A couple of hott and scientific Legacy Top 8s posted over on DeckCheck.
FRENCH DRAGON STOMPY
The first is supposedly the biggest non-Wizards Legacy event, Bazaar de Moxen, with 474 players, and wouldn't you know it but Dragon Stompy took it home. The build is fairly boilerplate, with one exception.
The deck contains zero Arc-Sloggers.
In its stead, the player is running 4x Taurean Mauler.
People have complained about consistency issues and inbuilt non-bos in Dragon Stompy since its inception. Seriously, casting Arc-Slogger is hhhaaaarrrrddd when more than 20% of your lands destroy themselves as soon as you play more land.
At the same time, having Arc-Slogger trapped in your hand cold sucks when a gangster wants to get hellbent and eat face with his Pit-Dargon.
Sometimes you can't even imprint the Slogger to Chrome Mox due to your own Trinisphere. Next thing you realize, you're 24, so even if Chuck-E-Cheese wasn't bankrupt, your mom STILL wouldn't take you there to cheer your sad ass up.
What I'm saying is sometimes Dragon Stompy makes it difficult to win with Dragon Stompy.
After James Mink made Top 4 at GP: Chicago, he wrote that Jitte was largely unnecessary, except against tribal aggro. Mink played an insurance mountain (read: one extra beyond the prescribed ten) which probably helped him resolve Arc-Slogger when it mattered. So why the hell would Mink need Jitte when his library is face up and the opposing team is full of holes? No wonder he found it unnecessary.
By contrast, with no Slogger, the European version probably NEEDS Jitte, in order to sling -1/-1 counters across the board and get better mileage out of its ponderous 12 - Twelve! - gray ogres. Sixteen if you count the Raiders as 2/2 for (3), really.
Ugr Faerie Fish
Anyway, in the same event was a beautiful Ugr aggro/control deck.
12 Creatures: 2 Cloud of Faeries, 2 Ninja of the Deep Hours, 4 Tarmogoyf, 4 Spellstutter Sprite.
26 Spells: 4 Brainstorm, 3 Daze, 2 Fire/Ice, 3 Lightning Bolt, 4 Force of Will, 3 Spell Snare, 3 Stifle, 3 Standstill, 1 Crucible of Worlds.
22 Land: 3 Polluted Delta, 2 Flooded Strand, 4 Mishra's Factory, 3 Wasteland, 1 Mutavault, 3 Tropical Island, 3 Volanic Island, 2 Island, 1 Breeding Pool.
Basically this looks to me like a mix between Tempo Thresh/R and NinjaStill, except unlike NinjaStill it probably actually fucking works.
Synergies I like about this deck:
- Crucible-Wastelock.
- Cloud of Faeries into Standstill.
- Spellstutter Sprite into Ninja of the Deep, now I'm holding Spellstutter Sprite again!
- Fire + Goyf > Opposing Goyf.
And the deck boards Shackles and Threads just to be certain it drinks other Goyfs' milkshakes.
It also boards one random Misdirection, which I like to imagine spent the day puking in opponents' shoes and cancelling their credit cards while they were on the phone with their dads. That is to say, I like to imagine the Misdirection was like the gift of an unwanted cat, or a 17-year-old roommate.
Lorescale Coatl
Now we move to the other Top 8, a humble (by comparison) 42-man in Madrid.
I've been waiting patiently to start seeing Thresh variants with Lorescale Coatl, which appears similiar to Quirion Dryad, except that the Coatl is a Binford nailgun to the Dryad's Swingline stapler. Hell, even the added U in the casting cost is awesome; now it pitches to Force of Will! Hey great!
I will admit I'm a little puzzled by the inclusion of Price of Progress in the board here. I thought the opponent in this match-up would be eager to board POP in, since it likely Sixes the Coatl player, but I guess in the right situation, if one of the fetches you crack goes for a basic island, then you Eight the other guy when it matters. Get there?
Variants on the last two decks:
Much of the remainder of that Spanish Top 8 is variations on the above two ideas. Lots more decks with Tarmogoyf and Fire/Ice and either Lorescale Coatl or Spellstutter Sprite. Vendilion Clique seems to find room either way; I'm sure bottoming Fire/Ice was sauce in the semis.
I suspect if the Stifle/Wasteland tempo package is this successful in the Spanish meta, Dragon Stompy players must come out in force. But then, the red removal package shines there - Mountains/schmountains! Lightning Bolt and Fire still kill Magus of the Moon just fine.
And stuff...
omfg i wanna play wilt-leaf liege in standard even more than usual lately.
D-Po out.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Friday, May 8, 2009
NinjaStill: Drawing Cards is Not Enough
So last night Ryan and I approximated the mono-blue ninja deck for some Legacy shenanigans.
It went about like this:
Creatures - 22 - 3 Ornithopter, 3 Mothdust Changeling, 3 Mistblade Shinobi, 3 Looter il-Kor, 4 Ninja of the Deep Hours, 4 Spellstutter Sprite, 2 Trinket Mage.
Spells - 18 - 2 Umezawa's Jitte, 1 Shuriken, 1 Relic of Progenitus, 4 Force of Will, 3 Spell Snare, 3 Stifle, 4 Standstill.
Land - 20 - 4 Mutavault, 1 Tolaria West, 1 Riptide Laboratory, 1 Wasteland, 1 Seat of Synod, 12 Islands.
We tested it about five games apiece against Team America, Aggro Loam, and Enchantress.
It was not very good. At least, after turn 5 or so it was basically shitty, on the balance.
The deck draws a lot of cards, and that is swell. However, most of the cards it draws just cause it to draw more cards.
Granted, this is not always a terrible strategy. A deck like Threshold plays 12 or so cantrips, only a handful of creatures and counters, and what would appear to be nowhere near enough land - like 17.
Threshold just uses the cantrips as a consistency engine, maximizing card quality while filling its graveyard for profit. The few creatures, counters and removal spells it plays are all top-notch - Goyf, FOW and Swords to Plowshares - and because it sculpts its hand so perfectly, the deck doesn't have to screw around with inferior filler spells.
This does not work with the ninja deck. In part I think this is because unlike Thresh, the deck has no means of filtering its draws. In part I think also it's because the creatures do not present a scary clock or even come close trading with Goyf, barring an active Jitte. Last but not least, Mistblade Shinobi is cute, but once the opponent re-plays his fatty and can block, his utility plummets.
Most games started with Ryan doing his best to keep me off Standstill. He was never happy when it resolved, and I would usually get in for 8 or 10 damage in the early turns, between Thopter-dropping Ninja of the Deep, and Spellstutter Sprite and Looter-il-Kor getting in for a few points. Somewhere in there I might Force of Will a Pernicious Deed or Spell Snare a Dark Confidant, whatever.
Once I ran out of counters, Ryan would resolve a Tarmogoyf and my ninjas would become useless. Messy combat would ensue and usually I would not draw enough threats to push through the final few points.
So. Scratch that off my list of decks to try, and file it under "danger of cool things."
In other news: Dreadstill + Elspeth = Red Bull gives this giant robotic worm from hell WIIIIIINNNGGSSSSSS..... (because the planeswalker makes the Dreadnought fly for extra win).
Still to come: Zur! The Enchanter. Plus: T2 - Dark Bant, without the dark?
It went about like this:
Creatures - 22 - 3 Ornithopter, 3 Mothdust Changeling, 3 Mistblade Shinobi, 3 Looter il-Kor, 4 Ninja of the Deep Hours, 4 Spellstutter Sprite, 2 Trinket Mage.
Spells - 18 - 2 Umezawa's Jitte, 1 Shuriken, 1 Relic of Progenitus, 4 Force of Will, 3 Spell Snare, 3 Stifle, 4 Standstill.
Land - 20 - 4 Mutavault, 1 Tolaria West, 1 Riptide Laboratory, 1 Wasteland, 1 Seat of Synod, 12 Islands.
We tested it about five games apiece against Team America, Aggro Loam, and Enchantress.
It was not very good. At least, after turn 5 or so it was basically shitty, on the balance.
The deck draws a lot of cards, and that is swell. However, most of the cards it draws just cause it to draw more cards.
Granted, this is not always a terrible strategy. A deck like Threshold plays 12 or so cantrips, only a handful of creatures and counters, and what would appear to be nowhere near enough land - like 17.
Threshold just uses the cantrips as a consistency engine, maximizing card quality while filling its graveyard for profit. The few creatures, counters and removal spells it plays are all top-notch - Goyf, FOW and Swords to Plowshares - and because it sculpts its hand so perfectly, the deck doesn't have to screw around with inferior filler spells.
This does not work with the ninja deck. In part I think this is because unlike Thresh, the deck has no means of filtering its draws. In part I think also it's because the creatures do not present a scary clock or even come close trading with Goyf, barring an active Jitte. Last but not least, Mistblade Shinobi is cute, but once the opponent re-plays his fatty and can block, his utility plummets.
Most games started with Ryan doing his best to keep me off Standstill. He was never happy when it resolved, and I would usually get in for 8 or 10 damage in the early turns, between Thopter-dropping Ninja of the Deep, and Spellstutter Sprite and Looter-il-Kor getting in for a few points. Somewhere in there I might Force of Will a Pernicious Deed or Spell Snare a Dark Confidant, whatever.
Once I ran out of counters, Ryan would resolve a Tarmogoyf and my ninjas would become useless. Messy combat would ensue and usually I would not draw enough threats to push through the final few points.
So. Scratch that off my list of decks to try, and file it under "danger of cool things."
In other news: Dreadstill + Elspeth = Red Bull gives this giant robotic worm from hell WIIIIIINNNGGSSSSSS..... (because the planeswalker makes the Dreadnought fly for extra win).
Still to come: Zur! The Enchanter. Plus: T2 - Dark Bant, without the dark?
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