The thing is that grape shot is uncounterable. counters are far more prevalent than stifle. If I was playing against stifle, i'd just wait one turn and alpha swing with a crapload of elves.
The elves deck I tested with looked something like this:
I might need to up the amount of visionaries , but I like the deck otherwise. With such a low amount of things that cost 1, the deck probably combos a little easier than others with numerous hivemasters and such, but a little more damaged by chalice. ancient grudge?
natural order may also be up for inclusion in the deck. with it, I could order up regal force for 4 mana and a creature rather than 10 with chord. I could also side things like progenitus, hellkite overlord, maybe even verdant force (good with skullclamp).
Atikin - Elvish Spirit Guide is superior to Lotus Petal it gives you a backup relevant creature - unless of course you're looking to splash another color. And it gets around Chalice at 0 since it's uncounterable. Plus it's a relevant creature type.
Boogie - Like your version, but no Chords? Are you finding that the summoner's pacts are enough?
I guess I want this Archetype to succeed as it would make creatures more relevant in Vintage, but I am unsure it has the resiliency that it takes to make Tier 1 in vintage. It lacks any way to interact with your opponent in terms of disrupting them or protecting your own combo. Course nothing like a backup plan of swinging with 8 little green men for a few turns.
I'm glad Elf Ball is seeing some action in the Eternal formats as well :). This is a list I may try out, and most of it is par for the course, with a couple of twists.
With the Cradle and a couple of Priests, the ability to produce big mana may not be so bad, and to save on lands I also went with Land Grant. But the big thing other than the possible storm kill through Grapeshot I wanted to try was Chording out big papa Progenitus. Also included are 3 Pact of Negation to stuff things like FoW when you need to complete your combo and aren't so worried about a next turn. Worst case you could produce the blue with the Birclore Ranger ability, but it's pretty much there just to say "Shut it and let me finish."
Ezuri, Renegade Leader (Aggro/Combo - Favorite) Skullbriar, the Walking Grave (Sac and Grave hijinks) Azusa, Lost but Seeking (Landfall hijinks) Kaalia of the Vast (Heavily modded)
I'm glad Elf Ball is seeing some action in the Eternal formats as well :). This is a list I may try out, and most of it is par for the course, with a couple of twists.
With the Cradle and a couple of Priests, the ability to produce big mana may not be so bad, and to save on lands I also went with Land Grant. But the big thing other than the possible storm kill through Grapeshot I wanted to try was Chording out big papa Progenitus. Also included are 3 Pact of Negation to stuff things like FoW when you need to complete your combo and aren't so worried about a next turn. Worst case you could produce the blue with the Birclore Ranger ability, but it's pretty much there just to say "Shut it and let me finish."
I would not run cradle as you will almost always have only 1-2 lands in hand, and its increasing the amount of mulls you need by almost 30%. Concordant crossroads is your finisher if your grapeshot gets stifled, so run it only as a 1-of.
Why no fyndhorn elves?
Remove progenitus from your list. He is just janky and a win-more. If you can generate 14 mana with chord in hand and you HAVENT won yet, go for regal force and just win that turn.
I wouldnt run priest of titania, since to be optimal we wanna go off turn 2-3, so you have to place the priest down in turns 1-2, only which of, turn 2 is likely. I dont know about you, but on turn 2, im usually laying down all my combo pieces.
Also, why did you decide to cut elvish visionary. Him+wirewood symbiote=Insanely easier to combo off.
Someone explain why are we using land grant? It seems I would rather draw a basic forest than a land grant anyday, otherwise you would only want to tutor for gaeas cradle, but if thats the only land in your hand your dead anyways.
I would not run cradle as you will almost always have only 1-2 lands in hand, and its increasing the amount of mulls you need by almost 30%. Concordant crossroads is your finisher if your grapeshot gets stifled, so run it only as a 1-of.
Why no fyndhorn elves?
Remove progenitus from your list. He is just janky and a win-more. If you can generate 14 mana with chord in hand and you HAVENT won yet, go for regal force and just win that turn.
I wouldnt run priest of titania, since to be optimal we wanna go off turn 2-3, so you have to place the priest down in turns 1-2, only which of, turn 2 is likely. I dont know about you, but on turn 2, im usually laying down all my combo pieces.
Also, why did you decide to cut elvish visionary. Him+wirewood symbiote=Insanely easier to combo off.
Someone explain why are we using land grant? It seems I would rather draw a basic forest than a land grant anyday, otherwise you would only want to tutor for gaeas cradle, but if thats the only land in your hand your dead anyways.
Hmm, after reading that Shay article, I see what you mean about the Cradle especially, though I was surprised to hear him say that ESG was lackluster - I guess I'll test it and see how it runs, but having that extra mana at the right time is so good early on. So really would a simple basic forest base or forests + Pendelhaven be enough then? How about this? -
As for Elvish Visionary, I'm not really sure it's needed, what with full racks of Glimpse and Clamp, though I was looking at doing the Symbiote + Visionary deal. I lowered the Crossroads down to 1 as you suggested, and I also included Hivesmasters for the buggy swarm.
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Decks
Commander
Ezuri, Renegade Leader (Aggro/Combo - Favorite) Skullbriar, the Walking Grave (Sac and Grave hijinks) Azusa, Lost but Seeking (Landfall hijinks) Kaalia of the Vast (Heavily modded)
Hmm, after reading that Shay article, I see what you mean about the Cradle especially, though I was surprised to hear him say that ESG was lackluster - I guess I'll test it and see how it runs, but having that extra mana at the right time is so good early on. So really would a simple basic forest base or forests + Pendelhaven be enough then? How about this? -
As for Elvish Visionary, I'm not really sure it's needed, what with full racks of Glimpse and Clamp, though I was looking at doing the Symbiote + Visionary deal. I lowered the Crossroads down to 1 as you suggested, and I also included Hivesmasters for the buggy swarm.
+3 Forest -3 ESG
I think he is really bad card disadvantage and often times you would rather have a mana elf (fyndhorn, heritage, llanowar) than him. I run it as a 1-of so I can summoner's pact him early combo.
You would now still have 14 forests, which is not enough since youre not running Black Lotus or Mox Emerald. Ideally you want 15-17 land depending on your build and Power 9.
Also, symbiote has helped me win so many games, due to being able to Generate you 1 mana (off of untapping) and a draw (returning to hand) each turn, and if you have 4 in play, thats 4 times during your combo that he can let you keep doing it. Or get that 3rd elf untapped when you have 2 and heritage druid in play.
Im interested to hear how pact of negation works out for you, Ive never seen the use of it... You would only use it if they try to counter/remove your skullclamp and glimpse, which you arent gonna be able to combo off anyways if so much of your hand isnt creatures.
Ive also never tested hivemaster, but I see more of a reason to run him now that we have access to skullclamp, so let me know how that goes.
I had the idea yesterday that perhaps Llanowar Elves might be 'too slow' because it is the only creature in our deck that needs to tap for ability. I hope you guys know where i'm coming from with this.
So instead, I had the idea of subbing Llanowar Elves with Elvish Pioneer instead. I always end up drawing multiple lands in a row and it pisses me off the most. Perhaps someone can try using 4 Elvish Pioneer instead of 4 Llanowar Elves just for the sake of testing for new ideas. I know it'll probably turn out to be a horrible idea anyways, but I guess it could be worth a try.
Also, for the ones with Concordant Crossroads, since I play Goblins ALOT, i think that Crossroad might end up harming us more than helping. I still need someone to explain or convince me that Skullclamp is good. It helps us draw, but what good is it if it kills our creatures that we need to combo off? Perhaps Skullclamp is only good for decks that run hivemaster with dragon and not the grapeshot ones.
@ylc: I believe that you are wrong about skullclamp, 100%. I play the grapeshot version with no crossroads and 1 eternal witness, and skullclamp is great. I usually try to lay it down the turn before I start comboing, just so I have the mana next turn. But if you start making mana, it is not unreasonable to drop it and start clamping guys. It doesn't matter that they die, because if grapeshot won't kill them, summoners pact eternal witness grapeshot will. This is why I think that hivemaster is unnecessary. Perhaps sideboard for chalice aggro and stax or something.
quirion ranger is a card that I think should at least be a 3-of. If you only have 1 land and a quirion, you can tap the land, play quirion, return the land, and play it again. That is a good way to lowball on mana, which really helps when comboing out.
elricjc, It seems that you run a lot of cards that would not help while comboing out. pact of negation seems unnecessary, mostly because it doesn't really counter chalice at 1, which seems to be the biggest threat. the spirit guides will also be somewhat dissapointing mid-combo, which is why I also only run 1 to get with pact.
I think that you are also missing out on symbiote, he is great for exactly the reasons atikin explained. visionary I think is a card that could be cut down, but I like it, and the picture is great.
That land would only be used on 0-3 cards in our deck (chord) so what's the point?
@YLC
I've tested a little bit now where I'm running skullclamp in place of 4x visionary, and I have to say visionary is better due to being able to tap with all ur elves, untapping nettles, and drawing with glimpse.
@Boogie
Quiron ranger does seem viable in this deck, do you consider it better than llanowar elves in testing?
EDIT: How is concordant crossroads possibly hurting us? We only play it when were winning that turn.
Even more importantly its the only reason I won against worship+mother of runes+pariah
Aha. That IS a very good point...had not considered.
My list is just a casual build. (It's potent, make no mistake, but definitely not tuned-for-format and is frankly a bit out of date.) Looking at these lists, this archetype has gone in a very different direction since I built mine. And that's a fine thing.
I'll now politely butt out of this thread. Thanks though Cyrax.
Yeah misdirection ruins fireball esque effects...I think the grapeshot is better also as it can kill their key dudes or anything that hurts your combo if it's a creature.
Summoner's pact is amazing as a deck thinner and key to keep on comboing if anyone wants to test without summoner's pact they can try it and will most likely find the deck less consistent not being able to get key cards that you need mid-combo.
Dunno about the skullclamp thing
Concordant crossroads doesn't hurt you unless you play it the turn before you combo or heaven forbid turn 1 on the play when goblins plays lackey after you play crossroads you will cry hard after they get a turn 1 siege-gang commander in play. Strictly to be played in the middle of your combo which is why it's a 1-of both in legacy and vintage you don't need it that badly except in some rare instances.
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Yeah misdirection ruins fireball esque effects...I think the grapeshot is better also as it can kill their key dudes or anything that hurts your combo if it's a creature.
Summoner's pact is amazing as a deck thinner and key to keep on comboing if anyone wants to test without summoner's pact they can try it and will most likely find the deck less consistent not being able to get key cards that you need mid-combo.
Dunno about the skullclamp thing
Concordant crossroads doesn't hurt you unless you play it the turn before you combo or heaven forbid turn 1 on the play when goblins plays lackey after you play crossroads you will cry hard after they get a turn 1 siege-gang commander in play. Strictly to be played in the middle of your combo which is why it's a 1-of both in legacy and vintage you don't need it that badly except in some rare instances.
Yes, there's no reason to not run 4 summoner's pact in the deck.
I'm thinking -some number of forests, +4 land grant. you are a combo deck, and they *will* be a forest. they add to your storm count, and they're free, or essentially so. also, if you draw a bunch of cards and one of those, and there aren't any lands in your hand, you can always reveal your hand and thin out your deck some. I've used it in a lot of combo that way and never regretted it. at least playtest it.
I'm thinking -some number of forests, +4 land grant. you are a combo deck, and they *will* be a forest. they add to your storm count, and they're free, or essentially so. also, if you draw a bunch of cards and one of those, and there aren't any lands in your hand, you can always reveal your hand and thin out your deck some. I've used it in a lot of combo that way and never regretted it. at least playtest it.
--welt
Trouble I had with land grants is that I would have just one in my opening hand with no other land card in my hand. So after turn 1 I'd be stuck because i have no mana.
I have since taken down -5 forests, +1 Gaea's Cradle +4 Land Grant. This insures that if I open a hand with no land, itll just get me the dual land that I need or a forest, and if I have a land and grant, i play land, a creature, and then grant to fix my mana. Also, it untaps nettle sentinels and generates mana, which is always good.
Yeah crop rotation = broken in combo decks like this one. Obviously can't be banned because it isn't broken enough and vintage is the format where anything can be played except ante cards and chaos orb esque cards which are few anyways numbering no more than 15 at most
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The elves deck I tested with looked something like this:
4 summoners pact
4 land grant
4 glimpse of nature
4 skullclamp
4 wirewood symbiote
4 nettle sentinel
4 heritage druid
4 birchlore ranger
4 llanowar elves
3 fyndorn elves
3 quirion ranger
2-3 visionary
1 grapeshot
1 elvish spirit guide
1 regal force
1 eternal witness/sex elf
mana
I might need to up the amount of visionaries , but I like the deck otherwise. With such a low amount of things that cost 1, the deck probably combos a little easier than others with numerous hivemasters and such, but a little more damaged by chalice. ancient grudge?
natural order may also be up for inclusion in the deck. with it, I could order up regal force for 4 mana and a creature rather than 10 with chord. I could also side things like progenitus, hellkite overlord, maybe even verdant force (good with skullclamp).
Boogie - Like your version, but no Chords? Are you finding that the summoner's pacts are enough?
I guess I want this Archetype to succeed as it would make creatures more relevant in Vintage, but I am unsure it has the resiliency that it takes to make Tier 1 in vintage. It lacks any way to interact with your opponent in terms of disrupting them or protecting your own combo. Course nothing like a backup plan of swinging with 8 little green men for a few turns.
4 Gaea's Cradle
1 Pendelhaven
5 Forest
Creatures (24)
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Birchlore Rangers
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Eternal Witness
2 Priest of Titania
1 Progenitus
3 Concordant Crossroads
Spells (19)
4 Glimpse of Nature
4 Land Grant
3 Chord of Calling
4 Summoner's Pact
3 Pact of Negation
1 Grapeshot
4 Skullclamp
With the Cradle and a couple of Priests, the ability to produce big mana may not be so bad, and to save on lands I also went with Land Grant. But the big thing other than the possible storm kill through Grapeshot I wanted to try was Chording out big papa Progenitus. Also included are 3 Pact of Negation to stuff things like FoW when you need to complete your combo and aren't so worried about a next turn. Worst case you could produce the blue with the Birclore Ranger ability, but it's pretty much there just to say "Shut it and let me finish."
Commander
Ezuri, Renegade Leader (Aggro/Combo - Favorite)
Skullbriar, the Walking Grave (Sac and Grave hijinks)
Azusa, Lost but Seeking (Landfall hijinks)
Kaalia of the Vast (Heavily modded)
Standard
Waiting for Innistrad...
Extended
Hah!
Modern
Living End Cascade (RGB)
Legacy
Burn
Vintage
None
Casual
WB Aggro-Control
Green Stompy
Pink Floyd (UWr Wall Control)
Lunch Box (Fatty ramp)
D-Bag (White Control)
Level 13 Task Mage
I would not run cradle as you will almost always have only 1-2 lands in hand, and its increasing the amount of mulls you need by almost 30%. Concordant crossroads is your finisher if your grapeshot gets stifled, so run it only as a 1-of.
Why no fyndhorn elves?
Remove progenitus from your list. He is just janky and a win-more. If you can generate 14 mana with chord in hand and you HAVENT won yet, go for regal force and just win that turn.
I wouldnt run priest of titania, since to be optimal we wanna go off turn 2-3, so you have to place the priest down in turns 1-2, only which of, turn 2 is likely. I dont know about you, but on turn 2, im usually laying down all my combo pieces.
Also, why did you decide to cut elvish visionary. Him+wirewood symbiote=Insanely easier to combo off.
Someone explain why are we using land grant? It seems I would rather draw a basic forest than a land grant anyday, otherwise you would only want to tutor for gaeas cradle, but if thats the only land in your hand your dead anyways.
Hmm, after reading that Shay article, I see what you mean about the Cradle especially, though I was surprised to hear him say that ESG was lackluster - I guess I'll test it and see how it runs, but having that extra mana at the right time is so good early on. So really would a simple basic forest base or forests + Pendelhaven be enough then? How about this? -
1 Pendelhaven
10 Forest
Creatures (29)
4 Nettle Sentinel
4 Heritage Druid
4 Llanowar Elves
4 Fyndhorn Elves
4 Wirewood Hivemaster
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Birchlore Rangers
1 Eternal Witness
1 Concordnant Crossroads
Spells (15)
4 Glimpse of Nature
3 Chord of Calling
4 Summoner's Pact
3 Pact of Negation
1 Grapeshot
4 Skullclamp
As for Elvish Visionary, I'm not really sure it's needed, what with full racks of Glimpse and Clamp, though I was looking at doing the Symbiote + Visionary deal. I lowered the Crossroads down to 1 as you suggested, and I also included Hivesmasters for the buggy swarm.
Commander
Ezuri, Renegade Leader (Aggro/Combo - Favorite)
Skullbriar, the Walking Grave (Sac and Grave hijinks)
Azusa, Lost but Seeking (Landfall hijinks)
Kaalia of the Vast (Heavily modded)
Standard
Waiting for Innistrad...
Extended
Hah!
Modern
Living End Cascade (RGB)
Legacy
Burn
Vintage
None
Casual
WB Aggro-Control
Green Stompy
Pink Floyd (UWr Wall Control)
Lunch Box (Fatty ramp)
D-Bag (White Control)
Level 13 Task Mage
+3 Forest -3 ESG
I think he is really bad card disadvantage and often times you would rather have a mana elf (fyndhorn, heritage, llanowar) than him. I run it as a 1-of so I can summoner's pact him early combo.
You would now still have 14 forests, which is not enough since youre not running Black Lotus or Mox Emerald. Ideally you want 15-17 land depending on your build and Power 9.
Also, symbiote has helped me win so many games, due to being able to Generate you 1 mana (off of untapping) and a draw (returning to hand) each turn, and if you have 4 in play, thats 4 times during your combo that he can let you keep doing it. Or get that 3rd elf untapped when you have 2 and heritage druid in play.
Im interested to hear how pact of negation works out for you, Ive never seen the use of it... You would only use it if they try to counter/remove your skullclamp and glimpse, which you arent gonna be able to combo off anyways if so much of your hand isnt creatures.
Ive also never tested hivemaster, but I see more of a reason to run him now that we have access to skullclamp, so let me know how that goes.
So instead, I had the idea of subbing Llanowar Elves with Elvish Pioneer instead. I always end up drawing multiple lands in a row and it pisses me off the most. Perhaps someone can try using 4 Elvish Pioneer instead of 4 Llanowar Elves just for the sake of testing for new ideas. I know it'll probably turn out to be a horrible idea anyways, but I guess it could be worth a try.
Also, for the ones with Concordant Crossroads, since I play Goblins ALOT, i think that Crossroad might end up harming us more than helping. I still need someone to explain or convince me that Skullclamp is good. It helps us draw, but what good is it if it kills our creatures that we need to combo off? Perhaps Skullclamp is only good for decks that run hivemaster with dragon and not the grapeshot ones.
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quirion ranger is a card that I think should at least be a 3-of. If you only have 1 land and a quirion, you can tap the land, play quirion, return the land, and play it again. That is a good way to lowball on mana, which really helps when comboing out.
elricjc, It seems that you run a lot of cards that would not help while comboing out. pact of negation seems unnecessary, mostly because it doesn't really counter chalice at 1, which seems to be the biggest threat. the spirit guides will also be somewhat dissapointing mid-combo, which is why I also only run 1 to get with pact.
I think that you are also missing out on symbiote, he is great for exactly the reasons atikin explained. visionary I think is a card that could be cut down, but I like it, and the picture is great.
What turn do you usually combo off with skullclamp and how consistent is it?
That land would only be used on 0-3 cards in our deck (chord) so what's the point?
@YLC
I've tested a little bit now where I'm running skullclamp in place of 4x visionary, and I have to say visionary is better due to being able to tap with all ur elves, untapping nettles, and drawing with glimpse.
@Boogie
Quiron ranger does seem viable in this deck, do you consider it better than llanowar elves in testing?
EDIT: How is concordant crossroads possibly hurting us? We only play it when were winning that turn.
Even more importantly its the only reason I won against worship+mother of runes+pariah
Well, I actually still run a singleton 'Ball' part of 'Elfball' in mine. Guess I should just man up & get some Banefires and be done with it.
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my only concern with torch/banefire/x damage spell vs grapeshot is you can misdirection it.
My list is just a casual build. (It's potent, make no mistake, but definitely not tuned-for-format and is frankly a bit out of date.) Looking at these lists, this archetype has gone in a very different direction since I built mine. And that's a fine thing.
I'll now politely butt out of this thread. Thanks though Cyrax.
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Summoner's pact is amazing as a deck thinner and key to keep on comboing if anyone wants to test without summoner's pact they can try it and will most likely find the deck less consistent not being able to get key cards that you need mid-combo.
Dunno about the skullclamp thing
Concordant crossroads doesn't hurt you unless you play it the turn before you combo or heaven forbid turn 1 on the play when goblins plays lackey after you play crossroads you will cry hard after they get a turn 1 siege-gang commander in play. Strictly to be played in the middle of your combo which is why it's a 1-of both in legacy and vintage you don't need it that badly except in some rare instances.
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Yes, there's no reason to not run 4 summoner's pact in the deck.
--welt
Credit to DolZero for this awesome sig!
Trouble I had with land grants is that I would have just one in my opening hand with no other land card in my hand. So after turn 1 I'd be stuck because i have no mana.
Burning Elves:http://www.deckcheck.net/deck.php?id=21876
This is for legacy but most of the concepts still apply.
Edit: Can someone explain the singleton crop rotation?
--welt
Credit to DolZero for this awesome sig!
Currently Playing:
Retired