Originally Posted by Alex_UNLIMITED
For that matchup, I believe I sided in:
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Rest in Peace
2 Council's Judgement
1-2 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar (2 on the play, 1 on the draw)
for
2 Swords to Plowshares
1 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Flickerwisp
1 Mother of Runes (only on the draw)
I agree that Flickerwisp is not at its strongest versus Shardless :)
Hey Thomas, congrats on the finish!
I have a question - were there any spots in the tournament where your maindeck Banisher Priest ended up being better/worse than Fiend Hunter?
I don't think there was, no. The main goal was to remove a creature, and I would have lost/won all games I drew it regardless whether it was a 1/3 or a 2/2. I guess my Eldrazi opponent had fewer outs to topdeck in one scenario, but that was it.
Well, there is also the issue of the Flickerwisp interaction with Fiend Hunter. (Also, I have been annoyed at being unable to get through a stupid Deathrite Shaman with Fiend Hunter.) I suppose there are a number of reasons to like one over the other, but I figured the Banisher Priest was a nod to the existence of Warping Wail and the expected presence of Eldrazi.
Good luck playing something else now. You will forever be linked to this deck considering your repeated success.
"Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job."
"Politicians are like diapers. They should be changed often and for the same reason."
"Governing is too important to be left to people as silly as politicians."
"Politicians were mostly people who'd had too little morals and ethics to stay lawyers."
Yeah, the Flickerwisp trick - I actually almost had a chance to do it at GP Columbus, though my first trigger got Stifled. Overall I think the 1/3 vs 2/2 aspect matters far more. I have lost a few games to Warping Wail but overall at this point I think I've won more (including one at the GP) from the extra toughness. Almost wonder if a 1/1 split isn't the worst idea, since the effect is clearly good at the moment.
Finn, have you ever tested with Weathered Wayfarer? (Guessing yes...) Did it ever come close to being good? Was thinking a one-of in Imperial could be decent, it's a little easier to have fewer lands than they do if you play fetchlands, since you can activate it in response to your own fetchland (or wasteland) activation. Via Recruiter it lets you access the only parts of your deck you can't currently tutor for. But it could also just be too durdly and is a terrible topdeck if you're ahead.
Yup, that's me. I won't write a too massive report from the tournament, but I would like to say that especially the Eldrazi match up felt very good everytime I played against it.
Round 1: Sultai Delver (w/ Jace and Deluge from board) 0-1
Round 2: Shardless 1-1
Round 3: Boros Prison 2-1
Round 4: Lands 3-1
Round 5: Legendary Miracles 4-1
Round 6: Orzhov Eldrazi 5-1
Round 7: Infect 6-1
Round 8: Eldrazi 7-1
Round 9: Eldrazi 8-1
Round 10: Eldrazi 9-1
Round 11: Merfolk 10-1
Round 12: Legendary Miracles 11-1
Round 13: Temur Delver 11-2
Round 14: Shardless 12-2
Round 15: Imperial Painter 12-2-1
I don't have much to say about the run, but the matches I didn't win were winnable in the end (probably). In r1g3 I should have searched a Skyfisher w/ Recruiter instead of a M. Crusader which would have traded w/ opposing Delver, but the clock was running out and I decided to try to race him w/ Crusader. Then my opponent drew a Golgari Charm which helped him enough to race me out. In the second loss (r12g1) I had two different lines of plays which would have probably won me the game but I took an unnecessary risk and lost (you can watch the replay from Twitch if anyone is interested). The tie from the last round was a result from me not knowing/notifying that Jaya is a Legendary fellow, sigh.
Then my thoughts about the deck. Leaving out Batterskull was maybe the best decision I made while preparing to the GP. There was not a situation where it could have been better than Jitte or SoFaI. The main deck felt perfect, every card I drew during the tournament felt like it had a meaningful impact. Pia and Kiran Nalaar was surprisingly good, I had tested it online a lot before and it didn't feel that good then (because 4 CMC and double red), but somehow during the tournament everytime I drew it (or had a safe moment enough with Recruiter to fetch it) it had a huge impact and I think I won every game where I got to play/Vial it. With the manabase I played the double red wasn't a problem at all and it wasn't once a dead weight in my hand. I replaced one Revoker with Skyfisher a week before the GP without testing it and in the very first game of the Grand Prix I got into a situation where it was good and would have probably won me the g3 as well.
Conclusion: Main deck was a solid 60 I would register to a tournament with this meta again anyday. The sideboard felt like it had enough business against every deck I played against as well. I'd say the deck is well positioned right now, but I still don't like the Miracles match up even though my match win % against the deck (online & offline) is somehow more than 50%.
I know I didn't write much, but TL;DR:
- I don't see enough reasons to not to play red.
- Batterskull is not needed.
- Kor Skyfisher does enough things.
- Pia and Kiran is a very awesome couple.
- Fiend Hunter effect was not necessary.
- Mangara is a must have.
- Karakas can bounce Jaya Ballard.
Also, congratulations to Thomas for getting into the top 8! Too bad your run got to an end in the semis.
I just wanted to take a minute and say thank you to all the players who shared their experiences while playing the GP - I enjoyed reading your reports and musings! :)
Hey, nice job nmks. An 11 round winning streak at a GP is pretty impressive and you came inches away from t8'ing a legacy GP with Kor Skyfisher. It's interesting that you don't like the Miracles match-up - with Recruiters, 3 Cavern and Pia/Kiran I feel like I have to get fairly unlucky to lose, even against good players. I think you could probably squeeze one more thing in your SB for the match-up though, all you really have are Ratchet Bombs.
Did Magus of the Moat do anything?
Thanks! I did board the Magus in in the Eldrazi matches, and had it in my hand 2 times but didn't have to play it since I was ahead and going for the kill. In those games it was more like a back up plan. I know Wail and every other spell they play can kill it, but I do keep Moms in so it could have a protection from Dismember sometimes. And from Swords if opponent is playing white. But you can't judge a card by the fact that 'it can be removed', especially if the card just shuts down the opponent if he can't remove it. It's also good against Elves (unless the deck is playing Shaman), but I was fortunate enough I didn't need to face the deck in the Grand Prix.
Edit; I also boarded the Magus in against Shardless and Merfolk, but didn't see him.
@nmks and Thomas
Can you talk a little about your sideboarding? What made you like these choices and what decks do you see them as being strongest against? How hard/easy were they to cast? What were they replacing, if it isn't obvious?
nmks:
- Crackdown
- 0 Rest in Peace/2 Surgical Extraction (I'm assuming 1 Faerie Macabre helped with that decision)
- 2 Ratchet Bomb
Thomas:
- Gideon
Congratulations to you both and thank you both for sharing your time and experience!
It's actually not a terrible topdeck if you have a couple of toolbox lands (Maze of Ith, Tower of the Magistrate, Buried Ruin), and it gets better in longer games. We did not keep it simply because it slows the deck down so much. But honestly, these red builds are more comfortable being slow. Though it is a shame the manabase is so tight now. The land toolbox is limited by that. But one cool thing you can do is to respond to your own Wasteland activation with Wayfarer to get another Wasteland. That way, you can put opponents in a situation where they see several Wastelands in a row. Their mana supply is tested while you are netting a card each time. There is sort of a cat and mouse that goes on when opponent fetchlands are involved, diminishing the value some. Never had my own fetchlands, but it sounds like value. I would definitely try it.Finn, have you ever tested with Weathered Wayfarer? (Guessing yes...) Did it ever come close to being good? Was thinking a one-of in Imperial could be decent, it's a little easier to have fewer lands than they do if you play fetchlands, since you can activate it in response to your own fetchland (or wasteland) activation. Via Recruiter it lets you access the only parts of your deck you can't currently tutor for. But it could also just be too durdly and is a terrible topdeck if you're ahead.
"Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job."
"Politicians are like diapers. They should be changed often and for the same reason."
"Governing is too important to be left to people as silly as politicians."
"Politicians were mostly people who'd had too little morals and ethics to stay lawyers."
I used to play a deck that was known for that feat (Wasteland chaining) in (I think) 2009 - it's called "UW Tempo", originally "NoGoyf", and was created by former users of this forum (thread: http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/s...-Deck-UW-Tempo). It abused Weathered Wayfarer and Gush-on-a-Stick (Fathom Seer) until you were ahead enough to land a threat equipped with Jitte.
While testing Imperial, I sometimes wished for a way to (indirectly) tutor up for a W source with Recruiter. Wayfarer might be a good fit - but it is rather slow, and the free stack control (Daze, Force) that "UW Tempo" had used to be critical to be able to afford that slower pace.
This was BY FAR the best deck of all time. 90% against everything, including the mirror. Unfortunately only two people in the entire world can play it properly: pi4meterftw and Forbiddian
Good memories.
Weathered Wayfarer is a very interesting idea if the direction of the build is to go to 3 Mother of Runes. Being able to tutor up Karakas, Cavern of Souls and Rishadan Port, not just Wasteland, is quite powerful in a deck that can also tutor up Wayfarer, so it only needs to be a 1-of. I think the direction the deck is going tends to mean that Imperial Recruiter is now an automatic 3-of and possibly a 4-of.
XD Loved that thread.
But in all fairness, UW tempo was a pretty cool deck.
Yeah I've already been playing Recruiter as a 4-of, and was looking at 1 drops to see if we could steal Thomas' 3 Mom idea without lowering the 1 drop count. Mom is arguably more important in Imperial though, because it's often a 2 card win con w/ Magus. Still, people have been having success with 3 SfM 2 Revoker, so who knows, the utility of an additional tutor chain might be worth it. You could also toss in a Wayfarer without dropping a Mom. It is unfortunate that there's zero room for extra fun-lands in the deck as the manabase is super tight as is.
I also just ordered a Serene Master to test as a nice SB card for Eldrazi, potentially a few other creature decks.
My questions exactly - nmks, I am really interested in your gy hate selections. Are you using 0 mama gy hate as a way to combat the really fast combo decks we struggle vs ? I could see it since we gain enough % in the match ups where rip is great (bug, lands) from magus.
Would love to hear your thoughts, congrats on the finish!
Last edited by Cwoj; 06-16-2016 at 03:45 PM.
I mentioned doing Mom as a 3 of back in the middle of March (page 292) and all of you guys pretty much told me I was an idiot for even considering it, but now that someone on an enormous stage did well with it as a 3 of it's all of a sudden his idea and heralded as a new innovation and a good idea to try? Not the first time either(Leonin Arbiter comes to mind, and Mirran Crusader, I was playing both since they got released), yes I am salty, it gets old after a while. I understand he was the first to put up an excellent result with it in a highly publicized tournament, but that doesn't mean that he was the first one to try, or even be successful with it...
On a non ranting/salty note I think that adding a 1 of Wayfinder is something worth trying, though I think that if we do that, going to 3 Ports might be reasonable to make room for another utility land as we would now be able to tutor for them anyway. Going down from the full playset of Wasteland is definitely a no go, perhaps dropping a fetch off would be another decent move as we could now tutor for or basics or Plateau, especially those of use who are playing 4 Recruiter (I absolutely love the full set with Skyfisher)
I know a lot of you think that play 22 Lands in Imperial is wrong, but I've never had an issue with it (I've also not had an issue with 21 lands when 4 are Karakas in mono white outside of maybe 1 in every 30 games), but that could be a way for you guys to make a utility land slot without needing to cut back on non land cards. Maze of Ith and Tower of the Magistrate sound like excellent choices, perhaps even Sejiri Steppe could be decent options.
Cockatrice: EMFry
Hey, I said I thought it was, quote, "worth testing" but I was concerned about going down on turn one plays. Which is all still true and why I was looking at Wayfarer. Anyway, lots of ideas don't get taken seriously either until they put up results, that's always going to be the way it is. When you were right you get bragging rights.
Going to 22 land, on the other hand, I'm more skeptical, I feel like I play a lot of games with tight mana and I still lose more to screw than flood. If it's right to play 22 land then it's way more right for WW to play it than RW. Our curve is much higher. e.g. Thomas' WW list has 8 3-drops, nmks' RW list has 12 3-drops and a 4-drop.
Hey man if it makes you feel any better I still think the idea of dropping a mom is terrible so I'll maintain consistency. On the other hand I want to say I think your idea of playing 22 lands is still completely valid and definitely worth some testing though I wouldn't try maze of ith or the other lands
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