Tanks are only good if you have just a bit more than your opponent, so you can threaten to siege up his section of the map and cut off reinforcements while you go expo hunting. Otherwise, I agree with DanoLefourbe's assessment that you don't want to blind mass tanks, because a tech switch to Banshees or BCs can ruin all that gas (and that's basically what you are fighting for TvT, gas).
And try not to do bio in TvT, particularly as you progress up the ladder, MMM is only really good in TvT if you can constantly harass your opponent with it, otherwise they straight up die to siege walls. So try to get used to playing TvT with mechs. There are a few tactics in late game TvT where you can mix stimmed Marauders into your army, so you can run those guys in to target tanks, while moving your own tank line up, but again, that's a positioning trick.
I don't think it's that black and white. It's not a bad card at all in a vacuum, but I think Scars might just be a bit tad fast for an equipment that requires you to leave 4 mana up to get the most out of it. If it costed 2 to do what it did and only gave +1/+0, I'd think it'd be a much, much better piece of equipment.
The 4 mana thing is pretty huge, particularly since you actually have to leave that mana open for your dudes to actually come back. 4 mana is a lot to leave open in this format.
You know what's more ridiculous than one Precursor Golem? Bouncing your own Precursor Golem with a Neurok Replica to make more Golems! Now if you don't cast him again, your opponent can't even kill your other golems with a single removal!
Silliness aside, this card is quite good. Anything that requires your opponent to have an immediate answer and impacts the board by dumping 9 power on it is pretty damn good.
Asceticism may be a decent card in Infect (all your dudes turn into Blight Mambas), but we really do need to cut Infect, if at least just so we can have a decent pack 2.
I think he wrote about that like early on in Scars limited, when people haven't really figured out really how to draft (not saying it's totally solved now, but it was even less solved before). I think he even said it in his article, that when things settle down, he should be getting less and less ridiculous cards late.
But so far, I have not met a single BR-15 land deck while drafting online or offline. I think you might need too many good removal spells for that deck, and you probably won't be able to get that quantity these days.
I'm having some trouble in my TvT matchup (Gold player) what are some basic builds you guys go?
TvT may not be my strongest matchup (it's TvP > TvT >>>> TvZ for me), but I still decent with it, and particularly recently I've found a good T player to practice against.
For TvT, the very standard play is: Reactor Marines, Tank + Vikings. So 15 Orbital, Fac off 1 gas (don't get 2nd gas too early, like on 16 or something, or else you can't make enough marines, tanks, depots and still get your expo), and then Reactor -> Starport. Mass marines, tanks and vikings (not reactored vikings, you won't have enough gas to support that), and base your expo timing around when you finish your siege mode research (so you can defend your expo from the high ground).
That's the very standard opening. Poke around your opponent's base with SCVs/Vikings/Scans to see what they are up to, chances are they are doing the same thing (but if you see like 2 Ports w/ tech labs something, save scan/get ebay ASAP), and now it's just a battle of positioning and macro. Try to catch his tanks off guard, snipe vikings, scout for ninja expos, etc. You can get 1 or 2 Thors to accompany your tanks to demolish vikings, or you can tech to BCs once you have at least 3 bases worth of gas, or you can tech switch too MMM and do a heavy harass type of play. But basically, Reactor Marines, Tanks and Vikings is the standard TvT opening.
Now if you want to get cheesy for just a bit, you can always do something like a 3 rax all-in on Steppes of War (short rushing distance, push out when you are around 60 supply so when your stim/grenade/maybe +1 are done), or 111->double cloak banshees (you would have made 2 banshees when the cloak research is done, which is HUGE against Siege Expand builds like the one I described on top).
But basically, I find that TvT is more about positioning and not slipping on your macro than just straight build orders, which is why you see so many Siege Expands in all these high level TvT games (and which is why TvT can easily take up 40min -> 1 hr), and you see players like TLO using nukes just so he can reposition his tank lines, etc. Position, position, position, and that just comes with practice and more game sense.
Nim Deathmantle is just OK in my opinion. Had it, was pretty good with Perilous Myrs and Replicas and whatnot, but 4 mana is TONS of mana. You really need to have a good amount of myrs to accelerate you so you can actually use the mantle without severely hindering your board development.
Koth, I don't think is a super bomb. Nothing wrong with a regular bomb, but he is definitely not on the same level as some of the top bombs in this set: Contagion Engine, Sunblast Angel, HSD, Geth, that can just take over as soon as they are dropped.
Sword of Mind and Body is pretty damn ridiculous too, and I would really put it up there. It suffers from being an artifact, but at least it's pretty cheap to cast and equip, and works wonder with just a dude.
Other than that, I don't really have any problems with that list (maybe Venser could be a little lower, but I don't see him enough on MTGO to say for sure how ridiculous or just OK he is).
Maybe it's just your drafting preferences? I haven't really noticed Scars being that different in terms of creature count. But that's probably because I've always drafted creatures if the picks are a bit close, or I'm really in need of them.
I wouldn't fault you for taking Shatter over Berserkers, but if it's like your 4th Shatter, and you already have a bunch of other removals, I would have personally taken the Berserkers, just to make sure I had a decent amount of creatures to back up my game plan.
2 Tainted Strike
3 Vector Asp
Throne of Geth
2 Lifesmith
Carrion Call
2 Blackcleave Goblin
And I wanted to play 17 lands because I want to consistently hit my 3-4 drops, as well as possibly always trying to hit Contagion Engine and maximizing the 2 Untamed Mights (as well as equipping things or maybe paying mana for Vector Asp if I decide to play them).
That means I have 23 slots, and out of 31 cards from the pool, I labeled 11 as maybes. So I have 3 slots where I thought were playable, maybe 4 if I decide to play more 1 and 2 drops instead of 4 drops.
I immediately cut the 2 Tainted Strikes and a Throne of Geth (which I found curious that everyone here included it immediately), because the Strikes were probably only going to benefit Painsmith really, or they become +1/+0 instants, which is pretty bad.
The Lifesmiths got the axe too, which I found out where kind of a mistake in the games, as this deck is REALLY low on removal spells (Tumble Magnet really doesn't remove anything, just delay some damage), and I boarded the Lifesmiths in every single game to help me race.
So I ended up putting in the 2 Vector Asp and a 1 Blackcleave Goblin, which was a pretty big mistake (they are pretty underpowered if the rest of your deck is full of Infect guys, and I hate Vector Asp, because it always messes with your curve).
So basically, the question in the end I have is: I see everyone playing Carrion Call and Throne of Geth. I can understand Throne of Geth, but Carrion Call? It's pretty situational, and seems pretty underpowered.
I think the correct build in the end would have been 1 Throne of Geth + 2 Lifesmith. Skip all the Vector Asps, and the Blackcleaves and the Call.
So I just came away with this draft. It was a swiss draft because I kinda wanted to try forcing Infect for a bit (I actually don't draft Infect, in fact, I try to stay away from it, so my card evaluation for Infect cards are pretty wonky, and I figure I probably have to work on it some more).
How would you build it? All the relevant cards are here, anything not shown is pretty much not relevant (no splash Galvanic Blast, or on-colour 2/1 dork or whatever). I ended every match 2-1 (and the losses were definitely my fault for either not being aggressive enough, or placing emphasis on the wrong threats, etc), and I always ended up boarding out a few cards, so I'm curious how the forum would build it.
I went for a build emphasizing on curving out, but I don't think it worked that well. I know the majority of the deck is pretty set in stone, but it's the final few choices that always bug me.
Scars is actually pretty fun, it's far from being solved, and I consistently see/hear about new innovative strategies.
Some days ago, my friend was drafting at 401 in Toronto right before the GP, and they somehow got into an 8-man with Saito and Nakamura (!!!). Saito had this sickest deck with 2 Skinrenders, a bunch of Neurok Replicas and I think some Disperse? It literally ripped through my friend's deck like it was nothing.
Granted, that's not a deck archetype, but it is definitely innovative, and definitely cool. The fact that we can still conjure up stuff like that (while balancing against the Infect archetype, which by itself is already pretty cool in how it forces you to find different interactions within your draft pod) is what makes this format nice in my opinion.
Scars is a format that I think might be up there in my long lists of limited formats, and I've played a lot of formats.
The whole "bomb/variance" talk is ridiculous, considering Scars is pretty damn good when it comes to being able to deal with bombs, and the variance issue happens to every format, and isn't particularly swingy in Scars.
Ugh...this looked like the pack that I opened like 2 days ago that caused me to go with an early 0-1 exit from the 8-4s (also, I was playing terribly, but at least a bomb or even an Arrest would have helped).
It's a very good build order, but more so for top level players than anyone else. In Silver/Gold and even sometimes in Platinum, you have a lot of these Terrans that just push all-in blind, and that really, really wrecks 1 gate fast expand.
So for the OP, unless you are very comfortable with your micro and timings, don't try fast expand strategies yet.
It's like how right now, most Diamond Zergs will go Hatch first, pool second against Terrans, so Terrans have started to do fast expands too to counter that. But quite a lot of lower level Zergs will still go gas, pool, and if the Terran goes fast expand, you will just get wrecked.
1 Iron Myr, 16 lands to support all of that? 3 4-drops, 5 5-drops (and 2 Turn to Slag), and a 6-drop? I'd play at least 18 lands, or cut some of those high drops for low drops.
Plus, Ichorclaw Myr looks pretty useless here too.
And try not to do bio in TvT, particularly as you progress up the ladder, MMM is only really good in TvT if you can constantly harass your opponent with it, otherwise they straight up die to siege walls. So try to get used to playing TvT with mechs. There are a few tactics in late game TvT where you can mix stimmed Marauders into your army, so you can run those guys in to target tanks, while moving your own tank line up, but again, that's a positioning trick.
The 4 mana thing is pretty huge, particularly since you actually have to leave that mana open for your dudes to actually come back. 4 mana is a lot to leave open in this format.
Silliness aside, this card is quite good. Anything that requires your opponent to have an immediate answer and impacts the board by dumping 9 power on it is pretty damn good.
But so far, I have not met a single BR-15 land deck while drafting online or offline. I think you might need too many good removal spells for that deck, and you probably won't be able to get that quantity these days.
TvT may not be my strongest matchup (it's TvP > TvT >>>> TvZ for me), but I still decent with it, and particularly recently I've found a good T player to practice against.
For TvT, the very standard play is: Reactor Marines, Tank + Vikings. So 15 Orbital, Fac off 1 gas (don't get 2nd gas too early, like on 16 or something, or else you can't make enough marines, tanks, depots and still get your expo), and then Reactor -> Starport. Mass marines, tanks and vikings (not reactored vikings, you won't have enough gas to support that), and base your expo timing around when you finish your siege mode research (so you can defend your expo from the high ground).
That's the very standard opening. Poke around your opponent's base with SCVs/Vikings/Scans to see what they are up to, chances are they are doing the same thing (but if you see like 2 Ports w/ tech labs something, save scan/get ebay ASAP), and now it's just a battle of positioning and macro. Try to catch his tanks off guard, snipe vikings, scout for ninja expos, etc. You can get 1 or 2 Thors to accompany your tanks to demolish vikings, or you can tech to BCs once you have at least 3 bases worth of gas, or you can tech switch too MMM and do a heavy harass type of play. But basically, Reactor Marines, Tanks and Vikings is the standard TvT opening.
Now if you want to get cheesy for just a bit, you can always do something like a 3 rax all-in on Steppes of War (short rushing distance, push out when you are around 60 supply so when your stim/grenade/maybe +1 are done), or 111->double cloak banshees (you would have made 2 banshees when the cloak research is done, which is HUGE against Siege Expand builds like the one I described on top).
But basically, I find that TvT is more about positioning and not slipping on your macro than just straight build orders, which is why you see so many Siege Expands in all these high level TvT games (and which is why TvT can easily take up 40min -> 1 hr), and you see players like TLO using nukes just so he can reposition his tank lines, etc. Position, position, position, and that just comes with practice and more game sense.
Koth, I don't think is a super bomb. Nothing wrong with a regular bomb, but he is definitely not on the same level as some of the top bombs in this set: Contagion Engine, Sunblast Angel, HSD, Geth, that can just take over as soon as they are dropped.
Sword of Mind and Body is pretty damn ridiculous too, and I would really put it up there. It suffers from being an artifact, but at least it's pretty cheap to cast and equip, and works wonder with just a dude.
Other than that, I don't really have any problems with that list (maybe Venser could be a little lower, but I don't see him enough on MTGO to say for sure how ridiculous or just OK he is).
I wouldn't fault you for taking Shatter over Berserkers, but if it's like your 4th Shatter, and you already have a bunch of other removals, I would have personally taken the Berserkers, just to make sure I had a decent amount of creatures to back up my game plan.
What I thought were NOT must plays:
2 Tainted Strike
3 Vector Asp
Throne of Geth
2 Lifesmith
Carrion Call
2 Blackcleave Goblin
And I wanted to play 17 lands because I want to consistently hit my 3-4 drops, as well as possibly always trying to hit Contagion Engine and maximizing the 2 Untamed Mights (as well as equipping things or maybe paying mana for Vector Asp if I decide to play them).
That means I have 23 slots, and out of 31 cards from the pool, I labeled 11 as maybes. So I have 3 slots where I thought were playable, maybe 4 if I decide to play more 1 and 2 drops instead of 4 drops.
I immediately cut the 2 Tainted Strikes and a Throne of Geth (which I found curious that everyone here included it immediately), because the Strikes were probably only going to benefit Painsmith really, or they become +1/+0 instants, which is pretty bad.
The Lifesmiths got the axe too, which I found out where kind of a mistake in the games, as this deck is REALLY low on removal spells (Tumble Magnet really doesn't remove anything, just delay some damage), and I boarded the Lifesmiths in every single game to help me race.
So I ended up putting in the 2 Vector Asp and a 1 Blackcleave Goblin, which was a pretty big mistake (they are pretty underpowered if the rest of your deck is full of Infect guys, and I hate Vector Asp, because it always messes with your curve).
So basically, the question in the end I have is: I see everyone playing Carrion Call and Throne of Geth. I can understand Throne of Geth, but Carrion Call? It's pretty situational, and seems pretty underpowered.
I think the correct build in the end would have been 1 Throne of Geth + 2 Lifesmith. Skip all the Vector Asps, and the Blackcleaves and the Call.
How would you build it? All the relevant cards are here, anything not shown is pretty much not relevant (no splash Galvanic Blast, or on-colour 2/1 dork or whatever). I ended every match 2-1 (and the losses were definitely my fault for either not being aggressive enough, or placing emphasis on the wrong threats, etc), and I always ended up boarding out a few cards, so I'm curious how the forum would build it.
I went for a build emphasizing on curving out, but I don't think it worked that well. I know the majority of the deck is pretty set in stone, but it's the final few choices that always bug me.
Some days ago, my friend was drafting at 401 in Toronto right before the GP, and they somehow got into an 8-man with Saito and Nakamura (!!!). Saito had this sickest deck with 2 Skinrenders, a bunch of Neurok Replicas and I think some Disperse? It literally ripped through my friend's deck like it was nothing.
Granted, that's not a deck archetype, but it is definitely innovative, and definitely cool. The fact that we can still conjure up stuff like that (while balancing against the Infect archetype, which by itself is already pretty cool in how it forces you to find different interactions within your draft pod) is what makes this format nice in my opinion.
Scars is a format that I think might be up there in my long lists of limited formats, and I've played a lot of formats.
The whole "bomb/variance" talk is ridiculous, considering Scars is pretty damn good when it comes to being able to deal with bombs, and the variance issue happens to every format, and isn't particularly swingy in Scars.
I'm gonna go with Plague Stinger here too.
It's a very good build order, but more so for top level players than anyone else. In Silver/Gold and even sometimes in Platinum, you have a lot of these Terrans that just push all-in blind, and that really, really wrecks 1 gate fast expand.
So for the OP, unless you are very comfortable with your micro and timings, don't try fast expand strategies yet.
It's like how right now, most Diamond Zergs will go Hatch first, pool second against Terrans, so Terrans have started to do fast expands too to counter that. But quite a lot of lower level Zergs will still go gas, pool, and if the Terran goes fast expand, you will just get wrecked.
Plus, Ichorclaw Myr looks pretty useless here too.