Been working on this for the last few months. I had a bit more LD though. What I gathered from it all, was that people who play properly using the new fetch lands just shut it down. The Boom//Bust trick is fun to do, but I felt AIR was a better land disruption deck. I hated scrapping the idea because its a lot of fun to play. I just couldn't see it being to efficient against players who adapt well.
I use proxies a lot in my playtest decks. No complaints from the group. It helps with testing against decks that no one is going to be playing, and for trying out new cards. I hate paying for something I wont bu using. I do actually print out an image of the card and sleeve it with a card though so there is no question of what the card is or does. I could not imagine using a proxy in any kind of tournament scene, that's just lame.
My deck started to feed me nothing but mana or absolutely zero mana. I felt that I played well and made good choices with mulligans (my biggest downfall as a player imo). Even though I placed 98th I was happy with how I played on an individual level.
Grats to everyone who won and/or placed well. Better luck next year to those like myself.
I agree with Spooky lol. Spells win games more then lands do. I know from my own experiences, that some games come down to the topdeck. About 90% of the time, I am hoping for just about anything besides a land. So even though the poker legends say it is not relevant, I will would like that chance to not draw into a land and possibly top deck an answer.
More then likely I will be taking Boros. Alot of decks have problems with its speed and ability to reset if played properly. I have not been to a States tourny before though, I hear there might be alot of T2 decks.
What do ya think of us havign the option to go to any States location we want to this year?
Taint, sorry I didnt get to make it man, I would of been your bye opponenet lol.
I did do some testing Thursday though.
vs G/B Rock - We tested a number of games without the sideboard. I would have to say it does very well. I took about 60% of the games. With the sideboard, I dont see how Rock would be a problem at all for us. Rafiq really was a game winner here with Vines protecting him for a turn or two.
vs Jund Agrro - This deck went scary fast. Once I was able to stabalize though, it was GG from there.
Still did not get to test out the land, sorry. I did try out the Sledges. I like them for the late game and against burn, but it is VERY mana demanding which throws me off. I think it might become a SB option if I even choose to put it there.
Hey! That was not my fault! It usually only takes an hour to get home from Morgantown! Anywho, yeah I'd be more than happy to sort things out, and go up against ya I haven't played the mirror yet either (played Bant Control, but that was completely different,) so I'm pretty excited.
Well I want to do some testing against some good control decks. It seem like our meta consists of aggro, aggro, random deck, aggro. After I get paid I might go into a control build of something else. So you can be my play test buddy with Bant lol. Have you made your call on Boa vs Infiltrator? I dont notice much U played around here.
@ Laquatas - I think that will be a strong point for us when it comes to tweaking around the meta. At the moment I am thinking of holding off on the Boa until our meta morphs abit. Last week I rarely had anything to worry about removal wise. From what it seems, we can bounce back from DoJ fast enough to wear the Regen isnt as big of an issue. I am sure we will have more changes coming in the future, but as of now, I think everyone here has done great at weeding through cards and actually discussing them.
I have altered it a bit (I won't say what so I don't give my opponent the edge [I'm looking at you firecrotch,]) but the changes aren't huge. Since I get 2 standard tourneys this weekend, I'll run the list in my sig one of the days, and run the new list another.
Ok, serious time... Since I'm not a total douche, I swapped out 3 Negate and 1 Bant Charm for 2 Vines and 2 Spell Pierce. Also, I'll run a single Pierce SB. I'd really like to get some serious testing with these new cards in here, and of the two, I really only think that Vines will stay. The extra colorless required for Negate doesn't seem relevant, and the liability the Pierce holds may prove to be too much.
The deal with Brave the Elements, is that it's essentially the same as Redeem the Lost, which also was not run in here, and some will argue that RtL was better. Also, BtE doesn't protect our dorks (Hierarchs, Birds) which is 75% of the time what I'm worried about getting killed.
Haha Taint, I see how it is lol. Maybe we can play each other this week. I just want to see Bant be great either way. I havnt done any testing against the mirror because I was told no one played it. Until you came along. Well I do agree with you on the Brave. This week I would like to see if you could help me otu with my Mana Base before FNM, if you arnt 2 hours late that is lol.
Im glad of glad to see that the biggest issue with Bant so far is the Land Count and the numbers on a few spells. I think we have a much more consistent deck here then alot of the other threads arguing back and forth about things.
I suggest we all go and test Oran-Rief in our various builds to see how it hold up. I don't think a purely theoretical examination of it will gets us far, because it's hard ot weigh the costs and benefits without hard evidence.
I agree with you here viper, this seems like a hard card to rule in or out without testing. As soon as I can get some in, I'll let ya know.
3-3 drop
Round 1: Jund 2-1
Round 2: Boros 1-2
Round 3: RDW 2-0
Round 4: Bant 2-1
Round 5: Jund 0-2
Round 6: Red/Green Ramp - 0-2
My deck started to feed me nothing but mana or absolutely zero mana. I felt that I played well and made good choices with mulligans (my biggest downfall as a player imo). Even though I placed 98th I was happy with how I played on an individual level.
Grats to everyone who won and/or placed well. Better luck next year to those like myself.
What do ya think of us havign the option to go to any States location we want to this year?
I did do some testing Thursday though.
vs G/B Rock - We tested a number of games without the sideboard. I would have to say it does very well. I took about 60% of the games. With the sideboard, I dont see how Rock would be a problem at all for us. Rafiq really was a game winner here with Vines protecting him for a turn or two.
vs Jund Agrro - This deck went scary fast. Once I was able to stabalize though, it was GG from there.
Still did not get to test out the land, sorry. I did try out the Sledges. I like them for the late game and against burn, but it is VERY mana demanding which throws me off. I think it might become a SB option if I even choose to put it there.
Well I want to do some testing against some good control decks. It seem like our meta consists of aggro, aggro, random deck, aggro. After I get paid I might go into a control build of something else. So you can be my play test buddy with Bant lol. Have you made your call on Boa vs Infiltrator? I dont notice much U played around here.
@ Laquatas - I think that will be a strong point for us when it comes to tweaking around the meta. At the moment I am thinking of holding off on the Boa until our meta morphs abit. Last week I rarely had anything to worry about removal wise. From what it seems, we can bounce back from DoJ fast enough to wear the Regen isnt as big of an issue. I am sure we will have more changes coming in the future, but as of now, I think everyone here has done great at weeding through cards and actually discussing them.
Haha Taint, I see how it is lol. Maybe we can play each other this week. I just want to see Bant be great either way. I havnt done any testing against the mirror because I was told no one played it. Until you came along. Well I do agree with you on the Brave. This week I would like to see if you could help me otu with my Mana Base before FNM, if you arnt 2 hours late that is lol.
Im glad of glad to see that the biggest issue with Bant so far is the Land Count and the numbers on a few spells. I think we have a much more consistent deck here then alot of the other threads arguing back and forth about things.
I agree with you here viper, this seems like a hard card to rule in or out without testing. As soon as I can get some in, I'll let ya know.