Dom Harvey
Contributor
BEHOLD:
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General The Constructed thread
- Thread starter Dom Harvey
- Start date
Dom Harvey
Contributor
hello
Mildly dreading the upcoming standard- I usually dabble in it at most, but there's always standard going on in the shops I cube at so I learn the format eventually. The constant shuffling induced by fetches combined with what appears to be a widening speed gap between aggro and everything else is going to make this very rock-paper-scissors "if only I had one of my seven cheap removal spells / if only I had xenagos instead of polukranos" formats. The removal is relatively sparse but very powerful (hero's downfall, banishing light, murderous cut are all very broad), and the threats are all so powerful alongside the generally slow mana that it feels like midrange everything is about to rear its head.
My sleeper pick of KTK is Dig Through Time. While hardly sphinx's rev, I feel it will fill a similar role in control decks, and jace's ingenuity doesn't quite reach deep enough.
Mono black looks very strong with its three elite vanguards, multiple cards that let it punch through and thoughtseize.
My sleeper pick of KTK is Dig Through Time. While hardly sphinx's rev, I feel it will fill a similar role in control decks, and jace's ingenuity doesn't quite reach deep enough.
Mono black looks very strong with its three elite vanguards, multiple cards that let it punch through and thoughtseize.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
grim haruspex exists too
So we have some questions here:
- Like is Painseer worth it without xathrid and if devotion intimidator is serving a role in the new meta
- How to distribute your thoughtseize in your 75
- How man 1 drops to run
- Is thrill kill worth replacing in this meta
- What's gonna be the average blocker's toughness
- which 8-12 bestow idiots do we want
- Is feast master any fucking good?
- Is Grim Haruspex anygood
- How do you get up from behind a courser / carytid without lifebane !!!!!!!!!!!
- How do you fight the red deck. The red deck is probably more aggressive than you and has more reach.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
- Probably not
- 3/1 or 4/0 are my ideas. Aggressive decks can't be that common
- 8-12 sounds alright
- A good 2 drop sounds necessary, but I kinda doubt we need specifically another creature with deathtouch. If so, how horrible is the morph 1/1 deathtouch that loses them 2 when it flips?
- courser of kruphix and sylvan caryatid are certainly going to be big players, not sure otherwise...
- There's more than 12 we can run? Deathtouch one sounds awful...
- If we can actually be aggressive enough yes. He won a lot of cube games while he was in.
- Certainly in the board, maybe 1-2 copies in the main if we have some way to ditch creatures?
- Maybe that deathtouch morph dude isnt that bad after all...
- Grey Merchant of Asphodel? or is that too slow... Whip of Erabos? Pharika's Cure?
Have played the format a bit, thoughts on stuff in this thread:
-Pain Seer is ok with some backup.
-2/2 or 3/1 is probably fine, 4/0 wasn't common in the successful block decks but I don't think it can be too wrong.
-The one drops all suck at attacking into Caryatid/Courser, their saving grace is all the removal sucks against 1-2 drops. They are best at getting sac'd to Butcher of the Hordes. Mono-black and mono-red are still fine on some level.
-Thrill-Kill Assassin will be missed somewhat. The 1-drop deathtouch morph is good. Always trades for at least a card, can trade off for aggro creatures or just get in chip damage against the green mana guys. There's a lot of cheap deathtouch guys if that's the effect you want, actually. Also Bow of Nylea.
-x/3 for 2, x/4 for 3 is pretty common. 5 toughness is valuable because of Stoke the Flames, 4 toughness guys hurt Bile Blight and Lightning Strike (existence of Mantis Rider and Xenagos means Lightning Strike still has value in more midrangey matchups)
-can usually do something better with your mana now, Herald of Torment is probably the most worth running? Leafcrown Dryad is close since it's a 2 that eats all the aggro dudes and bestows for cheap but it's probably not good enough.
-Master of the Feast is in a weird spot, 5 toughness is great, being an enchantment is bad. Personally don't think it's very good but it ends games quickly.
-Grim Haruspex is sweet. Plenty of good synergies to play with as well as just killing their guys and trading guys off in combat.
-Flying (Mantis Rider, Butcher of the Horde, Sarkhan... Vaporkin...), big creatures (Knuckleblade, Anafenza, Polukranos), go wide (Sidisi, Mardu Ascendancy), removal (Stoke the Flames, Hero's Downfall, Devouring Light), go big (Elspeth), go bigger (Hornet Queen), go bigger-er (Ashen Rider), go biggest?? (Stormtide Leviathan????)
-blockers? Rabblemaster + Stoke are like the only actual cards in the small monored decks so uh kill Rabblemaster on sight if possible.
As for the whole midrange thing, so far the midrange-y decks our locals have built have been run over by the extreme-manabase 3 color big-aggro decks but I'm pretty sure they are just building them wrong. That said, there are games where, say, the Temur guy goes elf -> courser -> polukranos and just dies because casting 1 spell a turn isn't enough.
Mardu 1-drop 2-drop Rabblemaster Butcher is one of our more successful decks at this stage, Jeskai Ascendancy aggro/"tempo"(burn) is the other. Reanimator also putting up good results. The Mardu deck is probably the closest to "good" since it's pretty paint-by-numbers in terms of construction.
Stock Naya and Temur were pretty underwhelming, all the Abzan midrange decks suck. I hate the lists people have been bringing for a lot of reasons (not enough removal, can never hope to cast more than .75 spells a turn, endgame isn't even better than the aggro decks, etc.)
Courser is likely worse than it was in Block ; still way too powerful with fetches to not be a key player right off the bat. The better your deck is at not caring about Courser, the better.
Dig Through Time is sweet. I think Treasure Cruise is slightly better due to U vs. UU being more relevant than sorcery vs. instant a lot of the time.
-edit-
elaborating on the bestow point, Herald is the only playable one that gets an x/2 to 5+ toughness to not die to Stoke after the fact. The tempo loss of going for a bestow and getting blown out in response may not be as bad as also getting 2-for-1'd but you can't really afford to get Time Walk'd very often.
I guess Nighthowler is also playable in a self-mill deck which is probably serviceable.
-Pain Seer is ok with some backup.
-2/2 or 3/1 is probably fine, 4/0 wasn't common in the successful block decks but I don't think it can be too wrong.
-The one drops all suck at attacking into Caryatid/Courser, their saving grace is all the removal sucks against 1-2 drops. They are best at getting sac'd to Butcher of the Hordes. Mono-black and mono-red are still fine on some level.
-Thrill-Kill Assassin will be missed somewhat. The 1-drop deathtouch morph is good. Always trades for at least a card, can trade off for aggro creatures or just get in chip damage against the green mana guys. There's a lot of cheap deathtouch guys if that's the effect you want, actually. Also Bow of Nylea.
-x/3 for 2, x/4 for 3 is pretty common. 5 toughness is valuable because of Stoke the Flames, 4 toughness guys hurt Bile Blight and Lightning Strike (existence of Mantis Rider and Xenagos means Lightning Strike still has value in more midrangey matchups)
-can usually do something better with your mana now, Herald of Torment is probably the most worth running? Leafcrown Dryad is close since it's a 2 that eats all the aggro dudes and bestows for cheap but it's probably not good enough.
-Master of the Feast is in a weird spot, 5 toughness is great, being an enchantment is bad. Personally don't think it's very good but it ends games quickly.
-Grim Haruspex is sweet. Plenty of good synergies to play with as well as just killing their guys and trading guys off in combat.
-Flying (Mantis Rider, Butcher of the Horde, Sarkhan... Vaporkin...), big creatures (Knuckleblade, Anafenza, Polukranos), go wide (Sidisi, Mardu Ascendancy), removal (Stoke the Flames, Hero's Downfall, Devouring Light), go big (Elspeth), go bigger (Hornet Queen), go bigger-er (Ashen Rider), go biggest?? (Stormtide Leviathan????)
-blockers? Rabblemaster + Stoke are like the only actual cards in the small monored decks so uh kill Rabblemaster on sight if possible.
As for the whole midrange thing, so far the midrange-y decks our locals have built have been run over by the extreme-manabase 3 color big-aggro decks but I'm pretty sure they are just building them wrong. That said, there are games where, say, the Temur guy goes elf -> courser -> polukranos and just dies because casting 1 spell a turn isn't enough.
Mardu 1-drop 2-drop Rabblemaster Butcher is one of our more successful decks at this stage, Jeskai Ascendancy aggro/"tempo"(burn) is the other. Reanimator also putting up good results. The Mardu deck is probably the closest to "good" since it's pretty paint-by-numbers in terms of construction.
Stock Naya and Temur were pretty underwhelming, all the Abzan midrange decks suck. I hate the lists people have been bringing for a lot of reasons (not enough removal, can never hope to cast more than .75 spells a turn, endgame isn't even better than the aggro decks, etc.)
Courser is likely worse than it was in Block ; still way too powerful with fetches to not be a key player right off the bat. The better your deck is at not caring about Courser, the better.
Dig Through Time is sweet. I think Treasure Cruise is slightly better due to U vs. UU being more relevant than sorcery vs. instant a lot of the time.
-edit-
elaborating on the bestow point, Herald is the only playable one that gets an x/2 to 5+ toughness to not die to Stoke after the fact. The tempo loss of going for a bestow and getting blown out in response may not be as bad as also getting 2-for-1'd but you can't really afford to get Time Walk'd very often.
I guess Nighthowler is also playable in a self-mill deck which is probably serviceable.
So sad about the fucking mutavault leaving.
Guh I dunno lets throw some fetch lands in there unless you are considering bestowing the siren.
Wait there's gotta be some trickier things to do in those creature slots.
Jeff, do you really think it's necessary to go heavily into multicolour or do you think a tuned aggro list could take advantage, even if it might end up splashing lightly.
I guess I need to figure out how much black's removal is capable of handling without having to cost 3cc or more.
Yeah the mono black deck is fucking me up because it seems like despite being a 1-2 cc 2x spells a turn deck, it want's a lot of mana to be able to eventually bestow / activate it's recursion, but it doesn't seem to have the card advantage capability to play enough spells per turn to compensate for it's low curve / get past land heavy draws / get past unnecessary thoughtseizes.
Thoughtseize, Scarhide, New gravecrawler, Tormented hero, deathtouch morph? Dark Betrayal
Painseer? Spiteful Returned? Headhunter, Bile Blight, Pharrikas cure?
Haruspex, Harold, Marauder?
Man I'm totally forgetting shit left and right. I know there were sweet cards and synergys I wanted to play in a deck like this but I can't wring them out of my mind. If removal is sorcery speed you could even sb that awful maggot. God...
Man lifebane was such a beating.
Guh I dunno lets throw some fetch lands in there unless you are considering bestowing the siren.
Wait there's gotta be some trickier things to do in those creature slots.
Jeff, do you really think it's necessary to go heavily into multicolour or do you think a tuned aggro list could take advantage, even if it might end up splashing lightly.
I guess I need to figure out how much black's removal is capable of handling without having to cost 3cc or more.
Yeah the mono black deck is fucking me up because it seems like despite being a 1-2 cc 2x spells a turn deck, it want's a lot of mana to be able to eventually bestow / activate it's recursion, but it doesn't seem to have the card advantage capability to play enough spells per turn to compensate for it's low curve / get past land heavy draws / get past unnecessary thoughtseizes.
Thoughtseize, Scarhide, New gravecrawler, Tormented hero, deathtouch morph? Dark Betrayal
Painseer? Spiteful Returned? Headhunter, Bile Blight, Pharrikas cure?
Haruspex, Harold, Marauder?
Man I'm totally forgetting shit left and right. I know there were sweet cards and synergys I wanted to play in a deck like this but I can't wring them out of my mind. If removal is sorcery speed you could even sb that awful maggot. God...
Man lifebane was such a beating.
Marauder is worse in a format with more incidental black creatures but it's still probably ok.
Spiteful Returned doesn't really get you over Caryatid for the most part and doesn't get you out of Lightning Strike/Bile Blight range. Probably not quite good enough when the wrath also clears bestow.
Actively bad to play fetches without a reason (fixing, Courser, delve). Don't think a draw 3 is what the blue deck needs, sadly.
It's not 100% free to splash but it's not particularly difficult. It's a consistency vs. power judgment call but I think the power jump is way bigger for a splash/full on multi-color deck compared to how much consistency you gain for staying monocolor. Lacking good mana sinks outside of maybe a bestow guy is especially harsh for the monocolor decks.
Spiteful Returned doesn't really get you over Caryatid for the most part and doesn't get you out of Lightning Strike/Bile Blight range. Probably not quite good enough when the wrath also clears bestow.
Actively bad to play fetches without a reason (fixing, Courser, delve). Don't think a draw 3 is what the blue deck needs, sadly.
It's not 100% free to splash but it's not particularly difficult. It's a consistency vs. power judgment call but I think the power jump is way bigger for a splash/full on multi-color deck compared to how much consistency you gain for staying monocolor. Lacking good mana sinks outside of maybe a bestow guy is especially harsh for the monocolor decks.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Cure sounds like SB material to me.
Is there a good sac outlet lying around? Raidcrawler and Hauspex could do a dream team dance if so...
I mean there's the 3 color demon guy, but jeez that mana
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Pretty much your only other "viable" option. Though "
: deal 2 damage to target creature or player and draw a card" is certainly not a bad deal, it is grindy as heck and you need an attacker to trigger the reanimation clause on Raidcrawler.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Pretty much your only other "viable" option. Though "
Player only
Man what I wouldn't give for like bloodthrone vampire or something. (Carrion Feeder seems like a greedy wish)
There's also this:
Seems slow though
*Wreching Noise*
Does dark betrayal also sound like a sb option to you lol?
Without being afeared of being caught red handed somehow I have never believed that.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Sounds fine to me, but you were wondering what we could do to shore up the mono-red matchup
the lifeloss on fetches is more real now than it was back in the day. Remember the deckthinning numbers on fetchlands are fractions of a percent
What fractions are we talking here?
Say you have 20 lands left in a 50-card deck.
20 / 50 = 40%
19 / 49 = 38.78%
So more than a percentage difference. Then that compounds over multiple draw steps. I mean, it's not irrelevant.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Okay so it's an improper fraction
Still though, the 1 life is likely going to be relevant sooner than the 1% better draws will be I think, at least where you can only use half the fetchland (Like Bloodstained Mire in White/Black for example)
If it's actually fixing your mana go right ahead