[Primer/Deck] Nic Fit

[Arianrhod]

Claiming that Nic Fit - or any other deck - has better/worse chances to do well in tournaments with more/less rounds due to variance is complete bullshit. Pilot fatigue yes, but not "lack of draw/ deck manipulation" or anything similar. It makes absolutely no sense. The winning percentage for games and winning chance for the tournament does not change at all, no matter if you play a 200 round tournament or a 3 round tournament.

Explain to me how a deck that does not play Brainstorm or Ponder is statistically capable of achieving the same stability across 35 games, let's say (assuming 14 rounds, 28 wins required, so a handful of matches go to game 3), as a deck that does. Just off mana screw/mana flood alone, I don't believe that it is possible for that to happen without gratuitous amounts of luck. I realize that it happens. I realize that you mull to 5 and win sometimes. Sometimes the matchups are just that good. But that does not change the fact that you are more likely to flood/screw if you don't play Brainstorm.

Bear in mind that I'm still here anyway. I've been here since the beginning of this deck. I've experienced the highs and the lows. I'm fine with accepting that I'm handicapping myself by not playing Brainstorm and friends, because this deck means that much to me. But I'm also realistic about what not playing those cards means.

Again, explain to me how I'm wrong. Give me reasons, and that's fine. Don't just say "that's bullshit," and not back it up.

[Koby]

I'm sure there's a 60 card configuration which is optimized to reduce variance to such a degree that it produces a highly competitive deck. I wouldn't be surprised if it's an amalgamation of Rock/Maverick/Stoneblade/Explorer/Walkers in customized numbers. Personally, I don't care what that configuration is and just want to play with sweet cards against stupid try-hard Brainstorm decks while curb stomping them. It's not as thought Legacy Grand Prix are frequent enough to push for that quality of deck consistency.

[sdematt]

Our problem is also number of people playing the deck, and testing opportunities to optimize. If 2 people go into a tournament with a deck in a sea of 2000, you have to way overperform to Top 8. If 300 people are playing a deck, different story.

-Matt

[Koby]

As for removing variance...

1. Play 3+ top of deck manipulation cards (SDT, Sylvan, Courser, Selvala, etc)
2. Play hard card advantage (PTruth, Night's Whisper, Harmonize, Elvish Visionary, Walkers, etc)
3. Play a low mana curve, likely topping at 4 cc (picture Maverick and D&T)

[Arianrhod]

As for removing variance...

1. Play 3+ top of deck manipulation cards (SDT, Sylvan, Courser, Selvala, etc)
2. Play hard card advantage (PTruth, Night's Whisper, Harmonize, Elvish Visionary, Walkers, etc)
3. Play a low mana curve, likely topping at 4 cc (picture Maverick and D&T)

I do think that going to 5 is reasonable, especially since Tower + Vet gives you 5 mana, and Sigarda in particular is just that good, as is Baneslayer. It's possible/probable that pushing to 6 is greedy, especially for something like a GP (although Dromoka in particular is very good against a lot of random shit). Otherwise, I agree.

Harmonize is not good enough, I've tried that route. Visionary (or rather Wall of Blossoms) has been run before to middling success -- it's not great, but it's not awful either. I do really want to test the 3x Night's Whisper + 21 land approach at some point, probably after Saturday.

Here's an open question: how many card advantage / manipulation cards, in number, is correct? I've been on 5 for a while, and have run 6 at points. Perhaps we should try to push to 8 (3 Top, 1 Sylvan, 3 Truths/Whispers, 1 Courser) in an attempt to mirror the 4x Brainstorm 4x Ponder engine (except ours are better because we can actually put mana into them)?

[Warden]

...Here's an open question: how many card advantage / manipulation cards, in number, is correct? I've been on 5 for a while, and have run 6 at points. Perhaps we should try to push to 8 (3 Top, 1 Sylvan, 3 Truths/Whispers, 1 Courser) in an attempt to mirror the 4x Brainstorm 4x Ponder engine (except ours are better because we can actually put mana into them)?

Let me change your perspective on what you're looking for (and I believe I touched upon this in my previous post). You'd need to up the # of times a card lets you see (preferably interact with) your library. It's the combination of bstorm, ponder, git probe, visions, jace, top, and fetchlands that makes [insert top deck] reduce variance. I postulate Junk could come close based on the arsenal of cards people play with.

If we use Miracles and Delver variants as the basis of our comparison, about 30-50% of the deck should allow you to view or interact with the library in some manner. I don't mean you need 30-50% of the deck to cantrip or straight draw cards. IMO, Veteran qualifies as "lets you view/interact with your library". Top, Library, and Courser work the top of the deck. Zenith, Intent, KotR, Empath, SFM, Sidisi let you look at the entire deck. Nissa can do both. Does raw card draw help? Most of the time, yes. However, a deck made of pure draw spells won't win. Ideally, you'd want to have some double-whammy of viewing your library attached to a creature similar to BUG's shardless agent (immediate Junk comparisons: SFM, KotR, Empath).

I don't know what the end-result looks like, but I believe it's possible to actively cut down on variance with NicFit. The biggest obstacle IMO is jamming fetches + basics + tower into the manabase yet preventing color-screw. Unlike other decks, we WANT basic lands.

[Arianrhod]

Let me change your perspective on what you're looking for (and I believe I touched upon this in my previous post). You'd need to up the # of times a card lets you see (preferably interact with) your library. It's the combination of bstorm, ponder, git probe, visions, jace, top, and fetchlands that makes [insert top deck] reduce variance. I postulate Junk could come close based on the arsenal of cards people play with.

If we use Miracles and Delver variants as the basis of our comparison, about 30-50% of the deck should allow you to view or interact with the library in some manner. I don't mean you need 30-50% of the deck to cantrip or straight draw cards. IMO, Veteran qualifies as "lets you view/interact with your library". Top, Library, and Courser work the top of the deck. Zenith, Intent, KotR, Empath, SFM, Sidisi let you look at the entire deck. Nissa can do both. Does raw card draw help? Most of the time, yes. However, a deck made of pure draw spells won't win. Ideally, you'd want to have some double-whammy of viewing your library attached to a creature similar to BUG's shardless agent (immediate Junk comparisons: SFM, KotR, Empath).

I don't know what the end-result looks like, but I believe it's possible to actively cut down on variance with NicFit. The biggest obstacle IMO is jamming fetches + basics + tower into the manabase yet preventing color-screw. Unlike other decks, we WANT basic lands.

I like this post, and I think this is an important topic to be discussing with GP Columbus (and Prague for our European brethren) rapidly approaching. We've examined individual card choices, engines, packages, and versions countless times, but this is the first I can remember us taking an actual serious look at how many of what types of cards we should ideally be looking at.

I'm short on time at the moment, but will likely be making a Large Post with my thoughts on the subject tomorrow morning. You've been warned :p

[Echelon]

Here's an open question: how many card advantage / manipulation cards, in number, is correct? I've been on 5 for a while, and have run 6 at points. Perhaps we should try to push to 8 (3 Top, 1 Sylvan, 3 Truths/Whispers, 1 Courser) in an attempt to mirror the 4x Brainstorm 4x Ponder engine (except ours are better because we can actually put mana into them)?

You're miscounting. As long as you run Courser + GSZ, you have to include those in the count since GSZ can be Courser.

Let me change your perspective on what you're looking for (and I believe I touched upon this in my previous post). You'd need to up the # of times a card lets you see (preferably interact with) your library. It's the combination of bstorm, ponder, git probe, visions, jace, top, and fetchlands that makes [insert top deck] reduce variance. I postulate Junk could come close based on the arsenal of cards people play with.

If we use Miracles and Delver variants as the basis of our comparison, about 30-50% of the deck should allow you to view or interact with the library in some manner. I don't mean you need 30-50% of the deck to cantrip or straight draw cards. IMO, Veteran qualifies as "lets you view/interact with your library". Top, Library, and Courser work the top of the deck. Zenith, Intent, KotR, Empath, SFM, Sidisi let you look at the entire deck. Nissa can do both. Does raw card draw help? Most of the time, yes. However, a deck made of pure draw spells won't win. Ideally, you'd want to have some double-whammy of viewing your library attached to a creature similar to BUG's shardless agent (immediate Junk comparisons: SFM, KotR, Empath).

I don't know what the end-result looks like, but I believe it's possible to actively cut down on variance with NicFit. The biggest obstacle IMO is jamming fetches + basics + tower into the manabase yet preventing color-screw. Unlike other decks, we WANT basic lands.

I agree. As for the manabase: The 10 fetch, 2 P. Tower manabase allows for 14/14/14 initial B/G/W sources and the highest number of explosive starts (b/c of the 2nd Tower). The fetches allow you to fix your mana, fetch basics and shuffle away unwanted cards seen by Top/Courser/etc. at the cost of a single life each (something of which we have plenty). If we're wanting to top off the curve @5, having just 6 basics isn't a problem either. So far I haven't had any trouble casting 6-drops b/c of it, anyways. I have been on this manabase for quite some time now and hardly ever run into color-screw. When it does happen, it's mostly b/c I fetch the wrong land or forget my opponent is not playing Wasteland.

So that's the first 21 slots. 39 left.

Other categories (both numbers & consistency):
- Creatures
- Removal suite
- Library manipulation/CA/Tutors

To make sure enough you get something in your opening hand, you need to run 14 or so of it so that means we need to find at least 3 cards that double in function unless we want to run 63 cards.

Maybe we'll need to rename the Creatures-categorie to Game closers. Perhaps that's a better fit for the conceptualisation we're aiming for. Creature isn't a function, closing the game is (or rather can be). That leaves us with the following functions we need/want to fulfill:
- Close the game
- Answer opposing threats/interact with the opponent
- Manipulate the top of our library/create CA to pull ahead

We should also plot out a general manacurve we wish to fit this stuff in and perhaps split that into function specific mana curves. When do we want to start messing with the top of our library, when do we want to start messing with our opponent etc (in other words: form a requirements model).

First couple of requirements:
- Must be able to go over the top of most opponents
- Must be able to handle/mitigate mana denial strategies
- Must be able to break through lock pieces
- Must be able to handle opposing threats on the board
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce green mana on turn 1
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce black mana on turn 1
- Manabase must be able to consistently produce white mana on turn 2
- No card may cost >5 mana

Taking a Systems Engineering approach to MTG!

[Tao]

Explain to me how a deck that does not play Brainstorm or Ponder is statistically capable of achieving the same stability across 35 games, let's say (assuming 14 rounds, 28 wins required, so a handful of matches go to game 3), as a deck that does. Just off mana screw/mana flood alone, I don't believe that it is possible for that to happen without gratuitous amounts of luck. I realize that it happens. I realize that you mull to 5 and win sometimes. Sometimes the matchups are just that good. But that does not change the fact that you are more likely to flood/screw if you don't play Brainstorm.

Bear in mind that I'm still here anyway. I've been here since the beginning of this deck. I've experienced the highs and the lows. I'm fine with accepting that I'm handicapping myself by not playing Brainstorm and friends, because this deck means that much to me. But I'm also realistic about what not playing those cards means.

Again, explain to me how I'm wrong. Give me reasons, and that's fine. Don't just say "that's bullshit," and not back it up.

Sorry, that was a bit rude. So you say that a deck like Nic Fit performs better during an 8-round-tournament than during a 16-round-tournament?

See, I don't even get where this idea comes from. Mathematically it makes as much sense as claiming on a roulette table that "it was red three times in a row so now it is more likely that black will come".

So where is the difference between an 8-round-tournament and a 16-round-tournament? Surely during the first 8 rounds of the 16-round-tournament your winning chances are identical with the entire 8-rounder. So if you got 7-1 in the 8-rounder you go 7-1 in the first 8 rounds of the 16-rounder. Or why wouldn't you?

Then what happens after round 8? Does your physical deck magically give you worse cards now?

What if a guy plays two 8-rounders in a row? Does he have a better overall winrate than a a guy who plays a 16-rounder?

[Navsi]

- Close the game
- Answer opposing threats/interact with the opponent
- Manipulate the top of our library/create CA to pull ahead

I don't know if we necessarily want 14+ cards that close the game - we don't need one in our opening hand so much as within the first 4-5 turns, and a second card advantage / removal effect gets us more time to find it.

Standard looking list:

16 removal / interaction
4 Path
4 Therapy
1 Vindicate / Unmaking
3 Pernicious Deed
2 Abrupt Decay
1 Qasali Pridemage / Reclamation Sage
1 Gaddock Teeg / Toxic Deluge

16 Card Advantage
4 Veteran Explorer
4 Green Sun's Zenith
3 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Painful Truths
1 Eternal Witness
1 Nissa, Vastwood Seer
1 Courser / Tracker / Library

12 Finisher
4 Green Sun's Zenith
4 Siege Rhino
1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
1 Meren of Clan Nel Toth
1 Deathrite Shaman
1 Scavenging Ooze

Totals 44, - 4 for the GSZ overlap. I guess you could count Green Sun's as interaction as well since it fetches Teeg and QPM but I don't know if that counts.

In general, I guess we want an opening hand to be 1-2 interaction, 1-2 CA/consistency, 0-1 Finisher, and 2-3 lands I suppose?

[Echelon]

I don't know if we necessarily want 14+ cards that close the game - we don't need one in our opening hand so much as within the first 4-5 turns, and a second card advantage / removal effect gets us more time to find it.

....

In general, I guess we want an opening hand to be 1-2 interaction, 1-2 CA/consistency, 0-1 Finisher, and 2-3 lands I suppose?

Good point! And something along those lines seems like an optimal starting hand, yes. We don't need to bother with lists just yet though. First we need to identify how many of which category we deem desirable, then we plot out a curve for each category and only after that we start to fill the spots (or identify which cards could possibly fill which spots).

Specifications first, implementation/realisation later.

Continuing this concept - maybe we can consider a Sligh curve for our 39 slots. That means:
17 CMC 1 cards
10 CMC 2 cards
5 CMC 3 cards
4 CMC 4 cards
3 CMC 5 cards

[pettdan]

Sorry, that was a bit rude. So you say that a deck like Nic Fit performs better during an 8-round-tournament than during a 16-round-tournament?

See, I don't even get where this idea comes from. Mathematically it makes as much sense as claiming on a roulette table that "it was red three times in a row so now it is more likely that black will come".

So where is the difference between an 8-round-tournament and a 16-round-tournament? Surely during the first 8 rounds of the 16-round-tournament your winning chances are identical with the entire 8-rounder. So if you got 7-1 in the 8-rounder you go 7-1 in the first 8 rounds of the 16-rounder. Or why wouldn't you?

Then what happens after round 8? Does your physical deck magically give you worse cards now?

What if a guy plays two 8-rounders in a row? Does he have a better overall winrate than a a guy who plays a 16-rounder?

I've been considering this topic too at times. Let me try to explain it my way using layman's terms.

The chances of having a shitty draw is the same for each match, but the more matches you play the higher the likelihood of it actually occurring. Assume one in twenty matches you will fail horribly due to drawing basically all lands (happened to me yesterday, won though since I was playing vs Affinity and a turn two Rhino stalled, a turn 6-7(?) Deed cleared his board). If a tournament is ten matches you will only have this breakdown of the deck occur in every second tournament you play. The longer the tournament, the larger the likelihood of having consistency issues.

Blue decks, having access to Brainstorm, can "undraw" cards thus making them less exposed to such inconsistency issues.

[Noctalor]

Reasoning? Your creatures and removal are garbage (no Path sucks). Your only saving grace is Jace, and Brainstorm. I've played against various flavours of BUG Fit before, and never had problems beating it.

The problem is it basically has to be a control deck bound on resolving Jaces, yet you don't have as much cheap removal as efficient as Terminus and STP. See what I mean? I think, realistically, you can just build BUG Control (non-Shardless) and just fare better.

Well, i guess that sucks since i play 0 jace


I actually find baleful strix to be WAY better than path to exile in the current metagame tho, the only creature based deck we have to deal with is eldrazi, and a cc2 remouval that generates ca is better than a cc1 that could ramp them a wastes likely.


I was thinking more about junk pod being better vs delver decks than bug pod while bug has a way better mu against combo, not to see claims about my deck being garbage

[Echelon]

I've been considering this topic too at times. Let me try to explain it my way using layman's terms.

The chances of having a shitty draw is the same for each match, but the more matches you play the higher the likelihood of it actually occurring. Assume one in twenty matches you will fail horribly due to drawing basically all lands (happened to me yesterday, won though since I was playing vs Affinity and a turn two Rhino stalled, a turn 6-7(?) Deed cleared his board). If a tournament is ten matches you will only have this breakdown of the deck occur in every second tournament you play. The longer the tournament, the larger the likelihood of having consistency issues.

Blue decks, having access to Brainstorm, can "undraw" cards thus making them less exposed to such inconsistency issues.

Not necessarily. The odds of it happening in the first game of the day are the same as they are in the last game of the second tournament you enter. But yeah, it's basically a lottery. Play often enough and you'll win eventually. You might win on your first try, you might win on your millionth. At some point you will and the longer you play, the more likely you are to reach that point.

Well, i guess that sucks since i play 0 jace


I actually find baleful strix to be WAY better than path to exile in the current metagame tho, the only creature based deck we have to deal with is eldrazi, and a cc2 remouval that generates ca is better than a cc1 that could ramp them a wastes likely.


I was thinking more about junk pod being better vs delver decks than bug pod while bug has a way better mu against combo, not to see claims about my deck being garbage

Waiting for your opponent to run something into Strix is better than just outright killing the creature on the spot when you desire to? I disagree.

[Noctalor]

Not necessarily. The odds of it happening in the first game of the day as they are in the last game of the second tournament you enter. But yeah, it's basically a lottery. Play often enough and you'll win eventually. You might win on your first try, you might win on your millionth. At some point you will and the longer you play, the more likely you are to reach that point.



Waiting for your opponent to run something into Strix is better than just outright killing the creature on the spot when you desire to? I disagree.

Well, i expect eldrazi to attack me, im fine if he doesnt, only problems in this play are warping weil and endbringer i guess.
Also chalice is a fun card that force you to not play what you want when you want to.

And i think is safe to say that if you get the creature to die drawing an extra card is better than nothing.

Also i may argue that sower of temptation is the best 4 drop we can get to play vs eldrazi in general.


Also the effect of the pte is bound to them playing wastes or not, that is true also for veteran in this mu in my experience, but in general we get more out of ramping usually.


What im asking is in what mu the junk list struggle, i think we both are fine against eldrazis in the end, playing bug i never felt the need of pte still

[Echelon]

What im asking is in what mu the junk list struggle, i think we both are fine against eldrazis in the end, playing bug i never felt the need of pte still

Junk struggles with Miracles & any form of combo. ANT/TES, Elves!, AnyShow, T1 combo. I imagine you know this.

Anyone else wants to contribute to SE Fit?

[Tao]

I've been considering this topic too at times. Let me try to explain it my way using layman's terms.

The chances of having a shitty draw is the same for each match, but the more matches you play the higher the likelihood of it actually occurring. Assume one in twenty matches you will fail horribly due to drawing basically all lands (happened to me yesterday, won though since I was playing vs Affinity and a turn two Rhino stalled, a turn 6-7(?) Deed cleared his board). If a tournament is ten matches you will only have this breakdown of the deck occur in every second tournament you play. The longer the tournament, the larger the likelihood of having consistency issues.

Blue decks, having access to Brainstorm, can "undraw" cards thus making them less exposed to such inconsistency issues.

The "consistency vs shitty draw" already applies to your win percentage. In every single game there is a chance to get screwed for you and for your opponent. If Nic Fit dies to inconsistency 10% of games and Brainstorm.dec only 5% of the time, this applies to every single game. After that RNG has no memory. Tournament length has absolutely ZERO percent influence on your winrate. It is important to get that thought out of your head.

- If you have a 54% winrate against the field with Brainstorm.dec you have a 54% win chance in 1 game and you have a 54% win chance in 5000 games.
- If you have a 55% winrate against the field with Nic Fit you have a 55% win chance in 1 game and you have a 55% win chance in 5000 games.

[Echelon]

Both of you read my lotery bit, shake hands and walk away. Kiss and make up. Stay cool and Let It Go. Whatever you guys think feels right. Break out in song if you have to.

Now let's continue with the fun stuff, shall we?

[Warden]

@Echelon and Navsi: I love what you wrote!
@Kev: Thanks man. We'll certainly continue this conversation (online and IRL)

Manabase ideas (21/22 lands)
-10 fetch / 6 basic / 4 dual / 1-2 utility (karakas, p. tower, stronghold, etc)
-10 fetch / 6 basic / 3 dual / 2-3 utility (double tower + karakas for example)
-8 fetch / 7 basic / 4 dual / 2-3 utility

I'm not sure what is optimal, but these are ideas to fool around with.

The bigger picture we can start to form is 8-10 fetch + what Navsi categorizes as "consistency" (he's got 16, which to me seems reasonable) = about 24-26 cards total. That puts us around 39% - 43% of all the cards in the deck looking and interacting with variance in some manner. I'm curious what Kev has to say about all of this (eagerly awaiting your long post). I'd type more, but work is a thing.

*I really like Navsi's comments about recategorizing card choices. "Finishers" certainly makes more sense, especially with the way you articulated it. That kind of perspective changing is really beneficial IMO. It also has me wondering about card choices I initially wrote off like Gitrog monster (who is a finisher + possibly card adv/consistency).

[Megadeus]

Is there any upside to going less toolbox and try to be more consistent trying to play 2-3 phyrexian towers and ways to abuse it? Just essentially try to go less 1-ofs and go more all in?