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4c best stuff

Started by Sephiron, 15-05-2011, 02:37:23 PM

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Sephiron

Here is the deck i played to get 2nd place in finnish highlander nationals

About deck:
After watching what people play in Finland it occured to me that there was practically no drawback to playing four colors instead of 3, because there clearly wasn't enough nonbasic land hate and i could play the best cards legal in highlander: JtMS, bribery, Stoneforge Mystic, recurring nightmare, demonic tutor, natural order, primeval titan and birthing pod. I tested quite a lot and ended up with the following list:

Decklist:
Deck: 4c Best Stuff

maze of ith
Bloodstained mire
verdant catacombs
windswept heath
arid mesa
wooded foothills
flooded strand
polluted delta
misty rainforest      
marsh flats
scalding tarn
wasteland
horizon canopy
dryad arbor
volrath's stronghold
treetop village
creeping tarpit      
plains   
underground sea
watery grave      
tropical island
bayou
savannah
overgrown tomb
breeding pool
tundra
hallowed fountain
swamp         
2 island
2 forest
snow-covered swamp
snow-covered island   
snow-covered forest
scrubland

sensei's divining top
ponder
swords to plowshares
duress         
fyndhorn elves
noble hierarch
thoughtseize
llanowar elves      
birds of paradise
arbor elf
inquisition of kozilek
preordain
worldly tutor
path to exile
elves of deep shadows
brainstorm

Tarmogoyf
sylvan library
tainted pact
quasali pridemage   
stoneforge mystic
eladamri's call
demonic tutor
fauna shaman      
sakua-tribe elder
mana drain
lotus cobra
wall of roots

vindicate
pernicious deed
trinket mage
sword of fire and ice   
recurring nightmare
knight of the reliquary   
vendilion clique
maelstrom pulse   
yavimaya elder
oblivion ring
kitchen finks
sword of feast and famine
court hussar
eternal witness

entomber exarch
birthing pod
glen elendra archmage
venser, shaper savant   
gifts ungiven
natural order
sower of temptation
loxodon hierarch      
jace, the mindsculptor
fact or fiction
skinrender
garruk wildspeaker

shriekmaw
primal command
mulldrifter
treachery      
batterskull
bribery   
acidic slime

Sun Titan
Primeval Titan

Force of will
Green Sun's zenith
Engineered explosives

Card choices:

Finishers: after a lot of testing i found out that primeval titan was sufficient finisher and deck didn't need any terastodon or progenituses, since you would practically never cast them, and only they were mostly NO targets, but primeval titan is always good (getting it and then tutoring volrath stronghold with wasteland or manlands puts you very far ahead, and even if they killed it you still have advantage). So you can play less expensive/dead cards and fill those slots with something more relevant. I never actually missed terastodon or progenitus since natural order won't usually resolve and if it resolved i won with just titan. On the other hand it made games against decks with bribery much easier, since now the best they got was prrimeval or sun titan that i could bounce to hand. And grave titan was useless in every game I drew it during testing, so while I understand it's very good, it just didn't have enough synergy with the rest of the deck, although i could see myself playing him in slower metagame (with more ramps and controls and less combo/bant/reanimator decks)

Counterspells: i left only drain and FoW because i usually tapout don't have mana to counter spells. And most of the time my spells are better than opponents. You could call i metachoice, since you only want counters against combo or ramp decks. While you still have good disruption against combo, I might add more counters to deck if there were more decks like what my finals opponent played.

No white planeswalkers: after testing i noticed that it was too hard to cast those with four color manabase so i had to cut nearly all spells that cost double black or double white. Only exeptions were sun titan (usually i had possibility to get 2 white sources by turn 5-6) and entomber exarch (In one game opponent asked me: "Isn't playing exarch too greedy for that deck" to which I answered: "No, you see I have 2 swamps in the deck so i can cast him"  :D). Mainly because they were creautres so i could tutor them to birthing pod and they come late enough for me to have time to fix my mana. I could usually cast them whenever i needed.

Primeval Titan: this guy is all you need to win a match, by tutoring wasteland and volrath stronghold you usually get ahead of opponent on mana, break their important lands (like their maze of ith). And if they somehow get rid of titan you just return it on top of the deck. against aggro you can always get maze of ith. If you have lacking board presence you get manlands. If you don's have much cards in hand horizon canopy helps you there. While i know these things are obvious, most people still try to win with Progenitus/terastodon that are vulnerable to mass removel/or edicts, while with primeval titan even if they kill it you still can get lands and if they don't kill him, well trampling 6/6 ends games fast enough. So while it's a bit harder to win with primeval titan being only big threat it makes deck more consistent.

About new cards:

Batterskull: this card is sick, i cut wurmcoil engine for it, since now playing stoneforge mystic t2 is gg against any deck that can't destroy it fast enough. It practically kills burn and gives tremendous advantage against control since it is very hard to destroy. With five mana and stoneforge open, you can just trade the token with anything and bounce+replay it EoT. now opponents have to get rid of both mystic and euipment ASAP. A lot of the times in tournament when asked how the games went they answered: "opponent got t2 mystic so couldn't do anything" or "I got t2 mystic so it was easy". Mystic was nearly borken before batterskull, now it's just stupid (recall what was argument for banning jitte, mystic creates similar situations).

Entomber exarch: I'm amazed how most of the people missed how good this guy is. This guy is pure utility: aginst contorol/combo you can duress them and beat down and against creature decks he returns finks/shriekmaw. It's good against any deck and always a relevant card (btw it can also discard lands, didn't notice it until yesterday)

Birthing pod: People who say it isn't good or medicore, just haven't tested with it. This card is nuts it's power level is somewhere between survival of the fittest and recurring nightmare. I am still to lose a game where this has resolved. Some highlights about this card:
-it practically gives your creatures vigilance since you can upgrade them postcombat.
-With  help of some mana guy you can play and activate it turn 3 or play it t2 and activate t3
-It can upgrade llanowar elves (or any other 1 mana managuy) into stoneforge mystic
-It can upgrade you 2 drops into: kitchen finks/witness/vendilion Clique/Yavimaya elder
-It can upgrade your 3 drops (especially fun when your 3 drop is yavimaya elder or finks) into: baloth/venser/sower/glen-elendra Archmage/entomber exarch/skinrender
-It can upgrade your 4 drops into: acidic slime/shriekmaw/mulldrifter/reveillark/arc slogger
-It can upgrade your 5 drops into: titans (i succeded only once every other time opponents scooped after i got 5th drop)
-it can sacrifice creatures you stole from opponent with sower/treachery
-you can set up chains that you want, for example saccing wall of roots into finks to get 2 four drops, or if you don't have enough land 2 drop into elder, and then into four drop
-creatures mentioned above are mostly for this deck, but any color combination with green in it (and sometimes without) has enough good targets for birthing pod to be very good.

comments and suggestions are welcome

Edit: tournament report can be found here: http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=619.0

Kristian

Looks nice, I'm gonna give it a try.
There can be only one!

LasH

Congrats for your 2nd place :)

I think your list is pretty one of the top tier decks in this meta and it will be always on the top spots in the right hands.

Quote from: Sephiron on 15-05-2011, 02:37:23 PM
Batterskull: this card is sick, i cut wurmcoil engine for it, since now playing stoneforge mystic t2 is gg against any deck that can't destroy it fast enough. It practically kills burn and gives tremendous advantage against control since it is very hard to destroy. With five mana and stoneforge open, you can just trade the token with anything and bounce+replay it EoT. now opponents have to get rid of both mystic and euipment ASAP. A lot of the times in tournament when asked how the games went they answered: "opponent got t2 mystic so couldn't do anything" or "I got t2 mystic so it was easy". Mystic was nearly borken before batterskull, now it's just stupid (recall what was argument for banning jitte, mystic creates similar situations).

I totally agree with this. Before BS it was already annoying and i wanted to get this card removed, now its just stupid, as you alrdy mentioned. Draw Stoneforge for the win.

Tabris

I appreciate your effort to post your list and experiences here.

Thanks

MarcMagic

Thanks for the report and gz to #2. Not much to say about this deck because it is 4 colored and goodstuff and will still be very strong even after 10-20 different cardchoices. Nevertheless your deck seems very solid and it worked out quite well for obvious reasons : ).