So after a a month of being unable to play legacy (due to exams), I've finally been able to test out the deck I posted earlier, last night with a few minor tweaks, here's the list:
0-2 vs BR Reanimator (lost game 1 on turn 1, game 2 on turn 2, unmask destroyed me before they went off)
2-1 vs ANT (ethersworn canonist won me both my games, landed it on turn 3 and turn 2 respectively)
2-1 vs Vial Smasher (won one of my games after my opponent tapped out to drop EE on 2, which I then played harmonic sliver after to steal the game)
2-1 vs Jeskai Stoneblade (this was a tough match up, my 1 loss was due to drawing my crystalline sliver the turn after he 1 for 1 removed 4 slivers the turn prior, and lost tempo from there from a batterskull with jitte on it, BOTH of my wins were due to EoT [[collected company]], one of which was after he exploded an EE to wipe my board, I was able to swing back for lethal)
Something to note is that in nearly all my games, I won due to crystalline sliver. I almost always had turn 1 vial, but it also almost always ate an abrupt decay, which I'm completely O.K. with since my lords stayed alive.
In terms of how I piloted the deck, I tended to err on the side of caution, foregoing a turn 1 galerider to just land-go since I knew it was going to eat removal (if I had a turn 2 crystalline sliver in hand). I definitely played a lot safer than usual, and it ended up rewarding me in terms of win %. I didn't go for any turn 4 aggro wins, but really just to win mid-game. I only played aggressively against storm since the race is all that mattered and they don't bother using removal on slivers.
Now for Some breakdown on the cards that I did like, and those that I didn't:
Manaweft sliver was an all-star last night, which impressed me more than I thought it would. Although, I didn't get a chance to use it to cast my Coco, he was an easy sliver to swing into a baleful strix with since I really didn't mind losing it (as a 3/3 or 4/4 due to lords). Also, a turn 2 manaweft sliver can cause some misplays on the opponent's behalf, sometimes they jump to remove it (while my hand of lords stay safe), or they don't, allowing me to drop 2-3 lords the next turn (if i had vial out turn 2). I often chose to play manaweft on turn 2 over any lord, only prioritizing a turn 2 crystalline sliver over it. It was also good to know that I wasn't as dependent on drawing a land if I had one in my hand, so keeping a 1 lander and vial felt way less sketchy (although vial always ate a turn 2 decay).
venom sliver was lackluster all night, but this might've been due to playing match ups where the card doesn't shine. I managed to get it out at one point with talon sliver against the jeskai stoneblade deck, but since I didn't have crystalline/diffusion sliver out to protect them it almost didn't matter anyways. It felt cute but not great. It did however stall a batterskull for 1 or 2 turns, but I ended up losing the game afterwards anyways. After seeing last nights performance with them, I think I'll be dropping them for sidewinder slivers since they seem a lot better against baleful strixs and early snapcaster blocks (snapcaster was super annoying since it'll flash in and block my 2/2 lord).
collected company never came up in the first 3 match ups. I either didn't draw it, won without casting it, or lost super hard with the card in my hand (before turn 4). I never felt that I didn't have enough mana for it which was great!! It won both of my games against stoneblade which blew them out of the water. I won after they spent all their resources clearing my board state, only to recover right after they did and swing for lethal the turn after. It was amazing. The issue of it getting countered didn't really come up (all of them resolved), since they either exhausted their counters for vial or early lords, or they boarded them out incorrectly because they saw cavern but not coco in the early rounds, or I protected it with FoW. That being said, please remember that the sample size of casting a coco was n = 2. I got to live the dream of swinging in with a single crystalline on board, only to have my opponent respond by flash-blocking with a snapcaster, to be met with a coco that ripped 2 lords off the top 6, allowing me to win combat. I followed up the turn after with a second coco to swing in for lethal (like 13 damage or so).
I dropped down to 18 because of the manawefts, but maybe running 19 or 20 is correct with the manawefts instead. The sliver hives aren't there because I want to minimize how often i'll get mana-screwed for sylvan library or collected company. I really don't think a bant list needs the added fixing of sliver hive at all (at the cost of being unable to cast Sideboard cards and mainboard sylvan library/collected company)
I just wanted to post the new list that I'll be testing in the upcoming new meta now that terminus/miracles match up is gone. The direction I'm going is bant for a fluid mana base. Here's the list:
You'll notice that I removed daze/STP from the main deck (taking a page from the full slivers list) but threw in some card advantage through collected company. 4 mana is expensive, and I agree that anything that cost's 4 "should just win the game", a sentiment that has been previously repeated. However, this build circumvents that by playing some manaweft slivers to help ramp into it (also helps to hard cast force of will if you don't have a blue card in hand).
Some things I wanted to discuss include whether or not sentinel sliver should be in the main due to it's synergy with manaweft sliver, and if that also will call for the mainboard inclusion of quilled sliver to deal with the potential rise of delver decks that we may see. The synergy of quilled sliver with sentinel sliver is obvious in that it provides us with extra removal while still allowing us to attack. Quilled sliver also offer us a method of fighting through any baleful strixs that might start seeing play as it is one of the few great defensive control creatures in the format. Also, quilled sliver helps us fight through block-boomerang shenanigans that elves present, as we can respond to their activated ability by shooting it down. Also, it kills thalia (or allows us to attack through one ie they choose not to block to prevent it from dying). Additionally, the interaction it'll have with venom sliver is that it'll kill most creatures in the format. Holy cow I think I just convinced myself to play the damn card.
I think Diffusion sliver is there as a flex slot, many times when we don't draw our crystalline sliver we just lose so much tempo in the face of removal. It's also there to bump up the blue count for force of will. I'm pretty much going to test this card as a functional replacement for hibernation sliver as it allows us to stick to fewer colors a little bit better. Also, in the absence of terminus, hibernation sliver's utility does drop, maybe just by a tiny bit, but the card just hasn't impressed me recently.
I dropped Deathrite shaman from my previous deathhooks list because I found that the deck just couldn't support the manabase DRS needed as much as I wanted it to. I did however LOVE the ramp it provided, so another card i started thinking about was noble hierarch, but a buddy had convinced me that it was better suited in a deck that goes tall rather than going wide (stoneblade decks vs slivers) which I had to agree with.
edited for grammar
edited for some after thought on the efficacy of quilled sliver
Hey ya'll, wanted to report about my night playing death hooks (death rite meathooks)
it was a 4 round 17-man legacy night
2-1 vs UW Bomberman (ft. meddling mage and git. probe, this deck was actually really tough to hedge a win against)
2-0 vs Grixis Vial Smasher Delver
1-2 vs Lands
1-2 vs Lands
Lands is a terrible match up, and the only games where I missed vials terribly (because of wasteland-loam locks from the early game). Since this was a super small sample size, and my wins against other decks were good, I'll have to continue to assess how this deck is. I intend to throw 2-3 pithing needles into the sideboard instead of abrupt decays to deal with the lands match up or just concede that it is an auto-lose. It should be noted that 4 of the 17 players tonight were playing lands, 2 were on eldrazi, 3 were on delver, 1 on burn, 1 on aluren, and some others that I can't remember.
My first win against lands was actually because of delver deathrite life gain, both of my wins were due to crystalline sliver offering shroud shutting off punishing fire / maze of ith, and mulling into surgical extractions to deal with loam/wasteland engine.
I've cut the aether vials and replaced them with Deathrite Shamans in this list. I know that this breaks the Cardinal Rules of Slivers to always play vial, but I've lately been unimpressed with the card. My initial testing actually included a list with both vial and DRS but I've found that having both wasn't necessary to pump out slivers quickly (and I've found that DRS was still able to get my slivers out at roughly the same rate as aether vial, without the benefit of making every sliver uncounterable). This of course makes our control match up worse, but I think its reasonable that cavern is enough to get there against those types of decks. To further support DRS and Brainstorm, I bumped up the fetch-land count to 8, but it can be 9 if we cut the scrubland.
I'm also aware that DRS is not a sliver, but I couldn't for the life of me find a sliver that I would want to play over it. The utility it has is very powerful and supports the hive too much for me not to test it out. Not sure why I hadn't explored this idea earlier when I thought shardless was a good idea (it was meh, library was just better).
I also cut hibernation sliver down to 2. I might throw 2 in the side board for the miracles match up. I just haven't really had a situation where I was dying to have one, but that might just be due to local meta changes recently.
I'm not in the FB group, I'll search it up and join
As for shardless agent, it did have some merit in terms of being used for card advantage, but it felt far too clunky at 3 mana to cast (since caverns don't support it). Replacing them with sylvan library has shown to be fruitful to refill the hand with slivers in games where a turn 2 crystalline sliver off a cavern didn't happen.
I'm going to start testing deathrite shaman in the deck in a more counter-sliver build, but after small amounts of testing it isn't looking too great (against combo at least, which is bad anyways so maybe I just need more games against other decks). I am definitely noticing that I want my hand refilled all the time as I haven't had the turn-4 kill very often. My meta is filled with lands and I tend to just lose on turn 3 from a flying 20/20 (if I couldn't buy time blocking after playing a galerider/winged)
EDIT: couldn't find the FB group, what's it called?
I mean it really just seems like a slightly more consistent soldier/human deck except it doesn't have actual removal. Is just bunch of creatures that boost each other alone enough for the meta? And have you considered collected company?
a recent deck topped with 2 Coco's and 2 eladamri's call. Coming from modern, collected company does cause huge deck building restrictions in that it's not advised to run less than 28 creatures in order to consistently hit 2 creatures with it. That said, if you are fine with that, you should go for it. My problem is that it leaves little to no room for a disruption package of force or daze
its not just more consistent, shroud and flying are both game winning buffs that other tribal strategies do not have
Hello, I recently bought into this deck and I was wondering if [[gemstone caverns]] was worth the look as a 1-2 piece. I was thinking it can be great when going 2nd to act as moxen 5-6, to help get that turn 1 thalia/SF into play. I'm not too sure if it's worth the risk of going down in terms of colored sources though and figured I could throw it up in the air for discussion. I am also an eldrazi player and have thrown it into the deck before, however, with the exception of 1 occasion, it never came up.
I don't want to be mean, but why would this help? Crystalline and Hibernation already make removal near-useless against us, including global removal like Terminus which is much more impactful and which Leovold doesn't help against. Also, adding one in the 75 with no way to tutor for it and little library manipulation (only Sylvan-fetch interaction) means you're highly unlikely to see it in the few cases where it would actually help. The fact that it's not a sliver means you can't protect it with Crystalline and Hibernation, nor pump/jump it so it can attack profitably against Legacy beaters. At 3 colored mana that doesn't benefit from Cavern (on Sliver), it's also extremely difficult to cast unless you have Vial on 3, which itself is a problem because we want vial to stay at 2. I see pretty much zero upside to this.
helps against burn (draws us gas so we can outrace them), helps against shardless match up (lili, abrupt, hymn), stops miracles from finding terminus by blanking brainstorm/top, stops elves from drawing with glimpse. We find it with brainstorm and library. I do agree it'll be hard to cast, but you must be blind if you can't see it's upside.
EDIT: might be better in builds running multiple chrome moxs
just going to throw this out there, I think that Leovold, Emissary of Trest can have a spot int he 75. He stops brainstorm decks while also giving us card advantage against decks that are stack with removal. Maybe just as a 1-of, but what do you think?
So what do we think of recruiter of the guard in slivers? It'll be a possibly better homing sliver in terms of tutoring sliver bullets (see what i did there? :P), without the benefit of being a sliver itself. I definitely see it being beneficial for the Full Slivers list, but not too sure for the counterslivers strategy.
I am more of a forum follower than a contributor but will try and post my legacy Slivers deck for feedback as it is my only legacy deck and I love the archetype.
I don't currently play the version of CounterSliver with black in it for Hibernation Sliver.
And I am following the testing of Sylvan Library and Shardless Agent with interest. Based on your recent results fewer Agents is better.
Would you mind posting some examples of where the Hibernation ability is/has been crucial?
Specifically it would be which slivers are worth the life loss to save. I am assuming the Galerider, a Crystalline and a lord.
Cheers.
Hey Beavis_NZ, Hibernation I've found is very effective in many situations. It helps to swing into a blocking baleful strix, just to bounce back the one he blocks and vial it back in (if its a lord) to still get damage through. Its also effective at dodging wraths such as toxic deluge and terminus or all is dust, all of which are a common sight at my LGS. It's also fantastic if you are behind in board presence to block a big tarmogoyf or thought-knot seer or a beefed up eldrazi mimic since the bounce life loss is much less. I also keep it in hand for aether vial tricks to whiff a swords to plowshares or abrupt decay. In terms of protecting my slivers, I like to think of hibernation sliver as pseudo-copies of crystalline 5-8. Also, having a 2/2 body is super relevant. It's also great if the opponent may wasteland your mutavault, you can respond by turning it on and bouncing it back to your hand.
Galerider is essential for our win-con, as there are tons of creatures out there that make it hard to swing into, so definitely saving it is a priority. With regards to saving lords, it really depends on the situation. If I'm sitting with no lords in hand, then just saving 1 or 2 might be good enough depending on the opponent's life total, always remember you want to put them on a clock, and wrapping things up sooner is in your favor because it gives them less opportunity to come back. If I have a sylvan library out, I'm less inclined to save 2 or more lords since the drawing engine it provides you is more than strong enough to apply pressure, I absolutely love that card. Against non-monastery miracles decks, I'd just bounce everything back to my hand because my own life total is pretty much irrelevant to my opponent.
Saving crystalline hasn't often come up, mostly because at that point, the only thing it needs protection against is larger creatures in combat, or wraths. Protection in combat doesn't often come up since crystalline often gets to a 4/4 or 5/5 since your lords are not being removed due to the shroud, again bouncing crystalline will probably most often occur against a strix. With regards to wrath effects, I would probably bounce it back since those decks also tend to run point removal which we need protection against (they probably have a bunch of dead removal cards in their hand from your turn 2 crystalline).
I wanted to test out the list with 3x shardless agents and ended up going 2-2 overall. Here are the match ups:
2-0 Shardless Bug Won game 1 by out racing the opponent, I played 3 lords and just kept bashing in with them for the win (he played 2 deathrites which blocked early turns and died, and a goyf that could block enough to prevent lethal). The opponent also misplayed and used abrupt decay on vial (when i had 1 card in hand) instead of on a lord which made his blocks inefficient. Game 2 I brought in RIP which shrank his goyf and made his 2 deathrites useless. He ended up playing toxic deluge (turn after i tap out to play rip and swing with mutavault), which i was fine with because I had 3 slivers in hand still, which also cleared his board of goyfs and deathrites. He wasn't able to recover from there.
1-2 UR Delver Basically won game 1 after a mulligan to 5 with no lands (kept a cavern on top with scry), but had aether vial, gale rider, and lords, and 1 STP. Got there game 1 by drawing into lands and swinging in hard and fast. Lost game 2 which would've been a win if i just drew a galerider, numerous times i had lethal but no evasion (perhaps i should play the 1 winged sliver). Game 3 he flipped 3 delvers and killed me quite quickly.
0-2 Miracles Game 1 was a loss, really good miracles player got his monk tokens huge and swung in while keeping lots of tokens up for blocks. Game 2 i put huge pressure on the board and again just needed flying to get lethal, even after he engineer exploded 2 aether vials and nearly my library + ethersworn canonist (i brought 2 canonist in, turns out it is BAD in the match up). Here shardless shined by allowing me to recover after numerous terminus's (he played 3!!!!), hitting STP for mentor (which he FoW'd), and hitting sideboard cards (like thalia, which he also fow'd), but once he got his tokens going I couldn't keep up (he would chain 2 tops over and over again with 2 monks out, generating 8 tokens a turn on 4 lands). Game 2 he FoW'd and terminus'd me 3 times each, and played 2 EE's, like wow. He was at 6 life before his mentor tokens over ran me, i really wish i hit a flying sliver for the win.
2-1 Thoughtlash Control Game 1 i ended up milling him by just swinging in for 20ish damage for 2-3 turns in a row. G2 He ended up getting his lab maniac win con on me as i had no counter spells or STP's to deal with it. Game 3 I played harmonic sliver off of cavern on turn 3 which crushed all his tops and thoughtlashes.
Overall Impressions: I felt that 3 shardless agents felt clunky. I ran into a string of bad luck as well, often drawing into my wastelands without having targets (delver, miracles, thoughtlash), but I'm not convinced I would've liked mutavault instead in those situations. Sylvan library proved again to be an amazing card in this deck, giving me game against every deck i played with. I do believe a lot of my losses were due to side board errors, and accidentally siding out useful cards for non impact cards. I'm planning on cutting 1 shardless agent for 1 winged sliver because flying would have been huge for all my game losses.
I like SC's versatility in being used as either a finisher pump effect or a removal spell. On the other hand, Dismember will likely cost 1 mana and 4 life, vs 2 mana and 0 life. SC is weaker to Blood Moon, but Dismember isn't exactly helping us in that situation either.
Thoughts?
Right now I'm running 2 dismembers, 1 spatial contortion and 1 warping wail Main board, with 1 SC and 1 WW also in the side board. I like the dismembers main to deal with large creatures previously mentioned in this thread. However, i LOVE the SC and WW in the side, they both great for dealing with decks where dismember isn't AS good (delver, burn) since it'll damage us huge (especially with tomb out, real bad feels taking 6 damage to kill a delver)
How does everyone feel about Eldritch Evolution?? Seems like it'll fit in a build that is more focused on getting sliver hivelord or sliver legion out quicker, whilst acting as a tutor. We could sac potential 3 drops like necrotic, homing, syphon, frenetic, etc to cheat it out for... basically the win. Might replace Coco/Aether vial in this new build?
Additionally, could be used to also grab 4 drops by sac-ing a lord to it, cards like bonescythe sliver would fit the bill on it.
4x Crystalline Sliver
1x Diffusion Sliver
4x Galerider Sliver
3x Manaweft Sliver
3x Muscle Sliver
4x Predatory Sliver
4x Sinew Sliver
1x Talon Sliver
3x Venom Sliver
1x Winged Sliver
4x Cavern of Souls
1x Forest
4x Misty Rainforest
4x Mutavault
3x Tropical Island
2x Tundra
1x Polluted Delta
Instant (7)
3x Collected Company
4x Force of Will
Enchantment (1)
1x Sylvan Library
4x Aether Vial
2x Containment Priest
2x Harmonic Sliver
3x Rest in Peace
1x Path to Exile
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2x Ethersworn Canonist
1x Back to Basics
1x Azorius Charm
I went 3-1 last night:
0-2 vs BR Reanimator (lost game 1 on turn 1, game 2 on turn 2, unmask destroyed me before they went off)
2-1 vs ANT (ethersworn canonist won me both my games, landed it on turn 3 and turn 2 respectively)
2-1 vs Vial Smasher (won one of my games after my opponent tapped out to drop EE on 2, which I then played harmonic sliver after to steal the game)
2-1 vs Jeskai Stoneblade (this was a tough match up, my 1 loss was due to drawing my crystalline sliver the turn after he 1 for 1 removed 4 slivers the turn prior, and lost tempo from there from a batterskull with jitte on it, BOTH of my wins were due to EoT [[collected company]], one of which was after he exploded an EE to wipe my board, I was able to swing back for lethal)
Something to note is that in nearly all my games, I won due to crystalline sliver. I almost always had turn 1 vial, but it also almost always ate an abrupt decay, which I'm completely O.K. with since my lords stayed alive.
In terms of how I piloted the deck, I tended to err on the side of caution, foregoing a turn 1 galerider to just land-go since I knew it was going to eat removal (if I had a turn 2 crystalline sliver in hand). I definitely played a lot safer than usual, and it ended up rewarding me in terms of win %. I didn't go for any turn 4 aggro wins, but really just to win mid-game. I only played aggressively against storm since the race is all that mattered and they don't bother using removal on slivers.
Now for Some breakdown on the cards that I did like, and those that I didn't:
Manaweft sliver was an all-star last night, which impressed me more than I thought it would. Although, I didn't get a chance to use it to cast my Coco, he was an easy sliver to swing into a baleful strix with since I really didn't mind losing it (as a 3/3 or 4/4 due to lords). Also, a turn 2 manaweft sliver can cause some misplays on the opponent's behalf, sometimes they jump to remove it (while my hand of lords stay safe), or they don't, allowing me to drop 2-3 lords the next turn (if i had vial out turn 2). I often chose to play manaweft on turn 2 over any lord, only prioritizing a turn 2 crystalline sliver over it. It was also good to know that I wasn't as dependent on drawing a land if I had one in my hand, so keeping a 1 lander and vial felt way less sketchy (although vial always ate a turn 2 decay).
venom sliver was lackluster all night, but this might've been due to playing match ups where the card doesn't shine. I managed to get it out at one point with talon sliver against the jeskai stoneblade deck, but since I didn't have crystalline/diffusion sliver out to protect them it almost didn't matter anyways. It felt cute but not great. It did however stall a batterskull for 1 or 2 turns, but I ended up losing the game afterwards anyways. After seeing last nights performance with them, I think I'll be dropping them for sidewinder slivers since they seem a lot better against baleful strixs and early snapcaster blocks (snapcaster was super annoying since it'll flash in and block my 2/2 lord).
collected company never came up in the first 3 match ups. I either didn't draw it, won without casting it, or lost super hard with the card in my hand (before turn 4). I never felt that I didn't have enough mana for it which was great!! It won both of my games against stoneblade which blew them out of the water. I won after they spent all their resources clearing my board state, only to recover right after they did and swing for lethal the turn after. It was amazing. The issue of it getting countered didn't really come up (all of them resolved), since they either exhausted their counters for vial or early lords, or they boarded them out incorrectly because they saw cavern but not coco in the early rounds, or I protected it with FoW. That being said, please remember that the sample size of casting a coco was n = 2. I got to live the dream of swinging in with a single crystalline on board, only to have my opponent respond by flash-blocking with a snapcaster, to be met with a coco that ripped 2 lords off the top 6, allowing me to win combat. I followed up the turn after with a second coco to swing in for lethal (like 13 damage or so).
Edited for formatting
I just wanted to post the new list that I'll be testing in the upcoming new meta now that terminus/miracles match up is gone. The direction I'm going is bant for a fluid mana base. Here's the list:
4x Crystalline Sliver
3x Diffusion Sliver
4x Galerider Sliver
3x Manaweft Sliver
4x Muscle Sliver
4x Predatory Sliver
4x Sinew Sliver
1x Talon Sliver
2x Venom Sliver
1x Winged Sliver
4x Cavern of Souls
1x Forest
4x Misty Rainforest
4x Mutavault
3x Tropical Island
2x Tundra
Instant (7)
3x Collected Company
4x Force of Will
Enchantment (1)
1x Sylvan Library
Artifact (4)
4x Aether Vial
2x Containment Priest
2x Harmonic Sliver
1x Krosan Grip
2x Quilled Sliver
3x Rest in Peace
2x Swords to Plowshares
3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
You'll notice that I removed daze/STP from the main deck (taking a page from the full slivers list) but threw in some card advantage through collected company. 4 mana is expensive, and I agree that anything that cost's 4 "should just win the game", a sentiment that has been previously repeated. However, this build circumvents that by playing some manaweft slivers to help ramp into it (also helps to hard cast force of will if you don't have a blue card in hand).
Some things I wanted to discuss include whether or not sentinel sliver should be in the main due to it's synergy with manaweft sliver, and if that also will call for the mainboard inclusion of quilled sliver to deal with the potential rise of delver decks that we may see. The synergy of quilled sliver with sentinel sliver is obvious in that it provides us with extra removal while still allowing us to attack. Quilled sliver also offer us a method of fighting through any baleful strixs that might start seeing play as it is one of the few great defensive control creatures in the format. Also, quilled sliver helps us fight through block-boomerang shenanigans that elves present, as we can respond to their activated ability by shooting it down. Also, it kills thalia (or allows us to attack through one ie they choose not to block to prevent it from dying). Additionally, the interaction it'll have with venom sliver is that it'll kill most creatures in the format. Holy cow I think I just convinced myself to play the damn card.
I think Diffusion sliver is there as a flex slot, many times when we don't draw our crystalline sliver we just lose so much tempo in the face of removal. It's also there to bump up the blue count for force of will. I'm pretty much going to test this card as a functional replacement for hibernation sliver as it allows us to stick to fewer colors a little bit better. Also, in the absence of terminus, hibernation sliver's utility does drop, maybe just by a tiny bit, but the card just hasn't impressed me recently.
I dropped Deathrite shaman from my previous deathhooks list because I found that the deck just couldn't support the manabase DRS needed as much as I wanted it to. I did however LOVE the ramp it provided, so another card i started thinking about was noble hierarch, but a buddy had convinced me that it was better suited in a deck that goes tall rather than going wide (stoneblade decks vs slivers) which I had to agree with.
edited for grammar
edited for some after thought on the efficacy of quilled sliver
it was a 4 round 17-man legacy night
2-1 vs UW Bomberman (ft. meddling mage and git. probe, this deck was actually really tough to hedge a win against)
2-0 vs Grixis Vial Smasher Delver
1-2 vs Lands
1-2 vs Lands
Lands is a terrible match up, and the only games where I missed vials terribly (because of wasteland-loam locks from the early game). Since this was a super small sample size, and my wins against other decks were good, I'll have to continue to assess how this deck is. I intend to throw 2-3 pithing needles into the sideboard instead of abrupt decays to deal with the lands match up or just concede that it is an auto-lose. It should be noted that 4 of the 17 players tonight were playing lands, 2 were on eldrazi, 3 were on delver, 1 on burn, 1 on aluren, and some others that I can't remember.
My first win against lands was actually because of
delverdeathrite life gain, both of my wins were due to crystalline sliver offering shroud shutting off punishing fire / maze of ith, and mulling into surgical extractions to deal with loam/wasteland engine.Edit: deathrite not delver
3x Cavern of Souls
3x Flooded Strand
1x Misty Rainforest
2x Mutavault
4x Polluted Delta
1x Scrubland
2x Tropical Island
2x Tundra
1x Underground Sea
Enchantment (2)
2x Sylvan Library
Creature (26)
4x Crystalline Sliver
4x Deathrite Shaman
4x Galerider Sliver
2x Hibernation Sliver
3x Muscle Sliver
4x Predatory Sliver
4x Sinew Sliver
1x Winged Sliver
4x Brainstorm
3x Daze
4x Force of Will
2x Swords to Plowshares
2x Abrupt Decay
1x Ethersworn Canonist
3x Harmonic Sliver
2x Mindbreak Trap
3x Surgical Extraction
1x Swords to Plowshares
2x Syphon Sliver
1x Venom Sliver
I've cut the aether vials and replaced them with Deathrite Shamans in this list. I know that this breaks the Cardinal Rules of Slivers to always play vial, but I've lately been unimpressed with the card. My initial testing actually included a list with both vial and DRS but I've found that having both wasn't necessary to pump out slivers quickly (and I've found that DRS was still able to get my slivers out at roughly the same rate as aether vial, without the benefit of making every sliver uncounterable). This of course makes our control match up worse, but I think its reasonable that cavern is enough to get there against those types of decks. To further support DRS and Brainstorm, I bumped up the fetch-land count to 8, but it can be 9 if we cut the scrubland.
I'm also aware that DRS is not a sliver, but I couldn't for the life of me find a sliver that I would want to play over it. The utility it has is very powerful and supports the hive too much for me not to test it out. Not sure why I hadn't explored this idea earlier when I thought shardless was a good idea (it was meh, library was just better).
I also cut hibernation sliver down to 2. I might throw 2 in the side board for the miracles match up. I just haven't really had a situation where I was dying to have one, but that might just be due to local meta changes recently.
As for shardless agent, it did have some merit in terms of being used for card advantage, but it felt far too clunky at 3 mana to cast (since caverns don't support it). Replacing them with sylvan library has shown to be fruitful to refill the hand with slivers in games where a turn 2 crystalline sliver off a cavern didn't happen.
I'm going to start testing deathrite shaman in the deck in a more counter-sliver build, but after small amounts of testing it isn't looking too great (against combo at least, which is bad anyways so maybe I just need more games against other decks). I am definitely noticing that I want my hand refilled all the time as I haven't had the turn-4 kill very often. My meta is filled with lands and I tend to just lose on turn 3 from a flying 20/20 (if I couldn't buy time blocking after playing a galerider/winged)
EDIT: couldn't find the FB group, what's it called?
a recent deck topped with 2 Coco's and 2 eladamri's call. Coming from modern, collected company does cause huge deck building restrictions in that it's not advised to run less than 28 creatures in order to consistently hit 2 creatures with it. That said, if you are fine with that, you should go for it. My problem is that it leaves little to no room for a disruption package of force or daze
its not just more consistent, shroud and flying are both game winning buffs that other tribal strategies do not have
EDITed: for grammar
helps against burn (draws us gas so we can outrace them), helps against shardless match up (lili, abrupt, hymn), stops miracles from finding terminus by blanking brainstorm/top, stops elves from drawing with glimpse. We find it with brainstorm and library. I do agree it'll be hard to cast, but you must be blind if you can't see it's upside.
EDIT: might be better in builds running multiple chrome moxs
Hey Beavis_NZ, Hibernation I've found is very effective in many situations. It helps to swing into a blocking baleful strix, just to bounce back the one he blocks and vial it back in (if its a lord) to still get damage through. Its also effective at dodging wraths such as toxic deluge and terminus or all is dust, all of which are a common sight at my LGS. It's also fantastic if you are behind in board presence to block a big tarmogoyf or thought-knot seer or a beefed up eldrazi mimic since the bounce life loss is much less. I also keep it in hand for aether vial tricks to whiff a swords to plowshares or abrupt decay. In terms of protecting my slivers, I like to think of hibernation sliver as pseudo-copies of crystalline 5-8. Also, having a 2/2 body is super relevant. It's also great if the opponent may wasteland your mutavault, you can respond by turning it on and bouncing it back to your hand.
Galerider is essential for our win-con, as there are tons of creatures out there that make it hard to swing into, so definitely saving it is a priority. With regards to saving lords, it really depends on the situation. If I'm sitting with no lords in hand, then just saving 1 or 2 might be good enough depending on the opponent's life total, always remember you want to put them on a clock, and wrapping things up sooner is in your favor because it gives them less opportunity to come back. If I have a sylvan library out, I'm less inclined to save 2 or more lords since the drawing engine it provides you is more than strong enough to apply pressure, I absolutely love that card. Against non-monastery miracles decks, I'd just bounce everything back to my hand because my own life total is pretty much irrelevant to my opponent.
Saving crystalline hasn't often come up, mostly because at that point, the only thing it needs protection against is larger creatures in combat, or wraths. Protection in combat doesn't often come up since crystalline often gets to a 4/4 or 5/5 since your lords are not being removed due to the shroud, again bouncing crystalline will probably most often occur against a strix. With regards to wrath effects, I would probably bounce it back since those decks also tend to run point removal which we need protection against (they probably have a bunch of dead removal cards in their hand from your turn 2 crystalline).
I hope that helped!
Creature (26)
4x Crystalline Sliver
4x Galerider Sliver
3x Hibernation Sliver
3x Muscle Sliver
4x Predatory Sliver
3x Shardless Agent
4x Sinew Sliver
Instant (9)
4x Force of Will
2x Daze
3x Swords to Plowshares
4x AEther Vial
Land (20)
3x Polluted Delta
1x Misty Rainforest
4x Cavern of Souls
3x Flooded Strand
2x Mutavault
2x Wasteland
2x Tropical Island
2x Tundra
1x Underground Sea
2x Sylvan Library
2x Containment Priest
2x Rest in Peace
2x Ethersworn Canonist
3x Harmonic Sliver
1x Syphon Sliver
4x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
I wanted to test out the list with 3x shardless agents and ended up going 2-2 overall. Here are the match ups:
2-0 Shardless Bug Won game 1 by out racing the opponent, I played 3 lords and just kept bashing in with them for the win (he played 2 deathrites which blocked early turns and died, and a goyf that could block enough to prevent lethal). The opponent also misplayed and used abrupt decay on vial (when i had 1 card in hand) instead of on a lord which made his blocks inefficient. Game 2 I brought in RIP which shrank his goyf and made his 2 deathrites useless. He ended up playing toxic deluge (turn after i tap out to play rip and swing with mutavault), which i was fine with because I had 3 slivers in hand still, which also cleared his board of goyfs and deathrites. He wasn't able to recover from there.
1-2 UR Delver Basically won game 1 after a mulligan to 5 with no lands (kept a cavern on top with scry), but had aether vial, gale rider, and lords, and 1 STP. Got there game 1 by drawing into lands and swinging in hard and fast. Lost game 2 which would've been a win if i just drew a galerider, numerous times i had lethal but no evasion (perhaps i should play the 1 winged sliver). Game 3 he flipped 3 delvers and killed me quite quickly.
0-2 Miracles Game 1 was a loss, really good miracles player got his monk tokens huge and swung in while keeping lots of tokens up for blocks. Game 2 i put huge pressure on the board and again just needed flying to get lethal, even after he engineer exploded 2 aether vials and nearly my library + ethersworn canonist (i brought 2 canonist in, turns out it is BAD in the match up). Here shardless shined by allowing me to recover after numerous terminus's (he played 3!!!!), hitting STP for mentor (which he FoW'd), and hitting sideboard cards (like thalia, which he also fow'd), but once he got his tokens going I couldn't keep up (he would chain 2 tops over and over again with 2 monks out, generating 8 tokens a turn on 4 lands). Game 2 he FoW'd and terminus'd me 3 times each, and played 2 EE's, like wow. He was at 6 life before his mentor tokens over ran me, i really wish i hit a flying sliver for the win.
2-1 Thoughtlash Control Game 1 i ended up milling him by just swinging in for 20ish damage for 2-3 turns in a row. G2 He ended up getting his lab maniac win con on me as i had no counter spells or STP's to deal with it. Game 3 I played harmonic sliver off of cavern on turn 3 which crushed all his tops and thoughtlashes.
Overall Impressions: I felt that 3 shardless agents felt clunky. I ran into a string of bad luck as well, often drawing into my wastelands without having targets (delver, miracles, thoughtlash), but I'm not convinced I would've liked mutavault instead in those situations. Sylvan library proved again to be an amazing card in this deck, giving me game against every deck i played with. I do believe a lot of my losses were due to side board errors, and accidentally siding out useful cards for non impact cards. I'm planning on cutting 1 shardless agent for 1 winged sliver because flying would have been huge for all my game losses.
Right now I'm running 2 dismembers, 1 spatial contortion and 1 warping wail Main board, with 1 SC and 1 WW also in the side board. I like the dismembers main to deal with large creatures previously mentioned in this thread. However, i LOVE the SC and WW in the side, they both great for dealing with decks where dismember isn't AS good (delver, burn) since it'll damage us huge (especially with tomb out, real bad feels taking 6 damage to kill a delver)
Additionally, could be used to also grab 4 drops by sac-ing a lord to it, cards like bonescythe sliver would fit the bill on it.