MTG Salvation

I just put together a goblin deck with Wort at the helm and I just get buried by Prime Speaker Zegana, Animar, Soul of Elements (two of these), Riku of Two Reflections, and Roon of the Hidden Realm. I can aggro out one of them sometimes, but I have no chance for the late game. They play something like Prophet of Kruphix, Rampaging Baloths with ramp spells, or Consecrated Sphinx and just overwhelm my goblins. It is not uncommon to see Omniscience and a chain of 5/5 and 6/6 creatures coming down, along with a ton of card draw. Often, it is by virtue of a disruptive Wheel of Fortune or an early Purphoros, God of the Forge that I can kill more than 1 player.

I want to take this opportunity to put together a second deck. What kind of deck can deal with this without playing the same decks as them?

Wait, do you ever try to combo?

There are three distinct options for dealing with UG players. These methods are considered unfriendly, but they are effective.

1. Mass LD: One of red's greatest strengths is how much land destruction the color gets. Unfortunately, it makes many a player take a heavy swig of Haterade and is thus shunned by many playgroups.

2. Combo: As mentioned by MR, if they can't respond to a combo, then you win. Wort can play Kiki-Jiki, who gets into all kinds of shenanigans without much hassle or niche cards.

3. Nekusar: Nekusar decks that can actively punish players for drawing cards will bring UG to a screaming halt or a screaming death.

These represent your best options and all are actually better than the mirror.

If those colors are in almost every game in your meta, then you can definitely get away with playing targeted hate.

Show them stuff like Bereavement, Insight, Carpet of Flowers, Deathgrip, Choke

Or play stax - limit their resources and see if they can keep up.

Quote from Woohah »

There are three distinct options for dealing with UG players. These methods are considered unfriendly, but they are effective.

1. Mass LD: One of red's greatest strengths is how much land destruction the color gets. Unfortunately, it makes many a player take a heavy swig of Haterade and is thus shunned by many playgroups.

2. Combo: As mentioned by MR, if they can't respond to a combo, then you win. Wort can play Kiki-Jiki, who gets into all kinds of shenanigans without much hassle or niche cards.

3. Nekusar: Nekusar decks that can actively punish players for drawing cards will bring UG to a screaming halt or a screaming death.

These represent your best options and all are actually better than the mirror.

Or you could play Doom Blades and Divinations.

Play land destruction if you can. It's one of the best tools to use in EDH, because almost no one is prepared for it. Do your best to make it asymmetrical.

Sounds like you need purphoros, god of the forge, he isn't quite combo but when playing red it is important to get your opponents life total as low as possible as fast as possible.

erabos, god of the dead, heartless hidsegu, sulfuric vortex. You have to shred their life total and draw cards.

I find that all UG does is ramp the first few turns.. if you play some will win the game on their own cards on turn 2 they can't interact well. e.g luminiac ascension. in RB perhaps... pack rat? Olivia voldren

They are susceptible to Tempo, lay down a clock and doom blade their threats. They also really bad against clone effects because you just take their power.. For BR.. that means reanimation Makeshift manniquin, rise of the dark realms.

If you play Mass land destruction or combo expect to be either prevented from playing or killed off first every game, even in the best case scenario you will start an arms race in which everyone in your meta just becomes more and more hardcore with combos and vicious hate until you all stop having fun.

Krenko, mob boss and purphoros is possibly one of your best bets. It may not do much at first but when you are popping out 100+ goblins from krenko, that is over 200 damage from purphoros.

be faster. Take them on their speed.

I've had my own run in with Roon decks while playing monored.

I ended up adding Molten Disaster. I know it's not appealing in Krenko because it kills your own board, but just being able to kill their Prophet of Kruphix and not allow them any way to respond.

Grafdigger's Cage can stop graveyard reanimation from cards like Revilark and Karmic Guide. I can't stop Eternal Witness, but it does have a seldom known function.

Cage stops creatures from entering play from graveyards or libraries so that if a green player plays Genesis Wave or has Lurking Predators it wont let the creatures they reveal come into play because those cards are technically still in their library.

Chandra Ablaze can ruin a blue deck. Ticking her down to wheel for 3 will obliterate their hands and often leave them with nothing. Don't forget Chandra is still in play after you tick her down and can be -2ed again on your next turn, which means they wont be in a rush to refill their hands or they'll get wheeled again.

Are you seeing U/G played by every opponent in your games or is it something that maybe 1 player is playing, but they end up winning?

I just put a 2nd deck together myself. I was having a problem in my meta of people coming in with decks that were honestly loaded up with massLD or won with a some cheesy uncounterable spell on turn 12. I had enough and was going to make a brutal deck that could just take out 1 player, but wouldn't ruin the game for the other players who were playing more casually.

I asked around and forum guru Donald suggested I try out a Wydwen, the Biting Gale deck. The idea is that you load the deck with a ton of instants and play the game entirely on other peoples turns with your flash creatures, counterspells, bounce, and kill spells.

The decks most common wincon is general damage. Wydwen ends games fast enough on her own and you can speed her up with equipment or Hatred.

The deck is brutally effective and has met all my expectations of what I wanted. Check out Donald's list and a more up to date one by Toonamiguy.

http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/commander-edh/multiplayer-commander-decklists/212804-wydwen-the-biting-gale-common-courtesy
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/commander-edh/multiplayer-commander-decklists/511106-toonamiguys-wydwen-the-biting-gale-edh-draw-go

Supreme Verdict, or Wraths with Boseiju, Who Shelters All.

Torpor Orb can stop Deadeye Navigator nonsense. So can Tainted Aether, I believe (though I could be wrong). Still, with goblins, you'll not want Tainted Aether in play.

As others pointed out, forcing combo-breakers through with Boseiju, Who Shelters All. If your games go late, with blue players holding 30+ card hands, Sirocco might prove amusing.

Aside from MLD, Zo-Zu the Punisher, Ankh of Mishra, and Tunnel Ignus can slow land-rampers down. Those relying on elves and birds cry at Night of Souls' Betrayal, but so will your goblins.

Humility is not in Wort's colors (either Wort), but goes a long way towards shutting down creature-based combos. I need to bite the bullet and buy one for my deck.

Cheers!

I have started to have a strong love for keldon firebombers. If your deck supports a lower curve and uses a decent amount of mana rocks, you can use this to reset ramped land bases.

With black, you can use pox - probably my favourite card in the game haha - which hurts players with more lands and few creatures (working as and edict if they only have 1 creature in play). A big bonus of this card is that it lava axes everyone's life total very badly, which is very important for killing multiple opponents.

My wort deck is decent enough vs 1-2 opponents that I think I mostly want to keep it as is, so I don't need answers based solely in red/black.

That said, I rather like Purphoros. Everytime I land him it's pretty brutal. What about Mogis as a general that punishes the enemy? I could include all the stax cards you mentioned. I used to play Mono-black Pox back in the day when Nether Spirit was a win condition, so I can get behind that idea.

Quote from ProfessorWhen »

My wort deck is decent enough vs 1-2 opponents that I think I mostly want to keep it as is, so I don't need answers based solely in red/black.

That said, I rather like Purphoros. Everytime I land him it's pretty brutal. What about Mogis as a general that punishes the enemy? I could include all the stax cards you mentioned. I used to play Mono-black Pox back in the day when Nether Spirit was a win condition, so I can get behind that idea.

I have a Mogis deck like this. Basically, you get mogis/other damaging enchantments into play and then blow up a whole lot of stuff. It's kind of an all-in deck and can get hosed by well-timed spot removal if I don't have a strong setup.

Quote from AylaTheCat »

Play land destruction if you can. It's one of the best tools to use in EDH, because almost no one is prepared for it. Do your best to make it asymmetrical.

Play LD in a Nekusar deck and throw Sword of War and Peace on to really **** them. I've won so many games that way.

Playing faster isn't the way you can also play Punisher / Stax / Lockdown and see how they function in that environment.

Although like MLD people see cards like Winter Orb Static Orb Overburden Stranglehold are seen with the same level of hate.

Jaya Ballard, Task Mage is very anti-blue while still being useful against other things. She is not very subtile though, and can get you hated on.

Quote from hyalapterouslemur »

Quote from AylaTheCat »

Play land destruction if you can. It's one of the best tools to use in EDH, because almost no one is prepared for it. Do your best to make it asymmetrical.

Play LD in a Nekusar deck and throw Sword of War and Peace on to really **** them. I've won so many games that way.

Sword of War and Peace in my Omnath, Locus of Mana has also killed multiple blue players with damage equal to hand size.

Mana Barbs bro. Seriously, that's my tech against any of the classic big stuff deck that plague the format. They can only cast so many battlecruisers before it kills them, and even if it doesn't kill them it gets them low enough that your Goblins can hopefully finish the job. Burning Earth is also good if your playgroup is the 1% and has a bunch of ABR duals and sweet lands.

Quote from harumph »

Mana Barbs bro. Seriously, that's my tech against any of the classic big stuff deck that plague the format. They can only cast so many battlecruisers before it kills them, and even if it doesn't kill them it gets them low enough that your Goblins can hopefully finish the job. Burning Earth is also good if your playgroup is the 1% and has a bunch of ABR duals and sweet lands.

I'll second this. I'm just waiting for the mana barbs version of Burning-Tree Shaman for my Adun Oakenshield hatebears. Right now I'm rocking Fate Unraveler to decent effect. Flashed it in vs someone's Show and Tell/Omniscience/Enter The Infinite combo. Stopped that one in its tracks.

A) Did you mean Wort, the Raid Mother or Wort, Boggart Auntie?? Sort of a relevant distinction!

B) Why build a 2nd deck when you can just tune your goblin deck to beat their control decks? If you are G/R, then I agree that LD in all forms is the absolute best strategy for blowing up their ramps or hurting their ramps. If you are B/R then I think just going hard suicide is the correct moon and just run a ton of aggro and stax effects that tax their lives. Mana Barbs can straight ruin people and you can also runs stuff like Stranglehold and Maralen of the Mornsong.

C) Beating them without joining them might just be as simple as building a good VOLTRON deck. Bruna, light Alabaster, Rafiq of the Many and Uril, the Miststalker are excellent options for incredibly hard to deal with monsters that just murder people in 1-2 hits.