Testing her 100% when she comes out. Being able to deal with Miracles (which in part is almost good enough for me), filter for Welder with a draw, and you can tutor your combo pieces, seems good enough in theory.
I agree that playing games with Nahiri makes sense but I'll be surprised if she ends up being better than Daretti.
This card fits perfectly into the deck, but is all just a bit too lack luster. I'd rather have a card like a red Krosan grip that cycles than this thing.
Considering this is the first card for the deck printed in a while, it's worth at least one slot from first glance alone. No matter how good orbad she would be in any given game state, she's easily castable and at every turn does something that puts us ahead. She's card advantage for sure.
The abilities is right, but they're all just mediocre. Don't feel she's powerful enough for main and can't see any MUs where I'd side her besides miracles. That being said, a new walker against miracles wouldn't hurt, miss casting Koth.
Might be terribly wrong of course, this card's hard to evaluate.. guess we all have to test her out lots.
Really wish that tapped artifact clause wasn't there. Would be nice to have against chalice decks. I just can't imagine ulting, tick up three times for a free Recruiter. Eh? I think it's more likely to be ticked up every time. And an occasional minor downtick.
If she just exiled artifacts, she would be a powerful card. tapped artifacts means that you will never exile any artifact, and god knows how important would be killing chalice of the void, jitte and so on. As it stands it is a decent card but i doubt she will be very good.
I went to GPDC for some side events and ended up only playing in the Saturday morning Legacy Challenge (didn't get a team together to play in the main event). I was told there were 91 people in the side event event though you only play 4 rounds (at most) It was the first legacy I had played in about 6 months so I thought it would be a good warm up. I played a slightly unconventional deck list (See below) and went 3-0-1. My match-ups were kind of weird so I don't know how much or little I'd read into it.
List:
[4x] Imperial Recruiter
[4x] Painter's Servant
[4x] Simian Spirit Guide
[1x] Manic Vandal
[2x] Phyrexian Revoker
[1x] Goblin Welder
[1x] Spellskite
[1x] Magus of the Moon
[1x] Jaya Ballard, Task Mage
[4x] Grindstone
[2x] Ensnaring Bridge
[3x] Sensei's Divining Top
[4x] Blood Moon
[4x] Pyroblast
[3x] Red Elemental Blast
[8x] Mountain
[4x] Ancient Tomb
[4x] City of Traitors
[3x] Arid Mesa
[3x] Wasteland
//Sideboard
[3x] Pyrokinesis
[4x] Thorn of Amethyst
[2x] Grafdigger's Cage
[2x] Ensnaring Bridge
[1x] Scab-Clan Berserker
[1x] Viashino Heretic
[1x] Ratchet Bomb
[1x] Phyrexian Revoker
Matchups
U/R Delver: 2-0
Game 1: was a bit of a grind fest but I was able to resolve a painters servant and top and find red blasts to remove his early creatures, then I attempted to race with Magus of the Moon. He lost when he cast price of progress which put him and I both at 2... so I attacked in and killed him... Oops.
Game 2: Pyrokinesis does what Pyrokinesis does and kills his early Storm Chaser Mage. He had a keep with a lot of ponders but very few threats, where he had to use his Dazes proactively against me, instead of protecting his threats. I also waste landed him setting him back some. I stick a painter, and a top and eventually top into the 3rd grindstone (The first two got countered) which he couldn't stop.
Tezzerater (w/ Tangle Wire?): 2-0
This deck seemed like a brew and wasn't much of a challenge. It seems like we can go for the kill much faster.
Game 1: This game took a while because of Tangle Wire I got to use a wasteland again, and ground him out of game one after countering his transmute artifact.
Game 2: This game was much of the same, he played a Lodestone Golem into play but it was much to late... Also tangle wire doesn't do a whole bunch against us since we can combo in the upkeep. [Side note, is Tangle Wire a card that has ever been evaluated for this deck, I mean if we slow some game plans down it makes our chances of winning much better... random though...]
Aggro Loam: 2-0
Game 1: I didn't get an early blood moon, but I stuck a early game painter's servant that he didn't deal with, and a mid game Blood Moon + Magus of the Moon. I managed to blast away his mox diamond, and then when he thought he had me at lethal I was able to REB one of his two 4/4 Knight of the Reliquaries, allowing me to chump the other with Magus of the Moon and then go off on my turn with Grindstone.
Game 2: This was more lopsided in the game because I stuck an turn 2 Blood Moon after his Lomed once and had just a basic forest. He never really recovered and I actually just ended up going the beat down route since I never saw a Grindstone. He did cast punishing fire on my Painter's Servant (with no way to recur due to blood moon)... which was funny... and well makes me question the skill of my competition...
Then I intentionally drew match 4, because the prize differential didn't really make it worth playing. Also it was time to eat food.
I'm not 100% sold on Wastelands yet, but I did actually like having access to more lands. Sometimes I feel like we are flying a little to close to the sun, and while Wasteland is mostly a spell it does a good job being a mountain or a colorless source some of the time.
Pyrokinesis was of course great. Main deck Manic Vandal did his job for me... I'm not sure if the sideboard really needs a second creature that deals with artifacts.. (I was thinking about playing Gorilla Shaman, but it seems a little to cute even though he's a boss at dealing with Chalice of the Void). I honestly didn't have to sideboard that heavy all day, with most of my substitutions being Pyrokinesis, Heretic (vs Tezzerater) and ensnaring bridge (vs aggro loam)
Thoughts on Nahiri, the Harbinger.
Interesting, not sure if she's good enough, but she's interesting, she does things we want to do, but seems a little too slow at doing them. If she had been 3 mana, she would be a no-brainier.
So I've been trying out a lot of different things online these days. I have been 5-0ing a bunch in league but I can't really tell if the success is because of the changes or just because the deck is good anyways, but there are a few notable things I have taken away from jamming a bunch of games:
A) Vexing Shusher has to go. I haven't been bringing it in against eldrazi because it is too slow, meaning it is only there for miracles and even then it is only pulling a little bit of weight before terminus cleans him up. I feel like there are better options that help more.
B) The new walker is definitely worth testing. It sort of molds like a Daretti, with the one exception that its ultimate is actually game ending as you just grab the combo piece you are missing through chalice/balance. Downside is obviously that it has white in it meaning blood moon could interfere. That probably isn't a large enough reason to not try playing it.
C) with the thought of trying Nahiri/walkers again, it obviously facilitates a defensive style game. That made me think of just playing a more bomby style build where you just spam bridges and then hide while dropping walkers. This helps with the miracles plan since i noticed I was running into issues of just not really doing anything even though i had a very favorable board state. This stemmed from running only shusher and another jaya as the additional help, whereas before we had koths to jam down.
D) building upon the last point, I am going to cut down to a maximum 4 removal spells (not going to tell anyone which ones exactly to run as I feel like its a playstyle and comfort choice) but with the chop down, it frees up another idea I know others have tried (mainly rampart and seth) of playing some copies of sulfur elemental. It acts as pseudo pyrokinesis vs death and taxes (one of the main matchups I was playing pyro for) while also acting as another good thing against miracles. So with those two dudes holding down mentors, I think I am going to run two koths again (or nahiris if they prove worth it) instead of shusher and the second jaya.
E) I am actually sort of intrigued by the wasteland idea. I do like its ability to sort of protect your combo turn or blood moons proactively. Mike I know you had a good tournament, but I think there are some inherent design flaws with the list you ran that I plan on addressing and testing out and hopefully strengthen the initial idea. For starters, the great furnace doesn't need to be in there with only 1 welder and the extra lands. The main appeal of running it is that it is tutorable when in dire need for more lands since Shortcake stretches the limits with only 19. If we want 3 welders, perhaps the furnace can be run but even then I'm not sure it is even necessary with the extra mana. I think that can be chopped to fit in wastes. Also the karakas just adds to variance since there is no way to reliably find it when you actually want it. That can become another waste. Goblin Settler may want to find its way in as well just to augment the LD plan over the spellskite or something. Lastly, with the extra colorless maybe warping wails could be an option.
I don't have set in stone lists for classic Shortcake or what I want to try with 'Wastecake' (dumb name but I kind of like it haha) but I am certainly excited to lay the deck out and shore up what have been slight problem areas. I can post again when I have a better idea. I am already pretty sure in my head that the classic list will end up better for larger events, but the latter is certainly from left field and can take some people by surprise when metagaming smaller tournaments.
Just some random thoughts I've been having. If it helps anyone great, if not, oh well then.
Strawberry Shortcake
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...erry-Shortcake
What a brainstorm do? Draw card and activate on draw effects fix hand, removing woods
#FreeNedleeds
wasteland？it can't change bad mu，but it makes deck unstable.Originally Posted by GundamGuy
I want to try Wasteland but I also have the deck foiled and don't want to have to get foil wastelands #FirstWorldProblems
Guys, read Hollywood's report before discussing the wastelands!
Exactly my thoughts. Shusher always feels powerful when thinking about it but only rarely helps when acutally playing it.
I also like your ideas B&C and will test it.
So far I have always dismissed sulfur due to it not being a recruiter target, but when comparing it to pyrokinesis it obviously has its merits! Damn, that comparison was helpful for my thought process!
In what way does Wasteland make the deck unstable? Non-basic lands are ubiquitous in Legacy, and sometimes an opponent having a non-basic Mountain isn't always lights out. In fact, I'd argue Wasteland destabilizes an opponent's mana base more than ours, more often. It augments the preexisting strategy of crippling an opponent's resources. We're playing with Ancient Tombs, City of Traitors, Simian Spirit Guides and Lotus Petals, so it's not like we can't follow a Wasteland up with a second main phase Blood Moon to knock them off Daze or Spell Pierce mana.wasteland？it can't change bad mu，but it makes deck unstable.
Wasteland changes the dynamic of how turn progression and mana retention is played in the deck, but it's still a land. Since almost 35-40% of the deck is colorless anyhow and few if any cards have a RR or WW requirement, I fail to see how Wasteland providing mana when it's needed creates instability to a degree where you're unable to cast anything. Wastelands and Blasts together are unsung, punishing greedy keeps with single cantrips.
What you said.
I also want to point out two things.
1) You should never run Wasteland in place of lands. Like if your plan is to play 19 lands with Wastelands, stop, that won't work in this deck, we aren't a variant of Delver with Ponders, Brainstorms and Limited Mana Requirements.
2) Playing Wastelands as spells means you are still playing more lands then usual. I tapped a few Wastelands for mana, and to blow up a land or two. I'm not sure how 22 lands makes the deck less stable then 19?
I totally had a small sample size, so given that I don't want to weight in to much, but I thought they were alright.
Painter on white can be pretty spicy as well. Especially if you do it before hand.
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Jack if your not careful people might realize this is a good deck. Keep those 5-0s on the downlow.
Ps. I'm going to be shipping my grixis delver online for painter.
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Update. Painter acquired. Currently 3-0 in league, feels good to be home.
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Has anyone else been testing out Nahiri at all? So far she seems pretty good to me. She is very easy to ramp to ultimate on. I almost feel bad for not playing an Emrakul or something like that to go get. The creature removal is also a non-zero effect as well. I still think she is definitely worth picking up a copy of and playing for a while.
As for wasteland, I can see the appeal. It's extra land and can come in handy for those situations where your opponent leaves one white or red up for bolt or swords and you can snatch it and then play out your painter for the win. It just seems like it will get turned off a lot with blood moon. Still not end of the world though.
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Gonna run one in main and one in side for awhile once she's released.
Quick Run down of a Local Comp REL Tournament In Morgantown WV.
We had 11 players. 3 on SnS, 2 Maverick, 1 DnT, 1 Grixis Delver, 1 Ant, 1 Miracles, 1 Infect, And me playing Shortcake.
I finished in 3rd place basically only getting my entry fee back.
Here is a quick walkthrough of how my day went.
Rd 1 I play against infect. (pretty much everyone knows what everyone is playing from the get go.)
I win Game 1 using welder to get back a Painter's servant from my yard and was able to blast an Inkmoth Nexus that had Berserk and Invigorate, I follow up my next turn with a Spellskite. And weather the storm until i find the grind stone.
Game 2 I win via turn 1 Magus of the Moon. into turn 3 Pyroblast his lone forest. He scoops afterwards.
Record (1-0)
RD 2 Maverick.
Game 1 Im on the play I play turn 1 Painter. He plays turn 1 Mom. I play turn two stone and win.
Game 2 I play an early moon and I have to play hard mode as i never see the comobo and turn my grey ogre's sideways/
Record (2-0)
RD 3 SnS.
Game 1 he plays a turn 2 Show N Tell into Spaghetti Monster I lose the following turn.
Game 2 EOT Through the Breach on turn 9 or 10. And then hits sneak attack for big Em and Taylor Swifts me.
Record (2-1)
RD 4 Miracles ( I win and Im in top 4)
Game 1 I see 4 blast effects which allows me to protect my combo and kill my opponent. On turn 5 or so.
Game 2 I Play a Mountain and pass leaving up a red Blast. Next turn I Play City and play Painter and Grindstone. This allows me to leave up blast with a Spirit guide in my hand. Pass turn he fails to find a Swords or Anything relevant and scoops.
Record (3-1) 2 Seed going to top 4
Rd5 Miracles (UGH)
Game 1 slow hand but has Daretti in it so i keep and we pass back and forth he lands a Jace we pass back and forth for a while as he deals with my Painters and Grindstones. I lose to Entreat some turns later.
Game 2 I lose to a Jace ultimate as i never really draw anything of Use. He used all 4 Swords in the Match though and Flashbacked 2.
Record (3-2)
I end up in 3rd for the event. Which isnt terrible just upsetting with the loss is all. I wanted to play Wastelands today but after putting them in the deck i could cut directly to them as mine are altered so I didnt play them on my own accord though the head judge allowed them. I didnt want to do that for obvious reasons.
I dont have my exact 75 on me at the moment but i will post it later this week.
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