I think the issue with affinity is knowing where to pick your battles. I think affinity presents so many counter / seas / snag options that it's hard to tell what the right move is. when they're on the play I think it's very hard, but the best hope is to do something like pray for 3 lands and a hurkyls and that they don't kill you before your t3, and then hurkyls their t4 and then have counter back up when they spew their hand again. Countering mana artifacts, and putting seas on their artifact lands and hope it's enough to get you there. but on the play if you can chalice for 0 and have some amount of counter back up you should be ok.
I've heard a few people on here say that they beat Affinity - but I just don't believe it. Either you have the *****test affinity pilots in your meta or I have Pro's - how in the hell do you beat this deck?
We all know how bad that matchup is but some luck and right circumstances can give us the match.
He Thoughtseized me turn 2 and 3 (he couldn't find black mana for turn 1) and I ripped an Island and 2 Hurkyl while Vial spewed Lords.
In this case your affinity opponent was very bad. Thoughtsieze is useless against us. 2 of them is ridiculous. I also won a match in a similar way but it wasn't based on good luck or good play on my part
Where did I say it isn't a bad matchup?
This is my 7th year of playing merfolk. Playing/played it in standard, modern and legacy (there were no vintage tournament nearby to try Reel Fish), never lost a mirror match (lost to merfolk but played another deck) and never afraid to play against the best. I played Ravager Affinity for as long as it was legal (from Clamp days to its mass-ban death). My first GPT victory and my first GP experience was with affinity. I am testing this matchup every week, just because it is bad. Should I concede the match against affinity? Or fear it?
Sure, the guy isn't Majlaton or Karsten, but that was just one match and I have positive experience overall. I would rather play against that then Tron or Martyr.
I'd love to see some camera games of mono-U Merfolk vs Affinity (seasoned and expert level players only) and perhaps some type of tutorial on how to play against it.
If you ask any Fish player I know these 2-0 wins are so unlikely and appear to be terribly bad luck on behalf of the opponent and amazing christmas land good luck on the Fish players behalf. As far as I can tell this matchup is at least 80-20 Affinity - please prove me wrong with a detailed and comprehensive response.
Furthermore, in support of what I'm saying, professional magic players took U/w merfolk to the pro tour and I think they did this for one reason and one reason alone - to have a fighting chance against affinity which was/is anticipated to be heavy in the post-TC ban era. I'd love to believe that mono-U merfolk has game against affinity - because playing white does for sure suck..
I'd love to see some camera games of mono-U Merfolk vs Affinity (seasoned and expert level players only) and perhaps some type of tutorial on how to play against it.
If you ask any Fish player I know these 2-0 wins are so unlikely and appear to be terribly bad luck on behalf of the opponent and amazing christmas land good luck on the Fish players behalf. As far as I can tell this matchup is at least 80-20 Affinity - please prove me wrong with a detailed and comprehensive response.
Furthermore, in support of what I'm saying, professional magic players took U/w merfolk to the pro tour and I think they did this for one reason and one reason alone - to have a fighting chance against affinity which was/is anticipated to be heavy in the post-TC ban era. I'd love to believe that mono-U merfolk has game against affinity - because playing white does for sure suck..
We have a lot of cards that are strong against affinity. Main deck spell pierce(to stop cranial plating) and vapor snag are great and spreading seas stops any sort of nexus action. If they don't have a flier to pump and we manage to land a master of waves well good luck to them trying to get through. Post board things only get better with hurkyl's recall chalice on two is game over for affinity. There are other hate cards that I'm probably not including here this is just off of the top of my head but it isn't an 80-20 match-up in their favour that's for sure. I rarely go 0-2 against affinity I usually go 2-1 or 2-0. The only deck that I'm worried about is abzan as it is one of the top decks atm and is probably one of our worst matchups.
The problems I come across is that the majority of their creatures have evasion which quickly swarm. Any competent Affinity player I know plays around spell pierce to resolve cranial plating and/or as I run 2x pierce and they have 4x plating - even if I do get one of them there are more. Im currently not running vapor snag because it seems poorly positioned to me against most of the field - instead running dismember as a 2x of - perhaps I need to reconsider vapor snag..
I run 3x Recall in my board and I'll agree - if you land it at a crucial time - it can be a blow out - but many times its really just a speed bump. For me the always win game 1 and then you're praying to land at least one recall at the right time. Chalice on two is pretty ambitious - if we are at 4 mana they have a swarm of robots about to finish us off - but can be a blow out if we manage to recall then chalice for two. A bit christmas land though - siding in 6 sb cards and hoping to see 2 of them in the first 3-4 rounds. Perhaps I need to change my deck to include 4x snag, 3x, Pierce and 4x recall, 3x chalice sb. Even then I think it's still strongly in Affinity's favour as our game 2/3 are now maybe 50-50 (more realistically 60-40 to them) after losing game 1.
I get a very strong feeling that ppl on here downplay the affinity match-up - making out like they reliably win - when this doesnt stack up to everything I've experienced and what I read from pro's.
Abzan seems much better for us at least 50/50 every game..
Of course is the new boogey man infect? Seriously. It is in Proven now. I am going to a PPTQ this weekend and am terrified to see it. Game 1 feels very hard. Game 2 at least I can sideboard. I am revamping my sideboard because I expect more infect now.
Is anyone good at spreadsheets or data? I was toying with the idea of taking each card and then giving it an evaluation something like this:
0 - Useless
1 - Poor
2 - Playable/good half the time (play/draw dependant)
3 - Good
4 - Hoser
Lets say we took a card like:
Spreading Seas
3 Abzan
3 Jund
3 BGx
0 UR Twin
0 Tarmo Twin
1 Burn
0 Scapeshift
0 Storm
0 Amulet Bloom
1 Merfolk
3 UWR Control
3 Soul Sisters
3 Zoo
4 R/G Tron
Or Kira
2 Abzan
3 Jund
2 BGx
3 UR Twin
3 Tarmo Twin
3 Burn
2 Scapeshift
0 Storm
0 Amulet Bloom
2 Merfolk
3 UWR Control
1 Soul Sisters
2 Zoo
0 R/G Tron
and if we graded every playable card and for every match up then we could then take the most popular decks in the metagame and hopefully a deck will create itself. Unfortunately I have no idea how to make this happen except to make the data.
Is anyone good at spreadsheets or data? I was toying with the idea of taking each card and then giving it an evaluation something like this:
[...]
and if we graded every playable card and for every match up then we could then take the most popular decks in the metagame and hopefully a deck will create itself. Unfortunately I have no idea how to make this happen except to make the data.
So if I understand you well, you want to give a subjective rating to each candidate card on a scale of 0 to 3 with respect to matchup, and then compare usefulness of each card based on popularity of each archetype.
If so then this is very easy. The mathematical apparatus that does this is called a weighted average. For instance, if 12% of the field is Abzan, 3% is Jund, ..., 7% is RG Tron, then you'd compute, for Kira,
But basically what I want is based on the most popular decks we can calculate the most effective cards to beat that sort of metagame. Merfolk is a unique deck in that aside from maybe 4x Silvergill, 4x Lord of Atlantis, and 4x Master of the Pearl Trident everything else is a flex slot. I was trying to figure out how to beat Amulet, infect, burn, and Abzan and the unfortunate thing is that all these decks need to be attacked at a unique angle and its hard to know what the efficient 75 cards are for beating these plus the rest of the field.
@Wify There are two infect players at my local store, one with G/U and the other with B/G. They are both fairly good with the deck, but I have 0 problems in any serious game with them. I've played against Infect basically since the creation of Modern with Merfolk and vapor snag is just too good. Plus spreading seas helps take them off green or just shut off their Inkmoths, cursecatcher to chump or stop their pump spells. I've never seen Infect as a problem match up in the years I've played the deck.
In terms of affinity, steel sabotage or annul help out alot since they might try to play about Spell Pierce but 1 cmc counterspells help tons, plus if you run Swan Song giving them a bird is not the worst thing in the world. As already mentioned Spreading Seas helps turn off their lands and we can flood the board just as well as them, it really is just practice against the deck and playing carefully.
I'd say for SB it really depends how much you expect a certain deck to show up, if you are honestly terrified of Affinity you will have to pick a deck to lose to. Twin, Amulet, Abzan, Burn, we only have so many SB slots. I still stand by the idea 2 cmc counters aren't worth playing, flashfreeze is cute in the SB and all but you aren't advancing the board and holding up extra mana when you could pierce and snag or other fancy stuff.
It indeed can be risky, but between fetching, probing, and mutagenic growthing they are doing half our work for us so I always felt the race was a bit more even. I do agree with the vial it does help a lot, but at least 75% of my games against infect I don't see any of my 4 vials which is just bad luck on my part. If you can resolve a turn 2 tidebinder against a glistener elf that can buy you a turn or more. I have won so many games off Vapor Snag from them not having the mana to cast Vines or just not having it in hand. I admit, that is luck on my part, but I found that I am usually fine. It is rarely a complete shut out where I go 2/0, but Pierce, Snag, and Cursecatcher do so much work with Infect being so light on mana and repeat threats. I always board out Kira, Master of Waves, and sometimes a few Rejerreys just so my deck is packing less expensive cards since I know the race will be short. I admit the match up is tough, but I never felt afraid to see Infect. A muta chump here and there never hurts either
If you ask any Fish player I know these 2-0 wins are so unlikely and appear to be terribly bad luck on behalf of the opponent and amazing christmas land good luck on the Fish players behalf. As far as I can tell this matchup is at least 80-20 Affinity - please prove me wrong with a detailed and comprehensive response. Furthermore, in support of what I'm saying, professional magic players took U/w merfolk to the pro tour and I think they did this for one reason and one reason alone - to have a fighting chance against affinity which was/is anticipated to be heavy in the post-TC ban era. I'd love to believe that mono-U merfolk has game against affinity - because playing white does for sure suck..
From my experience, affinity is 1.5 turns quicker than us. If we win a die roll than we have to draw interaction spell (Vapor Snag is the best, followed by Dismember and Truth) and curve out to negate the other 0.5.
The problems are their speed, our capabilities for blocking flyers and Skirge with Plating.
As a deck Affinity has access to best cards in modern in their category:
- removal
- draw
- 2 burn spells
- acceleration
- equipment
- manland
They even have their own "True-Name".
80-20 in their favor would mean they almost always have everything they need, which is not possible.
To abuse payoff cards they have to play chaff like Drum, Ornithopter, Memnite, extra Opal. Some draws can really be awkward.
We can race non-Plating draws, we can race Plating draws with bounce and Recall really is a blowout if cast properly.
I would never call it 20-80 matchup. 40-60 to 50-50 depending who goes first and if we have interaction in our deck/hand (Snag, Chalice and Recall).
I run 3x Recall in my board and I'll agree - if you land it at a crucial time - it can be a blow out - but many times its really just a speed bump. For me the always win game 1 and then you're praying to land at least one recall at the right time. Chalice on two is pretty ambitious - if we are at 4 mana they have a swarm of robots about to finish us off - but can be a blow out if we manage to recall then chalice for two. A bit christmas land though - siding in 6 sb cards and hoping to see 2 of them in the first 3-4 rounds. Perhaps I need to change my deck to include 4x snag, 3x, Pierce and 4x recall, 3x chalice sb. Even then I think it's still strongly in Affinity's favour as our game 2/3 are now maybe 50-50 (more realistically 60-40 to them) after losing game 1.
I get a very strong feeling that ppl on here downplay the affinity match-up - making out like they reliably win - when this doesnt stack up to everything I've experienced and what I read from pro's.
Keeping any hand with Recall might not do it, but if we both get normal draws that Recall will be blow out and game over, not speed bump. At least I never lost when I resolved 1 Recall. We are aggro and one sided Upheaval should be enough.
Of course is the new boogey man infect? Seriously. It is in Proven now. I am going to a PPTQ this weekend and am terrified to see it. Game 1 feels very hard. Game 2 at least I can sideboard. I am revamping my sideboard because I expect more infect now.
Why terrified? I don't know your decklist but Tidebinder and Seas lock half their win cons, Snag, Dismember and Cursecatcher are great for buying time. Chalice on one and Spellskite are brutal.
If infect and affinity are such problems, try some Gut Shots in the side.
I got beaten pretty badly at Channel Fireball's Modern Win-a-Box. Lost against Living End, Abzan Goodstuff, and Affinity, then won against Jeskai Control. I was using monoblue (the "all in on Spell Snare" method sucks against Living End, btw), but I bought into this bad boy yesterday.
I was at first enthusiastic about getting some red artifact destruction spells, but now I'm thinking that it's countered by Arcbound Ravager. Keep Hurkyl's Recall then? I don't think I've ever cast it and then lost later on anyway.
EDIT: My previous/current monoblue deck is basically that, but with thre red stuff replaced with blue stuff: Echoing Truth, Spell Snare, more Spellskites, &c.
I can't afford chalices and I only play paper magic, so I can't really help As for playing against living end, if their list is running simian spirit guide you need to play more carefully but if not pierce and cursecatcher are great. A close friend of mind plays living end and I usually lose game 1, he runs spirit guide btw but didnt always, where game 2 and 3 are more interested with Relic, Swansong, and just more hard counter magic.
I would imagine Chalice at 1 more or less shuts down infect since all their pump is gone, I have oft considered chalice but I would likely never main in. It really depends on your meta but 2-3 in the side would catch a lot of decks
I don't like chalice anymore... there are other cards that answer the 1cc threats that are more flexible against lots of matches. In the Delver era it was amazing though. A lot of decks that get wrecked for it come prepared (infect brings in it's hate) and I find it is such an awkward tempo play, because I won't get anything on the ground until T3... especially if they just go ahead and destroy it.
I am torn on removing the Spreading Seas. You guys say to remove Kira... but she blocks their fliers. Infect is now BUG and has 8 fliers. I actually want to add in +1 Kira + +1 Vaporsnag but don't know what to take out for it.
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In this case your affinity opponent was very bad. Thoughtsieze is useless against us. 2 of them is ridiculous. I also won a match in a similar way but it wasn't based on good luck or good play on my part
This is my 7th year of playing merfolk. Playing/played it in standard, modern and legacy (there were no vintage tournament nearby to try Reel Fish), never lost a mirror match (lost to merfolk but played another deck) and never afraid to play against the best. I played Ravager Affinity for as long as it was legal (from Clamp days to its mass-ban death). My first GPT victory and my first GP experience was with affinity. I am testing this matchup every week, just because it is bad. Should I concede the match against affinity? Or fear it?
Sure, the guy isn't Majlaton or Karsten, but that was just one match and I have positive experience overall. I would rather play against that then Tron or Martyr.
If you ask any Fish player I know these 2-0 wins are so unlikely and appear to be terribly bad luck on behalf of the opponent and amazing christmas land good luck on the Fish players behalf. As far as I can tell this matchup is at least 80-20 Affinity - please prove me wrong with a detailed and comprehensive response.
Furthermore, in support of what I'm saying, professional magic players took U/w merfolk to the pro tour and I think they did this for one reason and one reason alone - to have a fighting chance against affinity which was/is anticipated to be heavy in the post-TC ban era. I'd love to believe that mono-U merfolk has game against affinity - because playing white does for sure suck..
Bant Eldrazi
UW Control
U Merfolk
Legacy
Merfolk
UR Delver
We have a lot of cards that are strong against affinity. Main deck spell pierce(to stop cranial plating) and vapor snag are great and spreading seas stops any sort of nexus action. If they don't have a flier to pump and we manage to land a master of waves well good luck to them trying to get through. Post board things only get better with hurkyl's recall chalice on two is game over for affinity. There are other hate cards that I'm probably not including here this is just off of the top of my head but it isn't an 80-20 match-up in their favour that's for sure. I rarely go 0-2 against affinity I usually go 2-1 or 2-0. The only deck that I'm worried about is abzan as it is one of the top decks atm and is probably one of our worst matchups.
I run 3x Recall in my board and I'll agree - if you land it at a crucial time - it can be a blow out - but many times its really just a speed bump. For me the always win game 1 and then you're praying to land at least one recall at the right time. Chalice on two is pretty ambitious - if we are at 4 mana they have a swarm of robots about to finish us off - but can be a blow out if we manage to recall then chalice for two. A bit christmas land though - siding in 6 sb cards and hoping to see 2 of them in the first 3-4 rounds. Perhaps I need to change my deck to include 4x snag, 3x, Pierce and 4x recall, 3x chalice sb. Even then I think it's still strongly in Affinity's favour as our game 2/3 are now maybe 50-50 (more realistically 60-40 to them) after losing game 1.
I get a very strong feeling that ppl on here downplay the affinity match-up - making out like they reliably win - when this doesnt stack up to everything I've experienced and what I read from pro's.
Abzan seems much better for us at least 50/50 every game..
Bant Eldrazi
UW Control
U Merfolk
Legacy
Merfolk
UR Delver
0 - Useless
1 - Poor
2 - Playable/good half the time (play/draw dependant)
3 - Good
4 - Hoser
Lets say we took a card like:
Spreading Seas
3 Abzan
3 Jund
3 BGx
0 UR Twin
0 Tarmo Twin
1 Burn
0 Scapeshift
0 Storm
0 Amulet Bloom
1 Merfolk
3 UWR Control
3 Soul Sisters
3 Zoo
4 R/G Tron
Or Kira
2 Abzan
3 Jund
2 BGx
3 UR Twin
3 Tarmo Twin
3 Burn
2 Scapeshift
0 Storm
0 Amulet Bloom
2 Merfolk
3 UWR Control
1 Soul Sisters
2 Zoo
0 R/G Tron
and if we graded every playable card and for every match up then we could then take the most popular decks in the metagame and hopefully a deck will create itself. Unfortunately I have no idea how to make this happen except to make the data.
So if I understand you well, you want to give a subjective rating to each candidate card on a scale of 0 to 3 with respect to matchup, and then compare usefulness of each card based on popularity of each archetype.
If so then this is very easy. The mathematical apparatus that does this is called a weighted average. For instance, if 12% of the field is Abzan, 3% is Jund, ..., 7% is RG Tron, then you'd compute, for Kira,
0.12*2 + 0.03*3 + ... + 0.07*0.
P.S. I'm your biggest fan.
But basically what I want is based on the most popular decks we can calculate the most effective cards to beat that sort of metagame. Merfolk is a unique deck in that aside from maybe 4x Silvergill, 4x Lord of Atlantis, and 4x Master of the Pearl Trident everything else is a flex slot. I was trying to figure out how to beat Amulet, infect, burn, and Abzan and the unfortunate thing is that all these decks need to be attacked at a unique angle and its hard to know what the efficient 75 cards are for beating these plus the rest of the field.
Anyway, just an idea I'm throwing out there.
Episode 1: Spreading Seas
http://youtu.be/nt406K0hJnw
In terms of affinity, steel sabotage or annul help out alot since they might try to play about Spell Pierce but 1 cmc counterspells help tons, plus if you run Swan Song giving them a bird is not the worst thing in the world. As already mentioned Spreading Seas helps turn off their lands and we can flood the board just as well as them, it really is just practice against the deck and playing carefully.
I'd say for SB it really depends how much you expect a certain deck to show up, if you are honestly terrified of Affinity you will have to pick a deck to lose to. Twin, Amulet, Abzan, Burn, we only have so many SB slots. I still stand by the idea 2 cmc counters aren't worth playing, flashfreeze is cute in the SB and all but you aren't advancing the board and holding up extra mana when you could pierce and snag or other fancy stuff.
UMerfolkU
Legacy
UMerfolkU
Commander
RWBAlesha, Who Smiles At DeathRWB
UMerfolkU
Legacy
UMerfolkU
Commander
RWBAlesha, Who Smiles At DeathRWB
UMerfolkU
Legacy
UMerfolkU
Commander
RWBAlesha, Who Smiles At DeathRWB
From my experience, affinity is 1.5 turns quicker than us. If we win a die roll than we have to draw interaction spell (Vapor Snag is the best, followed by Dismember and Truth) and curve out to negate the other 0.5.
The problems are their speed, our capabilities for blocking flyers and Skirge with Plating.
As a deck Affinity has access to best cards in modern in their category:
- removal
- draw
- 2 burn spells
- acceleration
- equipment
- manland
They even have their own "True-Name".
80-20 in their favor would mean they almost always have everything they need, which is not possible.
To abuse payoff cards they have to play chaff like Drum, Ornithopter, Memnite, extra Opal. Some draws can really be awkward.
We can race non-Plating draws, we can race Plating draws with bounce and Recall really is a blowout if cast properly.
I would never call it 20-80 matchup. 40-60 to 50-50 depending who goes first and if we have interaction in our deck/hand (Snag, Chalice and Recall).
Keeping any hand with Recall might not do it, but if we both get normal draws that Recall will be blow out and game over, not speed bump. At least I never lost when I resolved 1 Recall. We are aggro and one sided Upheaval should be enough.
Is this only my experience?
Why terrified? I don't know your decklist but Tidebinder and Seas lock half their win cons, Snag, Dismember and Cursecatcher are great for buying time. Chalice on one and Spellskite are brutal.
If infect and affinity are such problems, try some Gut Shots in the side.
4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
3 Merrow Reejerey
1 Sygg, River Cutthroat
1 Tidebinder Mage
2 Master of Waves
1 Cold-Eyed Selkie
1 Skaab Ruinator
1 Kira, Great Glass Spinner
3 Aether Vial
4 Spreading Seas
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Brute Force
1 Redirect
Lands
5 Island
1 Minamo, School
1 Oboro, Palace
4 Flooded Strand
4 Polluted Delta
3 Steam Vents
2 Mutavault
4 Combust
2 Sowing Salt
2 Spellskite
2 Swan Song
3 Hurkyl's Recall
2 Relic of Progenitus
0 Shattering Spree
I was at first enthusiastic about getting some red artifact destruction spells, but now I'm thinking that it's countered by Arcbound Ravager. Keep Hurkyl's Recall then? I don't think I've ever cast it and then lost later on anyway.
EDIT: My previous/current monoblue deck is basically that, but with thre red stuff replaced with blue stuff: Echoing Truth, Spell Snare, more Spellskites, &c.
Modern: U M'Olk; B Goodstuff
I would imagine Chalice at 1 more or less shuts down infect since all their pump is gone, I have oft considered chalice but I would likely never main in. It really depends on your meta but 2-3 in the side would catch a lot of decks
UMerfolkU
Legacy
UMerfolkU
Commander
RWBAlesha, Who Smiles At DeathRWB
Here is my current decklist/sideboard:
4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
2 Tidebinder Mage
3 Reejery
3 Kira
3 Master of Waves
3 Dismember
3 Vaporsnag
4 Aether Vial
4 Spreading Seas
LANDS
11 Island
3 Cavern of Souls
1 Oboro
1 Minamo
4 Mutavault
3 Tectonic Edge
3 Spell Pierce
1 Kira
1 Master of Waves
2 Spellskite
1 Vaporsnag
4 Hurkyls Recall
Against infect my plan is to go:
- 3 Master of Waves
- 2 Reejery
+ 2 Spell Pierce
+ 2 Spellskite
I am torn on removing the Spreading Seas. You guys say to remove Kira... but she blocks their fliers. Infect is now BUG and has 8 fliers. I actually want to add in +1 Kira + +1 Vaporsnag but don't know what to take out for it.