The meta I play is rampant with Pyromancer Ascension / Homebrew / Soul Sisters, so my sideboard was based on that. Ricochet Trap and Back to Nature in the SB and Acidic Slime in MD were all for Pyromancer hate.
The first game I found my forest getting Twitch'ed 3 turns in a row with Mana Leak, Flashfreeze, and Spell Pierce to follow the rest of the spells I tried to cast.
I tried to rely on my sideboard and Acidic Slimes to destroy the enchantment, but every time I tried to cast the spell, it was countered. With the amount of Preordain, Foresee, and Call to Minds that are cast, the counters are always there and the land drops are always hit.
Just sitting here thinking about it, the only time I can even remember the deck tapping out was to cast a Time Warp, so maybe I should have tried to cast the Back to Nature then..... maybe that was the problem.
The times I tried to get tricky and cast a Ricochet Trap proved to be useless with a Pyromancer Ascension online. Suddenly I can only counter 1 of the 2 Mana Leaks, or the Time Warp that I wanted to steal, is now two Time Warps and I can only "steal" 1 (and they get theirs before I get mine).
On my drive home, here is what I thought I could do to improve the matchup (although these are probably bad/stupid ideas)
I know from previous Valakut discussions about counters, the argument on counters was retorted "no deck plays THAT many counters". I'm finding by looking at tournament reports and decks on this website that most decks run 4-6 mainboard and after sideboarding have 10-12 (and to be fair, I did manage to win a few game 1's)
Maybe I'm just frustrated and mad. Maybe I just did stupid things tonight. Maybe my deck was janky or maybe I just had bad draws. Anyone have any ideas?
Sorry, but with all those good cards vs PA, I think you must be misplaying a lot in order to lose.
They basically have 1 win condition, that's all. Get rid of PA and you won. And there is no way on hell they leave so much open mana every turn to counter your spells AND cast their crap to activate PA.
PA gives openings all the time, they have to, otherwise it would take them for ever to do their combo and win.
I don't doubt I probably do a lot of stupid things. For example, I foolishly Harrow'ed, only to sac my land and have the spell countered.
For games 2, 3 I sided out 4 Bolts, 1 Aoz, 1 Ramp Baloths and sided in 3 Back to Nature and 3 Ricochet Traps.
It seems like all they'd do in their turns was bolt me once, use a scry spell and keep mana open for a counter (which gets worse after turn 5 or so when they have enough mana open for 2 counters, etc..
Some good deck tech for sideboard may also include Bojuka Bog. Typically a one of. I use this against Dredgevine, Knight of the Reliquary(s), and of course Pyromancer's Ascension. Also, against RDW, it can come in handy, however, I almost never really bring it in against them. I'd rather just roll them with Obstinate Baloth
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To those who say "Grave Titan > Primeval Titan"... Primeval Titan attacks, two mountains come into play 6 damage to grave titan and 3 to his 2 buddies... who wins?
I don't doubt I probably do a lot of stupid things. For example, I foolishly Harrow'ed, only to sac my land and have the spell countered.
For games 2, 3 I sided out 4 Bolts, 1 Aoz, 1 Ramp Baloths and sided in 3 Back to Nature and 3 Ricochet Traps.
It seems like all they'd do in their turns was bolt me once, use a scry spell and keep mana open for a counter (which gets worse after turn 5 or so when they have enough mana open for 2 counters, etc..
I would side in the 4 Obstinate Baloth too. That way you lower your mana curve, gain some life, put some early presume and you can even bait an early ST.
I think that's the best you can do with your deck. Btw, I hate KHE as a 3 of, either go 4 of or 0.
Remember BtN is instant, abuse that, play all your instants spells in his turn if possible, that way you force them to use their mana in the wrong turns.
if you play it right, in most cases, a PA deck will tap out for a Timewarp before they have PA activated, so they can activate it with another Timewarp and start their combo, that's when you want to steal their Timewarp with ricochet trap. make sure you leave 1 open red mana for their turn 5.
I really wanted to work in Gaea's Revenge into the sideboard when I was building the deck, but came to the conclusion the rest of the cards in there were strictly better (guess not, huh?)
3rd summoning trap would probably help, I was unhappy with 2 but ran into the problem of not wanting to cut any of the cards I had.
You're absolutely right about 14 green sources of green. I took out 2 Expedition Maps and guess it never really clicked that they were forest tutors as well (although I do groan when I have to use it for that purpose)
Jund is dying at my meta, like I'm sure it is everywhere else, but a Jund deck did come in 2nd place tonight. There's always a few people who play red decks, but it usually falls on the side of homebrew decks opposed to RDW or even Goblins. I'd 75% comfortable with taking out Obstinate Baloth from my SB.
@String
I'm really tempted to SB 1 Bojuka Bog, but I'm sure if you asked me tomorrow against it, I'd be against it. Seems like for every pro argument for it, you could make a con argument against it.
@Deimos
I actually considered siding in Obstinate Baloth but came to the conclusion that getting 4 life doesn't help too much for the recurring Lightning Bolt for 6. To be honest, I didn't consider the converted mana cost when I thought of that though.
I originally had in the deck 1 more Inferno Titan and 1 less KHE and at the last minute talked myself into the change in order to guarantee more T2 ramp.
One of the main problems I have in playing Magic is I tend to use Instants at Sorcery Speed. I'm working on this, I promise.
PA is one of valakut's worst match up. Especially the polymorph variant. The best way to handle PA is to attack their graveyard with bojuka bog or relic of progenitus together with back to nature.
PA is one of valakut's worst match up. Especially the polymorph variant. The best way to handle PA is to attack their graveyard with bojuka bog or relic of progenitus together with back to nature.
Not at all. Pyromancer's is really is to beat because it's such a fragile deck. You just have to understand its fundamentals flaws and weaknesses and exploit them. PA is the only way this deck wins, get rid of that or get rid of their GY and you win. Naya and Bant seem to be my toughest match ups.
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To those who say "Grave Titan > Primeval Titan"... Primeval Titan attacks, two mountains come into play 6 damage to grave titan and 3 to his 2 buddies... who wins?
never lost to it, and it's not a bad matchup at all statistically or theoretically. Your goal is to hit a threat on turn 4-5, and if they counter it you trap. They take their turn and then you untap and win.
after boarding you improve greatly, as their strategy changes from goldfishing to trying to counter most of your stuff... and that doesn't really work for UW so why would it for Ascension?
Naya is a near bye also. They're simply not fast enough.
Mythic bant is a bad matchup, as well as RDW. That's it. Everything else is 50/50 or better, including mono green eldrazi.
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For reference, here's what I ran tonight:
4 Forest
12 Mountain
4 Evolving Wilds
3 Terramorphic Expanse
4 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
Creatures
4 Primeval Titan
1 Inferno Titan
2 Avenger of Zendikar
2 Acidic Slime
2 Rampaging Baloths
2 Summoning Trap
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Khalni Heart Expedition
4 Rampant Growth
2 Explore
4 Cultivate
3 Harrow
2 All is Dust
3 Pyroclasm
4 Obstinate Baloth
3 Ricochet Trap
3 Back to Nature
The meta I play is rampant with Pyromancer Ascension / Homebrew / Soul Sisters, so my sideboard was based on that. Ricochet Trap and Back to Nature in the SB and Acidic Slime in MD were all for Pyromancer hate.
The first game I found my forest getting Twitch'ed 3 turns in a row with Mana Leak, Flashfreeze, and Spell Pierce to follow the rest of the spells I tried to cast.
I tried to rely on my sideboard and Acidic Slimes to destroy the enchantment, but every time I tried to cast the spell, it was countered. With the amount of Preordain, Foresee, and Call to Minds that are cast, the counters are always there and the land drops are always hit.
Just sitting here thinking about it, the only time I can even remember the deck tapping out was to cast a Time Warp, so maybe I should have tried to cast the Back to Nature then..... maybe that was the problem.
The times I tried to get tricky and cast a Ricochet Trap proved to be useless with a Pyromancer Ascension online. Suddenly I can only counter 1 of the 2 Mana Leaks, or the Time Warp that I wanted to steal, is now two Time Warps and I can only "steal" 1 (and they get theirs before I get mine).
On my drive home, here is what I thought I could do to improve the matchup (although these are probably bad/stupid ideas)
- Maindeck Back to Nature or Naturalize.
- Splash Black / Thought Hemorrhage
- SB 4 Back to Nature instead of 3
- Try to figure out a way to get UU to splash Telemin Performance
- Sideboard Runeflare Trap
- Bojuka Bog
- Leyline of the Void
I know from previous Valakut discussions about counters, the argument on counters was retorted "no deck plays THAT many counters". I'm finding by looking at tournament reports and decks on this website that most decks run 4-6 mainboard and after sideboarding have 10-12 (and to be fair, I did manage to win a few game 1's)
Maybe I'm just frustrated and mad. Maybe I just did stupid things tonight. Maybe my deck was janky or maybe I just had bad draws. Anyone have any ideas?
They basically have 1 win condition, that's all. Get rid of PA and you won. And there is no way on hell they leave so much open mana every turn to counter your spells AND cast their crap to activate PA.
PA gives openings all the time, they have to, otherwise it would take them for ever to do their combo and win.
How do you SB btw?
For games 2, 3 I sided out 4 Bolts, 1 Aoz, 1 Ramp Baloths and sided in 3 Back to Nature and 3 Ricochet Traps.
It seems like all they'd do in their turns was bolt me once, use a scry spell and keep mana open for a counter (which gets worse after turn 5 or so when they have enough mana open for 2 counters, etc..
More summoning trap might help. They have to counter acidic slime, and when they do... well... having the trap is good.
1x bajuka bog wouldn't hurt much I do not think. Spreading seas ascension maybe... And if you do that I would go Thought Hemmorage.
If people aren't playing jund or mono red, you can cut the baloth from your board. Sub-optimal in every other matchup basically.
You also don't run enough green sources in my opinion. I run 14.
I would side in the 4 Obstinate Baloth too. That way you lower your mana curve, gain some life, put some early presume and you can even bait an early ST.
+ 3 Ricochet Traps
+ 3 Back to Nature
+ 4 Obstinate Baloth
- 4 LB
- 2 Avenger
- 2 Rampaging Baloths
- 2 Harrow
I think that's the best you can do with your deck. Btw, I hate KHE as a 3 of, either go 4 of or 0.
Remember BtN is instant, abuse that, play all your instants spells in his turn if possible, that way you force them to use their mana in the wrong turns.
if you play it right, in most cases, a PA deck will tap out for a Timewarp before they have PA activated, so they can activate it with another Timewarp and start their combo, that's when you want to steal their Timewarp with ricochet trap. make sure you leave 1 open red mana for their turn 5.
I really wanted to work in Gaea's Revenge into the sideboard when I was building the deck, but came to the conclusion the rest of the cards in there were strictly better (guess not, huh?)
3rd summoning trap would probably help, I was unhappy with 2 but ran into the problem of not wanting to cut any of the cards I had.
You're absolutely right about 14 green sources of green. I took out 2 Expedition Maps and guess it never really clicked that they were forest tutors as well (although I do groan when I have to use it for that purpose)
Jund is dying at my meta, like I'm sure it is everywhere else, but a Jund deck did come in 2nd place tonight. There's always a few people who play red decks, but it usually falls on the side of homebrew decks opposed to RDW or even Goblins. I'd 75% comfortable with taking out Obstinate Baloth from my SB.
@String
I'm really tempted to SB 1 Bojuka Bog, but I'm sure if you asked me tomorrow against it, I'd be against it. Seems like for every pro argument for it, you could make a con argument against it.
@Deimos
I actually considered siding in Obstinate Baloth but came to the conclusion that getting 4 life doesn't help too much for the recurring Lightning Bolt for 6. To be honest, I didn't consider the converted mana cost when I thought of that though.
I originally had in the deck 1 more Inferno Titan and 1 less KHE and at the last minute talked myself into the change in order to guarantee more T2 ramp.
One of the main problems I have in playing Magic is I tend to use Instants at Sorcery Speed. I'm working on this, I promise.
Not at all. Pyromancer's is really is to beat because it's such a fragile deck. You just have to understand its fundamentals flaws and weaknesses and exploit them. PA is the only way this deck wins, get rid of that or get rid of their GY and you win. Naya and Bant seem to be my toughest match ups.
after boarding you improve greatly, as their strategy changes from goldfishing to trying to counter most of your stuff... and that doesn't really work for UW so why would it for Ascension?
Naya is a near bye also. They're simply not fast enough.
Mythic bant is a bad matchup, as well as RDW. That's it. Everything else is 50/50 or better, including mono green eldrazi.