MTG Salvation

It amazes me how many people I play against online that forget about Cursecatcher and how "weak" Image is..

Quote from Corporal Levinyan

4 Seas is a definitive overkill maindeck IMO, especially that blue is pretty commonly played. Sure, it does deny manlands and duals, but vs U/x most of the time it's simply a 2 mana cantrip. No thanks.

And Snag/Pierce numbers are interchangable, depends on the meta.

As been said over and over in the thread, spreading seas is a card the deck will likely never cut in the maindeck. Unlike other cards like spell pierce, aether vial, and cursecatcher the second one is almost as good as the first one. It does a ton of things that we want to be doing, enabling Islandwalk, screwing colours, adding devotion, cantriping while our mana is awkward. I don't get at all why you are playing a first serum visions over your forth spreading seas, let alone a 1st 2nd or 3rd serum visions. The card is extremely low impact. This deck isn't a combo deck, its an disruptive aggro deck.

I actually haven't boarded in chalice for pod yet, but I find vapor snagging dorks when you are on the play is good before pod comes down or piercing the pod on the draw is where you want to be against them. seas doesn't really matter in the pod matchup UNTIL you enter the midgame when you want to keep finks off the table or gavony township comes down with whatever midrange stuff they hardcast.

You shouldn't bring in Chalice of the Void against Pod. That's a trap. If they have one mana dork out, then the Chalice doesn't accomplish anything. It shuts off Path, but you shouldn't be scared of Path. Chalice on 1 also shuts down Vapor Snag, which is one of the stronger cards in the matchup (removing blockers, disrupting their combo, and slowing down their mana dorks).

Grafdigger's Cage and (if you run it) Steel Sabotage and Tidebinder Mage are more than enough to disrupt Pod.

yeah by haven't yet, I mean I won't--cage seems way better and I also like torpor orb.

To add to what you're saying pod doesn't have enough removal even post-board to seriously really mess up the lord plan anyway which is what I pretty much what I want chalice for every time it comes in.

What is a good 'answer' for Pod? I only have Relics for graveyard hate.

Pithing Needle can also be good against Pod as it can be played against:

Birthing Pod
Cartel Aristocrat
Viscera Seer
Gavony Township
Knight of the Reliquary
Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker
Scavenging Ooze
Qasali Pridemage
Pulkranos, World Eater
Fullminator Mage
Spellskite

Obviously they have several different directions of attack, but being able to shut off either Birthing Pod or Gavony Township, you can limit one of those directions and focus on the other. It's a decent card worth thinking about. Note, however, that most lists run a Qasali Pridemage so play with care depending on how you want to go about it. Just some food for thought.

grafdiggers is probably best, then torpor orb. vapor snag is pretty ace in the matchup because if you're holding it up you can stop most gaming winning combos. I like relic but a lot of times I miss the chance to pick off the persist creatures and relic doesn't stop the life combo.

I actually don't like needle against pod because it has so many targets and is fairly easy to play around.

Quote from BatHickey

grafdiggers is probably best, then torpor orb. vapor snag is pretty ace in the matchup because if you're holding it up you can stop most gaming winning combos. I like relic but a lot of times I miss the chance to pick off the persist creatures and relic doesn't stop the life combo.

I actually don't like needle against pod because it has so many targets and is fairly easy to play around.

I agree that it has a lot of targets, but thing is I've found you typically either target the Pod or Township. It'll turn off that for the while giving you the advantage (plus, they'll have to tutor up or cast Qasali Pridemage if they need to play around it and it'll waste a turn + save your Aether Vial to give you some potentially fantastic tempo.

Obviously it depends on the game board state and sometimes it's a major flop drop. I was just listing it as another potential drop.

I currently play with 2 kira 1 Sygg 2 master and I hade the wonderful delight of beating affinity 2-0 Even with some great draw from is side. Phantasmal and kira delaying the flyer and vapor snag saving some tempo. I even managed to beat a 2 cranial plating draw.

But in the second game on the draw i had a serious decision to make. T1 vial or T1 hold spell snare? I choosed the second and snare a Steel overseer and was able to recover. So yeah.. againt affinity.. vial and image are making wonder.

I think pod is probably the best target for a pithing needle if you board it in because it makes it a dead card to draw--grafdiggers gives them 8 dead cards because it kills cord too. the combos are basically the only thing thats gonna let them win.

Gavony township is a great seas target, and I think that you could needle it too. I just find that this is such a good matchup if you can cut off the combo and not fall totally behind because the pod midrange plan makes smaller creatures than you have and yours can't be blocked--if you find yourself in a board state where everyone is counting up power of creatures on both sides (rough), then I say bounce the fliers or voice tokens as much as possible to stop the few creatures that can go over you.

my sideboard plan is +steel sabotage, torpor orb, hibernation, grafdiggers, -kira ggs, thassa, MOW.

Torpor orb turns off master of waves, phantasmal image, and silvergill adept. I'd run other hate options than torpor orb.

you are correct, I side out MOW, don't rely on image too heavily in any build of mine, and take my lumps with silvergill if I can't get one or two down before I find the singleton torpor orb. its a little anti-synergistic, but it stops you from losing even when you neuter yourself a little--honestly I think I'm something like 12-3 against pod variants, so I must be doing something right.

Congats! Sounds like you did extremely well (:

Any chance I could see your final decklist? And did you stick with the same sideboard you posted a few posts back?

Quote from duckslikerain

Torpor orb turns off master of waves, phantasmal image, and silvergill adept. I'd run other hate options than torpor orb.

Torpor Orb does not turn off Phantasmal Image. Its a replacement effect not an ETB effect.

Quote from Atherion

Sure, here it is

JPoJohnson's DeckMagic OnlineOCTGN2ApprenticeBuy These Cards
Lands: 20 15 Island 4 Mutavault 1 Cavern of souls Creatures: 25 4 Lord of Atlantis 4 Master of the pearl trident 3 Merrow Reejerey 3 Cursecatcher 2 Kira, Great-glass spinner 2 Master of waves 4 Silvergill Adept 1 Phantasmal Image 2 coralhelm commander	Spells: 15 4 Aether Vial 4 Spreading Seas 3 Vapor snag 2 Spell pierce 2 Disrupting shoal	Sideboard: 3x chalice of the void 2x dismember 1x grafdiggers cage 1x hibernation 3x hurkyl's recall 2x spellskite 2x steel sabotage 1x swan song

I haven't really tested the cage or hibernation out but I think they should be solid. I thought about damping matrix instead of hibernation - that might be a smart move because I haven't seen a single zoo deck playing. On the other hand it's great against auras, which is a very cheap deck so it will be seen in large numbers at GPs.

Added to the original post under tournament results if that's ok! Thanks for that (:

I think your thoughts on Hibernation are spot on. I like that card a lot. Good call.

So since I am still learning the deck, I wanted to test the affinity matchup today, and played three or four matches. How the hell do we win this matchup? If they went first, there was pretty much no chance in hell. If I go first I need to make my land drops, make my lord drops, and have bounce/counter spells, and then the sideboard makes it easier, if you actually draw the cards. Just seemed insanely hard, the hardest matchup I've had, and maybe just too complicated for me. A rundown of what to do would be welcomed

In my experience it is one of if not the worst matchup for us. I personally have 8-9 cards I could be bringing in against it which puts game 2 and 3 more in my favor.

Yeah, affinity is nearly impossible without game-ending sideboard cards. Winning pre-board is incredibly hard and requires your opponent to keep a mediocre hand while you get a good one. For that reason, most Merfolk lists play 2-4 hurkyl's recalls in the sideboard along with other effective sideboard hate. Some other ideas for sideboard you can play around with include steel sabotage, chalice of the void (set to 0), and annul for splash hate against bogles. If you care to splash white stony silence is a game ender and path to exile is very effective against them. The key to the matchup is mostly them not getting a cranial plating. No cranial plating can easily be a win, any cranial platings is usually a loss pre-board.

I put gut shot in my side after reading an article on Channel Fireball about merfolk. I've only played the match once since and never drew it so I'm not sure how it is yet. Was also thinking about Spell Snare for that matchup, since the cards I have the most trouble with in affinity are all cmc 2 and it would be playable against other decks too.