Some Type II strategy
Jesse Chounard
like this, and since no one has (unless I missed it) I
figured I might as well get the ball rolling myself.
If there is enough feedback I will keep this document along
with various responses on my web page.
In this post I am going to try to start everyone thinking
(most of us are already) on how to defeat the popular
and powerful Type II decks. Please feel free to contribute
anything that you think is valuable. (This will probably
become obscenely long, so you may want to print it out and
read it through at your leisure.)
I will post the various popular deck themes, and a small
description of each. I am asking all of the readers to
pick a deck, and tear it apart. Discover all of the
weaknesses you can find, and post them here.
Also post examples like:
"If you are using a Willowgeddon deck, you might
include Whirling Dervishes in your sideboard to
beat the Necropotence decks."
The Type II decks: (some currently popular themes)
1. W/G Willowgeddon
The point behind this type of deck is to get out a big
creature (usually Autumn Willow or Erhnam Djinn) and
then beat your opponent with it. Casting Armageddon
once you have your big creature is the way that
this deck achieves a semi-lock.
Ex: Bertrand Lestree's deck at PT1
2. B Necropotence
There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
a. Necro/Knights
This decks objective is to pump out creatures using
the Necro to draw an obscene amount of cards.
This deck also usually uses a fair amount of hand
destruction as well.
b. Necro/Regenerators
This deck uses Nevinyrral's Disk and a bunch of
regenerators to stop the enemy from having any
non-land permanents, while keeping your own.
c. Necro/Land destruction
This version uses Strips, Icequake, Blight, and
Icy Manipulators as well as Nevinyrral's Disk
to stop the opponent from having any sources of
mana.
3. W/U Control decks
In this category there are two common decks.
a. Type II versions of "The Deck"
This deck uses Disrupting Scepters to knock
its opponents hand away, and then uses
Millstones or Serra Angels (or both) to finish
of an opponent.
b. The Blinky-Mishra/Wrath of God deck
This one beats you up with Blinking Spirits and
Mishra's Factories, while countering your stuff.
It uses Hallowed Ground to Protect the Mishras,
and Wrath of God to kill your creatures if you
happen to beat his Counterspells.
Ex: Mike Loconte's (hope I spelled it right)
deck at PT1.
4. R/G
Three versions here.
a. Ehrnam and burn-em.
This one plays Ehrnam Djinn and sometimes Orggs
to do heavy damage to you, and finishes you
off with Bolts and Fireballs.
b. Quick Kill
This one uses lots of Bolts, little creatures,
and creature modifiers (Blood Lust, Giant Growth)
to do heavy damage quickly.
c. Land Destruction
Uses Thermokarst, Stone Rain, and Strip Mine, to
destroy an opponents lands, and Erhnam Djinn and
Orggs/Eron the Relentless to finish the opponent
off.
5. R/W Blinky/Bolt decks
This deck uses Blinking Spirits and Mishra's Factories
for damage, along with Bolts and Fireballs. For defense
it uses Wrath of God and sometimes Smoke. I've seen versions
with Icies and Winter Orbs.
There are several vartiations on all of these decks,
but these seem to be the most popular and the most
powerful. (Note: I am not saying popular=powerful,
but it only makes sense that the most powerful decks
would be the ones that everyone wants to use.)
The next step is up to all of you.
-------------------------------------------
the jester, Jesse J. Chounard II
jes...@umr.edu
http:\\www.umr.edu\jessec
"If you should die before me, ask if you
can bring a friend.", Stone Temple Pilots
-------------------------------------------
Donais Jeff
Ok, I'll bite. This looks like a good thread, and I will post some ideas
I have had (some I have used and worked).
> The Type II decks: (some currently popular themes)
>
> 1. W/G Willowgeddon
> The point behind this type of deck is to get out a big
> creature (usually Autumn Willow or Erhnam Djinn) and
> then beat your opponent with it. Casting Armageddon
> once you have your big creature is the way that
> this deck achieves a semi-lock.
> Ex: Bertrand Lestree's deck at PT1
OK, first of all, there are a few ways to screw this deck. This deck is
ultra-popular, so you can easily expect to see 1/3 of your opponents
playing a version of this. If you are playing a black Necro deck, you
should have little problem with this. Terror's will hurt those Ernahms,
and disks can blow up everything in an emergency. Another card you might
consider is Paralyze. Save a paralyze for when the opponent casts
Armageddon, and keep a swamp in your hand so you can use it the turn
after he armageddon's. Since dervishes will be invitable in the
sidebaord, the best thing you can do is throw in some artifact blockers
(wall of spears maybe, or brass man).
Any deck playing this deck should try to keep one or two lands in there
hand. You should have a minimum of 10 anti creature spells in any deck in
type 2 (bolts, terror, stp, paralyze, fireballs, hurricane, wrath, etc).
> 2. B Necropotence
> There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
> a. Necro/Knights
> This decks objective is to pump out creatures using
> the Necro to draw an obscene amount of cards.
> This deck also usually uses a fair amount of hand
> destruction as well.
> b. Necro/Regenerators
> This deck uses Nevinyrral's Disk and a bunch of
> regenerators to stop the enemy from having any
> non-land permanents, while keeping your own.
> c. Necro/Land destruction
> This version uses Strips, Icequake, Blight, and
> Icy Manipulators as well as Nevinyrral's Disk
> to stop the opponent from having any sources of
> mana.
The best defence against a necro deck are bolts and incinerates, and any
direct damage. You should also make sure you always have a defense for a
first turn Hippie in your deck.
>
> 3. W/U Control decks
> In this category there are two common decks.
> a. Type II versions of "The Deck"
> This deck uses Disrupting Scepters to knock
> its opponents hand away, and then uses
> Millstones or Serra Angels (or both) to finish
> of an opponent.
> b. The Blinky-Mishra/Wrath of God deck
> This one beats you up with Blinking Spirits and
> Mishra's Factories, while countering your stuff.
> It uses Hallowed Ground to Protect the Mishras,
> and Wrath of God to kill your creatures if you
> happen to beat his Counterspells.
> Ex: Mike Loconte's (hope I spelled it right)
> deck at PT1.
IMHO, these decks should not be able to work in T2, you should be able to
hammer the opponent faster than they can control you. Keep red elemental
blasts to stop those control magics, and wait till the opponent taps out
to cast your spells. Assume he has a counter in his hand if he has the
appropriate mana untapped. Don't drop all your creatures at once if he
is playing wraths. Disenchant Hallowed Ground whenever possible if he
has lots of mana and several mishra's, otherwise they are nearly unkillable.
If he have a sceptre in your sidebaord, now is the time to put it in,
these hurts the blinky strategy a little bit, but assume your first
sceptre to hit the table _will_ be disenchanted unless you give the
opponent so many things to disenchant.
> 4. R/G
> Three versions here.
> a. Ehrnam and burn-em.
> This one plays Ehrnam Djinn and sometimes Orggs
> to do heavy damage to you, and finishes you
> off with Bolts and Fireballs.
> b. Quick Kill
> This one uses lots of Bolts, little creatures,
> and creature modifiers (Blood Lust, Giant Growth)
> to do heavy damage quickly.
> c. Land Destruction
> Uses Thermokarst, Stone Rain, and Strip Mine, to
> destroy an opponents lands, and Erhnam Djinn and
> Orggs/Eron the Relentless to finish the opponent
> off.
These decks tend to fizzle out after a while if you can keep it in
control early in the game. Having some method of healing is nice, of
course getting a Zuran Orb out is good, but don't count on that. Keep a
bolt in hand to use when he bloodlusts. Keep at least 3 cards in your
sideboard vs. land destruction (low mana stuff, extra land, whatever).
If they drop Stormbind, get rid of it somehow (BEB. Tranq, Aren, Aura,
Disenchant, etc).
>
> 5. R/W Blinky/Bolt decks
> This deck uses Blinking Spirits and Mishra's Factories
> for damage, along with Bolts and Fireballs. For defense
> it uses Wrath of God and sometimes Smoke. I've seen versions
> with Icies and Winter Orbs.
This one is tough, you can beat it with a strong, fast offense, or a COP
type defense. The winter orb version is nasty when he has an Icy out.
I think crumbles are super nessecary in any sideboard, and now is the
time to put them in.
Jeff
--------
Gamemaster: But why did you kill the kobold women and children?
Player: Because they aren't worth any experience points to us alive.
--------
Daniel Gray
>I've been waiting for a while for someone to post something
>like this, and since no one has (unless I missed it) I
>figured I might as well get the ball rolling myself.
>If there is enough feedback I will keep this document along
>with various responses on my web page.
>In this post I am going to try to start everyone thinking
>(most of us are already) on how to defeat the popular
>and powerful Type II decks. Please feel free to contribute
>anything that you think is valuable. (This will probably
>become obscenely long, so you may want to print it out and
>read it through at your leisure.)
>I will post the various popular deck themes, and a small
>description of each. I am asking all of the readers to
>pick a deck, and tear it apart. Discover all of the
>weaknesses you can find, and post them here.
Each of these decks has weaknesses(some have SERIOUS weaknesses) which
can be exploited. The difficulty, as always, is in designing a deck that not
only significantly hoses the popular deck, but one that can stand up to and
defeat as many other decks as possible. George Baxter's "Rock, Scissors,
Paper" analogy is so very true in Type II(as well as Type I, but less so in
that overpowered environment)-- certain decks will always beat certain kinds
of decks, but will almost always lose to a third kind of deck. It's all in the
pairings, as in Type II, as the number of popular deck types shows, any one of
a group of decks can win the tournament.
Having said that by way of preface, I'll try to describe what I see as
the signifcant pros and cons of each of the major Type II decks outlined
below.
>Also post examples like:
> "If you are using a Willowgeddon deck, you might
> include Whirling Dervishes in your sideboard to
> beat the Necropotence decks."
>The Type II decks: (some currently popular themes)
>1. W/G Willowgeddon
> The point behind this type of deck is to get out a big
> creature (usually Autumn Willow or Erhnam Djinn) and
> then beat your opponent with it. Casting Armageddon
> once you have your big creature is the way that
> this deck achieves a semi-lock.
> Ex: Bertrand Lestree's deck at PT1
Perhaps a better example of WIllowgeddon, at least in my opinion, is
Preston Poulter's Lilly White deck(either the PT1 version, or his current
version). I thought Lestree's deck was a bit of an untuned example of
Willowgeddon.
Advantages: 1. Cheap spells. Willowgeddon typically averages 4 to 6
creatures with casting cost 1 or 2. Erhnams & Armageddon both cost only 4
mana. Nothing in the deck except Autumn Willow(except Wrath of God for those
who use it) costs more than one colored mana. 2. "Lifeopotence" the powerful
card drawing/access combination of Sylvan Library, Land Tax, and
Jalum/Jayemdae Tome. While nowhere near as fast as Necropotence, Lifopotence
is still powerful(and far less painful). It allows removal of "useless" cards
from the library via Land Tax, and Sylvan Library allows the player to dig
deeper into the deck for cards. Also combines great with Jalum Tome to either
toss excess land or knock the garbage off the top of the library in order to
dig deeper with Sylvan Library. 3. Willowgeddon. Autumn Willow(or Erhnam
Djinn) plus Armageddon is difficult to escape. The Willow is tough to kill
under normal circumstances, and with little or no land it can be almost
impossible(only Meekstone, Will-O-the-Wisp, and Balance can effective stop her
for less than 4 mana).
Problems: 1. Lack of damage diversity. Nearly every Willowgeddon deck
I've played with or against contains no method of dealing damage except
creatures and a couple of Hurricanes(and some don't even use the Hurricanes).
Creatures are the utmost in fragility, and Hurricanes are less versatile still
because they damage you too(making it difficult to cast them if you somehow
wind up behind in life). This is a problem the black decks also face, but
there it is mitigated by black's powerful disruption abiliteis and
Necropotence. 2. "The Black Problem" Black possesses more ways than any other
color to completely blast Willowgeddon. Hymn to Tourach can be deadly for any
deck which holds land or Armageddon waiting for the lock setup. Black has tons
of Protection from White creatures, invalidating Willowgeddon's best critter
cruncher-- Swords to Plowshares. Black has Gloom, which will completely shut
down half the Willowgeddon deck, and invalidate a good portion of its ability
to remove creatures and permanents(most Willowgeddon decks have a single Icy,
single Disk, and single Serrated Arrows for non-white removal). Black has
hyperspatial speed, but in Necropotence-fueld card drawing and in the ability
to Dark Ritual Hymns and critters out early. A Willowgeddon deck can cast only
Elves on the first turn, and only Elvish Archers or Dervishes on the second.
Black, conversely, can(and does) regularly drop Specters, Orders, & even
Vampires on the first turn, and Ihsan's Shade on the second turn. While StP
can stop some of those creatures, a mass rush of Orders or a single Ihsan
before the fourth or fifth turn will likely kill the Willowgeddon player. 3.
Fast burn. Willowgeddon can take time to get going. While it is possible to
cast Elves, Archers, or Dervishes early to draw a red player's bolts, the
larger creatures and Armageddon take several turns to get going. This is a
less major problem than against black, but one to take into consideration.
Solutions: Damage diversity is tough to get around without playing
red, since there are no truly good ways of dealing damage with artifacts left
in Type II(a single Vise is about all that would work. Racks have no place in
this deck). "The Black Problem" has two good, easy solutions-- the obvious one
is Whirling Dervish, which no monoblack player can block, and can only be
gotten rid of with Disks or Icys. I recommend running them IN the deck rather
than sideboard(I'm currently using 3 Dervishes & 2 Archers, with no mana elves
myself). The second good solution is Storm Seeker, probably in the sideboard.
When the Necropotence goes down, odds are your opponent will immeidately blow
4 to 8 life drawing cards. If you follow this up with a Storm Seeker you can,
if not immediately kill the opponent, at least seriously hamper his or her
ability to get anymore cards. Storm Seeker also works, although less well,
against decks with Land Tax. Red blasting can be solved via Reverse Damage.
Reversing a Bolt cancels not only that Bolt, but the next one as well. This
also gives you time to setup, by which time your opponent will have better
targets other than you for Bolts. Reverse Damage also works great against
large Fireballs, Storm Seekers, or Shivan Dragons :) I'd recommend against
COP's of any kind. They don't work particularly well with Armageddon, and
Gloom virtually incapacitates COP: Black. Other neat tricks-- Karma can be
used, although Gloom can make it unworkable. If you're playing with 2 or more
Disks, or enough red for something like Pyroclasm, Kormus Bell, followed by
either a blown Disk or a 'clasm will also completely kill a black deck.
>2. B Necropotence
> There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
> a. Necro/Knights
> This decks objective is to pump out creatures using
> the Necro to draw an obscene amount of cards.
> This deck also usually uses a fair amount of hand
> destruction as well.
> b. Necro/Regenerators
> This deck uses Nevinyrral's Disk and a bunch of
> regenerators to stop the enemy from having any
> non-land permanents, while keeping your own.
> c. Necro/Land destruction
> This version uses Strips, Icequake, Blight, and
> Icy Manipulators as well as Nevinyrral's Disk
> to stop the opponent from having any sources of
> mana.
Most of the monoblack Necropotence decks are virtually identical.
Almost all run 2-4 Necropotences, 3-6 pump Orders/Knights, 4 Specters, 4
Hymns, 3-4 Disks, 2 Vampires, 2 Shades, and 3-4 Dark Rituals. There are little
variants, including using Demonic Consultation(popular here in LA), land
destruction(Icequake & Strip Mine), Weakness, or Animate Dead. I've also seen
some new versions that use Icys and work very well.
Advantages: 1. Pure raw speed. Black has Dark Ritual, about the
fastest source of mana in Type II(only Mana Vault & Tinder Wall even come
close), allowing for first turn shenanigans, including fast creatures, Hymns,
or LD. Black also has Necropotence, the most obnoxious card drawer since the
Library of Alexandria, allowing it to get tonsmore cards to refill after
blowing its opening hand quickly. 2. Disruption. Black has more discard cards
than any other color, and more land destruction cards than any color except
green. Hymn to Tourach can completely screw an opponent, especially if done
early, and you pull land from their hands. Icequake can also slow down wouldbe
defenses, allowing the creatures of evil time, space, and freedom to do their
dirty work. These two advantages are all black really needs.
Problems: 1. Lack of removal. Monoblack players MUST rely on
Nevinyrral's Disk to do their permanent removal(aside from creature blocking,
of course). Without them, annoying artifacts(like Zuran Orb, Tomes, Serrated
Arrows, and Ivory tower) cannot be removed, nor can irritating
enchantments(Land Tax, Sylvan Library, COP's, Karma), nor can Protection from
Black critters(most notably Mr. Dervish, but the white knights as well) be
stopped. Disks are, while very effective, also very slow. You've got to wait a
turn, giving an opponent ample time to either kill you with the offending
permanent(s) or Disenchant, Divine Offering, or Shatter the Disk. 2. Easy
color hosing. Because a monoblack player only plays one color, he or she is
especially vulnurable to anti-color cards, mainly Protection from Black
critters, but also Karma, Drought, Lifeforce, and friends. Combined with the
difficulty of removing permanents, this can be very, very bad.
Solutions: There aren't any effective solutions to get around black's
inability to remove permanents. About the only major way to disrupt removal is
Gloom, and lots of it(although Stench of Evil can be effective too). Then
again, these decks don't really NEED the permanent removal ability, as this
shortcoming is more than mitigated by the sheer speed black can exert. This is
probably the best Type II tournament deck around right now(although I can see
arguments in favor of Willowgeddon), and about the only thing that could nuke
it completely would be the restriction or removal of Necrootence or Hymn to
Tourach.
>
>3. W/U Control decks
> In this category there are two common decks.
> a. Type II versions of "The Deck"
> This deck uses Disrupting Scepters to knock
> its opponents hand away, and then uses
> Millstones or Serra Angels (or both) to finish
> of an opponent.
> b. The Blinky-Mishra/Wrath of God deck
> This one beats you up with Blinking Spirits and
> Mishra's Factories, while countering your stuff.
> It uses Hallowed Ground to Protect the Mishras,
> and Wrath of God to kill your creatures if you
> happen to beat his Counterspells.
> Ex: Mike Loconte's (hope I spelled it right)
> deck at PT1.
Advantages: 1.Uber-removal. White's removers & defense combined with
blue's countering provides the ability to stop more stuff than any combination
except maybe R/W. This disruption is a key aspect in what made "The Deck"
dominant in Type I.
Problems: 1. Speed. U/W is the slowest color combo there is. "The
Deck" works in Type I because it can use Moxen, Lotus, Sol Ring, or Mana Crypt
for fast mana. No such mana exists in Type II, and this allows the black
decks, or even fast white weenie decks to just run a U/W player over before
he/she can set up defenses. Lack of permanent, global creatures nullification
like Moat or The Abyss doesn't help either. 2. Time. U/W decks, because they
are so slow, are often fighting the time limits imposed on most tournament
rounds. This is especially true of the Millstone/Cap variants. 3. "Must
Counter Syndrome" Because of its slowness, requirement of permanent and
environmental control, and time limits, numerous spells fielded by other major
decks MUST be stopped or a U/W player dies. Against Willowgeddon, this means
stopping Armageddon, against monoblack, Necropotence, and against any red or
part-red deck, you have to stop some of the incoming heat. None of the other
major decks have this problem, and all of them can easily win even if the
opponent manages to play one or more key cards. Not so U/W. Armageddon removes
your ability to do ANYTHING to stop the opponent effectively, Necropotence
lets the opponent totally outdraw you, making the Scepter soft lock difficult,
and totally negating the possibility of "decking" an opponent, and tons of
direct damage is sort of self-explanatory in the wake of U/W's few, if any,
damage sources.
Solutions: There are no easy solutions to the problems faced by U/W in
Type II. Lack of fast mana really kills this deck, and that fact, more than
any other, makes me believe that U/W is not a truly viable color
combination(Michael Loconto's PT1 victory notwithstanding). The necessity of
countering certain spells also doesn't help matters. Some ways to get around
more minor shortcomings are obvious-- Sleight of MInd can stop Gloom, which
normally totally shuts a U/W player down, more counters can alleviate the must
counter problem partially but are ineffective.
>4. R/G
> Three versions here.
> a. Ehrnam and burn-em.
> This one plays Ehrnam Djinn and sometimes Orggs
> to do heavy damage to you, and finishes you
> off with Bolts and Fireballs.
Erhnam & Burn 'Em is one of the oldest deck archetypes still prevalent
in Type II. It's been around since Ice Age was released, although at that time
if was more like Johtull'n'Burn'Em. It is sometimes effective, but I generally
find it too flaky to be consistent.
Advantages: 1. Speed. Either through use of cheap creatures, or
bootstrapped speed mana like Elves, Birds, Mana Vault, Tinder Wall, and Orcish
Lumberjack, this deck can easily get Erhnams, Shivans, Orggs, or Ball
Lightnings out early. The cheap damage sources that are Lightning Bolts &
Incinerates are also helpful in this regard. 2. Creatures. Red and green have
the best overall creatures available(despite the continuing removal of most
good rare red creatures everyimt The Gathering gets a new rotation). Erhnams,
Orggs, Shivans, Autumn Willow, and Ball Lightning, along with some of the
lesser creatures, can kick butt in a hurry.
Problems: 1. Cards. Many of these decks have a bad habit of sputtering
out after their initial hand runs out. Tomes can alleviate the problem, but
detract from the deck's speed. The obvious solution, Howling Mine, nets an
opponent more cards, and thus more opportunities to stop creatures and direct
damage. 2. Lack of removal. Most of these decks run without permanent
removal(aside from direct damage), and lacking Shatter, Crumble, or
Tranquility can be the downfall of the deck. 3. Combos. To achieve its speed,
this deck relies on keeping creatures like Birds, Elves, or Lumberjacks in
play to generat e mana. Remove them, and the deck slows down markedly. 4.
Flakiness. In those variants which use Giant Growth, Blood Lust, or other such
cards to augment the creature damage, the risk is always present of drawing
all augmentation and no critters.
Solutions: Removal can be added at the cost of speed, but if this is
done, you might as well play R/W instead. It has better, faster, and cheaper
removal, with an equally good creature selection. Getting cards is also a
problem. Adding tomes slows you down, which means, once again, you might as
well play R/W, since you can then access some part of the Land Tax/Jalum Tome/
Winds of Change/Land's Edge combo. The combo problem is even more difficult,
since no color except black has any true speed mana like Type I.
> b. Quick Kill
> This one uses lots of Bolts, little creatures,
> and creature modifiers (Blood Lust, Giant Growth)
> to do heavy damage quickly.
See above-- this deck suffers from the flakiness problem, and also the
card and lack of removal problems.
> c. Land Destruction
> Uses Thermokarst, Stone Rain, and Strip Mine, to
> destroy an opponents lands, and Erhnam Djinn and
> Orggs/Eron the Relentless to finish the opponent
> off.
Advantages: 1. Disruption. Land destruction is very disruptive.
Problems: This deck suffers all of the Erhnam & Burn 'Em problems
except flakiness, as well as a few of its own. 1. LD Hosers. Land Tax kills
this deck, and creature mana, artifact mana, and land enchaners like Nature's
Lore don't help it either. There are plenty of good ways around LD, and the LD
player would have to account for all of them, which is difficult to do. 2.
Three colors. To get more than 12 "effective" LD spells into a deck, you need
to play black, green, AND red. This means lots of pain land or lots of slow
land or tons of mana creatures or some combination of all of these. It also
means you could get mana-screwed more than you'd like.
Solutions: LD is an old deck. It doesn't have many easy solutions, and
is also, in my opinion, far too flaky when run in its full-tilt version, even
in Type I to work effectively all the time.
>5. R/W Blinky/Bolt decks
> This deck uses Blinking Spirits and Mishra's Factories
> for damage, along with Bolts and Fireballs. For defense
> it uses Wrath of God and sometimes Smoke. I've seen versions
> with Icies and Winter Orbs.
The major variants on R/W are the Cookbook-- Tomes & heat with some
supplementary removal and critters(first started, to my knowledge, by Brian
Weissman and friends in the Bay Area), and the Kitchen Sink-- tons of removal
with a few critters and some heat to win(first introduced to me by Adam
Maysonet, although I'm sure it was around long before then). The only, more
recent R/W deck is the Land Tax/Land's Edge deck.
Advantages: 1.Uber-removal. R/W can remove any permanent and can do it
cheaply. 2. Versatility. R/W can deal with most problems easily, primarily
because a large portion of the spells are cheap, and then can get rid of
stuff. 3. Cards. R/W can also easily get more cards with Land Tax, TOmes, and
Winds of Change.
Problems: 1. Speed. While not particularly slow tiself, due to all its
cheap spells, really fast white weenie or monoblack decks can overwhelm the
defenses of this deck. Land's Edge/Land Tax versions are particularly preyed
on by these fast decks because they often wait for the hammer to win.
Solutions: This is a fiarly solid deck, whatever the incarnation, but
I feel the speed of Necrodecks and the combo-free straightforwardsness of
Willowgeddon make them slightly better decks.I don't really have any good
ideas to improve this deck type, I'm afraid, but perhaps someone else does.
>There are several vartiations on all of these decks,
>but these seem to be the most popular and the most
>powerful. (Note: I am not saying popular=powerful,
>but it only makes sense that the most powerful decks
>would be the ones that everyone wants to use.)
Popular sometimes means powerful, but the tendancy of the less
innovative players to simply copy winning or popular decks may be a large
factor in retarding the advancement of deck technology(and the creation of
means to overwhelm the popular decks).Exercises like this one are a good
method of getting beyond this problem. It isn't always easy, except perhaps
for the top fewest players, for an individual to create an extremely powerful,
newly innovative tournament deck on his/her own. Most good decks are the
result of mass collaberation and even more massive playtesting.
>The next step is up to all of you.
>-------------------------------------------
>the jester, Jesse J. Chounard II
>jes...@umr.edu
>http:\\www.umr.edu\jessec
>"If you should die before me, ask if you
>can bring a friend.", Stone Temple Pilots
>-------------------------------------------
Dan Gray
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Daniel M. Gray
Department of History
University of California, Santa Barbara
Steven Liu
: I've been waiting for a while for someone to post something
: like this, and since no one has (unless I missed it) I
: figured I might as well get the ball rolling myself.
: If there is enough feedback I will keep this document along
: with various responses on my web page.
:
: In this post I am going to try to start everyone thinking
: (most of us are already) on how to defeat the popular
: and powerful Type II decks. Please feel free to contribute
: anything that you think is valuable. (This will probably
: become obscenely long, so you may want to print it out and
: read it through at your leisure.)
:
: I will post the various popular deck themes, and a small
: description of each. I am asking all of the readers to
: pick a deck, and tear it apart. Discover all of the
: weaknesses you can find, and post them here.
: Also post examples like:
: "If you are using a Willowgeddon deck, you might
: include Whirling Dervishes in your sideboard to
: beat the Necropotence decks."
:
: The Type II decks: (some currently popular themes)
:
: 1. W/G Willowgeddon
: The point behind this type of deck is to get out a big
: creature (usually Autumn Willow or Erhnam Djinn) and
: then beat your opponent with it. Casting Armageddon
: once you have your big creature is the way that
: this deck achieves a semi-lock.
: Ex: Bertrand Lestree's deck at PT1
: 2. B Necropotence
: There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
: a. Necro/Knights
: This decks objective is to pump out creatures using
: the Necro to draw an obscene amount of cards.
: This deck also usually uses a fair amount of hand
: destruction as well.
: b. Necro/Regenerators
: This deck uses Nevinyrral's Disk and a bunch of
: regenerators to stop the enemy from having any
: non-land permanents, while keeping your own.
: c. Necro/Land destruction
: This version uses Strips, Icequake, Blight, and
: Icy Manipulators as well as Nevinyrral's Disk
: to stop the opponent from having any sources of
: mana.
: 3. W/U Control decks
: In this category there are two common decks.
: a. Type II versions of "The Deck"
: This deck uses Disrupting Scepters to knock
: its opponents hand away, and then uses
: Millstones or Serra Angels (or both) to finish
: of an opponent.
: b. The Blinky-Mishra/Wrath of God deck
: This one beats you up with Blinking Spirits and
: Mishra's Factories, while countering your stuff.
: It uses Hallowed Ground to Protect the Mishras,
: and Wrath of God to kill your creatures if you
: happen to beat his Counterspells.
: Ex: Mike Loconte's (hope I spelled it right)
: deck at PT1.
: a. Ehrnam and burn-em.
: This one plays Ehrnam Djinn and sometimes Orggs
: to do heavy damage to you, and finishes you
: off with Bolts and Fireballs.
: This one uses lots of Bolts, little creatures,
: and creature modifiers (Blood Lust, Giant Growth)
: to do heavy damage quickly.
: Uses Thermokarst, Stone Rain, and Strip Mine, to
: destroy an opponents lands, and Erhnam Djinn and
: Orggs/Eron the Relentless to finish the opponent
: off.
: 5. R/W Blinky/Bolt decks
: This deck uses Blinking Spirits and Mishra's Factories
: for damage, along with Bolts and Fireballs. For defense
: it uses Wrath of God and sometimes Smoke. I've seen versions
: with Icies and Winter Orbs.
Ah...but I'm sure you have missed somebody's deck...say #6...and of course my
anti-popular-decks permission deck, which proved (to me), that the forces
behind the Necropotence deck are (besides the Hymn') the Nevinyrral's Disk
and the Strip Mine.
7. U Artifact/Control
"Heart of Darkness" (My ivory! My river! My intended!)
This deck uses Control Magic, Binding Grasp, Nevinyrral's Disk, Strip
Mine, Apprentice Wizard, Mahamoti Djinn, Jester's Cap, Mishra's Factory,
Serrated Arrows, Deflection, Power Sink, Counterspell, Steal Artifact,
Disrupting Scepter, Mesmeric Trance, Jalum Tome, Jayemdae Tome, Zuran
Orb, and a Homarid Spawning Bed (hmm...I must have missed something,
but that's the rough sketch).
It's just terribly amusing how people roll over and die to Control Magic and
Binding Grasp after just one 'Capping. The Homarid Spawning Bed is just
so cool for making a planter out of the wizards who have out-lived their
usefulness. The Nevinyrral's Disk/Homarid Spawning Bed trick is just out-
right effective (wiping the board and getting nine 1/1 critters usually
kills the opponent dead, especially when backed by counters). After all,
I'm just a true blue mage at heart.
: There are several vartiations on all of these decks,
: but these seem to be the most popular and the most
: powerful. (Note: I am not saying popular=powerful,
: but it only makes sense that the most powerful decks
: would be the ones that everyone wants to use.)
:
: The next step is up to all of you.
:
: -------------------------------------------
: the jester, Jesse J. Chounard II
: jes...@umr.edu
: http:\\www.umr.edu\jessec
: "If you should die before me, ask if you
: can bring a friend.", Stone Temple Pilots
: -------------------------------------------
:
:
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Alan D Kohler
here - there are WAAAAY to many "staple decks" creeping around.
Willowgeddon, necro, yadda, yadda, yadda...
Second: To the duelist: QUIT PUBLISHING TOURNAMENT WINNING DECKS - it only
compounds the problem! Now in addition to planning for numerous necro and
ernhamgeddon decks in the PT qualifiers, I'm gonna have to plan for numerous
loconto clones - sigh. (Actually, you should always plan for evey type of
deck, but ones you know you will see in slews, you should plan for putting
countermeasures in your main deck for, so you can win the 3rd game in all
those swiss rounds so you can qualifiy... and publishing tourney decks make
skill less and luck more of a factor in getting past those swiss rounds).
That said:
In article <dgray.829615460@casbah>, dg...@casbah.acns.nwu.edu says...
>
>jes...@saucer.cc.umr.edu (Jesse Chounard) writes:
>>1. W/G Willowgeddon
>> The point behind this type of deck is to get out a big
>> creature (usually Autumn Willow or Erhnam Djinn) and
>> then beat your opponent with it. Casting Armageddon
>> once you have your big creature is the way that
>> this deck achieves a semi-lock.
>who use it) costs more than one colored mana. 2. "Lifeopotence" the
powerful
>card drawing/access combination of Sylvan Library, Land Tax, and
>Jalum/Jayemdae Tome. While nowhere near as fast as Necropotence,
Lifopotence
>is still powerful(and far less painful).
And far harder to get out. And one tranquility or disk, and it goes away,
and you have to rebuild the combo from scratch. What was the term you used:
flaky?
>this deck). "The Black Problem" has two good, easy solutions-- the obvious
one
>is Whirling Dervish, which no monoblack player can block, and can only be
>gotten rid of with Disks or Icys. I recommend running them IN the deck
rather
>than sideboard(I'm currently using 3 Dervishes & 2 Archers, with no mana
elves
>myself). The second good solution is Storm Seeker, probably in the
sideboard.
Comment on dervishes: I have never had my necro-deck killed by dervishes.
Mainly because I am so afraid of them, I designed the deck with them in
mind. In addition to the ubiquous Larry's disk, I use icy manipulators,
serrated arrows, and mishras factories. Many other necro decks I have seen
feature walking walls, scimitars, and clay statues.
Storm seekers are strong against necro decks since you can almost always
rely on doing a full 7 points with it (occasionally 8 after they blow a disk
and they get a draw phase the next turn). This can be telling, because even
with the life gaining artifacts, a necro deck frequently dip very low in
life. (One reason I use simulacrum in my particular necro deck).
>>2. B Necropotence
>> There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
>> a. Necro/Knights
>> b. Necro/Regenerators
>> c. Necro/Land destruction
> Advantages: 1. Pure raw speed.
>2. Disruption.
#2 CANNOT be ignored. Necropotence alone does not a necro deck make. It is
the hymns that get rid of all those wraths of gods, armageddons, autumn
willows, droughts, life-o-potence combos that would otherwise kick its teeth
in.
> Problems: 1. Lack of removal.
>2. Easy
>color hosing. Because a monoblack player only plays one color, he or she is
>especially vulnurable to anti-color cards, mainly Protection from Black
>critters, but also Karma, Drought, Lifeforce, and friends. Combined with
the
>difficulty of removing permanents, this can be very, very bad.
> Solutions: There aren't any effective solutions to get around
black's
>inability to remove permanents. About the only major way to disrupt removal
is
>Gloom, and lots of it(although Stench of Evil can be effective too).
That's usually enough. The white cards that would really hose black just
never seem to come out with gloom on the table. Of course, U/W has sleigts,
and G/W has traquility/essence filter, but even if you pull one of these
off, the deck can typically disk it away and try again - and the card
superiority necro grants usually means you'll draw more glooms that your
opponent will sleights/tranquilities.
--
Alan D Kohler
AKA Hawkwind
hwk...@poky.srv.net
Seen in the back of Grimtooth's "Traps Fore":
"There's a sucker born every minute."
P.T. Barnum
"And they die about that fast, too"
Grimtooth
Alan D Kohler
> about the only thing that could nuke
>it completely would be the restriction or removal of Necrootence or Hymn to
>Tourach.
Remember last year, vice age was dominating the tournament circuit? And now
vice is restricted. Now necro is pretty much in the same spot. I'd pretty
much count on necropotence being next.
Matthew Hall
: Ok, I'll bite. This looks like a good thread, and I will post some ideas
: I have had (some I have used and worked).
: > The Type II decks: (some currently popular themes)
: >
: > 1. W/G Willowgeddon
: > The point behind this type of deck is to get out a big
: > creature (usually Autumn Willow or Erhnam Djinn) and
: > then beat your opponent with it. Casting Armageddon
: > once you have your big creature is the way that
: > this deck achieves a semi-lock.
: > Ex: Bertrand Lestree's deck at PT1
: OK, first of all, there are a few ways to screw this deck. This deck is
: ultra-popular, so you can easily expect to see 1/3 of your opponents
: playing a version of this. If you are playing a black Necro deck, you
: should have little problem with this. Terror's will hurt those Ernahms,
: and disks can blow up everything in an emergency. Another card you might
: consider is Paralyze. Save a paralyze for when the opponent casts
: Armageddon, and keep a swamp in your hand so you can use it the turn
: after he armageddon's. Since dervishes will be invitable in the
: sidebaord, the best thing you can do is throw in some artifact blockers
: (wall of spears maybe, or brass man).
I completely agree about the Paralyzes. I utilize them in my Necro deck,
and combined with Strip Mines, this can be powerful early in the game,
not to mention against Willowgeddon. What's really interesting about
Paralyze is the effect it has which is not specifically worded on the
card. By Paralyzing a creature, you have accomplished one of two things:
1) You've removed a creature from the equation. In my case this allows
me to rush in with my Knights and Hippies.
2) If the creature is that important, they will continue to untap it
every upkeep. This means that they will be losing 4 mana a turn, which
is fine by me because it gives me an even greater speed advantage.
I couldn't begin to count how many times this card has saved my butt
while playing my Necro deck. Everybody should seriously evaluate this
common card.
Also, you mentioned an artifact blocker for those Ehrnam Djinns. How
about Dancing Scimitar? It can block Djinns, Serras, and the like...not
a bad creature at all.
Matthew Hall
Daniel Gray
>Let me start this off my saying: This is just the kind of forum we need
>here - there are WAAAAY to many "staple decks" creeping around.
>Willowgeddon, necro, yadda, yadda, yadda...
>Second: To the duelist: QUIT PUBLISHING TOURNAMENT WINNING DECKS - it only
>compounds the problem! Now in addition to planning for numerous necro and
>ernhamgeddon decks in the PT qualifiers, I'm gonna have to plan for numerous
>loconto clones - sigh. (Actually, you should always plan for evey type of
>deck, but ones you know you will see in slews, you should plan for putting
>countermeasures in your main deck for, so you can win the 3rd game in all
>those swiss rounds so you can qualifiy... and publishing tourney decks make
>skill less and luck more of a factor in getting past those swiss rounds).
Why should they quit publishing winning decks? Just because you get
the formula to winning deck(s) doesn't necessarily mean you can win with one
of those deck(s). Besides which, Type II does have a limited number of current
"staple" decks. The last LA qualifier had about 30% Necro decks, 30%
Willowgeddon, 20% R/W, and the rest a mix of other things. Any tournament will
have this problem, even without publication of decks-- people will see what
won the last tournament and many people will copy it(and some of them will
win, generating still more mindless copying). Sometimes this is a major
problem(three specific instances I can think of were the widespread copying of
Vise Age after last year's Nationals, copying of "The Deck", and, more
locally, the copying of Scott Wilson's Derelor deck throughout Chicago after
he won a few tourneys with it last summer), but it is an unfortuante part of
the tournament dynamic. Not everyone is top flight tournament designer. Magic
is about one third luck, one third deck design, and one third play skill. Any
one of those aspects in abundance can win you games, matches, or tournaments.
That's (Magic) life. When someone who is only an average deck designer sees
the likes of Brian Weissman or Mark Chalice win a tournament with an
interesting deck, they'll figure if they can copy it and play it well, they'll
win some tournaments too. Offering folks $20,000+ for first place in a
tournament tends to compound the problem.
Having said all that, you're right in that preparing for as many
popular decks as possible is critical. Every deck has shortcomings, and they
can(and will) be exploited. I personally don't fell that Mike Loconto's deck,
or U/W in general, is a really effective Type II deck. It's far too slow.
I'm not disparaging Loconto's victory(I didn't do it, so I've no place to
talk), but I get the impression that the Force was with him that day, and it's
far easier to win with a Necrodeck or Willowgeddon deck than with any type of
U/W deck.
>That said:
>In article <dgray.829615460@casbah>, dg...@casbah.acns.nwu.edu says...
>>
>>jes...@saucer.cc.umr.edu (Jesse Chounard) writes:
>>>1. W/G Willowgeddon
>>> The point behind this type of deck is to get out a big
>>> creature (usually Autumn Willow or Erhnam Djinn) and
>>> then beat your opponent with it. Casting Armageddon
>>> once you have your big creature is the way that
>>> this deck achieves a semi-lock.
>>who use it) costs more than one colored mana. 2. "Lifeopotence" the
>powerful
>>card drawing/access combination of Sylvan Library, Land Tax, and
>>Jalum/Jayemdae Tome. While nowhere near as fast as Necropotence,
>Lifopotence
>>is still powerful(and far less painful).
>And far harder to get out. And one tranquility or disk, and it goes away,
>and you have to rebuild the combo from scratch. What was the term you used:
>flaky?
Well, the interesting part about Lifopotence is that any one of three
elements functions fine independently. You don't NEED Jalum Tome, Sylvan
Library, and Land Tax out at the same time. However, you are right-- it's far
more "flaky" than Necropotence. In fact, there simply isn't another card in
the game that's as effective at getting its player cards than Necropotence.
Wheel of Fortune, Braingesyer, and Timetwister can all net a ton of cards, but
they're all one shots(and all Type II illegal). Necropotence is simply the
best method of card acquistion around, assuming the player can afford the
life.
Even at its slower drawing rate, Willowgeddon still works. I've seen
it win numerous tournaments where Necrodecks are prevalent, and I've even seen
one(two weeks ago at Costa Mesa) where both finalists were playing
Willowgeddon and the players beat Necrodecks in the semis. As someone else
recently pointed out-- "getting more cards isn't everything."
>>this deck). "The Black Problem" has two good, easy solutions-- the obvious
>one
>>is Whirling Dervish, which no monoblack player can block, and can only be
>>gotten rid of with Disks or Icys. I recommend running them IN the deck
>rather
>>than sideboard(I'm currently using 3 Dervishes & 2 Archers, with no mana
>elves
>>myself). The second good solution is Storm Seeker, probably in the
>sideboard.
>Comment on dervishes: I have never had my necro-deck killed by dervishes.
>Mainly because I am so afraid of them, I designed the deck with them in
>mind. In addition to the ubiquous Larry's disk, I use icy manipulators,
>serrated arrows, and mishras factories. Many other necro decks I have seen
>feature walking walls, scimitars, and clay statues.
All of which are good choices(except maybe Clay Statue-- it's
expensive, and if someone Armageddons, you won't be regenerating it).
Dervishes CAN kill a Necrodeck dead(I've seen it happen), but there are plenty
of countermeasures to stop death by whirling :) Almost all the Necrodecks
around here now run, in addition to the Disks, Scimitars, Icys, or both,
usually with Arrows in the sideboard.
>Storm seekers are strong against necro decks since you can almost always
>rely on doing a full 7 points with it (occasionally 8 after they blow a disk
>and they get a draw phase the next turn). This can be telling, because even
>with the life gaining artifacts, a necro deck frequently dip very low in
>life. (One reason I use simulacrum in my particular necro deck).
Storm Seekers(and slightly less so, Black Vise) are obnoxious against
Necrodecks. It's a great sideboard card. Simulacrum might be a good solution,
but it has the disadvantage of requiring a creature around, something
Willowgeddon can ensure isn't happening(You may Simulacrum once, but the next
time he/she wants to Seeker, I'm willing to bet the creature(s) will be dealt
with first if at all possible). I've never seen anyone use Simulacrum, so I
don't really know how effective it is, but that's just my general opinion(with
absolutely no empirical evidence).
>>>2. B Necropotence
>>> There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
>>> a. Necro/Knights
>>> b. Necro/Regenerators
>>> c. Necro/Land destruction
>> Advantages: 1. Pure raw speed.
>>2. Disruption.
>#2 CANNOT be ignored. Necropotence alone does not a necro deck make. It is
>the hymns that get rid of all those wraths of gods, armageddons, autumn
>willows, droughts, life-o-potence combos that would otherwise kick its teeth
>in.
Card drawing & disruption are both great on their own, but the
combination of the two is what makes the Necrodeck so formidable. Standard
discard decks have disruption, but tend to sputter out once they run through
the initial hand. Necropotence sidesteps this problem nicely. This is perhaps
the best aspect of the Necrodecks-- speed kills, but speed with more cards
ALWAYS kills :)
>> Problems: 1. Lack of removal.
>>2. Easy
>>color hosing. Because a monoblack player only plays one color, he or she is
>>especially vulnurable to anti-color cards, mainly Protection from Black
>>critters, but also Karma, Drought, Lifeforce, and friends. Combined with
>the
>>difficulty of removing permanents, this can be very, very bad.
>> Solutions: There aren't any effective solutions to get around
>black's
>>inability to remove permanents. About the only major way to disrupt removal
>is
>>Gloom, and lots of it(although Stench of Evil can be effective too).
>That's usually enough. The white cards that would really hose black just
>never seem to come out with gloom on the table. Of course, U/W has sleigts,
>and G/W has traquility/essence filter, but even if you pull one of these
>off, the deck can typically disk it away and try again - and the card
>superiority necro grants usually means you'll draw more glooms that your
>opponent will sleights/tranquilities.
Sleight of MInd is a pain, especially against the Protection from
White critters as well. I've stopped even bothering to try and use Karma or
Drought in my sideboards. I use Storm Seeker(and Dervishes) in my Willowgeddon
deck, and the Kormus Bell plus Disk or Pyroclasm trick in my R/W deck(I also
recently modified to include Sleight of Mind).
>--
>Alan D Kohler
>AKA Hawkwind
>
>hwk...@poky.srv.net
>Seen in the back of Grimtooth's "Traps Fore":
>"There's a sucker born every minute."
> P.T. Barnum
>"And they die about that fast, too"
> Grimtooth
Dan Gray
Daniel Gray
>In article <dgray.829615460@casbah>, dg...@casbah.acns.nwu.edu says...
>(About necropotence)
>> about the only thing that could nuke
>>it completely would be the restriction or removal of Necrootence or Hymn to
>>Tourach.
>Remember last year, vice age was dominating the tournament circuit? And now
>vice is restricted. Now necro is pretty much in the same spot. I'd pretty
>much count on necropotence being next.
Which will probably be closely followed by the restriction of Land
Tax. Kill the Necro decks, and the Willowgeddon and R/W decks will probably
start dominating. Vise's restriction did kill Vise Age, but as someone pointed
out to me recently, a lot of the Vise Age decks got quick kills with
Channel/Fireball. Losing Channel was a blow as well.
Only time will tell...
Dan Gray
Stil
: I will post the various popular deck themes, and a small
: description of each. I am asking all of the readers to
: pick a deck, and tear it apart. Discover all of the
Hmm, this sounds fun. :)
: 1. W/G Willowgeddon
: The point behind this type of deck is to get out a big
: creature (usually Autumn Willow or Erhnam Djinn) and
: then beat your opponent with it. Casting Armageddon
: once you have your big creature is the way that
: this deck achieves a semi-lock.
: Ex: Bertrand Lestree's deck at PT1
Well, the Willowgeddon is a little more complex than that, I think. It
relies quite a bit on permanent removal, before the creature/geddon
hammer comes down.
Problems with the deck:
1. It relies far too much on a specific combo. If someone caps the
armageddons away, the deck suddenly has a *significantly* more difficult
time winning, as only half of the offense is now possible. For the deck
to win, it usually needs to remove the opponent's mana sources, so the
opponent can't deal with the big creature. If the opponent can keep hold
of her mana sources, than the strategy is compromised.
2. It is too easy to hose. What can hose this deck, you ask? Meekstone.
Maybe not many people play with it, but I sure as hell do, it stops the
erhnams, shades, sengirs, et cetra cold. Any blocker that the opponent
can keep out, be it a regenerator, or simply a high-defense creature,
can stop the deck cold if the player can't get rid of the creature.
Good points about the deck:
1. If you get the combo, you almost always win. Unless the opponent has
some method of speed recovery (i.e. necropotence), then the willowgeddon
player can usually beat them over the head.
2. Ridiculously easy to play, though not so much as the necrodeck.
damn, I have to go, I'll finish this up later.
I have enojoyed reading the replies that you all have made!
john
-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-
The contraction "You're" does not indicate possessive. It indicates a
state of being, or, more commonly, a description of the person being
addressed.
The word "Your" does indicate possesive. It does NOT indicate a state of
being, or a description.
-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-
Charles T. Schwope
>Let me start this off my saying: This is just the kind of forum we need
>here - there are WAAAAY to many "staple decks" creeping around.
>Willowgeddon, necro, yadda, yadda, yadda...
>Second: To the duelist: QUIT PUBLISHING TOURNAMENT WINNING DECKS - it only
>compounds the problem! Now in addition to planning for numerous necro and
>ernhamgeddon decks in the PT qualifiers, I'm gonna have to plan for numerous
>loconto clones - sigh. (Actually, you should always plan for evey type of
>deck, but ones you know you will see in slews, you should plan for putting
>countermeasures in your main deck for, so you can win the 3rd game in all
>those swiss rounds so you can qualifiy... and publishing tourney decks make
>skill less and luck more of a factor in getting past those swiss rounds).
I have a problem with this. One year ago I was in school, playing
magic fairly well. I was near the top of the class in our group. I
moved to Dallas, and now on a weekly basis play against and discuss
strategy with George Baxter. I am probably twice the player I was
previously. I have access to an excellent player... most people do
not. In fact, most people do not have net access. Their only
exposure to top decks is from the Duelist and other similar
publications. As it is now, the strongest players tend to either have
net access, or play against people who do.
Because I know George, I could have posted the top 8 decks from the
pro-tourney within a week of the PT. They are going to be in his next
book. WotC is going to be selling the PT decks as well. By putting
them in the Duelist people will get the same access as everyone who
went to the PT.
It does not seem fair to me that if I go to some small town with their
very strong (locally) magic players I might be able to clean up just
because no one there had seen a necro deck. By seeing the junior's
necro deck they might experiment with it, and at least have heard of
it. They will have seen a willowgeddon deck, and probably be ready.
The publishing will lessen the local mins and maximums that go on.
I'm sure that R/W is much more popular in Dallas then in LA b/c
several of the top players are playing R/W (which may be why necro
doesn't do as well here). But now with the Duelist out, people will
experiment with both necro and willogeddon.
There will be always staple decks because of the way the game is.
There are obvious decks that are superior to most others. But there
is also the rock/paper/scissors syndrom. Someone will eventually come
up with a deck that consistently beats the necro decks (currently R/W
is looking good, since all of my necro losses have been to it) and can
do well against other decks (which these can). Then the cycle will
restabilize.
However, right now necro and willowgeddon seem to be the class of Type
II. Until something comes out that can constistently beat both of
them, they will continue to dominate.
-CT
--
Charles T. Schwope | Every man is a spark in the darkness. By the
aka CT | time he is noticed, he is gone forever, a
sch...@infrared.csc.ti.com | retinal afterimage that fades, and is obscured
c-sc...@ti.com | by newer, brighter lights.
Preston Poulter
On 17 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
> Jesse Chounard (jes...@saucer.cc.umr.edu) wrote:
> : I will post the various popular deck themes, and a small
> : description of each. I am asking all of the readers to
> : pick a deck, and tear it apart. Discover all of the
> : weaknesses you can find, and post them here.
>
> : 1. W/G Willowgeddon
> : The point behind this type of deck is to get out a big
> : creature (usually Autumn Willow or Erhnam Djinn) and
> : then beat your opponent with it. Casting Armageddon
> : once you have your big creature is the way that
> : this deck achieves a semi-lock.
> : Ex: Bertrand Lestree's deck at PT1
"Semi-lock?" What lock could possibly be better than Willowgeddon.
Even the whole Stasis/ kismet/Serra thing only lasts for a few turns but
at 4 points a round its enough (just like this one.)
>
> Well, the Willowgeddon is a little more complex than that, I think. It
> relies quite a bit on permanent removal, before the creature/geddon
> hammer comes down.
>
> Problems with the deck:
> 1. It relies far too much on a specific combo. If someone caps the
> armageddons away, the deck suddenly has a *significantly* more difficult
> time winning, as only half of the offense is now possible. For the deck
> to win, it usually needs to remove the opponent's mana sources, so the
> opponent can't deal with the big creature. If the opponent can keep hold
> of her mana sources, than the strategy is compromised.
Not really, I've had the Armageddons capped before (more than once)- still
killed the guy. It's just a card to screw the opponent up and finish the
game right there, without it the game keeps on going which mean you have
a chance to kill that big nasty creature that ripping huge chucks out of
your lifetotal, but you better do it quick.
>
> 2. It is too easy to hose. What can hose this deck, you ask? Meekstone.
> Maybe not many people play with it, but I sure as hell do, it stops the
> erhnams, shades, sengirs, et cetra cold. Any blocker that the opponent
> can keep out, be it a regenerator, or simply a high-defense creature,
> can stop the deck cold if the player can't get rid of the creature.
>
Easy to hose. Not likely. Between Green and White you have every
conceivable lock breaking card in print with the exception of
coutnerspell. You've got so many cards that kill artifacts and
enchantments (more if Dust to Dust were in print like it should be!!!)
that you really have little to worry about if it isn't a creature of a
land. Swords and Icys take care of creatures and Armageddon takes care
of evil lands. Not easy to hose at all.
> Good points about the deck:
>
> 1. If you get the combo, you almost always win. Unless the opponent has
> some method of speed recovery (i.e. necropotence), then the willowgeddon
> player can usually beat them over the head.
Without the combo, you almost always win- but the combo makes it more
stylish.
>
> 2. Ridiculously easy to play, though not so much as the necrodeck.
Not as easy as one might think. There are many sublties (sp?) that you
are perhaps unaware of.
Simply put, the G/W is the most defensible/ hardest to screw of the
dominant Type II tournament decks. Its a bit slow soemtimes (compared to
necro what isn't) but against non-straight Black decks it appears
blazingly fast.
The only real way to screw W/G is to shut down creatures entirely which
is hard to do in Type II. Also, this is only true of Lestree's deck,
mine has direct damage in it which allows for a non-creature kill.
Cheers,
Preston
"Frankly Skywalker, it's touching that you can feel the good in me.
But since I've got my Zuran Orb out I'm afriad I'm now forced to
get Potent all over your ass!"
"Abandon all hope all ye who play without Land Tax or Necropotence."
Thomas Melinsky
>
>In this post I am going to try to start everyone thinking
>(most of us are already) on how to defeat the popular
>and powerful Type II decks. Please feel free to contribute
>anything that you think is valuable. (This will probably
>become obscenely long, so you may want to print it out and
>read it through at your leisure.)
Adding a category:
6. R/U Counter/Control/Kill Deck
Contains:
Bolts/Disintegrate: Kill off quick creatures, disintegrate opponent if
necessary. Sideboard Pyroclasm for bolts for weenies.
Control: Take the big/powerful creatures that come out.
Counter: Prevent the opponent from regaining their own creatures,
direct damage, misc. This includes Deflections.
Creatures: 3 or 4 Prodigal Sorcerers (optional) for continuous
damage.
I have a friend who plays this deck to maximum efficiency. Type II decks
really struggle against it. It is weak against land destruction (mostly
Type I), some quick decks (usually black with discard ability), and I would
like to know what else. It's tough to beat. Continuous damage is very
good, but there isn't a whole lot of it around in Type II (like Black Vise).
Help!
--
--Thomas-Melinsky-/-Out-There-Lately-/-OhioU-/-mel...@bobcat.ent.ohiou.edu-
! I can't do any one thing very well, but I can do lots and lots of things !
! very, very badly. - My Freshman French Professor !
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Stil
: Even the whole Stasis/ kismet/Serra thing only lasts for a few turns but
: at 4 points a round its enough (just like this one.)
Jesse calls it a "semi-lock" because it is just that. It is *not* a true
lock. Anything in the deck but the willow can be killed with a single
mana (plowshare), and she can be stopped cold by one (meekstone). For
a lock to be established, there must be no way to get out of it, and
there are ways to get out of this one.
: > Problems with the deck:
: > 1. It relies far too much on a specific combo. If someone caps the
: > armageddons away, the deck suddenly has a *significantly* more difficult
: > time winning, as only half of the offense is now possible. For the deck
: > to win, it usually needs to remove the opponent's mana sources, so the
: > opponent can't deal with the big creature. If the opponent can keep hold
: > of her mana sources, than the strategy is compromised.
: Not really, I've had the Armageddons capped before (more than once)- still
: killed the guy. It's just a card to screw the opponent up and finish the
: game right there, without it the game keeps on going which mean you have
: a chance to kill that big nasty creature that ripping huge chucks out of
: your lifetotal, but you better do it quick.
The Armageddon is just what you say it is. A card to screw the opponent,
and go for the end of the game. If you don't have the Armageddon, you
are suddenly playing a longer game, as you allow your opponent to have
mana resources to wrath/earthquake/stone et cetra your creatures. I'm
not saying that it make the game impossible to win if the 'geddons go,
but it *does* make it more difficult than it would have been *with* the
geddons.
: > 2. It is too easy to hose. What can hose this deck, you ask? Meekstone.
: > Maybe not many people play with it, but I sure as hell do, it stops the
: > erhnams, shades, sengirs, et cetra cold. Any blocker that the opponent
: > can keep out, be it a regenerator, or simply a high-defense creature,
: > can stop the deck cold if the player can't get rid of the creature.
: Easy to hose. Not likely. Between Green and White you have every
: conceivable lock breaking card in print with the exception of
: coutnerspell. You've got so many cards that kill artifacts and
: enchantments (more if Dust to Dust were in print like it should be!!!)
: that you really have little to worry about if it isn't a creature of a
: land. Swords and Icys take care of creatures and Armageddon takes care
: of evil lands. Not easy to hose at all.
Ok, I'll try this *again*. You do your little willowgeddon combo &
attack. On my turn, I toss out a meekstone. If you don't draw the land
you need to disenchant it, you give me the time to build up my mana
resources again. I could toss out a will-o-the-wisp, or a drudge a turn
later, or ritual out something big enough to stop her. Your swords don't
stop black knights, and your icys don't work if you don't have any mana
to pump into them.
I'm not trying to say that the 'geddon deck is ineffective, because it
obviously is very strong. What I am trying to point out is that it is
hardly the end all be all of decks. It relies heavily on early defense
and removal of dangerous permanents. If it cannot accomplish this task,
then it starts to hurt. If I'm running a counter deck, the armageddon
won't even go off anyway, nor will anything but the willow stay yours.
G/W Armageddon is good, but it is hardly unbeatable.
: > 1. If you get the combo, you almost always win. Unless the opponent has
: > some method of speed recovery (i.e. necropotence), then the willowgeddon
: > player can usually beat them over the head.
: Without the combo, you almost always win- but the combo makes it more
: stylish.
oh, bullshit. If G/W armageddon almost always won *without* the combo,
then there would be no other deck type. Now let's cut the chest beating
and go back to strategy, please.
: > 2. Ridiculously easy to play, though not so much as the necrodeck.
: Not as easy as one might think. There are many sublties (sp?) that you
: are perhaps unaware of.
Ok, tell me what is so subtle (subtleties? I'm not sure either. :) )
about the deck. As far as I can tell, it goes like this: Bring out an
early creature to occupy the opponent's attention, if you have one. If
not, then concentrate on defending yourself and destroying everything
your opponent brings out until you can creature/geddon your way to
victory.
: "Abandon all hope all ye who play without Land Tax or Necropotence."
sadly enough, it seems to be coming to that. I long for alliances, and
new deck designs.
John
Ravi Prashad
On 18 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
> : "Abandon all hope all ye who play without Land Tax or Necropotence."
>
> sadly enough, it seems to be coming to that. I long for alliances, and
> new deck designs.
Don't abandon hope yet! There's still room for other decks,
especially in the PT. I'm still working on my PT deck but I decided to
make it a little more unique: Refusal to use either Tax or 'Potence
(shudder) or Hymns. This puts me in a bad position, what on earth can
you use: Mesmeric Trance is pretty damn scary, as is Mystic Remora.
Zur's Wierding is acknowledged as being a sleeper, and Stormbind is just
ridiculously overpowered. For mine I decided to use the following deck:
<NOTE: Not optimized yet and in very rough shape, help would be appreciated>
Land:
4 City of Brass
2 Brushland
2 Adarkar Waste
2 Sylven... Temples <however you spell it>
3 Island
5 Forest
4 Mishra's Factory (Replace with Strips?)
---
22
Non Land Mana
4 Birds of Paradise
2 Fellwar Stones
---
6
Gold Spells
2 Stormbind
---
2
White Spells
3 Disenchant
---
3
Blue Spells
4 Control
2 Grasp
4 Counterspell
1 Wierding
---
11
Green Spells
4 Dervish
4 ARcher
4 Erhnam
1 Autumn
---
13
Black Spells <Yes, FIVE colours!>
2 Derelor
---
2
1 Zuran Orb
2 Jayemdae Tome
---
3
Total 62
sideboard in very rudimentary form:
2 Swords to Plowshares (Necrodeck for 1st turn specters)
2 Serrated Arrows
1 Aelopile (5th Fallen Card)
2 Spectral Bears (Any other HL cards?)
1 Feldon's Cane
1 Disenchant
1 Steal Artifact
3 Hydroblast
2 Pyroblast
Still deciding if I want to swap in CoP: Red/Green.
-=-
Comments I know will be forthcoming:
!Consistency!
Hello, consistent mana production?!
Mana producing lands:
Blue: 11 (19 blue symbols) with birds and rocks: 17
Green: 11 (22 green): 17
White: 8 (3 white): 14
Red: 4 (2 Red): 10
Black: 4 (2 Black): 10
As of yet I have not been mana screwed but admittedly I've only
played 8 or 9 games against live opponents (deck types: 2 Necropotences
(one with Scimitars <shudder>, one with Recalls <not as bad>), 1
Willowgeddon (with Stormbinds), 1 Willowgeddon-ish
(Bolts,Incinerates,Stormbinds), 1 Classic Cookbook, 1 Tax/Edge with Leng,
1 Urzatron (type 1 fun deck), 1 t1 Red/Green/White weenie, and a couple
of group games where I got smashed to shreds).
Goldfish test: 6 turns <not bad for a deck with counters and controls!)
May replace a tome with a Cap to remove disenchants or Wraths. Also the
Cap is a great lure: play with 4 mana out <unable to use it>, if your
opponent _does not_ disenchant then you know for a fact that they don't
have an artifact kill <I can't think of any player who would let it
live>, feel free to play a Control Magic <unless they're using Tranq's>.
RE: Necro-deck with Dancing Scimitars: a Hell of a lot better
than the normal necrodeck. Stops so many threats it's not even funny.
Even better is a Necro deck with Scimitars and _weakness_ <kill archers
and reduce Specters>
Other stuff: Play one creature at a time obviously <play an
attrition war> always play elves over dervishes to soak up bolts. Almost
always disenchant a disk. Protect the controls with counters _or_
protect the dervish. Note: Unmolested dervish kills in 6 rounds.
Wierding + Dervish. Count cards that you've seen. This is not a quick
kill deck, you want to get the game into a situation where you've got the
hand you want and are just luring out creature kills.
Help/advice is appreciated, the qualifier is on Saturday <today's
Thursday>
> John
Ravi
Preston Poulter
On 18 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
> Preston Poulter (ppou...@taurus.oac.uci.edu) wrote:
> : On 17 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
> : > Jesse Chounard (jes...@saucer.cc.umr.edu) wrote:
> : "Semi-lock?" What lock could possibly be better than Willowgeddon.
> : Even the whole Stasis/ kismet/Serra thing only lasts for a few turns but
> : at 4 points a round its enough (just like this one.)
>
> Jesse calls it a "semi-lock" because it is just that. It is *not* a true
> lock. Anything in the deck but the willow can be killed with a single
> mana (plowshare), and she can be stopped cold by one (meekstone). For
> a lock to be established, there must be no way to get out of it, and
> there are ways to get out of this one.
If you define a "lock" that way then I don't really know of one. Any
lock can be escaped with the right card. And the Willow can't be
plowed. And I have yet to have trouble with a meekstone since I can
disenchant it- I really think you guys are way overestimting meekstone.
It's just a minor annoynance at most.
You obviously don't play against this deck much do you?
Draw a land. I don't need to- I have a land tax out and you just played
a land, plus I might not even need one with Fellwar Stones in play
anyway. Any opponent of mine who hopes that meekstone will solve all
their worries is in for a bitter disappointment.
resources again. I could toss out a will-o-the-wisp, or a drudge a turn
> later, or ritual out something big enough to stop her. Your swords don't
I can't think of anything that can be ritualed out that is big enough to
stop here, unless you have 2 land in play or have 2 rituals. Will of the
Wisp, PA-LEAESE!
> stop black knights, and your icys don't work if you don't have any mana
> to pump into them.
>
If you just played a land, I have all the mana I'll ever need.
> I'm not trying to say that the 'geddon deck is ineffective, because it
> obviously is very strong. What I am trying to point out is that it is
> hardly the end all be all of decks. It relies heavily on early defense
> and removal of dangerous permanents. If it cannot accomplish this task,
> then it starts to hurt. If I'm running a counter deck, the armageddon
> won't even go off anyway, nor will anything but the willow stay yours.
> G/W Armageddon is good, but it is hardly unbeatable.
I think you're wrong. With a given set of parameters there are bound to
be decks that just preform better in the environment than other decks.
Somewhat reminicent of the 54 card deck in Type I (or Weissman as SoM
would call it.) That deck has become simply one of the best to play in
the Type I field. I now feel able to make the following claim:
The W/G or the Necro decks are I feel simply THE BEST possible decks to
play under the given parameters. Specific decks can be made to beat them
but they will be hard pressed to do as well against a wide field. These
decks simply stomp so many opposing decks designs that their tournment
viability simply outmatches anything that can be composed under the
current Type II rules.
Basically, if you don't play one of these 2 decks then you are going to
lose to one of these two decks and it doesn't really matter if you see it
coming.
>
>
> : > 1. If you get the combo, you almost always win. Unless the opponent has
> : > some method of speed recovery (i.e. necropotence), then the willowgeddon
> : > player can usually beat them over the head.
>
> : Without the combo, you almost always win- but the combo makes it more
> : stylish.
>
>
> oh, bullshit. If G/W armageddon almost always won *without* the combo,
> then there would be no other deck type. Now let's cut the chest beating
> and go back to strategy, please.
>
Pardon me, whose played this deck more- you or me. Not only that, I've
won against a WIDE field of opponents without ever casting armageddon.
It's just like the Necro deck- the potence is nice, but it's still a
great deck without it. You don't need it to win- the deck is strong by
itself. You can challenge the creditbility of my claim if you want, but
I know what works.
>
>
> : > 2. Ridiculously easy to play, though not so much as the necrodeck.
> : Not as easy as one might think. There are many sublties (sp?) that you
> : are perhaps unaware of.
>
> Ok, tell me what is so subtle (subtleties? I'm not sure either. :) )
> about the deck. As far as I can tell, it goes like this: Bring out an
> early creature to occupy the opponent's attention, if you have one. If
> not, then concentrate on defending yourself and destroying everything
> your opponent brings out until you can creature/geddon your way to
> victory.
>
That's white weenie- this is a little different.
I'm not really all that sure exactly what it is (that's why its subtle!)
I've just seen too many people try to play
it against me and fail miserably because they screw something up. You
need to play the deck for a good solid, oh, two weeks to get whatever
version you're playing down. And there are a lot more sophisticated
versions out there then Lestree's deck. Lestree's deck was just as he
said it was, simple. Simple works in tournaments, but if I play a style
that does something a little different that gets me over the other guys
then thats, what, subilty? What would you call it?
Cheers,
Preston
"Frankly Skywalker, it's touching that you can feel the good in me.
But since I've got my Zuran Orb out I'm afriad I'm now forced to
get Potent all over your ass!"
"Abandon all hope all ye who play without Land Tax or Necropotence."
a
a
a
a
a
Kathy Waddell
>: 2. B Necropotence
>: There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
>: a. Necro/Knights
>: This decks objective is to pump out creatures using
>: the Necro to draw an obscene amount of cards.
>: This deck also usually uses a fair amount of hand
>: destruction as well.
>: b. Necro/Regenerators
>: This deck uses Nevinyrral's Disk and a bunch of
>: regenerators to stop the enemy from having any
>: non-land permanents, while keeping your own.
>: c. Necro/Land destruction
>: This version uses Strips, Icequake, Blight, and
>: Icy Manipulators as well as Nevinyrral's Disk
>: to stop the opponent from having any sources of
>: mana.
How about playing a Howling Mine in response to opponent playing
Necropotence? You would get 2 cards a turn for free while
they would have to pay for their cards. Combined it with Library
of Leng, Storm Bind, Storm Seeker and a R/G deck. Of course you
would have to take care of their Icy with R/G anti-artifact stuff.
For non-necro decks keep Howling Mine in the SB.
Have fun!
=-Kathy->
Jamie C. Wakefield
Preston has gotten a rep as being one of the best willogeddon deck
players there is. As well as being one of the first to make it
popular with his lily white (is that the right name?) deck at the
pro-tour. Just having the design and the cards is not nearly
enough. I've seen experienced players play the willow-geddon
deck and mess it up. I've also seem people play the necro deck
and give up on it because their play style does not work with
them sacing life for cards. It took me about 20 games to figure out
when to cast the necro and when it would kill me. Then another twenty
to figure out the best support cards and adapt it to my preferences.
I play it with no knights. No racks and more drain lifes than
most people I've seen play it. Then of course there is the
sideboard.
The "gamemaster" (my friend doug) gave up on it after about ten
games and declared it a fad. It has it's pluses, but it's not for
everyone. I don't have the skill to play the willowgeddon deck,
not being much of a white player, and would not attempt to.
If you think these decks are pretty simple, enter your next
tournament with one after playing it only a couple of times and
tell us how you do.
But, on the other hand, I do not think they are the be all end all
of type two either. Necro is a good card, but I'm working on other
decks that I think with a lot of tuning, will be even better, and
will keep people unaware so I catch people off guard at regionals.
If everyone is playing willowgeddon/necropotence, then I'll have a
deck ready that is competitive, but has a sideboard and strategy
just for these decks. Asa many people have said - the metagame is
one of the most important aspects of the game.
good luck
good gaming
good night
jamie
Kai Martin
: The only real way to screw W/G is to shut down creatures entirely which
: mine has direct damage in it which allows for a non-creature kill.
R/W decks (non Tax/Edge decks) can do this on a fairly consistent basis.
With all the red DD, the plows, wraths, and Blinking Spirits on the white
side, and annoying artifacts like Disks or Icys (I prefer Icys), you'll be
lucky to do damage with creatures at all.
Kai "If you've got a creature, I've got a way to stop it" Martin
Full-fledged member of the Big Daddy's crew
###############################################################################
Kai Martin || // //\\ [][][]
Dept. of Computer Science & Electrical Engineering ||// // \\ []
University of Illinois at Chicago || \\ //====\\ []
kma...@eecs.uic.edu || \\ // \\ [][][]
###############################################################################
Preston Poulter
> of type two either. Necro is a good card, but I'm working on other
> decks that I think with a lot of tuning, will be even better, and
> will keep people unaware so I catch people off guard at regionals.
> If everyone is playing willowgeddon/necropotence, then I'll have a
> deck ready that is competitive, but has a sideboard and strategy
> just for these decks. Asa many people have said - the metagame is
> one of the most important aspects of the game.
> good luck
> good gaming
> good night
> jamie
>
>
needed one. I wish you the best of luck. However, I am of the opinion
that, as I said, a better deck does not exist other than these 2 under
the given parameters for Type II.
If someone could disprove me, no one would be more happy than myself.
Kai Martin
: I think you're wrong. With a given set of parameters there are bound to
: be decks that just preform better in the environment than other decks.
: Somewhat reminicent of the 54 card deck in Type I (or Weissman as SoM
: would call it.) That deck has become simply one of the best to play in
: the Type I field. I now feel able to make the following claim:
: The W/G or the Necro decks are I feel simply THE BEST possible decks to
: play under the given parameters. Specific decks can be made to beat them
: but they will be hard pressed to do as well against a wide field. These
: decks simply stomp so many opposing decks designs that their tournment
: viability simply outmatches anything that can be composed under the
: current Type II rules.
: Basically, if you don't play one of these 2 decks then you are going to
: lose to one of these two decks and it doesn't really matter if you see it
: coming.
Not to sound like a broken record (see my previous post), but you obviously
haven't faced any decent R/W decks. R/W has a good chance in beating
Willowgeddon and Necro decks, and (imo) is just as viable a deck as any
type II deck out there. Yes, people, you do have a 3rd type II option.
-Kai Martin
Alan D Kohler
>>Second: To the duelist: QUIT PUBLISHING TOURNAMENT WINNING DECKS - it
only
>>compounds the problem! Now in addition to planning for numerous necro and
>>ernhamgeddon decks in the PT qualifiers, I'm gonna have to plan for
numerous
>>loconto clones - sigh.
(Much snipping and abreviation follows):
> I have a problem with this.
> I have access to an excellent player... most people do
>not. In fact, most people do not have net access. Their only
>exposure to top decks is from the Duelist and other similar
>publications. As it is now, the strongest players tend to either have
>net access, or play against people who do.
I might buy that but not totally. Good players still exist outside the
bounds of the net.
> It does not seem fair to me that if I go to some small town with
their
>very strong (locally) magic players I might be able to clean up just
>because no one there had seen a necro deck.
> There will be always staple decks because of the way the game is.
>There are obvious decks that are superior to most others. But there
>is also the rock/paper/scissors syndrom. Someone will eventually come
>up with a deck that consistently beats the necro decks
It's hard to sum up why I feel differently than you do. I am from a small
town too. I may have a local reputation as a nasty player, but I've had
that reputation prior to my association with this newsgroup. And I don't
have a problem with people having access to the same type of information
that appears on this newsgroup.
However, I do have a problem when a player of marginal skill becomes serious
competiton for players who have toiled for hours on tuning their deck,
preparing it, learning its nuances getting knocked out of the tourney by
some bozo who copies a deck verbatim out of the duelist.
My original statement was probably a little reactionary. After looking over
loconto's deck, it's not a deck I would fear. I would be much more afraid
of Betrands deck - IMHO, he is THE magic player. All the ratle about the NY
pro tour being an event not influenced by luck is bunk. Betrand should have
won, based on strength of the deck alone. But loconto navigated around the
type of deck that would have given him serious problems - namely necro decks
and direct damage decks. The rock / paper / scissors thing is true, 100% -
loconto's rock just never played against any paper and in the end broke
betrands scissors.
But the less of these decks that are pubished and copied, the more people -
anyone, not just netizens - will come up with fresh, new deck concepts and
the more the tournament environment will evolve. Most good players on the
net operate with a basic knowledge of what a deck is like - like the fact
that most necro decks feature nevy's disks, cheap black spells, hymns and
strip mines. A verbatim breakdown of a necro deck is not needed to give a
player the low-down on the deck.
Stil
: > Jesse calls it a "semi-lock" because it is just that. It is *not* a true
: > lock. Anything in the deck but the willow can be killed with a single
: > mana (plowshare), and she can be stopped cold by one (meekstone). For
: > a lock to be established, there must be no way to get out of it, and
: > there are ways to get out of this one.
: If you define a "lock" that way then I don't really know of one. Any
: lock can be escaped with the right card. And the Willow can't be
: plowed. And I have yet to have trouble with a meekstone since I can
: disenchant it- I really think you guys are way overestimting meekstone.
: It's just a minor annoynance at most.
Preston, buddy. *read* the post. I know that Willow can't be plowed,
that's why I said "Anything...BUT the willlow". And yes, you *do* know
of such locks. Stasis/Kismet with an instilled bird or a time elemental
is such a lock, zur's/ivory tower is such a lock, Nether Void/ Land
Equilibrium can be such a lock, et cetra..
How many meekstones have you disenchanted in tournaments, with your G/W,
by the way? I'm just curious, because I don't see that many meekstones
floating around.
: > Ok, I'll try this *again*. You do your little willowgeddon combo &
: > attack. On my turn, I toss out a meekstone. If you don't draw the land
: > you need to disenchant it, you give me the time to build up my mana
: >
: You obviously don't play against this deck much do you?
Maybe 10-12 times a week, a friend of mine is loony over the thing.
: Draw a land. I don't need to- I have a land tax out and you just played
: a land, plus I might not even need one with Fellwar Stones in play
: anyway. Any opponent of mine who hopes that meekstone will solve all
: their worries is in for a bitter disappointment.
But what if you *don't* have a land tax out? What if I disenchanted it?
What if I have a zorb out and just eat the land immediately? What if,
what if, what if. This is not something that you can say "this always
happens" because it doesn't. The draw is everything, as is what you and
your opponent draw afterword.
: resources again. I could toss out a will-o-the-wisp, or a drudge a turn
: > later, or ritual out something big enough to stop her. Your swords don't
: I can't think of anything that can be ritualed out that is big enough to
: stop here, unless you have 2 land in play or have 2 rituals. Will of the
: Wisp, PA-LEAESE!
"PA-LEASE!"? Really, now, no need to get upset. We *can* discuss
strategy without being insulting, ok? The wisp is a legitimate way to
stop the willow/erhnam from beating the opponent over the head. Hell,
*Abu* can stop willow in her tracks, come to think of it. He was a
solution to her in the .misc newsgroup.
: > stop black knights, and your icys don't work if you don't have any mana
: > to pump into them.
: >
: If you just played a land, I have all the mana I'll ever need.
Perhaps... perhaps we need to take a look at the original post. I was
replying to the creature/geddon combo. You seem to be quite sure that
you would have out fellwars, icys, and a land tax or two. This is why we
cannot come to an agreement on what would/could happen. Because there
are just too many variables. Hell, what if I had thrown an Energy Flux
out on the table the turn before you were going to armageddon? Wait, let
me guess. You would have a disenchant, wouldn't you? And if I put out a
meekstone? You would have another disenchant, and so on, and so on.
There are too many variables here for us to reach a logical conclusion.
: > obviously is very strong. What I am trying to point out is that it is
: > hardly the end all be all of decks. It relies heavily on early defense
: > and removal of dangerous permanents. If it cannot accomplish this task,
: > then it starts to hurt. If I'm running a counter deck, the armageddon
: > won't even go off anyway, nor will anything but the willow stay yours.
: > G/W Armageddon is good, but it is hardly unbeatable.
: I think you're wrong. With a given set of parameters there are bound to
I think you're arrogant. You simply cannot prove that the deck is
unbeatable. Hell, you've lost before, so you *know* it isn't unbeatable.
It may be difficult to beat, and it may win a majority of the games that
it plays, but that does *not* mean that it cannot lose.
: The W/G or the Necro decks are I feel simply THE BEST possible decks to
: play under the given parameters. Specific decks can be made to beat them
: but they will be hard pressed to do as well against a wide field. These
: decks simply stomp so many opposing decks designs that their tournment
: viability simply outmatches anything that can be composed under the
: current Type II rules.
*Sigh*
I'm reminded of the craze over the white weenie decks, the discard
decks, the vice age decks, the land's edge decks, and so on and so on.
We have new "dominant" decks appearing in cycles, and every time a new
one shows up, people think that this is it, the best possible deck has
been made. I *really* can't wait for alliances to come out now.
That said, I agree with your above paragraph, with one addendum: I *do*
believe that there are decks that can beat the two kings of the current
hill, I think that they are simply just less popular. Examples:
1. R/W/g Permanent Removal
2. R/U Permanent Removal & Counter/Burn
3. R/G Orgg/Shivan 2nd turn
4. R/G Jokuweenie
5. B/w Discard
et cetra
: Basically, if you don't play one of these 2 decks then you are going to
: lose to one of these two decks and it doesn't really matter if you see it
: coming.
No, I don't believe this. The meta-game is what you have to win, and if
you know that everyone is going to have these decks, then you can
prepare against them.
: great deck without it. You don't need it to win- the deck is strong by
: itself. You can challenge the creditbility of my claim if you want, but
: I know what works.
Preston, I'm *not saying that the deck is bad*. I KNOW that it is a good
strategy, and a good deck. What I am saying is that it is not
unbeatable, and that losing an armageddon will hurt. I KNOW you don't
need it to win, but it does help a *great* deal, and if it is removed,
that help is not there.
: > Ok, tell me what is so subtle (subtleties? I'm not sure either. :) )
: > about the deck. As far as I can tell, it goes like this: Bring out an
: > early creature to occupy the opponent's attention, if you have one. If
: > not, then concentrate on defending yourself and destroying everything
: > your opponent brings out until you can creature/geddon your way to
: > victory.
: >
: That's white weenie- this is a little different.
That is *not* white weenie. White weenie is an all out offense, with an
armageddon hammer to let the weenies finish off the opponent. The focus
on the early defense is what makes the deck different.
: that does something a little different that gets me over the other guys
: then thats, what, subilty? What would you call it?
Ok, this one I know. :)
Subtlety
: "Abandon all hope all ye who play without Land Tax or Necropotence."
Can we put on some Metallica now? Say... "Sad but true"?
:)
Ok, I got a little vehement. If anyone is offended, I apologize, but I
think that we can all have a discussion without resorting to belittling
each other.
john
: a
: a
: a
: a
: a
--
Stil
: On 18 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
: Zur's Wierding is acknowledged as being a sleeper, and Stormbind is just
: ridiculously overpowered. For mine I decided to use the following deck:
ooh, tasty! I have run a deck much like this one, sans derelors, and a
little lighter on the other critters.
(deck deleted)
Ok, you need more blue. 8 Spells with a casting cost including UU, and
with only 9 sources of blue? 11 if you count the temples, but they are
slow. The fellwars are unreliable, because so few play blue, in these
days of necro/willow decks. The birds help, but birds tend to die pretty
fast, too. Perhaps add in two more wastes, over two islands. After all,
you'll really only be using U/W when there is a threat, or when you want
to toss down the weirding.
I like the counterspells, they stop those damn armageddons & disks (if
you are without a disenchant). Perhaps powersinks would work as well,
though, if not better? You have enough mana production with 28 sources
that a sink is easy, and it only requires 1 blue.
Personally, I would turn it into a howling mine/weirding/stormbind/leng
deck, but that's just me. :)
I like the variety you have, with 9 4/x creatures, you have a serious
critter threat. With the Stormbinds, you have an enchantment threat, and
with a leng, were you to add it, you could have a decking threat.
Very basic critter deck, *resist* the urge to put in armageddons, don't
join the dark side, Ravi.
john
Daniel Gray
>Preston Poulter (ppou...@taurus.oac.uci.edu) wrote:
>: The only real way to screw W/G is to shut down creatures entirely which
>: is hard to do in Type II. Also, this is only true of Lestree's deck,
>: mine has direct damage in it which allows for a non-creature kill.
>R/W decks (non Tax/Edge decks) can do this on a fairly consistent basis.
>With all the red DD, the plows, wraths, and Blinking Spirits on the white
>side, and annoying artifacts like Disks or Icys (I prefer Icys), you'll be
>lucky to do damage with creatures at all.
Blinking Spirit, of course, doesn't work so well with Armageddon
around. A Willowgeddon vs. a R/W deck is a strange match indeed. One deck
sends in the Marines, the other keeps trying to remove them. Whoever runs out
first usually loses in my experience. Armageddon can throw a monkey wrench i
the works, but both types of decks work fairly well with little mana. It's
kind of a toss-up between the two, but Necrodecks tend to mess up both of them
from time to time. More "Rocks, scissors, paper," I guess :)
>Kai "If you've got a creature, I've got a way to stop it" Martin
>Full-fledged member of the Big Daddy's crew
Dan Gray
>###############################################################################
>Kai Martin || // //\\ [][][]
>Dept. of Computer Science & Electrical Engineering ||// // \\ []
>University of Illinois at Chicago || \\ //====\\ []
>kma...@eecs.uic.edu || \\ // \\ [][][]
>###############################################################################
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Daniel Gray
>Preston Poulter (ppou...@rigel.oac.uci.edu) wrote:
>: I think you're wrong. With a given set of parameters there are bound to
>: be decks that just preform better in the environment than other decks.
>: Somewhat reminicent of the 54 card deck in Type I (or Weissman as SoM
>: would call it.) That deck has become simply one of the best to play in
>: the Type I field. I now feel able to make the following claim:
>: The W/G or the Necro decks are I feel simply THE BEST possible decks to
>: play under the given parameters. Specific decks can be made to beat them
>: but they will be hard pressed to do as well against a wide field. These
>: decks simply stomp so many opposing decks designs that their tournment
>: viability simply outmatches anything that can be composed under the
>: current Type II rules.
>: Basically, if you don't play one of these 2 decks then you are going to
>: lose to one of these two decks and it doesn't really matter if you see it
>: coming.
>Not to sound like a broken record (see my previous post), but you obviously
>haven't faced any decent R/W decks. R/W has a good chance in beating
>Willowgeddon and Necro decks, and (imo) is just as viable a deck as any
>type II deck out there. Yes, people, you do have a 3rd type II option.
I don't know about Preston's experience against R/W decks(I'm sure
he's played some), but Charles Schwope(a player from Texas, and friend of
George Baxter) recently pointed out that R/W decks do well down there. As Kai
says, there is a good third option. You still have to use Land Tax, of course,
so the "Abandon all hope" rule still applies.
Dan Gray
>-Kai Martin
> Full-fledged member of the Big Daddy's crew
>###############################################################################
the_furry_one
: Remember last year, vice age was dominating the tournament circuit? And now
: much count on necropotence being next.
pardon the french, but *FUCK* necropotence. hymn to tourach is the game
winning card in these decks, potence is just used to refill the hand
quickly.
ever since fallen empires came out, and people first saw hymns, the
general consensus was 'restrict this thing', at least locally. one of the
biggest fans of discard (played four mindtwists in every deck he could
before it was restricted) thought the hymn was too powerful. but alas,
the cries have fallen on deaf ears.
necropotence is a balanced card.. no draw phase, life for cards, etc.
hymn to tourach is black's cheese card. two out of an opponents hand for
one of your own? far too powerful for its own good. though there are
several cards that net two or more cards in play (wrath, armageddon, dust
to dust, shatterstorm, etc), they aren't always gamewinners like the hymn.
it is entirely possible to comeback from a wrath, or an armageddon, but it
isn't nearly as easy to come back from a hymn or two early on.
"did you win because you are a more skilled player? no, you won because
you used a cheesy ass card that was entirely luck."
"well.. yeah..."
--
jet...@teleport.com "quotes are for mortals."
.signature files are a waste of bandwidth
raj
>: 2. B Necropotence
>: There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
>: a. Necro/Knights
>: This decks objective is to pump out creatures using
>: the Necro to draw an obscene amount of cards.
>: This deck also usually uses a fair amount of hand
>: destruction as well.
This is the only version of the Necrodeck I have seen, and I think it is
the one we are all most familiar with. I have never played against one,
but I have seen severeal very good ones, as well as reading many posted
on this newsgroup.
I'm not saying I have a solution to beating this deck by any means, but
think of it this way: what we have is a stock mono-black denial deck
with just two key cards. Those two cards are Nevinyrral's Disk and (of
course) 'potence. Necropotence is key card #1, and the Disk is key card
#2.
Key card #1 provides massive ability to draw cards. Normally discard
decks are not too bad - after all, just one or two hymns and knights
isn't a game winner - but with this card they become very, very, bad.
Key card #2 prevents opponents of the deck from laying out permanents
that disrupt the action of the deck (howling mines, circles, big
creatures) and also removes necros that have outgrown their usefulness.
To deal with #1, howling mines are one of the best defenses I can think
of, plus perhaps counters for the denial (drawn at speed) and even for
the necro itself. You could always cap them out, too (though this is a
cop-out).
To deal with #2, destroy them tapped, play with blinkies and mishra's,
cap them out.
In general, I think necrodecks would be susceptible to various locks -
mana deprivation, augury/millstone, whatever else - as all they really
have is disk's to solve their problems.
Hope this helped - just remember, all they are is black denial with two
extra cards.
Toby.
Majesk
while without butting in, but I really think it's time.
ERHNAMGEDDON AND NECRO ARE NOT THE BE ALL AND END ALL OF TYPE 2 DECKS!!!!!
There, I've said it. I truely believe that these decks are beatable if
one plays the metagame correctly. Not to say that they are weak; indeed,
if that were true we would not be hearing report after report about how
they massacred all comers at another tournament. But there are other
possiblilities out there. I was a necro fanatic for about a month after
the Pro Tourney - won my fair share of tourneys with it, too. The best
was in the finals of a tourney a week after new york, when my opponent was
looking through his sideboard muttering "What the hell do I put in against
this thing??" But now he knows. Now everyone knows. And THAT is one
reason necropotence is weak. No, not weak, but not dominant. Necro and
Erhnamgeddon are the Net Decks - what everyone is talking about and what
everyone wants to find some way to beat. "Restrict Necropotence!"
"Restrict Hymn and Land Tax!" NO!!! Restrictions are not the answer.
Originality is the key to victory. If you can throw together a deck from
Scrye and win with it, good for you. But if you can build your own
*original* deck, take it to a tourney and romp through the Necros and
Erhnamgeddon decks, more power to you. Look at the top 16 of NY - there
were what, 4 or 5 G/W decks, 2 or 3 U/W, *1* necro decks, *1* winter orb
deck, *1* "House of Pain", etc. Just because the Erhnamgeddon deck is
plastered all over Duelist and the net, along with it's mono black Necro
brother doesn't mean these are the only ways to go! Look at these decks,
pick them apart, find how they tick, and BREAK them!!! The Weissman deck
was rumored to be unbeatable in it's day - it's obvious now that it isn't.
Bring on the Brown Ouphe decks! Dust off those stormseekers and let em
have it! C'Mon, this is the strategy board, not
"rec.games.trading-cards.magic.whining-about-winning-deck-types" It's
time we figure this one out!
Sorry for the repetition and obnoxiously long post
MAJESK
aka Brian Kibler
Designer of the Prototype Trike deck
Chance Harris
: Alan D Kohler (hwk...@poky.srv.net) wrote:
: : Remember last year, vice age was dominating the tournament circuit? And now
: : vice is restricted. Now necro is pretty much in the same spot. I'd pretty
: : much count on necropotence being next.
: pardon the french, but *FUCK* necropotence. hymn to tourach is the game
: winning card in these decks, potence is just used to refill the hand
: quickly.
: ever since fallen empires came out, and people first saw hymns, the
: general consensus was 'restrict this thing', at least locally. one of the
: biggest fans of discard (played four mindtwists in every deck he could
: before it was restricted) thought the hymn was too powerful. but alas,
: the cries have fallen on deaf ears.
I think Hymn would've been OK if they had just made sure that they
brought Pyshich Purge back in Chronicles. I don't think a necro
player would've enjoyed hymming one of those.
------------------------------------------------
Politics is a conflict of interests masquerading
as a conflict of ideals.
- (poorly paraphrased?) Ambrose Bierce
------------------------------------------------
Chance Harris
cha...@coyote.sps.mot.com
#include<std_disclaimer.h>
Jeff Sternal
raj <k304...@student.anu.edu.au> wrote:
>sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) wrote:
>>: 2. B Necropotence
>>: There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
>>: a. Necro/Knights
>>: This decks objective is to pump out creatures using
>>: the Necro to draw an obscene amount of cards.
>>: This deck also usually uses a fair amount of hand
>>: destruction as well.
>This is the only version of the Necrodeck I have seen,
>I'm not saying I have a solution to beating this deck by any means, but
>think of it this way: what we have is a stock mono-black denial deck
>with just two key cards. Those two cards are Nevinyrral's Disk and (of
>course) 'potence. Necropotence is key card #1, and the Disk is key card
>#2.
Hiya Tobey,
You're just about right here, except I think that the key cards
are in reverse order - as you recognize at the end. The Disk
allows the Necrodeck to play a control game. I put out a Disk,
and a creature (and probably a Mishra), and you have to deal
with those threats without the help of a Jayemdae Tome, Icy
Manipulator, or anything else I might find offensive. I'll
hold creatures in my hand, and Hymn away the cards you aren't
playing while you're waiting for a Disenchant. Then, after
the Disk goes off, out come more creatures, Infernal Darkness,
whatever.
>Key card #2 prevents opponents of the deck from laying out permanents
>that disrupt the action of the deck (howling mines, circles, big
>creatures) and also removes necros that have outgrown their usefulness.
>To deal with #2, destroy them tapped, play with blinkies and mishra's,
>cap them out.
Right on. My friend Jim beat me over the head by Capping out
my Disks and laying a Winter Orb out. This is very hard to recover
from.
>In general, I think necrodecks would be susceptible to various locks -
>mana deprivation, augury/millstone, whatever else - as all they really
>have is disk's to solve their problems.
>Toby.
Energy Flux is my new attempt to answer that vulnerability. Without
it, I think that good U/W decks (using the Icy/Winter Orb engine) beat
Necro everytime, though that doesn't seem to be happening around the
country.
Hmmm.
Jeff
Ravi Prashad
Ravi Prashad, University of Waterloo, HCO Systems Design Engineering,
On 19 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
> ooh, tasty! I have run a deck much like this one, sans derelors, and a
> little lighter on the other critters.
Derelerelerelor (as he's affectionately known) is a horribly powerful
creature especially because he's an Autumn Willow creature (and helps to
fulfill my FE requirement).
> Ok, you need more blue. 8 Spells with a casting cost including UU, and
> with only 9 sources of blue? 11 if you count the temples, but they are
> slow. The fellwars are unreliable, because so few play blue, in these
> days of necro/willow decks. The birds help, but birds tend to die pretty
> fast, too. Perhaps add in two more wastes, over two islands. After all,
> you'll really only be using U/W when there is a threat, or when you want
> to toss down the weirding.
I cut out a forest for an additional Island. Fellwars over more
land = robustness of design: I do not want to fry to an Armageddon. As
well it let's me play off colour's fairly easily (in a memorable game
agains the Tax/Edge deck that was designed for type 1, whne the Blood
Moon came out my only hope was to play a fellwar and disenchant).
> I like the counterspells, they stop those damn armageddons & disks (if
> you are without a disenchant). Perhaps powersinks would work as well,
> though, if not better? You have enough mana production with 28 sources
> that a sink is easy, and it only requires 1 blue.
The Sink is Good, and while I may toss out a Grasp for one, right
know there isn't room. Currently counters are in there for the following
cards: Hymn to Tourach, Disrupting Sceptre, Disk, Cap, Wierding, Wrath
of God, Armageddon, 'Haups, and Balance. That's not really that many.
Wrath doesn't hurt to much since I end up playing a game of attrition:
one creature at a time.
> Personally, I would turn it into a howling mine/weirding/stormbind/leng
> deck, but that's just me. :)
Refuse to use Howling Mine on a moral basis.
> I like the variety you have, with 9 4/x creatures, you have a serious
> critter threat. With the Stormbinds, you have an enchantment threat, and
> with a leng, were you to add it, you could have a decking threat.
Well actually it's only 7 4/x <only 2 Derelors>, but they usually don't
do damage, they just exist to block, and force the opponent to
Swords/Wrath...It's the _12_ weenies that do damage, as well as the
Controlled Stuff.
> Very basic critter deck, *resist* the urge to put in armageddons, don't
> join the dark side, Ravi.
It's the point of the deck: yes I could add in some 'potences
(making a different deck but very similar), but heck, why succumb to
popular trend? Willowgeddon and 'Potence are very strong, but they're by
no means all powerful: just wait 'til the next gen of Trance and Remora
decks come out: Blue is back.
> john
Ravi Prashad
Brian Mudge
For what little it's worth, I don't think that U/W decks are totally
helpless against Willowgeddon.
It occurs to me that we're discussing the tournament results that
were published in the Duelist.
That's well and good, but it strikes me as a little odd.
The tournament the duelist supplement wrote about is LONG over, and some
of the game has changed from that time.
Specifically, Recall and Feldon's cane have been removed from the
restricted list.
Strictly speaking, the game environment has changed, and we don't have
any empirical evidence as to what the new dominant strategy is.
Bri...
Steven Liu
: Preston Poulter (ppou...@taurus.oac.uci.edu) wrote:
: : On 17 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
: : > Jesse Chounard (jes...@saucer.cc.umr.edu) wrote:
:
: : "Semi-lock?" What lock could possibly be better than Willowgeddon.
: : Even the whole Stasis/ kismet/Serra thing only lasts for a few turns but
: : at 4 points a round its enough (just like this one.)
: lock. Anything in the deck but the willow can be killed with a single
: mana (plowshare), and she can be stopped cold by one (meekstone). For
: a lock to be established, there must be no way to get out of it, and
: there are ways to get out of this one.
:
: : > 1. It relies far too much on a specific combo. If someone caps the
: : > armageddons away, the deck suddenly has a *significantly* more difficult
: : > time winning, as only half of the offense is now possible. For the deck
: : > to win, it usually needs to remove the opponent's mana sources, so the
: : > opponent can't deal with the big creature. If the opponent can keep hold
: : > of her mana sources, than the strategy is compromised.
:
: : Not really, I've had the Armageddons capped before (more than once)- still
: : a chance to kill that big nasty creature that ripping huge chucks out of
: : your lifetotal, but you better do it quick.
:
: The Armageddon is just what you say it is. A card to screw the opponent,
: and go for the end of the game. If you don't have the Armageddon, you
: are suddenly playing a longer game, as you allow your opponent to have
: mana resources to wrath/earthquake/stone et cetra your creatures. I'm
: not saying that it make the game impossible to win if the 'geddons go,
: but it *does* make it more difficult than it would have been *with* the
: geddons.
A typical Willowgeddon deck becomes a critter horde deck with the Armageddons
removed. Just as the Necrodisk deck is a decent critter horde deck without
the Necropotence/Nevinyrral's Disk, the Willowgeddon deck is decent without
the Autumn Willow/Armageddon. The "theme" cards are just icing on the cake.
: : > 2. It is too easy to hose. What can hose this deck, you ask? Meekstone.
: : > Maybe not many people play with it, but I sure as hell do, it stops the
: : > erhnams, shades, sengirs, et cetra cold. Any blocker that the opponent
: : > can keep out, be it a regenerator, or simply a high-defense creature,
: : > can stop the deck cold if the player can't get rid of the creature.
: :
: : Easy to hose. Not likely. Between Green and White you have every
: : conceivable lock breaking card in print with the exception of
: : coutnerspell. You've got so many cards that kill artifacts and
: : enchantments (more if Dust to Dust were in print like it should be!!!)
: : that you really have little to worry about if it isn't a creature of a
: : land. Swords and Icys take care of creatures and Armageddon takes care
: : of evil lands. Not easy to hose at all.
:
: Ok, I'll try this *again*. You do your little willowgeddon combo &
: attack. On my turn, I toss out a meekstone. If you don't draw the land
: you need to disenchant it, you give me the time to build up my mana
: resources again. I could toss out a will-o-the-wisp, or a drudge a turn
: later, or ritual out something big enough to stop her. Your swords don't
: stop black knights, and your icys don't work if you don't have any mana
: to pump into them.
More likely than not, by the time the Willowgeddon deck pulls off the Autumn
Willow/Armageddon trick, he will have two lands sitting on the top shelves
of the Sylvan Library.
The key here is permanent-destruction. Potential blockers can be StPed (but
Ihsan's Shade). The only non-creature ways to stop Autumn Willow for less
than three mana are:
Anti-Autumn Willow Willowgeddon Counter
1) Meekstone Disenchant/Divine Offering.
2) Apocalypse Chime Disenchant/Divine Offering.
3) Nevinyrral's Disk (pre-cast) Disenchant/Divine Offering before hand.
4) Apocalypse Chime (pre-cast) Disenchant/Divine Offering before hand.
5) Balance Balance's restriction.
So you're basically stuck hoping that you have/get your Balance.
: I'm not trying to say that the 'geddon deck is ineffective, because it
: obviously is very strong. What I am trying to point out is that it is
: hardly the end all be all of decks. It relies heavily on early defense
: and removal of dangerous permanents. If it cannot accomplish this task,
: then it starts to hurt. If I'm running a counter deck, the armageddon
: won't even go off anyway, nor will anything but the willow stay yours.
: G/W Armageddon is good, but it is hardly unbeatable.
Of course Willowgeddon is not unbeatable. Necrodisk stands a chance, but
Willowgeddon has the edge here. Why? Well, let's take a closer look at
these two decks going head-to-head:
Necrodisk threats:
Gloom--Need two Glooms to shut down the cheap destruction spells in white;
can't 'Disk effectively; have to worry about Tranquility.
Hymn to Tourach--Put the important stuff on (Sylvan Library) shelve until
needed; fill your hand with Land Tax.
Necropotence--Damn the Necropotence, hit him early with dervish and djinn
so he can't get 'Potent, follow up with Hurricane or Storm Seeker.
Willowgeddon Threats:
Whirling Dervish--Dancing Scimitar, Serrated Arrows, Nevinyrral's Disk are
not effective counters for Whirling Dervish because of the existence of
Divine Offering (giving white eight easy-zappers, and even some life).
Erhnam Djinn--Dancing Scimitar, Nevinyrral's Disk are not effective counters
again for the same reason. Must use Dark Banishing or Terror against
these.
Karma--Erk.
Autumn Willow/Armageddon--Erk.
Land Tax/Jalum Tome/Sylvan Library--Erk.
: : > 1. If you get the combo, you almost always win. Unless the opponent has
: : > some method of speed recovery (i.e. necropotence), then the willowgeddon
: : > player can usually beat them over the head.
: :
: : Without the combo, you almost always win- but the combo makes it more
: : stylish.
:
:
: oh, bullshit. If G/W armageddon almost always won *without* the combo,
: then there would be no other deck type. Now let's cut the chest beating
: and go back to strategy, please.
:
:
:
: : > 2. Ridiculously easy to play, though not so much as the necrodeck.
: :
: : Not as easy as one might think. There are many sublties (sp?) that you
: : are perhaps unaware of.
:
: Ok, tell me what is so subtle (subtleties? I'm not sure either. :) )
: about the deck. As far as I can tell, it goes like this: Bring out an
: early creature to occupy the opponent's attention, if you have one. If
: not, then concentrate on defending yourself and destroying everything
: your opponent brings out until you can creature/geddon your way to
: victory.
:
:
: : "Abandon all hope all ye who play without Land Tax or Necropotence."
:
: sadly enough, it seems to be coming to that. I long for alliances, and
: new deck designs.
:
: John
:
:
:
:
: -/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-
: The contraction "You're" does not indicate possessive. It indicates a
: state of being, or, more commonly, a description of the person being
: addressed.
: The word "Your" does indicate possesive. It does NOT indicate a state of
: being, or a description.
: -\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-
:
Not that I like Willowgeddon, but it's one of the top T2 designs and you need
to be prepared for it. The Willowgeddon is definitely the hardest to hose
of all the standard T2 decks.
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Robert S. Hahn
: That said, I agree with your above paragraph, with one addendum: I *do*
: believe that there are decks that can beat the two kings of the current
: hill, I think that they are simply just less popular. Examples:
: 1. R/W/g Permanent Removal
: 2. R/U Permanent Removal & Counter/Burn
: 3. R/G Orgg/Shivan 2nd turn
: 4. R/G Jokuweenie
: 5. B/w Discard
John, allow me to be slightly disappointed and feel a pang of hurt because
of your not mentioning U/W control in the list above. Yes, U/W dies to
Necro hard, but I have yet to lose a match to a Willowgeddon deck in a
serious tournament. Need I mention that Loconto had to beat both Poulter
and Lestree with his U/W?
The way I see it, Baxter is right when he talks about rock-paper-scissors.
G/W will typically kill Necro; Necro will typically kill U/W; U/W will
typically kill G/W, etc. etc. R/W and R/G go where G/W would go, and the
other off-color decks really haven't been developed just yet.
Peace,
The Sophist
Robert S. Hahn rsh...@is.nyu.edu
NYU Law School, '97 http://pages.nyu.edu/~rsh9395/index.html
"They have no lawyers among them, for they consider them as a sort of
people whose profession it is to disguise matters."
-- Sir Thomas More, Utopia
Stil
: > ooh, tasty! I have run a deck much like this one, sans derelors, and a
: > little lighter on the other critters.
: Derelerelerelor (as he's affectionately known) is a horribly powerful
: creature especially because he's an Autumn Willow creature (and helps to
: fulfill my FE requirement).
He's a fun little guy to play with. He reminds me of the Juzam, though,
because even though his power to cost ratio is amazing, no one wants to
play with him. :(
I should say, reminds me of how the Juzam *used* to be, rather. One day
everyone realized about HIM.
: > with only 9 sources of blue? 11 if you count the temples, but they are
: > slow. The fellwars are unreliable, because so few play blue, in these
: > days of necro/willow decks. The birds help, but birds tend to die pretty
: > fast, too. Perhaps add in two more wastes, over two islands. After all,
: > you'll really only be using U/W when there is a threat, or when you want
: > to toss down the weirding.
: I cut out a forest for an additional Island. Fellwars over more
: land = robustness of design: I do not want to fry to an Armageddon. As
: well it let's me play off colour's fairly easily (in a memorable game
: agains the Tax/Edge deck that was designed for type 1, whne the Blood
: Moon came out my only hope was to play a fellwar and disenchant).
I'm not saying that the fellwars are *bad*, just that they are
unreliable for getting blue mana. They are great in general, just for
getting out that 3rd turn big guy. Definately keep them in, those
armageddons just are not fun.
: The Sink is Good, and while I may toss out a Grasp for one, right
: know there isn't room. Currently counters are in there for the following
: cards: Hymn to Tourach, Disrupting Sceptre, Disk, Cap, Wierding, Wrath
: of God, Armageddon, 'Haups, and Balance. That's not really that many.
: Wrath doesn't hurt to much since I end up playing a game of attrition:
: one creature at a time.
You *need* the countering, and you can afford to lose a Grasp. Actually,
I might even lose a control over a grasp, seeing as how your deck might
not have that 2nd blue when you see the turn 2/3 Ernham. If they kill
the ernham, or disenchant the grasp, you don't have to worry about the
upkeep. If they don't do anything about the theft, they will most likely
die, lest they bring out another erhnam.
: Well actually it's only 7 4/x <only 2 Derelors>, but they usually don't
: do damage, they just exist to block, and force the opponent to
: Swords/Wrath...It's the _12_ weenies that do damage, as well as the
: Controlled Stuff.
Yes, of course. It's a very proactive deck, I like it. The only problem
is a wrath/armageddon, it looks like. I think that you should have 4
fellwars in the main deck (I seem to only remember 2 being there), just
because W/G is getting *so* popular.
: popular trend? Willowgeddon and 'Potence are very strong, but they're by
: no means all powerful: just wait 'til the next gen of Trance and Remora
: decks come out: Blue is back.
I can see the Trance becoming powerful, but the Remora? That's too
dependant on the opponent's deck.
the_furry_one
: removed. Just as the Necrodisk deck is a decent critter horde deck without
: the Necropotence/Nevinyrral's Disk, the Willowgeddon deck is decent without
something that many people don't realize is that the disks are a VERY key
card to the survival of the necrohymn decks. without it, large creatures,
artifacts, and enchantments run rampant and kill the necrohymn'er.
: Anti-Autumn Willow Willowgeddon Counter
: 1) Meekstone Disenchant/Divine Offering.
: 2) Apocalypse Chime Disenchant/Divine Offering.
: 3) Nevinyrral's Disk (pre-cast) Disenchant/Divine Offering before hand.
: 4) Apocalypse Chime (pre-cast) Disenchant/Divine Offering before hand.
: 5) Balance Balance's restriction.
you forgot: earthquake, wrath of god, which willowgeddon has no counter
for. and of course, blocking willow with a big nasty creature (or a small
order pumped up and given first strike:)
: Gloom--Need two Glooms to shut down the cheap destruction spells in white;
: can't 'Disk effectively; have to worry about Tranquility.
cheap destruction? bah, necrohymn decks aren't concerned with cheap
destruction, its thoes damned karmas.
: Hymn to Tourach--Put the important stuff on (Sylvan Library) shelve until
: needed; fill your hand with Land Tax.
can't sylvan a card from your hand to your library, need a brainstorm for
that trick. besides, its the early hymns that win the game... second turn
hymntwist (swamp swamp ritual, double hymn = hymntwist) will win the game
almost every time. land taxing for more land isn't likely to save you
from that fate.
: Necropotence--Damn the Necropotence, hit him early with dervish and djinn
: so he can't get 'Potent, follow up with Hurricane or Storm Seeker.
damn the necropotence indeed. its the disks you have to look out for.
: Whirling Dervish--Dancing Scimitar, Serrated Arrows, Nevinyrral's Disk are
: not effective counters for Whirling Dervish because of the existence of
: Divine Offering (giving white eight easy-zappers, and even some life).
artifact zappers dont always come out though. besides, how many people
run 4 divine offerings as well as 4 disenchants? only the truly paranoid
of artifacts. 2 divine is more likely. besides, its hard to cast
either one under a gloom. :)
: Erhnam Djinn--Dancing Scimitar, Nevinyrral's Disk are not effective counters
: again for the same reason. Must use Dark Banishing or Terror against
: these.
no problem there. drain life is also a nice ernaremover.
: Karma--Erk.
: Autumn Willow/Armageddon--Erk.
: Land Tax/Jalum Tome/Sylvan Library--Erk.
enchants: disk, disk, and ...disk. willow: block with an order... pump it
up and give it first strike. armageddon: necro for more land, dark
ritual... besides, unless planning for a drainlife, a SMART necrohymn
player will retain two-three land to get out stuff after an armageddon.
: Not that I like Willowgeddon, but it's one of the top T2 designs and you need
: to be prepared for it. The Willowgeddon is definitely the hardest to hose
: of all the standard T2 decks.
hard to hose? not really, 18 creature removal spells (three more in
sideboard) is enough for my red/white to sufficiently pound willowgeddon
decks. and dont think that the armaegddon is going to work, i'm packing
em myself :). of course, after the armageddon we get to play tax/fellwar
wars, and that is ok with me, if you're not doing anything, then i'm not
doing anything, and that's what millstone decks do. :)
the_furry_one
: that, as I said, a better deck does not exist other than these 2 under
The fact of the matter is, in the pro tournament qualifiers, these decks
are dominant because they are the easiest to make type V (pro format)
legal. If i could make my red/white deck pro legal, then i'd be a much
happier camper, but since there's no useful homelands cards in white or
red, and very few fallen for either, there's not much hope.
and if anyone is planning on sending me mail/following up with garbage
that i could waste the slots of my deck with to make it legal under this
format, piss off. i've heard it before, and i'll have no part of it.
cheers :)
Alan D Kohler
>
>hwk...@poky.srv.net (Alan D Kohler) writes:
>
>>In article <dgray.829615460@casbah>, dg...@casbah.acns.nwu.edu says...
>>(About necropotence)
>>> about the only thing that could nuke
>>>it completely would be the restriction or removal of Necrootence or Hymn
to
>>>Tourach.
>
>>Remember last year, vice age was dominating the tournament circuit? And
now
>>vice is restricted. Now necro is pretty much in the same spot. I'd
pretty
>>much count on necropotence being next.
>
>Tax. Kill the Necro decks, and the Willowgeddon and R/W decks will probably
>start dominating. Vise's restriction did kill Vise Age, but as someone
pointed
>out to me recently, a lot of the Vise Age decks got quick kills with
>Channel/Fireball. Losing Channel was a blow as well.
> Only time will tell...
I personally don't think land tax will go away. The ernham/armageddon type
decks use it to give them long-term strength like the necro-decks have (but
thinning lands out of the deck and using cards like brainstorm, mesmeric
trance, winds of change, and jalum tome to trade them for "real" cards), but
the focus of the deck is getting rapid creature superiority and then
armageddoning- not a new concept at all, but one made much more practical by
the re-introduction of ernham djinns in chronicles.
Land tax is more powerful in white weenie decks utilizing winds of change -
where it performs essentially the same function as necropotence.
L.H.K. Chan
|>
|> Adding a category:
|>
|> 6. R/U Counter/Control/Kill Deck
|>
|> Contains:
|>
|> Bolts/Disintegrate: Kill off quick creatures, disintegrate opponent if
|> necessary. Sideboard Pyroclasm for bolts for weenies.
|> Control: Take the big/powerful creatures that come out.
|> Counter: Prevent the opponent from regaining their own creatures,
|> direct damage, misc. This includes Deflections.
|> Creatures: 3 or 4 Prodigal Sorcerers (optional) for continuous
|> damage.
Since almost all powerful blue spells need UU, how can this deck deal with first
turn land tax? And some nasty enchantments such as Vice? I am thinking of
building one for my local tourney but would like to sideboard somethings to deal
with all these weaknesses.
Kelvin
James Grahame
the_furry_one <jet...@teleport.com> wrote:
>
>pardon the french, but *FUCK* necropotence. hymn to tourach is the game
>winning card in these decks, potence is just used to refill the hand
>quickly.
>
>ever since fallen empires came out, and people first saw hymns, the
>general consensus was 'restrict this thing', at least locally. one of the
>biggest fans of discard (played four mindtwists in every deck he could
>before it was restricted) thought the hymn was too powerful. but alas,
>the cries have fallen on deaf ears.
>
>hymn to tourach is black's cheese card. two out of an opponents hand for
>one of your own? far too powerful for its own good. though there are
>several cards that net two or more cards in play (wrath, armageddon, dust
>to dust, shatterstorm, etc), they aren't always gamewinners like the hymn.
>it is entirely possible to comeback from a wrath, or an armageddon, but it
>isn't nearly as easy to come back from a hymn or two early on.
Hymn is a game winning card, but Armageddon isn't? Did I hear
that right? Are you actually saying that a Hymn is harder to come back from
than an Armageddon? This sounds like a MAJOR overreaction. Remember, speed
makes Hymns useless. Now if you want to argue that speed is too vulnerable
to global killers, and thus isn't a viable option, that's fine. But then
I'd like to point out that without Hymns ( and other cards that penalize
slow, reactive decks without using vulnerable permanents ), global killer
decks become the norm, and one gets a stagnant playing field.
A restricted card should have some of the following characteristics:
a) It shows up in every serious deck.
b) It stretches out the length of the game unbearably.
c) After being cast, the game is nearly won. ( ie. the card sets up
partial locks )
d) It somehow copies the powers of another restricted card.
a) doesn't apply; see Willowgeddon for details. b) obviously doesn't
apply. c) just isn't true; one burst of two cards is not enough to destroy
the "standard" power decks in Type II ( Willowgeddon is likely to have
Taxed lands to distract the Hymn, it isn't even a Bolt to a Necrodeck,
Blast has an empty hand, and most Millstone decks run Counterspells ( and
have quick permanents that aren't vulnerable to global hosers )). While you
might argue that d) applies ( "It's a two point Mind Twist!" ), the other
cards that were restricted under this criterion just don't compare ( Fork,
Copy Artifact, Regrowth, Tutor etc. )
James
Alexander Shearer
> The key here is permanent-destruction. Potential blockers can be StPed (but
> Ihsan's Shade). The only non-creature ways to stop Autumn Willow for less
> than three mana are:
> Anti-Autumn Willow Willowgeddon Counter
> 1) Meekstone Disenchant/Divine Offering.
> 2) Apocalypse Chime Disenchant/Divine Offering.
> 3) Nevinyrral's Disk (pre-cast) Disenchant/Divine Offering before hand.
> 4) Apocalypse Chime (pre-cast) Disenchant/Divine Offering before hand.
> 5) Balance Balance's restriction.
> So you're basically stuck hoping that you have/get your Balance.
Where does this infinite supply of Disenchants/Offerings available in
hand come from? On a similar, what about those infinite StPs? Having
four StPs and 4 Disenchants in a deck does not insure their
availability.
Alexander Shearer
ga...@uclink4.berkeley.edu
Lord Daroki
seems to be the three major types of decks and how effectively to stop them.
1) Necropotence
This one actually was so simple, that I nearly slapped myself when I came up
with the answer. Necros have a hard time getting rid of artifacts and
enchantments. They rely on the disks to do so. So I figured there are two
ways to do this :
1) Iceberg [get lots of counters on there] + Illusionary Terrain.
No more Swamps, no more Necropotence. Counter all disks as will, let them
have the necropotence and get cards they can't use.
2) Damnit, I still like the Cursed Rack and Scepter idea. I don't know
how viable it is since it's slow and the necro might have done his damage
or have the capability, but the first should put that necro at a DEAD HALT
and the second should at least slow him down.
Add Zims and Tims to get rid of knights and the black weenies, they don't
have prot. blue.
2) G/W Willogeddon deck.
This can get a bit more expensive if you want to nuke it in one shot. Sure
the illusionary can be used (shut down white! No disenchant or swords!)
But if you want, use reality twist as well to shut down BOTH colors (hey,
you're not playing a R/B deck, are you?)
This can at least slow them down for a bit and allow you to make up for
blue's horrendously slow nature.
3) W/R Blast/defence
Ug, this one is the most difficult of all. Since reality twist won't work
here, as it won't in W/B, you're stuck negating half. I would AGAIN go
White, since Red can't do squat against enchantments, even Jockulhaups
won't touch them, where the Iceberg can help you continue to fund it after
it goes off if you don't counter it.
Yes, you have to include the counter ability of blue as well... but it has
that in spades, and it's simply not enough. What I thought then was to
look at the other strengths which blue has (flying and mana screw!) and use
those instead of relying on counterspells to tie your opponent's hands up.
I haven't built these elements into the deck that I had (which was a blue
cantrip deck and may remain one), and will report once I get it made, test
it, tune it, and have it in a more playable manner.
Any comments on this though? Yes, Illusionary terrain is expensive, and
Reality Twist more so.... but if you're a necro, or if you're a Willowgeddon
player, tell me how much you'd like to see these cards on the table against
you... (remember, I'm going for your WHITE Willowgeddon, you're not
disenchanting it.)
--
Lord Daroki @ Oasis & Ancient Anguish :: dar...@aros.net
"I've got my faith, and I've got my prayers. But if push comes to shove,
I've also got a little something extra."
Alan D Kohler
>
>Okay, I've been listening to the arguements going on in this thread for a
>while without butting in, but I really think it's time.
>
>ERHNAMGEDDON AND NECRO ARE NOT THE BE ALL AND END ALL OF TYPE 2 DECKS!!!!!
>
>There, I've said it. I truely believe that these decks are beatable if
>one plays the metagame correctly.
I agree. There is a reason that they are popular: they are fairly easy to
build and trim, and the whole concept behind either one is fairly simple.
It does take a little skill to PLAY the decks all the way to the top, but
the straightforwardness of either type of these deck makes them simple to
build and trim. The reason there are only a few necro-decks and ernham
decks in the top is it is those few who go beyond the basics of those type
of decks and add original elements that make them more competative.
>Sorry for the repetition and obnoxiously long post
Quite allright :)
--
Alan D Kohler
hwk...@poky.srv.net
"You die, the girl dies everybody dies" heavy metal
(Also uttered by myself whenever using a nevy's disk)
Canticle
> On 18 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
> > : "Abandon all hope all ye who play without Land Tax or Necropotence."
> > sadly enough, it seems to be coming to that. I long for alliances, and
> > new deck designs.
Personally, I think the popularity of Willowgeddon & Necropotence decks
is far more a product of 'Fad Design' than of real power. Certainly,
Necropotence decks are effective against almost all styles of play
(although they can suffer horribly to a well played Burn deck...no life
to draw cards with). And Willowgeddon decks are just plain effective.
Nevertheless, I do believe that other deck styles do have a chance.
Currently, I'm playing a Black/Blue touch of Red deck (which I will get
around to posting, for those people who asked :)) in our store League,
and I've managed to make it to the Semifinals, having defeated a
Willowgeddon deck quite handily to get there (note: The League doesn't
allow sideboards). I've also fared well against a Necropotence deck
wielded by one of Winnipeg's best players, Chris Loly. I still lost, but
hey, you can't win them all :).
Take a look at the number of posts where people ask for the contents of a
Necropotence or Willowgeddon deck, where they ask for help designing
their own after reading about one somewhere else, or what have you.
Clearly, the popularity of these designs is a result not only of their
effectiveness, but of the concept of 'Deck Fad' which I've mentioned a
few times.
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Robert S. Hahn
: I would welcome any change in dominant deck style as a refreshing and
: needed one. I wish you the best of luck. However, I am of the opinion
: that, as I said, a better deck does not exist other than these 2 under
: the given parameters for Type II.
: If someone could disprove me, no one would be more happy than myself.
I just thought I'd point out that I won a spot to the Pro Tourney at Long
Beach earlier today using a deck nothing like Willowgeddon or
Necromnipotence, but played against both types. I thought I trashed Necro
pretty handily and Willowgeddon was... tougher, but dealt with. It's based
on Justice's deck at Pro Tour 1, and I think it will become a serious
contender sometime very soon.
Full report on another thread.
-rsh
--
Alan D Kohler
>
>Preston Poulter (ppou...@taurus.oac.uci.edu) wrote:
>: that, as I said, a better deck does not exist other than these 2 under
>: the given parameters for Type II.
>
>are dominant because they are the easiest to make type V (pro format)
>legal. If i could make my red/white deck pro legal, then i'd be a much
>happier camper, but since there's no useful homelands cards in white or
>red, and very few fallen for either, there's not much hope.
After converting my titania deck to pro-format, I'm inclined to agree. It's
still a very strong deck, but I think the cards I hade to trade off made it
from a "consistent tourney winner" to a "fairly good deck".
Darin Cozine
'dar...@aros.net (Lord Daroki)' wrote:
>1) Necropotence
>This one actually was so simple, that I nearly slapped myself when I came
up
>with the answer. Necros have a hard time getting rid of artifacts and
>enchantments. They rely on the disks to do so. So I figured there are
two
>ways to do this :
>1) Iceberg [get lots of counters on there] + Illusionary Terrain.
>No more Swamps, no more Necropotence. Counter all disks as will, let them
>have the necropotence and get cards they can't use.
>2) Damnit, I still like the Cursed Rack and Scepter idea. I don't know
>how viable it is since it's slow and the necro might have done his damage
>or have the capability, but the first should put that necro at a DEAD HALT
>and the second should at least slow him down.
>Add Zims and Tims to get rid of knights and the black weenies, they don't
>have prot. blue.
>
>2) G/W Willogeddon deck.
>This can get a bit more expensive if you want to nuke it in one shot.
Sure
>the illusionary can be used (shut down white! No disenchant or swords!)
>But if you want, use reality twist as well to shut down BOTH colors (hey,
>you're not playing a R/B deck, are you?)
>
>Yes, you have to include the counter ability of blue as well... but it has
>that in spades, and it's simply not enough. What I thought then was to
>look at the other strengths which blue has (flying and mana screw!) and
use
>those instead of relying on counterspells to tie your opponent's hands up.
>I haven't built these elements into the deck that I had (which was a blue
>cantrip deck and may remain one), and will report once I get it made, test
>it, tune it, and have it in a more playable manner.
>
>Any comments on this though? Yes, Illusionary terrain is expensive, and
>Reality Twist more so.... but if you're a necro, or if you're a
Willowgeddon
>player, tell me how much you'd like to see these cards on the table
against
>you... (remember, I'm going for your WHITE Willowgeddon, you're not
>disenchanting it.)
I would agree that blue is definately the way to go against these decks,
The idea of building a deck around a few cards is what is is "supposed" to
be
good at. The problem is that Necro can just make you discard the counters,
while Willageddon can do something like: I strip your blue land,
play erm and arm..
A deck that will do good against aainst both of these, while still winning
against othersshould look like one of these:
<1>
A deck that has large amounts of mana, with enough reactive capabilities
to stop Necros, Armageddon, Disk, Wierding, whatever. Also a strong defense
that can take out Ernhams, willows, whatever wil very little mana. This
deck will steadily attack the opponent in a way that is hard to defend
against.
<2>
A fast lock deck that can quickly take control of the gaming enviroment and
make it hard fot the opponent to do anything.
Steven Liu
What infinite supply of Disenchant/Divine Offering? Say you have 4 'Disk
and 4 Meekstone (not likely), and I have 4 Disenchant and 4 'Offering,
if I don't match your output, nothing happens. If you don't match my
output, you die. Meekstone even allows me to zap 4 life off the Necro
draw before it pins each critter, and I can wait to draw Dis/DvOf and
still hose you, while you will die if you wait for the Meekstone.
The key here is that Willowgeddon doesn't need to ensure the availability
of the Disenchant and StP. If, instead of the Disenchant and StP, the
Willowgeddon is drawing all the other cards and the Necrodisk is drawing
all the hoser, nothing happens. if, however, the Willowgeddon and the
Necrodisk meets and neither is drawing hoser/counter-hosers, then the
Willowgeddon has the edge.
: Alexander Shearer
: ga...@uclink4.berkeley.edu
:
Look, I'm not even a Willowgeddon fan, but I do play everything and I'm
just saying that, in my experience, Willowgeddon versus Necrodisk goes
to the Willowgeddon more often than not. I'm more of a U/w, U/w/g, B/u,
B/w/u, or G player in T2, and U/W or U/W/g in T1 (look, I've been playing
U/W since before M:tG tournaments even exists, so don't give me the
Weissman excrement and I won't tell you to <optional vulgarity> off).
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Steven Liu
: Steven Liu (sl7...@cc.utah.edu) wrote:
:
: : removed. Just as the Necrodisk deck is a decent critter horde deck without
: : the Necropotence/Nevinyrral's Disk, the Willowgeddon deck is decent without
:
: something that many people don't realize is that the disks are a VERY key
: card to the survival of the necrohymn decks. without it, large creatures,
: artifacts, and enchantments run rampant and kill the necrohymn'er.
I do realize that the 'Disk is the force behind the Necrodisk deck. Why do
you think I call it the Necrodisk deck when everybody else calls it Necro-
deck or Necropotence deck? Of course the Hymn' is as much so, but the Hymn'
are four no-brainers in any deck that can cast it.
: : Anti-Autumn Willow Willowgeddon Counter
: : 1) Meekstone Disenchant/Divine Offering.
: : 2) Apocalypse Chime Disenchant/Divine Offering.
: : 3) Nevinyrral's Disk (pre-cast) Disenchant/Divine Offering before hand.
: : 4) Apocalypse Chime (pre-cast) Disenchant/Divine Offering before hand.
: : 5) Balance Balance's restriction.
:
: you forgot: earthquake, wrath of god, which willowgeddon has no counter
: for. and of course, blocking willow with a big nasty creature (or a small
: order pumped up and given first strike:)
I said for less than three mana.
: : Gloom--Need two Glooms to shut down the cheap destruction spells in white;
: : can't 'Disk effectively; have to worry about Tranquility.
:
: cheap destruction? bah, necrohymn decks aren't concerned with cheap
: destruction, its thoes damned karmas.
It's the cheap destruction which makes the Karma possible. You know the
'Disk that WAS going to save your buttocks from the Karma? Well, it just
turned into four life for the Willowgeddon.
: : Hymn to Tourach--Put the important stuff on (Sylvan Library) shelve until
: : needed; fill your hand with Land Tax.
:
: can't sylvan a card from your hand to your library, need a brainstorm for
: that trick. besides, its the early hymns that win the game... second turn
: hymntwist (swamp swamp ritual, double hymn = hymntwist) will win the game
: almost every time. land taxing for more land isn't likely to save you
: from that fate.
You can't put your opening hand on to your deck, but you don't have to draw
any of the cards coming up until you need it. You won't Armageddon, or lay
down the extra land until late in the game, so don't draw them.
: : Necropotence--Damn the Necropotence, hit him early with dervish and djinn
: : so he can't get 'Potent, follow up with Hurricane or Storm Seeker.
:
: damn the necropotence indeed. its the disks you have to look out for.
:
: : Whirling Dervish--Dancing Scimitar, Serrated Arrows, Nevinyrral's Disk are
: : not effective counters for Whirling Dervish because of the existence of
: : Divine Offering (giving white eight easy-zappers, and even some life).
:
: artifact zappers dont always come out though. besides, how many people
: run 4 divine offerings as well as 4 disenchants? only the truly paranoid
: of artifacts. 2 divine is more likely. besides, its hard to cast
: either one under a gloom. :)
Well, at least one. :) What I find extremely useful in Necrodisk deck is
Jester's Cap. Most Necrodisk players don't use the 'Cap in their deck,
but I find it to be EXTREMELY useful. I run one standard and two more
in the sideboard; they have saved my buttocks so many times I lost count.
: : Erhnam Djinn--Dancing Scimitar, Nevinyrral's Disk are not effective counters
: : again for the same reason. Must use Dark Banishing or Terror against
: : these.
:
: no problem there. drain life is also a nice ernaremover.
Swamp, Dark Ritual, Drain Life for one point.
: : Karma--Erk.
: : Autumn Willow/Armageddon--Erk.
: : Land Tax/Jalum Tome/Sylvan Library--Erk.
:
: enchants: disk, disk, and ...disk. willow: block with an order... pump it
: up and give it first strike. armageddon: necro for more land, dark
: ritual... besides, unless planning for a drainlife, a SMART necrohymn
: player will retain two-three land to get out stuff after an armageddon.
Disk: Disenchant, Divine Offering, Disenchant, Divine Offering, Disenchant,
Divine Offering, Disenchant, Divine Offering. Knight: Armageddon. Necro:
Mishra's Factory, Whirling Dervish, Erhnam Djinn early, Storm Seeker late.
The smart Necrodisk player won't play too many Drain Life unless he's playing
against another Necrodisk deck. Over-dependence on mana is a big weakness
of the Necrodisk deck, using too many Drain Life complicates the problem.
: : Not that I like Willowgeddon, but it's one of the top T2 designs and you need
: : to be prepared for it. The Willowgeddon is definitely the hardest to hose
: : of all the standard T2 decks.
:
: hard to hose? not really, 18 creature removal spells (three more in
: sideboard) is enough for my red/white to sufficiently pound willowgeddon
: decks. and dont think that the armaegddon is going to work, i'm packing
: em myself :). of course, after the armageddon we get to play tax/fellwar
: wars, and that is ok with me, if you're not doing anything, then i'm not
: doing anything, and that's what millstone decks do. :)
You need 18 creature removal spells in order to beat a deck and it's not
hard to hose? Hello? I'm not saying that it's difficult to design a deck
to hose it; I'm saying that there are very few options as far as hosing
Willowgeddon decks go. I mean, I can think of ten deck designs off the
top of my head that can hose Necrodisk, and only a couple that can hose
Willowgeddon. Are you getting a clear picture now?
: --
: jet...@teleport.com "quotes are for mortals."
: .signature files are a waste of bandwidth
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Steven Liu
: Also sprach Preston Poulter (ppou...@taurus.oac.uci.edu):
:
: : I would welcome any change in dominant deck style as a refreshing and
: : needed one. I wish you the best of luck. However, I am of the opinion
: : If someone could disprove me, no one would be more happy than myself.
:
: I just thought I'd point out that I won a spot to the Pro Tourney at Long
: Beach earlier today using a deck nothing like Willowgeddon or
: Necromnipotence, but played against both types. I thought I trashed Necro
: pretty handily and Willowgeddon was... tougher, but dealt with. It's based
: on Justice's deck at Pro Tour 1, and I think it will become a serious
: contender sometime very soon.
:
: Full report on another thread.
What? Mark's Howlingbind deck? I've seen Mike (Callahan, another regular
poster here) play it effectively. I killed him three times in a row with
a standard Necrodisk deck dispite multiple Detonated 'Disks and Howling
Mines to neutralize the Necropotence; he modified the deck with more
critters and trampled all over my standard Necrodisk deck three times in
a row. Well, he did sideboard in five of the six duels while my standard
Necrodisk test deck didn't have a sideboard. And he was having his share
of trouble earlier that day against a pretty much standard Willowgeddon
(except Scavenger Folks) deck.
Anyway, it'll be interesting to hear what happened with your deck in that
tournament. Be looking for that post...
: -rsh
:
:
: --
: Robert S. Hahn rsh...@is.nyu.edu
: NYU Law School, '97 http://pages.nyu.edu/~rsh9395/index.html
:
: "They have no lawyers among them, for they consider them as a sort of
: people whose profession it is to disguise matters."
: -- Sir Thomas More, Utopia
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Jonathan Paxman
: that trick. besides, its the early hymns that win the game... second turn
: hymntwist (swamp swamp ritual, double hymn = hymntwist) will win the game
: almost every time. land taxing for more land isn't likely to save you
: from that fate.
Sorry, but this is just rubbish. Second turn two hymns is nasty yes, but
certainly will not "win the game almost every time". Don't forget that it
costs you 3 cards to remove 4 random cards from your opponent. Supposing
he went first and played a land in each turn, and that you only played the
hymns this leaves:
Him: 2 land, 3 cards in hand, with the next turn..
You: 2 land, 4 cards in hand.
Certainly doesn't look like game over to me..
Of course, if you went first, and happen to snare some land with those
hymns it is a little worse, but it still leaves an enormous amount of play
left in the game.
cheers,
Jon P
--
==========================================================================
How many Bass players does it take to change a lightbulb?
None. The Pianist can do it with his left hand.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jonathan Paxman | Mathematics and Electrical Engineering at
jpa...@tartarus.uwa.edu.au | The University of Western Australia
==========================================================================
Ravi Prashad
On 20 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
> I should say, reminds me of how the Juzam *used* to be, rather. One day
> everyone realized about HIM.
Idiots. . .Juzam was my first must have in Arabians, mostly
because I liked the picture, then City of Brass, then Guardian Beast and
then Library of Alexandria (I was slow to catch on to the power).
> You *need* the countering, and you can afford to lose a Grasp. Actually,
> I might even lose a control over a grasp, seeing as how your deck might
> not have that 2nd blue when you see the turn 2/3 Ernham. If they kill
> the ernham, or disenchant the grasp, you don't have to worry about the
> upkeep. If they don't do anything about the theft, they will most likely
> die, lest they bring out another erhnam.
Hmm, it's possible so I'll try it, my usual blue configuration is
4 Counters, 2 Sinks, 4 Controls, 1 Recall.
> Yes, of course. It's a very proactive deck, I like it. The only problem
> is a wrath/armageddon, it looks like. I think that you should have 4
> fellwars in the main deck (I seem to only remember 2 being there), just
> because W/G is getting *so* popular.
Actually W/G Erhmageddon dies against this deck, W/G weenies tend
to do well on the other hand.
> I can see the Trance becoming powerful, but the Remora? That's too
> dependant on the opponent's deck.
Mystic Remora is very powerful: especially against Red and White
(consider: I disenchant your Remora, well I'll draw another card then ->
you've just gained one card and killed a valuable disenchant).
> John
Ravi
Steven Liu
: It does take a little skill to PLAY the decks all the way to the top, but
: the straightforwardness of either type of these deck makes them simple to
: build and trim. The reason there are only a few necro-decks and ernham
: decks in the top is it is those few who go beyond the basics of those type
: of decks and add original elements that make them more competative.
There are just too many ways to hose the Necrodisk deck. Anti-artifact to
kill the 'Disks being the nastiest.
: >Sorry for the repetition and obnoxiously long post
:
: Quite allright :)
: --
: Alan D Kohler
: hwk...@poky.srv.net
:
: "You die, the girl dies everybody dies" heavy metal
:
: (Also uttered by myself whenever using a nevy's disk)
Hey, you didn't get the quote right. It's:
DEN: "And if I refuse?"
ROY: "Then you die, she dies, everybody dies."
DEN: "Sounded reasonable to me."
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
the_furry_one
: I do realize that the 'Disk is the force behind the Necrodisk deck. Why do
: you think I call it the Necrodisk deck when everybody else calls it Necro-
: deck or Necropotence deck? Of course the Hymn' is as much so, but the Hymn'
: are four no-brainers in any deck that can cast it.
Heh, i call them 'necrohymn' decks...
: It's the cheap destruction which makes the Karma possible. You know the
: 'Disk that WAS going to save your buttocks from the Karma? Well, it just
: turned into four life for the Willowgeddon.
wow, so you're playing four divine offerings and four disenchants for..
four disks, zuran orb, ivory tower, and potence? gosh, that's... silly.
i found that four artifact destruction is good enough against necro (of
course, with two feldons canes ...)
: any of the cards coming up until you need it. You won't Armageddon, or lay
: down the extra land until late in the game, so don't draw them.
of course, 'late-game' your sylvan has probably been disked away, so
you'll draw that armageddon anyways.. and of course, you'll say 'but i'll
disenchant/divine offering the disk' again.
: Jester's Cap. Most Necrodisk players don't use the 'Cap in their deck,
: but I find it to be EXTREMELY useful. I run one standard and two more
: in the sideboard; they have saved my buttocks so many times I lost count.
i was using one in the sideboard, but i had to get home-dicapped and thus
had to make room for something stupid like serrated arrows. :P
: Swamp, Dark Ritual, Drain Life for one point.
what are you talking about? do you think that you're to armageddon every
turn and keep the mana down or something? it doesn't happen my friend.
sorry to burst your bubble, but the way that the draw works in magic you
dont always get what you need when you need it.
: Disk: Disenchant, Divine Offering, Disenchant, Divine Offering, Disenchant,
: Divine Offering, Disenchant, Divine Offering. Knight: Armageddon. Necro:
: Mishra's Factory, Whirling Dervish, Erhnam Djinn early, Storm Seeker late.
again, you're using 8 artifact destruction for four artifacts that give
you problems? that's just silly. and whats more, you think you'll draw
all of them? I've played decks with 8 bolts and not seen a single one all
game, same thing happens with disenchants/offers.
: The smart Necrodisk player won't play too many Drain Life unless he's playing
: against another Necrodisk deck. Over-dependence on mana is a big weakness
: of the Necrodisk deck, using too many Drain Life complicates the problem.
drain life can be sideboarded out for banishings, terrors, or paralyze.
they dont HAVE to stay in the deck ya know.
: You need 18 creature removal spells in order to beat a deck and it's not
: hard to hose? Hello? I'm not saying that it's difficult to design a deck
: to hose it; I'm saying that there are very few options as far as hosing
: Willowgeddon decks go. I mean, I can think of ten deck designs off the
: top of my head that can hose Necrodisk, and only a couple that can hose
: Willowgeddon. Are you getting a clear picture now?
apparently not. you see, i want to be able to take on any decks and win,
not just hose two separate decks. in case you didn't realize this, there
are people that play decks without armageddon, willow, or necro in them,
and those decks sometimes use a few creatures that i'd like to get rid of.
Stil
: : That said, I agree with your above paragraph, with one addendum: I *do*
: : believe that there are decks that can beat the two kings of the current
: : hill, I think that they are simply just less popular. Examples:
: : 1. R/W/g Permanent Removal
: : 2. R/U Permanent Removal & Counter/Burn
: : 3. R/G Orgg/Shivan 2nd turn
: : 4. R/G Jokuweenie
: : 5. B/w Discard
: John, allow me to be slightly disappointed and feel a pang of hurt because
: of your not mentioning U/W control in the list above. Yes, U/W dies to
: Necro hard, but I have yet to lose a match to a Willowgeddon deck in a
: serious tournament. Need I mention that Loconto had to beat both Poulter
: and Lestree with his U/W?
I know, I know. I did indeed forget to mention the all powerful U/W Mill
and U/W Orb decks. But I do believe that after #6, I had a "et cetra",
to include those decks that I had forgotten to mention.
: The way I see it, Baxter is right when he talks about rock-paper-scissors.
: G/W will typically kill Necro; Necro will typically kill U/W; U/W will
: typically kill G/W, etc. etc. R/W and R/G go where G/W would go, and the
: other off-color decks really haven't been developed just yet.
This is a good theory, but I don't know if it is really that accurate.
It all depends on the draw that the people get. Or perhaps the r-p-s
analogy is correct, but the 'luck of the draw' just has a great
influence upon it.
What I see happening is that less people seem to be playing U/W, which
is the reason for the sudden surge of the G/W geddon decks. Perhaps I am
mistaken, but that is what this looks like.
And don't even start me on the Loconto/Lestree. :)
No way in hell he would have won without that lucky plow.
Then again, magic is very much a game of luck.
Stil
: On 20 Apr 1996, Stil wrote:
: > You *need* the countering, and you can afford to lose a Grasp. Actually,
: > I might even lose a control over a grasp, seeing as how your deck might
: > not have that 2nd blue when you see the turn 2/3 Ernham. If they kill
: > the ernham, or disenchant the grasp, you don't have to worry about the
: > upkeep. If they don't do anything about the theft, they will most likely
: > die, lest they bring out another erhnam.
: Hmm, it's possible so I'll try it, my usual blue configuration is
: 4 Counters, 2 Sinks, 4 Controls, 1 Recall.
It's a nice configuration, but if you are holding counters, and no blue
land, or only one, that's a dead card, along with the controls. I don't
like to pay mana upkeep costs, but the grasp works wonders, especially
with that +1 to the defense (usually noticed when your opponent brings
out 2 of the same creature, such as a hippie, and suddenly, he stops
attacking. :) )
: > Yes, of course. It's a very proactive deck, I like it. The only problem
: > is a wrath/armageddon, it looks like. I think that you should have 4
: > fellwars in the main deck (I seem to only remember 2 being there), just
: > because W/G is getting *so* popular.
: Actually W/G Erhmageddon dies against this deck, W/G weenies tend
: to do well on the other hand.
The countering is what does it, no? Stop the 'geddon, or the willow, and
you are home free. Against necro, stop the disk, and the same.
Countering just tends to *really* hurt those deck types.
: > I can see the Trance becoming powerful, but the Remora? That's too
: > dependant on the opponent's deck.
: Mystic Remora is very powerful: especially against Red and White
: (consider: I disenchant your Remora, well I'll draw another card then ->
: you've just gained one card and killed a valuable disenchant).
Naah, most people will simply let the remora die, with the upkeep. It's
a good way to slow your opponent down, but I think that there are better
things to put in the card slot, such as the trance. I just used it last
night for the first time in play, and with a mono blue deck, I *ripped*
through my cards finding what I needed.
Steven Liu
: Steven Liu (sl7...@cc.utah.edu) wrote:
: : I do realize that the 'Disk is the force behind the Necrodisk deck. Why do
: : you think I call it the Necrodisk deck when everybody else calls it Necro-
: : deck or Necropotence deck? Of course the Hymn' is as much so, but the Hymn'
: : are four no-brainers in any deck that can cast it.
:
: Heh, i call them 'necrohymn' decks...
:
: : It's the cheap destruction which makes the Karma possible. You know the
: : 'Disk that WAS going to save your buttocks from the Karma? Well, it just
: : turned into four life for the Willowgeddon.
:
: wow, so you're playing four divine offerings and four disenchants for..
: four disks, zuran orb, ivory tower, and potence? gosh, that's... silly.
: i found that four artifact destruction is good enough against necro (of
: course, with two feldons canes ...)
If you kill the 'Disk, you kill the Necrodisk. I don't see how going four
Disenchant and four Divine Offerings against four 'Disks, an Ivory Tower,
and a Zuran Orb is bad. The few artifacts in the Necrodisk are crucial
to the deck.
: : any of the cards coming up until you need it. You won't Armageddon, or lay
: : down the extra land until late in the game, so don't draw them.
:
: of course, 'late-game' your sylvan has probably been disked away, so
: you'll draw that armageddon anyways.. and of course, you'll say 'but i'll
: disenchant/divine offering the disk' again.
No, probably rats' whiskers. The 'Disk won't go off "usually." Those
Disenchant/Divine Offerings sitting on the shelve will make sure of that.
Standard Necrodisk just has too many weaknesses, Willowgeddon can beat
it, so can a whole bunch of other deck designs. Again, I'm not saying
that Willowgeddon is a dominant deck design (although it's certainly the
most popular one right now), I'm just saying that Willowgeddon beats the
standard Necrodisk.
: : Jester's Cap. Most Necrodisk players don't use the 'Cap in their deck,
: : but I find it to be EXTREMELY useful. I run one standard and two more
: : in the sideboard; they have saved my buttocks so many times I lost count.
:
: i was using one in the sideboard, but i had to get home-dicapped and thus
: had to make room for something stupid like serrated arrows. :P
Hey! Take that back! Serrated Arrows are not stupid!
: : Swamp, Dark Ritual, Drain Life for one point.
:
: what are you talking about? do you think that you're to armageddon every
: turn and keep the mana down or something? it doesn't happen my friend.
: sorry to burst your bubble, but the way that the draw works in magic you
: dont always get what you need when you need it.
I see, so the way that the draw works in Magic is that only you always get
what you need when you need it.
: : Disk: Disenchant, Divine Offering, Disenchant, Divine Offering, Disenchant,
: : Divine Offering, Disenchant, Divine Offering. Knight: Armageddon. Necro:
: : Mishra's Factory, Whirling Dervish, Erhnam Djinn early, Storm Seeker late.
:
: again, you're using 8 artifact destruction for four artifacts that give
: you problems? that's just silly. and whats more, you think you'll draw
: all of them? I've played decks with 8 bolts and not seen a single one all
: game, same thing happens with disenchants/offers.
Of course, I could also draw no land twice in a row, what the heck is your
point? I'll take eight-to-four odds any day of the week.
: : The smart Necrodisk player won't play too many Drain Life unless he's playing
: : against another Necrodisk deck. Over-dependence on mana is a big weakness
: : of the Necrodisk deck, using too many Drain Life complicates the problem.
:
: drain life can be sideboarded out for banishings, terrors, or paralyze.
: they dont HAVE to stay in the deck ya know.
Of course not, but if you play the metagame, you don't want them in your main
deck because mana-deprivation (Willowgeddon, Liongeddon, and/or Howlingbind
depending on where you play) are more common than Necrodisk. So chances
are you will face more of them than Necrodisk (varies with geographical
location, of course, but with Willowgeddon and Howlingbind both able to
beat Necrodisk consistently, the mana-deprivation decks are coming to your
favorite tournament).
: : You need 18 creature removal spells in order to beat a deck and it's not
: : hard to hose? Hello? I'm not saying that it's difficult to design a deck
: : to hose it; I'm saying that there are very few options as far as hosing
: : Willowgeddon decks go. I mean, I can think of ten deck designs off the
: : top of my head that can hose Necrodisk, and only a couple that can hose
: : Willowgeddon. Are you getting a clear picture now?
:
: apparently not. you see, i want to be able to take on any decks and win,
: not just hose two separate decks. in case you didn't realize this, there
: are people that play decks without armageddon, willow, or necro in them,
: and those decks sometimes use a few creatures that i'd like to get rid of.
That has nothing to do with what I am arguing. I'm saying that there are many
more ways to hose Necrodisk than there are ways to hose Willowgeddon. What
has that to do with the fact that people play decks without 'Geddon, Necro',
or 'Willow? I myself don't play any of those except for playtesting against
my own decks. Heck, I don't even play Howlingbind (Icy Manipulator/Winter
Orb type, like the one Mark [Justice] took to PT1) except for playtesting
against my own decks. I'm not a Willowgeddon wagoneer, I'm just sharing
my personal experience with he who cares to listen. You want to to play
a standard Necrodisk deck, go right ahead; you want to play Fireplow, feel
free; you want to do some chest-beating, that's just fine with me.
: --
: jet...@teleport.com "quotes are for mortals."
: .signature files are a waste of bandwidth
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
So is usenet.
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Daniel Jocham
: 2. B Necropotence
: There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
: a. Necro/Knights
: This decks objective is to pump out creatures using
: the Necro to draw an obscene amount of cards.
: This deck also usually uses a fair amount of hand
: destruction as well.
: b. Necro/Regenerators
: This deck uses Nevinyrral's Disk and a bunch of
: regenerators to stop the enemy from having any
: non-land permanents, while keeping your own.
: c. Necro/Land destruction
: This version uses Strips, Icequake, Blight, and
: Icy Manipulators as well as Nevinyrral's Disk
: to stop the opponent from having any sources of
: mana.
I have seen another very funny variation, although i dont know, if it is
competitive:
Necropotence, Lands Edge plus 60% land in your deck.
Draw as many cards as possible if you have both down and hope that you get
enough lands to kill your opponent in one strike.
Greetings
Daniel
Dark Isz
<Pine.SUN.3.91.960418113...@rigel.oac.uci.edu>,
Preston Poulter <ppou...@rigel.oac.uci.edu> wrote:
>I think you're wrong. With a given set of parameters there are bound to
>be decks that just preform better in the environment than other decks.
>Somewhat reminicent of the 54 card deck in Type I (or Weissman as SoM
>would call it.) That deck has become simply one of the best to play in
>the Type I field. I now feel able to make the following claim:
>
>The W/G or the Necro decks are I feel simply THE BEST possible decks to
>play under the given parameters. Specific decks can be made to beat them
>but they will be hard pressed to do as well against a wide field. These
>decks simply stomp so many opposing decks designs that their tournment
>viability simply outmatches anything that can be composed under the
>current Type II rules.
>
>Basically, if you don't play one of these 2 decks then you are going to
>lose to one of these two decks and it doesn't really matter if you see it
>coming.
Wow, I could never imagine myself being one-hundred percent content with any
one deck style. I believe the greatest thing about this game is that there are
an unlimited number of decks to build. Granted that all of them are not
tourney viable, I still think that one should not limit themself to thinking
that they can only win if they play one of two deck styles.
I recently won a type1 tourney with a completely original deck idea
("completely original" meaning that I never saw anyone playing a deck like
this, not that noone ever played a deck like this) The most satisfying part of
the victory was knowing that the tourney was run "dream style"...you could
proxy any card you didn't have. This meant that everyone started with the same
card pool. I faced many kinds of decks (though most of them were land
destruction). The point I'm trying to make is that even though I knew the
"killer decks" to play in type1, I chose to make up my own deck style...and it
won.
It also seems to me that when you limit yourself to one deck style you don't
allow yourself to grow as much as you would if you were playing many different
styles of decks. Playing different styles and knowing how they work allows you
to better predict how to handle an opponents deck. So...play the 'geddon decks
and the 'potence decks, but don't ever think that those are the only kinds of
decks that will win...lest you be defeated be the almighty Sea Troll. ;)
George W. Bayles
[snip]
: Hymn is a game winning card, but Armageddon isn't? Did I hear
: that right? Are you actually saying that a Hymn is harder to come back from
: than an Armageddon? This sounds like a MAJOR overreaction. Remember, speed
It depends on timing, and generally the Hymn get there first. I'm not
convinced that using a Ritual for a 2nd turn double Hymn is a good idea, but
I've never seen a Type 2 deck that doesn't suffer from a turn 2 Hymn. Since
the Hippy is always in the deck too - an early Hippy increases the
pressure. That Armageddon may very well get discarded or rendered useless
because of discards before you get a chance to use it.
[snip]
Alan D Kohler
anti-willowgeddon tactics, since right now in PT qualifiers, willowgeddon
seems to be holding the upper hand.
In article <4le7ia$8...@news.cc.utah.edu>, sl7...@cc.utah.edu says...
>What infinite supply of Disenchant/Divine Offering? Say you have 4 'Disk
> and 4 Meekstone (not likely), and I have 4 Disenchant and 4 'Offering,
> if I don't match your output, nothing happens. If you don't match my
> output, you die. Meekstone even allows me to zap 4 life off the Necro
> draw before it pins each critter, and I can wait to draw Dis/DvOf and
> still hose you, while you will die if you wait for the Meekstone.
First off, I want to remember what deck you are playing against- it's called
a necrodeck because it utilizes multiple necropotences. Necropotence = it's
more likey you're going to be "waiting" for a disenchant/divine offering
than I'm going to be waiting for a meekstone because I'm drawing cards
faster.
Second - gloom. I will admit the disenchants and divine offerings are
headaches for a necroplayer. I'll go further and also say that armageddons
and wraths of god are also headaches for a necro player. Against a willow
deck, I have little fear of a gloom being slieghted to black. Gloom is a
major weapon against a willowgeddon type deck for that reason. While your
are trying to pull up a tranquility, I hopefully am stripping those nasty
cards from your hand with hymns and spectres. Hopefully, I get a few
disechants, divine offerings, and armageddons in the process. Also, I'll be
trying to strip your land out to keep you from getting enough mana to cast a
tranquility - the last is most difficult, it isn't too hard to get 3 mana
with a green deck, but it's still worth pursuing.
Even if you do manage to tranquility away the gloom, you could loose any
sylvan library you have in play, which is your main defence against discard.
I think that the reason that ernhamgeddon type decks are holding the upper
hand over necrodecks in PT5 tourneys is that necrodecks are more difficult
to play and tune. Ernhamgeddon is disgusingly simple - get creature
superiority and go for the throat!
Necro on the other hand is a little more complex. You have to know when to
play a necro, a timing consideration that varies with what type of deck you
are fighting. Also, the timing of playing your creatures can be very
critical - you not only have to consider your own disk, but any wraths of
god the opponent may have. You play too fast, it is much longer too recover
your horde after a wrath of god or you are forced to blow a disk, you play
too slow, you are not doing damage fast enough and may be allowing your
opponent creature superiority.
As an example, most PT reports lately have been dominated by G/W geddon
decks, with the notable exception (a while back) of Adam and his buddies at
the orlando PT qualifier, which 7/8 (IIRC) of the finalsits were
necro-decks. Well, Adam is ranked 2nd on the DC point list (compared to
loconto - 10th!). Obviously, there is a little bit of skill involved.
ANTI-ANTI-NECRO TACTICS:
Some people have discussed a variety of tactics being used against
necro-decks. THERE ARE BETTER ONES, but I'm not about to spew them out here
- after my titania decks' poor showing at saturday, I may tune my necro deck
and play it saturday. More likely, I'll try something new.
WHIRLING DERVISH: Disks are the obvious answer, but in my opinion,
disking because there is a weenie dervish on the board is excessive - sort
of like using a bazooka to kill cockroaches. Some use aeleopiles, ok
answer, not my personal favorite. Serrated arrows are usually a good
answer. If you think you might see a dervish, save a dark ritual to get out
a serrated arrows early - unlike disk, the arrows can be used on the turn
they come out, and can be used on the next dervish that comes out, or order
of lite-beer, or whatever else tickles your fancy. Which means that you'll
probably draw a disenchant or divine offering. Also, if you are playing
mono-black necro, there is no reason that you should not be playing with 4
mishras and 4 strip mines. The mishra can hold off the dervish and keep it
from growing until you can get some arrows out. Finally, your deck has a
problem if you deck does not have 2 (or more) of one the following cards:
dancing scimitar, walking wall, icy manipulator.
STORM SEEKER: First counter tactic is to not always fill your hand until
you need to. Hell, don't even put out a necro unless you need to. If you
are maintaing a lead with what you have, hole it up in your hand. Agaisnt
white, I sort of think of necro more as a braingeyser than as a permanent,
since it is likely to go away. All this crap about a necro hurting a player
more than helping him is just that - crap, a good white player is liable to
disenchant it. Second counter tactic - and this one is not normal for
necrodeck, but I often wonder why not: Simulacrum. Even if you don't have
regenerating creatures, it is better to loose 1 card than 7 life (or, as a
necro player calls life, cards).
BLASTS: First pyroclasm is a threat. I use bad moons and cut a few disks
to the sideboard. Also, do a full out hymn attack, get pyroclasms and
earthquakes out of his hand. Third, try a few regenerators- they also work
well with the disk. Four- SIMULACRUM. Any good blast player is going to
try and take advantage of your life-strained situation and go for the
throat. Note, if you are the demonic consult crazy type and you are playing
a blast deck, save a consult for a simulacrum - it's an instant and can snag
the simulacrum from your deck in a heartbeat.
Also, against blasts, put out bad moons as fast as possible and get out
any big creautes you have as soon as possible (most necro decks keep 2
vampires and 1 or 2 ishans shades on hand). The hymn and strip him to
death. If he can't get enough bolts or mana with an x spell to kill it,
your damage to card ratio will overcome him. If he can, it's likely that he
expended most of his available firepower blasting the vampire or shade,
leaving you in a much easier breathing position.
KORMUS BELL/GLOBAL HOSER or PYROCLASM: It's a combo, but it could happen.
First solution is to use 4 ebon stronghold - this also helps agaisnt Karma.
Second, have a disk in hand and be ready to disk away the bell after he
gets the combo off. Thrid, and the most vengeful, is to put a smattering of
blue in and hack the kormus bell to mountains as he casts the pyroclasm
(mwahahahahaha!). Fourth, he's unlikely to have enough mana to do both in
the early game on the same turn, so have a hymn ready. And last, one that
most people with the blast mentality are likely to overlook, is to play with
an icy like I do and tap the damn thing when the global hoser gets cast.
KARMA/DROUGHT:
Gloom, gloom, gloom! If you experience a lot of sleight decks that are
going to hose you if you do this, then put a couple despotic scepters in
your sideboard. Gloom once, if it get sleighted, kill it and try again.
Nevy's disk will work for this too, but its slow response time makes it a
less than ideal choice against a B/W deck - they can
disenchant/offer/boomerang it and generally make your life miserable. But
that's no reason not to use gloom, because gloom hoses them more than karma
hoses you.
Going with 4 ebon strongholds helps agaisnt the karma but not the drought.
Drought has an upkeep cost, so strip mines may be useful in shutting it
down, in addition to the disk. If you get in the ugly situation where
drought is out agaisnt you and they have a land tax out, keep casting black
spells, get your land less than theirs - you can get them back quickly with
the necro. If they are stupid enough to ZORB down to less than you to use
the tax, eventually they are going to find themselves on the wrong end of a
strip mine and unable to pay the upkeep on the drought. If they don't use
the land tax, they may find it hard to get enough mana to mount an effective
offense while paying the upkeep.
That's all for now. Perhaps some generic anti 'geddon tactics as I ponder
them.
Monica Severa
->James Grahame (ja3g...@barrow.uwaterloo.ca) wrote:
->[snip]
->: Hymn is a game winning card, but Armageddon isn't? Did I hear
->: that right? Are you actually saying that a Hymn is harder to come
-back from
->: than an Armageddon? This sounds like a MAJOR overreaction. Remember,
-speed
->: makes Hymns useless. ...
->
->It depends on timing, and generally the Hymn get there first. I'm not
->convinced that using a Ritual for a 2nd turn double Hymn is a good
-idea, but
->I've never seen a Type 2 deck that doesn't suffer from a turn 2 Hymn.
-Since
->the Hippy is always in the deck too - an early Hippy increases the
->pressure. That Armageddon may very well get discarded or rendered
-useless
->because of discards before you get a chance to use it.
Yeah, but at least you can Swords or Bolt the Specter, where as with a
Willow/Armaggeddan situation, you're completely screwed.
-Matt
Alan D Kohler
says...
>
>Jesse Chounard (jes...@saucer.cc.umr.edu) wrote:
>: 2. B Necropotence
>: There are 3 main varieties of this deck that I have seen.
>: a. Necro/Knights
>: b. Necro/Regenerators
>: c. Necro/Land destruction
>I have seen another very funny variation, although i dont know, if it is
>competitive:
>Necropotence, Lands Edge plus 60% land in your deck.
>Draw as many cards as possible if you have both down and hope that you get
>enough lands to kill your opponent in one strike.
I made that once - added 4 bolts in, and 4 mishras for blockers and
auxiliary damage (still tossable, the bolts are not a drawback since you can
toss them for 3, and you can use them for early anti-creature power. Added
in typical sideboard stuff - glooms, pyrocalsm, etc. Plus the mandatory 4
necro, 4 edge, 4 consultation, and a zorb in case things got ugly- which
they frequently did.
I won a tourney with it once - and never played that same deck in a tourney
again. But rumors of that deck spread like wildfire.
The last game was sort of funny. I was playing against a U/W counter/big
creature deck. He countered or disenchanted my necros and lands edges, but
I got 3 glooms out on him. He was desperately searching for his air
elementals in his deck as I beat him to death with a mishras factory.
The thing about this deck is it can beat about any deck 60% of the time, but
any deck can beat it 40% of the time. The tourney I won with it was double
elimination, but I lost one game in almost every match - it is very risky.
I don't think I would have qualified had it been swiss format.
Steven Liu
: Also sprach Stil (jsh...@osf1.gmu.edu):
:
: : That said, I agree with your above paragraph, with one addendum: I *do*
: : believe that there are decks that can beat the two kings of the current
: : hill, I think that they are simply just less popular. Examples:
:
: : 1. R/W/g Permanent Removal
: : 2. R/U Permanent Removal & Counter/Burn
: : 3. R/G Orgg/Shivan 2nd turn
: : 4. R/G Jokuweenie
: : 5. B/w Discard
:
: John, allow me to be slightly disappointed and feel a pang of hurt because
: of your not mentioning U/W control in the list above. Yes, U/W dies to
: Necro hard, but I have yet to lose a match to a Willowgeddon deck in a
: serious tournament. Need I mention that Loconto had to beat both Poulter
: and Lestree with his U/W?
: G/W will typically kill Necro; Necro will typically kill U/W; U/W will
: typically kill G/W, etc. etc. R/W and R/G go where G/W would go, and the
: other off-color decks really haven't been developed just yet.
I find that having four Divine Offering in the sideboard greatly improves
Willowgeddon's performance against both Millstone and Howlingbind decks.
That's interesting how your U/W dies to Necrodisk hard, I'm guessing that
you're running an Icy Manipulator/Wrath of God based U/W. How exactly
does it kill G/W consistently? (That is, how does a typical game against
Willowgeddon go?)
I have a few deck designs which don't fall into the standard Necrodisk,
Willowgeddon, Liongeddon, Millstone, Fireplow, or Howlingbind categories
and perform well against these standard deck types (eats some for
lunch, breaks even with the rest), but that's probably mostly because
people aren't prepared for decks other than those types. In general,
I find the existence of Willowgeddon to be the biggest limiting factor
in my deck construction; and I'll like to see how others overcome this
deck type effectively.
: Peace,
:
: The Sophist
:
Richard
nsively (meaning at least 50 games against competition with each) and I have ye
t to find something that can beat both of these types as consistently as these
2 can defeat everything else. I recently read a post from robert hahn who clai
med he had the anti-necro deck. I pieced it together card for card and found t
hat not only could it NOT beat necropotence, it didn't do well against the will
owgeddon decks either. In order of dominance here are the choices one has for
type II:
1. Willowgeddon or any of it's zillions of variants.
2. Necro-decks: and any of it's zillions of variants.
3. ummmm......hard pressed here.
4. still nothing close
5. is there a trend here?
6. maybe red/white fits in here yet it's very difficult to place it this high.
Anyone see where this leads.
Again, I think Preston has it right.
Richard
"Forced to the dark side because there is nothing better except white"
Alan D Kohler
says...
from
>: than an Armageddon? This sounds like a MAJOR overreaction. Remember,
>: makes Hymns useless. ...
>I've never seen a Type 2 deck that doesn't suffer from a turn 2 Hymn. Since
>the Hippy is always in the deck too - an early Hippy increases the
>pressure. That Armageddon may very well get discarded or rendered useless
>because of discards before you get a chance to use it.
This is all totally true - if a hippie gets into play, it MIGHT eliminate a
crucial card in your hand - like say a wrath of god. But is this any worse
than if a wrath of god is played, it WILL eliminate a hippie?
It's all ploy and counter-ploy, parry and riposte, yada yada yada.
In short (alluding to another thread here), anyone who thinks hymn should be
restricted and not suggesting that armageddon and wrath of god should also
be restricted is selling something (which you might have seen if you were at
the SF tourney :) ).
Cheers
--
Alan D Kohler
hwk...@poky.srv.net
"you die, she dies, everybody dies." Roy, in Heavy Metal
Daniel Brickwell
While I usually belive everything you say Steve, I don't think there
are ten deck designs which "hose" necro-decks and are tourney viable.
My experience tells me that a good necrodeck is much to quick in
land-hand-permanent destruction for most decks to cope with.
The reasons are as you nicely put it yourself, the disk, the hymn and
the stripmine. My necrogames usually go like this. I hit the enemy with
one stripmine and one to two hymns (consultation is key here). This forces
him to play cards out of his hand or lose them. Then I hit them with
the first disk and necropotence. Game Over. The ugly thing that this
game plan ignores basicly what the other person is playing. Disk, hymn and
stripmine eliminate or can eliminate depending on luck of the draw
ofcourse every threat.
Friendly Greetings,
Daniel
George W. Bayles
: >I've never seen a Type 2 deck that doesn't suffer from a turn 2 Hymn. Since
: >the Hippy is always in the deck too - an early Hippy increases the
: >pressure. That Armageddon may very well get discarded or rendered useless
: >because of discards before you get a chance to use it.
: This is all totally true - if a hippie gets into play, it MIGHT eliminate a
: crucial card in your hand - like say a wrath of god. But is this any worse
: than if a wrath of god is played, it WILL eliminate a hippie?
Of course not. And the turn 1 Hippy risks a Plow or Bolt resulting in a
card disadvantage - does anyone think the risk isn't worth it?
: It's all ploy and counter-ploy, parry and riposte, yada yada yada.
: In short (alluding to another thread here), anyone who thinks hymn should be
: restricted and not suggesting that armageddon and wrath of god should also
: be restricted is selling something (which you might have seen if you were at
: the SF tourney :) ).
Not that I believe the Hymn should be restricted; but, there's a crucial
difference - Hymn's come much earlier than Armageddon and Wrath of God,
especially in type 2. Any deck with more than minor black can use the Hymn -
Armageddon and Wrath affect the caster as well, the decks have to be designed
around that. If Wrath were restricted defensive decks wouldn't have a chance
at all in type 2. Armageddon is pointless until you get an advantage in cards
in play. A Hymn is useful anytime your opponent is holding cards. Even if
the Hymn is restricted Armageddon and Wrath wouldn't merit it.
The Dragon Reborn
: >I have seen another very funny variation, although i dont know, if it is
: >competitive:
: >Necropotence, Lands Edge plus 60% land in your deck.
: >Draw as many cards as possible if you have both down and hope that you get
: >enough lands to kill your opponent in one strike.
: I made that once - added 4 bolts in, and 4 mishras for blockers and
: auxiliary damage (still tossable, the bolts are not a drawback since you can
: toss them for 3, and you can use them for early anti-creature power. Added
: in typical sideboard stuff - glooms, pyrocalsm, etc. Plus the mandatory 4
: necro, 4 edge, 4 consultation, and a zorb in case things got ugly- which
: they frequently did.
: elimination, but I lost one game in almost every match - it is very risky.
: I don't think I would have qualified had it been swiss format.
The first Necro deck I made and tested was this same theme. You are
absolutely right about it's riskiness. When it works, it is blindlingly
fast and effective, when it doesn't, you just resign.
Bill
Daniel Brickwell
>
>Preston Poulter (ppou...@rigel.oac.uci.edu) wrote:
>
>: The W/G or the Necro decks are I feel simply THE BEST possible decks to
>: but they will be hard pressed to do as well against a wide field. These
>: decks simply stomp so many opposing decks designs that their tournment
>: viability simply outmatches anything that can be composed under the
>: current Type II rules.
>
>: Basically, if you don't play one of these 2 decks then you are going to
>: lose to one of these two decks and it doesn't really matter if you see it
>: coming.
>
>haven't faced any decent R/W decks. R/W has a good chance in beating
>Willowgeddon and Necro decks, and (imo) is just as viable a deck as any
>type II deck out there. Yes, people, you do have a 3rd type II option.
>
Just because i was there. I saw Preston Play against Mark Justice
(reigning american national champion no less) in the quarter
finals of PT 1 and Justice was playing a red/white Deck with just
2 stormbinds for green I think.
He won 2:0 I think.
They both played very well too I might add. (one does have to note though
that Justice was undefeated in the swiss with his deck, but that was
before Ernhamgeddon and Necroominsence were improved.)
To me it is very funny that the two deck Types who went undefeated
through the swiss part of PT 1 Justices New Vise Age and Baxters Good
Stuff get the least Hype, while Necropotence and Ernhamgeddon get
all the attention.
Friendly Greetings,
Daniel
>-Kai Martin
> Full-fledged member of the Big Daddy's crew
>
>###############################################################################
>Kai Martin || // //\\ [][][]
>Dept. of Computer Science & Electrical Engineering ||// // \\ []
>University of Illinois at Chicago || \\ //====\\ []
>kma...@eecs.uic.edu || \\ // \\ [][][]
>###############################################################################
>
>
Steven Liu
Daniel Brickwell (Br...@ccmailer.wiwiss.fu-berlin.de) wrote:
: In article <4le62j$8...@news.cc.utah.edu>,
: sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) says:
: >
: >the_furry_one (jet...@teleport.com) wrote:
: >: Steven Liu (sl7...@cc.utah.edu) wrote:
:
: >
: >
: >You need 18 creature removal spells in order to beat a deck and it's not
: > hard to hose? Hello? I'm not saying that it's difficult to design a deck
: > to hose it; I'm saying that there are very few options as far as hosing
: > Willowgeddon decks go. I mean, I can think of ten deck designs off the
: > top of my head that can hose Necrodisk, and only a couple that can hose
: > Willowgeddon. Are you getting a clear picture now?
:
: While I usually belive everything you say Steve, I don't think there
: are ten deck designs which "hose" necro-decks and are tourney viable.
: My experience tells me that a good necrodeck is much to quick in
: land-hand-permanent destruction for most decks to cope with.
Well, I said ten deck designs which "hose" Necrodisk, and two deck designs
which "hose" Willowgeddon, but I didn't mention anything about "tourney-
viable." :) The point is, it's more difficult to "hose" Willowgeddon in
general, tourney-viable or not.
: The reasons are as you nicely put it yourself, the disk, the hymn and
: the stripmine. My necrogames usually go like this. I hit the enemy with
: one stripmine and one to two hymns (consultation is key here). This forces
: him to play cards out of his hand or lose them. Then I hit them with
: the first disk and necropotence. Game Over. The ugly thing that this
: game plan ignores basicly what the other person is playing. Disk, hymn and
: stripmine eliminate or can eliminate depending on luck of the draw
: of course every threat.
That's interesting. I rarely find a Strip' and a Hymn' enough to slow down
the opponent significantly, especially if he's built his deck expecting a
four Strip' suite in every deck (which he should). How many 'Consultations
do you use in your deck standard? I don't use more than two.
You have to remember that you can quite easily lose a Hymn' to the initial six
cards, in which case you don't actually make your library more Hymn'-heavy
on average. Getting two Hymn' is definitely an above-average draw (before
actually Necropotencing). Another problem is that Necrodisk doesn't work
as well with cards missing in the deck as Willowgeddon does. Having three
'Disks 'Consulted away is devastating.
: Friendly Greetings,
:
: Daniel
So you guys don't feel cheated out of your secrets, here's the content of one
of my tournament decks (minus sideboard):
"Had a Nice Day" (G)
Black Vise
2 Crumble
4 Erhnam Djinn
2 Force of Nature
16 Forest
4 Forgotten Lore
2 Fyndhorn Elves
Fyndhorn Elder
3 Hurricane
2 Jester's Cap
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Nature's Lore
2 Nevinyrral's Disk
2 Serrated Arrows
4 Strip Mine
2 Sylvan Library
4 Whirling Dervish
Zuran Orb
Yes, it is a lot more effective than it appears to be. Don't slam it 'til
you've tried it. And yes, it takes skills to play. A player, after going
undefeated in three rounds of Swiss, got swept by this deck, when asked
about how he felt about his first defeat, he replied, "I was having a nice
day until I ran up against that stupid deck," and the name stuck. :)
So how exactly do YOUR Necrodisk decks work?
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Robert S. Hahn
Also sprach Richard (IO2...@MAINE.MAINE.EDU):
: 2 can defeat everything else. I recently read a post from robert hahn who clai
: med he had the anti-necro deck. I pieced it together card for card and found t
: hat not only could it NOT beat necropotence, it didn't do well against the will
: owgeddon decks either. In order of dominance here are the choices one has for
: type II:
Well, I can't claim anything for certain, since I only played one major
tourney with the deck in question (which I've named, by the way -- "Winter
Storm" -- in the tradition of Preston Poulter and his "Lilywhite").
However, in theory, Winter Storm should kill Necro dead. In practice, it
did kill Necro dead in every game in which I've played it (but that's
perhaps not as many games as it needs to be).
As for Willowgeddon, I know that Winter Storm had to go through three G/W
Willowgeddon type decks. I think G/W gives it more trouble than Necro
does, but I also think that theoretically, it should be stronger than G/W
as well. In practice, again, who can say for sure?
A lot of the game is in the draw, and in the subtle decisions that some
people make and some people don't. I'm a very conservative player, having
been trained on U/W control -- others are aggressive players, having been a
devotee of Red or Green or Black. Nonetheless, I feel comfortable claiming
that G/W Willow and B Necro are not the only kings of the hill.
Take care,
-The Sophist
--
Steven Liu
: seems to be holding the upper hand.
:
: In article <4le7ia$8...@news.cc.utah.edu>, sl7...@cc.utah.edu says...
:
: >What infinite supply of Disenchant/Divine Offering? Say you have 4 'Disk
: > and 4 Meekstone (not likely), and I have 4 Disenchant and 4 'Offering,
: > if I don't match your output, nothing happens. If you don't match my
: > output, you die. Meekstone even allows me to zap 4 life off the Necro
: > draw before it pins each critter, and I can wait to draw Dis/DvOf and
: > still hose you, while you will die if you wait for the Meekstone.
:
: First off, I want to remember what deck you are playing against- it's called
: a necrodeck because it utilizes multiple necropotences. Necropotence = it's
: more likey you're going to be "waiting" for a disenchant/divine offering
: than I'm going to be waiting for a meekstone because I'm drawing cards
: faster.
That has been the primary problem I have been having with Necrodisk. I have
rarely, playing a Necrodisk, been able to actually utilize Necropotence to
any effectiveness due to early setback (unless I get really lucky and get
an unmolested Ivory Tower or Zuran Orb).
To put it more plainly, I'm always taking a ton load of damage early which I
can't afford to Erhnam Djinn, Mishra's Factory, Whirling Dervish, Elvish
Archers, assorted Crusaded knights, (heck even Soul Kissed Ashen Ghouls),
and other things despite constant Hymn's and Strip's, and left wishing
for a 'Disk just to stay alive.
: Second - gloom. I will admit the disenchants and divine offerings are
: headaches for a necroplayer. I'll go further and also say that armageddons
: and wraths of god are also headaches for a necro player. Against a willow
: deck, I have little fear of a gloom being slieghted to black. Gloom is a
: major weapon against a willowgeddon type deck for that reason. While your
: are trying to pull up a tranquility, I hopefully am stripping those nasty
: cards from your hand with hymns and spectres. Hopefully, I get a few
: disechants, divine offerings, and armageddons in the process. Also, I'll be
: trying to strip your land out to keep you from getting enough mana to cast a
: tranquility - the last is most difficult, it isn't too hard to get 3 mana
: with a green deck, but it's still worth pursuing.
:
: Even if you do manage to tranquility away the gloom, you could loose any
: sylvan library you have in play, which is your main defence against discard.
Sure, Gloom shuts down half of Willowgeddon (putting aside completely the
'Disk and Tranquility for now), but the problem is that it's the wrong
half timing-wise. It's the damage you want to shut down to preserve the
Necropotence advantage for later, but Gloom doesn't stop the Erhnam Djinn
and Mishra's Factory and Whirling Dervish and Spectral Bears and all the
other good stuff. In my experience, Willowgeddon won't hesitate to play
Tranquility because by the time they do, you are forced to 'Disk or die
(usually die, because the 'Disk gets the top-shelve Divine Offering of
the now-defunct Sylvan Library).
: I think that the reason that ernhamgeddon type decks are holding the upper
: hand over necrodecks in PT5 tourneys is that necrodecks are more difficult
: to play and tune. Ernhamgeddon is disgusingly simple - get creature
: superiority and go for the throat!
:
: Necro on the other hand is a little more complex. You have to know when to
: play a necro, a timing consideration that varies with what type of deck you
: are fighting. Also, the timing of playing your creatures can be very
: critical - you not only have to consider your own disk, but any wraths of
: god the opponent may have. You play too fast, it is much longer too recover
: your horde after a wrath of god or you are forced to blow a disk, you play
: too slow, you are not doing damage fast enough and may be allowing your
: opponent creature superiority.
:
: As an example, most PT reports lately have been dominated by G/W geddon
: decks, with the notable exception (a while back) of Adam and his buddies at
: the orlando PT qualifier, which 7/8 (IIRC) of the finalsits were
: necro-decks. Well, Adam is ranked 2nd on the DC point list (compared to
: loconto - 10th!). Obviously, there is a little bit of skill involved.
Alright, so it's quite possible that I'm just not a very good Necrodisk
player. The thing is, I could beat Willowgeddon before the Divine
Offerings and Crumblesin the sideboard version; and I could beat
Howlingbind before the Erhnam Djinn and Detonate in the main deck version.
: ANTI-ANTI-NECRO TACTICS:
:
: Some people have discussed a variety of tactics being used against
: necro-decks. THERE ARE BETTER ONES, but I'm not about to spew them out here
: - after my titania decks' poor showing at saturday, I may tune my necro deck
: and play it saturday. More likely, I'll try something new.
:
: WHIRLING DERVISH: Disks are the obvious answer, but in my opinion,
: disking because there is a weenie dervish on the board is excessive - sort
: of like using a bazooka to kill cockroaches. Some use aeleopiles, ok
: answer, not my personal favorite. Serrated arrows are usually a good
: answer. If you think you might see a dervish, save a dark ritual to get out
: a serrated arrows early - unlike disk, the arrows can be used on the turn
: they come out, and can be used on the next dervish that comes out, or order
: of lite-beer, or whatever else tickles your fancy. Which means that you'll
: probably draw a disenchant or divine offering. Also, if you are playing
: mono-black necro, there is no reason that you should not be playing with 4
: mishras and 4 strip mines. The mishra can hold off the dervish and keep it
: from growing until you can get some arrows out. Finally, your deck has a
: problem if you deck does not have 2 (or more) of one the following cards:
: dancing scimitar, walking wall, icy manipulator.
I prefer a combination of Dancing Scimitars and Serrated Arrows in addition
to the Mishra's Factories. The thing is, smart Willowgeddon always "saves
the Strip's for the 'Factories" (it's practically a chant), and nails the
Serrated Arrows and Dancing Scimitars with Disenchants, Divine Offerings,
and Crumbles (I personally prefer the non-Gloomable Crumbles, since if the
Necrodisk can't stop the dervish, it doesn't matter if I give him the life,
the dervish will still crush him). And, let's not forget the Spectral's.
: STORM SEEKER: First counter tactic is to not always fill your hand until
: you need to. Hell, don't even put out a necro unless you need to. If you
: are maintaing a lead with what you have, hole it up in your hand. Agaisnt
: white, I sort of think of necro more as a braingeyser than as a permanent,
: since it is likely to go away. All this crap about a necro hurting a player
: more than helping him is just that - crap, a good white player is liable to
: disenchant it. Second counter tactic - and this one is not normal for
: necrodeck, but I often wonder why not: Simulacrum. Even if you don't have
: regenerating creatures, it is better to loose 1 card than 7 life (or, as a
: necro player calls life, cards).
I usually have one (two rarely) Storm Seeker just to threaten the Necrodisk
player with it. You know what the sick thing is? Necrodisk is not a speed
deck. It is, in practice, quite slow to set into motion and very defensive
(as far as early creature clash goes). Imagine a Wrath'/Icy' deck that has
a one-turn delay for the Wrath' which can be Disenchanted, Divine Offered,
Crumbled, Detonated, and Shattered, and you have no countermagic to defend
it. That's how I see the Necrodisk against these newer versions of Willow-
geddon, Howlingbind, and Fireplow decks. The Storm Seeker presents quite
a problem as any late-game direct-damage does against the Necrodisk. It's
like finally surviving the early creature onslaught with a control deck
and not being able to use your Jayemdae Tome because it will likely just
kill you. Once again, the key is the 'Disk, if they stop the 'Disk, you're
in it way over your head.
: BLASTS: First pyroclasm is a threat. I use bad moons and cut a few disks
: to the sideboard. Also, do a full out hymn attack, get pyroclasms and
: earthquakes out of his hand. Third, try a few regenerators- they also work
: well with the disk. Four- SIMULACRUM. Any good blast player is going to
: try and take advantage of your life-strained situation and go for the
: throat. Note, if you are the demonic consult crazy type and you are playing
: a blast deck, save a consult for a simulacrum - it's an instant and can snag
: the simulacrum from your deck in a heartbeat.
: Also, against blasts, put out bad moons as fast as possible and get out
: any big creautes you have as soon as possible (most necro decks keep 2
: vampires and 1 or 2 ishans shades on hand). The hymn and strip him to
: death. If he can't get enough bolts or mana with an x spell to kill it,
: your damage to card ratio will overcome him. If he can, it's likely that he
: expended most of his available firepower blasting the vampire or shade,
: leaving you in a much easier breathing position.
Yeah, Pyroclasm is just devastating. Ironically, your solution of Bad Moon I
find useful against a variety of decks, including Willowgeddon and Howling-
bind. Specifically, I find the Bad Moon extremely useful against any deck
which uses those annoying 5-toughness critters because it puts them in the
five-mana range for the pump knights to first strike to death. This is
especially good because the Dark Ritual bluff suddenly becomes a luxury
and not a necessity in early creature clash, and, against control decks,
the Bad Moon often makes the critical kill for you before the control deck
can do anything.
: KORMUS BELL/GLOBAL HOSER or PYROCLASM: It's a combo, but it could happen.
: First solution is to use 4 ebon stronghold - this also helps agaisnt Karma.
: Second, have a disk in hand and be ready to disk away the bell after he
: gets the combo off. Thrid, and the most vengeful, is to put a smattering of
: blue in and hack the kormus bell to mountains as he casts the pyroclasm
: (mwahahahahaha!). Fourth, he's unlikely to have enough mana to do both in
: the early game on the same turn, so have a hymn ready. And last, one that
: most people with the blast mentality are likely to overlook, is to play with
: an icy like I do and tap the damn thing when the global hoser gets cast.
:
: KARMA/DROUGHT:
: Gloom, gloom, gloom! If you experience a lot of sleight decks that are
: going to hose you if you do this, then put a couple despotic scepters in
: your sideboard. Gloom once, if it get sleighted, kill it and try again.
: Nevy's disk will work for this too, but its slow response time makes it a
: less than ideal choice against a B/W deck - they can
: disenchant/offer/boomerang it and generally make your life miserable. But
: that's no reason not to use gloom, because gloom hoses them more than karma
: hoses you.
: Going with 4 ebon strongholds helps agaisnt the karma but not the drought.
: Drought has an upkeep cost, so strip mines may be useful in shutting it
: down, in addition to the disk. If you get in the ugly situation where
: drought is out agaisnt you and they have a land tax out, keep casting black
: spells, get your land less than theirs - you can get them back quickly with
: the necro. If they are stupid enough to ZORB down to less than you to use
: the tax, eventually they are going to find themselves on the wrong end of a
: strip mine and unable to pay the upkeep on the drought. If they don't use
: the land tax, they may find it hard to get enough mana to mount an effective
: offense while paying the upkeep.
Karma is the worst, although Reclamation is also a severe pain in the neck.
Too bad for the existence of Tranquility and Crumble, otherwise Necrodisk
would have a much better shot at the sideboard game.
: That's all for now. Perhaps some generic anti 'geddon tactics as I ponder
: them.
Good generic anti-Willowgeddon and anti-Liongeddon tactics will be much
appreciated. And I believe I speak for more than just myself here.
: --
: Alan D Kohler
: hwk...@poky.srv.net
: "You die, the girl dies everybody dies" heavy metal
: (Also uttered by myself whenever using a nevy's disk)
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Steven Liu
Steven Liu (sl7...@cc.utah.edu) wrote:
:
: "Had a Nice Day" (G)
:
: Black Vise
: 2 Crumble
: 4 Erhnam Djinn
: 2 Force of Nature
: 16 Forest
: 4 Forgotten Lore
: 2 Fyndhorn Elves
: Fyndhorn Elder
: 3 Hurricane
: 2 Jester's Cap
: 4 Mishra's Factory
: 4 Nature's Lore
: 2 Nevinyrral's Disk
: 2 Serrated Arrows
: 4 Strip Mine
: 2 Sylvan Library
: 4 Whirling Dervish
: Zuran Orb
Oops, I knew I missed something, 2 Jayemdae Tomes. For you 60-card fanatics,
replace a Hurricane and a Forest with 2 Jayemdae Tomes.
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Craig Sivils
>So how exactly do YOUR Necrodisk decks work?
Well (currently), I added 4 sulfer springs and 4 bolts for some off
colour. Then prone to a fit of extreme stupidity, I made the
sideboard 4 Dwarven ruins, 3 Mountains, 4 Lands Edge and 2
Consultations and 2 gloom.
With the intent of taking out the disks, drain life, and other "slow"
stuff for a good quick braindead luck of the draw kill.
I haven't played it in a tournament, and I'm probabbly not THAT silly,
but it was fun to see my wife's face when I "sideboarded" and things
are going along great, she doesn't suspect a thing other than I'm
playing really aggressive (bolt, order, another order, whatever).
Then I throw down the lands edge/necro combo and receive a quick bonk
to the head and some cards thrown playfully at me to the chours of
"you idiot".
And yes, someone had this idea before I did, but they did it the other
way around. When the first necroedge deck was posted someone
suggested putting orders and stuff in it. So alas, I can't take
credit for this insanity. I guess we're all not deck designer's but
rather deck tweakers.
Craig
p.s. It may not win a tourney, but it made my wife smile.
Dang, I guess necro decks are more versitile than previously thought.
Craig Sivils
sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) wrote:
>Good generic anti-Willowgeddon and anti-Liongeddon tactics will be much
> appreciated. And I believe I speak for more than just myself here.
Although I'm stating the obvious, I'll do it anyways.
Wait a month.
If even some of the alliances rumors/tidbits ring true, there will be
a bunch of weapons against Xgeddon.
* Repriasal is a much better answer than swords (don't give em life).
* The improved Felwar stone can provide immediate postgeddon mana.
* The freaky millstone thing would help prevent over-taxing.
* The 0 cost spells (counter spell and 4 point bolt) are
anti-anti-mana denial.
I expect Alliances to shake up the tourney environment more than Ice
Age did, least I hope so :)
Craig
Craig Sivils
sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) wrote:
>Steven Liu (sl7...@cc.utah.edu) wrote:
>:
>: "Had a Nice Day" (G)
>:
>: Black Vise
>: 2 Crumble
>: 4 Erhnam Djinn
>: 2 Force of Nature
>: 16 Forest
>: 4 Forgotten Lore
>: 2 Fyndhorn Elves
>: Fyndhorn Elder
>: 3 Hurricane
>: 2 Jester's Cap
>: 4 Mishra's Factory
>: 4 Nature's Lore
>: 2 Nevinyrral's Disk
>: 2 Serrated Arrows
>: 4 Strip Mine
>: 2 Sylvan Library
>: 4 Whirling Dervish
>: Zuran Orb
>:
Wow, this is remakably similar to a deck I made (You can have credit,
thats not the point I'm making). Mine replaced twister's for the
crumbles, didn't have the elder. Put in bee's for the hurricane's and
only one sylvan library or something like that. I think it had mist
over dervishes and some Giant Growths. It's focus at the time was
more anti-control magic rather than anti-black. Forgotten Lore just
rocks in a heavy green deck and nature's lore is very strong as well.
Nice deck overall
Craig
Steven Liu
Craig Sivils (csi...@blkbox.com) wrote:
: sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) wrote:
:
: >Steven Liu (sl7...@cc.utah.edu) wrote:
: >:
: >: "Had a Nice Day" (G)
: >:
: >: Black Vise
: >: 2 Crumble
: >: 4 Erhnam Djinn
: >: 2 Force of Nature
: >: 16 Forest
: >: 4 Forgotten Lore
: >: 2 Fyndhorn Elves
: >: Fyndhorn Elder
: >: 3 Hurricane
: >: 2 Jester's Cap
: >: 4 Mishra's Factory
: >: 4 Nature's Lore
: >: 2 Nevinyrral's Disk
: >: 2 Serrated Arrows
: >: 4 Strip Mine
: >: 2 Sylvan Library
: >: 4 Whirling Dervish
: >: Zuran Orb
I forgot the 2 Jayemdae Tomes. :)
: Wow, this is remakably similar to a deck I made (You can have credit,
: thats not the point I'm making).
Actually, Craig, this deck indeed evolved from the monochrome green deck
outlined in one of your posts. After reading your post, I broke out my
four spare Forgotten Lore, Nature's Lore, and Johtull Wurm and put the
deck together for a newbie. It had Giant Growth, Shambling Strider,
Killer Bees, Desert Twister, Thelonite Druid (these guys rock), and a
lot of elves (57% mana counting all the elves and Nature's Lore). The
deck proved very effective in casual play, which prompted me to create
the tournament version.
Observing the spare-parts version in action, I found that, aside from the
obvious speed advantage, Nature's Lore's library purification effect was
more potent than it first appeared. Forgotten Lore was effective in the
spare-parts version, but was not spectacular, since it didn't have the
broken cards and situational cards to recycle (in the "Had a Nice Day"
version, the Forgotten Lore is simply devastating; as a sidenote, I do
have a four 'Caps, extra elves version of this deck, which nobody likes
to play against :). The Sylvan Library/Nature's Lore combo is also an
effective trick.
: Mine replaced twister's for the crumbles, didn't have the elder. Put
: in bee's for the hurricane's and only one sylvan library or something
: like that.
In playtesting, I found the Hurricanes to be absolutely necessary. The
Erhnam Djinn and Whirling Dervish are mere grunts. More often than
not, this deck wins by one of the Hurricanes or Force of Nature. The
second Sylvan Library is also essential, as it is the primary defense
against Hymn's for this deck. If the second Sylvan Library comes up,
you can always keep it on "top-shelve" (that's what we call the top
car on your library when you have a Sylvan Library out) in case the
first Sylvan Library is destroyed. I did have Desert Twisters for
the Crumbles originally, but this deck has obviously gone "tournament
cheat." :)
: I think it had mist over dervishes and some Giant Growths. It's focus
: at the time was more anti-control magic rather than anti-black.
This deck is not designed to be anti-black. Admittedly playing against
black with four Whirling Dervish standard is very nice. Against Control
Magic the Tranquility goes into the deck, of course. Although I haven't
seen too many people play with Control Magic lately, except myself. :)
: Forgotten Lore just rocks in a heavy green deck and nature's lore is
: very strong as well.
:
: Nice deck overall
And it wins, too. :) They really should restrict Jester's Cap.
: Craig
:
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Steven Liu
Craig Sivils (csi...@blkbox.com) wrote:
: >So how exactly do YOUR Necrodisk decks work?
Heh, cool. Alright, in another attempt to draw out yet other insights, I
will share the contents of my latest Necrodisk design, again minus the
sideboard (as it varies):
"'Capping Arcanix" a.k.a. "The Necrocap Deck" (B)
Artifact (16)
Black Vise
3 Dancing Scimitar
Ivory Tower
3 Jester's Cap
4 Nevinyrral's Disk
3 Serrated Arrows
Zuran Orb
Black (21)
3 Dark Ritual
Demonic Consultation
2 Drain Life
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Hypnotic Specter
Ihsan's Shade
2 Knight of Stromgald
2 Necropotence
2 Order of Ebon Hand
Land (23)
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Strip Mine
15 Swamp
It used to have a Vexing Arcanix in it (hence the name), but later on I found
it to be nastier without it. Any suggestion on how to improve it against
Willowgeddon and Howlingbind?
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Technowiz
On Tuesday, April 23, 1996, Steven Liu wrote...
> Robert S. Hahn (rsh...@is.nyu.edu) wrote:
> : Also sprach Stil (jsh...@osf1.gmu.edu):
> :
> : : That said, I agree with your above paragraph, with one addendum: I
*do*
> : : believe that there are decks that can beat the two kings of the
current
> : : hill, I think that they are simply just less popular. Examples:
> :
> : : 1. R/W/g Permanent Removal
> : : 2. R/U Permanent Removal & Counter/Burn
> : : 3. R/G Orgg/Shivan 2nd turn
> : : 4. R/G Jokuweenie
> : : 5. B/w Discard
6. U/W Control
7. G/W Ernhamgeddon
8. B Necrodeck....
And within each category is 3 subcategories.
But each one can die against the wrong deck.
1. Burn Deck (No permanents needed.)
2. Land Destruction (No permanents needed, # 2 is mana intensive)
3. U/W Control (Unsummon Ball lightning, Swords Lumberjack....)
4. Ernhamgeddon (You put out another weenie, i put out my big guy.)
5. Ernhamgeddon/Necro (Land tax, Necropotence, Land tax, Necro...)
6. Jokuweenie, White Weenie, Necro
7. U/W Control (Conter armageddon, control ernham. nuff said.)
8. 2 cards do this, Pyroclasm and disenchant. Any deck which has these
destroys a Necrodeck.
Oh, and I love the name Jokuweenie. Just a fun thing to call a deck.
Yes, there are more decks out there, but seriously just because one wins a
tournament doesn't mean it is King of the Hill. Sometimes i like to throw
wrench in the works and play something that nobody expects... Never know
when it works out.
Beware the 'Ernhamcontrolgeddonnecroweenie burnLD deck.'
-Technowiz
"Hmm... I wonder if that would work..."
Mike Donais
On 26 Apr 1996, Steven Liu wrote:
> : >: Black Vise
> : >: 2 Crumble
> : >: 4 Erhnam Djinn
> : >: 2 Force of Nature
> : >: 16 Forest
> : >: 4 Forgotten Lore
> : >: 2 Fyndhorn Elves
> : >: Fyndhorn Elder
> : >: 3 Hurricane
> : >: 2 Jester's Cap
> : >: 4 Mishra's Factory
> : >: 4 Nature's Lore
> : >: 2 Nevinyrral's Disk
> : >: 2 Serrated Arrows
> : >: 4 Strip Mine
> : >: 2 Sylvan Library
> : >: 4 Whirling Dervish
> : >: Zuran Orb
> : >:
>
>
> I forgot the 2 Jayemdae Tomes. :)
>
> : Craig
> --Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Hi Craig, and steve, I would highly recommend trying 2-3 ritual of
subdual in this deck. I have played lots of mono green decks and this
spell is a extremely powerful lock spell. I stopped using me ritual of
subdual deck in friendly play because it was just too damn powerful.
Remember your elves will still produce coloured mana even after you cast RoS.
It is almost like a armaggedon that you see in the ehrnageddon decks.
If you manage to cast RoS and then the next turn cast ehrnam there is
nothing that can stop it and you win the game.
You may need to add 2 or 3 elves if you want to make sure the RoS doesn't
effect you so much.
Mike Donais. (BOFH) (don...@uwindsor.ca)
SOCR: Student Operated Computing Resources (Http://supernova.uwindsor.ca)
Albert Ko
On 26 Apr 1996, Steven Liu wrote:
> Craig Sivils (csi...@blkbox.com) wrote:
> : >So how exactly do YOUR Necrodisk decks work?
[snip serious stuff about Necrodeck (tm) w/ Bolts]
> : With the intent of taking out the disks, drain life, and other "slow"
> : stuff for a good quick braindead luck of the draw kill.
> :
> : I haven't played it in a tournament, and I'm probabbly not THAT silly,
> : but it was fun to see my wife's face when I "sideboarded" and things
> : are going along great, she doesn't suspect a thing other than I'm
> : playing really aggressive (bolt, order, another order, whatever).
> : Then I throw down the lands edge/necro combo and receive a quick bonk
> : to the head and some cards thrown playfully at me to the chours of
> : "you idiot".
> :
> : And yes, someone had this idea before I did, but they did it the other
> : way around. When the first necroedge deck was posted someone
> : suggested putting orders and stuff in it. So alas, I can't take
> : credit for this insanity. I guess we're all not deck designer's but
> : rather deck tweakers.
Ahh, but when does tweaking become so evolutionary to a deck the it stops
being someone elses design? That's part of originality!
> : Craig
> :
> : p.s. It may not win a tourney, but it made my wife smile.
> : Dang, I guess necro decks are more versitile than previously thought.
>
> Heh, cool. Alright, in another attempt to draw out yet other insights, I
> will share the contents of my latest Necrodisk design, again minus the
> sideboard (as it varies):
Hmm, look at the deck below and compare it to the ol' Necrodisk (tm) aka
Necrodeck (tm) archetype decks and you'll notice that this deck isn't
even CLOSE to standard.
> "'Capping Arcanix" a.k.a. "The Necrocap Deck" (B)
>
> Artifact (16)
>
> Black Vise
> 3 Dancing Scimitar (courtesy of Brian Weissman I guess)
> Ivory Tower
> 3 Jester's Cap
> 4 Nevinyrral's Disk
> 3 Serrated Arrows
> Zuran Orb
>
> Black (21)
>
> 3 Dark Ritual (4 Rituals not a neccesity but a must-have)
> Demonic Consultation _
> 2 Drain Life |
> 4 Hymn to Tourach | (pretty much standard fare)
> 4 Hypnotic Specter |
> Ihsan's Shade -
> 2 Necropotence (only 2 Potence. . .makes Necro a secondary strategy)
> 2 Knight of Stromgald
> 2 Order of Ebon Hand
(only 4 pumpknights is a severe difference between the standard fast
weenie strategy of Necrodisk)
> Land (23)
>
> 4 Mishra's Factory
> 4 Strip Mine
> 15 Swamp
One thing you should always think about in any Type II deck nowadays
(with the Tax so prevalent) is the use of blowup lands (saclands from FE)
to increase early mana production (it's like a non-permanent Elf) and
create an anti-Tax environment.
> It used to have a Vexing Arcanix in it (hence the name), but later on I found
> it to be nastier without it. Any suggestion on how to improve it against
> Willowgeddon and Howlingbind?
A possible suggestion would be to make the deck more speedy with the
addition of more attack cards (Necro and Rituals) and more effecient
defense (Dancing Scimitars & 1 Serrated out (sideboard), in couple Icies)
Change Knights to all Sengirs. Cap becomes main strategy, with Necro for
speed of Capping only. Disk still for control. 4 Kniggits (NI!) is not
enough for a weenie horde and if Cap fires to break down defenses (StP,
Balance, Wrath, . . .) and Sengirs should have no problem with kill.
However, due to the blinding speed of the Cap (that's sarcastic), we know
we have the newest and most deadly Necrodeck out there ;)
(Actually, it might work with B/U with counterspells)
--
Al:)
Steven Liu
Mike Donais (don...@server.uwindsor.ca) wrote:
:
: On 26 Apr 1996, Steven Liu wrote:
:
: > : >: Black Vise
: > : >: 2 Crumble
: > : >: 4 Erhnam Djinn
: > : >: 2 Force of Nature
: > : >: 16 Forest
: > : >: 4 Forgotten Lore
: > : >: 2 Fyndhorn Elves
: > : >: Fyndhorn Elder
: > : >: 3 Hurricane
: > : >: 2 Jester's Cap
: > : >: 4 Nature's Lore
: > : >: 2 Nevinyrral's Disk
: > : >: 2 Serrated Arrows
: > : >: 4 Strip Mine
: > : >: 2 Sylvan Library
: > : >: 4 Whirling Dervish
: > : >: Zuran Orb
: > : >:
: >
: >
: > I forgot the 2 Jayemdae Tomes. :)
: >
: > : Craig
: > --Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
:
: Hi Craig, and steve, I would highly recommend trying 2-3 ritual of
: subdual in this deck. I have played lots of mono green decks and this
: spell is a extremely powerful lock spell. I stopped using me ritual of
: subdual deck in friendly play because it was just too damn powerful.
I did consider using the Ritual of Subdual, but Howlingbind is extremely
popular around these parts, and Ritual of Subdual is just ineffective
against Howlingbind (heavy artifact, Winter Orb, and Stormbind doesn't
need colored mana to operate), so I took them out. The 'Caps are just
much nastier against most decks (two more in the sideboard which can
go in, along with Felwar Stones and Tinder Walls for more 'Capping
speed against mana-denial decks and decks which are particularly
vulnerable against 'Caps [which is to say most T2 decks these days,
with a couple of noted exceptions]).
: Remember your elves will still produce coloured mana even after you cast RoS.
: It is almost like a armaggedon that you see in the ehrnageddon decks.
:
: If you manage to cast RoS and then the next turn cast ehrnam there is
: nothing that can stop it and you win the game.
:
: You may need to add 2 or 3 elves if you want to make sure the RoS doesn't
: affect you so much.
I'm reluctant to run more elves because most decks I play against run three
Serrated Arrows standard (I'm really surprised that more decks don't).
: Mike Donais. (BOFH) (don...@uwindsor.ca)
: SOCR: Student Operated Computing Resources (Http://supernova.uwindsor.ca)
:
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Steven Liu
: even CLOSE to standard.
That's because this deck isn't supposed to play like the standard Necrodisk
decks. The strategy of this deck is one of variable tactics. Depending
on the draw, this deck can be either offensive or defensive, and it will
often shift gear in mid-game. Over-all, it is considerably more defensive
than the standard Necrodisk decks.
: > "'Capping Arcanix" a.k.a. "The Necrocap Deck" (B)
: >
: > Artifact (16)
: >
: > Black Vise
: > 3 Dancing Scimitar (courtesy of Brian Weissman I guess)
I have seriously considered replacing at least some of these with Icy
Manipulators because of the popularity of Howlingbind, but lately
I have been playing against some "Had a Nice Day" clones, so I'm
still experimenting here.
: > Ivory Tower
: > 3 Jester's Cap
: > 4 Nevinyrral's Disk
: > 3 Serrated Arrows
: > Zuran Orb
: >
: > Black (21)
: >
: > 3 Dark Ritual (4 Rituals not a neccesity but a must-have)
I really want to add a fourth Dark Ritual, but I can't find room for it.
Maybe I'll just add one and go 61 cards standard. I just keep telling
myself that this deck is far more defensive than the standard Necrodisk
and I need the card advantage, but the fourth Dark Ritual will greatly
improve my chances for the devastating quick 'Cap.
: > Demonic Consultation _
: > 2 Drain Life |
: > 4 Hymn to Tourach | (pretty much standard fare)
: > 4 Hypnotic Specter |
: > Ihsan's Shade -
: > 2 Necropotence (only 2 Potence. . .makes Necro a secondary strategy)
This deck is far more defensive than your average Necrodisk, it can afford to
wait for Necropotence longer. Note that there are extra Necropotence in
the "usual" sideboard for use against all sorts of things. I have, however,
been stuck hoping for a Necropotence multiple times lately, so I might just
add the third at the expense of the fourth 'Disk.
: > 2 Knight of Stromgald
: > 2 Order of Ebon Hand
: (only 4 pumpknights is a severe difference between the standard fast
: weenie strategy of Necrodisk)
Ironically, the pump knights (and, for that matter, the Ihsan's Shade) are
there primarily for non-FtPable defense against large grunts like Erhnam
Djinn (after I Serrated Arrows them once or twice, which, quite often
opens doors for forestwalking, depending on the situation). Again, the
draw determines whether I'll play full-out offense or 'Cap defense.
: > Land (23)
: >
: > 4 Mishra's Factory
: > 4 Strip Mine
: > 15 Swamp
:
: One thing you should always think about in any Type II deck nowadays
: (with the Tax so prevalent) is the use of blowup lands (saclands from FE)
: to increase early mana production (it's like a non-permanent Elf) and
: create an anti-Tax environment.
You are quite possibly right. I have this irrational distaste for the
sacrifice lands and am quite possibly hurting this deck by not using
the Ebon Strongholds (which would speed up the 'Capping considerably,
an extremely important advantage for this deck).
: > It used to have a Vexing Arcanix in it (hence the name), but later on I
: > found it to be nastier without it. Any suggestion on how to improve
: > it against Willowgeddon and Howlingbind?
:
: A possible suggestion would be to make the deck more speedy with the
: addition of more attack cards (Necro and Rituals) and more effecient
: defense (Dancing Scimitars & 1 Serrated out (sideboard), in couple Icies)
A definite possibility.
: Change Knights to all Sengirs.
Possible, except I need the pump knights for early non-FtPable defense; maybe
replacing a couple of Hypnotic Specters with Sengir Vampires for more late-
game punch? Since I usually save the Dark Rituals for the 'Caps, decreasing
the chances for a first-turn Hypnotic Specter. It would definitely solve
the "Dark Ritual, Hypnotic Specter...hmm...should I save the 'Ritual in
case I get a 'Cap in the next few draws?" syndrome.
: Cap becomes main strategy, with Necro for speed of Capping only.
The 'Cap is already the key strategy (assuming that I draw one).
: Disk still for control. 4 Kniggits (NI!) is not enough for a weenie horde
: and if Cap fires to break down defenses (StP, Balance, Wrath, . . .) and
: Sengirs should have no problem with kill.
Maybe another Ihsan's Shade.
: However, due to the blinding speed of the Cap (that's sarcastic), we know
: we have the newest and most deadly Necrodeck out there ;)
Ebon Stronghold and Dark Ritual...third-turn 'Cap is often worth the cards
against many kinds of decks.
: (Actually, it might work with B/U with counterspells)
I have another deck, which is B/U but it has only two Counterspells. It is
based around the Dark Ritual, 'Cap, Control Magic, Steal Artifact, and
Mahamoti Djinn (standard defense apply: Serrated Arrows, Strip Mines,
Mishra's Factories, Nevinyrral's Disk, Dancing Scimitar, Icy Manipulator,
and such). Only one Necropotence since I use four Cities of Brass in
that deck. It has almost 50% mana (duh) and is frightfully effective, but
it's consistently inconsistent, making Swissing with it a risky proposition.
Maybe I should replace the Deflections in it with Counterspells, since
Deflectable spells are usually the first to get 'Capped.
: --
: Al:)
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
the_furry_one
Steven Liu (sl7...@cc.utah.edu) wrote:
: If you kill the 'Disk, you kill the Necrodisk. I don't see how going four
: Disenchant and four Divine Offerings against four 'Disks, an Ivory Tower,
: and a Zuran Orb is bad. The few artifacts in the Necrodisk are crucial
: to the deck.
i still think four of each is excessive.. 6 artifact destruction is
alright, but i couldn't bring myself to use 8.
: Standard Necrodisk just has too many weaknesses, Willowgeddon can beat
: it, so can a whole bunch of other deck designs. Again, I'm not saying
ah yup. i saw a willowgeddon win a qualifier yesterday, and he was the
only non-necro deck in the final four.
: Hey! Take that back! Serrated Arrows are not stupid!
sure they are. i like fiery justice a lot more :):) (then again,
red/white millstone doesn't really care about that five life gain).
: I see, so the way that the draw works in Magic is that only you always get
: what you need when you need it.
jesus, i wish, i might have made the round of 8 at the qualifier yesterday
if i didn't draw land land land land and more land in the only games i
lost <sigh>.
: location, of course, but with Willowgeddon and Howlingbind both able to
howlingbind... cute:)...
: That has nothing to do with what I am arguing. I'm saying that there are many
: more ways to hose Necrodisk than there are ways to hose Willowgeddon. What
heh. the only real way to hose willow is more creature destruction than
they have creatures. (hence why i run 18 stock - 3 global - and 3 more
sideboard)
: my personal experience with he who cares to listen. You want to to play
: a standard Necrodisk deck, go right ahead; you want to play Fireplow, feel
: free; you want to do some chest-beating, that's just fine with me.
actually, i *want* to play an original deck, but since everything has been
done... its rather difficult.
: So is usenet.
and the world wide web. :)
--
jet...@teleport.com "quotes are for mortals."
.signature files are a waste of bandwidth
potato farmer
On Tue, 23 Apr 1996 21:20:19 EDT, Richard <IO2...@MAINE.MAINE.EDU>
wrote:
>2 can defeat everything else. I recently read a post from robert hahn who clai
>med he had the anti-necro deck. I pieced it together card for card and found t
>hat not only could it NOT beat necropotence, it didn't do well against the will
i quite liked the look of robert hahn's deck for the sake that it was
more "artistic" than brute ernageddon, or ugly mono speed black
necro. so i built it with some changes involving the sideboard.
i think it just needs some other fast mana. elves/natures lore
perhaps. the howling mines and winter orb on their own or
as a combination are just DAMN handy in shutting down any
resource deprivation strategy, which incidentally, i hate.
othernick
Stil
Technowiz (df...@orion.alaska.edu) wrote:
: On Tuesday, April 23, 1996, Steven Liu wrote...
: > : : 2. R/U Permanent Removal & Counter/Burn
: > : : 3. R/G Orgg/Shivan 2nd turn
: > : : 4. R/G Jokuweenie
: > : : 5. B/w Discard
: 6. U/W Control
: 7. G/W Ernhamgeddon
: 8. B Necrodeck....
I was attempting to list deck types that will beat the two current
kings, not including the kings, so #7 and #8 must go.
: Oh, and I love the name Jokuweenie. Just a fun thing to call a deck.
Also a fun deck to play. I highly reccomend it. Jokus, Manaweenies for
early jokus, and night soils so you can say you killed an opponent with
a token creature. :)
: Yes, there are more decks out there, but seriously just because one wins a
: tournament doesn't mean it is King of the Hill. Sometimes i like to throw
: wrench in the works and play something that nobody expects... Never know
: when it works out.
"a tournament", no. "multiple tournaments" or "multiple copies of the
deck in the top X spaces in a tournament", yes.
anyone look into netrunner? I just tried it last night, it's fun.
john
-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-/|\-
The contraction "You're" does not indicate possessive. It indicates a
state of being, or, more commonly, a description of the person being
addressed.
The word "Your" does indicate possesive. It does NOT indicate a state of
being, or a description.
-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-\|/-
mark balabon
Alan D Kohler (hwk...@poky.srv.net) wrote:
: My original statement was probably a little reactionary. After looking over
: loconto's deck, it's not a deck I would fear. I would be much more afraid
: of Betrands deck - IMHO, he is THE magic player. All the ratle about the NY
: pro tour being an event not influenced by luck is bunk. Betrand should have
: won, based on strength of the deck alone. But loconto navigated around the
: type of deck that would have given him serious problems - namely necro decks
: and direct damage decks. The rock / paper / scissors thing is true, 100% -
: loconto's rock just never played against any paper and in the end broke
: betrands scissors.
I'm sorry, but I have a _real_ problem with this statement. First, decks
should never be feared - it's the person playing the deck that makes it work.
Without that person, a deck is simply a jumble of cards. Second, having
played against Loco in both Type I and II, and having played against his ProT
deck, you seriously underestimate it. Granted, it doesn't have the sex appeal
of Bertrands deck, but the cards work _very_ well together and Mike knows how
to use them to their optimal efficiency. He put a lot of hours into that
deck, testing against everything he could (both ProT decks and normal Type
II). I'm also not exactly sure what you would consider the 'paper' of this
deck. I don't think there are any decks out there that will consistently beat
this deck - although there are players that could make those decks consistent
winners (keep in mind that of the 16 finalists, Loco plays 3 of them on a
regular basis and always does very well).
Bally
Daniel Brickwell
>
>Heh, cool. Alright, in another attempt to draw out yet other insights, I
> will share the contents of my latest Necrodisk design, again minus the
> sideboard (as it varies):
>
>
>"'Capping Arcanix" a.k.a. "The Necrocap Deck" (B)
>
>Artifact (16)
>
> Black Vise
Yes! Finally someone who also puts a Vise in his necro deck.
It is great in Necro ag. Necro. Howling Bind decks. Land
Tax Decks and I have won several games with it without
having to show more than stripmines or swamps in the first game.
> 3 Dancing Scimitar
> Ivory Tower
> 3 Jester's Cap
> 4 Nevinyrral's Disk
> 3 Serrated Arrows
This burdens you with 13 high cost spells (16 if you add the
2 drain life and the shade), yet you only have 3 dark rituals?
My necro deck also has only 3 DR, but it has more cheaper spells.
Perhaps you could exchange a Serrated arrow or two with cumbajai
witches? They are a pretty neat sideboard card in my deck but fit
even better in your slower even more control necro deck.
They can block archers, kill llanos etc.
> Zuran Orb
>
>Black (21)
>
> 3 Dark Ritual
> Demonic Consultation
I hate this card, even if I have to admit it's power. As you might really
want a dark ritual early I would put in two and 4 DR.
> 2 Drain Life
> 4 Hymn to Tourach
> 4 Hypnotic Specter
> Ihsan's Shade
> 2 Knight of Stromgald
> 2 Necropotence
This is not really a Necropotence deck with only two :(
> 2 Order of Ebon Hand
>
>Land (23)
>
> 4 Mishra's Factory
> 4 Strip Mine
> 15 Swamp
Fifteen? I know that you have a lot of artifact spells, but this
eliminates quite a few percentages of your second round hymn
chance.
>
>
>It used to have a Vexing Arcanix in it (hence the name), but later on I found
> it to be nastier without it. Any suggestion on how to improve it against
> Willowgeddon and Howlingbind?
It looks pretty though against willowgeddon because you are going to overload
his artifact defence. What problems have you discovered in play?
I see more problems against Howling Bind, as you do not have as many creatures
or drain lifes as the "standard" necrodisk deck thus enabling him to get at you
with direct damage. I think here Cumbajai withches would also be of help.
Friendly Greetings,
Daniel
>
>--
>--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Alan D Kohler
In article <4m2re6$5...@news.bu.edu>, bala...@bu.edu says...
>
>Alan D Kohler (hwk...@poky.srv.net) wrote:
>
>: My original statement was probably a little reactionary. After looking
over
>: type of deck that would have given him serious problems - namely necro
decks
>: and direct damage decks. The rock / paper / scissors thing is true, 100%
-
>: loconto's rock just never played against any paper and in the end broke
>: betrands scissors.
>
>I'm sorry, but I have a _real_ problem with this statement. First, decks
>should never be feared - it's the person playing the deck that makes it
work.
I'll buy the player should be feared - Loconto is ranked #10 (I'm
presuming this ranking didn't all just come from the pro-tourney). However,
I have a tendency to take a gander at a deck and pick it apart, and figure
out what makes it tick. And once in a while I can just look at the deck and
see the synergy of a well built and tuned deck and I can just see the
synergy seething out of a real good one - and tell that I would not want to
face off agaisnt it- this is how I felt when looking at Lestree's deck.
This is NOT how I felt about Locontos deck - not that it's bad, it just
doesn't scream "my synergy is incredible" like Lestree's. To his credit
though, I disagree with the analysis in the scrye of Locontos deck- it was
way off the money. The analysis there totally stripped the deck of one of
it's roads to victory. Loconto's deck is not unlike a type 2 version of a
weissman deck (actually sort of a combo between weisman and maysonets
"ahmish" deck). Sure, Loconto only had 4 counterspells in his deck, but
where weisman needed a smear of counters to protect the serra (or whatever
creature you select to finish off the opponent), the blinkies are
self-protecting and he protects the mishras with a re-usable permanent
(hallowed ground). And the millstones are another totally unrelated road to
victory, which makes it difficult to circumvent both roads.
Despite the fact that I RESPECT this deck, I am not as fearful of it as
others. Perhaps it's playing control decks made by Robert (a local player
of some repute), I've gotten a taste for when the turning point of a
game agaisnt a control deck, and that makes it so I don't sit there and
shudder in fear of them, since I can often tell how to avert that "turning
point". But the armageddon in an crittergeddon type deck becomes a quick
"you're screwed", which against a well tuned one like Lestree's, you may not
have time to prepare for like agaisnt a control deck.
And, BTW, even not considering the NY pro-tour and Loconto's situation, I
think luck plays a huge part in most tournaments. In the Utah qualifier, I
quickly got knocked into the "few wins" level for the second half of the
tourney, mailnly due to bad draws. There, I raked up over the decks there,
and said to myself "I really don't belong here". And George Baxter, who
also placed well at NY, also recently posted a report with a similar
experience in which he got bashed in a small tourney, mainly due to bad
draws. It happens.
--
Alan D Kohler
hwk...@poky.srv.net
"you die, she dies, everybody dies." Roy, in Heavy Metal
Steven Liu
Daniel Brickwell (Br...@ccmailer.wiwiss.fu-berlin.de) wrote:
: In article <4lrert$l...@news.cc.utah.edu>, sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu)
: says:
:
: >
: >Heh, cool. Alright, in another attempt to draw out yet other insights, I
: > will share the contents of my latest Necrodisk design, again minus the
: > sideboard (as it varies):
: >
: >
: >"'Capping Arcanix" a.k.a. "The Necrocap Deck" (B)
: >
: >Artifact (16)
: >
: > Black Vise
:
: Yes! Finally someone who also puts a Vise in his necro deck.
: It is great in Necro ag. Necro. Howling Bind decks. Land
: Tax Decks and I have won several games with it without
: having to show more than stripmines or swamps in the first game.
The way I see it, Black Vise is just a no-brainer in any T2 deck, anti-Land
Tax, anti-Howling Mine, anti-Necropotence. What more can one ask for? :)
: > 3 Dancing Scimitar
: > Ivory Tower
: > 3 Jester's Cap
: > 4 Nevinyrral's Disk
: > 3 Serrated Arrows
:
: This burdens you with 13 high cost spells (16 if you add the
: 2 drain life and the shade), yet you only have 3 dark rituals?
: My necro deck also has only 3 DR, but it has more cheaper spells.
Very true, I have since gone to four Dark Rituals.
: Perhaps you could exchange a Serrated arrow or two with cumbajai
: witches? They are a pretty neat sideboard card in my deck but fit
: even better in your slower even more control necro deck.
The witches don't combine with the pump knights too well, and they are very
ineffective against Liongeddon (mostly because of those @%& Crusades, and
I rather overload the Disenchant/Divine Offering than StP), although I'll
have to admit that I've definitely experienced my share of mana-problems
with this deck.
: They can block archers, kill llanos etc.
You also lose a card every time you use them. People I play against rarely,
if ever, run elves (mana or archer), even in Willowgeddon decks, so I'm
probably a little biased as far as this goes. Just about everybody I play
against run at least two, more often than not three, Serrated Arrows (and
I do, too, obviously), so the elves just aren't that attractive an option.
Those damn Serrated Arrows are going to be the death of green fast mana
critters yet (thank god for Nature's Lore). I play against Whirling
Dervishes far more often than elves here.
: > Zuran Orb
: >
: >Black (21)
: >
: > 3 Dark Ritual
: > Demonic Consultation
:
: I hate this card, even if I have to admit it's power. As you might really
: want a dark ritual early I would put in two and 4 DR.
Yeah, I used to run two of these, but it killed me more often than it saved
me, so I took one out and it works much better now, and has saved me more
often than it kills me. Weird how that works.
: > 2 Drain Life
: > 4 Hymn to Tourach
: > 4 Hypnotic Specter
: > Ihsan's Shade
: > 2 Knight of Stromgald
: > 2 Necropotence
:
: This is not really a Necropotence deck with only two :(
I have since added a third so I can Demonic Tutor for it if needed be.
: > 2 Order of Ebon Hand
: >
: >Land (23)
: >
: > 4 Mishra's Factory
: > 4 Strip Mine
: > 15 Swamp
:
: Fifteen? I know that you have a lot of artifact spells, but this
: eliminates quite a few percentages of your second round hymn
: chance.
I don't usually cast the Hymn's immediately (depends on the situation), but
fewer lands means more staying power (another usually, but mana-screwedness
can often suck). In any event, I have since gone with 13 Swamps and 3 Ebon
Strongholds.
: >
: >
: >It used to have a Vexing Arcanix in it (hence the name), but later on I found
: > it to be nastier without it. Any suggestion on how to improve it against
: > Willowgeddon and Howlingbind?
:
: It looks pretty though against willowgeddon because you are going to overload
: his artifact defence. What problems have you discovered in play?
Mana problems, especially against early Black Vise/Howling Mine/Winter Orb.
: I see more problems against Howling Bind, as you do not have as many
: creatures or drain lifes as the "standard" necrodisk deck thus enabling
: him to get at you with direct damage. I think here Cumbajai withches
: would also be of help.
Very true. My best bet here is to go to the sideboard for the second Demonic
Consultation and the fourth 'Cap.
: Friendly Greetings,
:
: Daniel
:
Here's the newest version:
"Necrocap"
ARTIFACT (17)
Black Vise
2 Dancing Scimitar
2 Icy Manipulator
Ivory Tower
3 Jester's Cap
4 Nevinyrral's Disk
3 Serrated Arrows
Zuran Orb
BLACK (23)
4 Dark Ritual
Demonic Consultation
2 Drain Life
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Hypnotic Specter
Ihsan's Shade
2 Knight of Stromgald
3 Necropotence
2 Order of Ebon Hand
LAND (24)
3 Ebon Stronghold
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Strip Mine
13 Swamp
I'm considering a little blue for a Recall and some BEBs in the sideboard for
the Stormbinds (can't even respond by using it if it's my turn. :), and a
few Sleight of Mind in the sideboard for the Control Magics or something,
but the damage would suck.
: >
: >--
: >--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Daniel Brickwell
Hi,
In article <4m60dn$g...@news.cc.utah.edu>, sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) says:
>
>: Perhaps you could exchange a Serrated arrow or two with cumbajai
>: witches? They are a pretty neat sideboard card in my deck but fit
>: even better in your slower even more control necro deck.
>
>
>The witches don't combine with the pump knights too well, and they are very
> ineffective against Liongeddon (mostly because of those @%& Crusades, and
> I rather overload the Disenchant/Divine Offering than StP), although I'll
> have to admit that I've definitely experienced my share of mana-problems
> with this deck.
>
>
>: They can block archers, kill llanos etc.
>
>
>You also lose a card every time you use them. People I play against rarely,
> if ever, run elves (mana or archer), even in Willowgeddon decks, so I'm
> probably a little biased as far as this goes. Just about everybody I play
> against run at least two, more often than not three, Serrated Arrows (and
> I do, too, obviously), so the elves just aren't that attractive an option.
> Those damn Serrated Arrows are going to be the death of green fast mana
> critters yet (thank god for Nature's Lore). I play against Whirling
> Dervishes far more often than elves here.
>
One last try for the witches:
1) Two black for a black direct damage creature
which is 1/3 is a bargain. (No wonder it is an Arabian Card, can we say
Ernham, Juzam etc.)
2) You can choose when to use them and you do not have to many knights
which dissallow the use. A Witch is not like a painland where you sometimes
have no choice and have to take the damage.
3) The point of damage can cost you a card in necropotence, but the benefits
of blocking, beeing an additional target for direct damage etc. can save
you more life in effect than you lose.
Other than the comment above the deck now looks very strong to
me, so that I can not say more without building and testing it.
>
>I'm considering a little blue for a Recall and some BEBs in the sideboard for
> the Stormbinds (can't even respond by using it if it's my turn. :), and a
> few Sleight of Mind in the sideboard for the Control Magics or something,
> but the damage would suck.
>
I have thought about slights also for my necro deck, but usually
the knights are not very good control magic material, unless the other
player has access to black mana. I personally don't like recall so
much because it gives the opponent a double window of opportunity
(tapping you out and raising the importance of the picked up card having
traded two cards for it.) BEBing a strombind is very fun ofcourse.
I have to say though that the damage has kept me from reintegrating
another color (my deck used to have white before New York). The deck
just feels stronger mono-colored.
On the other hand utilizing a single color considerably limits your
card choice and enthereby arms your opponent with preknowledge of
what your deck can and can not do. This fact I think will be the
downfall of necropotence decks once they are widely known outside
the net. (Unless someone hasty restricts them first.)
PS: I have created a Howling-Bind Deck (W/G/R with 4 Icies,
3 Mines, 4 Scavenger Folk 4 Disenchants (the only white cards)
and one storm seeker). It has a 5:1 record vs. my Ernhamgeddon deck
but only played 6:10 against my necro deck.
Any suggestions?
Friendly Greetings,
Daniel
Steven Liu
Daniel Brickwell (Br...@ccmailer.wiwiss.fu-berlin.de) wrote:
: Hi,
The primary problem is that it doesn't stop white pump knights and Whirling
Dervishes. However, after going 5-9 with the Necrocap deck as listed below
(of which 7 of the losses are direct results of mana shortage), I am now
looking to cheaper spells.
: >
: >Here's the newest version:
Playtests revealed the weakness of the above version: Severe mana shortage.
The new version is just like the above, minus Serrated Arrows, Nevinyrral's
Disk, and Dancing Scimitar (x2).
: >
: >I'm considering a little blue for a Recall and some BEBs in the sideboard for
: > the Stormbinds (can't even respond by using it if it's my turn. :), and a
: > few Sleight of Mind in the sideboard for the Control Magics or something,
: > but the damage would suck.
: >
:
: I have thought about slights also for my necro deck, but usually
: the knights are not very good control magic material, unless the other
: player has access to black mana. I personally don't like recall so
: much because it gives the opponent a double window of opportunity
: (tapping you out and raising the importance of the picked up card having
: traded two cards for it.) BEBing a strombind is very fun of course.
In "Principia," my T2 offensive control deck, the two Recalls are devastating
when used in the late game. I must admit that drawing Recalls early in the
game just plain sucks, and if I somehow manage to fit a little blue into my
Necrodisk deck, there will be no more than one Recall. In my experience,
Recall is most effective in control decks, usually after you have stablized
the board (Jayemdae Tome out, I Recall for two Counterspell/Control Magic/
Steal Artifact, care to conceed?).
: I have to say though that the damage has kept me from reintegrating
: another color (my deck used to have white before New York). The deck
: just feels stronger mono-colored.
I have to agree. BEBing the Stormbind is the only thing that makes it even
remotely attractive to add blue, but I likewise fear the damage from the
damage lands enough to have never tried it. However, watch out for the
fearsome Sleight' Liongeddon decks. These suckers can win Land Tax wars
with perpetual ease, can BEB Stormbind, can Sleight' pump knights against
Control Magic, can Armageddon and Crusade Necrodisk and Willowgeddon to
Kingdom Come, can take the Adarkar Wastes damage (Land Tax doesn't take
life to use), and can Recall and Jalum Tome to terrifying effectiveness.
: On the other hand utilizing a single color considerably limits your
: card choice and enthereby arms your opponent with preknowledge of
: what your deck can and can not do. This fact I think will be the
: downfall of necropotence decks once they are widely known outside
: the net. (Unless someone hasty restricts them first.)
And Necrodisk is black of all colors.
: PS: I have created a Howling-Bind Deck (W/G/R with 4 Icies,
: 3 Mines, 4 Scavenger Folk 4 Disenchants (the only white cards)
: and one storm seeker). It has a 5:1 record vs. my Ernhamgeddon deck
: but only played 6:10 against my necro deck.
:
: Any suggestions?
First of all, use Detonate instead of Scavenger Folk, plus Shatter in the
sideboard. Black has a lot of creature defense and they can afford to
kill the 'Folks before playing the 'Disk, but they can't afford the four
damage to a Detonated 'Disk. And generally, Detonating your opponent's
Icy Manipulator (which must go) makes them that much easier to Stormbind
to death. You MUST MUST MUST shelve your anti-artifact cards using the
Sylvan Library, or else a Hymn' may just push a 'Disk through. You must
stop the 'Disk, focus everything on the 'Disk, if a 'Disk goes off, you
are in for a quick defeat. Again, Jester's Cap will make the crucial
difference, depending on whose 'Cap fires first (Necrodisk is quicker on
the trigger with Dark Rituals).
Secondly, sideboard in four Erhnam Djinns against Necrodisk and drop down
to 2 Wrath of God and 2 Disenchant (replace with Shatter). This will
force the Necrodisk to use Gloom and Dark Banishing/Terror in a one-on-
one reactive match-up (which is to your advantage, as if they draw the
countermeasure and you don't draw your threat, nothing happens, but if
you draw your threat and they don't draw their countermeasure, they die).
You can slaughter the weenies with four Stormbinds while shelving key
cards. The pump knights don't stand up to djinns too well under Winter
Orb (you can Stormbind/'Bolt them anyway) and you can Icy Manipulate
shades; a couple of hits from a djinn will totally screw the Necrodisk
strategy. This also complicates the Necrodisk's 'Capping scheme, as the
Erhnam Djinns makes the Winter Orbs legitimate offensive threats, while
if you're still running 3-4 WoGs, the Icy Manipulators are the first to go
to the 'Cap, unless you have already lost a significant amount of artifact
defense to Hymn's, or the Necrodisk player can fire another 'Cap soon, in
which case 'Capping your artifact defense to allow the 'Disk to go through
is the way to go. This is the primary reason why I'm using so many 'Caps
standard in my Necrodisk deck. If I can manage to 'Cap most of my foe's
artifact defense away so the 'Disk can fire, then I have a MUCH better
chance of winning. The combination of 'Cap and Hymn' makes it impossible
to hide the artifact defense. If I can't 'Disk, I usually die. Bad Moon
is the anti-Erhnam Djinn/Stormbind sideboard card of choice here.
: Friendly Greetings,
:
: Daniel
:
: >
: >: >
: >: >--
: >: >--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
: >
: >--
: >--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Daniel Brickwell
Hi,
In article <4mlsoq$e...@news.cc.utah.edu>, sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) says:
I have since then tried integrating caps (to my 2 serrated arrows and 4 disks)
into my necrodeck.
It does not work. While the cap is great against decks with limited threats,
against decks with multiple threats (like Old necro) you suddenly have
4+3+3+2+2 14 4 mana cost artifacts
or
new version: 10 4-mana cost artifacts plus shade plus 2 drain life.
This totally ruins the progression of casting costs in the necro deck.
Optimal is:
Play yourself down to 1-3 cards cast necropotence.
Draw 4-6 cards
Play 3-4 cards (1 land, 1 pump knight, a hymn or ritual spectre)
Draw 3-4 cards
Play 2-3 Cards (land + drain life or land ivory tower, paralyze to remove blocker)
Draw 3 cards
Opponent dies.
With the higher casting cost deck things move like this:
Play yourself down to 3-5 cards (because some are to heavy)
Draw 2-4 cards
Play 2 cards (land and something heavy)
Draw 2 cards
Play 2 cards (land activate heavy, order)
Draw 2 cards
Play 1 card (land, start controling playing field)
Draw 1 card
Opponent loses control or not.
The high mana cost necropotence deck drew 6-9 cards.
The old necro deck drew 10-12 cards.
That's a net difference of 2 ancestral recalls in 4 rounds.
Does this mean that your version is not as good?
I don't know.
I am a rather offensive player and like to gain control by
crushing my opponents life points, controlling the playing field
can also be very valuable, I just don't know if it's worth the
lost card drawing advantage.
>
>
>I have to agree. BEBing the Stormbind is the only thing that makes it even
> remotely attractive to add blue, but I likewise fear the damage from the
> damage lands enough to have never tried it. However, watch out for the
> fearsome Sleight' Liongeddon decks. These suckers can win Land Tax wars
> with perpetual ease, can BEB Stormbind, can Sleight' pump knights against
> Control Magic, can Armageddon and Crusade Necrodisk and Willowgeddon to
> Kingdom Come, can take the Adarkar Wastes damage (Land Tax doesn't take
> life to use), and can Recall and Jalum Tome to terrifying effectiveness.
>
Yes, I definitely have to build such a white weenie before the german champion-
ships. I saw one in the Berlin championships (report will be up soon)
and it did very well. Unless it proves to be dominatingly powerful though
I will have to bite into the sour apple of playing the deck I have played
most in the last tournaments and that is necropotence. I just don't want
to risk a new concept before a major tournament (again;).
btw Any sideboarding tips for necro against necro?
I would like to add: a 4th drain life, a 4th necro, 2 weekness or paralyze,
or 4 really
thats 4-6 cards But what to take out? Hypnos win you the game, Knights win,
strips, mishra, orders, disks, arrows, dark rituals.
Sofar I have 1 Shade to take out perhaps also the sengir. Should i Take out hymns???
This is ridiculous. The whole deck is so strong and interlocking that there is just
no room to sideboard.
Thanks for the ideas I will try them out (though my bind deck is running
4 ernhams 2 orggs standard instead of wrath of god winter orbs).
btw. I love the shelf idea. You have introduced a term in Berlin.
Friendly Greetings,
Daniel
Ceterum censeo Orbem Zurensem esse interdicendum.
(And otherwise I think that the Zuran Orb should be banned.)
Steven Liu
Howdy.
Daniel Brickwell (Br...@ccmailer.wiwiss.fu-berlin.de) wrote:
:
: Hi,
:
: In article <4mlsoq$e...@news.cc.utah.edu>,
: sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) says:
: >
: >Daniel Brickwell (Br...@ccmailer.wiwiss.fu-berlin.de) wrote:
: >
:
: I have since then tried integrating caps (to my 2 serrated arrows and 4 disks)
: into my necrodeck.
:
: It does not work. While the cap is great against decks with limited threats,
: against decks with multiple threats (like Old necro) you suddenly have
"Does not work" is putting it mildly. It sucked. :)
: 4+3+3+2+2 14 4 mana cost artifacts
Your analysis is acurate. I originally envisioned the Necrocap deck as a
"swing" deck, where, if I drew 'Caps instead of extra pump knights, I'd
play defensively, otherwise, I'd play offensively; and the Necropotence
was just a late-game combo with 'Orb or 'Tower. However, as I began to
tweak the deck, it grew closer and closer to standard Necrodisk and the
'Caps began to serve no other purpose than slowing the weenies down.
: I am a rather offensive player and like to gain control by
: crushing my opponents life points, controlling the playing field
: can also be very valuable, I just don't know if it's worth the
: lost card drawing advantage.
I am a rather indecisive player and like to gain control by gaining the
advantage in tempo. The primary weakness of control strategies is the
inherent risk involved in being prepared to deal with anything, as the
luck of the draw can turn being prepared to deal with anything into
being prepared for nothing. That is why most of my decks shoot for
the "offensive control" strategy, where I try to control the game by
gaining the edge on offensive tempo.
: btw Any sideboarding tips for necro against necro?
:
: I would like to add: a 4th drain life, a 4th necro, 2 weekness or paralyze,
: or 4 really
:
: thats 4-6 cards But what to take out? Hypnos win you the game, Knights win,
: strips, mishra, orders, disks, arrows, dark rituals.
:
: Sofar I have 1 Shade to take out perhaps also the sengir. Should i Take out
: hymns??? This is ridiculous. The whole deck is so strong and interlocking
: that there is just no room to sideboard.
Sounds like you're IN LOVE. :)
"Standard" Necrodisk (Well, at least my standard version):
ARTIFACT (12)
Black Vise
2 Icy Manipulator
Ivory Tower
Jester's Cap
4 Nevinyrral's Disk
2 Serrated Arrows
Zuran Orb
BLACK (28)
4 Dark Ritual
Demonic Consultation
3 Drain Life
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Hypnotic Specter
Ihsan's Shade
3 Knight of Stromgald
3 Necropotence
3 Order of Ebon Hand
2 Sengir Vampire
LAND (20)
2 Ebon Stronghold
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Strip Mine
14 Swamp
SIDEBOARD (15)
Aeolipile
Bad Moon
4 Cuombajj Witches
2 Dance of the Dead
Drain Life
3 Gloom
Necropotence
2 Serrated Arrows
"After sideboarding against Necrodisk" Necrodisk:
ARTIFACT (11)
Black Vise
Ivory Tower
4 Nevinyrral's Disk
4 Serrated Arrows
Zuran Orb
BLACK (29)
4 Cuombajj Witches
2 Dance of the Dead
4 Dark Ritual
Demonic Consultation
4 Drain Life
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Hypnotic Specter
4 Necropotence
2 Sengir Vampire
LAND (20)
2 Ebon Stronghold
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Strip Mine
14 Swamp
: Thanks for the ideas I will try them out (though my bind deck is running
: 4 ernhams 2 orggs standard instead of wrath of god winter orbs).
Er...you must run at least three 'Orbs, those are like the Hypnotic
Specters in a Necrodisk deck. 4 Howling Mine, 4 Icy Manipulator,
4 Stormbind, 3 Winter Orb are the supposed starting point for any
Howlingbind deck. No wonder your "Howlingbind" deck lost to your
Necrodisk deck. You're letting the Necrodisk deck have all the
mana it thrives on. Without limiting the Necrodisk's mana, your
big critters can't crush his small critters. As far as Wrath of
God go, they are just too effective to not include in decks which
already run 4 Icy Manipulators. Supposed standard artifact defense
for a "standard" Howlingbind consists of 4 Disenchants and 2 Detonates.
: Friendly Greetings,
:
: Daniel
:
: Ceterum censeo Orbem Zurensem esse interdicendum.
: (And otherwise I think that the Zuran Orb should be banned.)
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Steven Liu
Steven Liu (sl7...@cc.utah.edu) wrote:
:
: Sounds like you're IN LOVE. :)
:
:
: "Standard" Necrodisk (Well, at least my standard version):
It's amazing how a person can have three years of real analysis, two years
of set/group theory, and still not know how to count...now that I have
my notes in front of me, let's try this again, with a little explanation
this time.
Standard...
ARTIFACT (9)
Black Vise
Ivory Tower
4 Nevinyrral's Disk
2 Serrated Arrows
Zuran Orb
BLACK (27)
Cuombajj Witches
Dance of the Dead
4 Dark Ritual
Demonic Consultation
2 Drain Life
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Hypnotic Specter
Ihsan's Shade
2 Knight of Stromgald
3 Necropotence
2 Order of Ebon Hand
2 Sengir Vampire
LAND (24)
2 Ebon Stronghold
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Strip Mine
14 Swamp
SIDEBOARD (15)
Bad Moon
(These are for anti-*geddon and other decks not making extensive use
of black critters)
2 Cuombajj Witches
(These are for anti-Necrodisk)
Dance of the Dead
(Originally for anti-Willowgeddon as a cheap critter animator after
an Armageddon. The assumption here is that there are already a lot
of targets for Disenchants. It turned out to be so effective with
Serrated Arrows, Nevinyrral's Disk, and Hymn to Tourachs, that one
made it into the main deck. In Necrodisk versus Necrodisk, an extra
one goes in because both players are using card-denial, 'Disk, and
more likely than not, Cuombajj Witches and Serrated Arrows. I have
won a lot of games with a post-'Disk Dance of the Dead and am very
tempted to add one more Dance').
2 Drain Life
(Versus other Necrodisk or slow decks).
3 Gloom
2 Icy Manipulator
(Anti-Howlingbind for the Winter Orbs, more targets for the Disenchant,
Shatter, and Detonate).
Necropotence
(Versus other Necrodisk).
2 Terror
(These are for Erhnam Djinn, Serra Angel, Orgg, and Mahamoti Djinn.
The Terrors also work well with Dance of the Dead).
Serrated Arrows
(Versus any deck with creatures, pretty much, especially slower decks).
Post-sideboard...
ARTIFACT (10)
Black Vise
Ivory Tower
4 Nevinyrral's Disk
3 Serrated Arrows
Zuran Orb
BLACK (29)
3 Cuombajj Witches
2 Dance of the Dead
4 Dark Ritual
Demonic Consultation
4 Drain Life
4 Hymn to Tourach
4 Hypnotic Specter
Ihsan's Shade
4 Necropotence
Sengir Vampire
LAND (22)
2 Ebon Stronghold
3 Mishra's Factory
3 Strip Mine
14 Swamp
: : Friendly Greetings,
: :
: : Daniel
: :
: : Ceterum censeo Orbem Zurensem esse interdicendum.
: : (And otherwise I think that the Zuran Orb should be banned.)
:
:
: --
: --Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
Roma locuta, causa finita. (Rome has spoken, case closed.)
--Scribble found on my copy of the DCI Banned/Restricted List
Daniel Brickwell
In article <4n891j$b...@news.cc.utah.edu>, sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) says:
>
>Howdy.
>
>Daniel Brickwell (Br...@ccmailer.wiwiss.fu-berlin.de) wrote:
>:
>:
>: I have since then tried integrating caps (to my 2 serrated arrows and 4 disks)
>: into my necrodeck.
>:
>: It does not work. While the cap is great against decks with limited threats,
>: against decks with multiple threats (like Old necro) you suddenly have
>
>
>"Does not work" is putting it mildly. It sucked. :)
You said it first ;)
>: btw Any sideboarding tips for necro against necro?
>:
>: I would like to add: a 4th drain life, a 4th necro, 2 weekness or paralyze,
>: or 4 really
>:
>: thats 4-6 cards But what to take out? Hypnos win you the game, Knights win,
>: strips, mishra, orders, disks, arrows, dark rituals.
>:
>: Sofar I have 1 Shade to take out perhaps also the sengir. Should i Take out
>: hymns??? This is ridiculous. The whole deck is so strong and interlocking
>: that there is just no room to sideboard.
>
>
>Sounds like you're IN LOVE. :)
>
I am. Now if just everyone else stopped fooling around with my love
everything would be dandy. ;)
>
>Standard...
>
>ARTIFACT (9)
> Black Vise
> Ivory Tower
> 4 Nevinyrral's Disk
> 2 Serrated Arrows
> Zuran Orb
>
>BLACK (27)
> Cuombajj Witches
> Dance of the Dead
> 4 Dark Ritual
> Demonic Consultation
> 2 Drain Life
> 4 Hymn to Tourach
> 4 Hypnotic Specter
> Ihsan's Shade
> 2 Knight of Stromgald
> 3 Necropotence
> 2 Order of Ebon Hand
> 2 Sengir Vampire
>LAND (24)
> 2 Ebon Stronghold
> 4 Mishra's Factory
> 4 Strip Mine
> 14 Swamp
>SIDEBOARD (15)
> Bad Moon
> (These are for anti-*geddon and other decks not making extensive use
> of black critters)
I also have like three One card slots in my necropotence deck where
I experiment around with and if you are truthful to yourself having
one Bad Moon in the sideboard will not change the deck in the least.
I think it comes from the fact that Necro is so hard to sideboard.
I think i have a deathgrip in this slot. (Pretty nasty if dropped
after a late disk. Isn't it always the green part which kills
you?
>
> 2 Cuombajj Witches
> (These are for anti-Necrodisk)
>
> Dance of the Dead
> (Originally for anti-Willowgeddon as a cheap critter animator after
> an Armageddon. The assumption here is that there are already a lot
> of targets for Disenchants. It turned out to be so effective with
> Serrated Arrows, Nevinyrral's Disk, and Hymn to Tourachs, that one
> made it into the main deck. In Necrodisk versus Necrodisk, an extra
> one goes in because both players are using card-denial, 'Disk, and
> more likely than not, Cuombajj Witches and Serrated Arrows. I have
> won a lot of games with a post-'Disk Dance of the Dead and am very
> tempted to add one more Dance').
Another free slot (I have dark Bansihing)
>
> 2 Drain Life
> (Versus other Necrodisk or slow decks).
>
> 3 Gloom
> 2 Icy Manipulator
> (Anti-Howlingbind for the Winter Orbs, more targets for the Disenchant,
> Shatter, and Detonate).
>
I have two Meekstones which I still love, just like you seem to love 4-mana
artifacts. (Autumn Willow Armageddon- That's game ... I don't think so.)
> Necropotence
> (Versus other Necrodisk).
>
> 2 Terror
> (These are for Erhnam Djinn, Serra Angel, Orgg, and Mahamoti Djinn.
> The Terrors also work well with Dance of the Dead).
>
> Serrated Arrows
> (Versus any deck with creatures, pretty much, especially slower decks).
>
>
>Post-sideboard...
>
>ARTIFACT (10)
> Black Vise
> Ivory Tower
> 4 Nevinyrral's Disk
> 3 Serrated Arrows
> Zuran Orb
>
>BLACK (29)
Ahem, 28 you mean.
> 3 Cuombajj Witches
> 2 Dance of the Dead
> 4 Dark Ritual
> Demonic Consultation
> 4 Drain Life
> 4 Hymn to Tourach
> 4 Hypnotic Specter
> Ihsan's Shade
> 4 Necropotence
> Sengir Vampire
>
>LAND (22)
> 2 Ebon Stronghold
> 3 Mishra's Factory
> 3 Strip Mine
> 14 Swamp
Differences to my version:
1) You take out a mishra, a stripmine and a stronghold
and a swamp compared to my after sideboard version (I wont bore
you with it it looks very similar.)
For that you can add a shade, a sengir, 2 dance of the dead.
So this item basicly runs down to the fact that you are willing to run a lower
mana percentage than I am.
2) You are also willing to take out all knights and supplant 'em
with 1 extra serrated arrow and 3 cumbajai withches.
This I haven't been willing to do yet because of my playing style.
But maybe I should after all I suggested the witches for your deck ;).
Comments: I am not willing to have less than 17 black mana sources
and really prefer 18 because of enemy stripmines and LD. Also only having
3 mishras and 3 stripmines makes you vulnerable to opponents mishras,
especially with 8 Disks flying around. I also would stay with 2 sengirs
instead of a shade and a sengir as necropotence decks lack flying defence.
(Since the Berlin Championship (see the report) I have been thinking a lot
about dancing scimitars (but it would bring back the too many 4-cost
artifact problem). Taking out all the knights is probably the best thing
to do, but it does hurt mentally.
Now to Howlingbind:
>
>
>: Thanks for the ideas I will try them out (though my bind deck is running
>: 4 ernhams 2 orggs standard instead of wrath of god winter orbs).
>
>
>Er...you must run at least three 'Orbs, those are like the Hypnotic
> Specters in a Necrodisk deck. 4 Howling Mine, 4 Icy Manipulator,
> 4 Stormbind, 3 Winter Orb are the supposed starting point for any
> Howlingbind deck. No wonder your "Howlingbind" deck lost to your
It does have Howlingmines and Stormbind. ;) It just has Orggs and
Ernhams instead of wrath of God and these also combine well with Icies.
Though I admit that the lack of mana-denial is probably the key to my
loss against Necros (Though it was very satisfying to see dancing
scimitars and serrated arrows go up against Orggs!)
> Necrodisk deck. You're letting the Necrodisk deck have all the
> mana it thrives on. Without limiting the Necrodisk's mana, your
> big critters can't crush his small critters. As far as Wrath of
> God go, they are just too effective to not include in decks which
> already run 4 Icy Manipulators. Supposed standard artifact defense
> for a "standard" Howlingbind consists of 4 Disenchants and 2 Detonates.
>
>
>--
>--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
David J Low
sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) writes:
>It's amazing how a person can have three years of real analysis, two years
> of set/group theory, and still not know how to count...
Oh, there's some ammunition for the Swiss debate :-)
Regards,
David.
--
{ David J. Low | dl...@kurasc.kyoto-u.ac.jp }
{ JSPS Postdoctoral Fellow | http://www.kurasc.kyoto-u.ac.jp/~dlow }
{ Radio Atmospheric Science Center | "I'd rather be lost in the Darkness }
{ Kyoto University, Uji, Kyoto 611 | than blinded by the Light" }
Steven Liu
David J Low (d...@tornado.maths.monash.edu.au) wrote:
: sl7...@cc.utah.edu (Steven Liu) writes:
: >It's amazing how a person can have three years of real analysis, two years
: > of set/group theory, and still not know how to count...
:
: Oh, there's some ammunition for the Swiss debate :-)
*ROFL*
Godel would be so proud; he didn't starve to death for nothin'. :)
*sniff*
Be like Mike; drink M:tG!
: Regards,
:
: David.
:
: --
: { David J. Low | dl...@kurasc.kyoto-u.ac.jp }
: { JSPS Postdoctoral Fellow | http://www.kurasc.kyoto-u.ac.jp/~dlow }
: { Radio Atmospheric Science Center | "I'd rather be lost in the Darkness }
: { Kyoto University, Uji, Kyoto 611 | than blinded by the Light" }
--
--Steve Internet: sl7...@u.cc.utah.edu
"Never express yourself more clearly than you are able to think." --Neils Bohr
"Philosophy is the perpetual battle against the bewitchment of our minds by
means of language." --Ludwig Wittgenstein