Have you recently changed your beainstorms? I changed arts on mine, now I feel like I lose all the timeOriginally Posted by ironclad8690
There are a ton of Stoneforge decks in my meta including Death & Taxes, Bant, Maverick, Deadguy and UWR Stoneblade. These are the cards I use in my sideboard for the match ups:
+1 Vendilion Clique
+2 Disfigure
+1 Golgari Charm
+1 Thoughtseize
+1 Null Rod
+1 Night of Souls' Betrayal
+1 Sylvan Library
This is what I'll take out
-3 Hymn to Tourach
-2 Baleful Strix
-1 Force of Will
-2 Tarmogoyf
1. I take out Hymns, leave in thoughtseize. Hymn just always feels bad against these decks, but Thoughtseize always seems to pull its weight and let me take a key card. I don't always hold it for the fetched equipment either.
2. I only bring in Null Rod for the equipment. I rely on discarding it if it's a Batterskull but I also have Abrupt Decay to deal with Swords/Jitte.
3. I bring in Disfigure for Stoneforge and whatever other creatures they have based on the build. If they have True-Name I bring in the Golgari Charm+Night of Souls' Betrayal. These also come in against less blue versions since it'll get Mother of Runes and Thalias.
4. I try to never board out all my Forces unless I know they'll be completely useless. Being able to Force a Stoneforge or Jace or anything else when you have no other answer can turn the game around
Sometimes I'll board out more Forces and keep in Hymns on the play.
Shardless
BUG Delver
Thanks! This is very helpful. I actually just played a very tight match against Webb who was playing an Esper Standstill blade variant, and I realized just how crucial force of will is in the matchup, especially on the draw. I took game 1 to tight play and lucky draws, lost game 2 to an Elspeth which I lost a counter war to (also forgot about the regenerate mode in response to a supreme verdict to protect clique to kill elspeth), but then boarded out the FoW for 2 Hymns and more removal g3 and got there.
I think I will experiment with being the "control deck" more in these matchups, boarding in all answers and cutting some threats.
Do you like night of souls betrayal? I love it in modern jund but in legacy I've noticed 4 mana can be a lot against wasteland/Rishadan port decks. I've thought about engineered plague though
I should have also mentioned that I take out Tarmogoyfs because of Rest in Peace. I feel I'm holding my Abrupt Decays and Maelstrom Pulse for Stoneforges and the equipment that I can't really worry about killing the RiPs. Like you said, you want to become more controlling. You can grind out better than most decks and the long game is where you want to be.
Shardless
BUG Delver
I've tried Engineered Plague, and sometimes I still run it in BUG Delver. I just think it's too narrow to play. I like Night of Souls' Betrayal because it's hard to remove since it can't be abrupt decayed. For the True-Name matchups its great since they don't usually have many Wastelands or Ports. It seems like a lot against Death and Taxes and Maverick but those matchups should get grindy enough where you'll end up with access to 4 mana. Deathrite Shaman also helps a lot with it costing 4 mana.
Shardless
BUG Delver
@ironclad According to your examples you are just having bad luck. The friend i live with plays D&t and deathblade(i have also played this deck a lot) and I have a lot of experience in the MU. Hymn to tourach is a card you should leave in against this decks like deathblade or stoneblade, also fows are really good, using a fow on a sfm can win you games against this decks, sfm is their main win condition and they can only play 4 so countering 1 gives you the time to build a board presence and once you solve a lili or a good shardless you almost won. Against D&t and maverick is different, vial and wll are enough to justify sidding out fow and hyms, against them i bring:
null rod
desfigure
engineered plague
toxic deludge
golgari charm
sylvan library
thoughtseize
seal of primordium(this card is so good against decks like this or jund that is crazy)
@alasafrica
I am not sure cutting tarmogoyf i s a good idea even agaisnt rip. This decks dont run a lot of removal and you have many ways of destroying rip(in my case 4 abrupt, 1 maelstrom, 1 golgari charm, 1 seal of primordium). Once you get a tarmo 4/5 they have a hard time dealing with. How do you close out a game against d&t without tarmos? manlands, baleful, and shardless agent cant go over their cards and die yo your deludge. Shaman has the same problem to rip.
Hey all. Wanted to post my current list and results of some recent events. Here's what I'm running currently:
15 Creatures
4x Deathrite
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Shardless Agent
3x Baleful Strix
24 Spells
2x Liliana of the Veil
1x Jace, the Mind Sculptor
4x Brainstorm
3x Ancestral Vision
4x Abrupt Decay
3x Force of Will
3x Hymn to Tourach
2x Thoughtseize
1x Maelstrom Pulse
1x Sylvan Library
21 Lands
3x Wasteland
3x Underground Sea
2x Bayou
1x Tropical Island
1x Forest
1x Island
1x Swamp
3x Verdant Catacombs
3x Misty Rainforest
3x Polluted Delta
Current sideboard looks like this:
2x Disfigure
2x Golgari Charm
2x Engineered Plague
1x Toxic Deluge
2x Surgical Extraction
2x Grafdigger's Cage
1x Null Rod
1x Pithing Needle
1x Nature's Claim
1x Garruk Relentless
1x True-Name Nemesis
I recently went 3-1-1 at a Legacy challenge at GP Detroit. I posted a write-up here if anyone is interested: https://www.reddit.com/r/MTGLegacy/c...match_results/.
Last week, March 24, I played in a local Legacy GPT for GP Columbus and lost three straight matches. Faced against R/G Lands, Aluren combo, and Elves.
Have been playing online with a very similar list, just minus one Liliana, plus one basic swamp, card availability issue. Went 2-3 in my most recent league, beating Burn and Eldrazi, losing to Goblins, Eldrazi, and the mirror.
Welcome to the forums! Yes I think I play against you a lot (the mirror). I am Adelorenzi on there.
Nice write up too
I went 4-0 in my weekly local last night, which felt good because it is the last legacy tournament I will have in California before I move to Washington in a couple of weeks.
Round 1: Bye
Round 2: Miracles (2-1)
G1 - I get ahead on both cards and the board as my Shardless Agent cascades into an Ancestral Vision. He tries to Misdirect it to himself, but I have a FoW and another Vision in hand to pitch. After that I landed Liliana or something and cleaned up from there.
G2 - I keep a hand with turn 1 Pithing Needle, but all nonbasics. I have to leave Abrupt Decay mana up in case of Blood Moon, and he lands a 2nd Jace that I cannot deal with (1st was Pulsed). He brainstorms every turn while I draw do nothings and lands, he wins with an entreat.
G3 - I take a somewhat risk line of playing out my Goyf and then playing a Shardless Agent which cascades into another Goyf, then playing a 2nd Shardless Agent which cascades into Hymn. He misdirects that back to me, it hits my last 2 cards in hand: 2 lands. Goyfs are at least 3/4s now, I swing in putting him to 11 or something. He plays a Monastery Mentor and makes a token with SDT, I attack again after drawing a land and he chumps with the token. He lands Jace on his turn and brainstorms, doesn't find the 5th land he needed to Terminus away my over-extended board, and concedes when I attack.
Round 3: Bant Stoneblade (2-1)
I have to say, my results have really improved thanks to your guys' tips in the SFM matchups.
G1 - It is a very back and forth game where we each just win on the spot if we draw the right cards. I don't end up finding the cards I need with him at 1 (1 turn I attack with baleful strix for lethal, he Cliques and blocks, if I draw a land 1 turn while his wasteland is tapped I can swing in with the Tar Pit, etc). And his True-Name puts me to 6, then 3, then dead.
G2 - I mull to 6, keep a good hand of disfigure, lands, shardless agent and brainstorm, scry shardless agent to the top. I disfigure his turn 1 dork, and that throws him off for a while while I cascade into decay and then golgari charm on an empty board, FeelsBadMan. It turns into a little bit of a grind, but eventually an Ancestral Vision resolves and I find pretty much everything I need to deal with his board.
G3 - My turn 1 dismember on the draw gets dazed. I feel pretty behind after this, but I am able to resolve a visions eventually after FoWing a Knight and a Clique. FoW did some serious work in these post board games, I am glad I cut Hymn and the Strixes instead. I have some really good cascades, get a Liliana on the board, and overwhlem him with Tarmobeats.
Round 4: Zombardment (2-0)
G1 - These games are kind of fuzzy, but I basically felt like I was playing circles around his clunky draws with Brainstorm and Jace. I got so ahead on cards it wasn't even funny, and my Deathrite Shamans did what I needed them to do. I FoW basically all the important stuff like Goblin Bombardment and draw decays at all the right times, Tidehollow Sculler doesn't really have an impact.
G2 - Mull to 5, but I curve Vision suspend into DRS into turn 3 Jace (can't complain about that one), and I basically win from there with massive card advantage from Shardless Agents and Jace Brainstorms to find all the removal I need for Pithing Needle naming Jace and his small zombie army.
I went back to my old list of 3 Strix 2 Hymn 0 Thoughtseize 3 Wasteland 1 Creeping Tar pit for this tournament, and the only thing I really missed was Tar Pit #2. I think 2 Tar Pit 3 Wasteland is kind of greedy, but I might switch to that for extra help in the race matchups.
Interesting that you keep in FoW postboard vs. fair stuff like Stoneblade. As a general rule, I dislike having FoW postboard vs. grindy, fair stuff (unless there absolutely isn't anything better in the SB) as the card disadvantage in a grinder can be a death sentence.
Playing with most decks I agree, but Shardless has the unique advantage of being so much better at drawing cards than other decks. Our FoW doesn't hurt nearly as bad as Delver or something that has no way to get ahead on cards. Bant is also unique in that things can spiral out of control much faster than most stoneblade decks. For this reason I approach it like a tempo deck, trying to answer every threat it presents on board or on the stack.
It could just be my playstyle, but dealing with their threats on the stack or with removal feels so much better than discard. The discard has a smaller window than FoW to be effective.
In the long, grindy matchups that primarily revolve around dudes, I tend to eschew discard and counters (in that order) in favor of overloading on removal. Spot and mass (disfigure, deluge, night of soul betrayal, m pulse, etc) is what I'm generally looking to board in. If I don't have anything else, I'll leave in 2 FoW, then work backwards depending on how much removal I'm boarding in.
If you side out discard and counters how do you deal with cards like jtms or other similar threats that dont die to removal? I wouldnt side out hymns against blades lists, the amount of games where casting two hymns wins you this matches is enough in y opinion.
I definitely subscribe to the same general school, but I prefer to leave in discard rather than Force against Blade decks. I definitely want to be as proactive and efficient (in terms of mana and cards) as possible, and holding up 3UU or not playing another spell is almost always worse than whatever you'd be using Force to stop. The discard is only dead the opponent is topdecking, and we're favored from that point anyway.
This is an argument as old as time itself. All I know is that since I started cutting Hymns and leaving Thoughtseize in the board vs SFM decks I have been winning most if not all of my matches against them.
In fact, I think Lejay's version has the best game against blade decks in general because it is basically pre-boarded (0 strixes/discard, more planeswalkers/sweepers).
I am not sure who is "right", all I can speak from is personal results against who I consider to be talented opponents.
I agree with this mostly, Jace isn't as bad for us coming from blade decks as we don't have to play around terminus and can flood the board with critters, making the impact of a Jace-bounce less troublesome. I also like some amount (not too much) discard against blade as it neatly answers SfM. I would definitely rethink force if the style of blade deck is a more U/W-oriented one with sweepers like verdict.
I don't like siding in that much spot-removal against blade decks though as most (or all) of their creature are 2-for-1s (SfM, Snappy, Clique) or just doesn't care like TNN. More general answers like Liliana, Toxic Deluge and NoSB are better.
That is how I approach the matchup anyway, I play the Lejay version and yes, the matchup is very favorable. :)
4-1 in a league today with Lejay build.
Death and Taxes: 2-1
Death and Taxes: 2-0
Mirror: 2-0
Maverick: 1-2 (won g1 because I saw a Deluge, lost the next 2 because I couldn't find deluge and he had mom openings followed by Thalias).
Grixis Delver: 2-0
I am really feeling this version much more than the previous builds with Hymns and such. The 5 planeswalkers make it feel impossible to lose to slow decks, and the sideboarding is easier in general. The only thing I am iffy on is the Swords to Plowshares in the sideboard, it just feels a bit too greedy. I might replace with a Dismember or Disfigure.
I think that Swords is definitely greedy right now, and it's a one CMC spell to boot. Disfigure or Go for the Throat seems better. I'm hesitant to go Strixless since there's still lots of Eldrazi around and it's the best card against basically all Delver variants. I wouldn't turn up my nose at extra Planeswalkers, but I'm hesitant to cut discard because I think that Sneak and Show is probably being underplayed relative to how good "combo deck that can minimize Chalice and Counterbalance and run Blood Moon" looks against the field.
Yeah, I have actaully been losing to Eldrazi now that I am Strixless and Hymnless. One thing I didn't really think about before switching versions is that Goyf is usually a 5/6 because there is a sorcery in addition to artifact. Without the discard you lose your sorcery for the gy to make goyf big enough to stop their dudes. Also Toxic Deluge gets blown out by Warping Wail, which feels REALLY bad after paying 5 life.
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