a friend of mine has a blue/black fairy deck that has been pretty impossible to beat. I've done a little reading and I know that it can be done. The problem lies in Budget. The only thing I've come across is a pretty cheap Goblin deck that somebody claims can beat fairies. That's cool, but I don't really want to play Goblins. I think elves might be able to do it, but I don't want to play elves either.
Is there a way I can beat a fairy deck with say mono green beasts or black/green beasts or something like that? The colors I most like to play are black, green, and white. I'm willing to play any combination of those colors, though I like green the most. Maybe a G/B/W deck?
What are my options? I'm not sure this is possible because I don't want to spend over $50-$70 on this deck, but I thought I would ask anyway.
I don't remember everything my friend is running, but I know he has 4x cryptic command. I also know he has mistbind clique, Thoughtseize, Go for the Throat, Faerie Miscreant. I cannot remember what else, but pretty much a ton of cards that can counter spells. There's one that can tap all of my lands. It's brutal.
Any thoughts? How about something like this? This isn't much, but it's late here and I'm headed to bed.
So you're building strictly a counter deck to his while disregarding how it works against anything else?
Your choices of creatures would definitely be hard to interact with for him, but they are subpar and slow. His fairies will just swarm the field. Skylasher is a good choice though.
Honestly I would just sit back on a bunch of cheap removal spells like Disfigure and stuff like Golgari Charm and Night of Souls' Betrayal. Fairies are super fragile so you got to take advantage of that.
The other way is to make a quick White Weenie deck. All your creatures will cost 1 or 2 CMC and be too quick to swarm the field to a point that he can't really deal with it himself. Just be faster than him.
Toolbox decks with minister of pain are quite strong once they land 2-4 fae you can clean them up. There is also a BW dude with haunt that does this but I can remember the name.
Aside from a handful of cards the deck doesn't have access to much lifegain, so burn is typically rough for them. Many of those cards are also newer.
pucatrade
big receipts
alpha mox emerald
beta time walk
4 goyfs received
3 liliana of the veil
4 karn liberated
3 force of will
4 grove of the burnwillows
snapcaster mage
3 horizon canopy
2 full art damnation
Honestly I would just sit back on a bunch of cheap removal spells like Disfigure and stuff like Golgari Charm and Night of Souls' Betrayal. Fairies are super fragile so you got to take advantage of that.
Depends on whether he's playing 4 Scion of Oona, which he can easily do if you make a dedicated anti-Faerie deck relying on -1/-1 effects.
Only if you want to maybe beat his deck and lose to just about everything else.
YES. I want to build a deck that can beat his deck only. I have plenty of other decks that I play that work for all sorts of gameplay. Right now, I'm just looking for something that can possibly beat him.
Woah. Pretty sure he's running most of the cards you talk about here. Am I screwed? He hardly loses games and the only time I remember him losing was ONCE to a dude playing Goblins. I'd really love to beat him using something other than Goblins Or Elves. Although, I'd take Elves over Goblins. Something else that's not too hard on the wallet, I'd consider too.
Honestly I would just sit back on a bunch of cheap removal spells like Disfigure and stuff like Golgari Charm and Night of Souls' Betrayal. Fairies are super fragile so you got to take advantage of that.
Depends on whether he's playing 4 Scion of Oona, which he can easily do if you make a dedicated anti-Faerie deck relying on -1/-1 effects.
You're focusing too much on his countermagic, but a modern-caliber fairy deck (the one you describe looks like that) has more tricks up its sleeve than just that. There's a reason why few uncounterable creatures other than Thrun, the Last Troll see play competitively. Bitterblossom is particularly bad for you without good fliers/reach. It's difficult to beat competitive decks with non-competitive ones, but the key to fairy decks is that they're very reactive. If you spam threats quickly, your opponent will have trouble keeping up, and using a lot of flash threats will force your opponent to play cards on his/her own turn. I know you want to stick to green, but spirit tribal is a great counter to fairies since it allows you to do everything your opponent does, just better. Otherwise, your best bet is to try to predict your opponent's plays to sneak threats through their countermagic. Even control decks can run out of resources, especially when put under heavy pressure.
YES. I want to build a deck that can beat his deck only. I have plenty of other decks that I play that work for all sorts of gameplay. Right now, I'm just looking for something that can possibly beat him.
OK, if your deck just needs to beat him then you can make a dedicated hate deck. Do you play with sideboards or just maindeck?
I guess RG has the best hate.
This deck would function both against Faeries and in general, but feel free to just maindeck the 8 Blasts to go heavy on hate. Use whatever manabase you can afford.
Evoking Cloudthresher is also a hilarious way to wipe his board, and you can wait to do it in response when he taps out for something. Lategame it's randomly a 7/7 win condition. Faeries hate this card.
The rest of the deck is mostly cheap aggressive threats to put pressure on his life total early. Mold Adder is hilarious when opponent is playing UB. I've never run this card before, but would be very tempted to in your deck. Other cheap aggro options include Experiment One, Hellspark Elemental, Burning-Tree Emissary, Ash Zealot.
I know you want to stick to green, but spirit tribal is a great counter to fairies since it allows you to do everything your opponent does, just better.
Awesome. Thanks for the info! I'm cool with a spirit tribal. Also, what do you think about an Eldrazi deck? Can I beat fairies this way?
Thanks! Kind of a noob question, but is it ok to have more than 4 Gruul Guildgate
Haha, no, you can only run 4 copies. And I would even run 0 copies, picking other lands instead. There are much better red-green duals, even on a budget.
I don't like posting manabases when people are on a budget. I have no idea what lands you own and what kind of duals you can afford, so that complicates it a lot. It was just a placeholder. Just play whatever lands you can get.
Also, what do you think about an Eldrazi deck? Can I beat fairies this way?
Eldrazi, and any "big spell" deck, is a bad matchup against Faeries. Decks with big creatures get outpaced by counterspells, cheap removal, and cheap flyers. You're better off beating Faeries with a more aggressive deck.
Cards like that should be reasonably priced. Because you are aggro, you don't want too many lands entering the battlefield tapped. So ones that can enter untapped sometimes (live Rootbound Crag and Game Trail) are useful. You also want some basic Mountain and basic Forest.
Going through my cards at home and I discovered that I have 4 Needle Storm. Would this be good to run as well or too expensive mana-wise?
EDIT: I guess this would be bad news for my Skylasher though.
It doesn't kill Skylasher (which has Reach, not Flying). Just like Cloudthresher doesn't kill Skylasher.
Needle Storm is 3 mana and Sorcery speed. That will make it easy for him to counter. Volcanic Fallout is the best choice, both instant speed and uncounterable (although it hurts your team, so it can be risky in a fast weenie deck). Scattershot Archer is only 1 mana, so you can often sneak it down on turn 1 before he can counter it! Something like Cloudthresher is at least an instant, so you can time it for when he is tapped out. With a sorcery effect, it is easier for him to stop you with countermagic. You could also consider stuff like Squall Line, but that costs a lot of mana.
Direct every single burn spell at him. You should kill him faster than his Faeries can put up much of an offense. Meanwhile you can shred his team away with Searing Blaze and Searing Blood and Volcanic Fallout. Each of those cards kills Faeries while also damaging him too. If shroud is too much of an issue (e.g. 4 Scion of Oona) or if he doesn't play out THAT many creatures at once, then feel free to replace some of the Searing Blazes with direct burn like Flame Rift.
I wouldn't run Fireblast just because it sucks to have that card countered.
Don't play a bad green creature deck just because its cards say "can't be countered." Even if he can't counter your stuff, he'll still have a good chance of winning, just because he plays cards that are better than yours.
Well, it is a pretty good and expensive deck. While not all expensive decks are good, all good decks eventually become expensive because more people want the cards. You can't expect to compete with that on unequal footing. The deck does have an Achilles heel (all 1 toughness) but it can still counter or make you discard the problematic cards. Unless this is the only Magic you'll ever play, your best bet is to find a cheap-but-still-competitive deck that just happens to stack up well against 1-toughness critters. An even better idea might be to just ask him to grab another deck so you can have an actual tense game.
I don't mean to steer away from this aggro idea into an entirely new idea, but I was brainstorming and if this can defeat fairies - sounds way more pleasing to me and is up my alley.
I'm not sure what type of deck this would be called, but basically it involves causing mass destruction with cards like Wrath of God, Armageddon, Day of Judgment, etc..
a friend of mine has a blue/black fairy deck that has been pretty impossible to beat. I've done a little reading and I know that it can be done. The problem lies in Budget. The only thing I've come across is a pretty cheap Goblin deck that somebody claims can beat fairies. That's cool, but I don't really want to play Goblins. I think elves might be able to do it, but I don't want to play elves either.
Is there a way I can beat a fairy deck with say mono green beasts or black/green beasts or something like that? The colors I most like to play are black, green, and white. I'm willing to play any combination of those colors, though I like green the most. Maybe a G/B/W deck?
What if I build a deck with some Great Sable Stag, Autumn's Veil, Blurred Mongoose, Gaea's Herald, Mistcutter Hydra, Scragnoth, Skylasher, Spearbreaker Behemoth, Bellowing Tanglewurm, Gilded Light, Humble Budoka, Greater Auramancy, Ivory Mask?
What are my options? I'm not sure this is possible because I don't want to spend over $50-$70 on this deck, but I thought I would ask anyway.
I don't remember everything my friend is running, but I know he has 4x cryptic command. I also know he has mistbind clique, Thoughtseize, Go for the Throat, Faerie Miscreant. I cannot remember what else, but pretty much a ton of cards that can counter spells. There's one that can tap all of my lands. It's brutal.
Any thoughts? How about something like this? This isn't much, but it's late here and I'm headed to bed.
4x Skylasher
4x Blurred Mongoose
4x Great Sable Stag
4x Isao, Enlightened Bushi
4x Mistcutter Hydra
4x Gaea's Revenge
4x Autumn's Veil
2x Abrupt Decay
Your choices of creatures would definitely be hard to interact with for him, but they are subpar and slow. His fairies will just swarm the field. Skylasher is a good choice though.
Honestly I would just sit back on a bunch of cheap removal spells like Disfigure and stuff like Golgari Charm and Night of Souls' Betrayal. Fairies are super fragile so you got to take advantage of that.
The other way is to make a quick White Weenie deck. All your creatures will cost 1 or 2 CMC and be too quick to swarm the field to a point that he can't really deal with it himself. Just be faster than him.
Standard: BG Golgari Midrange
Modern: U Merfolk GWUBR 5 Color Humans UBW Esper Gifts GW Bogles
Aside from a handful of cards the deck doesn't have access to much lifegain, so burn is typically rough for them. Many of those cards are also newer.
Any enchantments like night of soul's betrayal are hard for them to remove if they don't run something like echoing truth.
You can just go super wide, like elves, and by the time they play 1-2 spells they're in dead range.
also
decree of pain
pucatrade
big receipts
alpha mox emerald
beta time walk
4 goyfs received
3 liliana of the veil
4 karn liberated
3 force of will
4 grove of the burnwillows
snapcaster mage
3 horizon canopy
2 full art damnation
2x Minister of Pain
4x Skylasher
2x Great Sable Stag
4x Tsabo's Decree
4x Boil
4x Red Elemental Blast
4x Pyroblast
2x Engineered Plague
Sorcery
2x Sowing Salt
4x Duress
4x Hymn to Tourach
Only if you want to maybe beat his deck and lose to just about everything else.
When Faeries were dominating Standard, a few cards were printed to help combat them. The big weapons were Volcanic Fallout, Guterral Response, Scattershot Archer and Vexing Shusher. Eventually Great Sable Stag was also a thing.
You want cheap answers, especially the uncounterable or instant ones, but not jank like Tsabo's Decree or maindecking 8 red blasts.
Depends on whether he's playing 4 Scion of Oona, which he can easily do if you make a dedicated anti-Faerie deck relying on -1/-1 effects.
He could easily run something like this
4 Faerie Miscreant
4 Spellstutter Sprite
4 Scion of Oona
4 Mistbind Clique
4 Bitterblossom
//Spells: 16
4 Thoughtseize
4 Counterspell
4 Go for the Throat
4 Cryptic Command
4 Mutavault
20 Dimir Guildgate
Or more counterspells main and Scions in SB. Or more weenies main (e.g. Cloud of Faeries). Many options.
YES. I want to build a deck that can beat his deck only. I have plenty of other decks that I play that work for all sorts of gameplay. Right now, I'm just looking for something that can possibly beat him.
OK, if your deck just needs to beat him then you can make a dedicated hate deck. Do you play with sideboards or just maindeck?
I guess RG has the best hate.
This deck would function both against Faeries and in general, but feel free to just maindeck the 8 Blasts to go heavy on hate. Use whatever manabase you can afford.
4 Scattershot Archer
4 Kird Ape
4 Mold Adder
4 Skylasher
4 Vexing Shusher
4 Flinthoof Boar
4 Great Sable Stag
2 Cloudthresher
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Forked Bolt
//Lands: 22
22 Gruul Guildgate
4 Red Elemental Blast
4 Pyroblast
3 Volcanic Fallout
Scattershot Archer is just hilarious and sweeps out all those annoying 1/1s, especially Bitterblossom tokens. Great budget card.
Forked Bolt can 2-for-1 him.
Evoking Cloudthresher is also a hilarious way to wipe his board, and you can wait to do it in response when he taps out for something. Lategame it's randomly a 7/7 win condition. Faeries hate this card.
The rest of the deck is mostly cheap aggressive threats to put pressure on his life total early. Mold Adder is hilarious when opponent is playing UB. I've never run this card before, but would be very tempted to in your deck. Other cheap aggro options include Experiment One, Hellspark Elemental, Burning-Tree Emissary, Ash Zealot.
Awesome. Thanks for the info! I'm cool with a spirit tribal. Also, what do you think about an Eldrazi deck? Can I beat fairies this way?
4 Scattershot Archer
4 Kird Ape
4 Mold Adder
4 Skylasher
4 Vexing Shusher
4 Flinthoof Boar
4 Great Sable Stag
2 Cloudthresher
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Forked Bolt
//Lands: 22
22 Gruul Guildgate
4 Red Elemental Blast
4 Pyroblast
3 Volcanic Fallout
Haha, no, you can only run 4 copies. And I would even run 0 copies, picking other lands instead. There are much better red-green duals, even on a budget.
I don't like posting manabases when people are on a budget. I have no idea what lands you own and what kind of duals you can afford, so that complicates it a lot. It was just a placeholder. Just play whatever lands you can get.
Eldrazi, and any "big spell" deck, is a bad matchup against Faeries. Decks with big creatures get outpaced by counterspells, cheap removal, and cheap flyers. You're better off beating Faeries with a more aggressive deck.
Can you name a few? I'm having a hard time with the mtg search. A lot of times when I search for something it comes back with zero results.
Sure.
Cards like that should be reasonably priced. Because you are aggro, you don't want too many lands entering the battlefield tapped. So ones that can enter untapped sometimes (live Rootbound Crag and Game Trail) are useful. You also want some basic Mountain and basic Forest.
EDIT: I guess this would be bad news for my Skylasher though.
Why would it be bad news? It doesn't effect it.
Standard: BG Golgari Midrange
Modern: U Merfolk GWUBR 5 Color Humans UBW Esper Gifts GW Bogles
It doesn't kill Skylasher (which has Reach, not Flying). Just like Cloudthresher doesn't kill Skylasher.
Needle Storm is 3 mana and Sorcery speed. That will make it easy for him to counter. Volcanic Fallout is the best choice, both instant speed and uncounterable (although it hurts your team, so it can be risky in a fast weenie deck). Scattershot Archer is only 1 mana, so you can often sneak it down on turn 1 before he can counter it! Something like Cloudthresher is at least an instant, so you can time it for when he is tapped out. With a sorcery effect, it is easier for him to stop you with countermagic. You could also consider stuff like Squall Line, but that costs a lot of mana.
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Chain Lightning
4 Rift Bolt
4 Lava Spike
4 Searing Blaze
4 Searing Blood
4 Volcanic Fallout
4 Rakdos Cackler
4 Monastery Swiftspear
4 Hellspark Elemental
20 Mountain
Direct every single burn spell at him. You should kill him faster than his Faeries can put up much of an offense. Meanwhile you can shred his team away with Searing Blaze and Searing Blood and Volcanic Fallout. Each of those cards kills Faeries while also damaging him too. If shroud is too much of an issue (e.g. 4 Scion of Oona) or if he doesn't play out THAT many creatures at once, then feel free to replace some of the Searing Blazes with direct burn like Flame Rift.
I wouldn't run Fireblast just because it sucks to have that card countered.
Either play something very fast (your friend's Goblins deck is an example, but burn/affinity/stompy/infect are probably also fine) or play a strong deck with strong cards that don't care about counterspells (eg. Aether Vial, Cavern of Souls, Supreme Verdict, Shardless Agent, Bloodbraid Elf, Prized Amalgam).
Edit: Engineered Plague and Slice and Dice can be pretty vicious sideboard cards against most Faeries lists.
I don't mean to steer away from this aggro idea into an entirely new idea, but I was brainstorming and if this can defeat fairies - sounds way more pleasing to me and is up my alley.
I'm not sure what type of deck this would be called, but basically it involves causing mass destruction with cards like Wrath of God, Armageddon, Day of Judgment, etc..
Also, I would be running cards like Stuffy Doll, Darksteel Myr, Darksteel Juggernaut, Worldslayer.
Maybe....
4x Darksteel myr
4x Darksteel Juggernaut
4x Stuffy Doll
4x Manor Gargoyle
3x Worldslayer
Enchantments
4x Tempered Steel
Instants
4x Dispatch
Sorcery
4x Wrath of God
4x Armageddon
4x Day of Judgment
4x Phyrexian Rebirth
4x Sol Ring
Lands
20x Plains
4x Darksteel Citadel