Well yes but there are the Misty Rainforests. :) I agree about the potential of Explore though I hate having it, playing it and then getting an uncastable card. In that instance I always wish it was preordain or something similar.
I just feel Mana Leak by its lonesome is unreliable as a consistent counter in need. For one thing it is no good once your opponent stabilizes their mana base if they are playing well. (We want to assume hard match ups in the form of well informed and skilled opponents so that we don't falter against such.) For another if your op is also playing counter magic essentially it is just a one for one vs their own counters. Maybe it is more worth it as a SB counter vs certain match ups. (Which? I don't have a clue but Negate would be higher priority in the SB too.)
But yeah acceleration into slime, slime slime is not terrible (:D) and the other fellow who mentioned Metamorph below has a point too. Metamorph can make a list with a bunch of 1-2 ofs a lot stronger and more flexible. Baloth is mostly strong vs certain archetypes so perhaps it belongs fully in the SB too. Man that cabinet is getting smaller and smaller!)
Andrew good luck with your higher education, I can't say I'm not a little jealous. :)
I don't watch videos often because I generally find them a little tedious. (I tend to look for something else to do while they are on.) But just to solidify the vote against music and for comments, I think it gives your article a bit more depth to make commentary to what is being watched. If that were happening I would be more tempted to watch yours. Another suggestion geared towards those of us who are not videophiles: You might want to give a bit more in the written department though I realize that is perhaps not as much fun.
I have to admitt I don't like listening to music while watching other peoples videos.
First and foremost, the reason I watch videos is to hear people's thinking and their line of strategy
Second I almost always find people's music tastes different from mine, thus it is painful to listen to.
I find that people posting music / magic do so on Youtube and not in run downs of DE's and PE articles.
Just my thoughts. Good luck in your next DE.
I was really looking forward to this but the music is so offputting. Your voice will be awesome. Explaining what you do and why you do it is way better than this. I couldn't watch it but from what I read its great.
Paul your not looking at his mana base. He has 5 blue sources, not including birds of blue mana. It's really loose to play mana leak consistantly.
An option to combat this is to add more lands 25-27, in the form of terramorphic expanse, and run explore.
The fetch thins your deck back down, lets you choose between blue or green, and allows you to accerlate while cantripping.
doing this thus, will make mana leak more reliable, double blue for titan and sphinx way more relaiable and enabling you to play ponders/preordains. And possibly jace for control matchups.
Id cut a baloth, and a into the roil for 2 more acidic slimes. Theyre one of your best weapons against the caw.
Do you remember jund and elves when nissa and eldrazi monument came out?
Their(elves) against jund, sb plan was to accelerate into slimes and mold shambler and destroy lands to slow them down. I feel like this is a good way to attack caw right now, seeing that their deck is very mana intensive.
Another way to attack caw is to add more sword of war and peace.
Another note is to make sure you have 4 baloths in the 75 against aggro decks. They are soo good. Tooo goood for the matter.
First let me say I am not a standard player/builder and I do not play in FNMs anymore so my advice here is tongue in cheek a little.
UG is one of my favorite positions on the color wheel, having written articles dating back 10+ years on the subject. I like the idea behind this but it seems a bit loose.
- Mana Leak by itself as a counterspell, is really best in the early game or against an unwary opponent. Though of course your opponent may be overcautious if you always keep your blue untapped after countering something. I think you might be better off running something like Rite of Replication to out-monster their bombs instead. Since you aren't running dedicated control Mana Leak does not fill in any redundancy gaps but merely is an occasional surprise "no". Not exactly a resounding answer vs the decks you fear.
- Think about Primeval Titan + Frost Titan for the high end of your curve. Primeval interacts nicely with Dungrove which suffers from the blue inclusion. As you mentioned Frost Titan acts to lock down troublesome opposition.
- I would run at least one copy of each in print sword (not vengeance) that gives color protection. Each serves a function. The only drawback to this is you can't really search them out (no Stoneforge Mystics sadly) and so you can't predict which ones you will draw. Preordain could also help.
- Acidic Slime can be devastating. Don't underestimate its effect against enemy swords, etc. I'd run more than one, probably at least 3.
- Consecrated Sphinx is a great card no doubt but as a 4/6 flier it does not trade well vs the likes of Titans and Admonition Angel so you are hoping to draw into a sword to armor it up. That plan seems flawed. It fits better into dedicated control because in that kind of deck it is easier to protect.
- Garruk is hard to argue against but I wondered: why no Jace? It seems like a decent fit.
- Not really convinced by GSZ in this particular last build. With 4 creatures that you can't search out with it, and 14 noncreatures it seems a little limited. Not to say it can't be good but 4x seems a bit much.
Well anyway hope you keep working on this and winning with it.
By the way is Mill a factor at all in your FNM scene? If not, perhaps Ulamog could be something else.
It's obnoxious - I'm trying to think while watching MTG videos, and the music ("music"?) doesn't exactly aid my focus. I want to hear your thoughts on the situation as it's happening. If you don't have a microphone, get one.
Yes, I can (and did) just mute it, but if everyone's muting it, why add audio???
(Please don't tell me this is something you learned in film school.)
This deck is pretty strong. Hexproof is difficult for most decks to interact with.
Kind of a janky suggestion, but since the game plan is punching them in the face with hexproof guys, maybe Distortion Strike? It has rebound and forces them to answer your 2 turn clock.
Great statistics update as always!
As i mentioned it earlier on MPDC forum its really terrifying that i fell asleeep after 4th round after winning first 3 with a 2-0 then i got a screw versus pk23 and got a tech loss against gwyned( though hadn't played mirror which i wanted badly. Its Really nice that my idea of TurtleDog deck is alive and competitive. Hope to be with you next time.
Thanks for the article - I took a few points in mind for my last Swiss draft and ended up winning all 3 rounds with a Green/White deck (first time I've won more than 1 round!). The griffin's made it all work, but a Jade Mage, Acidic Slime and a couple of bomb-sized Creatures bought it all together.
About the only round I lost was due to someone else's Overrun - if I had that card the deck really would have been monster.
I was thinking of building this deck for standard (have yet to get into standard, and this deck seems pretty budget friendly). How do you feel about summoner's bane? A good answer for DOJ if you're on the play, and isnt really a timewalk since you get a dude and helps in an aggro deck like this. Overall a nice article, and the videos were great! Keep up the good work.
Chainer's Edict would be interesting as a come back because it is has a double effect. Even if you never pay the flashback it sits there in your grave as a threat. On the other hand, removal is quite common and perhaps another one would be less than exciting for some.
Ancient Grudge and Ray of Distortion would be interesting from the point of view of sideboard hate cards. But then again not that exciting.
Deep Analysis and Momentary Blink are more exciting cards.
If you think 12 post is crazy in 2 player, you should try it in a multiplayer games, especially 2-headed giant. Cloudposts with Vesuvia was breaking the format back in the old extended. It was so bad that nobody was playing 2-headed giant extended without saying in the game description "no Cloudposts". I may have even written an article with that as a sub-theme. Now with Glimmerpost in the mix things will be even worse in the new modern format. I don't know if there is a specific online 2-headed giant banlist, but I expect Cloudpost will be on it soon.
Hey Lord Erman, Thanks as always for the detailed work. Your original article made me play with 12 post and i tried many versions over the last 2 weeks. Unfortunately, I think blue version is much weaker than green one except 1 important detail. It crashes the green version entirely with 1 card :Bribery. Other than that, it is very slow for the current environment. Trinket mage is great but by the time it comes in turn 3, you are already way behind. zoo and rdw are just too fast for this deck. green version on the other hand is much more consistent and persistent against aggro, however since alot of people play either versions of 12 posts, i dont think it is a good choice at the moment. Green version can rarely defeat blue one and 12 post mirror is very random.
and gifts ungiven is not that good if you do not run life from the loam. i'd take thist for knowledge over it anyday
Well yes but there are the Misty Rainforests. :) I agree about the potential of Explore though I hate having it, playing it and then getting an uncastable card. In that instance I always wish it was preordain or something similar.
I just feel Mana Leak by its lonesome is unreliable as a consistent counter in need. For one thing it is no good once your opponent stabilizes their mana base if they are playing well. (We want to assume hard match ups in the form of well informed and skilled opponents so that we don't falter against such.) For another if your op is also playing counter magic essentially it is just a one for one vs their own counters. Maybe it is more worth it as a SB counter vs certain match ups. (Which? I don't have a clue but Negate would be higher priority in the SB too.)
But yeah acceleration into slime, slime slime is not terrible (:D) and the other fellow who mentioned Metamorph below has a point too. Metamorph can make a list with a bunch of 1-2 ofs a lot stronger and more flexible. Baloth is mostly strong vs certain archetypes so perhaps it belongs fully in the SB too. Man that cabinet is getting smaller and smaller!)
Andrew good luck with your higher education, I can't say I'm not a little jealous. :)
I don't watch videos often because I generally find them a little tedious. (I tend to look for something else to do while they are on.) But just to solidify the vote against music and for comments, I think it gives your article a bit more depth to make commentary to what is being watched. If that were happening I would be more tempted to watch yours. Another suggestion geared towards those of us who are not videophiles: You might want to give a bit more in the written department though I realize that is perhaps not as much fun.
This is solid advice. Maybe you should be playing FNMs again. :)
Just a thought, but have you thought of maybe running Phyrexian Metamorph somewhere in your 75?
More of what I am looking for in terms of format.
Thank you. The people have spoken. I will definitely talk in the next one.
I appreciate the feedback.
I have to admitt I don't like listening to music while watching other peoples videos.
First and foremost, the reason I watch videos is to hear people's thinking and their line of strategy
Second I almost always find people's music tastes different from mine, thus it is painful to listen to.
I find that people posting music / magic do so on Youtube and not in run downs of DE's and PE articles.
Just my thoughts. Good luck in your next DE.
There is two votes.
I had a feeling that this was the case. But no one said anything last time.
I do encourage that you watch with mute on.
I will use my voice on next week's series.
I have a draft video coming up that does have my voice while drafting, but I recorded the games without audio. I may just leave them like that.
Thank you for saying something.
Thanks for the feedback! They're actually made with Google Charts and some scripting magic. ;)
I was really looking forward to this but the music is so offputting. Your voice will be awesome. Explaining what you do and why you do it is way better than this. I couldn't watch it but from what I read its great.
Please think of doing a normal one!
Paul your not looking at his mana base. He has 5 blue sources, not including birds of blue mana. It's really loose to play mana leak consistantly.
An option to combat this is to add more lands 25-27, in the form of terramorphic expanse, and run explore.
The fetch thins your deck back down, lets you choose between blue or green, and allows you to accerlate while cantripping.
doing this thus, will make mana leak more reliable, double blue for titan and sphinx way more relaiable and enabling you to play ponders/preordains. And possibly jace for control matchups.
Id cut a baloth, and a into the roil for 2 more acidic slimes. Theyre one of your best weapons against the caw.
Do you remember jund and elves when nissa and eldrazi monument came out?
Their(elves) against jund, sb plan was to accelerate into slimes and mold shambler and destroy lands to slow them down. I feel like this is a good way to attack caw right now, seeing that their deck is very mana intensive.
Another way to attack caw is to add more sword of war and peace.
Another note is to make sure you have 4 baloths in the 75 against aggro decks. They are soo good. Tooo goood for the matter.
First let me say I am not a standard player/builder and I do not play in FNMs anymore so my advice here is tongue in cheek a little.
UG is one of my favorite positions on the color wheel, having written articles dating back 10+ years on the subject. I like the idea behind this but it seems a bit loose.
- Mana Leak by itself as a counterspell, is really best in the early game or against an unwary opponent. Though of course your opponent may be overcautious if you always keep your blue untapped after countering something. I think you might be better off running something like Rite of Replication to out-monster their bombs instead. Since you aren't running dedicated control Mana Leak does not fill in any redundancy gaps but merely is an occasional surprise "no". Not exactly a resounding answer vs the decks you fear.
- Think about Primeval Titan + Frost Titan for the high end of your curve. Primeval interacts nicely with Dungrove which suffers from the blue inclusion. As you mentioned Frost Titan acts to lock down troublesome opposition.
- I would run at least one copy of each in print sword (not vengeance) that gives color protection. Each serves a function. The only drawback to this is you can't really search them out (no Stoneforge Mystics sadly) and so you can't predict which ones you will draw. Preordain could also help.
- Acidic Slime can be devastating. Don't underestimate its effect against enemy swords, etc. I'd run more than one, probably at least 3.
- Consecrated Sphinx is a great card no doubt but as a 4/6 flier it does not trade well vs the likes of Titans and Admonition Angel so you are hoping to draw into a sword to armor it up. That plan seems flawed. It fits better into dedicated control because in that kind of deck it is easier to protect.
- Garruk is hard to argue against but I wondered: why no Jace? It seems like a decent fit.
- Not really convinced by GSZ in this particular last build. With 4 creatures that you can't search out with it, and 14 noncreatures it seems a little limited. Not to say it can't be good but 4x seems a bit much.
Well anyway hope you keep working on this and winning with it.
By the way is Mill a factor at all in your FNM scene? If not, perhaps Ulamog could be something else.
This is the first comment I have received regarding the music.
I just don't want "dead air". I am self-conscious about my recorded voice.
I will try one with my voice, but I can't promise that it will be any more interesting/less annoying.
Thank you for this. I will make an effort to have my voice.
I did not learn that in film school, lol.
Are those Excel graphs?
I really wish I had time for one of these. I even have an Esper deck: Just in case an opportunity presents itself.
Meanwhile, I play it in the casual room. Just to annoy people. It is so good at generating card advantage.
Another good article, sir.
It's obnoxious - I'm trying to think while watching MTG videos, and the music ("music"?) doesn't exactly aid my focus. I want to hear your thoughts on the situation as it's happening. If you don't have a microphone, get one.
Yes, I can (and did) just mute it, but if everyone's muting it, why add audio???
(Please don't tell me this is something you learned in film school.)
This deck is pretty strong. Hexproof is difficult for most decks to interact with.
Kind of a janky suggestion, but since the game plan is punching them in the face with hexproof guys, maybe Distortion Strike? It has rebound and forces them to answer your 2 turn clock.
Love the evolution. Keep it coming.
Great statistics update as always!
As i mentioned it earlier on MPDC forum its really terrifying that i fell asleeep after 4th round after winning first 3 with a 2-0 then i got a screw versus pk23 and got a tech loss against gwyned( though hadn't played mirror which i wanted badly. Its Really nice that my idea of TurtleDog deck is alive and competitive. Hope to be with you next time.
Glad I made it a little easier being Green/(White).
Thanks for the article - I took a few points in mind for my last Swiss draft and ended up winning all 3 rounds with a Green/White deck (first time I've won more than 1 round!). The griffin's made it all work, but a Jade Mage, Acidic Slime and a couple of bomb-sized Creatures bought it all together.
About the only round I lost was due to someone else's Overrun - if I had that card the deck really would have been monster.
I was thinking of building this deck for standard (have yet to get into standard, and this deck seems pretty budget friendly). How do you feel about summoner's bane? A good answer for DOJ if you're on the play, and isnt really a timewalk since you get a dude and helps in an aggro deck like this. Overall a nice article, and the videos were great! Keep up the good work.
Chainer's Edict would be interesting as a come back because it is has a double effect. Even if you never pay the flashback it sits there in your grave as a threat. On the other hand, removal is quite common and perhaps another one would be less than exciting for some.
Ancient Grudge and Ray of Distortion would be interesting from the point of view of sideboard hate cards. But then again not that exciting.
Deep Analysis and Momentary Blink are more exciting cards.
Btw hope AJ is feeling better soon.
How to get to the finals of a Classic top 8 event: never play versus Shops! Pro tip of the day. ;-p
Nice to see a return to form for you! =)
In Match 1 Game 2 you could have selected the Watery Grave for the Swamp AND the Island, allowing your land to stay in play.
I liked the videos, but the microphone was way too quiet and full of hissing sounds.
Great article.
If you think 12 post is crazy in 2 player, you should try it in a multiplayer games, especially 2-headed giant. Cloudposts with Vesuvia was breaking the format back in the old extended. It was so bad that nobody was playing 2-headed giant extended without saying in the game description "no Cloudposts". I may have even written an article with that as a sub-theme. Now with Glimmerpost in the mix things will be even worse in the new modern format. I don't know if there is a specific online 2-headed giant banlist, but I expect Cloudpost will be on it soon.
Have a relaxing vacation!
Hey Lord Erman, Thanks as always for the detailed work. Your original article made me play with 12 post and i tried many versions over the last 2 weeks. Unfortunately, I think blue version is much weaker than green one except 1 important detail. It crashes the green version entirely with 1 card :Bribery. Other than that, it is very slow for the current environment. Trinket mage is great but by the time it comes in turn 3, you are already way behind. zoo and rdw are just too fast for this deck. green version on the other hand is much more consistent and persistent against aggro, however since alot of people play either versions of 12 posts, i dont think it is a good choice at the moment. Green version can rarely defeat blue one and 12 post mirror is very random.
and gifts ungiven is not that good if you do not run life from the loam. i'd take thist for knowledge over it anyday
Hey LE enjoy your well earned rest! :)