Deck advice... Kind of Deadguy

Ego_Sum · Joined: 21 Jun 2009 Posts: 7

I'm re-engaging magic since long time ago (1998) and want to start playing Legacy, I build adeck which seemed fun, controlish and playable, but since I have very little idea of actual meta-game I' d like tohave advice from more experienced players.

This is my list:

4x Dark Confidant
3x Nantuko Shade
2x Tombstalker

4x Thoughteize
2x Duress
2x Extirpate
4x hymn to Tourach
4x Sinkhole
4x Dark Ritual
4x Vindicate
3x Swords to Plowsahres

2x Sensei' s divining Top
2x Engineered explosives

3x Bloodstrained Mire
1x Polluted Delta
2x Flooded Strand
4x Wasteland
4x Scrublands
1x Urborg, tomb of Yawgmoth
4x Swamp
1x Plains

Side

3x Engineered Palgue
3x Ghostly Prison
3x Chalice of the Void
3x Relics of Progenitus
2x Duress
1x Extirpate

I' ve been thinking of changing

4x Hymn to tourach

for

3x Smallpox
1x Volrath Stronghold

Since one of my worst pairings is aggro and this could give me some time, also smallpox is quite solid against other archetypes.

About the side I'm not sure, I thought about some enlightened tutor for side versatility instead of 3x "staple"

What do you think about Cursed scroll?

How can I deal with countertop? and with Dragon stompy? (the Blood mon/magus of the moon are really hard to deal with)

Thanks for bothering,

Iñaki.-

gypsy · Joined: 15 Jun 2007 Posts: 1118

why would you cut hymn its the best card in the deck and the only reason to play black discard, all the matchups you listed are dealth the same way, disrupt them then start a clock with a good creature which is the reason all the black decks play goyf now.

Ego_Sum · Joined: 21 Jun 2009 Posts: 7

I can see the point... but I purposed Smallpox since it can deal easily with those decks (dragon stompy: it' seasier for me having 2 swamps than a plains or a plains and a swamp to get rid of magus of the moon and big nasty dragon, and disrupting early mana base of countertop will give me a little edge). Against aggro HtT does pretty much nothing, I discard 2 whatever and he will have more copies of that whatever in his hand so I disrrupted nothing, and he can win me just by topdecking, also the randomness of HtT is what worries me, but anyway I admit HtT is a great card, that' s why it is my actual built, but I just wanted to know about general opinion of smallpox in this deck.

Greetings,

Iñaki.-

Tomper0 · Joined: 22 Mar 2007 Posts: 1

What about playing with G for Tarmogoyf? Big guy, low cost =)

Ego_Sum · Joined: 21 Jun 2009 Posts: 7

I m considering Goyf for the deck. But there should be among the thousands of magic cards good responses adapted to BW other than adding green for goyf, aren't there?

greetings,

Iñaki.-

IkeReilly · Joined: 11 Dec 2007 Posts: 34

you can probably be safe removing white, or splashing white in addition, green for tarmogoyf and pernicious deed, vs aggro you can have elephant grass as a pseudo prison. White really just gives you vindicate and maelstrom pulse is virtually the same.

Engrishskill · Joined: 15 Jan 2007 Posts: 472

Extirpate is a terrible main deck card and arguably a bad sideboard card too. Other than that, the deck looks like a more or less normal Deadguy build with a few less creatures than usual.

Just test it and give people more information to work with than just looking at the list. I don't think that you have been testing very much if you don't know what to do about DS(win the flip, take the best card out of their hand and run more basics, so you don't scoop to moons) and for CB decks, discard and dismantling blow or abolish in the side might work.

The chalices in your sideboard are confusing though: you have countless cards in your deck that are shut down by a chalice for one and several that are shut down by a chalice for two. If you want a strong match against AdN decks, you should run more creatures to accompany your disruption rather than trying to rely on a small number of creatures and a card that any good storm pilot should be prepared to get around easily.

Again: actually do a noteworthy amount of testing into a list and actually put some time into the deck in order to get better quality advice. If you actually put time into testing the deck and not just throwing it together, the time that others put into helping you will be more effectively used because we won't be addressing issues that could just be solved by running the deck through a damned gauntlet.

Ego_Sum · Joined: 21 Jun 2009 Posts: 7

@Engrish: one of the wisest advices that I 've been done in any forums. I' m testing but I started holidays yesterday so testing time have just begaun. I just only wanted an overview from an experienced player. and this I've got.

Greetings,

Iñaki.-

gypsy · Joined: 15 Jun 2007 Posts: 1118

ive found that, especially in legacy, that if your not playing 4 goyfs, your not giving yourself the best chance to win as your just going to lose to other peoples goyfs

Engrishskill · Joined: 15 Jan 2007 Posts: 472

The goyf thing is a fallacy perpetuated by people that don't know a lot about the format or the resources available. Yes, goyf are good, but so was affinity and I managed to have insanely solid finishes through out the type two seasons that featured the dreaded mechanic without ever actually playing it myself. I played lots of different decks too.

If buddy wants to splash for goyf, he could easily, but the fact is that for a Deadguy variant, there are dominant archetypes to worry about long before a creature that can gets axed by nearly every removal spell that is played in the format. When I have lost to a goyf turning sideways, it could have just as easily been a hill giant in many cases or even a grizzly bear.

Seriously though, I can think of so many decks that don't run goyf that are extremely good and place routinely. Keep in mind that these decks place in big IRL events and not weird ones here that are filled with people that don't do much homework on the format and just pick straightforward shit to play that has had a lot of showings on DC.net recently.

The mention of goyf does remind me that shade isn't as awesome as he once was. There are other creatures available though...here are some off of the top of my head that you might want to test:

-Spectral Lynx: Regeneration is kind of situational, but still nice at times and pro green is exceptional for dodging/fogging goys/mongeese.

-Nyaxthid: I haven't tested these, but an acquaintance says that they are working really well in his Team America variant, which run less discard than Deadguy.

-Phyrexian Negator: Some people hate them, I've played lots of sui and as long as there isn't a lot of burn decks or decks with burn, he is pretty good in my experience. In conjunction with swords, snuff out and such saccing three permanents or so in exchange for the eight damage or more that he will often do along with trampling most creatures in the format is often worth it. Three CC also dodges CB in the more out-dated CB decks.

-Exalted Angel: Might require the mana base to be tweaked, but I think with the increasing popularity of Zoo and Tarmo-sligh, could really potentially throw an opponent off their game. In many cases too an angel could curve out more consistently than a stalker.

-Tidehollow Sculler: I've seen these guys be run before and while they won't necessarily be powerhouses in the red zone, but people have been running them regardless...I would personally run shade over them, but I am haven't been playing BW deadguy for a while.

-Jotun Grunt: Not a four slot and doesn't play well with stalker, but a noteworthy card because he's awesome.

There are other creatures that are more in the area of tech, but I can't think of anything off of the top of my head.

In my opinion, Goblins is on the rise, Merfolk are starting to see less play because of this and Tarmo-sligh/Zoo are gaining popularity because people are starting to figure out that they are good because the pure control and more control-oriented aggro/control decks that made them see shitty are less popular now(I am guessing here, but not a lot of top eights seem to feature UWx landstill or ITF anymore). Aggro Loam is also a perennial favorite and contrary to what some people think, grunt is better than extirpate because it removes targets for loam, shrinks Lhurgoyfs and Knights, requires a fairly big DD to kill and also forces them to basically draw a terminate or wish before they can go nuts...I know because I spent a lot of time playing with agro loam in the last while.

There is always random really good decks that you need to worry about though, but you shouldn't focus on beating aggro too heavily or else something like 'Geddon Stax, Death & Taxes, MUC or just about anything else that can play very well off of the of the deck and stabilize after the early game disruption.

You should also look into testing Snuff Outs in the place of extirpate and putting the EE's in the sideboard for something like more creatures or discard or something that is more or less universal. EE is an awesome card, but I think it is a somewhat unexpected card for you to run that would be better to bring into a second game than potentially clog up draws in the first. Blowing up a CB is cool and everything, but if things work out properly (read: keeping them off the second blue mana or discard), you shouldn't be sweating CB too bad and goyfs are laughable when you run four swords, vindies and hopefully two snuff outs.

You might also want to try out cursed scrolls in the place of EEs. Word on the 1.5 street is that scrolls are working quite well because of the rise of tribal aggro and they are also randomly useful against many creatures and strategies in the format. An example of this is that a scroll basically invalidates an Elspeth. Scroll might not work for you in the end, but from what I have gathered and understand about current trends, it could be a very good card to have as a pair in the main.

If you have the card pool, you may want to experiment with a green splash for your own goyfs, sideboard deeds, k.grips, seedtime and other random tech because a third colour is almost painless to splash.