I ran Leviathan in New Zealand Nationals the past weekend. I expected a reasonable amount of aggo.
Admittedly, I didn't consider the Sphinx, but I ran the Leviathan because of Shroud, which the Sphinx lacks.

Vs pure aggro, the Sphinx is better. He is still immune to artifact kill.
Vs Fish, I would rather have the Leviathan. They will usually have some main deck bounce and possibly also Swords. If they know you have Confidants, they will likely keep/bring in some swords. Being able to Tinker for Leviathan is often a play they have 0 answers for if they fail to win the counter war.
There are many games situations where after an early Tinker and the resulting counter war leaves you with your robot on table, but no hand to defend it. When the robot has Shroud, you can still have some confidence in it going the distance.

In Drain vs Drain games, I like the Leviathan also. It avoids possible cards like Sower that Remora decks will play.

Both being Blue makes them much better than the 11/11 now that Thirsts is restricted.

---Korhil

I'm slightly confused by this play.
Could you not have found Vault & Key with Tez and Tinker?
Or, did you rip Tinker off the top?

---Korhil

New Zealands Vintage Nationals were won by Fatestitcher Dredge.

The list played:

4 Bridge from Below
4 Serum Powder
4 Narcomeba
4 Ichorid
3 Fatestitcher

4 Unmask
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Chalice of the Void

4 Golgari Grave Troll
4 Stinkweed Imp
4 Golgari Thug

3 Dread Return
2 Sadistic Hypnotist
1 Flamekin Zealot

4 Bazaar of Baghdad
4 City of Brass
3 Gemstone Mine

Sideboard:
1 Gemstone Mine
4 Chain of Vapor
3 Emerald Charm
2 Contagion
2 Dark Blast
3 Ancient Grudge

There were no Leylines in the field, so the Charms could have been something else.
Ancient Grudge was key in atleast one game. EOT bounced a Relic, then dropped a Chalice for 1 (Chalice for zero was already on table) after failing to dredge into a Cabal Therapy/Narco.
The Grudge was able to remove Chalice on the following turn and allow him to go off.

---Korhil

I build Rich's list with extra land for the Lotus & Mox, since if this deck gets played it will be run unpowered by a friend.

We tested it against Manaless Ichord, Etherium Slaver, & Oath (Akroma/Hellkite).
We must be 'doing it wrong', but it was getting trashed in most games.

Vs Manaless Ichorid could block easily, and Clamp isn't instant for removing bridges. Seems like your forced to Grapeshot, but I could never generate enough storm, often fizzling because Chalice for Zero was stopping Pact.

Vs Slaver it did pretty well without sideboards 50/50 (All the Card drawing would be countered). With sideboard Engineered Plague or Pyroclasm I think the Elves! would struggle since Slaver had many chances in the games it lost to tutor for one, or with enough brought in, would have dug through enough cards that the likelyhood of drawing one was high.

Vs Oath it won only 1 game, where Akroma was Oathed up, and the Hellkite was drawn into hand on the same turn. Meaning 3 hits with Akroma didn't kill before enough Elves! attacked. Again, all the card draw was being countered, or Null Rod was stopping Clamp.
Like Rich found, running a T1 Llanowar Elf into a T1 Ancestral can be bad times for Elves!

Why is my testing so far from showing the results that everyone indicates this deck should have?
I'm tempted to put Predator Dragon in the deck, since often it would have 5-6 Elves! in play, but no remaining draw engine, and swinging with 1/1 men just wont get the job done fast enough.

---Korhil

This moves away from the original thread topic, but it seems it's moved a bit anyhow.
(btw, interesting stats from the people that have posted data.)

With regard to Magic as a game, I think it is important to pay some attention to probabilities and have a fair understanding of what a 'correct' number of lands to run are or how many duress effects to play.
I don't think any deck has been perfect from its first build however. You may have applied all the best theory available in assisting you with the mix of cards in your deck, but when you start testing you find that it's not as 'perfect' as it should be.

Things that can make it seem less perfect in testing is that your opponent is making assumptions about the distribution of your deck and therefore the resources you have available. They are assuming that you’re playing a specific configuration of spells and they will play their spells in a way to disrupt your game.
There isn't always a correct order to play things in because of the interactive nature of the game. If you make what probability suggests is the best action, there’s a reasonable chance your opponent has expected that line of play, and will have done their best to be in a position to disrupt it when your commit to it.

What I'm trying to suggest, is I believe intuition is important.
You want you opponent to believe things about your deck, and play to avoid them.

Concrete examples are difficult to come up with.

One that begins to show the concept I have is:
Your opponent believes you are playing with Daze in your deck as a 4 of when you aren't, in fact you may have sideboarded them all out. They end up playing much of the game trying to play around the spell. They think they are playing correctly and playing their spells in a way that is 'probably' going to win them the game. You assume they know you would sideboard daze out for this match up, and don't know to take advantage of the situation and bluff having daze more often.
Both of you are playing thinking you have perfect information of the game and are making 'correct' decisions.

Equally, you may be playing with 4 daze in your deck when you should have sideboarded them out. Your opponent doesn't think you have any in your deck at all. Your opponent plays with what you consider reckless abandon, throwing bombs at you while tapping out. You never have daze in hand to punish him and get destroyed.
You'll likely think he played badly and you were unlucky to lose.
They will think that they won as they should have because you didn't bring in tormods crypts for your dazes. (No good example of what would be better comes to mind right now, assume there is a match up where some card is definitely better than your dazes would be) 

Magic isn't a game of perfect information like Chess.
You may be playing a game making decisions for the wrong reasons. I think there is a limit to how much you can apply probability to Magic. Intuition and feel for the game can be more powerful tools.

---Korhil

Your reference to an upkeep confuses me.
Any size changes are permanent, he doesn't revert back to a 1/1 at end of turn or anything.
He costs twice as much to get 2 power initially, but after that he's just another 2/2 until you find you have the 3 mana to spend on permanently making him a 4/4.

Finding the 1 mana to make him a 2/2 is pretty easy. Having the ability to also later become a 4/4 makes him superior IMO.

---Korhil

I've been testing with Figure of Destiny as a 4 of in the 1 drop slot, cutting some Cat's and Dog's.
He's awesome.

He's replacing 2/2's and 2/1's, so he only has to compare with them to earn his spot, which he does.
There is such minimal tempo loss from playing T1 Figure, T2 Standstill, swing for 1, T3 Swing for 2.

The potential for him to become a 4/4 later on is just a bonus that makes him superior to Cat's and Dog's.

---Korhil

It's off topic, but did you read the book in that night, or over the weekend?
If not, then getting on any other day would achieve much the same end point.

It's not really different to missing a concert of [insert favorite rock band here] because they will tour again in a year, to go buy a book that will still be in print for months!

---Korhil

Wait a sec... people ditch on an amazing 'one time only' vintage event to instead go see a kids movie (which will remain available for viewing for many weeks)??!? gg.

---Korhil

You added Mindcensor to improve the Flash Match up, and in doing so, removed Red for White instead.
Would you not get similar results from playing REB's main in an otherwise more normal GAT build instead?
REB main is good in the GAT mirror too, and seems more precise than Mindcensor.

This would allow you to maintain access to cards like Artifact Mutation and Ancient Grudge for the Stax matchup.
You do also have extra mana sources vs Stax, but you could add these anyway if you saw this as another means of improving this matchup.

---Korhil

I do find it slightly amusing to see you too abandoned Street Wraith now.
The 2nd Tog main is interesting.

---Korhil

Umm, OK.
Travis, could you please upload this vid for the rest of us?

---Korhil

Could you get this footage of the final onto YouTube or something for the rest of us?

---Korhil

First power I got was 2 moxen at the same time - Beta Pearl, & UL Ruby for US$220.

One of the local card players had been overseas on the back of a big inheritance, he returned with the mentioned two moxen plus UL Lotus & Ancestral.
He'd always been on of those people that would end up short on cash, and sell of cards cheap to pay the weeks rent. So, when I saw he had the power, I told him when he comes to sell it, find me first, and I'd beat any other local offer (Which is true, I would have).

Of course, he flicked it off to some other people one week without telling me. The Lotus and Recall went to a collector that seems to think they are worth millions and just keeps them (He doesn't play the game at all). That annoys me because there's such a low amount of power in the country as is, and he's taking some of it out of circulation.

The Ruby & Pearl ended up with one of his friends however, who is also the kind of person that sells cards when he needs to pay rent. So I gave him the same story. One day he was up at the local card store (which is run by one of my good friends - CJ) wanting to sell it off (Again, I wasn't being told). CJ knew I was chasing it, so he rang me at work and said that the power was going to be sold, and that he wanted NZ$300 for it. I took an early lunch break and gave the man his money

Since then I've picked up all the rest, and made progress on the 2nd set of power (finishing my beta).
There are nowhere near enough tourneys to make owning power worth it in this country (Let alone having 2 sets), but it's pretty cool being one of a handful that have full sets. All the kids getting in to the game seem to know who I am fairly quickly tho.

Maybe I'll sell the UL set when I want more $$$ to buy a house or something, can't see me flicking the Beta at any point tho.

---Korhil

Playing with Proxies sucks tho. I hate having to even play test with Proxies.
I don't have many pimp foils yet, I'm working on finishing my 2nd set of power still.
4/9 Beta remaining to get (Lotus, Recall, Walk, Ruby).

The other Black Border stuff I have is:
4 Dark Rituals
2 Demonic Tutor
4 Illusionary Mask

---Korhil

I never find GAT to be short of card drawing.
Adding Bob would also lower your blue count, something that many GAT players have been trying to increase as much as possible (Brain Freeze over 4th Dryad etc).

I know not everyone else likes LOA, but I find it to be very solid in GAT.

Swings for two seems to be the only thing Bob does better than other options. Adding a counter is redundant, anything else you run will also be a non-green spell too. I'd argue that his Card advantage comes too slowly - GAT is weaker in the early game where it needs to have a big grip of counters so it can reach the mid game vs decks like Flash. This is why spells like Opt are good in GAT - fast cycling.

I just don't think Bob really belongs in GAT for these reasons, and the already mentioned life loss.

---Korhil

Further questions:
Did you ever get caught with a Smother in hand and not be able to FOW?
Would bring in your Smothers against Stacks to kill welders? Or was that not the plan.
What other matches did you expect, and intend to use Smother in?

---Korhil

How good was Smother for you? Did you find it better than Submerge?
How often would the 'free' Submerge have been of more use?
Do you have any idea of the number of times you cast Smother in the mirrior while an opponent held a Red Blast with Red available?

What was your sideboard plan for the Mirrior?

---Korhil

Daves point here seems important, and relevant to some of the discussion above.
If Ichorid players are adapting to run some sideboard cards in the main, the deck must be losing some of it's game 1 power. If it gives up too much game 1 power, and still can have problems folding to Layline/Jailer/Crypt games 2 & 3, then the deck can't be totally overpowered.

Not all players will want to run Ichorid to start with, but will we see the players that enjoy the deck try tune the maindeck so they can survive vs hate? Ultimately causing the deck to become more 'fair'?

(Flash is a different topic)

---Korhil

What makes you decide to not FOW the Ancestral?
Doesn't that count as enough of a bomb?

---Korhil

I'd agree with Steve that Gift's restriction is pointless at this stage of the T1 Metagame.
'Gifts' decks we're never over powered, it was simply the best deck that could run Mana Drain for a period of time.

I could argue (rather pointlessly) that back in the day, Keeper was over powered, simply because it was the best Mana Drain deck for ages, and I hated playing against it. There was no individual card that wasn't on the restricted list in Keeper that could be restricted and cause it to no long be able to be built.

'Gifts' decks are just an evolution of Mana Drain decks need to be faster and faster about winning after obtaining control of the game state. CS was the previous Mana Drain deck to find a faster win condition.

To me, the biggest problem with the loss of Gifts from the format is that we have no longer have a really powerful Mana Drain deck. I don't see that as a good for the metagame as a whole. It allows combo decks more freedom in the type of cards the run if they don't have to risk them ever being Drain'ed during a tournament.

It's likely in this Gush enviroment that Gifts wouldn't be able to compete at all anyway, but that would only be another reason for not restricting it.

Bomberman has a lot of weight on it's shoulders to try prove Mana Drain can still be good.

---Korhil

This is incorrect.
You are putting the land into play, hence Fastbond doesn't trigger.

---Korhil

It's powerful vs Rich Shay's Ichorid list, so if that indeed becomes the standard build, then Tinker - Platinum Angel is a very valid tactic.
Perhaps people need to start boarding the Platinum Angel to force Ichorid to board CoV + Blue sources again, thus meaning they can't have space for Contagion vs Jailer. Something will have to give.

It may steal a game vs Flash. I suspect that if you can resolve Tinker vs Flash, you could often more simply get Jar and instead win yourself.

---Korhil

So, you suggest Flash?
There aren't enough T1 tourneys to encourage many others to collect full power, kinda sucks.

What are the reasons for running the harder to cast Negator over Grunt?
I think it's these slots that compete, rather than the Planar Void slots that you indicate.
Given the rise of Ichorid in most Metas, surely Grunt is the better 'fat' creature option.

Your correct about needing more Blue cards to support FOW. Stifle seems like the best card to fit into the deck. My testing has conviced me to run 4 Stifle in any Fish deck.

---Korhil

I'd think of Mana Drain as a card to run either 4 or 0 of.
There are definately viable Gifts lists running 0 Mana Drains - Ritual Gifts.
But the typical reason to run Gifts over other Tendrills decks, like Long, is that you can play a control game.

If your reaching the point with your testing or consider your Meta bad for a combo/control gifts deck, then perhaps it's best to change decks and build from an outight combo baseline, like Long.
Having some Hybrid between controllish Gifts (which would include 4 Scrolls, 4 Drain, 4 FOW), and the more combo like Ritual Gifts (with 4 Ritual and 4 Duress), seems certain to fail - it's highly unlikely that the build will be optimal for it's purpose.

---Korhil

It's an intentional mis-quote for purposes of humour.
I found it funny the first time atleast.

On another note, someone must have an opinion about what I might play :/

I've started over analysing myself and the metagame, I need an outside perspective.

Vintage Nationals will be in August (New Zealands vintage nats anyhow).
Myself and my 'team' have been testing a lot, and making metagame predictions.

Given Vintage Nats is run over the same weekend as Standard Nats, the number of players is limited.
That, and the total amount of Power in the country that sees play is fairly small.

Last year saw a field of 14 players, with 5 decks being powered.
That was up from the year previous, both in number of players, and the amount of powered decks.
(I have a tourney report from last year in which I ran Vengeur Masqué to a Top4 if anyone wants to locate it)

This year, I'd anticipate more players, 20, and more powered decks, 8.
I don't think there will be more than 2 Ichorid decks total, I don't know of many Bazaar sets in the country.
I suspect most of the people with power will run Gifts, so 3 Gifts decks. I expect atleast 1 Long, and 1 CS.
I expect some 'Legacy' Flash decks to turn up, maybe 3.

The rest of the field will be crap aggro (Golbins, Sligh, Sui) or unpowered combo (MOM Academy stuff)

The decks we've tested thus far:
Gifts
Oath
Ichorid
Fish (UBW)
Vengeur Masqué
Goblins

Decks that will be given a full test soon:
Doomsday (Post FS list)
Flash Hulk

We need 3 or 4 decks for Nats, depending if our 4th decides to play or not.
My teammates are mich easier to please than I am; one is set on running Ichorid, another was going to play Oath, but now intends to play Flash, the 4th we can give the goblin deck too.

Since I own pretty much the whole card pool and all the power, I get dibs on what I play.
I don't own Grims or Shops, so decks requiring those are out for this year.

Currently I'm thinking either Gifts or Doomsday (pending play testing) would be my best options based on the outright power of the decks.
My love for Vengeur Masqué means I'm tempted to play that given it will trash the aggro half of the field easily.

My concerns are; I can predict the meta to have a number of Gifts decks, - hence we'll run sideboards to deal with combo. The strength of both Ichorid and Flash should force everyone to have serious GY hate in their sideboards also. I have to assume that everyone else can reach the same conclusion, right?

Should I instead play a deck that can ignore this GY hate, and any combo hate, and in general, just ignore hate because of the many ways it can win (Vengeur Masqué)?
Or just play Gifts or Doomsday and rely on the power of the deck to get me thought?

There is definately pressure to do well this year, last year we reached 3rd & 4th, previous year was 1st & 3rd, we definately have to stop the gradual side in performance!

Others less clouded opinions please!

An unpowered fish that we built for a friend to run ended up looking as such:

2 Island
3 Flooded Strand
1 Plains
2 Polluted Delta
1 StripMine
1 Swamp
3 Tundra
3 Underground Sea
2 Volcanic Island
4 Wasteland

4 Dark Confidant
4 Meddling Mage
3 Jotun Grunt
2 Yixlid Jailer

4 Brainstorm
4 Chalice of the Void
1 Demonic Tutor
3 Duress
1 Echoing Truth
4 Force of Will
3 Hide/Seek
4 Stifle
1 Vampiric Tutor

While only unpowered, some things about the deck still impressed me.
My testing found this list was capable of going 50% vs MD Gifts.

The mana base proved to be fine. The total mana count was higher to support the 5th strip effect and the red to be able to use the 'Hide' effect of Hide/Seek.

4 Stifles are impressive, it's not a card I'd want to run less of. There are always targets for it. It also pitches to FOW as an additional benefit

Including Hide/Seek and pushing the deck into a 4th Colour proved successful.
On the play, if you get a Chalice + Duress, or Chalice + Stifle fetchland start, dropping either a Jailer or casting Seek vs Gifts on T2 is quite strong. The Jailer disables Recoup and can create problems for a Gifts player when Chalice is on the board already, they tend to need to find 2 bounce effects to enable a full tendrills kill. And in the mean time it makes their Gifts piles less powerful. The Jailer tends to buy you an extra turn when Chalice is also on the board.
Some Gifts players are sticking with an 11/11 given the general move to Echoing Truth over spells like Wipe Away in many decks now, Seeking him makes the Tendrills kill require a much bigger storm, again, buying you time to win with men.

Seek can be highly effective vs many Long builds if a Chalice for 0 has been resolved.

Jaliers other obvious good point is it's strength vs Ichorid.
I think Jailers better costing makes him a better choice than the Aven.

Being Unpowered, the new Ichorid was trashing this too quickly barring a T1 Stifle Bazzar T2 Jailer play in game 1.
Having the ability to play T1 Jailers off moxen along with Laylines, the Ichorid matchup should become very playable for Fish.

Perhaps some of these finding were of interest.

Oath is a reasonable deck unpowered.

I think T1 is harder to get into now that it use to be about 5 years ago. When I started taking T1 seriously, Keeper still existed. So 'cheap to build' decks like Stompy, Sui, and Sligh were viable. I built those first and went from there.
I managed to obtain Drains fairly easily, and started playing some FEB deck with Drains and FOW for a while.
I later obtained the masks for Vengeur Masqué because I always loved survival decks (be damned how good they ever really are/were).
I kept playing that until I stopped being a student.
Now I own everything except Shops and Grims, so I pretty much play what I want

As a student, T1 is a pretty hard format to get into.