My favorite release this year was Innistrad, because you never forget the first time you turn a foil Bloodline Keeper with his foil Vampire tokens sideways against three Werewolves and an unflipped Cloistered Youth...
This was something I caught early in your first video, which could have left you in an even better position:
Match 1 vs. Stoneblade - Game 1 - Opponent plays second Stoneforge with Wasteland untapped. When you start to Snapcaster for Spell Snare, he wastes your Tropical Island. Rather than let it resolve, you could have protected your land by returning it back to your hand and countered his play with Daze now that he is tapped out, two birds, one stone. Then you could have flashed back Brainstorm with Snapcaster. The final result would have been: an additional card in hand and extra library manipulation thanks to Brainstorm, guaranteed third land drop, and Spell Snare left in the yard waiting for Snapcaster.
med 4 wa sthe best and most climatic realise - worst was def masques terrible ev+ horrible date bad advertise bad placement of events terrible championship date
I was so not awake that morning. I mis-ordered cards from Top and Brainstorm many times, you pointed out the most obvious one in game 2 where I missed flipping the Delver. At the end of game 1, I had another Bolt on top and I forget what else. It was so close, I think it was something where if I had planned ahead better with Top I would have had it. Game 3 that early Old Man won it. I had Bob and I think two Trygons in my opening hand, which were just nullified.
My favorite release this year would have to be Innistrad. One factor that may play in that was that I played 2 pre-release events and opened garruk, liliana who was selling for ~48 tickets and 2 other mythics. However, even now I still enjoy drafting Innistrad and playing block constructed.
As usual when you tackle a subject you really hit it in depth. I've built variations on some of these decks (one of which was very useful in the Saturday Night Melee a few months ago.) Proliferation is such an odd and useful ability in red. You wouldn't think so since it has a slow concept but a couple turns of filling up things (and people) with counters changes your perspective. In particular turbo planeswalkers and turbo Lux Cannon are just insane vs an unprepared opponent. Even if they are prepared these kinds of decks usually have some threat density to provide backup plans.
As always nice work LE. I look forward to writing and getting the answers for our up coming (after the Holidays) interview.
A very clear winner of the Commander decks. Specifically the UBG one.
It's the first time in years that I've actually bought sealed product when not using it in a tournament.
I was very impressed with all of the cards in all the decks!
keya, ill see you there, managed the same feat last week, heres to a soft event as a nice christmas present.
my favorite release was in all reality, the 5 commander decks, as they are awesome. thats mostly paper though. For online i guess ill roll with Innistrad. So much good stuff and nothing is stupid overpowerful yet. although snapcaster is pretty nutty.
Interesting you choose to concede m2 g2 the game when you could have won. Play the spirit, equip the +4+2, and hit for 7. He mills all your cards away, then you untap and shoot him with the torch before you have to draw. Am I missing something here?
Thanks for posting another great isd draft! I like to watch the stuff. Rick you coulda made one crazy black and red deck starting with that brimstone volley. I agree with what you wrote on the mill. every mill deck I played I beat.
Grudge is a 2 for vs. their other equipment and if they go for batterskull and you have removal, you have just set them back even further. You bolt their turn 2 stoneforge and force them to find 5 lands or another stoneforge to play it out. If counterbalance starts becoming more of a menance, then grip should replace grudge imo.
Also, I prefer Grim Lavamancer in the sideboard over pyroclasm. Unless elves are running around (which is possible in a casual FNM) or Goblins start becoming a problem, then Grim is your guy. Don't worry about the interaction with Snappy or Tarmo, trust me, it works out just fine.
Hit me up in game if you ever want to test.
-ImpinAintEasy-
Edit:
Another small thing I saw was in Round 3. You have delver on board, you brainstorm putting back bolt and Fire/Ice. You reveal fire/ice, then proceed to play tarn into another delver, meaning you are flipping your 2nd delver blind. You probably should of played Tropical there, laying Delver and then for sure you would flip bolt next turn. You attacked for 3 there, putting him to 17, next turn you attack for 6, he goes to 11, you bolt at his eot, 8, then win with Delver and Fire/Ice. Just my 2 cents on that matchup.
I can't really comment on the sideboard as I'm not all that familiar with his deck.....seems like you knew what you were doing there!
Hey man thanks a ton for taking time and commenting. It has been some time sime I played competitive Legacy and as I said in the article I was basically playing based on my insticts rather than experience. That TNMO event helped me "polish" my Legacy skills (considering I have some to begin with).
One question: Why do you think Ancient Grudge is better than Krosan Grip? I mean, you're totally right, I should have brought them against Stoneforge in R1. Maybe they would have helped me kill that Batterskull. But Ancient Grudge cannot truly kill it because they will just bounce it back to their hand and play again. Krosan Grip therefore is a better choice.
So why do you prefer Grudge over Grip? That I want to know. Also I took out the Pyroclasms from the sideboard after the event and replaced them with Submerge. Do you think that was the right decision or should I bring back my Pyroclasms?
Thanks again Raddman and everybody for the comments.
First of all, I am so happy to see some Legacy content.......So thank you for writing some!
I want to comment on your matches, first things first, you may have made mention of these things in your audio, but I was listening at work so I wasn't able to hear everything you were saying.
Match 1 vs. Stoneblade - Game 1- You Stifle his 5 land trigger which turns out to be huge in this match. You could of saved the stifle to protect your Tropical Island when he wastelands it.......or you could of cast snappy there and used stifle again from gy (although it would of been dazed probably). Instead you double bolt jace and run face first into Daze. Had you held back Stifle on his 5th land drop, you stifle his wasteland, bolt his jace once and then save the bolt next turn. You have got assume he is running daze. Also, don't be afraid to be the beatdown, without an early Delver in this matchup and seeing 3 snappys, you might of wanted to run out a turn 3 Snappy with snare backup to commence the beats.
Sideboard - you didn't bring in any grips, seems bad to me (although I prefer grudge anyways) and I would be siding out stifles tbh, just play tighter. Stoneblade lists tend to run enough lands to get around stifle and with your removal package, snares and grips you shouldn't worry about stoneforge which is the only thing stifling would be worthy imo. Stifling jace just seems meh as well.
Game 2 - You fetch right away on turn one putting yourself in harms way for Wasteland, I'd hold back the fetch as he more than likely is siding out stifles vs. you. Not to mention if you rip brainstorm, you now have a way to shuffle back that 2nd snappy that you really don't want at the moment.
I'm still watching the rest of the videos and will post on them later. I'm no pro, so take my advice with a grain of salt, but I do have extensive experience piloting thresh type builds as they are simply my favorite deck type of all times. I took NO RUG to Top 16 at Gencon this year and this new and improved RUG deck is even better.
Edit: Just finished watching Game 3 - Tough beats on the double Jace there, but Batterskull really sealed the deal, which is why I'm an advocate for Grudge. Your creatures are always bigger than theirs and your removal takes care of all their dudes, the only thing you are really worried about is Jace and batterskull.
I will watch the rest of the videos and keep editing as necessary, hope my comments help.
Round 2 vs. RDW
Game 1 - Nice Tarmo Delver beats, pretty flawless play for the most part, maybe you run out Wasteland instead of your 3rd volcanic in case he has double price of progress.
Game 2 - Don't dismiss Grip here for Sulfuric Vortex. I'm pulling stifles, putting in prolly 1-2 grips and maybe surgical which can be more useful than stifle.
RDW is a pretty rough matchup for RUG, so well done.
I believe that every one of the TNMO's fired last week. Which makes me wonder why we can barely fire the Daily Events. But on a different note we did indeed fire one Daily Event this week.
I don't think that would have been the right play. He would just have blocked the Geistcatcher's Rig and gone down to one life anyway, so I'd still be dead to a burn spell. Also, he had one card in hand I didn't know, and if it was a removal spell for my Geist (say, Rebuke), I'd be dead on board to a simple Crossway Vampire or Nightbird's Clutches.
I figure there's no reason to overextend when the odds were pretty much in my favor and there was zero chance of killing him that turn.
So I've been a long time Magic player but only recently stepped onto the MTGO scene (I've had an account for a little over a month now). What's more, is that I've only ever played "kitchen table" Magic.
I say this because I've been scouring the internet looking for unique deck ideas for Legacy and Modern (of which I've NEVER EVER played). I have no idea what I'm getting myself into and recently just purchased the Boltslinger deck offered by WotC just so I could test the Legacy waters. Anyway, I found this article and this deck really intrigued me. Much like laughinman above me, I too dislike mill decks but I really like the approach that this deck takes. Maybe I just haven't been around long enough to see what mill decks are "supposed" to look like, but I really am intrigued by this (so much so that I created an account just so I could submit a reply).
So, after my long-winded introduction, I've got a few questions. Please keep in mind I'm new to this whole Legacy thing..
1) Does Soratami Mindsweeper have a home here? With the crab, you can essentially mill 5 cards for 1cmc while having a presence in the air (albeit a small one).
2) Walk the Aeons. It's buyback doesn't seem too bad when you have a Second Sunrise.. but you would need a lot of mana to pull this off..
Anyway, I'll just leave it at that (I've taken enough of your time already, haha). But I enjoyed reading this article and pondering the possibilities!
My favorite release this year was Innistrad, because you never forget the first time you turn a foil Bloodline Keeper with his foil Vampire tokens sideways against three Werewolves and an unflipped Cloistered Youth...
This was something I caught early in your first video, which could have left you in an even better position:
Match 1 vs. Stoneblade - Game 1 - Opponent plays second Stoneforge with Wasteland untapped. When you start to Snapcaster for Spell Snare, he wastes your Tropical Island. Rather than let it resolve, you could have protected your land by returning it back to your hand and countered his play with Daze now that he is tapped out, two birds, one stone. Then you could have flashed back Brainstorm with Snapcaster. The final result would have been: an additional card in hand and extra library manipulation thanks to Brainstorm, guaranteed third land drop, and Spell Snare left in the yard waiting for Snapcaster.
My vote for favorite goes to Innistrad!
med 4 by far the best release.
med 4 wa sthe best and most climatic realise - worst was def masques terrible ev+ horrible date bad advertise bad placement of events terrible championship date
I was so not awake that morning. I mis-ordered cards from Top and Brainstorm many times, you pointed out the most obvious one in game 2 where I missed flipping the Delver. At the end of game 1, I had another Bolt on top and I forget what else. It was so close, I think it was something where if I had planned ahead better with Top I would have had it. Game 3 that early Old Man won it. I had Bob and I think two Trygons in my opening hand, which were just nullified.
My favorite release this year would have to be Innistrad. One factor that may play in that was that I played 2 pre-release events and opened garruk, liliana who was selling for ~48 tickets and 2 other mythics. However, even now I still enjoy drafting Innistrad and playing block constructed.
As usual when you tackle a subject you really hit it in depth. I've built variations on some of these decks (one of which was very useful in the Saturday Night Melee a few months ago.) Proliferation is such an odd and useful ability in red. You wouldn't think so since it has a slow concept but a couple turns of filling up things (and people) with counters changes your perspective. In particular turbo planeswalkers and turbo Lux Cannon are just insane vs an unprepared opponent. Even if they are prepared these kinds of decks usually have some threat density to provide backup plans.
As always nice work LE. I look forward to writing and getting the answers for our up coming (after the Holidays) interview.
A very clear winner of the Commander decks. Specifically the UBG one.
It's the first time in years that I've actually bought sealed product when not using it in a tournament.
I was very impressed with all of the cards in all the decks!
So, i have to love your articles. Well written, well thought out, and obviously, you have a lot of time for playtesting. I wish i had.
keya, ill see you there, managed the same feat last week, heres to a soft event as a nice christmas present.
my favorite release was in all reality, the 5 commander decks, as they are awesome. thats mostly paper though. For online i guess ill roll with Innistrad. So much good stuff and nothing is stupid overpowerful yet. although snapcaster is pretty nutty.
When I said geist I meant the chapel geist and not the rig, since the flyer could get through and win you the game on the turn.
You're absolutely right. For some reason I thought the Ghoulcaller Bell would do the trick for him. :(
Interesting you choose to concede m2 g2 the game when you could have won. Play the spirit, equip the +4+2, and hit for 7. He mills all your cards away, then you untap and shoot him with the torch before you have to draw. Am I missing something here?
Thanks for posting another great isd draft! I like to watch the stuff. Rick you coulda made one crazy black and red deck starting with that brimstone volley. I agree with what you wrote on the mill. every mill deck I played I beat.
Why are you playing Magic Online? Don't you have dragons to kill!?
Grudge is a 2 for vs. their other equipment and if they go for batterskull and you have removal, you have just set them back even further. You bolt their turn 2 stoneforge and force them to find 5 lands or another stoneforge to play it out. If counterbalance starts becoming more of a menance, then grip should replace grudge imo.
Also, I prefer Grim Lavamancer in the sideboard over pyroclasm. Unless elves are running around (which is possible in a casual FNM) or Goblins start becoming a problem, then Grim is your guy. Don't worry about the interaction with Snappy or Tarmo, trust me, it works out just fine.
Hit me up in game if you ever want to test.
-ImpinAintEasy-
Edit:
Another small thing I saw was in Round 3. You have delver on board, you brainstorm putting back bolt and Fire/Ice. You reveal fire/ice, then proceed to play tarn into another delver, meaning you are flipping your 2nd delver blind. You probably should of played Tropical there, laying Delver and then for sure you would flip bolt next turn. You attacked for 3 there, putting him to 17, next turn you attack for 6, he goes to 11, you bolt at his eot, 8, then win with Delver and Fire/Ice. Just my 2 cents on that matchup.
I can't really comment on the sideboard as I'm not all that familiar with his deck.....seems like you knew what you were doing there!
Thanks again for the Vids
Hey man thanks a ton for taking time and commenting. It has been some time sime I played competitive Legacy and as I said in the article I was basically playing based on my insticts rather than experience. That TNMO event helped me "polish" my Legacy skills (considering I have some to begin with).
One question: Why do you think Ancient Grudge is better than Krosan Grip? I mean, you're totally right, I should have brought them against Stoneforge in R1. Maybe they would have helped me kill that Batterskull. But Ancient Grudge cannot truly kill it because they will just bounce it back to their hand and play again. Krosan Grip therefore is a better choice.
So why do you prefer Grudge over Grip? That I want to know. Also I took out the Pyroclasms from the sideboard after the event and replaced them with Submerge. Do you think that was the right decision or should I bring back my Pyroclasms?
Thanks again Raddman and everybody for the comments.
LE
First of all, I am so happy to see some Legacy content.......So thank you for writing some!
I want to comment on your matches, first things first, you may have made mention of these things in your audio, but I was listening at work so I wasn't able to hear everything you were saying.
Match 1 vs. Stoneblade - Game 1- You Stifle his 5 land trigger which turns out to be huge in this match. You could of saved the stifle to protect your Tropical Island when he wastelands it.......or you could of cast snappy there and used stifle again from gy (although it would of been dazed probably). Instead you double bolt jace and run face first into Daze. Had you held back Stifle on his 5th land drop, you stifle his wasteland, bolt his jace once and then save the bolt next turn. You have got assume he is running daze. Also, don't be afraid to be the beatdown, without an early Delver in this matchup and seeing 3 snappys, you might of wanted to run out a turn 3 Snappy with snare backup to commence the beats.
Sideboard - you didn't bring in any grips, seems bad to me (although I prefer grudge anyways) and I would be siding out stifles tbh, just play tighter. Stoneblade lists tend to run enough lands to get around stifle and with your removal package, snares and grips you shouldn't worry about stoneforge which is the only thing stifling would be worthy imo. Stifling jace just seems meh as well.
Game 2 - You fetch right away on turn one putting yourself in harms way for Wasteland, I'd hold back the fetch as he more than likely is siding out stifles vs. you. Not to mention if you rip brainstorm, you now have a way to shuffle back that 2nd snappy that you really don't want at the moment.
I'm still watching the rest of the videos and will post on them later. I'm no pro, so take my advice with a grain of salt, but I do have extensive experience piloting thresh type builds as they are simply my favorite deck type of all times. I took NO RUG to Top 16 at Gencon this year and this new and improved RUG deck is even better.
Edit: Just finished watching Game 3 - Tough beats on the double Jace there, but Batterskull really sealed the deal, which is why I'm an advocate for Grudge. Your creatures are always bigger than theirs and your removal takes care of all their dudes, the only thing you are really worried about is Jace and batterskull.
I will watch the rest of the videos and keep editing as necessary, hope my comments help.
Round 2 vs. RDW
Game 1 - Nice Tarmo Delver beats, pretty flawless play for the most part, maybe you run out Wasteland instead of your 3rd volcanic in case he has double price of progress.
Game 2 - Don't dismiss Grip here for Sulfuric Vortex. I'm pulling stifles, putting in prolly 1-2 grips and maybe surgical which can be more useful than stifle.
RDW is a pretty rough matchup for RUG, so well done.
I believe that every one of the TNMO's fired last week. Which makes me wonder why we can barely fire the Daily Events. But on a different note we did indeed fire one Daily Event this week.
I don't think that would have been the right play. He would just have blocked the Geistcatcher's Rig and gone down to one life anyway, so I'd still be dead to a burn spell. Also, he had one card in hand I didn't know, and if it was a removal spell for my Geist (say, Rebuke), I'd be dead on board to a simple Crossway Vampire or Nightbird's Clutches.
I figure there's no reason to overextend when the odds were pretty much in my favor and there was zero chance of killing him that turn.
The preview frame for your first video shows your hand of 3x FOrce of Will and 2x Snapcaster Mage... THAT is why I play magic!
Good stuff as usual!
Pretty horrible of him to flip his human seeing as how u had the looter and torch equipped on him....Just leaving his angel to be destroyed.
Also, you could have midnight haunting main turn, sac a spirit token, equip ur geist and win without worrying about him getting an extra turn
So I've been a long time Magic player but only recently stepped onto the MTGO scene (I've had an account for a little over a month now). What's more, is that I've only ever played "kitchen table" Magic.
I say this because I've been scouring the internet looking for unique deck ideas for Legacy and Modern (of which I've NEVER EVER played). I have no idea what I'm getting myself into and recently just purchased the Boltslinger deck offered by WotC just so I could test the Legacy waters. Anyway, I found this article and this deck really intrigued me. Much like laughinman above me, I too dislike mill decks but I really like the approach that this deck takes. Maybe I just haven't been around long enough to see what mill decks are "supposed" to look like, but I really am intrigued by this (so much so that I created an account just so I could submit a reply).
So, after my long-winded introduction, I've got a few questions. Please keep in mind I'm new to this whole Legacy thing..
1) Does Soratami Mindsweeper have a home here? With the crab, you can essentially mill 5 cards for 1cmc while having a presence in the air (albeit a small one).
2) Walk the Aeons. It's buyback doesn't seem too bad when you have a Second Sunrise.. but you would need a lot of mana to pull this off..
Anyway, I'll just leave it at that (I've taken enough of your time already, haha). But I enjoyed reading this article and pondering the possibilities!