Im just gonna throw this out there cause its kinda random and I havent tested this deck yet. Anyway, I was going throw a pile of cards today and found a Granite Gargoyle. I had totally forgotten about that card. Its 2R, it evades, and its a pretty good blocker if you have the mana. Just another card to consider.
Oh and please change Bloodrock Cyclops to Hulking Ogre. Its slightly better.
EDIT: Theres also this dude out of TSP:
Coal Stoker 3R
Creature-Elemental
3/3
Card text: When Coal Stoker comes into play, if you played it from your hand, add RRR to your mana pool.
When I played Black Stompy I used Priest of Gix as a mana fixer and equipment carrier. I imagine this guy could do the same if you can fit him in the curve. In a perfect world its a 3/3 for 1 mana plus RRR in your pool.
Last edited by xsockmonkeyx; 10-05-2006 at 11:23 PM. Reason: jeez typed the wrong freaking word
info.ninja
Even if I don't like Cyclopses, this statement is just not true. Strictly would be something like Mogg Fanatic to Mon's Goblin Raiders.Originally Posted by xsockmonkeyx
But this is not true here. For example Hulking Ogre cannot block Lackey.
Good point, I never thought about it like that.
info.ninja
You know, Mons Goblin Raiders are superior to Fanatic if you are at one life and they Mindslaver you. Just going to say it, there is almost never a card strictly better. But Hulking Orge is better in this deck.
[3. LocalDefense]: English is under attack!
I don't understand this. If you start to discuss weird scenarios you can justify running Shock over Lightning Bolt or play Fetchlands that come into play tapped.
Of course Mogg Fanatic is strictly superior to Mons Goblin Raiders. In any realistic scenario.
And the ability to block a Lackey is a realistic advantage. Furthermore this deck is good at killing blockers. I never said which card is better, I just said that no card is strictly superior here.
This is exactly why we run Cyclops over Hulking Ogre. Blocking the first turn is a much bigger plus to this deck than being forced to attack subsequent turns is a minus.
@Tao: I'll go -1 Squee, +1 FtK if it'll make you happy. I still think you'd be suprised at the usefulness of a hardcasted Squee in this deck.
@Lancer: I ignored the suggestion because I rejected a better card (Bushido>Flanking) and I thought that would make my answer clear. Sorry. I would never intentionally ignore someone who took the time to respond.
Yeah, I just wanted to say that. The ability to not die to Werebear, which is kinda everywhere, and to avoid running into, say, a Factory, in my area, is more important than making sure I have a lackey blocker for the first turn that I play it.
[3. LocalDefense]: English is under attack!
I've been thinking about this too. There is pretty much no reason to run Razormane Masticore and Squee above Arc-Slogger. Even if RM didn't have the discard every turn drawback, I still think that AS would be better in this format.
KIDS WITH GUNS!
You're on crack. You sacrifice Fanatic to dome them before they gain control of your turn.
The probability of your opponent having Ivory Mask down, you being at 1 life, them getting Mindslaver off on you, and there being no legal targets besides you (you've played Steely Resolve naming Goblins and there's no non-Goblins in play?? Big WTF?!) is neglible. Besides, you should know your match-ups and be planning ahead such that when you see Ivory Mask dropped you should be sacrificing Fanatic in response.
Sorry, Mogg Fanatic is in fact better in every way than Mons's Goblin Raiders in every deck, against every deck when not in the hands of a complete tool.
You could actually target Fanatic with itself.
KIDS WITH GUNS!
Yeah, but not if he mindslavers you in his turn, you're on 1, and you (under his control) draw a Fanatic.But anyway, we're drifting of..
Coal Stoaker is an good option.
It was kinda a joke.... I'm just messing with people, since there was one time, when I had tapped out to Flame Rift a guy with Fanatic in hand and he did the whole rip TKF into Slaver, Welder, kill me. But yes, if you can't get it, it is a joke about how people rate things "strictly" better.
Coal Stroker is a 4 Drop, and can suck since the deck would be missing a three drop then. It would be "ok" if we had more things at CMC 3, but with SOF&I... and Squee right now, I don't like it.
[3. LocalDefense]: English is under attack!
Lies! You totally ignored the Ember Beast suggestion.
Lol, sillyness aside. I proxied up the list and test it with Ember Beast in the spot replacing the Cyclops. The result is quite mixed. First turn Ember Beast is horrible, people who can deal with the second creature that I cast basically turns Beast into a useless permenent, can't swing, can't block, really frustrating.
However, the times that he does start swinging or blocking with friends, (usually blocking with a newly casted Core or another Ember buddy.) He can block Mongoose all day long and put up a decent fight.
Overall, I'm still not sold on what those 4 slots should be, so here is another suggestions:
Going with what you said above, I don't want to cut the Squee for the FTK, so +1 FTK, which leaves 3 slots, for those 3 slots, +2 Avatar of Discord, and then to compensate, add the 4th Squee in the last slot.
I haven't had the time to test the above configuration at the time I'm typing this, so I don't know how viable it is. But Avatar greatly increases your clock, (being a flier and all) and can trade with Exalted in an air fight. Running 2 should not impose any super card disadvantage, especially with the addition of the 4th Squee.
Then again, the Avatar bit is purely theoratical. My test result with Ember Beast is quite mixed, if anyone else have favourable results with the Beast, please let me know, may be I'm doing something wrong.
PS.
If possible, I like to see some Lightening Greaves in here, haste makes this deck | | this much better.
PPS.
On a purely random note, has anyone tried Browbeat in place of the Cyclops? LOL.
Nothing witty to say.
When I was testing this, I ran 4 char in place of the rolling earthquake with some decent success. Targeted removal is something missing in this deck i think (sans razormane) and I believe it helped in a lot of situations.
I don't think Avatar of Discord is a good option. It's triple red, and with the current manabase (4 Tombs, 4 City's), that's rather meh..
I seriously think more direct damage / spot removal is the answer here. Kill of the Goblins, Mage's and treshed Bears! Or just finish your opponent off.
Have you guys considered Brimstone Dragon or are you guys looking for something cheap?
Cathodion FTW
Sorry lol. I gotta say that I don't like Ember Beast at all. We run way too few creatures to rely on 2 living and I don't like the idea of our first creature drop having to wait 2 more turns to attack.
Well, we also run 4 FtKs for that sort of thing. When I was testing, I never really had too much of a problem with needing targeted removal. I always liked the devastating nature of Rolling Earthquake against Zoo, Fish, Goblin, and even Thresh decks. Char's a quality card though.
Agreed.
Way out of our curve. Tops out at five and that spot's pretty full as is.
Not a bad thought, but I think if I were going to go with an artifact creature in the slot, Chimeric Idol is still the frontrunner.Cathodion FTW
Speaking of, I have a crazy week, but the next chance I get I'm going to do some hardcore testing with the Cyclops/Idol and Razorman/Slogger spot in mind. I'll try to keep some tight notes too.
Last edited by Phantom; 10-09-2006 at 12:09 AM.
I built a deck witht he same idea in mind (I've only read the first couple of posts) and I did something like this: (Not competetive, although I bet it could be somewhat)
Lands (22):
4x Sandstone Needle
4x Ancient Tomb
4x Great Furnace
10x Mountain
Creatures (24):
4x Dragon-Speaker Shaman
4x Lightning Dragon
4x Covetous Dragon
4x Rakdos Pit Dragon
4x Two-Headed Dragon
Artifacts (6):
4x Lightning Greaves - Used to be Worn Powerstone, then I realized I had enough accel and not enough useful stuff.
4x Talisman of Impulse - Probably should replace with Chrome Mox.
Other (10):
4x Incinerate
4x Earthquake
2x Seething Song - Maybe more?
Gets nice openings, usually wipping out a turn 3-4 Two-Headed/Covetous Dragon.
So I finally got to do some testing vs Bardo's Thresh list. Last time, I went 60/40 with them which had disagreed with what Tacosnape had found. This time I went 17-3! Unreal. I kept some notes on the first ten games (all pre-board) and kept a careful eye on the Cyclops/Idol and Razorman/Slogger spots.
Game 1: If you get down a double Pillar and Thresh isn't winning, they're in trouble. If you can then get an active Jitte, even better (note - A lot of times vs Thresh you will only get one swing in with a Jitte before it gets needled. It sucks, but the four point lifegain can be huge with Quake/Pillar/Tomb).
Game 2: Double Striking Pit Dragon does 12, then throws a Jitte on...
Game 3: Too many creatures vs. a slow Threshold draw. Killed two bears and a goose pre Thresh with a Quake.
Game 4: Razormane with Pillar backup is nice.
Game 5: A little mana screw, but Quake followed by Pillar, followed by Cyclops does it.
Game 6: Razormane first turn. Jitte second.
Game 7: Chalice @1 meets FoW. Next turn, Chalice @1.
Game 8: Mystic Enforcer flys over my two FtKs. Gah, a LOSS!
Game 9: Chalice @1 turn 1.
Game 10: Late game Chalice with 2 Ftk's to answer 2 Bears.
The other 10 games were played post board and I was playing Thresh so I don't have notes. Here are my notes on the debated slots:
Game one: Cyclops > Idol because he was holding a Needle and could have slowed me down till he hit Thresh. Instead, he had to start digging for answers.
Game three: Razormane > Slogger b/c two Mongooses back to block.
Game four: Cycloops slightly better than Idol b/c I attacked multiple turns with Jitte and would have had to tie up my mana to re-equip it.
Game four: Razormane >>> Slogger because I didn't have RR.
Game six: Slogger > Razormane because I drew 2 Razormanes. Note that Razormane did go on to win the game.
Game nine: Cyclops > Idol because it pitched to mox allowing me to pay the daze backup.
Note that Cyclops so called "drawback" came into play a whopping 0 times. I never once attacked into a Threshed Goose or Bear. Also, I never once killed my own Cyclops with a Quake (the other benefit of Idol is to dodge quakes). I did kill my own Dragon once, but that was after I attacked and the quake killed both his bears and brought his life down to one with a Pillar out leaving him one out in the deck (Enforcer).
The Razormane/Slogger battle was a tad closer and still deserves some more testing.
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