I played a 50-person tournament this weekend with the Ensnaring Bridge sideboard. It was my first time playing the deck, and it felt great!
The rounds were:
1. Burn. Won. 1-0
2. Burn. Lost. 1-1 (they had a god hand)
3. Humans. Won. 2-1
4. Jeskai Control. Lost 2-2 (only one was a real game, they others were decided by mana screw).
5. Bant Company. Won 3-2
6. Jeskai Control. Won 4-2
Enough to get me 12th place and still get a tiny prize.
The lost against burn felt like it was inevitable. They had great hands and I wasn't able to do much about it (even with 4 Brutalities). The round against Jeskai was definitely winnable.
Overall the deck was great. Looking forward to playing it more.
I have a question for those of you who've been playing the deck for a while: Turn 1 you Faithless Looting, bin a Griselbrand and you have a Goryo's Vengeance in your hand. They go, do something irrelevant and then it's your turn.
Do you:
a) Play another land, Goryo's and combo off.
b) Play a land, pass the turn, Goryo's on their end step, and combo off in your next turn (so you have more mana available).
I find that I get this decision quite a bit. Sometimes it's with Through the Breach instead (which is even trickier because it often involves using a mana monkey, but waiting to their end step usually means taking more damage).
Cathartic has been the worst card in my grishoalbrand lists by far. I've been actively looking for other solutions (like MD lightning axe or brutality).
I was *just* coming here to ask about this.
After thinking some more about my last tournament, I was almost never excited about drawing Cathartic Reunion and I was often hoping for some small creature removal (Meddling Mage, Devoted Druid, Freebooter...). So I was thinking of straight swapping the 2 Cathartic Reunions for 2 Collective Brutality. Not sure if you leave Lightning Axe in or change it for another CB or some extra card drawing (Read the Bones? Maybe even an extra Manamorphose?)
The key to beating the deck is that you have to never let the Devoted Druid not be summoning sick if you can. If you can't, then you deal with whatever happens. Maybe this is obvious to some, but I don't think you want to even kill it on the upkeep or their turn because they will automatically have 4 mana to use on turn 3 with just him - more if they had a mana dork on turn 1.
Agreed. The games I won against them, I was aggressively killing the Druid whenever I could (postboard Collective Brutality, Bontu's Reckoning). At one point I almost was too greedy and I thought about not killing it for one turn to make better use of my mana, but I did anyway (because I often get too cute with my plays). It turns out I would have been dead the following turn had I not killed it.
One of the games against them I misplayed because I didn't take the Aether Vial into account: He had 2 lands and a Vial on 2. I started comboing off post attack and Borboginos wasn't showing up, so I decided to go with a Wurm breach instead of pushing it and trying for one last draw (even if it got me down to 2 life). In my end step, he vialed in the druid, cast Vizier in his main phase, and played the werewolf guy. Sigh. I should have definitely gone for that last draw.
I played Grishoalbrand this weekend at a 250-person tournament. Overall it went pretty well and I ended up with 4-3 before I dropped in the last round.
I beat a variety of decks, but my 3 losses came from 3 Vizier combo decks. Is it bad luck, or are we just very unfavored vs Vizier Combo? Any particular tricks or sideboard cards we should keep in mind to deal with them, or is it just a matter of mulliganing hard to be faster than them?
Hi everybody,
I'm planning on dusting off Grishoalbrand for a tournament this weekend, and I was wondering what everybody's opinions are on the sideboard for the post-unban meta.
My initial thoughts is that maybe Chalice isn't as good as it was before (with DS on the decline). Lots of midrange decks don't care all that much about Chalice, right?
Also, is Blood Moon good now? Yes, there are a lot of greedy manabases, but it seems that people are ready for it. And we don't really need them against big mana.
If that's the case, it opens up a ton of sideboard slots we could be using for our worst matchups. Any thoughts?
I seem to have the most trouble against Company decks. Not specifically Vizier, but mid-rangey builds with Knights, Gavony Townships, and Spell Quellers. And when they bring Reflector Mages out of the board, it gets much worse.
Is it a bad matchup or is it just me?
My usual boarding goes something like this:
+1 Liliana Last Hope
+2 Collective Brutality
-1 Thought Scour
-2 Inquisition
I've tried Flaying Tendrils off the board but they don't seem to do much as soon as they get a Township out. I also started experimenting with Temur Battle Rage to punch through all the blocking mana dorks.
Are there any recent good videos of an expert pilot commenting through his plays? I've watched Ari Lax's series, but he's not really an expert at the deck. I'd love to get someone who's really familiar with it and all the possible lines.
I just started playing Dredge recently, but can someone explain to me the decisions for the choice of lands in that deck? Why would you want more fast lands and fewer fetches? I would think that with Bloodghast, keeping a fetch to use at end of turn is very important. And besides, fast lands end up being slow lands after a few turns. Is it worth it to preserve the life total? I've seen some versions that only run 4 fetches, which seems crazy.
Also, why is that version running City of Brass instead of Gemstone Mine? I thought Gemstone was great because you end up getting it back with Life from the Loam.
I haven't tried it yet, but I like that the Reflector Mage serves as a kind of removal for a couple of turns, and the idea of having the Knights as a beefy beatdown after all their removal is gone is pretty solid.
Here's the promised mini-report with the list I posted earlier.
24-person tournament (5 rounds).
R1 Eldrazi Taxes
I never had a chance in any of the games. He had plenty of removal, Thought-Knot seer, Tidehollow Sculler, Wasteland Stranger, etc. Game two I was doing better, but a well-timed Zealous Prosecution wipes my board completely. Ouch!
0-1 (0-2)
R2 Elves
Game 1 he comboes in turn 3 I believe (maybe it was turn 4 but he was on the play). I sideboard to just race him. I hesitated whether to bring some of the anti-storm cards like Eidolon of Rhetoric or Ethersworn Canonist. I think I decided not to because I thought they would hit the table too late. Maybe that was a mistake. I did bring in 2-3 Paths, which helped in some key moments (get rid of a Lllanowar Elves when he was casting the elf that gives you an extra dude if you have an elf). I manage to combo before him in the next two games.
1-1 (2-3)
R3 Eldrazi Tron
Game 1 he gets me pretty low in life and he has a fair amount of interaction killing my dudes, but I manage to combo. I bring in 2 Stony Silence but then I realized that against Eldrazi Tron they aren't nearly as good than against regular Tron. And right as I was thinking that, he casts Walking Ballista and I feel great. And then I realize I'm a moron because I sided out Rhonas and I was planning on killing him with Ballista as well. Doh! Wolf Run it is I suppose. I never get that far and he kills me with random beats and a 3/3 Ballista.
Game 3 I side out Ballista and bring in Rhonas. He gets a LOT of removal (Spatial Contortion, Warping Wail, Dismember...) so I'm always off my combo. Finally I'm set up to go, but he brings a Smasher. If I had a Fiend Hunter I could have won that game. Flickerwisp didn't do it.
1-2 (3-5)
R4 Abzan
I lose game 1 to two pumped-up Lingering Souls right as I was about to combo. I win game 2 out of nowhere. Not much of a hand or board presence, set up the combo and boom. Game 3 I play really badly (forgetting to attack Lili with a Selfless Spirit) but he has no pressure and I combo out just fine. This was a surprisingly breezy matchup. Discard doesn't hurt nearly as much with all the Witnesses and they don't have as much removal as Jund.
2-2 (5-6)
So overall not a great showing. Part of it was my inexperience with the deck and lack of sideboarding experience. A Magus of the Moon would have been great in several games, as would have been a Fiend Hunter. Kessig Wolf Run didn't become relevant a single time. If I had the combo, I didn't need it. If I didn't, I never had the mana for it. It makes me question whether the red splash is worth it.
The game played a bit like Legacy Elves, but I wish it had more card drawing somehow. Duskwatch is fine but something else to let you go through your deck faster when you're out of companies would be great.
Thanks for the advice Pokken. I actually based a lot of my decisions on your reasoning on previous posts.
The plan was to play 2 Wolf Runs but... I only have 1 and the store doesn't have any in stock. So that will have to wait for next week (don't you hate it when that happens for cheap cards you'd buy in an instant?).
I like your idea of going up in mana a bit, so I took out the Rec Sage (less need with the Flickerwisp, which I first saw you advocate for it) and added another Stomping Ground. I also cut one Path in the SB and added a Grim Lavamancer (since the 4 Paths were mostly for the mirror anyway).
I play Elves in Legacy, so when I saw this deck approaching that level of combo I got all excited. Hopefully it'll do well. I'll post a mini-report later today or tomorrow.
After playing the Abzan Melira/Finks combo for a bit, I'm going all-in on the Vizier/Druid combo. I'm planning on bringing this deck to a small tournament tomorrow. Any thoughts?
What's our the plan vs Grafdigger's Cage on game 2? Having 1 or 2 Rec Sage doesn't seem good enough when Chord doesn't work. Maybe that's an argument for keeping black and having 4 Abrupt Decay instead of 4 Path to Exile. Thoughts?
The rounds were:
1. Burn. Won. 1-0
2. Burn. Lost. 1-1 (they had a god hand)
3. Humans. Won. 2-1
4. Jeskai Control. Lost 2-2 (only one was a real game, they others were decided by mana screw).
5. Bant Company. Won 3-2
6. Jeskai Control. Won 4-2
Enough to get me 12th place and still get a tiny prize.
The lost against burn felt like it was inevitable. They had great hands and I wasn't able to do much about it (even with 4 Brutalities). The round against Jeskai was definitely winnable.
Overall the deck was great. Looking forward to playing it more.
Edit: Eventually I found a link in Reddit. Here it is for posterity https://discord.gg/EcDdJJr
Do you:
a) Play another land, Goryo's and combo off.
b) Play a land, pass the turn, Goryo's on their end step, and combo off in your next turn (so you have more mana available).
I find that I get this decision quite a bit. Sometimes it's with Through the Breach instead (which is even trickier because it often involves using a mana monkey, but waiting to their end step usually means taking more damage).
Thoughts?
I was *just* coming here to ask about this.
After thinking some more about my last tournament, I was almost never excited about drawing Cathartic Reunion and I was often hoping for some small creature removal (Meddling Mage, Devoted Druid, Freebooter...). So I was thinking of straight swapping the 2 Cathartic Reunions for 2 Collective Brutality. Not sure if you leave Lightning Axe in or change it for another CB or some extra card drawing (Read the Bones? Maybe even an extra Manamorphose?)
Agreed. The games I won against them, I was aggressively killing the Druid whenever I could (postboard Collective Brutality, Bontu's Reckoning). At one point I almost was too greedy and I thought about not killing it for one turn to make better use of my mana, but I did anyway (because I often get too cute with my plays). It turns out I would have been dead the following turn had I not killed it.
One of the games against them I misplayed because I didn't take the Aether Vial into account: He had 2 lands and a Vial on 2. I started comboing off post attack and Borboginos wasn't showing up, so I decided to go with a Wurm breach instead of pushing it and trying for one last draw (even if it got me down to 2 life). In my end step, he vialed in the druid, cast Vizier in his main phase, and played the werewolf guy. Sigh. I should have definitely gone for that last draw.
I beat a variety of decks, but my 3 losses came from 3 Vizier combo decks. Is it bad luck, or are we just very unfavored vs Vizier Combo? Any particular tricks or sideboard cards we should keep in mind to deal with them, or is it just a matter of mulliganing hard to be faster than them?
I'm planning on dusting off Grishoalbrand for a tournament this weekend, and I was wondering what everybody's opinions are on the sideboard for the post-unban meta.
My initial thoughts is that maybe Chalice isn't as good as it was before (with DS on the decline). Lots of midrange decks don't care all that much about Chalice, right?
Also, is Blood Moon good now? Yes, there are a lot of greedy manabases, but it seems that people are ready for it. And we don't really need them against big mana.
If that's the case, it opens up a ton of sideboard slots we could be using for our worst matchups. Any thoughts?
Is it a bad matchup or is it just me?
My usual boarding goes something like this:
+1 Liliana Last Hope
+2 Collective Brutality
-1 Thought Scour
-2 Inquisition
I've tried Flaying Tendrils off the board but they don't seem to do much as soon as they get a Township out. I also started experimenting with Temur Battle Rage to punch through all the blocking mana dorks.
Any tips or suggestions?
I just started playing Dredge recently, but can someone explain to me the decisions for the choice of lands in that deck? Why would you want more fast lands and fewer fetches? I would think that with Bloodghast, keeping a fetch to use at end of turn is very important. And besides, fast lands end up being slow lands after a few turns. Is it worth it to preserve the life total? I've seen some versions that only run 4 fetches, which seems crazy.
Also, why is that version running City of Brass instead of Gemstone Mine? I thought Gemstone was great because you end up getting it back with Life from the Loam.
I haven't tried it yet, but I like that the Reflector Mage serves as a kind of removal for a couple of turns, and the idea of having the Knights as a beefy beatdown after all their removal is gone is pretty solid.
24-person tournament (5 rounds).
R1 Eldrazi Taxes
I never had a chance in any of the games. He had plenty of removal, Thought-Knot seer, Tidehollow Sculler, Wasteland Stranger, etc. Game two I was doing better, but a well-timed Zealous Prosecution wipes my board completely. Ouch!
0-1 (0-2)
R2 Elves
Game 1 he comboes in turn 3 I believe (maybe it was turn 4 but he was on the play). I sideboard to just race him. I hesitated whether to bring some of the anti-storm cards like Eidolon of Rhetoric or Ethersworn Canonist. I think I decided not to because I thought they would hit the table too late. Maybe that was a mistake. I did bring in 2-3 Paths, which helped in some key moments (get rid of a Lllanowar Elves when he was casting the elf that gives you an extra dude if you have an elf). I manage to combo before him in the next two games.
1-1 (2-3)
R3 Eldrazi Tron
Game 1 he gets me pretty low in life and he has a fair amount of interaction killing my dudes, but I manage to combo. I bring in 2 Stony Silence but then I realized that against Eldrazi Tron they aren't nearly as good than against regular Tron. And right as I was thinking that, he casts Walking Ballista and I feel great. And then I realize I'm a moron because I sided out Rhonas and I was planning on killing him with Ballista as well. Doh! Wolf Run it is I suppose. I never get that far and he kills me with random beats and a 3/3 Ballista.
Game 3 I side out Ballista and bring in Rhonas. He gets a LOT of removal (Spatial Contortion, Warping Wail, Dismember...) so I'm always off my combo. Finally I'm set up to go, but he brings a Smasher. If I had a Fiend Hunter I could have won that game. Flickerwisp didn't do it.
1-2 (3-5)
R4 Abzan
I lose game 1 to two pumped-up Lingering Souls right as I was about to combo. I win game 2 out of nowhere. Not much of a hand or board presence, set up the combo and boom. Game 3 I play really badly (forgetting to attack Lili with a Selfless Spirit) but he has no pressure and I combo out just fine. This was a surprisingly breezy matchup. Discard doesn't hurt nearly as much with all the Witnesses and they don't have as much removal as Jund.
2-2 (5-6)
So overall not a great showing. Part of it was my inexperience with the deck and lack of sideboarding experience. A Magus of the Moon would have been great in several games, as would have been a Fiend Hunter. Kessig Wolf Run didn't become relevant a single time. If I had the combo, I didn't need it. If I didn't, I never had the mana for it. It makes me question whether the red splash is worth it.
The game played a bit like Legacy Elves, but I wish it had more card drawing somehow. Duskwatch is fine but something else to let you go through your deck faster when you're out of companies would be great.
The plan was to play 2 Wolf Runs but... I only have 1 and the store doesn't have any in stock. So that will have to wait for next week (don't you hate it when that happens for cheap cards you'd buy in an instant?).
I like your idea of going up in mana a bit, so I took out the Rec Sage (less need with the Flickerwisp, which I first saw you advocate for it) and added another Stomping Ground. I also cut one Path in the SB and added a Grim Lavamancer (since the 4 Paths were mostly for the mirror anyway).
I play Elves in Legacy, so when I saw this deck approaching that level of combo I got all excited. Hopefully it'll do well. I'll post a mini-report later today or tomorrow.
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Devoted Druid
4 Vizier of Remedies
4 Duskwatch Recruiter
4 Eternal Witness
2 Renegade Rallier
1 Walking Ballista
1 Rhonas
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Selfless Spirit
1 Flickerwisp
Spells (8)
4 Chord of Calling
4 Collected Company
Lands (21)
2 Temple Garden
1 Stomping Ground
3 Forest
1 Plains
3 Horizon Canopy
1 Kessig Wolf-Run
4 Windswept Heath
2 Wooded Foothills
4 Path to Exile
2 Stony Silence
1 Selfless Spirit
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Loaming Shaman
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Ethersworn Canonist
1 Burrenton Forge-Tender
1 Harsh Mentor