If you know me, you know that I rarely like to leave my house on Sundays. I use this day to get my weekly affairs in order, clean up from the weekend, and prepare for the week to come. It is a very tight regime. Since the beginning of my brief foray into Magic, I have been watching the Star City Games tournament coverage. Legacy coverage is usually on Sundays, I began to watch it. This led into an interest in playing legacy.
The deck I most enjoyed watching was "Maverick", it seemed fun and interactive. (I will admit that "Trading Stacks" also looked fun, I am not that experienced in playing control) It seemed to have all the tools it needed to be able to compete. I purchased and built a Maverick deck.
4 Mother of Runes
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Fauna Shaman
1 Gaddock Teeg
4 Qasali Pridemage
3 Scavenging Ooze
2 Scryb Ranger
1 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Knight of the Reliquary
1 Path to Exile
4 Swords to Plowshares
2 Green Sun's Zenith
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Batterskull
1 Sylvan Library
2 Garruk Relentless
2 Cavern of Souls
1 Dryad Arbor
3 Forest
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Karakas
1 Maze of Ith
3 Plains
4 Savannah
4 Wasteland
4 Windswept Heath
Sideboard
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Homeward Path
1 Path to Exile
1 Abeyance
2 Scryb Ranger
2 Krosan Grip
2 Armageddon
4 Blastoderm
1 Gideon Jura
As far as the sideboard goes, I did not really know what to expect, since I have never played Legacy.
Turns out, I was woefully unprepared.
Until next time.
Side boarding has been my weakness since getting back into competitive constructed magic, especially when trying to brew my own deck rather than copy one.
ReplyDeleteI think we need to test WAY more. And I should probably stop switching decks so often and work on just one for a while. I like that both standard and legacy are open enough that you can be successful with whatever you want to play if you put in the testing and time.
So I guess we'll be getting into Modern soon.
Damn, I typed a large comment, but it seems it didn't publish correctly...
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I wasn't aware that you owned any Legacy cards at all. Sweet that you do now, as Legacy is pretty much the only format I know about at this point.
Some thoughts on your deck list:
1) There should probably be some number (3 or 4) Thalia in the maindeck. The card is excellent against matchups where a traditional G/W deck is dead in the water (Storm, Belcher, High Tide, other degenerate combo decks, etc). It is also serviceable in both the U/W Miracles matchup, and is a reasonable combat creature as well (2/1 first strike is pretty decent with a couple of exalted triggers).
2) Two Scryb Rangers is at least one too many. The card is neat and tricky, yet is easily one of the weakest cards in the deck.
3) Green Sun's Zenith is one of the best cards in the deck. I would need a reason to not play at least 3. It can be acceleration, a tutor, or simply Knights #5-8.
4) Singleton Fauna Shaman + Stoneforge Mystic + Equipment seems ineffective to me. If you expect to play in a heavy tribal metagame, where you would want Stoneforge and Equipment, my strong preference would be to just play 3-4 SfM.
5) Garruk Relentless is excellently positioned - he is also a badass.
6) You need to have dedicated graveyard hate in your sideboard. The graveyard decks' nut draws (Reanimator and Dredge specifically) occur too frequently, and pretty much win on the spot. I would default to Surgical Extraction. Also, just to keep in mind - A tech play I would pull with my Bant deck would be to Wasteland my own Dryad Arbor to kill Dredge's Bridge from Belows.
7) Armageddons in the sideboard are a great way to steal wins from the U/W deck. The matchup is quite difficult otherwise. Geddon and/or Choke seem like the most legitimate ways to win a match.
8) Blastoderm is "loose." I can't think of a match-up where I would want him in the deck. I think there are too many other weaknesses to shore up, which will crowd up the sideboard.
I'm glad to see you getting into Legacy. The learning curve is steep, especially because people don't just play the "best decks." They also play pet decks or decks that used to be viable or even just bad decks. It does really help though to not only play against a bunch of different decks, but also to play a few games with all of the popular decks. I think that between you, Eric, Nick, and myself we should have a sufficient Legacy "gauntlet." I currently have built:
1) U/W/r Miracles (Control)
2) LED Dredge
3) R/b Goblins
4) Canadian Threshold (RUG Delver)
5) Combo Elves
6) Enchantress (my list is out of date, but it's close enough)
I also plan to build shortly:
1) Maverick (I think I have all of the cards except Thalia and maybe a few Windswept Heath)
2) Affinity
3) Nic-Fit (B/G/x Veteran Explorer Deck)
4) Possibly the Esper Stoneblade deck
I would like to also build the Sneak and Show Deck, but am missing a number of very pricey cards, so that one is out for now. I would like to start playing more often again, and would be happy to start some (semi) regular testing as well!
Up until about 2 weeks ago, I did not own any legacy cards.
ReplyDeleteYou are pretty spot on in 1-8 (which I will elaborate on in my next post)
I would be happy to play more legacy, I definitely need the practice.
(I got your first post in e-mail, but not on the blog...odd.)
-Mike