
In terms of matchups:
- Sneak and Show has been pretty good - I often have countermagic or more creatures when they go off and can close the deal.
- Merfolk depends on whether or not they land a chalice and if I have any equipment for TNN. SoFaI on SFM even seems like a reasonable thing against Merfolk.
- Painter has been good for the most part, except when they turn 2 kill me.
- Elves has been okay, though I have only played a few matches against one elves player, so I have a bit of an edge knowing what to keep.
- Death and Taxes feels like a good matchup because my creatures are usually better, though I did have one player with Thalia and 3 Wingmares on the board, which really mucked things up. Supreme Verdict sat in my hand just being sad.
If I could pick up an Underground Sea or two (I have a Scrubland), I'd probably swap some things out for 3 Thoughtseize and Engineered Explosives.
Toxic Deluge is good against both elves and DnT.
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Hey, y'all! I'm a Tezzeret player considering a transition to Esper Stoneblade. I was wondering if you guys would mind providing some input on a list I'm working on that plays Thopter combo, seeing as Stoneforge Mystic can fetch up Sword of the Meek. No testing yet, just a preliminary idea:
3 Underground Sea
2 Tundra
1 Scrubland
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Plains
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
1 Marsh Flats
1 Karakas
1 Academy Ruins
1 Seat of the Synod
1 Liliana of the Veil
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
2 Baleful Strix
1 Snapcaster Mage
4 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Vendilion Clique
1 True-Name Nemesis
4 Brainstorm
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Thoughtseize
2 Spell Pierce
1 Counterspell
1 Lingering Souls
4 Force of Will
3 Thopter Foundry
1 Sword of the Meek
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Batterskull
No sideboard yet, but it would consist of the typical suite of Meddling Mages, Containment Priests, Ethersworn Canonists, Supreme Verdict, Flusterstorm, Rest in Peace (and I'd board out the combo), probably a Misdirection in a new, BUG-y meta, etc.
My main fear is that there isn't enough fat to wear equipment, though Baleful Strix ain't a terrible candidate. I'm banking on Thopter Foundry combo doing the work that multiple copies of Lingering Souls would do. And if Foundry's bad in a game 1, I can always pitch it to Force of Will.
Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas might be too cute, as there aren't many artifacts in this list. Maybe it should just become a second Jace, the Mind Sculptor, but I can see scenarios where +1ing Tezz to find a combo piece would be better than Jace-storming (5 cards > 3). It can also make 5/5s and drain life when Thopters are online. Not sure what's best, though.
Any input is greatly appreciated.
Thanks!
@ theMonster, from my experiences in esper, I have to say that the tezz, AoB is far too inconsistent with only 9 real artifacts to grab. Just giving a quick calculation based on a 40 card deck, and 7 targets, tezz's +1 will whiff about 46% of the time. It's really not a good feeling when you land a 4cc walker and proceed to +1 to absolutely no avail. If you want the thopter combo in here, I'd suggest a singleton of the big tezz and probably 1 bridge to find with him.
I don't like the particular numbers of fow, tseize, spell pierce and cspells in the deck, but that's more personal preference than anything else. However, I'd say that a cjudgment and at least 1 ee should probably find its way somewhere into your 75 (i personally love them md) to deal with the counterbalances that will ruin your day now that you're not just jamming tezz's/jaces.
I've tried this idea and it's *really* slow and oddly enough quite weak to D&T IME. It's better to jam 3/2 thoper sword or even higher if you want to reliably hit it. Natural thopter sword with no accel looks like:
T2 : Foundry
T3 : Sword + token
this gives you immediate return on your cards spent; although you're still behind a card or so for a turn. Mystic looks like:
T2 : Foundry
T3 : Mystic
T4 : Sword + Tokens
or worse:
T3 : Mystic
T3 : Sword + Foundry
(in any combination of those sets of 2-drops.
So you go from having tokens on T3 to having tokens T4 or T5. Most games are decided by that point; stretching your mediocre combo time even farther out. I don't mind having mystic as a backup, but it'd probably now be:
3+ Foundry
2+ Meek
~2 mystic
Jitte
0-1 other equip
and even then; my guess is that just landing foundry + meek is better than trying to be cute with mystic. I tried it at ~4 locals and while the combo is awesome; mystic + that is too low impact and slow to want to really do.
Further, you *need* to have maindeck hate against D&T if going this route; as Revoker + SoFaI + other obnoxious keeps you from effectively executing. For whatever reason I also had terrible luck with miracles in tournies but had great luck with them in practice.
If going this route I'd focus on E-Tutor and Baleful Strix and just forget about mystic. Running a Bridge, EE, Canonist, etc.. with Tutor and the combo should give you pretty immense control over a variety of major players in the format and having something goofy that kills artifacts in the main (and lots of them) would be good. I lost several games against D&T with the combo + Tezz simply because the game took so long to assemble that theyd' have SoFai and batterskull.
I think I'd go with something like:
-15-
3 Enlightened Tutor
4 Swords to Plowshares
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
-11-
1 Crucible of Worlds
1 Chalice of the Void
1+ Engineered Explosives
1 Engineered Plague
2 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Ensnaring Bridge
4 Phyrexian Revoker
x Dark Blast
-8-
3 Thopter Foundry
2 Sword of the Meek
3 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
17 real lands
4 wasteland
X Mishra's factory?
Thanks for all the feedback, guys. Yeah, I guess Stoneforge Mystic + Sword of the Meek is sweeter on paper than in practice. I'm not married to Thopter combo in a Blade shell at all, but the Enlightened Tutor idea looks like it would have game against most decks. But it seems like there are more powerful options for Blade than going with thopters, so perhaps I'll save my Foundries for when I play my Tezz shell.
Since I'm relatively unfamiliar with the nuances of piloting Blade, do we like True-Name Nemesis or Lingering Souls or both right now? And are any people playing more control-ish shells with Little Jace and Venser? Any room for our own CounterTop combo?
Thanks for educating me!
Shane Remelt's list from the recent Legacy IQ is super clean. I sleeved it up (figuratively, because magic online), and it just feels so busted:
2 Snapcaster Mage
4 Stoneforge Mystic
3 True-Name Nemesis
2 Vendilion Clique
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Batterskull
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
4 Brainstorm
1 Counterspell
4 Force of Will
2 Lightning Bolt
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Spell Pierce
1 Spell Snare
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Council's Judgment
1 Ponder
3 Island
1 Mountain
2 Plains
2 Arid Mesa
4 Flooded Strand
2 Mishra's Factory
3 Scalding Tarn
3 Tundra
2 Volcanic Island
1 Karakas
Sideboard:
1 Pithing Needle
1 Containment Priest
1 Izzet Staticaster
3 Meddling Mage
2 Rest in Peace
1 Flusterstorm
2 Red Elemental Blast
2 Wear
1 Venser, Shaper Savant
1 Supreme Verdict
This looks really nice. How have the Mishra's Factories been?
A gift for the original Legacy players! Been away from these forums for a while, but the eight pages of debate that came up during my "ban top" tirade brought me back in. This is the most recent, tested Legacy esper stoneblade deck I have. This is the list I'll be battling with in these next few Elite IQs coming up if I don't day two the main events.
Creatures (9)
2 Snapcaster Mage
2 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
4 Stoneforge Mystic
1 Vendilion Clique
Planeswalkers (3)
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Lands (22)
2 Island
1 Plains
1 Swamp
4 Flooded Strand
1 Marsh Flats
4 Polluted Delta
1 Scrubland
3 Tundra
3 Underground Sea
1 Karakas
1 Creeping Tar-pit
Spells (26)
1 Batterskull
1 Engineered Explosives
4 Brainstorm
1 Counterspell
3 Force of Will
1 Intuition
4 Swords to Plowshares
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Council's Judgment
3 Lingering Souls
1 Ponder
1 Supreme Verdict
4 Thoughtseize
Sideboard
2 Containment Priest
1 Notion Thief
1 Blue Elemental Blast
1 Disenchant
1 Force of Will
2 Spell Pierce
2 Rest in Peace
1 Cabal Therapy
2 Perish
1 Telemin's Performance
1 Nahiri, the Lithomancer
Shaheen Soorani
9th at Worlds 2006
How's the MUD matchup for your list, Shaheen?
Also kind of surprised you're not going to be battling at GP: Seattle...
I almost decided to just go for it, but while booking other GP visits I read it was capped. There goes that!
I love my MUD matchup. It really boils down to if they resole a Chalice for one and if so it gets real ugly. Otherwise I have been historically very successful against them.
Shaheen Soorani
9th at Worlds 2006
Your Esper list looks good now that Dig is banned since Jeskai was so good for Red blasts to counter Dig.
Do you run into a legend problem with both Jace Vryn's Prodigy and Jace the Mindsculptor in the deck?
Has Telemin's Performance helped the lands match up that much to be worth the slot? Seems like it would be difficult to cast though Wastelands and Ports. Has any lands player boarded in Phage so when you Telemin's Performance them you lose the game?
Sorry to be getting back so late, the factories have really over-performed for me. I am very happy with manlands in general with so much miracles in the format.
It's not as inconsistent as all that, the trick is to use Sensei's Divining Top with the Agent of Bolas in a build of that nature. You spin the top, tap to grab whatever the best card was, then +1 the walker to get the Top back and the chaff on the bottom of the deck. Replay the top, and there's a fresh 3 on top waiting for you.
I'm not saying there aren't better cards to play or stronger things to be doing, but a deck running Top, the usual cantrips, and some equipment actually has plenty of work for a 1-of Tezzeret to do.
Alright, so I am putting Esper Stoneblade together again. What do you guys think of this list?
Creature (10)
4x Stoneforge Mystic
4x Snapcaster Mage
2x Vendilion Clique
Sorcery (5)
4x Thoughtseize
1x Council's Judgment
Instant (16)
4x Brainstorm
4x Force of Will
4x Spell Pierce
4x Swords to Plowshares
Artifact (3)
1x Batterskull
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Umezawa's Jitte
Planeswalker (3)
3x Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Land (23)
1x Creeping Tar Pit
4x Flooded Strand
2x Island
1x Karakas
2x Marsh Flats
1x Plains
4x Polluted Delta
1x Scrubland
1x Swamp
3x Tundra
3x Underground Sea
Sideboard (15)
2x Containment Priest
1x Disenchant
1x Duress
2x Flusterstorm
1x Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2x Meddling Mage
1x Path to Exile
1x Pithing Needle
1x Surgical Extraction
1x Vendilion Clique
2x Zealous Persecution
I still play the UWR version and i have add 1x Engineered Explosives maindeck leaving a Lightning Bolt.
Before this change i play 3x Bolt, now only 2x Bolt + 4x Swords to Plowshares + 1x Supreme Verdict + 1x Council's Judgment maindeck).
Now my sideboard is:
1 Engineered Explosives (and 1 maindeck)
1 Nahiri, the Lithomancer
2 Blood Moon
2 Rest in Peace
1 Vendilion Clique (and 2 maindeck)
2 Containment Piest
2 Wear Tear
2 Flusterstorm
2 Red Elemental Blast
I Have a question about the 2nd Engineered Explosives.
I don't know if:
- it's ok the 2nd in side for chalice.deck
- change it for add 1 Supreme Verdict (i play 1 maindeck)
- change it for add other (Sugical Extraction for Punishing Fire, Telemin Performance for combo or other trick)
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