Took The combo deck back to Wed standard and added Scrapheap/swap into the sideboard over Blue and it straight won me a game against Control on the draw. . Was really happy with how it played over hellion, I felt Hellions just ate all my energy and without trample that slowed me down enough to lose games. No idea why I ever took out Larger in Life that card is single handily my MVP of the day. Got second 3-1, I beat W/U control/ Planeswalker deck(Ajani she's newer to maigic)/ G/W Counters( he tapped out game 3 with a elcotro on board and I hit for 42/42 trample) and lost to mono black discard deck again. Probably the only deck in the meta that can just shut down this deck that I've seen. His deck is most likely the best suited for the local meta, he can just strip people's hands and play TKS/Reality smashers to close the game. We both attack control but different ways which the best players at my LGS tend to play. Overall I think a splash in Black is worth it, I'm thinking about adding some fatal pushes into the SB and a Blooming marsh now.
I'm torn on adding Elephant over cub, I love cub's ability to make energy and grow but I also love Elephant overall stats and T2 two 3/4s is a dream. It's hard for me to say he's better then cub as cub has dominated so many matches by himself. I'm thinking I just SB Elephant in against Red decks? That 4 butt is going to be problems for them.
CHandra- I run two SB and even though a powerful card just didn't flow right I'm cutting her out.
Alrin Kord- Never shows up ever. I'm thinking about adding two to the SB in place of chandra because Mono Black discard, the Wolf tokens I can see being a huge help. I really think that deck is just highly favored to beat me and he just draws the nuts against me everytime.
WED Standard I went 2-1 only losing to G/B in a hard fought 3 games. I felt well positioned and happy to play the beater.
I went 0-3 at gameday with the energy/combo deck in honesty I could have been 3-0 or at least top 3 had the deck even remotely wanted me to win.
Luckily only 6 people at the LGS so I topped 8. YEAH!
Played Saheeli control first match 2-1. Game three on the play and drew 5 lands straight :((((((((((((((((((((((. Feels good to lose to crazy cat lady combo twice!
Played a Mono-Black Discard deck. 2-1. This deck is super strong (obviously) against the deck. Game three it's 4-10(I'm at 10), I have one longtusk cub to chump his 5/5 haste drazi dude, he kills it with Ob Nixilis and slams another and gets me for lethal. He had the one card to win it. Just brutal.( that was a pun because he collective brutailied? Me twice game three taking Blossoming defence and uncaged fury.)
Weirdly, in match three I had to play against G/B delirium, 0-2. He just had all the answers. Play a creature, it dies. Slam a Hydra! Target player sacs a creature. Basically sat there to watch a flying demon slap my face around.
I will say Hellion is boss against control and feels great, it makes them think about countering a Attuned so you can sneak a creature in, or you continue to punch them in their adam's apple. I will also say make sure they are not playing a list that runs a Kleetus, otherwise you may be giving them zombies.
So this is what I'm bringing to standard tomorrow, Renegade elf is great way to make my opp use up removal, I think he's good for a one-of that can be SB'd out for a PW once I know what I'm facing. I also would be adding more Rampage if my shop has them, but I only pulled one from my box.
Has anyone thought about splashing black for the scrapheap? I like the idea of recurring threats, and it also opens up for fatal push or some other sb tech.
The biggest downfall I've had is not keeping creatures on board, and this would help with that.
Oh hey look a expertise that can play the legendary creature it's named after....IN RED!
This into an always watching seems good, even with the Monkey not getting a buff, the fact she is a 2/4 menace fs will do! Good thing she's a human for Thalia's Lieutenant as well!
Expertise + reckless bushwhacker seems fun way to steal a vehicle crew it, and buff whatever ya got on the field !
RIP Galvanic Bombardment in standard. Though maybe some people will prefer it for the late game? Not me though.
Galvanic Bombardment is vastly superior for most midrange and controlling decks, and will continue to see heavy play in decks that want 1 mana red removal. Shock might see play as well since there are a decent number of creatures that will die to a shock, but three toughness is a pretty important number too.
The more I'm looking at all these great small butt creatures the more I think a combination of both will do great.
Tournament report: I took Naya Humans (similar to the list above, -Copters. By request, I can post a list) out to FNM at a new place while on vacation. It was a delightful crowd for a four round event. I beat RG Werewolves, Grixis Visions and RG Pummeler in 3-game sets before soccumbing weakly to RB Artifact/Madness Aggro.
In the first three matches, Heron's Grace Champion was generally great. Against RB, I kept a 2-lander and never got a third land, then flooded in Game 2. I took the opportunity to test more against RB aggro, since it was a no-holds-barred version. I went 2-3 otherwise without boarding. I think I want to work in some 1 mana 1/2s, like Inspector or Oviya to keep the Bomat Couriers in check.
I tried the deck again and fell into some seriously bad luck, I haven't won a dice roll in two weeks and it cost me my matchups I went 0-3.
U/W Flash:(1-2) Won a game with Mana bear beatdown, all damage coming from her and pumps. Game one wasn't anything special, but game three I got reflector mage'd twice and then elder deep fiend reared it's ugly face, and he had just enough for lethal. It was my first time playing the deck with this deck and I'm not 100% sure I SB'd right, but the matchup just felt bad on the draw.
W/B Sac deck(1-2)(saffronolives deck from a few months back). First time playing the deck and I had clunky draws, longtusk cub was bad He always had servos out with cutthroats and again could not find any of my removal to kill the cuttthroats.
Dwarfs R/W(0-2) Was really bad, I didn't draw removal game 2 or creatures apart from my opening hands. WHich was icing on a defeating day.
I hope everyone else had better luck then.
So far I'm 2-4 with the deck. I think I like the 2/2 cub/lightning split better then 4/cub. I feel like I just need to roll dice better.
I agree with you on the mana, I've had some very clunky hands but Servant and Attune are in the deck to help.
The painful ones for me are the one land hands with attune. If the land is a forest or an aether hub then the hand is probably awesome. If the land is anything else then it's very sketchy. I'm tempted to pull the two Cinder Glade for more forests to be honest.
Yeah there was a couple times where I thought about just holding a Cinder glade in my hand incase I topdeck a game trail. I never went through with it but both times I ripped a game trail, yeeeesh.
I've been trying out the Lossett version of the deck and it's a lot more consistent than I expected. The volume and power of the pump spells make every creature a threat. I won one game doing 20 points with Servant of the Conduit. It's possible to wind up with all pump and no creatures but there are 20 creatures in there and it's not like anybody is running 20 removal spells.
The mana base is a problem. I didn't even follow Lossett in switching in the Spirebluff Canal and Botanical Sanctum for a mountain and a forest and the mana still made things a lot harder than it had to be. Against an aggro deck it's really bad to have your first play be a two drop on turn three. Equally frustrating are the games where you have Larger than Life and Uncaged Fury in hand, four lands in play, a brief window open to win the game... and rip a Game Trail off the top. Even Cinder Glade can easily come into play tapped as your fifth or sixth land.
This deck could really use Copperline Gorge. It could also use a one drop energy creature (longtusk kitten?) to really vault it into the top tier.
I agree with you on the mana, I've had some very clunky hands but Servant and Attune are in the deck to help.
I hope we do get a green or red one drop creature in energy, Swiftspear that instead of prowess makes one energy per hit, would be very nice or generates a energy per power. So you can dump a pump spell and get some energy! That's very christmas land but oh well.
Joe Lossett played the Standard portion of SCG Players' Champioship with a Pummeler deck and won the whole tournament. Pretty hilarious to see a $72 budget deck there on top of all the expensive top tier decks.
I used his list but had 2 MB Harnessed instead of 4x cub. I didn't have 4x cubs from draft shaft. I went 2-1 losing to a mirror match, I even beat R/w vehicles on the draw!. The deck is most impressive. After playing it, I think 2 harnessed are needed, a guy had thalia and if I couldn't answer it right away I most likely loose(R/W deck), though there were points when I wished my Harnessed lightning were cubs. I wanted to play hellion but I think more pump spells like uncaged fury are better, as they can come out of nowhere and put the opposition away. Needless to say I'm hooked on the all in combo, and my playmat is savage punch so the flavor is oozing! haha
I chatted with the guy with also running R/G energy to get his take on the deck, and he said it was weak to control. Maybe Hellions in the board to punch damage? This wasn't my local meta, but I know at my local meta their is a few control players. Are hellions needed for the SB against control?
I'm torn on adding Elephant over cub, I love cub's ability to make energy and grow but I also love Elephant overall stats and T2 two 3/4s is a dream. It's hard for me to say he's better then cub as cub has dominated so many matches by himself. I'm thinking I just SB Elephant in against Red decks? That 4 butt is going to be problems for them.
CHandra- I run two SB and even though a powerful card just didn't flow right I'm cutting her out.
Alrin Kord- Never shows up ever. I'm thinking about adding two to the SB in place of chandra because Mono Black discard, the Wolf tokens I can see being a huge help. I really think that deck is just highly favored to beat me and he just draws the nuts against me everytime.
Still happy to get second out of 12!
I went 0-3 at gameday with the energy/combo deck in honesty I could have been 3-0 or at least top 3 had the deck even remotely wanted me to win.
Luckily only 6 people at the LGS so I topped 8. YEAH!
Played Saheeli control first match 2-1. Game three on the play and drew 5 lands straight :((((((((((((((((((((((. Feels good to lose to crazy cat lady combo twice!
Played a Mono-Black Discard deck. 2-1. This deck is super strong (obviously) against the deck. Game three it's 4-10(I'm at 10), I have one longtusk cub to chump his 5/5 haste drazi dude, he kills it with Ob Nixilis and slams another and gets me for lethal. He had the one card to win it. Just brutal.( that was a pun because he collective brutailied? Me twice game three taking Blossoming defence and uncaged fury.)
Weirdly, in match three I had to play against G/B delirium, 0-2. He just had all the answers. Play a creature, it dies. Slam a Hydra! Target player sacs a creature. Basically sat there to watch a flying demon slap my face around.
I will say Hellion is boss against control and feels great, it makes them think about countering a Attuned so you can sneak a creature in, or you continue to punch them in their adam's apple. I will also say make sure they are not playing a list that runs a Kleetus, otherwise you may be giving them zombies.
4 Bristling Hydra
4 Voltaic Brawler
4 Longtusk Cub
4 Electrostatic Pummeler
4 Servant of the Conduit
1 Rishkar, Peema Renegade
Instant:
3 rush of adrenaline
4 Uncaged Fury
4 Blossoming Defense
1 Invigorated Rampage
4 Aether Hub
2 Cinder Glade
4 Game Trail
7 Forest
3 Mountain
Sorcery:
4 Larger Than Life
4 Attune with Aether
2 Shock
4 Harnessed Lightning
4 hellion
2 Natural State
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
1 Arlinn Kord
So this is what I'm bringing to standard tomorrow, Renegade elf is great way to make my opp use up removal, I think he's good for a one-of that can be SB'd out for a PW once I know what I'm facing. I also would be adding more Rampage if my shop has them, but I only pulled one from my box.
The biggest downfall I've had is not keeping creatures on board, and this would help with that.
This into an always watching seems good, even with the Monkey not getting a buff, the fact she is a 2/4 menace fs will do! Good thing she's a human for Thalia's Lieutenant as well!
Expertise + reckless bushwhacker seems fun way to steal a vehicle crew it, and buff whatever ya got on the field !
The more I'm looking at all these great small butt creatures the more I think a combination of both will do great.
I would love to see a list!
U/W Flash:(1-2) Won a game with Mana bear beatdown, all damage coming from her and pumps. Game one wasn't anything special, but game three I got reflector mage'd twice and then elder deep fiend reared it's ugly face, and he had just enough for lethal. It was my first time playing the deck with this deck and I'm not 100% sure I SB'd right, but the matchup just felt bad on the draw.
W/B Sac deck(1-2)(saffronolives deck from a few months back). First time playing the deck and I had clunky draws, longtusk cub was bad He always had servos out with cutthroats and again could not find any of my removal to kill the cuttthroats.
Dwarfs R/W(0-2) Was really bad, I didn't draw removal game 2 or creatures apart from my opening hands. WHich was icing on a defeating day.
I hope everyone else had better luck then.
So far I'm 2-4 with the deck. I think I like the 2/2 cub/lightning split better then 4/cub. I feel like I just need to roll dice better.
Yeah there was a couple times where I thought about just holding a Cinder glade in my hand incase I topdeck a game trail. I never went through with it but both times I ripped a game trail, yeeeesh.
I agree with you on the mana, I've had some very clunky hands but Servant and Attune are in the deck to help.
I hope we do get a green or red one drop creature in energy, Swiftspear that instead of prowess makes one energy per hit, would be very nice or generates a energy per power. So you can dump a pump spell and get some energy! That's very christmas land but oh well.
I used his list but had 2 MB Harnessed instead of 4x cub. I didn't have 4x cubs from draft shaft. I went 2-1 losing to a mirror match, I even beat R/w vehicles on the draw!. The deck is most impressive. After playing it, I think 2 harnessed are needed, a guy had thalia and if I couldn't answer it right away I most likely loose(R/W deck), though there were points when I wished my Harnessed lightning were cubs. I wanted to play hellion but I think more pump spells like uncaged fury are better, as they can come out of nowhere and put the opposition away. Needless to say I'm hooked on the all in combo, and my playmat is savage punch so the flavor is oozing! haha
I chatted with the guy with also running R/G energy to get his take on the deck, and he said it was weak to control. Maybe Hellions in the board to punch damage? This wasn't my local meta, but I know at my local meta their is a few control players. Are hellions needed for the SB against control?