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Deck Comments / Re: UR Delver - Comments

« on: December 09, 2014, 07:24:49 am »

UR Delver

So, Legacy has changed fairly drastically since Karns of Karkir was released and this deck is almost certainly the biggest reason. Like other tempo decks it still focuses on getting a threat and delaying your opponent long enough to chip away at their life and win, but this deck always feels less like a close win. It is highly aggressive and often doesn't mind being non-interactive because it is so fast. I once heard someone call this a “glorified burn deck” and while it is much more complex than that, I can see where they're coming from. It hits hard and fast with cheap threats and burn spells, in fact, most of the deck costs less than 2. However, it's only possible due to the following card...

Treasure Cruise

This card is absurd. It's basically ancestral recall in a deck like this. The entire deck is structured around this card. Cheap threats, heaps of cantrips and fetch lands make filling up your graveyard absurdly easy. This card is what allows the deck to play so aggressively. In most aggro decks, your board can be wiped or they can establish a big enough threat, you just run out of gas and lose. With this card, that simply doesn't happen, in fact, running out all your threats is actually preferable because it means you can cast treasure cruise more easily. It also changes how you play your counterspells. Before this card, you would often save a card like daze for key spells that severely slow down their game. However, with treasure cruise, it's actually better to run out daze fairly quickly. Even if it doesn't counter something, if the extra mana prevents them from playing something else that can very often be good enough in a deck this fast, and being able to play treasure cruise earlier because you've used daze aggressively makes it worthwhile.   


Creatures

Delver of secrets-
As good as ever. It's a cheap flying threat that flips easily in a deck with so many cantrips and burn spells. It's especially useful against bigger threats such as knight of the reliquary, tarmogoyf, etc... because it can fly over them while the rest of your board prevents them from getting too much damage in.

Monastery Swiftspear-
Before Karns, UR Delver would run Goblin Guide, which simply makes no sense. It gave your opponent land in a deck full of soft counters. This is a much better replacement. It's fast and hard to deal with because it's a 1/2. With the amount of cheap draw cards and burn it often can hit for as much as 2 or 3 points of damage, and with treasure cruise it can hit for as much as 5 each turn.

Young Pyromancer-
This card has always been good. But never before has a deck been so suited for it. This deck has the lowest curve and most card advantage (thanks to treasure cruise) which makes playing a bunch of instants and sorceries very easy to do. This makes young pyromancer a “one man army” and it is very difficult to deal with once it starts flooding the board with tokens. Watch out for sweepers, in particular eletrickery can be good against this card, but otherwise it is an essential threat.

Burn

The thing about treasure cruise is that it has made burn spells a lot better in a deck like this. If you think of playing a treasure cruise with even one monastary swiftspear in play. You draw two lightning bolts and a land. You play both, dealing 6 damage, and attack with swiftspear for 4. That's 10 damage for 3 mana. However, to make this work the burn spells have to be very mana efficient, such as...

Lightning Bolt-
The best burn spell by a long way. Quick, efficient and versatile it really shines in the deck. It's also great spot removal against other UR Delver decks.

Chain Lightning-
Lightning Bolt's little brother. It's not as versatile because it's a sorcery, but it's still 3 damage for 1 mana. Just be careful when up against other red decks that you don't play it when they have mana up to use its copy effect. This isn't often relevant, but just something to keep in mind.

Fireblast-
This is just a 1 of because you rarely want to cast it more than once, especially in a mana efficient deck like this. But it is an excellent kill spell and works very well with monastery swiftspear. It also stocks up your graveyard quickly for treasure cruise.

Counter Magic

Because this deck uses burn as removal, countermagic is essential to stopping larger threats. It is also, as always, vital for dealing with combo decks.

Force of Will-
As always force of will is your best answer to combo decks. It is a bit clunky, but against decks that can win on turn 1 or 2, it's really your best option. It's also your best answer to really impactful threats that can't be killed with burn. Not only creatures, but also cards like chalice of the void, which completely lock you out of the game.

Daze-
While force of will is your key defence card, saved to target really impactful spells, daze is a bit more flexible. This is still a tempo deck and you still want to slow down your opponent. While, of course, it would be ideal to use this to counter an important spell, daze gets worse and worse as time goes on, so it's better to play it as early as you can.

Draw Cards

Besides Treasure cruise, the rest of the cantrips are fairly typical. Brainstorm, Ponder and Gitaxian probe. They are all essential because they set sculpt your hand, find threats, and fill up your graveyard quickly.

Brainstorm-
This card is often described as the best card in legacy, although that title may now belong to treasure cruise, it's still very good. With a fetchland you can shuffle away unwanted cards. It can also be cast at instant speed, allowing you to search for options at the time you need them. Also, if your opponent tries to cast discard cards against you, you can use brainstorm to hide good cards. And, as if all of this wasn't enough, you can also use it to make sure delver flips consistently.

Ponder-
Not quite as good as brainstorm because it isn't an instant, but still useful. The shuffle option is often handy, especially if you don't have any cards you want to get rid of from your hand. It's often better to use this to set up your draws first and then cast brainstorm.

Gitaxian Probe-
The free draw spell. Very useful with Young Pyromancer and monastery swiftspear. Of course, the 0 mana cycling effect helps fill up your graveyard quickly for treasure cruise and the information gained from it tends to be more important than you might think.

Mana Base

I won't write too much about this. The Important thing is that the mana base is very lean. This deck only runs 18 lands. While this optimises treasure cruise and works very well when so many of your cards are so cheap, it has one vital drawback... there is no wasteland. You simply can't afford to run it because so many of your spells cost 1 coloured mana. This makes daze a little worse and means you have to err on the aggressive side so you can win before the other player develops their board too much.


Sideboard

Pyroblast-
Useful against opponent’s counter cards and also against Delver, Jace the Mind Sculptor, Trasure Cruise and Dig Through Time, to name a few. You mainly bring it in against delver, stoneblade, and miracles. But it can also be useful againt combo decks which use defensive counterspells like infect. A lot of people have taken to using this in the maindeck. I can certainly see why, but I do feel that nonblue decks are still around and having this as a dead card game one seems too impactful in those matchups.

Grafdigger's Cage, Tormod's Crypt-
Dredge and Reanimator are both really bad matchups for this deck. They are fast combo decks that can ignore countermagic and build up a board too dificult to get through. These give us a change against them. Grafdigger's cage is also good against Elves (natural order and green sun's zenith) and sneak and show.

Sulfuric Vortex-
This is really against control decks like miracles that can subdue a board state quickly. It puts extra pressure on them and gives them no way out. Overall it's just very difficult to deal with. It can also be a good way to deal with batterskull against stoneblade.

Hydroblast-
Burn is a pretty bad matchup, they don't mind counterspells and can very often win faster. This gives us an extra card that can answer key burn spells, either price of progress, or burn spells that are targeting key threats of ours.

Eletrickery, Forked Bolt-
Both for the mirror match. They are very useful for dealing with numerous small threats and eletrickery is especially good at dealing with young pyromancer. Eletrickery can also be brought in to deal with decks like TES and Charbelcher, that produce massive amounts of tokens.

Smash to Smithereens-
Let's face it, artifacts are just plain bad for us. Chalice of the void on 1 undoes almost all of our spells, batterskull's lifelink can stop our assult in its tracks, umezawa's jitte can obliterate our field as soon as it connects. Smash to smithereens is a great way to deal with all of these threats and it's a burn spell too. It's particularly effective against batterskull and jitte because many decks wont run more than 1, so once it's gone, it's gone. Be careful to target batterskull when your opponent is tapped out so it can't be returned to its owner's hand to dodge the smash to smithereens.

Flusterstorm-
Easily the besta counter card against storm and most combo decks in legacy. Also again be useful when caught in a counter war.

Zuran Orb-
This card is absurdly good against burn. Not only does it gain life, it also makes price of progress completely useless, and with our deck's low mana curve sacrificing lands is rarely an issue.

2

Deck Comments / Re: Kevin Nguyen's Shardless BUG - Comments

« on: June 28, 2014, 02:34:29 pm »

Creatures/Threats

Shardless Agent-
The card this whole deck is centred around. At first glance it may not seem great, but when you see how it plays you'll understand how good it is. Besides being an efficient 2 for 1, anything you can cascade into in this deck will have a significant effect. The best combo is cascading into ancestral visions. Think about it, 3 for a 2/2 that lets you draw 3 cards. Besides that there are a lot of good options, hymn to tourarch, baleful stryx, abrupt decay all have a very significant impact on the game. There are just a few little rules that will help you get the best out of Shardless Agent. Firstly, try to set up cascades with Jace the Mind Sculptor and brainstorm. This will allow you to more specifically target the situation and set you up for better draws following it. Secondly, be careful not to sideboard out too many 2 cost “business” spells. This deck runs on them, so only sideboard any of them out if you're absolutely certain that you wouldn't want them in the matchup.Thirdly, don't be too cautious about using Shardless Agent. Yes, it's ideal that you set up the cascade, but that's not always going to possible, so don't be afraid to just play it. The absolute worst cascade you're going to get is brainstorm or deathrite shaman, and neither of those are even remotely bad. Finally, unless you're certain of what you're going to cascade into, make sure that anything you could cascade into. A lot of this depends on your opponent's board and hand. You generally want them to have at least 2 cards in hand (so discard spells are relevant) and one creature on the board that's targetable with abrupt decay. This generally won't be too hard, but there's nothing worse than cascading into something that you literally can't use, so be careful. The only other thing to keep in mind is that cascade means you cast both spells, meaning that your opponent can't counter shardless agent to prevent both of the spells. That being said, they can stifle the cascade trigger to prevent it.

Tarmogoyf-
This is your big beater. Cascading into tarmogoyf is generally pretty amazing and it almost always has an impact on the board. Because you run instants, sorceries, lands, creatures, planeswalkers and artifacts (shardless agent), tarmogoyf can very easily get as big as a 6/7, and if your opponent destroys your sylvan library it can get as big as a 7/8. and with the number of discard cards we run, it's very easy to get it up to this power fairly quickly. Watch out for true-name nemesis or mother of runes. True-name nemesis has become popular because it can deal with tarmogoyf and it does do very well, so be sure to clear the board with mass removal when needed.

Deathrite shaman-
This card does everything a control needs. It ramps into important spells like tarmogoyf and shardless agent, it stalls with its lifegain ability, it can pick away at your opponent's life when the game is locked out and it serves as graveyard hate against graveyard based combo decks. What more can you want? While the obvious downside is that it's not fantastic to cascade into, it's so good in the first couple of turns that that doesn't matter. And ultimately, cascading into it is never that bad.

Baleful Stryx-
This card is surprisingly useful. It can block large threats and trade with them. It can evade to get in extra points of damage, and it replaces itself by letting you draw a card. Even though it's not a really big creature it almost always makes your board quite difficult to deal with, especially if you cascade into it. Of course the best thing about this card is how good it is against reanimator, omnitell and even tin fins. It can block and trade with any large threat they put out, which makes their combo much worse. Just watch out for emrakul's anhillator ability, you need to have six other permanents in play if you want to block with baleful stryx.

Jace, the Mind Sculptor-
This card is amazingly good. There's a reason it's been banned in standard and modern without being part of any combo. You can use it to change your opponent's top card to lock them out of options. It draws you extra cards, bounces your opponent’s creatures and its final ability can be used to make your opponent draw themselves to death. It also allows you to recurringly set up cascade triggers with its brainstorm ability. The main downside is that it costs 4 to cast, but you can ramp into it with deathrite shaman if need be. Though, in most cases, it's best to cast it when your opponent it starting to run out of cards. This makes it easier to lock them out of the game and gives them fewer ways to answer it.

Disruption

Hymn to Tourarch-
This is probably our best discard spell. It simply annihilates your opponent's hand and cascading into it rarely disappoints. Also, because it makes them discard at random, it does very well against combo decks, as it often takes out their key cards. Watch out against dredge, tin fins or reanimator. In that case, hymn to tourarch could be better for them than it is for you, generally, in those matchups, you'll sideboard out at least a couple of hymn to tourarch for graveyard hate.

Thoughtseize-
The more targeted disruption. This card is incredibly useful for taking out key cards against combo, but in general it is an all purpose answer to the best card in your opponent's hand.

Abrupt Decay-
This card is probably amongst the best removal in legacy. In most cases it will be able to deal with any threat your opponent can put out. Also, because it can't be countered, it is amazing against counterbalance and any other deck that seeks to control the game with counter cards. Watch out for cards like misdirection that redirect it and keep in mind that this can't deal with most threats cheated out by show and tell, reanimator and sneak and breach decks. It also can't deal with True-name Nemesis. But is can deal with pretty much anything else in legacy.

Toxic deluge-
This is a remarkably good field wiper. In most cases you can kill all of your opponent's creatures and keep your own tarmogoyf alive. It is brilliant against death and taxes as it kills all of their trouble creatures and there's not much they can do about it. It's also an easy way to kill true name nemesis.

Force of Will-
The fact is, this format has a lot of fast combo decks, and without force of will, there is no way to deal with them if you go second. Force of will is also good at dealing with annoying counter cards. Keep in mind that you can pitch shardless agent, ancestral visions or baleful stryx to force of will.

Wasteland-
Incredibly useful at slowing down your opponent's resources. Almost every deck legacy runs nonbasic lands, and if it isn't shutting off their mana by killing dual lands, it's destroying their utility lands that allow combos and disrupt you.

Draw Cards

Ancestral Visions-
Besides being amazing in combination with shardless agent, this card is quite good on its own. It's a 3 for 1, which is pretty unheard of. In a lot of cases, waiting four turns for it isn't too bad. As a control deck, we generally want the game to go for a long time and suspending ancestral visions on turn 1 sets you up very well for the mid-late game. Watch out for your opponent using stifle to counter the trigger of casting it after the last counter is removed, it basically just leaves your card exiled.

Brainstorm-
Gives you huge card advantage with fetchlands and it allows you to easily set up cascades. This deck tends to use brainstorm a little differently to most other decks that run it. While, most decks will want to cast it in your opponent's turn to give them the most flexible option and make it harder to deal with, in this deck (if you have the mana) it can be better to cast this on the same turn you cast shardless agent. The reason is that, if you do it after you draw for the turn, you get one more card in your hand, which means one more option to put on top of your deck before you cascade.

Sylvan Library-
This card is quite good at setting up cascades, also, it can be fairly useful to cascade into. It gives you a lot more options and essentially extends your hand by 2 cards. Also, unlike sensei's divining top, it can let you keep more than one of those cards in your hand.

Sideboard

Thoughtseize, Duress-
Extra targeted discard against combo decks.

Nihil Spellbomb, Scavenging ooze, Surgical Extraction, Leyline of the Void-
Graveyard hate to deal with reanimator, dredge and tin fins. Scavenging ooze can also be good to side in against creature decks, and its very rarely  bad thing to cascade into. Surgical extraction can also be good against slower combo decks like High tide as it shuts down their combo if you hit key cards at the right time.

Force of Will-
extra counter card against fast combo decks.

Baleful Stryx-
Mainly to deal with show and tell, sneak and show and reanimator.

Maelstrom pulse-
Extra removal that's very good against tokens. It's also very good against larger creatures that can't be killed by abrupt decay (ie: against sneak and breach, reanimator, etc.)

Liliana of the Veil-
Useful against slower combo decks as it narrows their options very quickly, also very good against creatures like true-name nemesis as it forces your opponent to sacrifice rather than targeting.

Massacre-
Death and taxes hate. It completely wipes their board and is very useful if you have tarmogoyf in play. Also can be useful against RWU Delver as it kills all of their threats except batterskull.

3

Deck Comments / Re: Tin fins - Comments

« on: June 27, 2014, 03:12:41 pm »

Tin Fins

Tin Fins is a griselbrand combo deck. It is a strange combination of reanimator and storm, and because of this it’s fairly flexible in terms of how it kills the opponent. This deck has one of the highest turn 1 kill rates, especially against decks that don’t run counter cards. The combo is fairly simple, you use entomb or discard a grisbrand to get griselbrand into your graveyard. You then use instant speed reanimation that gives grisebrand haste, such as shallow grave  or goryo’s vengeance to put it into play. After that you use Griselbrand to draw 14 cards. You then have a couple of options, you can either attack with griselbrand so you can use his ability again, then ramp into tendrils of agony to finish your opponent to win, or you can use a discard spell to discard your copy of emrakul, and in response to his abilty, return him to play with instant speed reanimation cards, allowing you to attack your opponent for 22. You run 10 ramp cards, so this is very doable in turn 1, turn 2 at the latest. The major downside to this deck, is that it’s both vulnerable to graveyard hate and storm hate. However, in a lot of cases this deck is fast enough that it can outrun you opponent before they get the chance to play hate cards.

Reanimation Targets

Griselbrand-
This card is what makes this deck work. You use griselbrand as a draw engine to find ramp cards so you can kill your opponent with tendrils of agony. Watch out for Stifle, it will make you lose 7 life for nothing, keep in mind that if your opponent tries to kill it with swords to plowshares or removal, you can use its ability in response. As a general rule you want to mulligan to either an entomb or a griselbrand. The deck doesn’t require many cards to combo so that shouldn’t be too big a problem.

Emrakul, the Aeons Torn-
Because this deck runs instants as reanimation spells, you can reanimate emrakul in response to its ability trigger. Just keep in mind that all the other cards in your graveyard will still be shuffled into your library when you do.

Reanimation cards-

Goryo’s Vengeance-
Instant speed removal that works on Griselbrand and Emrakul. Keep in mind that they gain haste, but get exiled at the end of the turn, which means that you can’t reanimate them again. The splice onto an arcane ability is almost never relevant.

Shallow Grave-
Also instant speed reanimation, very similar to goryo’s vengeance. The main thing to note about this is that it returns the top creature of your graveyard to play. So, be careful, you don’t want to accidently reanimate a children of korlis rather than a griselbrand. Because of its drawback, you’ll generally aim to play it first, and goryo’s vengeance second, to reanimate emrakul.

Reanimate-
This is a sorcery, so it can’t target emrakul. And it makes you loose life, which makes griselbrand less good. The main upside is that it’s cheap, so it gets the combo going faster, especially if you don’t have a dark ritual in hand.

Draw Cards

Sometimes you need to fix draws, especially if you need to combo through counter cards, these can help you do that.

Brainstorm-
Cheap, efficient draw spell that you can play at instant speed. You can use it in combination with fetchlands to get rid of unwanted cards and find the combo pieces you need. You can also use it to hide combo pieces if your opponent uses discard.

Ponder-
Not an instant, but the next best thing to brainstorm. It sets up draws very nicely and can shuffle away bad draws. You mainly use this to find specific combo pieces, but it can also set up well for the future if you intend to combo on the next turn.

Gitaxian probe-
Free draw card, it also increases your storm count. But the most relevant thing, especially against decks that run counter cards, is that it lets you look at your opponent’s hand. This can give you an idea of exactly what you have to deal with when preparing to combo, which will hopefully allow you to play around it.

Lifegain

Children of Korlis-
This creature, in combination with Griselbrand, allows you to draw an additional 14 cards. After you pay 14 life to draw 14 cards with Griselbrand, you can then sacrifice Children of Korlis to gain the life back so you can do it all over again. You can even then ramp into reanimation cards to retun children of Korlis so you can do the process all over again. In theory, it's not too difficult to draw your whole deck if you want, although you'll rarely need to, but it can be useful if you need to find your 1 copy of tendrils of agony to finish them off.

Mana Ramp

Dark Ritual-
This is probably the best ramp card in the deck. Turn 1: dark ritual, entomb, shallow grave, and you've got your combo online. It's just that good. It also makes it much easier to ramp into tendrils of agony, as it gives the most immediate mana.
Lotus Petal-
Although this doesn't give quite the same advantage as dark ritual, it's still pretty good. The fact that it cost 0 to cast is pretty good and playing it on turn 1 makes your opponent unsure about precarious as to whether you're comboing or not. As a general rule, play it on turn 1, even if you don't need it. Your opponent will either counter it with force of will or leave it be, in either case it works out well for us.

Chrome Mox-
This is the worst mana accelerator because you need to use another card to make it work. However, because it stays in play, it can be useful in the first couple of turns, especially if you need to play extra disruption before you need to combo. Also, the fact that it costs 0 mana to play can be fairly useful.

Discard/Tutor

Entomb-
By far the easiest way to get Griselbrand into your graveyard. It only costs 1 and it doesn't require Griselbrand to be in your hand. It also fits nicely with Dark Ritual as you can cast entomb and a reanimation spell on the same turn with 3 mana. Because it's an instant, unless you plan to combo on the same turn as when you cast it, you can cast it in your opponent's end step, making it more difficult to respond to.

Cabal Therapy-
A cheap and effective way to get Griselbrand into your graveyard, especially if you have multiple copies in your hand. It's also a very good disruption card when targeted at your opponent, especially with Gitaxian Probe. In most cases it will either lure out a counter card, hit its target, or establish that there's nothing to worry about.

Thoughtseize-
This probably works better as disruption as it can target any card in your opponent's hand. However, it can also be a good way to discard griselbrand without revealling your hand to your opponent.

Protection

Silence-
This is very good at preventing your opponent from interfering with your combo, it either flushes out their disruption or prevents them from casting counter cards for the rest of the turn.

Sideboard

Pithing Needle-
Stops Deathrite Shaman and Scavenging ooze. It also forces charbelcher to use empty the warrens and goblin tokens to win, which will generally take them longer than it will for you to combo and win.

Chain of Vapor-
Deals with any noncreature graveyard hate: leyline of the void, rest in peace, tormod's crypt, etc. Also fairly good against any show and tell or reanimator decks.

Echoing truth-
Deals with any deck that uses tokens very effectively. Charbelcher, dredge, epic storm are all decks you want to use this against.

Hurkyl's Recall-
Deals with Pithing needle, which is a real pain if they target griselbrand with it. Also good against artifact based graveyard hate, such as tormod's crypt, and arifact based storm hate, such as ethersworn cannonist.

Pull from Eternity-
Protects you form more targeted graveyard hate like surgical extraction. Also allows you to reanimate griselbrand again if your combo fizzles.

Silence-
Good against any deck that runs counter cards. See description above.

Surgical extraction-
Good against any other graveyard based decks. Also can be useful against counter cards if you can bait one out with silence, imagine exiling all copies of daze or force of will from your opponent's deck.

Massacre-
Death and taxes hate. Deals very well with annoying creatures like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, Ethersworn Cannonist and Phyrexian Revoker.

4

Deck Comments / Re: Caleb Durwood Sneak and Breach - Comments

« on: June 27, 2014, 05:29:41 am »

Sneak and Breach

This is a fast combo deck that aims to use sneak attack or through the breach to cheat out a massive creature to kill your opponent with. Using ramp cards and lands that add extra mana, like ancient tomb, city of traitors, or sandstone needle, this deck can fairly easily kill on turn 1, and it's not too difficult to kill on turn 2 or 3 if necessary. However, because it's mono red, it doesn't run many draw cards, meaning that sometimes the draws can be a bit unreliable. You generally want to keep a hand if it has at least almost all of the following elements: A giant creature, a copy of sneak attack or through the breach, lands and a ramp card. However, this isn't always possible, so the deck uses prison cards to allow it to survive long enough to find the cards you need. Blood Moon, Chalice of the Void, and Trinisphere make it really difficult for combo decks and fair decks alike. And often you can win solely on the basis of locking them out with these cards.

Lands

Mountain-
This is a mono red deck and it's nice to have a red source that can't be killed by wasteland.

Ancient Tomb-
Probably our best ramp land. This deck is so fast that the 2 damage will rarely make a difference. Besides using it to get out sneak attack or through the breach quicker, you can also use it to play chalice of the void for 1 on turn 1, or blood moon or trinisphere on turn 1 if you also have a ramp card. This is pretty hard for most decks to deal with as it doesn't give them time to establish their board or stabilise before you play your disruption. It basically means that in most cases they have to use force of will early, which means they can't use it to stop your combo.

City of traitors-
Also very good and has similar advantages to Ancient Tomb, but you cen't develop you manabase easily after you play it, so make sure to play it as late as possible.

Sandstone Needle-
This card is useful because it produces 2 red mana. Very useful with sneak attack or inferno titan. However, it coming into play tapped means that it is slightly slower, and because you can only use it twice, you generally only use it when you're comboing. Keep in mind that if you have blood moon out, sandstone needle still enters the battlefield tapped because it doesn't become a mountain until its already entered the battlefield.

Combo Cards

Sneak Attack-
Allows you to cheat out any big creature we need as many times as you have mana and creatures for. The fact that they gain haste is what makes the deck so fast and is well worth the fact that you have to sacrifice them at the end of the turn.

Through the Breach-
While this card is a bit less flexible than sneak attack, it certainly does the job. Even though it costs 5, it's not that difficult for this deck to ramp into it, even as early as turn 1.

Fatties

Emrakul, the Aeons Torn-
While cheating him into play means that you can't get the extra turn from him, because he gains haste from sneak attack or through the breach, that doesn't matter too much. If you cheat this guy into play and he gets to attack, your opponent is generally left with nothing on the board and no way to recover, even if they have enough life to take 15 points of damage. The key to using this card is that, if you don't intend to kill them on that turn, to wait to cheat him out until the opponent has a substantiil amount on the board that can be kill by emrakul's annhiliator. If you cheat him out on turn 1 and don't have anything to follow him up, he's had almost no effect on the board and your opponent can just proceed as usual.

Griselbrand-
This is by far the best card to cheat out. Besides being a 7/7 flier with lifelink, if you cheat him out with sneak attack, you've almost got a guarantee that you'll be able to get something else out too. Here's how it works: Once you've put Griselbrand into play, use his ability to draw up to 14 cards. This makes you incredibly likely to draw into multiple free mana sources (like lotus petal or simian spirit guide) and multiple fatties (preferably at least 1 Emrakul). You then use the free mana for sneak attack to put the fatties into play. Then, attack and win. You can also draw an extra 7 cards after you attack with griselbrand, allowing you to set up for next turn (if there is one)
Inferno Titan-
Surprisingly good. His “deal three damage can help get those final points deal to the opponent or pick off nuisance creatures and blockers. Also, because of all the ramp cards, it's fairly easy to just cast this card outright, especially if you're locking down your opponent with blood moon. He's also not legendary, which means he can't be bounced by karakas, which is fairly relevant against against death and taxes.

Blightsteel Colossus-
This is our most easy turn 1 kill. An 11/11 with trample and infect means that he's very difficult to stop, especially on turn 1. He also isn't legendary, which, once again is relevant against karakas. The main downside is that it doesn't interact with other cards so much. If your opponent has enough of a field to block and prevent fatal infect, all of the other damage you do with other creatures is irrelevant, and he's basically redundant. So only use it when you're cerntain you can win with it on that turn.

Ramp

Lotus Petal-
0 cost ramp for any colour. The coloured ramp is fairly relevant because a lot of our lands only add colourless, and this can act as a mana fixer as well as a ramp card. A lot of the time you will end up using it to ramp into seething song. I would say that, regardless of whether you need it or not, almost always play it on turn 1. This forces your opponent to decide whether to force of will a mana source or rick the combo that may ensue, which is generally a fairly difficult position to be in. It also means that if they don't have force of will, they're unlikely to be able to counter it.

Simian Spirit Guide-
This card is good because it ramps without you having to cast anything, which makes it uncounterable. Very similar to lotus petal in that it just adds 1 red mana (the only relevant colour for this deck) and can help fix your mana when you're stuck with colourless lands.

Seething Song-
This is the big ramp card. It's perfect because 5 mana is enough to either cast Through the Breach, or cast Sneak Attack with 1 red mana left over to put a creature into play. Also, the fact that it adds 5 red mana means that it can be useful to cheat out extra creatures if you already have sneak attack in play, also it can be pretty awesome if you use it for inferno titan's first ability.

Alternate Kill Condition

Pyromancy-
Surprisingly useful when you're in a tough spot. If you have emrakul you only need to discard 2 creatures for lethal damage. You can also use it pick off your opponent's creatures, even by discarding simian spirit guides. Keep in mind that if you discard emrakul, your graveyard gets shuffled into your library, so you can use it to keep recycling cards.

Draw(ish) Card

Crystal Ball-
Because you run chalice of the void, you can't run sensei's divining top. And since this is a mono red deck, crystal ball is the next best thing. The cost isn't a problem because you run so much mana acceleration and it can dig through your deck fairly fast. It's useful for fixing those draws where you get stuck.

Prison Cards

Of course, what really makes this deck competitive is the prison cards, they shut down your opponent’s options and buy you time to find your combo pieces, and you can generally get them out on turn 1 or 2.

Chalice of the Void-
Chalice for 1 locks out a lot of your opponent's options. It shuts down draw cards, and a lot of the time ramp cards (but not for this deck) and it even prevents your opponent from playing delver It also prevents cards like swords to plowshares from disrupting your combo. Keep in mind that playing Chalice for 2 is also an option. It doesn't disrupt any of your cards and in a format where a lot of the time the top of people's mana curve is 3, Chalice for 1 and chalice for 2 means that you shut off well over two thirds of their cards.

Blood Moon-
In legacy, almost everyone runs nonbasic lands, many decks run only nonbasic lands. This is why wasteland is so good. So if wasteland is that good in this format, think of how good blood moon is. Turn one blood moon can sometimes mean an automatic surrender from the opponent. You don't care if all your lands are mountains because this is a mono red deck anyway, yes it can slow you down a little bit, but when your opponent is shut down completely it's not that much of a problem.

Trinisphere-
This really makes life difficult for decks that seek to be efficient with their mana. It stops all free counter spells and it gives them no play for until turn 3. This deck can kill by turn three easily, so it gives you a pretty big advantage. Just keep in mind that it does mean you have to pay three for lotus petal.


Sideboard-

Most of the cards in the sideboard are fairly self explanatory. Blood moons and defense grid against control, trinishpere against tempo, pyroclasm against TES storm, dredge, and charbelcher, Red elemental blast against blue decks. There's only one card I think I need to explain.

Stronghold Gambit-
In a deck that mainly runs high cost creatures, this card may not make a lot of sense at first glance. You run this against decks that run no creatures: high tide, storm, etc. It means you only need 2 mana to cheat out something like emrakul, which is pretty cool. And you don't even have to sacrifice it at the end of the turn.

5

Deck Comments / Re: High Tide - Comments

« on: June 27, 2014, 03:38:47 am »

High Tide

High Tide is possibly one of the slowest combo decks in legacy, it is certainly the least interactive. While most combo decks will try to deal massive amounts of damage or put out a massive amount of tokens, this deck makes your opponent draw their entire deck to win. The combo is centred around the card high tide. You cast high tide to make all of your islands tap for more mana then use cards like turnabout to untap all of your lands gaining a profit of mana. The best part of the deck is Time Spiral, which lets you shuffle all of your high tides back into your deck, meaning that you can (and often do) end up playing high tide up to 7 or 8 times. Making each island tap for 9 mana! Of course the downside is that because you require islands in play, this deck cannot combo quickly. You can combo on turn three, but it's not very reliable. Generally you want 5 islands in play before you combo off, however you may even want more. The key to playing with this deck is comboing at the very last possible turn. When thinking about whether you should combo think the following questions. “Do I have at least 4 islands in play?”, “Do I have a copy of high tide in my hand?”, “Do I have a card to untap my lands?”, “Do I have a draw card, or multiple draw cards?”, “Do I have countermagic?” (if up against another blue deck) and, most importantly “is this the absolute last time I can combo?” If you say yes to all of them, you're ready to combo.

Combo Pieces

High Tide-
The namesake card of the deck that allows this combo to be possible. As you keep shuffling and redrawing copies of high tide, you can get huge amounts of mana again and again. If possible, always try to avoid tapping lands to cast high tide, always try to use mana already left in your mana pool, this  makes the mana production much more efficient. Watch out for cards like Thalia, Guardian of Thraben and Chalice of the Void. Thalia makes life a lot more difficult because it means you have to pay 2 for your first high tide, meaning you essentially have to use 2 lands instead of 1. This is fine if you have enough lands despite that, but if not, you can always bounce Thalia with Snap or Wide away in their end step and combo the following turn. Chalice on 1 is much harder to get around because you have to bounce it (same applies to counterbalance). Rebuild and Wipe Away are your only choices, but the good news is that Wipe Away can't be countered or responded to, so it's guaranteed to resolve.

Turnabout-
Untaps your lands allowing you to gain more mana from high tide. As a general rule, this is the first thing you want to cast after high tide besides other copies of high tide. It also has the advantage of being shuffled into your deck with time spiral. Keep in mind that, in a pinch this can also be used to disrupt your opponent by tapping all their creatures or lands.

Candelabra of Tawnos-
The good thing about this card is that it can be set up early, in the turns before you combo. Keep in mind that the cost of X: is a misprint. It's actually X (tap): which means you can only use it once each turn. But it's very flexible and gets you a lot of mana fast.

Time Spiral:
This does everything. It draws you cards, shuffles your graveyard into your library allowing high tide to be reused, and untaps a bunch of your lands. Once you have time spiral going, it's pretty rare that the combo fizzles. Make sure that you play this spell last out of anything relevant in your hand, that way you get the most out of every card before you have to shuffle them away. Also, remember that you need to exile time spiral as it resolves, so you don't get to shuffle it back.

Blue Sun's Zenith-
This is your kill card. You ramp to to some absurd amount and make them draw a their entire deck plus 1. Keep in mind that daze and spell pierce are often used in this format, so don't use all; your mana, leave at least some left over just in case.

Draw Cards

You need consistent draws in this deck. You need to play a land each turn and find all of your combo pieces. This is why you need as many draw cards as you can. They're also useful for finding high tide or time spiral when you've already started comboing as you'll have heaps of mana to play them.

Brainstorm-
Cheap, instant speed draw card. With a fetchland you can use it to get rid of unwanted cards, and it's very good at setting up draws for your next turn. You can also use it to hide combo pieces if your opponent tries to play a discard card against you. Generally, because of how much card advantage this gives you, it can be better to set up with preordain or ponder first and then play this. But, of course, it depends on what situation you're in.

Ponder-
Next best cantrip after brainstorm. It's a sorcery, but it gives you the option of shuffling away cards, which can be very useful. It can be a good play when you're not sure what's on top of your deck, or even when you're just looking for a specific card.

Preordain-
This is probably the best draw card to start with. It lets you dig a bit less, but because you can pick which cards you want and which you don't it's very good at setting up other draws and future draw cards.

Meditate-
This is generally used during your combo. Since you intend to win on the turn you combo it basicaaly has no downside. However, I have seen it played before comboing and it seems fairly effective. Just make sure that you only do this in a matchup where you are certain that the extra turn wont allow them to kill you or get too far ahead.

Blue Sun's Zenith-
This is also your kill card, but when you're comboing and generating a bunch of mana, you can use it to draw 10, 15 or even 20 cards. It can be particularly useful when you feel like your combo is fizzling. Just make sure you leave at least 4 mana so that you can play turnabout or candelabra to untap your lands and keep the cycle going. I personally think that leaving 6 or 7 mana is best because you can cast turnabout while leaving a bit of mana for extra high tides, it even allows for enough mana that you can use merchant scroll to find turnabout in the unlikely event that you don't draw into it.

Disruption

These will help you to live until you need to combo. Make sure you only counter key cards, as you will probably need counter cards to protect your combo as well. It can also be useful to counter hate cards like ethersworn cannonist, but only if you feel that it's too difficult to bounce it.

Force of Will-
Not only does it protect your combo, but it also allows you to deal with fast combo decks like Tin Fins, charbelcher or storm.

Pact of Negation-
This is mainly to protect your combo. Since you intend to win on that turn, the extra cost doesn't mean anything. Also keep in mind that is this gets countered, you don't have to worry about paying the extra mana on your next turn because it's part of the effect, not an additional cost.

Flusterstorm-
Useful against storm and other combo decks, also incredibly hard to beat in a counter war.

Tutors

Merchant Scroll-
This card finds almost anything you could need. It finds high tide, turnabout, even brainstorm if need be. It's especially relevant because we need 4 copies of high tide in the main deck to make time spiral better, which means we can't wishboard for it.

Cunning Wish-
While we can't use this to find high tide, it can find pretty much everything else. It finds remaining combo pieces, draw cards, counter cards, and even answers to your opponent's disruption (see wishboard below).

Wishboard

Every card in your sideboard is an instant. Which means every card can be fetched with cunning wish. This means that you probably wont want to sideboard that heavily unless you feel that having this cards in the deck has relevance. However, as a general rule, it is always good to leave at least 1 copy of each card in the sideboard so you have the option there.

Turnabout, Meditate-
Allows you to fill gaps in your combo if need be. Meditate can be especially useful as you're less likely to draw it in the main deck.

Blue Sun's Zenith, Brain Freeze-
Your kill conditions. I've already explained Blue Sun's Zenith but I'll talk about Brain Freeze for a bit. In a sense, Brain freeze is a lot better than Blue Sun's Zenith. It requires far less mana and it produces copies of itself making it much harder to counter. Make sure you keep track of your storm count in case you want to use it. However, never, ever, ever, ever cast brain freeze unless you are certain that your opponent isn't running any eldrazi cards (emrakul included) or blightsteel colossus. These cards are popular in a lot of decks in legacy and they make Brain Freeze completely redundant. The following decks are guaranteed to use them: Sneak and Show, Sneak and Breach, Omnitell, Tin Fins. The following decks may use them: Elves, High Tide (yes a lot of high tide decks tun emrakul in the sideboard to prevent cards like leyline of sanctitiy from being effective). However, keep in mind that people may sideboard in Emrakul if they know that High Tide is in their metagame and they don't want to die to brain freeze. However I don't think that would happen much as they would still die to Blue sun's Zenith, so it's really just a waste of a slot on their part.


Pact of Negation-
Your go to counter card when you're comboing off. This one's useful to search for before you combo because it allows you to use other counter cards to prevent your opponent from winning.

Flusterstorm-
Search for it when you need to win a counter war, or if you're desperate to storm your opponent comboing with storm.

Wipe Away-
Your go to anti hate card. It can't be countered, or even responded to, making it very difficult to deal with. Use this when the opponent has something fairly tricky to deal with, like leyline of sanctity, chalice of the void, or counterbalance. It's also very useful when your know your opponent runs a lot of counter magic.

Snap-
Very useful in regards to dealing with trouble creatures, Ethersworn Cannonist, Thalia, Guradian of Thraben, etc. Plus, it untaps two of your lands, often giving you a profit in mana. It can also be useful for stalling problem creatures like tarmogoyf.

Rebuild-
For dealing with trouble artifacts like Chalice of the void. The main advantage of this is that it can also cycle, meaning that if you shuffle it back into your deck with Time Spiral, it is never a redundant card. Beyond that, it can also used to bounce your own copies of candelabra of tawnos, allowing you to use them again in the turn to ramp more. Finally, of course, this card is brilliant against affinity and can really slow them down, which is fairly relevant as they are a fast deck that can often kill us before we combo.

Ravenous Trap, Surgical Extraction-
Dredge, Reanimator and Tin Fins can be fairly bad matchups for us. These help disrupt them enough that we have time to get our combo out first.

6

Deck Comments / Re: Junk Depths - Comments

« on: June 24, 2014, 03:18:45 pm »

I've added Vexing Shusher to the wishboard. Useful against counterbalance and tempo decks

7

Deck Comments / Re: Legacy 12 Post - Comments

« on: June 24, 2014, 03:17:07 pm »

12 Post

12 Post uses Cloudpost, Vesuva and Glimmerpost in order to ramp into huge amounts of mana, gain a bunch of life so that you can kill the opponent by hardcasting massive Eldrazi creatures. The main upside to this deck is that, unlike Sneak and Show or Sneak and Breach, or even Tin Fins, you're actually casting these massive creatures. What's the one thing better than a giant eldrazi creature? A giant eldrazi creature that also lets draw 4 cards, or destroy an opponen't permenant, or gain an extra turn. You have a very high mana curve and produce a lot of mana, so you generally do well against decks that seek to take advantage of a low curve or mana efficiency. The main downside of course is that this deck is slow, so it uses cards like moment's peace or elephant grass to buy time. The inclusion of white in this version of 12 Post, also gives you a lot of sideboard options against decks that are particularly good against you.

The Posts

Cloudpost-
The reason the deck can run. Produces insane amounts of mana very quickly.

Glimmerpost-
Gains you life and contributes to Cloudpost's mana producing. Also comes into play untapped, so it can be a useful way to get mana in the short term if need be. Ie: turn 1: cloudpost tapped: turn 2: glimmerpost, play exploration map and sacrifice it on that turn.
Vesuva-
Any land you want it to be. You generally get it to copy cloudpost, essentially doubling the number of cloudposts in the deck. Keep in mind that it can copy opponent's lands if need be.

Thespian's Stage-
Kind of a fake post. It's mainly in the deck for the dark depths combo (see in “combo”) but if need be, it can copy a cloudpost to increase the number.

The Threats

Emrakul, the Aeons Torn-
This is our biggest, most badass eldrazi. Can't be killed by any instants or sorceries that would target it, has flying and is a 15/15. And as if that isn't enough it has Anhiliator 6. When this guy attacks, it's pretty rare that your opponent is left with anything on their board at all before he's even dealt damage. And as if all of that wasn't enough, when you cast him, you get an extra turn. Not only does this allow him to attack before your opponent gets to untap, it also means that you can potentially cast another eldrazi before they get to untap.

Kozilek, Butcher of Truth-
A 12/12 with anhillator 4 that lets you draw 4 cards when you cast it. It's also the cheapest eldrazi and can be useful to cast first when you need to stabilise the game.

Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre-
The fact that it can destroy any permanent when you cast it makes this card pretty useful. Of course, it's also a 10/10 with Anhillator 4, that can be pretty useful too.

Wurmcoil Engine-
I suppose this card is a little anticlimactic after the eldrazi, but sometimes you just need a slightly smaller threat to hold off your opponent. And as far as slightly small threats go, this is pretty amazing. It's hard to kill, and its lifelink means that you can often stabilise very easily against creature decks. It also gives combo decks a fast clock to deal with and its deathtouch makes it problematic for larger creatures to deal with, although, in legacy I haven't come across many larger creatures than this. It's even bigger than a batterskull and you can usually cast it by turn three or four. Also, it can be searched for by enlightened tutor.

Eye of Ugin-
Of course this isn't an eldrazi creature, but it is the main way of searching for all of your major threats, and it makes the eldrazi cost less too. However, we only run 1 copy, so make sure to protect it from wastelands.

The Ramping/Tutor Cards

Exploration-
Awesome ramp card. Yes, it can become useless after the first couple of turns, but generally by then its already done its job. It can also crazy things with fetchlands and crucible of worlds (see in “combo”).

Crop Rotation-
Helps filter away lands that are less useful and finds the lands we need. Is an instant, so it can be done whenever you need it too. Just watch out for counter cards, and remember that sacrificing the land is part of the cost, so you still have to do it, even if the card gets countered.

Expedition Map-
A colourless way to find your lands, usually a good play in the first couple of turns. It's a flexible search card that this deck needs.

Sylvan Scrying-
A slightly chaper search card but it requires green mana and it is a sorcery. Still, very useful in general.

Primeval Titan-
Yes, this 6/6 with trample is a search card. In fact, it's our best search card. The second this hits the board you will rarely have a problem finding what you need to combo. As a general rule, get eye of ugin and a cloudpost first. It sets you up very well, and is usually enough, even if the titan gets killed immediately after being cast.

Sensei's divining top-
Sing this deck isn't blue, it's useful to have an extra draw card, and this combos very well with fetchlands.

Enlightened Tutor-
This card can find a card for almost any situation. Need to get more lands in play? Find Exploration. Need to stop Wasteland? Find Pithing Needle. Overrun with creatures? Find Elephant Grass. Need a big threat? Find Wurmcoil Engine. The list goes on. The only downside is that it's a bit slow, so make sure you only use it when you have time to use it.

Survival/Disruption

Pithing needle-
This is in here for one purpose and one purpose only, to stop wasteland. Wasteland is just downright good against this deck and while we can handle one, more than that gets tricky. Turn 1 enlightened tutor into pithing needle is often a very good play.

Moment's Peace-
Let's face it, this is a slow deck for legacy. So we need a way to hold off attackers. While this isn't so create against storm or high tide, it is very good against any creature based deck. In most cases, each copy will by you two turns, which is very often enough. Plus, the flashback makes it hard to deal with through discard or counter cards.

Elephant Grass-
Very good against efficient creature decks like tempo. Make sure not to play it too early, because you don't want to risk losing it early because you're unable to pay the upkeep cost. It's also amazing against dredge. As long as you keep paying the cost to keep it alive, they have virtually co creatures that can attack you.

All is Dust-
If you're going to run a field wiper, you might as well make it a good one. The mana is rarely a problem and people don't often see it coming. It even kills True-Name Nemesis. Just watch out that you don't unintentionally kill your elephant grass, exploration or primeval titan.

Bojuka Bog-
This, plus 4 Vesuva and heaps of ways to search for it, gives you a huge edge against any graveyard based deck. It can also shrink creatures like Tarmogoyf or knight of the reliquary.


Combos/Tricks

Dark Depths, Thespian's stage-
Thespian's stage copies Dark Depths but has no counters on it and is thus immediately sacrificed to put a 20/20 indestructible flying token into play. This combo is really secondary to casting Eldrazi, but it's a good backup plan for if they destroy all of your cloudposts or your eye of ugin. The combo is easy to find because so many of your cards search for lands.

Sensei's Divining Top, Fetchlands-
You can use fetchlands to shuffle away your top three cards if you don't like them. You can also use it to shuffle away sensei's divining top after you draw a card if you don't think you need it any more.

Crucuble of Worlds, Fetchlands-
You will never run out of green sources again. You can just keep playing the same fetchlan over and over again from your graveyard.
Crucible of worlds, fetchlands, exploration-
Allows you to use the same fetchland multiple times each turn. This is the one time where exploration isn't a useless card in multiples.

Crucible of Worlds, fetchlands, exploration, sensei's divining top-
Of course, being able to shuffle multiple times means you can dig multiple times if you're looking for a particulate card. This may seem a bit outlandish but I have seen it happen. In fact, it allowed them to search for an Emrakul that let them win the game.


Sideboard

Ravenous Trap, Rest in Peace-
More graveyard hate. Also, Rest in Peace can be searched for with Enlightened Tutor.

Ethersworn Canonist-
Fast combo and storm is probably our worst matchup. This can be searched for with enlightened tutor and can stop storm dead in its tracks, also good against high tide, charbelcher and tin fins.

Elephant Grass-
Excellent against creature based decks. Also, Very good against dredge.

Defense Grid-
Useful when your opponent is running a lot of counter cards, especially against countertop and tempo.

Lux Canon, Seal of Primordium-
To kill blood moon, or any other trouble cards. Blood moon is very good against this deck as it shuts down all of our nonbasic lands, which is basically everything we do. This gives us a precaution and both can be played when blood moon is out.

Leyline of Sanctity-
Good against storm, burn and high tide and we can cast it fairly easily, so even if you don't get it in your opening hand it won't be a dead card.

Moment's Peace-
Against creature based decks. Buys more time.

Enlightened Tutor-
I didn't put this earlier because I got sick of typing “can be searched for with enlightened tutor”. Every card in our sideboard, except moment's peace and ravenous trap, can be searched for with enlightened tutor. It is the all purpose slot that makes a lot of our sideboard 1 ofs a lot easier to find.

8

Deck Comments / Re: Grixis tempo - Comments

« on: June 24, 2014, 01:31:50 pm »

Grixis Tempo

Grixis tempo, or Grixis delver, operates like a lot of tempo decks. You aim to establish an early threat, then disrupt your opponent until you can beat their life down to zero. The advantage of this deck is that, possibly besides death and taxes, you will never have a really bad match up. And, at the very least, every match is winnable. The downside is that you have to have a good handle on the game all the way through. You win by accumulating many small advantages. If you win, your opponent will often think that they've only barely lost. But that's not the case, you won because you had the advantage the whole game and never let it slip away, even if it was only by a small amount. Because Grixis delver quite heavily relies on small utility threats, it does this even more than other delver decks. It doesn't run batterskull, tarmogoyf, or even maindeck Truename Nemesis, so it can't win back the game with one big or unstoppable creature. But what you will find is that if any of your threats aren't answered, they get out of control incredibly quickly. Not only are they heap and efficient, but many of them gain huge card andvantage and just overwhelm your opponent through sheer numbers. And that's what makes this deck fun to play.

Lands

Bloodstained Mire, Misty Rainforest, Underground Sea, Volcanic Island-
You run no basic lands. An advantage of this deck is that it its curve is so low, you only really need two lands to cast any spell in the maindeck. This also makes dark confidant much better. However, this also means that basic lands become a lot worse. For instance, it you have a volcanic island and a basic island in play, you can't cast  any black card in this deck, making a lot of the cards in your hand dead weights. Of course, this can leave you vulnerable to wasteland and other cards that target nonbasic lands. But ultimately, it's worth it to have such an efficient mana base that means a large majority of cards you will draw are threats or disruption. And ultimately it isn't as big a drawback as you might think. I've seen this deck beat a mono red painter's servant combo deck that aimed to put out a turn 1 blood moon in most games.

Wasteland-
The fact is that in legacy, most decks are thinking the same way as we are in terms of mana base. And while wasteland isn't the be all and end all, it's very rarely a completely dead card. It can slow down your opponent's mana and destroy utility lands that would cause us problems, like rishadan port. If used correctly it can completely shut off a colour, which is fairly good when dealing other delver decks.

Disruption and Removal

Force of Will-
This card is a necessary evil in legacy. It has a bunch of downsides. To play it you have loose 2 cards to your opponent's 1, and if you hit it with dark confidant you lose 5 life. But in a format where decks such as charbelcher, storm, dredge and even sneak and breach have the potential to kill on turn 1, you need a way to stop it. Force of will means that, even if you go second, you have a line of defence against a turn 1 kill. It's also very useful for this deck to have a free counterspell like this one. It allows you to play a threat while still defending against your opponent. It also gets you an extra token if you have Young Pyromancer out.

Daze-
This is like Force of Will light. Which actually makes it a lot better than Force of Will. With such a low curve, this deck doesn't really have a problem with returning a land to your hand. This has all the benefits of force of Will without having to get rid of an extra card from your hand. The main downside is that it's a soft counter. In a mana efficient format like legacy this isn't usually a problem, but keep in mind that Daze gets worse and worse as the game goes on. Make sure to use it as early as necessary. Generally after turn 3 it gets pretty irrelevant. Also, make sure you sideboard at least some of them out against decks like 12 Post which gain huge amounts of mana quickly.

Spell Pierce-
Cheap, efficient counter that is usually very effective against combo. It also does pretty well in a counter war because it's so cheap to cast.

Lightning Bolt-
Possibly one of the best burn cards ever. It's cheap and efficient and can generally kill most creatures that come up in legacy. Very relevant in Death and Taxes, which is a tough matchup for us, as it kills almost all of their threats and disruption. It can also finish off an opponent if need be.

Grim Lavamancer-
This card will come up later under threats, but it's also excellent spot removal. It kills most creatures in legacy and best of all, it's recurring. Also very relevant against Death and Taxes. Make sure they don't shut down your Grim Lavamancer with Phyrexian Revoker.

Dismember-
Necessary to kill larger threats. It's kind of bad if we hit this with Dark Confidant, but otherwise it's a very flexible removal spell. If you need to conserve life you pay the cost, if you need to conserve mana you pay the life. Very useful against batterskull, tarmogoyf or knight of the reliquary.

Cabal Therapy-
The only discard card in this deck. This card is crazy useful in this deck. It can be used to sacrifice dark confidant if our life is too low. You can use Gitaxian probe to ensure Cabal Therapy hits, which generally means you'll get 2 cards for one. Most importantly it can combo with Young Pyromancer. If you have Young Pyromancer in play, you cast cabal therapy, getting you a token. You then sacrifice the token to flashback cabal therapy, getting you another token to replace it and leaving your opponent with two less cards, for 1 mana.

Draw Cards-

Brainstorm-
This card is often described as the best card in legacy. With a fetchland you can shuffle away unwanted cards, which is almost life paying one mana to draw 3 cards. It can also be cast at instant speed, allowing you to search for options at the time you need them. Also, if your opponent tries to cast discard cards against you, you can use brainstorm to hide good cards. And, as if all of this wasn't enough, you can also use it to make sure delver flips consistently.

Ponder-
Not quite as good as brainstorm because it isn't an instant, but still very good. The shuffle option is often very useful, especially if you don't have any cards you want to get rid of from your hand. From what I've heard, it's often better to use this to set up your draws first and then cast brainstorm. Although, I'm not 100% sure as to why.

Gitaxian Probe-
The free draw spell. Very useful with Young Pyromancer. The ability to see your opponent's hand is also very important. It allows you to make better decisions over what to counter and also makes Cabal Therapy better.

Threats

Delver of Secrets-
There is a reason this card has dominated every format it has been in. It's printing completely changed legacy and brought the resurgence of tempo decks that we see today. It's a 3/2 flyer that costs 1. Yes, that comes with a condition, but with brainstorm and ponder setting up your draws it's virtually guaranteed that it will flip. Also, because it checks the card in the upkeep, ie: before the draw step, after you've checked the card on top, you can crack a fetchland to shuffle it away if you don't like it. Overall, there is very rarely the situation where you won't want to play this card on turn 1 if you have it.

Dark Confidant-
This card is one of those threats that gets completely out of control if left unattended. If your opponent doesn't deal with this card quickly, each turn you draw twice as many cards as your opponent draws (2 as opposed to 1) and that advantage adds up quickly. You get more threats, more disruption, more counter, and more draw cards than your opponent. And eventually your opponent will run out of cards trying to deal with it. You'll have a and full of cards and they'll be left with virtually nothing. It can be sacrificed to cabal therapy if the loss of life is getting too much.

Grim Lavamancer-
Can be used to deal damage directly to your opponent if need be. Useful when if both players are topdecking, or if the game's locked out. It puts your opponent on slow and steady clock.

Young Pyromancer-
The best threat in this deck, the reason this deck works. This deck runs 28 instants and sorceries. That's almost half the deck, including lands. This card can easily get you as many as 5 or 6 tokens. That's 7 points of power for the cost of 2. The recurring source of creatures can be very difficult for your opponent to deal with. The tokens can be used as chump blockers, cabal therapy fodder, or just keep attacking.

Sideboard

Grim Lavamancer-
Mainly against Death and Taxes or other creature based decks, it can be useful to have a third copy.

Red Elemental Blast-
We're not the only blue deck out there. This of course if very useful against Show and Tell or High Tide, but also helps win counter wars against other tempo decks or control decks.

Smash to Smithereens-
This deck is quite bad against batterskull and Umejawa's Jitte, so it's good to have a way to deal with these equipments.

Cabal Therapy-
Mainly against combo decks where we need to disrupt them by taking away their key combo pieces.

Surgical extraction-
Useful against Dredge, Reanimator and even against High Tide, also, another free instant to give us a quick young pyromancer token. This is absolutely cruel against Tin Fins. If you target Griselbrand they basically have nothing they can do. Just watch out they don't kill you before you get it.

Extirpate-
Graveyard hate that can't be countered. Less relevant against Dredge, but good against Reanimator and High Tide. Also, very good against Tin Fins.

Ravenous Trap-
Dredge hate, very useful if played at the right time. You generally want to wait until they case their dread return, it removes their target and generally gets rid of a huge chunk of their deck.

Perish-
Tarmogoyf and Knight of the Reliquary are very good against us. This gives us a solid amount of removal to deal with them without affecting our board at all.

Flusterstorm-
Excellent against most combo decks. Also very hard to beat in a counter war.

True-Name Nemesis-
Mainly to deal with large creatures like Tarmogoyf or Knight of the Reliquary. Can block them forever without dying, can't be targeted by removal and can evasively attack whenever necessary.

9

Deck Comments / Re: Death and taxes - Comments

« on: June 18, 2014, 03:00:52 pm »

Death and Taxes

This deck is essentially a control deck mixed with a white weenie deck. You use land destruction and mana denial to limit your opponent's options while using disruptive creatures to lock down the game and beat down. This deck is particularly good at dealing with mana efficient decks, but generally has an answer for almost anything. As long as the opponent doesn't kill you on turn one, you should be able to hold off their combo or cause problems for them. The key to the deck is knowing the interactions and tools to deal with your opponent's strategy. I am not a death and taxes expert, but hopefully I can shed some light on at least some of the key tricks.

Mana Denial

Wasteland-
In a format where almost every good “fair” deck and a lot of good “unfair” decks are running nonbasic lands, wateland is amazing. It can choke off your opponent's key dual lands and also is useful for killing utility lands if necessary.

Rishadan Port-
This card often allows you to lock off key colours that your opponent needs, and it works on basic lands. The only downside is that you have to pay mana. But a lot of the time that isn't a problem because you can use Aether Vial to put out a creature while using rishadan port to shut down their lands.

Utility Creatures

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben-
Good against most combo decks, and pretty good against mana efficient decks like tempo. You'd be surprised how often this makes life difficult for your opponent. It makes draw cards harder to play, it makes free counter spells suddenly cost mana, and it makes most mana ramp spells (often essential to combo) almost redundant. Plus, it's a 2/1 with first strike, which will generally handle a vast majority of your opponent's creatures

Phyrexian Revoker-
This card is good at handling tricky creatures and planeswalkers. It shuts down Jace, Liliana, Grim Lavamancer, and can even prevent Goblin Charbelcher from activating. Any deck that relies on Griselbrand also gets stopped by this creature. As long as you know what your opponent is using to win, this card, in most cases can stop it. Keep in mind that because you name a card “as phyrexian revoker enters the battlefield” rather than “when phyrexian revoker enters the battlefield”, it's ability can't be responded to. Ie: if grim lavamancer is already in play and you name grim lavamancer with phyrexian revoker's ability, they can't use grim lavamancer's ability in response to destroy phyrexian revoker. Furthermore, it's a 2/1, and that damage can add up when your opponent is locked out of doing anything.

Mother of Runes-
This card doesn't seem like much at first glance, but it is incredibly useful. Once it loses summoning sickness, it is very hard to kill, and makes all of your other creatures very hard to kill. It can evade removal, make your creatures unblockable, or allow your creature to chump block a larger threat without dying. There is one simple rule for playing with this card. Never attack with it. Untapped it leaves your opponent with a lot of very tricky decisions. A lot of the time they will have to use two removal spells to deal with it, and you can usually then punish them for that.

Aven Mindcensor-
Stops fetchlands and is a 2/1 flier. Also stops tutor effects where necessary, which is useful against combo.

Aether Vial

Aether Vial-
Yes, Aether vial is good enough that it gets its own section. This card really makes your deck tick, it allows you to put out twice the number of creatures, it can make any creature uncounterable, and it lets you put them out at instant speed. It also allows you to do a lot of tricks a lot more easily (see below)

Utility Lands

Cavern of Souls-
Makes key creatures uncounterable. Generally you would name human, but it can fit any situation that you need it for.

Enjago Castle-
Mainly to protect Thalia and Mangarra of Corondor, but it adds white anyway so there isn't really a downside to having a one of in here.

Horizon Canopy-
This deck doesn't really have may draw cards, so horizon canopy helps smooth things out.

Karakas-
Protects your legendary creatures. Also gives you a way to bounce Emrakul and Griselbrand when you need to.

Threats

Besides the utility and lockdown, sometimes your just need to beat down, and these cards let you do that.

Stoneforge Mystic, Batterskull, Sword of Fire and Ice-
Stoneforge Mystic lets you search for Batterskull or Sword of Fire and Ice and cheat any of them into play. Batterskull's living weapon ability mean's that you're essentially paying 2 for a 4/4 with vigilance and lifelink. Also, if your opponent tries to kill it, you can just bounce it in response to protect it. Sword of Fire and Ice allows you to draw cards and get in extra bits of damage, it also helps to deal with decks that run delver of secrets, grim lavamancer or lightning bolt. Also, keep in mind that if an equipment is put into play with Stoneforge Mystic, it can't be countered.

Serra Avenger-
A 3/3 flier for 2. It can cheated in with Aether Vial to bypass the ability that prevents you from playing it until the fourth turn. It can be useful for going over the top your opponent's creatures or possibly trading with delver of secrets.

Mirran Crusader-
This creature can be pretty tough for the opponent to deal with. Protection from black and green protects against cards like abrupt decay. Also, the fact that it has double strike means that if you equip it it becomes insane. Imagine having a 6/6 with double strike, protection from black and green, lifelink and vigilence. You'd be gaining 12 life each turn. With sword of fire and ice, the double strike means that the abilities trigger twice. Besides that, it can handle most creatures and even beating down for 4 each turn is pretty good.

Removal

Swords to Plowshares-
Possibly the best spot removal in legacy. Certainly better than path to exile.

Fiend Hunter-
Removal with a 2/2 body attached. Can be cheated in with Aether Vial.

Mangarra of Corondor-
(See in “Tricks”)

Flickerwisp
(See in “Tricks”)

Tricks

I got a list of these tricks from the primer at mtgsalvation.com

Mangarra and Karrakas/Flickerwisp and Aether Vial-
Mangara soft lock is a simple, repeatable removal tool. You are going to find that opponents will stop at nothing to rid themselves of Mangara once they understand what he can do. This will almost always be true even if you don't consider him to be your best tool at the moment. Mangara hardcast on turn four with Karakas still untapped is usually a superior play to Mangara on turn three using Karakas for mana.
1. How does the Mangara soft lock work?
You tap him and return him with Karakas or "flicker" him from play with the Flickerwisp while his ability is on the stack. He will remove a permanent from the game and not himself if he is off the battlefield when his ability resolves. Do not tap Mangara and ask "OK?". You have to respond with the unsummon or flicker effect before you ask for a response or a savvy opponent will simply do nothing and you will not get a chance to.
2. If you are removing mana sources, do it on your own turn whenever possible.
3. If you are trying to maximize instead, consider something like this:
-a. block a Nimble Mongoose
-b. tap to remove an attacking Tarmogoyf from the game
-c. use Karakas or Flickerwisp to circumvent Mangara removing himself from the game

Flickerwisp-
Vial it in to save Mangara or from itself
2. Hardcast it to "untap" one of your creatures after combat.
3. Vial it in to "Port" an opponent's land on their upkeep or (even better) at your own end of turn step.
4. Hardcast it targeting your own land to make it essentially only cost two mana.
5. Hardcast it to remove a blocker.
6. Vial it in to prevent an opposing creature from attacking for a turn.
7. Vial it in to take out Counterbalance so you can cast a spell.
8. Vial it in to counter a removal spell from your opponent.
9. Vial it in to temporarily remove Standstill.
10. Hardcast it to make a Phyrexian Dreadnought look silly.
11. Hardcast it removing Vial, Chalice, or Engineered Explosives to remove all counters. {snicker}
12. Hardcast it targeting Stoneforge Mystic to get extra equipment.
13. Hardcast it targeting another Flickerwisp to have the other Flickerwisp remove a permanent for the entire next turn.
14. Vial it in to rescue your chump blocker.
15. Hardcast it to switch your Phyrexian Revoker, Oblivion Ring, Runed Halo, or Leonin Relic-Warder from one target to another.
16. Hardcast it to essentially take out a Mox Diamond (or Chrome Mox).
17. Hardcast it to "rebirth" a germ token by targeting an unequipped Batterskull.
18. Vial it in to abuse the hell out of Oblivion Ring.
Here's how:

a. Cast Oblivion Ring.
b. With it's exile trigger on the stack (targeting, say, a Siege-Gang Commander), activate Aether Vial.

stack = 1. exile SGC (O-ring trigger) 2. Vial activation

c. Vial resolves. Vial in the Flickerwisp. Put its ability on the stack targeting your own Oblivion Ring.

stack = 1. exile SGC 2. exile O-ring (wisp trigger)

d. Flickerwisp's ability resolves exiling Oblivion Ring. Oblivion Ring's second ability goes on the stack.

stack = 1. exile SGC 2. return SGC (O-ring trigger)

e. Oblivion Ring's second ability resolves, returning the Siege-Gang Commander to the battlefield, which, of course never left in the first place - so nothing happens.

stack = 1. exile SGC

f. Oblivion Ring's first ability then resolves, exiling Siege-Gang Commander permanently (since the return trigger already resolved).
g. At the beginning of your end step, Flickerwisp's delayed trigger returns Oblivion Ring to the battlefield, exiling another nonland permanent as normal.

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben-
1. Like Mangara, Thalia can be returned to your hand simply by tapping Karakas at any time.
2. Thalia has first strike, so she can deal combat damage and be returned to hand before receiving damage. With a Sword of Fire and Ice that means that she can inflict up to six points of damage and not take damage in return.
3. If she is carrying a Jitte, she can deal combat damage, get counters on the Jitte, and use them before any other creatures deal damage. She could use the counters to buff her defense before that attacker deals damage or deal additional damage to kill the attacker before it deals its damage back to her. She can even use the counters to kill a different attacker before it deals its damage. Or you can gain four life before taking combat damage to your life total, which is a weakness of Jitte used with other creatures.

10

Deck Comments / Re: Death and taxes - Comments

« on: June 18, 2014, 03:00:50 pm »

Death and Taxes

This deck is essentially a control deck mixed with a white weenie deck. You use land destruction and mana denial to limit your opponent's options while using disruptive creatures to lock down the game and beat down. This deck is particularly good at dealing with mana efficient decks, but generally has an answer for almost anything. As long as the opponent doesn't kill you on turn one, you should be able to hold off their combo or cause problems for them. The key to the deck is knowing the interactions and tools to deal with your opponent's strategy. I am not a death and taxes expert, but hopefully I can shed some light on at least some of the key tricks.

Mana Denial

Wasteland-
In a format where almost every good “fair” deck and a lot of good “unfair” decks are running nonbasic lands, wateland is amazing. It can choke off your opponent's key dual lands and also is useful for killing utility lands if necessary.

Rishadan Port-
This card often allows you to lock off key colours that your opponent needs, and it works on basic lands. The only downside is that you have to pay mana. But a lot of the time that isn't a problem because you can use Aether Vial to put out a creature while using rishadan port to shut down their lands.

Utility Creatures

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben-
Good against most combo decks, and pretty good against mana efficient decks like tempo. You'd be surprised how often this makes life difficult for your opponent. It makes draw cards harder to play, it makes free counter spells suddenly cost mana, and it makes most mana ramp spells (often essential to combo) almost redundant. Plus, it's a 2/1 with first strike, which will generally handle a vast majority of your opponent's creatures

Phyrexian Revoker-
This card is good at handling tricky creatures and planeswalkers. It shuts down Jace, Liliana, Grim Lavamancer, and can even prevent Goblin Charbelcher from activating. Any deck that relies on Griselbrand also gets stopped by this creature. As long as you know what your opponent is using to win, this card, in most cases can stop it. Keep in mind that because you name a card “as phyrexian revoker enters the battlefield” rather than “when phyrexian revoker enters the battlefield”, it's ability can't be responded to. Ie: if grim lavamancer is already in play and you name grim lavamancer with phyrexian revoker's ability, they can't use grim lavamancer's ability in response to destroy phyrexian revoker. Furthermore, it's a 2/1, and that damage can add up when your opponent is locked out of doing anything.

Mother of Runes-
This card doesn't seem like much at first glance, but it is incredibly useful. Once it loses summoning sickness, it is very hard to kill, and makes all of your other creatures very hard to kill. It can evade removal, make your creatures unblockable, or allow your creature to chump block a larger threat without dying. There is one simple rule for playing with this card. Never attack with it. Untapped it leaves your opponent with a lot of very tricky decisions. A lot of the time they will have to use two removal spells to deal with it, and you can usually then punish them for that.

Aven Mindcensor-
Stops fetchlands and is a 2/1 flier. Also stops tutor effects where necessary, which is useful against combo.

Aether Vial

Aether Vial-
Yes, Aether vial is good enough that it gets its own section. This card really makes your deck tick, it allows you to put out twice the number of creatures, it can make any creature uncounterable, and it lets you put them out at instant speed. It also allows you to do a lot of tricks a lot more easily (see below)

Utility Lands

Cavern of Souls-
Makes key creatures uncounterable. Generally you would name human, but it can fit any situation that you need it for.

Enjago Castle-
Mainly to protect Thalia and Mangarra of Corondor, but it adds white anyway so there isn't really a downside to having a one of in here.

Horizon Canopy-
This deck doesn't really have may draw cards, so horizon canopy helps smooth things out.

Karakas-
Protects your legendary creatures. Also gives you a way to bounce Emrakul and Griselbrand when you need to.

Threats

Besides the utility and lockdown, sometimes your just need to beat down, and these cards let you do that.

Stoneforge Mystic, Batterskull, Sword of Fire and Ice-
Stoneforge Mystic lets you search for Batterskull or Sword of Fire and Ice and cheat any of them into play. Batterskull's living weapon ability mean's that you're essentially paying 2 for a 4/4 with vigilance and lifelink. Also, if your opponent tries to kill it, you can just bounce it in response to protect it. Sword of Fire and Ice allows you to draw cards and get in extra bits of damage, it also helps to deal with decks that run delver of secrets, grim lavamancer or lightning bolt. Also, keep in mind that if an equipment is put into play with Stoneforge Mystic, it can't be countered.

Serra Avenger-
A 3/3 flier for 2. It can cheated in with Aether Vial to bypass the ability that prevents you from playing it until the fourth turn. It can be useful for going over the top your opponent's creatures or possibly trading with delver of secrets.

Mirran Crusader-
This creature can be pretty tough for the opponent to deal with. Protection from black and green protects against cards like abrupt decay. Also, the fact that it has double strike means that if you equip it it becomes insane. Imagine having a 6/6 with double strike, protection from black and green, lifelink and vigilence. You'd be gaining 12 life each turn. With sword of fire and ice, the double strike means that the abilities trigger twice. Besides that, it can handle most creatures and even beating down for 4 each turn is pretty good.

Removal

Swords to Plowshares-
Possibly the best spot removal in legacy. Certainly better than path to exile.

Fiend Hunter-
Removal with a 2/2 body attached. Can be cheated in with Aether Vial.

Mangarra of Corondor-
(See in “Tricks”)

Flickerwisp
(See in “Tricks”)

Tricks

I got a list of these tricks from the primer at mtgsalvation.com

Mangarra and Karrakas/Flickerwisp and Aether Vial-
Mangara soft lock is a simple, repeatable removal tool. You are going to find that opponents will stop at nothing to rid themselves of Mangara once they understand what he can do. This will almost always be true even if you don't consider him to be your best tool at the moment. Mangara hardcast on turn four with Karakas still untapped is usually a superior play to Mangara on turn three using Karakas for mana.
1. How does the Mangara soft lock work?
You tap him and return him with Karakas or "flicker" him from play with the Flickerwisp while his ability is on the stack. He will remove a permanent from the game and not himself if he is off the battlefield when his ability resolves. Do not tap Mangara and ask "OK?". You have to respond with the unsummon or flicker effect before you ask for a response or a savvy opponent will simply do nothing and you will not get a chance to.
2. If you are removing mana sources, do it on your own turn whenever possible.
3. If you are trying to maximize instead, consider something like this:
-a. block a Nimble Mongoose
-b. tap to remove an attacking Tarmogoyf from the game
-c. use Karakas or Flickerwisp to circumvent Mangara removing himself from the game

Flickerwisp-
Vial it in to save Mangara or from itself
2. Hardcast it to "untap" one of your creatures after combat.
3. Vial it in to "Port" an opponent's land on their upkeep or (even better) at your own end of turn step.
4. Hardcast it targeting your own land to make it essentially only cost two mana.
5. Hardcast it to remove a blocker.
6. Vial it in to prevent an opposing creature from attacking for a turn.
7. Vial it in to take out Counterbalance so you can cast a spell.
8. Vial it in to counter a removal spell from your opponent.
9. Vial it in to temporarily remove Standstill.
10. Hardcast it to make a Phyrexian Dreadnought look silly.
11. Hardcast it removing Vial, Chalice, or Engineered Explosives to remove all counters. {snicker}
12. Hardcast it targeting Stoneforge Mystic to get extra equipment.
13. Hardcast it targeting another Flickerwisp to have the other Flickerwisp remove a permanent for the entire next turn.
14. Vial it in to rescue your chump blocker.
15. Hardcast it to switch your Phyrexian Revoker, Oblivion Ring, Runed Halo, or Leonin Relic-Warder from one target to another.
16. Hardcast it to essentially take out a Mox Diamond (or Chrome Mox).
17. Hardcast it to "rebirth" a germ token by targeting an unequipped Batterskull.
18. Vial it in to abuse the hell out of Oblivion Ring.
Here's how:

a. Cast Oblivion Ring.
b. With it's exile trigger on the stack (targeting, say, a Siege-Gang Commander), activate Aether Vial.

stack = 1. exile SGC (O-ring trigger) 2. Vial activation

c. Vial resolves. Vial in the Flickerwisp. Put its ability on the stack targeting your own Oblivion Ring.

stack = 1. exile SGC 2. exile O-ring (wisp trigger)

d. Flickerwisp's ability resolves exiling Oblivion Ring. Oblivion Ring's second ability goes on the stack.

stack = 1. exile SGC 2. return SGC (O-ring trigger)

e. Oblivion Ring's second ability resolves, returning the Siege-Gang Commander to the battlefield, which, of course never left in the first place - so nothing happens.

stack = 1. exile SGC

f. Oblivion Ring's first ability then resolves, exiling Siege-Gang Commander permanently (since the return trigger already resolved).
g. At the beginning of your end step, Flickerwisp's delayed trigger returns Oblivion Ring to the battlefield, exiling another nonland permanent as normal.

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben-
1. Like Mangara, Thalia can be returned to your hand simply by tapping Karakas at any time.
2. Thalia has first strike, so she can deal combat damage and be returned to hand before receiving damage. With a Sword of Fire and Ice that means that she can inflict up to six points of damage and not take damage in return.
3. If she is carrying a Jitte, she can deal combat damage, get counters on the Jitte, and use them before any other creatures deal damage. She could use the counters to buff her defense before that attacker deals damage or deal additional damage to kill the attacker before it deals its damage back to her. She can even use the counters to kill a different attacker before it deals its damage. Or you can gain four life before taking combat damage to your life total, which is a weakness of Jitte used with other creatures.

11

Deck Comments / Re: Legacy Pox - Comments

« on: June 16, 2014, 11:12:39 am »

This deck is a control deck. It seeks to choke off all of your opponent's resources, leaving them with no cards in hand, no creatures in play and no lands in play. Sufficed to say, if both players are topdecking you've done well. The best part is, most of the removal isn't targeted, but instead makes them sacrifice, meaning that any abilities like protection, indestructible, etc, become completely useless.The deck works because there is so much mana efficiency in legacy. Sometimes, destroying just one or two lands can lock them out of the game completely.
 And a lot of the time decks will rely on key threats that are easily dealt with when you have a deck designed to kill everything. You will not win quickly, or even as quickly as a control deck normally would. A lot of the time you can just beat down with nether spirit or target them with cursed scroll turn after turn until the opponent's life is 0. This deck, however, also runs tomb of urami, which can also pull out a slightly quicker game if need be.

Discard

Inquisition of Kozilek-
This is a necessary evil for the deck. It's a 1 for 1, so it's not the most efficient spell, but it saves you from fast combo decks that can kill on turn 1 and often gives you a turn 1 play that makes life difficult for your opponent.

Hymn to Tourarch-
This is a legacy staple for a reason. Besides being a 2 for 1 it doesn't even give your opponent a coice about which cards to discard, and it only costs 2. It's efficient, powerful discard. And often you'll fin that it helps you beat your opponant through sheer quantity of cards.

Liliana of the Veil-
This card is going to come up a lot, but in the discard capacity it's pretty powerful. If not dealt with it makes them have to play their cards quickly or risk loosing them, which often isn't possible when this deck has so much land destruction. If your opponent is topdecking against liliana they'll find that, turn after turn they're forced to give up their card because they simply can't play it, and if they do play it, it's likely to get killed anyway. Meanwhile, you have plenty of redundant cards to discard, and in some cases it can even be useful (like discarding nether spirit). But even if you do have to discard useful cards, you are more likely to draw removal, discard and land destruction than anything else, so you can generally deal with any threats.

Removal

Innocent Blood-
1 cost removal that takes care of any creature regardless of protection. Absurdly good, especially against decks that run Emrakul.

Liliana of the Veil-
Liliana is basically a recurring innocent blood that only applies to your opponent. It makes Liliana fairly hard to deal with, especially when your opponent's plan is to attack it to death,

Cursed Scroll-
Although this is mainly in the deck as a slow but reliable way to deal damage to your opponent, it also can be used to pick off small creatures that your opponent draws into in the late game.

Land Destruction

Wasteland-
A zero cost, uncounterable card that destroys any nonbasic land, can be discarded for mox diamond if need be, and taps for mana. Sure, this card can be redundant if your opponent has a lot of basic lands, but in a majority of cases it is awesome.

Sinkhole-
If we could, we'd run 8 watelands, but we can't. Besides which this card fills some nice gaps and prevents the opponent from trying to lock you off with basic lands.

All of the Above

Pox-
The reason this deck was created. Since the printing of Liliana of the Veil, a lot fewer decks run this now, but I see no reason not to. This card simply obliterates any opponent who tries to stockpile their cards. The more cards you have, the more you end up loosing. Keep in mind that the amount they sacrifice is rounded up, which can very often be used to your advantage. Ie: if they have four lands and you have 3, they have to sacrifice 2 lands and you only have to sacrifice 1.

Smallpox-
This card is run far more often than pox because it's a bit cheaper, and the reason why we have four of it should be obvious. Similar to Pox, kills one of everything and fills any gaps in the deck. It's the all purpose card that ties up all the loose ends.

Mass Removal

Night of Soul's Betrayal-
Pretty good as a means of dealing with tokens of any kind, also kills most good utility creatures, and if it doesn't kill them, it makes them weak enough to not be able to kill you as quickly.

Engineered Plague-
A cheaper, more targeted Night of Soul's betrayal. It also deals with tokens fairly well. Plus, if you have engineered plague and Night of soul's Betrayal out at the same time, it won't kill your Nether Spirit unless you name “spirit” with engineered plague.

Threats
Pox doesn't need many threats, but it does need a couple so it can actually win the game.

Cursed Scroll-
When both players are topdecking it's guaranteed to hit every time. Kill your opponent slowly, 2 points at a time.

Nether Spirit-
A recurring threat. You only run one creature in this deck so there's no chance of it not coming back. It can block larger creatures time and time again and it will come back each time. And when your opponent runs out of things to do, you can just keep attacking with it until they lose all their life.

Tomb of Urami-
A bigger threat that ends the game fast. When it's not a creature it's a land that taps for black mana, so it won't every be useless. Just keep in mind the drawback of sacrificing your lands, and only use it if you're certain your opponent can't deal with it.

Ramp

Because this deck has a lot of cards that cost more than one, you need some mana ramp to get your control cards out sooner.

Dark Ritual-
The classic black ramp card. Allows you to play turn 1 Liliana of the Veil, which pretty much locks down the game by itself. It also allows you to fairly easily cast any spell except Night of Soul's Betrayal.

Mox Diamond-
Not only does this allow you to ramp mana, and, for instance, play a turn 1 Hymn to Tourarch,  but it also has a lot of other functions. You can play it and a wasteland to potentially kill a land and play inquisition of kozilek or innocent blood. But most importantly, this card is unnaffected by pox. Thus, even when both players are sacrificign land after land, you can still develop your mana base and cast bigger spells. It works especially well with Tomb of Urami.

Sideboard

Leyline of the Void, Surgical Extraction, Tormod's Crypt-
I'll be blunt, dredge is the worst matchup for this deck. Your discard cards actually help them and a lot of the time they don't care about lands. The generate too many zombie tokens for this deck to deal with. So you need as much graveyard hate as you can get.

Spinning Darkness-
There will be times when you need targeted removal. This removal happens to be free. Just make sure you don't exile a nether spirit.

Pithing Needle-
Useful in a lot of situations, but mainly against charbelcher.

Infest-
Another way to deal with dredge (if your desperate) can be to kill all of their tokens. This card is pretty good at that, it also kills a lot of good creatures, especially if you already have Night of Soul's Betrayal.

12

Deck Comments / Re: Junk Depths - Comments

« on: June 16, 2014, 09:14:29 am »

This deck is a combination of combo, junk (ie: WGB creatures) and utility.

Combo
Dark Depths + Thespian's stage. Thespian's stage copies Dark Depths but has no counters on it and is thus immediately sacrificed to put a 20/20 indestructible flying token into play.

Junk Creatures
Knight of the Reliquary-
Knight of the Reliquary does everything in this deck. It searches out lands for the combo and other utility lands, but a lot of the time is big enough (usually at least a 4/4, more often a 6/6 or 8/8) to beat down and win the game.

Dark Confidant-
Because of the high amount of lands and Mox Diamond, Dark Confidant is a very useful draw spell. It helps search for key cards and gives an edge against control or tempo decks that rely on having more cards than you. Plus, it can often beat down if need be.

Deathrite shaman-
Deathrite Shaman gains life, accelerates mana and just acts really well as a turn 1 play. ramping into Knight of the reliquary on turn 2 is pretty rewarding and it's also nice to have a card that can interact with an opponent's graveyard.

Mana Ramp
Mox Diamond-
This not only dumps lands in the graveyard for Knight of the Reliquary, but also allows us to make amazing turn 1 plays. Chalice of the void, Dark Confidant, Sylvan Library or Living Wish on turn 1 usually puts us in a very good position.

Draw Cards + Tutor Cards
Sylvan Library-
Besides dark confidant, Sylvan library is our other draw card. We can't run sensei's divining top because of chalice of the void (see below). And most of the time, despite being slower, it gets us more cards, more easily, without having to pay recurring mana.

Green Sun's Zenith-
This is only a 1 of, because we don't have that many green creatures for it to fetch, but it is very useful. It can fetch dryad arbour to ramp, it can fetch deathrite shaman or scavenging ooze if you have graveyard problems, and it can fetch Knight of the Reliquary if you need more combo pieces. Also note, against combo decks it can fetch gaddock teeg to stop their kill card.

Living Wish-
This card is what makes this deck good. You'll have to look at the “wishboard” section below to see why, but sufficed to say it gives you answers to anything, and finds your combo pieces.

Disruption and Removal

Chalice of the Void-
The fact is, this deck is not fast. The combo can be a turn 4 kill, but that's often the case. So we need ways to disrupt faster decks. And one of the best ways is Chalice of the Void on 1. Against combo decks this stops dark ritual, entomb, and high tide. Against tempo it stops pretty much all of their draw cards (ponder, brainstorm) as well as delver of secrets and all the ways they would kill our dark depths token (ie: swords to plowshares). You can ramp into this with mox diamond a fair amount of the time and you'd be surprised how big an impact it can have. Of course there is a downside, it counters our Deathrite Shaman. But if you play Cavern of Souls naming elf, the Deathrite Shaman can be cast anyway because it becomes uncounterable. You generally don't want to Chalice for 2 though. It shuts down far too many of your options and I would only recommend it in extreme circumstances.

Abrupt Decay-
The (almost) unstoppable removal spell. This is just a card that gets rid of any pesky problems without fear of it being countered. Of course, the card was originally designed against counterbalance, but it has many applications beyond that. A majority of cards in legacy have a converted mana cost of 3 or less, and this card can hit almost any of them.

Vindicate-
But when that fails, vindicate can generally take care of it. Vindicate is a safety net against any deck that cheats out a big creature. It also kills lands, giving you an answer to Karakas when you're trying to put out a toke.

Maelstrom pulse-
Similar to vindicate but it can't kill lands. What it can do is kill tokens, and lots of them. Good against dredge (if they manage to get through your graveyard hate and put out a bunch of tokens) and good against charbelcher  if they go to their plan B of playing empty the warrens.

Diabolic edict-
But when none of the above removal spells are good enough. When, say, the creature has protection or hexproof. This card can deal with it. Very good against True name nemesis, but also against decks that cheat out Emrakul.

Utility

Wasteland-
This card is the standard land removal card in legacy. It pumps knight of the reliquary, gives fodder to deathrite shaman, and can be fetched with knight of the reliquary and living wish. It can generally kill most trouble lands and if a deck runs a lot of non-basics (which most legacy decks do) it can often cut decks off a mana source completely. So why only run 2 in the main deck and one in the sideboard. Well, the fact is we have 7 ways to search for it, so there isn't really that big a need to have 4 in the main deck, or even three in the main deck. Plus we have a lot of lands that don't add mana or only add colourless mana, so it's good to have fewer so we don't get mana screwed.

Cavern of Souls-
Your best answer to any deck that runs counter cards. If you name human: knight of the reliquary, dark confidant and thalia guardian of thraben become uncounterable. In the sideboard, orzhov pontiff and ethersworn canonist also become uncounterable. However, you can often just name a type based on the situation you're in and it will work fairly effectively.

Karakas-
Protects thalia and gaddock teeg if need be. However, more than that, it defends you against decks that cheat out emrakul.

Sejiri Steppe-
Most of the time this card has one purpose and one purpose only, to protect your 20/20 token from removal and make it unblockable if your opponent has flying creatures. It can be fetched with knight of the reliquary at instant speed.

Dryad Abrour-
Mainly in there to be fetched with Green Sun's Zenith, but also can be used as a chump blocker then sacked with knight of the reliquary.

Gaddock Teeg-
Protects you against combo decks like storm and high tide as it often stops their kill card.

Thalia, Guradian of Thraben-
This card is nuts. It slows down fast combos and makes ramp cards almost redundant. It also cripples tempo decks if they don't have a way to deal with it as they now have to pay for all their free counter spells, and it makes their draw cards much less efficient (who would want to pay 2 for a ponder). If you make it uncounterable with cavern of souls it can be very hard to deal with.

Scavenging Ooze-
Graveyard hate and a big beater if need be. The life gain is useful too.

Wishboard

Finally, the most versatile and useful part of the deck, Living Wish can fetch you any of these cards whenever you need them.

Knight of the Reliquary, Thespian's Stage, Dark Depths-
Helps to complete your combo.

Wasteland-
See above explanation.

Maze of Ith-
Protects you from any deck that cheats out one or two big creatures. It can also be used in combo with knight of the reliquary to allow it to attack and use its tap ability. This is because, you can use Maze of Ith on a creature after the damage has been dealt, meaning the damage still goes through but the creature becomes untapped.

Bojuka Bog-
Your all purpose graveyard hate. Easy to fetch and highly effective against dredge, reanimator and tin fins.

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben-
See above.

Gaddock Teeg-
See above.

Orzhov Pontiff-
Your mass removal. Incredibly useful against elves and charbelcher's goblin strategy. Also very good against unflipped delver, true name nemesis and young pyromancer and a whole heap of really good creatures. But it does kill our dark confidants, so be careful.

Quasali Pridemage-
Useful against things like counterbalance, but also any sort of lock down cards. The exalted can come in handy too.

Yixilid Jailer-
Anti-dredge. I wouldn't call it graveyard hate because it doesn't do much against reanimator, but it just kills dredge.

13

Deck Comments / Re: Doomsday (Hard) - Comments

« on: April 21, 2014, 05:47:10 am »

This may be stupid of me, but I'm just wondering what the kill condition of this deck is? I've always been interested in doomsday decks but a lot of the time I'm not sure how they win.

14

Deck Comments / Re: Altar of Melira - Comments

« on: April 12, 2014, 02:32:36 am »

You might want to look into viscera seer, it's a really cheap card that let's you sacrifice as many times as you want (ie: infinite life with kitchen finks) and it lets you easily search for kill cards.

15

Deck Comments / Re: BUG Control - Comments

« on: February 14, 2014, 12:51:19 am »

It's just that, a majority of the time I've seen shadow of doubt used, it tries to stop a fetchland working (leaving them with one less land) or potentially stopping a stoneforge mystic trigger, and stifle can stop both of those things. Beyond that, I feel like shadow of doubt works better in the sideboard against combo decks like storm that use infernal tutor to search up their combo piece.