If you want Fauna Shaman, you're 2 cards away from the Elesh Norn Package. Personally, I think Shaman is too high of a risk with so much burn running around. You can't afford to durdle too long.
Conceptually, I am not sure if Mastodon's lack of SFM is genius or foolish. You are so fragile to -1/-1 sweepers and general offense outside of a KotR. At least equipment presents a threat when tied to a weenie.
@Dryad Militant: I don't know what you're trying to hate out here. I'd personally opt for 2-3 dedicated GY hate cards than a 2/1 who doesn't stop dredge/reanimator/redundant-spell decks
@s3raphix:
That's a really interesting idea. I have been contemplating some of the things you experimented with. Scryb as a whole has been lackluster since we moved into 2014. I was hesitant to shave it out but as you mention, it does very little.
I've caught some slack recently from friends about playing 7 fetches instead of 8. How did 24 lands (feat. 8 fetch) work for you? Similarly, How were 2 black duals? Did opponents ever hold you off of black for SB cards? By Maverick's standards, 21 creatures (not counting dryad) is low. Did you find yourself durdling or scrambling to find threats?
*I'm not sure how I feel about Maverick for the GP. I may switch over to Rock, which has a larger "catch all" against a large field. I expect "oops I win" combo decks to run rampant --- decks I hate playing against with Mav.
What do you think about Titania, Protector of Argoth in place of Sigarda?
Titania, Protector of Argoth 3GG
Mythic
Legendary Creature - Elemental
When Titania, Protector of Argoth enters the battlefield, return target land card from your graveyard to the battlefield.
Whenever a land you control is put into a graveyard from the battlefield, put a 5/3 green Elemental creature token onto the battlefield.
5/3
In place of a tutorable Sigarda with an easier casting cost, you can instantly revive a wasteland and destroy another of your own land to get three 5/3.
It is WAY more synergistic than Sigarda since you can interact with Sylvan Safekeeper, Fetchs, Wastelands, KOTR, DD, Crop rotation
This has been my logic with the card as well. KotR tricks also yield 5/3s on command. My hesitation is when you're against a stalled board. Sigarda shines because she flies over for 5+ dmg. I would need to "race" with 5/3s, which brick against the Pyromancer right now. The upside is having a strong army out of nowhere. The downside is chump blocking against your team and/or Terminus still wipes you clean. I am willing to try her out at the GP I think her upside is that high.
EDIT: Containment Priest is looking like a card I need to pick up
Don't run Thalia in the main with pfires. It gets in the way. You would benefit from thoughtseize > thalia in the maindeck OR run with zero disruption but more threats OR run with alternative disruption a la Mindcensor. pfires concedes to combo in exchange of "punishing" creatures. You have to leverage pfires against thalia, as both on the table create a no-bo. pfires is clunky but grinds the crap out of opponents. You do not want to be paying an additional [1] mana per casting.
I know its wrong, but I always feel better when I'm not the only one who has a bad time versus Miracles.
Honestly it's next to impossible to win. I did it at 'Cuse and I haven't gotten lucky since. Game 1 he mulls to 4 and I still lost the attrition war. One of those days I guess. The pilot is a friend who is very very good at MTG, so I'm not complaining about luck. He just outright outplayed me. G2 I managed to pull a game 1. Game 3 we went to time where he undoubtedly would win if we had another 5 minutes (thank god we didn't)
Made Top 8 in a very small event. Didn't earn byes for the GP :/
I honestly can't beat Miracles, however, going with my gut and packing Armageddon did win a game (tied the match R1).
The difference between the ranked 5 teams and the pro teams is strategy. Champion picks normally do not differ from solo queue unless it directly clashes with a strategy or meta. For instance, the worlds championship in South Korea saw the resurgence of Janna, a pure support. Vayne and Tristana were both pure ADCs played by all regions.
@Raver: This makes a lot of sense.
Are you asking if the game is mid/top oriented or if the champs chosen are mid/top champs?
The second; how come the champs chosen are mid/top champs?
Forgive me for asking a noob question, but why do competitive/pro LoL team comps different from those in random 5s or low ranked? Specifically, the absence of a pure-ADC or Support. I am aware Jinx (ADC) is sometimes used right now + Nami/Thresh/Janna (Supp). I've always wondered why professional teams gyrate towards more top or mid-lane style champs. I'm assuming this is due to the raw power level -- how some characters are "strictly better" than others?
I've asked questions before about which champions to play, and I appreciate earlier feedback. Just wondering about this above question. Hope I don't get flamed or start a flame-war lol.
Earthcraft is a relic and has been for years. If they had unbanned it at the time they unbanned dream halls no one would have given a **** about it. Unban it right now? I still don't care. It loses to spell pierce and what does it go in? If it makes enchantress tier 1 I would be impressed. Enchantress really doesn't need help winning the game, which is what earthcraft does for them as the only synergy outside the combo is making mana with some argothian enchantress's that you don't necessarily have in play/it's just a slight boost and nothing more. Earthcraft is definitely no better than show and tell in fact it's way, way worse. Lion's eye diamond is way better as well. I would argue dark ritual is as well. So many things are more powerful than a crappy 2 mana green enchantment it isn't even funny. To top it off it dies to phyrexian revoker. Squirrelcraft would not happen in legacy ever as well. The card is a joke. WotC just doesn't do anything with legacy at all anymore despite the rumors that GP New Jersey will have upwards of 6,000 in attendance or at least SCG is preparing for 6,000. I thought nothing could top GP Las Vegas since that was modern masters limited/a vastly underprinted set that many attended. I knew lots of people who were going to GP Las Vegas who don't normally travel by air. It just shattered the records and I thought it would be on top for quite some time. If legacy dethrones it as the most attended grand prix....wow. Madrid back in the day was legacy and was most attended but that GP was just 2,227 people, a seemingly tame number in comparison to recent GPs but at the time caused issues logistically as they didn't have enough chairs to seat all the players/some people were playing standing up.
Agreed with all of this. Earthcraft would just be "annoying" but certaintly not broken due to the many cards in print that destroy it. And SCG is talking 6,000 players. My mind cannot comprehend this.
I am still not on the 'ban brainstorm' bandwagon, but the larger argument I've been talking about for a while (see: blue's core of efficient cards + fetchlands = growing too powerful) now pisses me off. Fetches + bstorm/ponder/probe/top is my limit for how much total dig/efficiency/filter Legacy should allow. If a deck wants to be tempo or control alongside these cards, that's one thing. Adding Treasure Cruise to an already strong cluster of filtering cards surpassed my arbitrary line of fun. I want WotC to step in and do something.
Making matters worse, I can't isolate the problem. I fully admit TC by itself (key thing to point out) isn't busted. It's a very fair card. However, the combination of fetches and cantrips makes decks centered around that strategy ridiculous. If GPNJ is dominated by Treasure Cruise, I think it's safe to assume we have another Mental Misstep. This is a tough call because the larger narrative is how TC is busted because of the other synergistic cards that fuel it. This puts us in a different situation than Survival or Mystical.
The question I openly ask 2 questions:
Has TC pushed blue's filtering over the proverbial power-level line?
Would the format be better with blue's (amazing) filter cards sans TC or do we keep TC and ban something else (commonly argued as brainstorm)?
Continuing the second question, perhaps it's time we pull the plug on probe and TC? This would leave us with fetches, brainstorm, and ponder. Alternatively, we could ban bstorm but allow sorcery-speed filtering moving forward.
As of right now, TC could slip into almost every deck, like when Tarmogoyf hit the mainstream. The format is a breeding ground for combining grave-fillers and filtering; both negating TC's "natural downside" of 8 mana. Because it has delve and because this is Legacy, the card is easily cast for very little mana. I've seen the card cast anywhere between fact or fiction and ancestral recall. The UR and BUG delver lists are unfair because they perfectly exploit the card into a chain reaction of bstorm, fetches, ponder, probes, removal ---> TC ---> hitting many of those cards and doing it again. It doesn't help that a powerful strategy has emerged that abuses cards that benefit from this durdling behavior.
Yea Miracles is horrendous. I think I need to bring in Geddons and Kgrips and Walkers just to break parity. Even then, a well-timed entreat is GG. I also suffer from "wherearemyhatecard"-itis against the deck. I'm thinking about dropping Light and Shadow from my staple build because that card isn't saving creatures. Batterskull has been a better all-around card, despite its cost. I am tempted to forgo 'Bskull as well for Elspeth or Heliod, God of the Sun. Heliod is something I can play for 4 mana under Teeg and Thalia because the god is a creature. Heliod's "everyone has vigilance" allows for KotR attacks + activations, which is nifty. It also lets you drop a small army of tokens if needed. Elspeth can end games but doesn't play well with Teeg/Thalia...and it's Teeg/Thalia who are keeping me in games lately.
Actually I'm picking up Maverick again because of the Cruise greedy decks, but I'm definitely going to be packing RIP in the sideboard whenever I play it. DRS and Ooze go a long way Game 1, but post board you sometimes just need to lock out the 'yard entirely.
I sort of disagree with Elves an Miracles being the reason it dropped off, Elves was around in more or less the same form when Maverick was at its peak, and while it can be tough to beat, it wasn't the biggest concern since Elves lost badly to a lot of other decks at the time. In reality it was Sneak and Show and Miracles that did Maverick in. Miracles was and is still rough, but not unbeatable; Sneak and Show however is nearly impossible, they go over the Maverick gameplan faster than Maverick can stop it. Since there are fewer Sneak and Show decks around, Maverick can probably ease in a comeback, but I don't think it will ever really dominate the format again.
I don't think RIP does much against 'cruise decks. I had this discussion with a bunch of good players and MTG friends. Outside of TC, the deck doesn't need the grave. UR has trouble with efficient spot removal a la STP/PTE/Decay. I'll let them draw for days. They need business to hit me with when all is said and done.
Elves is just annoying. I lost over the weekend to a guy who luckily hardcasted hoof for lethal both games on like turn 4 both games despite me correctly dropping Teeg to disable his NO on turn 3. Utterly frustrating to lose to "well I just win anyway" lines of play. Miracles is disastrous. I've beaten it at SCG but lost to it waaaay too much recently. I am convinced I need LD like 'Geddon and some kind of dedicated CA engine that pumps out creatures (Elspeth 1.0 for example).
Sneak/Show is terrible if you don't plan on seeing it. Maverick actually has a decent matchup against it G1 due to KotR/Karakas. If you expect it to be in the meta, planning accordingly can help significantly improve your odds. But, like Elves, it's possible they just go "ummm I win through your hate. GG"
RUG can deal with Batterskull several ways: Ancient Grudge, Smash to Smithereens, K-Grip, Submerge. I wouldn't declare it the trump card over RUG. Thalia and Wasteland friggin' shut it down against RUG Delver.
Delver as a whole loses to spot removal like 4 STP + 2-3 Decay/PTE. The current UR list also has trouble with Pfires, should anyone want to go that route. I don't like Pfires against the rest of the field, including Elves (I'd rather go black than red).
As for SFM, the # you run depend upon your affinity towards the Kor chica. If you love her, run 4 and don't look back -- but understand what she does to your opening turn progressions. I dislike SFM in Maverick but she's undeniably good in the current meta. Figure that one out lol. "Can't neglect her if she can break stalemates" sort of logic. Sword of Fire and Ice is also undeniably insane. It trumps Delver and TNN -- some very popular and important decks to defeat. I am on the fence about going 2:2 with SFM:Equips. I had a good outing with Batterskull last week against burn and a poor Storm pilot. If I were to replace this [LaS/BSkull] slot, I'd be looking for an upgrade. No idea what's arguably better. So as it stands, I'm sticking by 3 equips. Batterskull is also a "must answer" card for every fair deck in the format.
@DudeItsCorey:
Anecdotally, USA Northeast is very blue. If SCG: NJ (summer), SCG: Cuse (summer), and SCG: Edison (sept) are indicators, expect to see a large showing of delver-anything and miracles. I was too greedy at the earlier SCG: NJ meta -- getting burned for pushing a 3 color dark maverick list. I went GW + SB splash list at SCG: Cuse expecting Delver and Miracles and saw a lot of that (facing off against Patriot, BUG, and Miracles amongst other things). The GP will be gigantic. To be honest, the scariest thing is going to be the opening rounds where ANYTHING is viable.
Because I expect the GP to be so large, I am fully expecting "cheaper" decks to appear: unoptimized DnT (lacking ports and full karakas, as the rest of the deck is not terribly expensive), dredge, burn, burn, and more burn.
@Combo:
This is hard to point out. Bryant will certainly be a favorite I'd pencil in to go far. Nevertheless, "storm" in general depends on the pilot. With UR cruise delver and miracles being hot decks, true combo like storm could just die out. Elves is EXTREMELY well-positioned right now. Any half-decent player can run through a bracket (assuming they play against anything that's not burn all day).
Reanimator and Sneak are always viable as well. They just "auto-win" against half the field. If you're an efficient player, those 2 decks can make matches last 20-30 minutes, giving you plenty of time to scout and/or relax between rounds.
I'm personally going Maverick or Junk because 1) I have the cards for said decks and 2) I'm comfortable "outplaying" opponents. To switch decks would be a tough call. I would have to obtain the cards to make something else (like Bant or DnT). I also like people "writing off" Maverick. It lets us be a dark horse deck. Even last week I had my delver opponent go "wow, I didn't know KotR was that good"....people forget the intricacies of Maverick.
@Canonist:
I never know what to do with her in large open metas. She's never bad but she's also never going to single-handedly win the event unless you're facing a metric ton of combo dump-your-hand type decks.
@tescrin:
Agreed. Slyvan is nuts.
@Flex slots from the Herzog Shell:
1 Mom (could totally shave 1 out if you wanted to)
1 Equip (I believe Light/Shadow is a meta-call but Jitte + Fire/Ice are mandatory)
1 KotR (dropping to 3 is alright. I've been digging the 4 because Zenith, KotR, and Thalia hold the deck together. Why skim on the glue of the deck?)
4 total slots to run QPM/Scooze (I think Herzog was correct with 3:1, but he's also got QPM #4 and Scooze #2 in the board. 2:2 isn't terrible but I ran into a situation or two where I needed a 3rd QPM. #1 and #2 died, which made board positions awkward)
3 Utility Lands (I like Bayou #2/DD/Stage. Herzog has enjoyed Horizon/Cradle/Verdant #4)
@Confidant:
You need to alter the manabase to accommodate. It's your call here. I'd run 1x Sylvan + 2-3 Confidant for a total of 3-4x "draw support". I usually shave Mom, Thalia, and and Equip for this. You need more lifegain to offset bob inadvertently killing you.
@2 Discard:
Like others have said, 2 is awkward. Do you want discard or do you want a real spell? The rationale is well articulated above. I agree, like Bob, it throws off the mana.
@My SCG List:
Go back a bunch of pages to this summer. I speak candidly. I got lucky with pairings and playing out of my mind. However, I made some decisions/tweaks to Herzog's list to fit the room. I still think Light/Shadow is not pulling its weight, despite being insane on paper.
@Dorks
I think 5 is the sweet spot. I've run 4, 5, and 6 over the past year. 4 was awkward. Some games I run through 3 or 4 (removal, blocker, naturally draw a few). 6 was viable when hierarch didn't meet a ton of -1/-1 effects. The exalted stacks were pretty. Nowadays, I need my mana dork to stick. 3 DRS is plenty. 2 Noble work for me. If you go Bob/TS/Decay main, I highly encourage Birds as the 2nd dork.
The concept of 4 dorks for another basic is tempting. I REALLY want a 4th basic land. No idea what I'd shave out at this point to do that. We run 23 "lands" (22 + Dryad) as is. That's already 38.34% of the deck. To go up to 40% -- all for a basic -- seems iffy.
@RIP
If you want to punish decks depending upon the GY, RIP is the card. Surgical is better for combo or reanimator protection T0. For goyf and DRS decks, opt for RIP. KotR (2/2) beats Goyf (0/1). Bojuka has been more of a homerun card for me. I don't like Bog + Crop Rotation in the board. I'd rather have 2 dedicated hate cards than a mini-chain meant to cause blowouts. Too much risk.
@Toxic Deluge:
Weenie swarms like Elves and DnT. Toxic also helps with Reanimator (Iona) and any deck that can race you with Progenitus or its smaller cousin TNN. The UR Delver deck also has a problem with sweepers but the life loss is a tough call. They may burn you out if you pay 2-3 life + fetch often.
Conceptually, I am not sure if Mastodon's lack of SFM is genius or foolish. You are so fragile to -1/-1 sweepers and general offense outside of a KotR. At least equipment presents a threat when tied to a weenie.
@Dryad Militant: I don't know what you're trying to hate out here. I'd personally opt for 2-3 dedicated GY hate cards than a 2/1 who doesn't stop dredge/reanimator/redundant-spell decks
What would you change for next time outside of Scooze/GY hate?
That's a really interesting idea. I have been contemplating some of the things you experimented with. Scryb as a whole has been lackluster since we moved into 2014. I was hesitant to shave it out but as you mention, it does very little.
I've caught some slack recently from friends about playing 7 fetches instead of 8. How did 24 lands (feat. 8 fetch) work for you? Similarly, How were 2 black duals? Did opponents ever hold you off of black for SB cards? By Maverick's standards, 21 creatures (not counting dryad) is low. Did you find yourself durdling or scrambling to find threats?
*I'm not sure how I feel about Maverick for the GP. I may switch over to Rock, which has a larger "catch all" against a large field. I expect "oops I win" combo decks to run rampant --- decks I hate playing against with Mav.
This has been my logic with the card as well. KotR tricks also yield 5/3s on command. My hesitation is when you're against a stalled board. Sigarda shines because she flies over for 5+ dmg. I would need to "race" with 5/3s, which brick against the Pyromancer right now. The upside is having a strong army out of nowhere. The downside is chump blocking against your team and/or Terminus still wipes you clean. I am willing to try her out at the GP I think her upside is that high.
EDIT: Containment Priest is looking like a card I need to pick up
Honestly it's next to impossible to win. I did it at 'Cuse and I haven't gotten lucky since. Game 1 he mulls to 4 and I still lost the attrition war. One of those days I guess. The pilot is a friend who is very very good at MTG, so I'm not complaining about luck. He just outright outplayed me. G2 I managed to pull a game 1. Game 3 we went to time where he undoubtedly would win if we had another 5 minutes (thank god we didn't)
I honestly can't beat Miracles, however, going with my gut and packing Armageddon did win a game (tied the match R1).
@Raver: This makes a lot of sense.
The second; how come the champs chosen are mid/top champs?
I've asked questions before about which champions to play, and I appreciate earlier feedback. Just wondering about this above question. Hope I don't get flamed or start a flame-war lol.
Agreed with all of this. Earthcraft would just be "annoying" but certaintly not broken due to the many cards in print that destroy it. And SCG is talking 6,000 players. My mind cannot comprehend this.
I am still not on the 'ban brainstorm' bandwagon, but the larger argument I've been talking about for a while (see: blue's core of efficient cards + fetchlands = growing too powerful) now pisses me off. Fetches + bstorm/ponder/probe/top is my limit for how much total dig/efficiency/filter Legacy should allow. If a deck wants to be tempo or control alongside these cards, that's one thing. Adding Treasure Cruise to an already strong cluster of filtering cards surpassed my arbitrary line of fun. I want WotC to step in and do something.
Making matters worse, I can't isolate the problem. I fully admit TC by itself (key thing to point out) isn't busted. It's a very fair card. However, the combination of fetches and cantrips makes decks centered around that strategy ridiculous. If GPNJ is dominated by Treasure Cruise, I think it's safe to assume we have another Mental Misstep. This is a tough call because the larger narrative is how TC is busted because of the other synergistic cards that fuel it. This puts us in a different situation than Survival or Mystical.
The question I openly ask 2 questions:
Has TC pushed blue's filtering over the proverbial power-level line?
Would the format be better with blue's (amazing) filter cards sans TC or do we keep TC and ban something else (commonly argued as brainstorm)?
Continuing the second question, perhaps it's time we pull the plug on probe and TC? This would leave us with fetches, brainstorm, and ponder. Alternatively, we could ban bstorm but allow sorcery-speed filtering moving forward.
As of right now, TC could slip into almost every deck, like when Tarmogoyf hit the mainstream. The format is a breeding ground for combining grave-fillers and filtering; both negating TC's "natural downside" of 8 mana. Because it has delve and because this is Legacy, the card is easily cast for very little mana. I've seen the card cast anywhere between fact or fiction and ancestral recall. The UR and BUG delver lists are unfair because they perfectly exploit the card into a chain reaction of bstorm, fetches, ponder, probes, removal ---> TC ---> hitting many of those cards and doing it again. It doesn't help that a powerful strategy has emerged that abuses cards that benefit from this durdling behavior.
I don't think RIP does much against 'cruise decks. I had this discussion with a bunch of good players and MTG friends. Outside of TC, the deck doesn't need the grave. UR has trouble with efficient spot removal a la STP/PTE/Decay. I'll let them draw for days. They need business to hit me with when all is said and done.
Elves is just annoying. I lost over the weekend to a guy who luckily hardcasted hoof for lethal both games on like turn 4 both games despite me correctly dropping Teeg to disable his NO on turn 3. Utterly frustrating to lose to "well I just win anyway" lines of play. Miracles is disastrous. I've beaten it at SCG but lost to it waaaay too much recently. I am convinced I need LD like 'Geddon and some kind of dedicated CA engine that pumps out creatures (Elspeth 1.0 for example).
Sneak/Show is terrible if you don't plan on seeing it. Maverick actually has a decent matchup against it G1 due to KotR/Karakas. If you expect it to be in the meta, planning accordingly can help significantly improve your odds. But, like Elves, it's possible they just go "ummm I win through your hate. GG"
I'd kill for Friday Night Vintage. I'd get out of work early to make it to FNM for that kind of business.
I'd love that setup as well. Mash different sets together for a wacky draft? I'm in.
Delver as a whole loses to spot removal like 4 STP + 2-3 Decay/PTE. The current UR list also has trouble with Pfires, should anyone want to go that route. I don't like Pfires against the rest of the field, including Elves (I'd rather go black than red).
As for SFM, the # you run depend upon your affinity towards the Kor chica. If you love her, run 4 and don't look back -- but understand what she does to your opening turn progressions. I dislike SFM in Maverick but she's undeniably good in the current meta. Figure that one out lol. "Can't neglect her if she can break stalemates" sort of logic. Sword of Fire and Ice is also undeniably insane. It trumps Delver and TNN -- some very popular and important decks to defeat. I am on the fence about going 2:2 with SFM:Equips. I had a good outing with Batterskull last week against burn and a poor Storm pilot. If I were to replace this [LaS/BSkull] slot, I'd be looking for an upgrade. No idea what's arguably better. So as it stands, I'm sticking by 3 equips. Batterskull is also a "must answer" card for every fair deck in the format.
Anecdotally, USA Northeast is very blue. If SCG: NJ (summer), SCG: Cuse (summer), and SCG: Edison (sept) are indicators, expect to see a large showing of delver-anything and miracles. I was too greedy at the earlier SCG: NJ meta -- getting burned for pushing a 3 color dark maverick list. I went GW + SB splash list at SCG: Cuse expecting Delver and Miracles and saw a lot of that (facing off against Patriot, BUG, and Miracles amongst other things). The GP will be gigantic. To be honest, the scariest thing is going to be the opening rounds where ANYTHING is viable.
Because I expect the GP to be so large, I am fully expecting "cheaper" decks to appear: unoptimized DnT (lacking ports and full karakas, as the rest of the deck is not terribly expensive), dredge, burn, burn, and more burn.
@Combo:
This is hard to point out. Bryant will certainly be a favorite I'd pencil in to go far. Nevertheless, "storm" in general depends on the pilot. With UR cruise delver and miracles being hot decks, true combo like storm could just die out. Elves is EXTREMELY well-positioned right now. Any half-decent player can run through a bracket (assuming they play against anything that's not burn all day).
Reanimator and Sneak are always viable as well. They just "auto-win" against half the field. If you're an efficient player, those 2 decks can make matches last 20-30 minutes, giving you plenty of time to scout and/or relax between rounds.
I'm personally going Maverick or Junk because 1) I have the cards for said decks and 2) I'm comfortable "outplaying" opponents. To switch decks would be a tough call. I would have to obtain the cards to make something else (like Bant or DnT). I also like people "writing off" Maverick. It lets us be a dark horse deck. Even last week I had my delver opponent go "wow, I didn't know KotR was that good"....people forget the intricacies of Maverick.
@Canonist:
I never know what to do with her in large open metas. She's never bad but she's also never going to single-handedly win the event unless you're facing a metric ton of combo dump-your-hand type decks.
@tescrin:
Agreed. Slyvan is nuts.
@Flex slots from the Herzog Shell:
1 Mom (could totally shave 1 out if you wanted to)
1 Equip (I believe Light/Shadow is a meta-call but Jitte + Fire/Ice are mandatory)
1 KotR (dropping to 3 is alright. I've been digging the 4 because Zenith, KotR, and Thalia hold the deck together. Why skim on the glue of the deck?)
4 total slots to run QPM/Scooze (I think Herzog was correct with 3:1, but he's also got QPM #4 and Scooze #2 in the board. 2:2 isn't terrible but I ran into a situation or two where I needed a 3rd QPM. #1 and #2 died, which made board positions awkward)
3 Utility Lands (I like Bayou #2/DD/Stage. Herzog has enjoyed Horizon/Cradle/Verdant #4)
@Confidant:
You need to alter the manabase to accommodate. It's your call here. I'd run 1x Sylvan + 2-3 Confidant for a total of 3-4x "draw support". I usually shave Mom, Thalia, and and Equip for this. You need more lifegain to offset bob inadvertently killing you.
@2 Discard:
Like others have said, 2 is awkward. Do you want discard or do you want a real spell? The rationale is well articulated above. I agree, like Bob, it throws off the mana.
@My SCG List:
Go back a bunch of pages to this summer. I speak candidly. I got lucky with pairings and playing out of my mind. However, I made some decisions/tweaks to Herzog's list to fit the room. I still think Light/Shadow is not pulling its weight, despite being insane on paper.
@Dorks
I think 5 is the sweet spot. I've run 4, 5, and 6 over the past year. 4 was awkward. Some games I run through 3 or 4 (removal, blocker, naturally draw a few). 6 was viable when hierarch didn't meet a ton of -1/-1 effects. The exalted stacks were pretty. Nowadays, I need my mana dork to stick. 3 DRS is plenty. 2 Noble work for me. If you go Bob/TS/Decay main, I highly encourage Birds as the 2nd dork.
The concept of 4 dorks for another basic is tempting. I REALLY want a 4th basic land. No idea what I'd shave out at this point to do that. We run 23 "lands" (22 + Dryad) as is. That's already 38.34% of the deck. To go up to 40% -- all for a basic -- seems iffy.
@RIP
If you want to punish decks depending upon the GY, RIP is the card. Surgical is better for combo or reanimator protection T0. For goyf and DRS decks, opt for RIP. KotR (2/2) beats Goyf (0/1). Bojuka has been more of a homerun card for me. I don't like Bog + Crop Rotation in the board. I'd rather have 2 dedicated hate cards than a mini-chain meant to cause blowouts. Too much risk.
@Toxic Deluge:
Weenie swarms like Elves and DnT. Toxic also helps with Reanimator (Iona) and any deck that can race you with Progenitus or its smaller cousin TNN. The UR Delver deck also has a problem with sweepers but the life loss is a tough call. They may burn you out if you pay 2-3 life + fetch often.