I am having trouble figuring out the side boarding plan for the deck. I am not sure what I should be taking out versus certain decks and how many cards to put in with out diluting the deck. Does anyone have any tips or articles they can share?
If you want to just mess with the one player then I would recommend an Elf Opposition deck. The idea behind this deck is to power out Opposition. Then tap down your opponents lands on their upkeep which is basically a soft lock.
If you want to screw everyone, one of my favorite decks is a kataki, war's wage & Mycosynth Lattice deck where your creatures Produce mana with some producing 2 mana and attack them for 1 damage each turn.
I hope this is the correct place to post this. I tried posting in the Tournament reports but then I realized those were locked and archived.
I went to a small ~30 people GP Richmond Trail yesterday. I ended up second after the Swiss rounds going 3-0-2 drawing the last two round to make it into the top 8.
I decided to try a dark version of affinity with Dark Confidant and Thoughseize. Here is my deck list.
G1 - This was a long atrition war with me placing a few threats down while leaving up a color mana source to fake as if I have Galvanic Blast. After about 8 turns I tap out to cast Etched Champion then he combos off next turn.
G2 - Another long attrition war but this time my thoughtseize removed his combo peace and I was able to kill him slowly but it got the job done.
G2 - I had a much faster clock with Arcbound Ravager and some side board cards including Torpor Orb and Spellskite. He was dead in 5 or 6 turns.
G2 – Turn 1 Dark Confidant gave me a huge card advantage and a ton of artifacts which was to much for him to overcome.
2-0 (4-1)
Round 3 - UWR Control
G1 – He had ot mulligan down to 6 cards. He kept a hand with 1 wrath and all lands. I dropped a Steel Overseer while shuffling which is why I think he kept that hand. Thankfully i had a Thoughtseize which removed the wrath and that was pretty much game.
Game 2 – He had all the burn and I ran out of cards.
Game 3 – He got stuck on 2 lands and I landed an Etched Champion that was unanswered. It toke forever to kill him since he kept burning out my other creatures but the 2 damage a turn won it.
I had a misplay this game that could have cost me the game. I used thoughtseize him noticing a stranded pyroclasim, lightning helix and electrolyze. I toke the lightning helix because of the life gain. The problem was that I missed the lightning bolt which became a problem when I only put two ravager counters on my Blinkmoth Nexus. So I learned that when playing a deck with bolts never put less than 3 modular tokens on a man land.
3-0 (6-2)
Round 4 - ?
intentional Draw
3-0-1 (6-2-3)
Round 5 - ?
intentional Draw
3-0-2 (6-2-6)
TOP 8
Quarter Finals - Soul Sisters
G1
I win off the back of a ravager buffed inkmoth.
G3
He had another turn 2 stoney silence which locked my mana. I only got about 5 poison counters on him before he swarmed me.
Deck review:
Overall I thought that Dark Confidant was a good card and worth including. Most of the time he gained me a card and ate a burn spell which saves my ravager or steel overseer from the burn.
Dark Confidant is a blow out versus other agro decks light on removal. You barely take any damage with him and you can easily flood the board.
Thoughtseize was an all star. The card won me atleast two games and no one expects it main board. Thoughtseize will let you know if it is ok to go all in on Arcbound Ravager as well as letting you plan out how to respond to various removal.
Etched Champion was one card that I wish I had more of in the main board. Currently there are a lot of URx decks that load up on removal. I found him very useful.
Deck Changes
Main Deck
I would add 2 more etched champions to the main board and remove 1 Dark Confidant and 1 Ornithopter or Memnite.
The deck is currently set up for the aggro match up. I have not completed the sideboard since our knowledge of the metagame is little to none. I imagine it will include Thoughtseize for the control among other cards.
Sample Nuts Draw:
We all like to talk about the best possible draws of our deck so here is a sample.
Rakdos's Return - Fireball with discard works well with alot of mana. Pray it doesn't get countered. Mistcutter Hydra - fireball that can't be countered but can be blocked. Colossus of Akros - almost unkillable beast. 20/20 trample.
Here is an article about the deck: http://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/gpnj14/artifactaggro
And here are the round 15 standings: http://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/gpnj14/r15standings
Thanks
Here is a sample deck list:
4 Coiling Oracle
4 Imperious Perfect
4 Llanowar Elves
1 Sylvan Messenger
1 Viridian Shaman
4 Wirewood Herald
3 Wirewood Hivemaster
4 Wirewood Symbiote
4 Wren's Run Vanquisher
3 Boreal Druid
4 Breeding Pool
4 Windswept Heath
4 Yavimaya Coast
1 Pendelhaven
4 Opposition
3 Umezawa's Jitte
4 Tormod's Crypt
1 Viridian Shaman
3 Krosan Grip
4 Remand
If you want to screw everyone, one of my favorite decks is a kataki, war's wage & Mycosynth Lattice deck where your creatures Produce mana with some producing 2 mana and attack them for 1 damage each turn.
I went to a small ~30 people GP Richmond Trail yesterday. I ended up second after the Swiss rounds going 3-0-2 drawing the last two round to make it into the top 8.
I decided to try a dark version of affinity with Dark Confidant and Thoughseize. Here is my deck list.
3 Memnite
4 Signal Pest
4 Vault Skirge
4 Arcbound Ravager
3 Steel Overseer
1 Etched Champion
4 Dark Confidant
4 Mox Opal
3 Springleaf Drum
3 Galvanic Blast
3 Thoughtseize
4 Cranial Plating
4 Blinkmoth Nexus
4 Darksteel Citadel
4 Inkmoth Nexus
1 Swamp
2 Whipflare
2 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Spellskite
2 Ancient Grudge
2 Etched Champion
2 Torpor Orb
2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Illness in the Ranks
Round 1 - Splinter Twin
G1 - This was a long atrition war with me placing a few threats down while leaving up a color mana source to fake as if I have Galvanic Blast. After about 8 turns I tap out to cast Etched Champion then he combos off next turn.
G2 - Another long attrition war but this time my thoughtseize removed his combo peace and I was able to kill him slowly but it got the job done.
G2 - I had a much faster clock with Arcbound Ravager and some side board cards including Torpor Orb and Spellskite. He was dead in 5 or 6 turns.
1-0 (2-1)
Round 2 - Poison
G1 – I had 2 Thoughtseize, Steel Overseer and Ornathorper and he has no removal. He got me to 8 poison on turn 2 then I removed all the creatures in his hand multiple Thoughtseize and killed him through Ornathopter and Steel Overseer.
G2 – Turn 1 Dark Confidant gave me a huge card advantage and a ton of artifacts which was to much for him to overcome.
2-0 (4-1)
Round 3 - UWR Control
G1 – He had ot mulligan down to 6 cards. He kept a hand with 1 wrath and all lands. I dropped a Steel Overseer while shuffling which is why I think he kept that hand. Thankfully i had a Thoughtseize which removed the wrath and that was pretty much game.
Game 2 – He had all the burn and I ran out of cards.
Game 3 – He got stuck on 2 lands and I landed an Etched Champion that was unanswered. It toke forever to kill him since he kept burning out my other creatures but the 2 damage a turn won it.
I had a misplay this game that could have cost me the game. I used thoughtseize him noticing a stranded pyroclasim, lightning helix and electrolyze. I toke the lightning helix because of the life gain. The problem was that I missed the lightning bolt which became a problem when I only put two ravager counters on my Blinkmoth Nexus. So I learned that when playing a deck with bolts never put less than 3 modular tokens on a man land.
3-0 (6-2)
Round 4 - ?
intentional Draw
3-0-1 (6-2-3)
Round 5 - ?
intentional Draw
3-0-2 (6-2-6)
TOP 8
Quarter Finals - Soul Sisters
G1
I win off the back of a ravager buffed inkmoth.
G2
He had a second turn stoney silence and I kept a greedy hand with 1 land and steel overseer, arcbound ravager and cranial plating all of which were worthless after the stoney hit.
G3
He had another turn 2 stoney silence which locked my mana. I only got about 5 poison counters on him before he swarmed me.
Deck review:
Overall I thought that Dark Confidant was a good card and worth including. Most of the time he gained me a card and ate a burn spell which saves my ravager or steel overseer from the burn.
Dark Confidant is a blow out versus other agro decks light on removal. You barely take any damage with him and you can easily flood the board.
Thoughtseize was an all star. The card won me atleast two games and no one expects it main board. Thoughtseize will let you know if it is ok to go all in on Arcbound Ravager as well as letting you plan out how to respond to various removal.
Etched Champion was one card that I wish I had more of in the main board. Currently there are a lot of URx decks that load up on removal. I found him very useful.
Deck Changes
Main Deck
I would add 2 more etched champions to the main board and remove 1 Dark Confidant and 1 Ornithopter or Memnite.
Side Board
Remove the obviously worthless card Ethersworn Canonist and add Wear // Tear
Updated Deck list
3 Memnite
4 Signal Pest
4 Vault Skirge
4 Arcbound Ravager
3 Steel Overseer
3 Etched Champion
3 Dark Confidant
4 Mox Opal
3 Springleaf Drum
3 Galvanic Blast
3 Thoughtseize
4 Cranial Plating
4 Blinkmoth Nexus
4 Darksteel Citadel
4 Inkmoth Nexus
1 Swamp
2 Whipflare
2 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Spellskite
2 Ancient Grudge
2 Wear // Tear
2 Torpor Orb
2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Illness in the Ranks
Thanks for reading. I am curious to hear everyone's thoughts.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/fox-bring-magic-gathering-big-670529
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Stomping Ground
2 Mountain
3 Mutavault
8 Forest
4 Swamp
4 Elvish Mystic
3 Mistcutter Hydra
4 Sylvan Caryatid
4 Burnished Hart
3 Colossus of Akros
2 Axebane Guardian
4 Read the Bones
3 Rakdos's Return
2 Hero's Downfall
2 Golgari Charm
2 Gruul Charm
2 Abrupt Decay
The deck is currently set up for the aggro match up. I have not completed the sideboard since our knowledge of the metagame is little to none. I imagine it will include Thoughtseize for the control among other cards.
Sample Nuts Draw:
We all like to talk about the best possible draws of our deck so here is a sample.
Turn 1 Forest into Elvish Mystic
Turn 2 Swamp into Burnished Hart
Turn 3 Mutavault sac Burnished Hart after attacking or blocking get a Mountain and Forest
Turn 4 play a land into a Rakdos's Return for 5.
Card Choices:
Mana Rampers
Elvish Mystic - obvious first turn ramp always a classic
Sylvan Caryatid - Hexproof, reasonable blocker & mana ramp. Great card.
Burnished Hart - All Star allows for super ramp assuming he doesn't get shot on the first turn he is out.
Axebane Guardian - One of the weaker cards but he works well with both Sylvan Caryatid & Colossus of Akros.
Win Conditions
Rakdos's Return - Fireball with discard works well with alot of mana. Pray it doesn't get countered.
Mistcutter Hydra - fireball that can't be countered but can be blocked.
Colossus of Akros - almost unkillable beast. 20/20 trample.
Supporting Cards
Read the bones - Card advantage
Hero's Downfall - helps with those Planeswalkers
Golgari Charm - Helps against Anger of the Gods and tokens from cards like Elspeth, Sun's Champion.
Gruul Charm - Flying is a weakness and so are chump blockers.
Abrupt Decay - good early removal.
That is the basic deck. I have not play tested it. I am also not sure it it has any potential to be competitive.
Any and all thoughts and comments are welcome. Thank you and have fun brewing.