So I did a small amount of testing with Daze last night. I only got in 10 or so games vs a friend on shardless bug, but it was enough to start to get a feel for the card. Definitely merits more testing, but so far I wasn't thrilled. Dazing hymn was nice, and I got to daze a force on my doomsday. I wasn't super aggressive about dazing threats (mistake? Still getting used to playing the card). But the rest of the time it felt like the worst card in hand. Obviously it could be much better against other decks and I think I need to get comprehensive testing in before I decide.
Side note: how do you board against shardless? I've found the match up to feel heavily favorable pre-board, and unfavorable post board, so I feel like I'm doing it wrong since I don't think I should lose so many percentage points post board.
Against Shardless BUG, I would assume that Daze is just meant to hit anything your opponent plays on Turn 2. Getting a Hymn seems like what should normally happen if you're presenting as a combo deck, and even if your opponent knows you play Daze I don't think they can afford to play around it without opening themselves to getting punished by a discard spell or just outright dying with their disruption in their hand. Edit: I forgot about Deathrite Shaman blanking Daze. I see why you're not a fan of this card if the first deck you tested against can have three mana on turn two. I can't say up or down what the plan should be about Dazing threats either because I haven't played the card much myself, but I would say that it probably depends on how much time you think you'll gain from countering a threat, and how much time you think you'll need given the composition of your own hand.
Frankly, I give the Shardless deck the minimum amount of respect that I can afford to because their cards normally line up pretty poorly against a Storm deck. A while back someone told me "Shardless opponents are like slower Jund opponents who can sometimes have Force of Will" and it really helped me with my approach against the deck.
Against Shardless, my normal sideboard plan is just to switch a Gitaxian Probe for Cruel Bargain. The deck is notorious for having a terrible combo matchup, so I think that the only upgrading to be done here is that you can side in your Draw-4. The discard spells from Shardless are weaker than discard from Jund or Delver because Shardless doesn't have the speed to take advantage of tripping you up with discard; therefore, cards are usually more important than life here.
When you're losing to Shardless, what exactly are you losing to?
When I lose to shardless it's usually to null rod, or just highly disruptive hands. looking at some shardless lists online, most have a lot less disruption post-board than the shardless player in my playgroup, so maybe he's just gunning for me. I don't see a lot of shardless on mtgo so most of my shardless experience is irl in my small playgroup.
Yeah, sometimes you're just going to get Junded out, but in general their cards aren't efficient enough to let them effectively disrupt you and clock you at the same time and you can take advantage of that. Most players only have one Null Rod so I don't board for it; you can discard it, bounce it with Void Snare if you play that, or you can make a pile that uses no artifacts. It's funny, the only reason I hestitate to say that Laboratory Maniac owns this deck is that many Shardless opponents I have seen are so desperate for anything disruptive that they keep in a few Abrupt Decay in hopes of hitting LEDs.
The opponent you're playing against, what hate is he packing besides Null Rod? More discard, or more counter spells? More discard makes him more Jund-like so Maniac is probably your plan. Spell Pierces or Flusterstorms mean he should be cutting some Shardless Agents and he's going to be slower since he has theoretically has less creatures and doesn't have the best choices when it comes to tapping out. If he's playing both, he might just be gunning for you like you said.
I've seen Flusterstorm, Thoughtseize, and sometimes surgical extraction, plus the Null Rod which he seems to have an inordinate amount. And he usually keeps in 2 Abrupt Decays. So maybe my suspicions are correct. My LGS is starting bi-monthly legacy tournaments soon, so hopefully we'll have a less inbred metagame and his sideboard will even out a bit.
So the player is playing Thoughtseize, Hymn to Tourach, Force of Will, Flusterstorm, Surgical Extraction, plus Null Rod, AND he still has room to keep in 2 Abrupt Decay? Do you think he might be sideboarding in a way that's exploitable? It seems like there are so many cards he's bringing in that he has to be cutting back a lot on threats, or something.
I'm not really sure what is going on because he seems to stay pretty threat dense but I think he sides in at least 8 cards. I'll have to ask him what his sideboarding plan is like.
Well, what are you considering to be his threats? Tarmogoyf is pretty much the only creature in the deck that ends the game quickly, right? Deathrite Shaman is slow and mana intensive, Baleful Strix is a 1/1, and Shardless Agent having cascade is basically the only card in his deck that can apply pressure and disrupt you at the same time, but that also assumes that his post-board cascades aren't hitting Flusterstorm, Surgical Extraction, the Abrupt Decay he apparently keeps in, or other cards that seem terrible to cast at random. Planeswalkers are also pretty good at ending the game, but your opponent tapping all that mana for a Liliana or a Jace often can be a good thing for you because your deck is capable of preventing the game from going long which reduces those two cards into a 3 mana Raven's Crime and a 4 mana Brainstorm.
This is all coming from a place of theory, so I can understand if your games just aren't playing out this way; however, I don't feel like the Shardless matchup is supposed to be that rough, so your opponent really just refuses to lose to combo at the expense of making his deck weaker against other archetypes (always has the Null Rod? Hope he isn't playing more than 1), or I don't know what I'm talking about, or you're approaching things in a way that doesn't leverage your deck's strength. For me, it all just boils down to the fact that your opponent doesn't play more than 4 creatures capable of dealing more than 2 damage a turn and there are no Bolts or anything so you're never going to lose a turn earlier than anticipated. Force of Will is the only disruption that doesn't cost mana, so your opponent has to spend their early turns deciding whether to cast Deathrite or Thoughtseize, Goyf or Hymn, etc.
That being said, I saw a few Leovolds last week, and I don't know if that's going to become a BUG mainstay from here on out...
I agree with you in theory and I played against him some more last week and my record was improved. I'm not sure if I was doing something wrong before or what, or just had a rough patch. I asked about his sideboarding and he boards out baleful strix and all but sometimes 1 of the decays (I guess he's undecided on whether it's worth keeping) and brings in thoughtseizes and flusterstorm and null rod. He acknowledged that he is over prepared for combo but considers it such a bad matchup that it is worth it.
Now that my LGS is having regular tournaments, I'm hoping to get a chance to play against a wider variety of decks. The online meta lately seems to be like 80% BR reanimator and it's really annoying
Interesting. Baleful Strix is definitely very weak, but this deck barely has enough blue cards for Force to function as it is. Shardless is bad enough against Combo that I understand over-preparing for it, but the sideboarding you just described seems relatively tame unless you're telling me that he sides in multiple Flusterstorms.
Hi, I'm a relatively new player to mtg but really enjoy the format and after about four months I've decided to take a break from playing Shardless and learn to pilot combo with DDFT. One of the people I play against runs UWr Miracles and I was wanting to know a little more about how this matchup should be thought about, because my first exposure to it was a couple of nights ago. The match went something like this:
Game 1: I am on the draw and end up with a hand that can turn one combo if he does not have a FoW. He plays a fetch into Island for SDT and passes the turn. I don't draw any of my Duress or Therapy and decide to go in for the kill with DR, DD, LED, and Probe in hand. I win using the basic IU LED LED Probe BW pile.
Game 2: I draw into another opportunity to use the pile above, but this time with a Cabal Therapy. He plays SDT for opening turn again and passes, I Therapy for FoW finding none. He reveals a fetch and three counterbalance. Next turn he plays counterbalance and I dumbly play into countertop and lose my DR.
Game 3. I mull down to 5 and hit FoW with a Duress, and have Doomsday in hand but cannot cast it before he gets countertop up. I eventually am fatesealed until I lose.
I realize I must have made a mistake in using Therapy or some other unknown to me (I do not quite get how to play combo around hate), any insight would be very useful for me. This deck might be too difficult for me to play, but I have a lot of fun with it and would like to learn more about it.
Generally when up against miracles you're expecting to play a long game, although honestly I probably would have jammed the turn 1 kill anyway like you did. What's your decklist look like? With abrupt decay, especially after sideboarding, you can avoid getting locked out by counterbalance. Once you get the feel for it miracles is a pretty good matchup. As for your use of cabal therapy, if you don't have abrupt decay and can't win before counterbalance comes down, I think therapy naming counterbalance is reasonable because it will lock you out of using cantrips to find business. But force of will isn't a terrible choice either, so maybe you just had bad luck.
I've leveled up a bit since playing this game last week, but still am definitely not a good combo player yet. Gotta keep playing this deck out, it's a blast.
I've leveled up a bit since playing this game last week, but still am definitely not a good combo player yet. Gotta keep playing this deck out, it's a blast.
Are you still playing the deck? It's a pretty tricky deck to learn but watching other players will definitely help.
So my favorite deck of all time is pretty much dead now.
I have never built this deck, but the free draw off sensei's divining top is pretty important when looking at it before in the past. Since you need to be able to draw a card after cracking an Lion's Eye Diamond. While they can't help you dig for the doomsday like top could. I tried finding some 1 or less CMC permanents with a free draw. I think only one would work.
First one loses badly to Wasteland + you need to play the Trop/Bayou MD. Bauble works (needs no target), rest again doesn't work.
However, all of those cards miss a crucial aspect, they all don't help you to find interaction, fast mana or the combo enabler (Wish/DD). They just help, when you are already "winning" basically, which was not the most important aspect about Top. Sure, Top allows for some really nice piles, but what does it help you to have some nice piles, when you do not even get to that point?
Greetings,
Kathal
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What I play or have:
Modern/Legacy
either funpolice (Delver, Deathcloud, UW Control) or the fun decks (especially those ft. Griselbrand)
First one loses badly to Wasteland + you need to play the Trop/Bayou MD. Bauble works (needs no target), rest again doesn't work.
However, all of those cards miss a crucial aspect, they all don't help you to find interaction, fast mana or the combo enabler (Wish/DD). They just help, when you are already "winning" basically, which was not the most important aspect about Top. Sure, Top allows for some really nice piles, but what does it help you to have some nice piles, when you do not even get to that point?
Greetings,
Kathal
I mentioned they don't have the searching power of top. Your right about bauble it says up to one target. I missed that part.
You could fetch a basic if you know your going to play Unbridled Growth. However, I would agree it's a bad idea to put it on a dual land.
I suppose you could cast brainstorm and respond to it by cracking LED. Requires one more mana the turn you go off, but the deck run brain storm already. The only other 1 CMC instant speed draw that digs a little I can think of is opt.
~EDIT~
SDT can dig pretty aggressively with fetches I am not sure there is any that can quite do that. There are 2 CMC spells like Peer Through Depths, but I think we are getting into costs too much mana territory.
might work. but it's nowhere near as versatile as the top related piles. and multiple top related piles. and it's mana cost to get the cards into your hand.
though it does work as a draw 5 from your doomsday pile or however many you want to take off assuming you have enough cards in hand to do so. i think it'd be a worth a try at leasy
Kind of funny that the most active this thread has been in a long time is after the deck is nearly killed.
I'm taking a doomsday list to a GPT this weekend. I've decided to try something a bit different, and instead of trying to replace top in the old lists I just built a more grindy BUG list. Something like this:
It seems to either feel insanely powerful or very clumsy, and certainly isn't as buttery smooth as the top lists, but therapy->flashback therapy->kill feels real good, as does having 6 lands and an opponent with no hand on turn 2.
With just 4 (and half) sac outlets for Diabolic Intent, do you really want to play it?
Greetings,
Kathal
Well with fetching dryad arbor, it brings the creature count in this list up to effectively 9, which has been enough, with cantrips and stuff. Probably the fetches should be 4x Misty, 4x verdant, giving you effectively 13 creatures which should be plenty, but I don't own enough of each, so I'm stuck with this. At any rate it hasn't really been an issue so far, but the dryad is definitely the creature that dies the most to diabolic intent because the vets usually flashback therapy in the early turns.
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Side note: how do you board against shardless? I've found the match up to feel heavily favorable pre-board, and unfavorable post board, so I feel like I'm doing it wrong since I don't think I should lose so many percentage points post board.
Frankly, I give the Shardless deck the minimum amount of respect that I can afford to because their cards normally line up pretty poorly against a Storm deck. A while back someone told me "Shardless opponents are like slower Jund opponents who can sometimes have Force of Will" and it really helped me with my approach against the deck.
Against Shardless, my normal sideboard plan is just to switch a Gitaxian Probe for Cruel Bargain. The deck is notorious for having a terrible combo matchup, so I think that the only upgrading to be done here is that you can side in your Draw-4. The discard spells from Shardless are weaker than discard from Jund or Delver because Shardless doesn't have the speed to take advantage of tripping you up with discard; therefore, cards are usually more important than life here.
When you're losing to Shardless, what exactly are you losing to?
The opponent you're playing against, what hate is he packing besides Null Rod? More discard, or more counter spells? More discard makes him more Jund-like so Maniac is probably your plan. Spell Pierces or Flusterstorms mean he should be cutting some Shardless Agents and he's going to be slower since he has theoretically has less creatures and doesn't have the best choices when it comes to tapping out. If he's playing both, he might just be gunning for you like you said.
This is all coming from a place of theory, so I can understand if your games just aren't playing out this way; however, I don't feel like the Shardless matchup is supposed to be that rough, so your opponent really just refuses to lose to combo at the expense of making his deck weaker against other archetypes (always has the Null Rod? Hope he isn't playing more than 1), or I don't know what I'm talking about, or you're approaching things in a way that doesn't leverage your deck's strength. For me, it all just boils down to the fact that your opponent doesn't play more than 4 creatures capable of dealing more than 2 damage a turn and there are no Bolts or anything so you're never going to lose a turn earlier than anticipated. Force of Will is the only disruption that doesn't cost mana, so your opponent has to spend their early turns deciding whether to cast Deathrite or Thoughtseize, Goyf or Hymn, etc.
That being said, I saw a few Leovolds last week, and I don't know if that's going to become a BUG mainstay from here on out...
Now that my LGS is having regular tournaments, I'm hoping to get a chance to play against a wider variety of decks. The online meta lately seems to be like 80% BR reanimator and it's really annoying
Game 1: I am on the draw and end up with a hand that can turn one combo if he does not have a FoW. He plays a fetch into Island for SDT and passes the turn. I don't draw any of my Duress or Therapy and decide to go in for the kill with DR, DD, LED, and Probe in hand. I win using the basic IU LED LED Probe BW pile.
Game 2: I draw into another opportunity to use the pile above, but this time with a Cabal Therapy. He plays SDT for opening turn again and passes, I Therapy for FoW finding none. He reveals a fetch and three counterbalance. Next turn he plays counterbalance and I dumbly play into countertop and lose my DR.
Game 3. I mull down to 5 and hit FoW with a Duress, and have Doomsday in hand but cannot cast it before he gets countertop up. I eventually am fatesealed until I lose.
I realize I must have made a mistake in using Therapy or some other unknown to me (I do not quite get how to play combo around hate), any insight would be very useful for me. This deck might be too difficult for me to play, but I have a lot of fun with it and would like to learn more about it.
I've leveled up a bit since playing this game last week, but still am definitely not a good combo player yet. Gotta keep playing this deck out, it's a blast.
Are you still playing the deck? It's a pretty tricky deck to learn but watching other players will definitely help.
I have never built this deck, but the free draw off sensei's divining top is pretty important when looking at it before in the past. Since you need to be able to draw a card after cracking an Lion's Eye Diamond. While they can't help you dig for the doomsday like top could. I tried finding some 1 or less CMC permanents with a free draw. I think only one would work.
I loathe creatures! Praise Prison and Land Destruction!
My Peasant Cube (looking for feedback)
However, all of those cards miss a crucial aspect, they all don't help you to find interaction, fast mana or the combo enabler (Wish/DD). They just help, when you are already "winning" basically, which was not the most important aspect about Top. Sure, Top allows for some really nice piles, but what does it help you to have some nice piles, when you do not even get to that point?
Greetings,
Kathal
Modern/Legacy
either funpolice (Delver, Deathcloud, UW Control) or the fun decks (especially those ft. Griselbrand)
I mentioned they don't have the searching power of top. Your right about bauble it says up to one target. I missed that part.
You could fetch a basic if you know your going to play Unbridled Growth. However, I would agree it's a bad idea to put it on a dual land.
I suppose you could cast brainstorm and respond to it by cracking LED. Requires one more mana the turn you go off, but the deck run brain storm already. The only other 1 CMC instant speed draw that digs a little I can think of is opt.
~EDIT~
SDT can dig pretty aggressively with fetches I am not sure there is any that can quite do that. There are 2 CMC spells like Peer Through Depths, but I think we are getting into costs too much mana territory.
I loathe creatures! Praise Prison and Land Destruction!
My Peasant Cube (looking for feedback)
Greetings,
Kathal
Modern/Legacy
either funpolice (Delver, Deathcloud, UW Control) or the fun decks (especially those ft. Griselbrand)
though it does work as a draw 5 from your doomsday pile or however many you want to take off assuming you have enough cards in hand to do so. i think it'd be a worth a try at leasy
I'm taking a doomsday list to a GPT this weekend. I've decided to try something a bit different, and instead of trying to replace top in the old lists I just built a more grindy BUG list. Something like this:
1x Bayou
4x Brainstorm
4x Cabal Therapy
1x Chromatic Sphere
1x Conjurer's Bauble
1x Dark Petition
3x Dark Ritual
1x Diabolic Intent
4x Doomsday
2x Duress
1x Forest
3x Gitaxian Probe
1x Ideas Unbound
2x Island
1x Laboratory Maniac
3x Lion's Eye Diamond
1x Lotus Petal
3x Misty Rainforest
4x Polluted Delta
4x Ponder
2x Preordain
1x Rain of Filth
2x Swamp
1x Tropical Island
2x Underground Sea
1x Verdant Catacombs
4x Veteran Explorer
2x Abrupt Decay
2x City of Solitude
1x Engineered Explosives
2x Fatal Push
2x Flusterstorm
1x Forest
1x Hurkyl's Recall
1x Infernal Contract
2x Surgical Extraction
1x Toxic Deluge
It seems to either feel insanely powerful or very clumsy, and certainly isn't as buttery smooth as the top lists, but therapy->flashback therapy->kill feels real good, as does having 6 lands and an opponent with no hand on turn 2.
Greetings,
Kathal
Modern/Legacy
either funpolice (Delver, Deathcloud, UW Control) or the fun decks (especially those ft. Griselbrand)
Well with fetching dryad arbor, it brings the creature count in this list up to effectively 9, which has been enough, with cantrips and stuff. Probably the fetches should be 4x Misty, 4x verdant, giving you effectively 13 creatures which should be plenty, but I don't own enough of each, so I'm stuck with this. At any rate it hasn't really been an issue so far, but the dryad is definitely the creature that dies the most to diabolic intent because the vets usually flashback therapy in the early turns.