I mentioned this in another thread but this discussion is so good that I felt like joining in as well.
Basically in the other thread, the guys mentioned that standard lack efficient answers to pushed mechanics/ cards like heart of Kiran, Gideon , scrap heap scrounger and etc. in the format and sweepers are rendered useless as they simply can't deal with all the different types of threat that aggressive and mid range decks chump out.
For me, I look at the healthier modern format and previous standards for reference.
Generally the current standard lack a lot of 2-for-1 utility cards in ramp or control Colours to buffer against aggro and midrange decks.
It gets funny when people are wishing for lone missionary, maniac vandals and reclamation sages. The best equivalent now before amonket is release the gremlins which cannot be blinked for value by felidar sovereign.
There is also a lack of efficient 4 damage burns to the face at Low cmc, effectively only allowing white and black to deal with planeswalkers 1 for 1. Green are supposed to have cards to deal with non creature permenants but that doesn't exist as well. Even naturalise is either conditional or expensive.
Personally I feel wizards is trying too hard to control the success of certain mechanics and certain cards. Maybe to encourage more buying of boosters in order to acquire those cards.
In the past they always print equivalent 2-1 answers regardless of the mechanics and let the players and meta decide what is good at any given tournament.
Heart of Kiran and smuggler thopter wouldn't be an issue if tin street hooligan was in standard, neither would Gideon matter if exquisite fire craft or warleaders helix was around. Players simply took the risk when they select decks like this and pray the meta isn't against them.
With the new set, mardu and copy cards are generally contained by green based decks but to be honest blue is really really a 3rd class citizen now. Most played blue spell in standard isn't torrential gearhulk or Jace but Negate in SB.
I think wizard should introduce a special set of reprints to add more variance to standard.
Hi guys, personally I don't think the lack of removal is the problem with standard. The "narrowing" of removals and the lack of card advantage utility creatures in red and green is the problem.
For example, if ancient grudge or naturalise was standard legal and reflector Mage and smuggler thopter is still unbanned, UW flyers would still be unaffected. Even with abrupt decay available it would still not change the equation. But if it was maniac vandal or reclamation sage, it would be very different. Not only do you remove their turn 2 play but have put in a creature and advance your board position. You can even destroy the clue token when the opponent is tapped out just for some value. But the fact is that wizard is pushing the vehicle sub type as a way to innovate the game. However they are pushing it way too much, so much so that you don't even have an acidic slime equivalent at 5 cmc other than release the gremlins which is played now in 4c copy cat and mardu.
They should have just printed utility creaturea at 4 cmc. Vehicles would still be played but the game will be more balance other than emrakul. For that, a generic graveyard hate would solve the problem especially since they have aetherwork marvel.
The newer devastating red depends heavily on a strong persistent 2 or 1 cmc assault. This forces players to react to the assault and tap out, creating an opportunity for the devasting summon + goblin bushwacker combo to go through from turn 3 onwards, pushing the opponent life to less than 10 points and finish off with cheap burns or remaining creatures.
This strategy works simply becos of the heavy threat of the combo which deals a minimal damage of 10 on turn 3 if un-defended.
2 4/3 elementals (hasted) + 1 2/1 goblin (hasted)
Sacing land become unimportant at that stage as you have already dealt a very heavy blow and the opponent needs to have an immediate solution else he would be finish either by the remain creatures on the table
I personally love Kiln Fiend, and although I may be the only one I actually am starting to favour him over Geopede.
Actually I favour it over geopede as well. Basically most people dont play test it enough to count their cards correctly.
What I mean is simple.
Imagine it is turn 3, your opponent dropped a Wall of Omen and is tapped out.
You have a geopede on the table, to deal him 4 or more damage this turn, you need to lay a land and cast a removal for wall of omen.
If you have a kith fiend, you only need a removal and not a land.
Imagine it is turn 5. You have both expel ur hands, the opponent has a wall of omen and you have a geopede.
You top deck a removal, remove the wall and deal 1 damage.
If you have a kith fiend, you would remove the wall and deal him 4.
If you top deck any land or than spires, the opponent would simply block.
Most people compare kith fiend and geopede base on what it takes to power them up. But they dont realise the actions require to actually LET the geopede or kith fiend deal its damage actually requires additional cards.
They also often forget that Kith Fiend has the option of super charging.
There are many ocassions due to the cards in my hand, I super charge the kith fiend on turn 3 when the opponent taps out. Flame Slash, lightning bolt, devasting summons sack 1 land. 13 damage with 3 power on the table. My opponent than lay a land and put a creature with mana for 1 removal. I then mark of mutiny the creature which he remove the fiend and end up with 1 life.
He plays one more creature and pass the turn, I top deck a spire, target one of his creature and finish the game. Can a geopede do that?
Kith fiend has a better tempo option than geopede. It is only bad in a deck with light removals or burns.
How did the beast breaker work for you it seems like an odd choice
I originally used Lotus Cobra in that slot. It was good for some spectacular plays like 3rd turn Gideon, Vengevine or Baneslayer, but I realise I hate top decking it and the spectacular plays happen like once every 8 games, so I just don't see the benefit in it despite not losing any tempo since it is still 2 power at 2 cmc. Other than that noble hierach can give me a 3rd turn vengevine as well so I just drop the lotus cobra. The beastbreaker was especially good if for some odd reason u have a sub optimal hand like "land, land, oblivion ring, land, path, ranger, beastbreaker'. You have free mana and you may not want to use the removal on early creatures.
It was also much stronger as a top deck despite me only leveling it up to level 4 on 1 ocassion in all 10+ games. I had 5 lands, and top deck it with no cards in hand versus a boros deck that was losing steam, I up it to level 1 and the lynx and geopede cant attack. I top deck another land so I just up it for 2 levels. Then I finally go a wall of omen and play it to get a path, then I use 3 mana to up it to level 4 and smack with a 6/6 trample, with a wall as blocker and a removal in hand.
Basically my build is closer to the concept of GW stompy, so big fat creatures for end game is good for me. A creature that is 2 mana 2/2 that can be upgraded to a 4/4 or 6/6 trample is generally not bad. Therefore you can see why put Student and Master in mainboard with Great Sable Stag in sideboard.
It did quite well in the tournament of 60 participants and came in at 5-1 losing 1-2 to a polymorph deck. I originally played an equipment suit, but in the end favoured more creatures after adding in Gideon. This is because I orginally used the behemoth sledge as life gain and evasion but gideon provided more with semi mass removal, repeated removal and mass evasion.
I have to explain the mass removal part. There are often days when my creatures are chump blocked due to lack of evasion (other than baneslayer). However with Gideon it is easier to force the opponent's weaker or troublesome creatures to attack (example: a singular baneslayer holding the fort) I can selectively block off a lot of creatures to my advantage and counter swing at average 10+ damage (vengevine + gideon or 2 creatures plus gideon)
Nice input, I forgot about needle and luminarch. I like that. My reasoning behind vines was for quicker aggro damage. The emerged unscathed are very nice because it's good evasion, but I like taking out the vines for 2 needles and 2 luminarchs. I'm going to try that for sure. 8 counters are probably too much. And although it would slow down the aggro deal, you're right, they'd have to take care of the luminarch or needle.
I was thinking siding out Baneslayers because they are too slow. But I also agree to take out Gideon. So my thinking is this
Obviously all these aren't in my sideboard, but I think I'll tweak it around a little bit more.
Sweet man, thanks again. Good call.
Cool man. Seems like a good side board. Just take note that tapout and WB tends to put in baneslayer post sideboard. For me , because I normally dont use protection spells, so I would never take out baneslayer. The acension is good enough magnets for removals for me.
So I did plenty of testing tonight. And determined that UW tapout/control is by far my worst matchup.
Hey man. I got had similar results as you against UW. However the tapout typically dies after sideboard over in my group. I choose to play luminarch acension and pithing needle. The needle deals with the planeswalkers and acension adds as oblivion ring bait and a turn 2 acension forces bad play. For the needle, if I have it, I would normally drop it turn 1 or 2 naming jace. I typically dont care too much about creatures going bye bye so I normally dont have creature protection spells in main or side.
I guess as I mentioned before, we have 2 different play styles, that's why u prefer to go protecting ur creatures. But I feel emerge unscath is not bad cos it does give evasion as well.
I recommend you use a non creature focus strategy to deal with tapout. In fact I think you are better off side boarding out Gideons, 2 path and 1 fall and put in 3 luminarch acension and 3 pithing needle.
Nice try in building ur own deck. The Elfdrazi isnt too bad, may get a few decent wins, but the wall deck is really too weak in terms of win conditions. There arent many ways for you to win in the defender deck other then using Gideon to beat ur opponent flat, use man lands to do the same or use vent sentinel to burn ur opponent to cinders. Most of these methods are considered secondary win conditions in today's competitive format.
To let you understand what is considered primary win cons, imagine sphinx of the jwar isle. Difficult to remove, have evasion and have enough muscles to make it a 4 turn clock on the opponent.
You could dump the hydra in the elfdrazi and put in the ant queen. Else you can splash white for the man lands and ranger of eos to tutor for the war caller as win cons. Splashing white also allows u to side board in removals.
Generally I dont see elfdrazi being too powerful in the format, cos the board position is easily disrupted and they dont have much attack power until you spam the board and put in the monument. But it sure is fun to see elves spam the board.
Thanks to you too! I'll report back. I really feel this deck is very strong. But I understand that many won't be able to gather all the cards for it, which is why it's probably not getting much interest. It's very expensive.
Cool. I agree the WG stompy build with Vengevine is really quite strong and EXPENSIVE. LOLZ
I actually had to proxy my Baneslayer Angel most of the time as it was simply too expensive for me to get a set around where I live.
I did a RG version of a Vengevine deck for the next tournament near my home even though I know it is weaker than the WG version just because of the cost as Vengevine is the only expensive card compared to 4 KotR, 3-4 Baneslayer and 2-3 Gideon.
I run it like a ENHANCED RDW with haste creatures and burns and it still does really well against jund, WU control (original and Planeswalker version) and eldrazi green. But it has a slightly tougher time against Bant and outright dies to this version of WG stompy.
I feel so bad each time I meet someone who built something similar as I conceived the deck the moment vengevine was revealed, but cant build it cos it cost WAY too much money.
That stoneforge package is tempting, but it just seems to be working without it. Stoneforge as a 1/2 is just so unimpressive to me. And feels like a underpowered card even though it nets you a card. It generally doesn't do anything. Therefore I'd rather be casting a lotus cobra turn 2, or an elspeth turn 4. Because my current list has just more value in each card. Anyways. Those are my thoughts on the cards.
I just want to avoid doing to many 3 of's because it reduces constistency. Otherwise I'd consider going 3 cobra's and 3 nobles. But the ramp feels vital.
Hi man
I suddenly realised momentus fall helps you gain life as well. Generally the strength of your early game is similar to mine. It's something this deck gives in order to have a stronger late game therefore I also agree that ramping is important. I would normally reduce the copies of lotus cobra to 3 as I like it in my opening hand but dont want to top deck it. Noble hiearch can be a 4 of as it can serve as a static pump for singular creatures. I will think of momentus fall as a good way to recover cards and life in mid-game, especially on an exalted/pumped vengevine or lotus cobra.
Elspeth does give good singular punching power and is not redundant by itself compared to individual components of the equipment package. However you are sacrificing point removals for it. I guess you are characterisically a creature aggro player. Meaning you are better navigating a deck that just beat heavy with creatures. I am more of aggro tempo player, cos I like the idea of making 1/4 of my non land cards removals so that I can control the pace of the damage race.
If I were to modify your deck to suit my taste, I will still reduce the lotus cobra to 3 and remove elspeth to throw in 2 paths and 1 more momentus fall. BTW, Gideon is a good repeatable removal and beater, I would never think of using him until u made this list. Thanks.
I dont think your deck has a very good aggro strategy though, it feels more mid range to me.
1st turn noble hierach
2nd turn KotR
3nd turn hit drop elspeth and hit for 6-9 with KotR?
1st turn student
2st turn upgrade and hit for 3
3nd turn KotR and hit for another 3?
1st turn land
2nd turn lotus cobra
3rd turn vengevine and hit for 6 with cobra and VV?
Basically I build a similar deck like this with a similar selection of creatures. It generally have creature superiority compare to other decks CMC versus CMC. However one of the chief weakness is that it is slower. Your version doesn't have much attacking low drops, it has no equipment suit mainboard to gain back possible life loss in early turns and has very few removals other than 3 x Oblivion Ring and 3 x Gideon at 5 cmc.
For me, I choose to mainboard the equipment suit with 2 stoneforge mystic, 1 basilisk collar and 1 behemoth sledge. I also choose to drop the planeswalkers and out in more removals such as 4 path and 4 oblivion rings. I feel putting in Gideon or elspeth is okay, but they dont make a significant improvement in ur strategy cos u still deal damage mainly with ur creatures.
My list was
3 x student of warfare
3 x noble hiearch
1 x scute mob
4 x path to exile
3 x lotus cobra
2 x stoneforge mystic
4 x Knight of the relinquary
4 x Oblivion Ring
1 x Behemoth Sledge
4 x Vengevine
3 x Ranger of Eos
4 x Baneslayer Angel
4 x Stirring Wildwood
4 x Sunpetal Grove
2 x Verdant Catacomb
2 x Arid Mesa
1 x Sejiri Stepps
6 x Forest
5 x Plains
It should be called a GW stompy deck with equipment upgrade. I think if I were to modify my deck to something similar to yours. I would throwaway a few copies of Oblivion ring and put in either Gideon cos it forces the block open with the first ability and can alpha strike with the rest with the last ability. I feel elspeth dont work well in this deck.
Wow. I did not expect people to be quite so harsh about this. I just heard some guys talking about it at my store and my curiosity got piqued. If no one has heard anything of this, then I must have mis-understood it. Sorry for all the animosity I caused.
Hey man
You should chill out a little. You didn't cause any problems. There have always been 2 camps who have different views about the competitiveness of Vengevine. Those who don't believe in its value don't understand that he has actually no home in the existing pro tour archtypes. Vengevine will create entire new deck types by itself.
I have wrote in various other threads that Vengevines home is either in a GW Stompy deck or a RG aggro burn deck. The reason why it would not be in Naya Boss is becos the red components of Naya are made obsolete by the new strategy. Wild natacl is overwhelmed by student of warfare making it a bad tutor option for ranger of eos in mid or late game. Bird of paradise is not needed as the red source is no longer required. Lightning bolt is neligible compare to 4 copies of Path and Oblivion Ring cos the combine direct damage available to Naya boss is at max 18 (4 bolts 2 Ajani Vengeant). Bloodbriad elf's best cascade other than KotR is inferior to vengevine and takes up four 4cmc slots. How would Jund deal with 3 Student of Warfare, 1 scute mob, 4 Knights, 4 Vengevine and 4 Baneslayer? The Vengevine would look at Malakir Bloodwitch and laugh, especially since there is still plenty of space left to put in an equipment suit or elspeth.
The whole concept of GW stompy is only viable due to Vengevine as he makes up the last 4 slots for high removal target following the strategy of high threat density. Now GW has 12 High priority targets (VV, KotR, Baneslayer) that make lightning bolt feel wasted, hurts really bad if left alone and only sprouting thrinax in Jund can match the power of each of them.
To combo it off with Kor Sky fisher is just icing on the cake, it should not be thought of as a key win cond, cos Vengevine is definitely not a finisher. No control deck would run Vengevine, cos Baneslayer and Sphinx of the Jwar Isle are better individually. However it is a great companion creature, cos it promises most of the time to be either 4 damage to the head, a good trade with a creature of similar CMC and a possible recuring threat that has immediate board presense due to haste.
To understand the advantage, imagine this board position.
Ur side. 1 Baneslayer, 5 lands, 2 cards in hand
His side. 1 Malakir Bloodwitch, 5 lands 2 cards in hand
You proceed to play vengevine with 1 card in hand and 1 mana left
and you declare attack. The statemate is broken. He has to remove vengevine and baneslayer or lose the board position. He choose to terminate baneslayer and block with bloodwitch. You know he does not have a second removal and the card in hand is not a removal or creature. Once both creature dies, you play ur student of warfare and bring back vengevine, promising a 4/3 creature and a 3/3 first strike the next attack.
This sounds like an ideal scenario. But the whole point was that playing any other creature in Naya boss would not have broken the stalemate with as much impact as Vengevine. I am preparing to see a lot of GW decks with Vengevine in the coming GPTs and games day.
I don't think you get a single part of what I said, so i'll put it in bullet form.
Naya cascades > Jund cascades for activating vengevine
Vengevine > Day of judgment
Blightning beats anyone and everyone (seriously) Vengevine is a huge leg up against it.
So, this card protects against one of the most powerful card advantage monsters of all time, blightning, it helps us in UW control matchups by lessening the effectiveness of Wall of omens and Day of Judgment (which you yourself think is where we're very weak) Convinced yet?
Hi man
He isnt really wrong. DOJ USED TO beat up Naya especially back to back but I really think he should rethink about that statement if Vengevine is added. Mono white removals are the only ones that can reduce the CA from the free recursion and only Path can deal with Vengevine on the turn it lands while I am totally discounting counter spells here cos it really doesnt matter when Vengevine is involved.
My playgroup has tested WG stompy since Vengevine is revealed and we are pretty certain that the existing WU control has an inherit advantage pre side board, but practically dies post side board due to the simple idea that they need to build up to a finisher and they cannot deal with luminarch acension, vengevine and pithing needle at the same time. We expect WU to evolve.
Jund gets raped heavily by a combination of high threat density from 3 student of warfare, 1 scute mob, 4 knight of relinquary, 4 vengevine, 3 ranger of eos, 3 baneslayer and equipment package. All 16 removals for jund can't remove everything and any single one of those creature is superior to jund's creatures (if you treat ranger as an additional copy of vengevine). The only creature that can match is sprouting thrinax which we will handle with the 8 main board removals (path and oblivion ring) and side board Devout lightcaster.
Jund most of the time have no upfront advantage pre or post side board but a well time consume the meek may turn the game around along with a seldom seen jund charm.
I mentioned this in another thread but this discussion is so good that I felt like joining in as well.
Basically in the other thread, the guys mentioned that standard lack efficient answers to pushed mechanics/ cards like heart of Kiran, Gideon , scrap heap scrounger and etc. in the format and sweepers are rendered useless as they simply can't deal with all the different types of threat that aggressive and mid range decks chump out.
For me, I look at the healthier modern format and previous standards for reference.
Generally the current standard lack a lot of 2-for-1 utility cards in ramp or control Colours to buffer against aggro and midrange decks.
It gets funny when people are wishing for lone missionary, maniac vandals and reclamation sages. The best equivalent now before amonket is release the gremlins which cannot be blinked for value by felidar sovereign.
There is also a lack of efficient 4 damage burns to the face at Low cmc, effectively only allowing white and black to deal with planeswalkers 1 for 1. Green are supposed to have cards to deal with non creature permenants but that doesn't exist as well. Even naturalise is either conditional or expensive.
Personally I feel wizards is trying too hard to control the success of certain mechanics and certain cards. Maybe to encourage more buying of boosters in order to acquire those cards.
In the past they always print equivalent 2-1 answers regardless of the mechanics and let the players and meta decide what is good at any given tournament.
Heart of Kiran and smuggler thopter wouldn't be an issue if tin street hooligan was in standard, neither would Gideon matter if exquisite fire craft or warleaders helix was around. Players simply took the risk when they select decks like this and pray the meta isn't against them.
With the new set, mardu and copy cards are generally contained by green based decks but to be honest blue is really really a 3rd class citizen now. Most played blue spell in standard isn't torrential gearhulk or Jace but Negate in SB.
I think wizard should introduce a special set of reprints to add more variance to standard.
For example, if ancient grudge or naturalise was standard legal and reflector Mage and smuggler thopter is still unbanned, UW flyers would still be unaffected. Even with abrupt decay available it would still not change the equation. But if it was maniac vandal or reclamation sage, it would be very different. Not only do you remove their turn 2 play but have put in a creature and advance your board position. You can even destroy the clue token when the opponent is tapped out just for some value. But the fact is that wizard is pushing the vehicle sub type as a way to innovate the game. However they are pushing it way too much, so much so that you don't even have an acidic slime equivalent at 5 cmc other than release the gremlins which is played now in 4c copy cat and mardu.
They should have just printed utility creaturea at 4 cmc. Vehicles would still be played but the game will be more balance other than emrakul. For that, a generic graveyard hate would solve the problem especially since they have aetherwork marvel.
This strategy works simply becos of the heavy threat of the combo which deals a minimal damage of 10 on turn 3 if un-defended.
2 4/3 elementals (hasted) + 1 2/1 goblin (hasted)
Sacing land become unimportant at that stage as you have already dealt a very heavy blow and the opponent needs to have an immediate solution else he would be finish either by the remain creatures on the table
2 3/3 elementals + 1 1/1 goblin
or cheap burns
1 cmc lightning bolt, 1 cmc burst lightning, 1 cmc fork bolt.
To illustrate imagine an opening hand like this and assuming a smooth assault where the opponent taps out and disclude the cards u may draw.
1 goblin guide, 1 summons, 1 bushwacker, 4 lands.
turn 1 goblin guide cast and attack, 2 damage total
turn 2 goblin guide attack, 4 damage total
turn 3 devasting summon cast, sack 3 lands, bush wacker, 17 damage total
(goblin guide 3, bushwacker 2, 2 elementals 8, and 4 damage done in turn 1 & 2)
turn 4 continue assault and finish the game.
In a way it doesnt matter if u sack ur land cos the opponent is near critical by turn 3
Hope that helps
Cheers
Actually I favour it over geopede as well. Basically most people dont play test it enough to count their cards correctly.
What I mean is simple.
Imagine it is turn 3, your opponent dropped a Wall of Omen and is tapped out.
You have a geopede on the table, to deal him 4 or more damage this turn, you need to lay a land and cast a removal for wall of omen.
If you have a kith fiend, you only need a removal and not a land.
Imagine it is turn 5. You have both expel ur hands, the opponent has a wall of omen and you have a geopede.
You top deck a removal, remove the wall and deal 1 damage.
If you have a kith fiend, you would remove the wall and deal him 4.
If you top deck any land or than spires, the opponent would simply block.
Most people compare kith fiend and geopede base on what it takes to power them up. But they dont realise the actions require to actually LET the geopede or kith fiend deal its damage actually requires additional cards.
They also often forget that Kith Fiend has the option of super charging.
There are many ocassions due to the cards in my hand, I super charge the kith fiend on turn 3 when the opponent taps out. Flame Slash, lightning bolt, devasting summons sack 1 land. 13 damage with 3 power on the table. My opponent than lay a land and put a creature with mana for 1 removal. I then mark of mutiny the creature which he remove the fiend and end up with 1 life.
He plays one more creature and pass the turn, I top deck a spire, target one of his creature and finish the game. Can a geopede do that?
Kith fiend has a better tempo option than geopede. It is only bad in a deck with light removals or burns.
Cheers
I originally used Lotus Cobra in that slot. It was good for some spectacular plays like 3rd turn Gideon, Vengevine or Baneslayer, but I realise I hate top decking it and the spectacular plays happen like once every 8 games, so I just don't see the benefit in it despite not losing any tempo since it is still 2 power at 2 cmc. Other than that noble hierach can give me a 3rd turn vengevine as well so I just drop the lotus cobra. The beastbreaker was especially good if for some odd reason u have a sub optimal hand like "land, land, oblivion ring, land, path, ranger, beastbreaker'. You have free mana and you may not want to use the removal on early creatures.
It was also much stronger as a top deck despite me only leveling it up to level 4 on 1 ocassion in all 10+ games. I had 5 lands, and top deck it with no cards in hand versus a boros deck that was losing steam, I up it to level 1 and the lynx and geopede cant attack. I top deck another land so I just up it for 2 levels. Then I finally go a wall of omen and play it to get a path, then I use 3 mana to up it to level 4 and smack with a 6/6 trample, with a wall as blocker and a removal in hand.
Basically my build is closer to the concept of GW stompy, so big fat creatures for end game is good for me. A creature that is 2 mana 2/2 that can be upgraded to a 4/4 or 6/6 trample is generally not bad. Therefore you can see why put Student and Master in mainboard with Great Sable Stag in sideboard.
Cheers
This is my recent build for a local tournament.
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Student of Warfare
3 Wall of Omens
3 Beastbreaker of Bala Ged
3 Transcendent Master
4 Vengevine
3 Ranger of Eos
3 Baneslayer Angel
4 Path to Exile
3 Oblivion Ring
2 Gideon Jura
Lands [24]
6 Forest
2 Marsh Flats
6 Plains
4 Stirring Wildwood
4 Sunpetal Grove
2 Verdant Catacombs
3 Kor Firewalker
3 Luminarch Ascension
3 Dauntless Escort
2 Relic of Progenitus
3 Great Sable Stag
1 Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
It did quite well in the tournament of 60 participants and came in at 5-1 losing 1-2 to a polymorph deck. I originally played an equipment suit, but in the end favoured more creatures after adding in Gideon. This is because I orginally used the behemoth sledge as life gain and evasion but gideon provided more with semi mass removal, repeated removal and mass evasion.
I have to explain the mass removal part. There are often days when my creatures are chump blocked due to lack of evasion (other than baneslayer). However with Gideon it is easier to force the opponent's weaker or troublesome creatures to attack (example: a singular baneslayer holding the fort) I can selectively block off a lot of creatures to my advantage and counter swing at average 10+ damage (vengevine + gideon or 2 creatures plus gideon)
Cheers
Cool man. Seems like a good side board. Just take note that tapout and WB tends to put in baneslayer post sideboard. For me , because I normally dont use protection spells, so I would never take out baneslayer. The acension is good enough magnets for removals for me.
Cheers
Hey man. I got had similar results as you against UW. However the tapout typically dies after sideboard over in my group. I choose to play luminarch acension and pithing needle. The needle deals with the planeswalkers and acension adds as oblivion ring bait and a turn 2 acension forces bad play. For the needle, if I have it, I would normally drop it turn 1 or 2 naming jace. I typically dont care too much about creatures going bye bye so I normally dont have creature protection spells in main or side.
I guess as I mentioned before, we have 2 different play styles, that's why u prefer to go protecting ur creatures. But I feel emerge unscath is not bad cos it does give evasion as well.
I recommend you use a non creature focus strategy to deal with tapout. In fact I think you are better off side boarding out Gideons, 2 path and 1 fall and put in 3 luminarch acension and 3 pithing needle.
Cheers
Nice try in building ur own deck. The Elfdrazi isnt too bad, may get a few decent wins, but the wall deck is really too weak in terms of win conditions. There arent many ways for you to win in the defender deck other then using Gideon to beat ur opponent flat, use man lands to do the same or use vent sentinel to burn ur opponent to cinders. Most of these methods are considered secondary win conditions in today's competitive format.
To let you understand what is considered primary win cons, imagine sphinx of the jwar isle. Difficult to remove, have evasion and have enough muscles to make it a 4 turn clock on the opponent.
You could dump the hydra in the elfdrazi and put in the ant queen. Else you can splash white for the man lands and ranger of eos to tutor for the war caller as win cons. Splashing white also allows u to side board in removals.
Generally I dont see elfdrazi being too powerful in the format, cos the board position is easily disrupted and they dont have much attack power until you spam the board and put in the monument. But it sure is fun to see elves spam the board.
Cheers
Cool. I agree the WG stompy build with Vengevine is really quite strong and EXPENSIVE. LOLZ
I actually had to proxy my Baneslayer Angel most of the time as it was simply too expensive for me to get a set around where I live.
I did a RG version of a Vengevine deck for the next tournament near my home even though I know it is weaker than the WG version just because of the cost as Vengevine is the only expensive card compared to 4 KotR, 3-4 Baneslayer and 2-3 Gideon.
I run it like a ENHANCED RDW with haste creatures and burns and it still does really well against jund, WU control (original and Planeswalker version) and eldrazi green. But it has a slightly tougher time against Bant and outright dies to this version of WG stompy.
I feel so bad each time I meet someone who built something similar as I conceived the deck the moment vengevine was revealed, but cant build it cos it cost WAY too much money.
Cheers
Hi man
I suddenly realised momentus fall helps you gain life as well. Generally the strength of your early game is similar to mine. It's something this deck gives in order to have a stronger late game therefore I also agree that ramping is important. I would normally reduce the copies of lotus cobra to 3 as I like it in my opening hand but dont want to top deck it. Noble hiearch can be a 4 of as it can serve as a static pump for singular creatures. I will think of momentus fall as a good way to recover cards and life in mid-game, especially on an exalted/pumped vengevine or lotus cobra.
Elspeth does give good singular punching power and is not redundant by itself compared to individual components of the equipment package. However you are sacrificing point removals for it. I guess you are characterisically a creature aggro player. Meaning you are better navigating a deck that just beat heavy with creatures. I am more of aggro tempo player, cos I like the idea of making 1/4 of my non land cards removals so that I can control the pace of the damage race.
If I were to modify your deck to suit my taste, I will still reduce the lotus cobra to 3 and remove elspeth to throw in 2 paths and 1 more momentus fall. BTW, Gideon is a good repeatable removal and beater, I would never think of using him until u made this list. Thanks.
Cheers
A nice build you have there.
I dont think your deck has a very good aggro strategy though, it feels more mid range to me.
1st turn noble hierach
2nd turn KotR
3nd turn hit drop elspeth and hit for 6-9 with KotR?
1st turn student
2st turn upgrade and hit for 3
3nd turn KotR and hit for another 3?
1st turn land
2nd turn lotus cobra
3rd turn vengevine and hit for 6 with cobra and VV?
Basically I build a similar deck like this with a similar selection of creatures. It generally have creature superiority compare to other decks CMC versus CMC. However one of the chief weakness is that it is slower. Your version doesn't have much attacking low drops, it has no equipment suit mainboard to gain back possible life loss in early turns and has very few removals other than 3 x Oblivion Ring and 3 x Gideon at 5 cmc.
For me, I choose to mainboard the equipment suit with 2 stoneforge mystic, 1 basilisk collar and 1 behemoth sledge. I also choose to drop the planeswalkers and out in more removals such as 4 path and 4 oblivion rings. I feel putting in Gideon or elspeth is okay, but they dont make a significant improvement in ur strategy cos u still deal damage mainly with ur creatures.
My list was
3 x student of warfare
3 x noble hiearch
1 x scute mob
4 x path to exile
3 x lotus cobra
2 x stoneforge mystic
4 x Knight of the relinquary
4 x Oblivion Ring
1 x Behemoth Sledge
4 x Vengevine
3 x Ranger of Eos
4 x Baneslayer Angel
4 x Stirring Wildwood
4 x Sunpetal Grove
2 x Verdant Catacomb
2 x Arid Mesa
1 x Sejiri Stepps
6 x Forest
5 x Plains
It should be called a GW stompy deck with equipment upgrade. I think if I were to modify my deck to something similar to yours. I would throwaway a few copies of Oblivion ring and put in either Gideon cos it forces the block open with the first ability and can alpha strike with the rest with the last ability. I feel elspeth dont work well in this deck.
Regards
Hey man
You should chill out a little. You didn't cause any problems. There have always been 2 camps who have different views about the competitiveness of Vengevine. Those who don't believe in its value don't understand that he has actually no home in the existing pro tour archtypes. Vengevine will create entire new deck types by itself.
I have wrote in various other threads that Vengevines home is either in a GW Stompy deck or a RG aggro burn deck. The reason why it would not be in Naya Boss is becos the red components of Naya are made obsolete by the new strategy. Wild natacl is overwhelmed by student of warfare making it a bad tutor option for ranger of eos in mid or late game. Bird of paradise is not needed as the red source is no longer required. Lightning bolt is neligible compare to 4 copies of Path and Oblivion Ring cos the combine direct damage available to Naya boss is at max 18 (4 bolts 2 Ajani Vengeant). Bloodbriad elf's best cascade other than KotR is inferior to vengevine and takes up four 4cmc slots. How would Jund deal with 3 Student of Warfare, 1 scute mob, 4 Knights, 4 Vengevine and 4 Baneslayer? The Vengevine would look at Malakir Bloodwitch and laugh, especially since there is still plenty of space left to put in an equipment suit or elspeth.
The whole concept of GW stompy is only viable due to Vengevine as he makes up the last 4 slots for high removal target following the strategy of high threat density. Now GW has 12 High priority targets (VV, KotR, Baneslayer) that make lightning bolt feel wasted, hurts really bad if left alone and only sprouting thrinax in Jund can match the power of each of them.
To combo it off with Kor Sky fisher is just icing on the cake, it should not be thought of as a key win cond, cos Vengevine is definitely not a finisher. No control deck would run Vengevine, cos Baneslayer and Sphinx of the Jwar Isle are better individually. However it is a great companion creature, cos it promises most of the time to be either 4 damage to the head, a good trade with a creature of similar CMC and a possible recuring threat that has immediate board presense due to haste.
To understand the advantage, imagine this board position.
Ur side. 1 Baneslayer, 5 lands, 2 cards in hand
His side. 1 Malakir Bloodwitch, 5 lands 2 cards in hand
You proceed to play vengevine with 1 card in hand and 1 mana left
and you declare attack. The statemate is broken. He has to remove vengevine and baneslayer or lose the board position. He choose to terminate baneslayer and block with bloodwitch. You know he does not have a second removal and the card in hand is not a removal or creature. Once both creature dies, you play ur student of warfare and bring back vengevine, promising a 4/3 creature and a 3/3 first strike the next attack.
This sounds like an ideal scenario. But the whole point was that playing any other creature in Naya boss would not have broken the stalemate with as much impact as Vengevine. I am preparing to see a lot of GW decks with Vengevine in the coming GPTs and games day.
Cheers
Hi man
He isnt really wrong. DOJ USED TO beat up Naya especially back to back but I really think he should rethink about that statement if Vengevine is added. Mono white removals are the only ones that can reduce the CA from the free recursion and only Path can deal with Vengevine on the turn it lands while I am totally discounting counter spells here cos it really doesnt matter when Vengevine is involved.
My playgroup has tested WG stompy since Vengevine is revealed and we are pretty certain that the existing WU control has an inherit advantage pre side board, but practically dies post side board due to the simple idea that they need to build up to a finisher and they cannot deal with luminarch acension, vengevine and pithing needle at the same time. We expect WU to evolve.
Jund gets raped heavily by a combination of high threat density from 3 student of warfare, 1 scute mob, 4 knight of relinquary, 4 vengevine, 3 ranger of eos, 3 baneslayer and equipment package. All 16 removals for jund can't remove everything and any single one of those creature is superior to jund's creatures (if you treat ranger as an additional copy of vengevine). The only creature that can match is sprouting thrinax which we will handle with the 8 main board removals (path and oblivion ring) and side board Devout lightcaster.
Jund most of the time have no upfront advantage pre or post side board but a well time consume the meek may turn the game around along with a seldom seen jund charm.
Cheers