[Article] Learning From The Flaws Of Aggro Decks In Vintage

[Vegeta2711]

http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/article/9214.html

Yeah, this was fun to write. I think I covered all the main problems as well, go figure.

[Moxlotus]

I thought it was a very good article.  I'm interested in your second one and can't wait.  Also-your Team Reflection sig at the end of your article made me actually lol.

[cssamerican]

This was a very fun read although it would have been nice if you had purposed some possible solutions to these problems within this article. Maybe not so much an exact list, but perhaps an idea of possible avenues one could explore in order to reduce these flaws. For example, I have two aggro decks that I enjoy playing, and I am always looking at ways to make them better, simply because they are fun to play. One is my take on Marc Perez’s Sex deck, and the other is my take on the modern Suicide deck. The thing that both my decks focus on is the use of Time Walk because it address Flaw #1 by making the deck faster, and reduces Flaw#2 by using the best form of disruption in the game, turn denial. However, the reason these decks aren't great decks is because the one flaw that aggro decks can't overcome is Flaw#4. This is due to the fact aggro decks by nature try to win ASAP (Some aggro-control decks like Fish don't, but this is not the norm), which is exactly what combo decks are trying to do, except in this format combo always does it better.

I just noticed you plan on writing another article focusing on how to overcome the flaws. I can't wait to read it, but I hope you decide to focus more on general concepts that can apply to the whole genre than rather a couple of specific decks.

Edit: Removed links to decklist in order to prevent thread from becoming a discussion about my decks.

[Klep]

1) Sex is not aggro.  It is combo-control that kills with creatures, and your list doesn't have anything that changes that.  It looks like you've just weakened the recursion engine and slowed down its acceleration.

2) Adding a single Time Walk to Suicide won't do anything to solve its problems.  That list is still terrible, only now it's even worse because the manabase is weaker.

[Vegeta2711]

Appreciate the good word guys.

CSS: As for generalities, the entire idea was not to drone on about the subject. It's depressing. Not to mention at the time I had very few real anwsers to that problems aggro decks had, in fact I still only have a few real leads. Going over specfic successful decks is general in the sense that people can see what they did right and apply that. It's a far more useful tool than if in my next article I just went, 'oh here are my concept decks, take my word for it, that they're better than the other ones.'

I think once I lay out the outline to why some of these decks were good, others will key in on that and build upon it.

[MCS]

Seems to me that nobody is talking about root maze. This card is just 2 good against any form of control and storm combo decks. I've been playing aggro for a while, and I've been winning for a while. It seems to me that all we need is a good player that will post a good result on a major tourney, and then sudenly everybody will start talking that aggro is viable.

It is just sad what Internet did to deckbuilding  

[Vegeta2711]

It is just sad what Internet did to deckbuilding

Yeah, completely refining the way we build decks and getting to hear differing opinions from all over the world certainly was a downgrade from throwing down Craw Wurms back in the day!

I've been playing aggro for a while, and I've been winning for a while.

Feel free to share the secret to your success if these aren't 20 man scrubfest tournies. And I sincerely hope it's better than 'Root Maze r0x0rZ my boxorZ!'.

P.S. - It's aggro. Note the 2 g's.

aggro- or agri- or agr-
pref.
Field; soil: aggrology.
Agriculture: aggroindustrial.

-Zherbus, who also get's bugged when people spell things oddly.

[[FtN|FH] Negator]

I think one "problem" aggro decks have is that often they are suboptimal or even bad builds and and the player who is playing it has not the experience with the deck.
This may be caused because many of the aggro decks are unpowered and played by players who don't play T1 for a long time or not very seriously.

A good build aggro needs lots of playtesting, carddiscussions, etc. like every other deck too. Sadly many players don't do this if they play aggro simply because they are unexperienced.
So i think if you should be so fair and keep this in mind.

Rootmaze:
In my opinion this is one of the strongest cards for aggro with green in it. It effects nearly all decks in a more or less important way. Vs many decks (dragon, TPS, CS) it's really very strong and there are only very few decks that don't care about it.

[WildWillieWonderboy]

It's always interesting for me to read history that I didn't witness. This article in particular was highly entertaining because I only started playing type 1 a year ago. Good article.

I used to think that the lack of complete aggro in a format was a flaw, but the more I think about it the more I'm reminded of that game with different pieces played on an eight-by-eight grid. This game is regarded by some people as the paragon of strategery, and it is interesting that the same duality of needing an offence and a defence has developed completely parallel as the player intelligence increased.

[MCS]

It is just sad what Internet did to deckbuilding

Yeah, completely refining the way we build decks and getting to hear differing opinions from all over the world certainly was a downgrade from throwing down Craw Wurms back in the day!

I don't remeber craw wurms, but I do remember juzams, moats, serra angels, serendib efreet and so on. I must say I liked the enviorment of the old days.

I've been playing aggro for a while, and I've been winning for a while.

Feel free to share the secret to your success if these aren't 20 man scrubfest tournies. And I sincerely hope it's better than 'Root Maze r0x0rZ my boxorZ!'.

There has been a discussion on this forum (twice) about classic r/g aggro decks. I don't want to reopen that discussion, so if you care - read those posts, if you don't - well, then don't.

All I'm saying is that players, especialy the good ones, won't bother about taking a r/g rootmaze deck to a big event. They will play anything that made T8 in one of the last big event. So, we shall have the next field:

80% of the field will be one of the Tier 1 decks. Most of the good player will belong in this pool.
10% of the field will be a tier 2 deck. Average and bad players tend to play tier 2 decks.
10% of the field will be rogue. Some of those players will be good players with new combo decks, because good players like to play with themselves (you can understand this as you wish). Mostly, rogue players are realy bad players or beginers.

P.S. - It's aggro. Note the 2 g's.

Thnx, I always like people who are so gentle to civilize us savages.

gg - good game?

[[supa_t(im)]]

I really enjoyed the article, being a long time aggro player myself.

However, since straight aggro doesn't exist anymore, us aggro players have to restort to aggro-control.  Which isn't so bad, because it lets us play with out nifty critters again.

Anyway, on the point of root maze, it is a very powerful disruption card in any deck that runs mana denial.  If you remember Jacob Orlove ran root maze in his original WTF build and it completely wrecked the original build of Deathlong.

It stalls combo's storm count because they can't use the mana from those precious moxen when they play them.  Since their land comes into play tapped, they can't even use the land to cantrip or bounce.

It makes it so only FoW hinders your threat development against control for two turns.  This can be huge if you play a fairly scary beatstick like river boa and slap a rancor on his back.

Its good against both combo and control, and can be fit into a deck that is good against aggro as well.  I guess its similar to null rod in the mana denial aspect, but it also affects land for 1 turn, which can be crucial.  Also, throw a mox monkey in the mix, and they won't even be able to use their moxen, or even lotus.

That is why root maze is good.

[Vegeta2711]

Appreciate the compliments on the article once again.

One thing though, did I diss Root Maze somewhere or what? There's a LONG list of Aggro cards that are pretty good and mentioned a mere fraction of them in the article. But I mean I believe we know why Root Maze is good. If it was because of the comment I said in the thread, all I meant was that alone isn't going to change squat. It's been tried before to a decent effect, but now more than ever, you need to focus on the deck as a syngeristic whole than indivual sections.

There has been a discussion on this forum (twice) about classic r/g aggro decks. I don't want to reopen that discussion, so if you care - read those posts, if you don't - well, then don't.

All I'm saying is that players, especialy the good ones, won't bother about taking a r/g rootmaze deck to a big event. They will play anything that made T8 in one of the last big event. So, we shall have the next field:

I've read the R/G aggro discussions and been somewhat intrested in them. But you guys have been able to come to some sort of a conclusive list so I have yet to do more than prelimenary testing with it.

And yes, that's right, not a lot of people will play an R/G Root Maze deck. It's supremely underpowered compared to other choices so of course it has less chance of being played. I'd just accept this.

[xrobx]

Vegeta,
you should take the time to go through the R/G Hate threads, as there were some notable things mentioned there worth reading I urge this, especially if you're going to make a generalization about aggro and where it's headed.

It was a great article to read, and easy to understand.  Basically, you came to the conclusion (from my understanding atleast) that there were a few things aggro did wrong/didn't do at all, that made it a nonviable winning option for T1 tier one tournies.  Cool...let me address that real quick  I'm going to take the RG standpoint, as I've rocked this deck for the last 8 months, and I know it quite thoroughly (sp?).  I played it in 3 local tournaments of less than 100 players (40-80 in each, for power of course), top 8ing twice, and one SCG event (syracuse), finishing just out of contention (between 9th - 30th) with a 5-3-0 (one game given to a friend, as I knew I could not top 8 with 6-2-0 ).

Flaw #1: The aggro deck is too slow or lacks significant threats.

RG has the tubbies here, there is no question.  Undercosted and synergistic fools with maaaaaaaaaad rancors.  Ha...seriously though, shaman, boa, mancer, and kird ape are enough to make any player edgey.  Not to mention good old ESG.

Flaw #2: Lack of disruption and mis-assignment of what is useful disruption

My build packs more disruption than ANY deck out there; wastelands/strip, root maze, ankh, shaman, naturalize, bolt (yes, i count this as disruption), and this is just MB.  SB adds art. mutation, crypt/seal, more naturalize, pillar, etc.  Disruption is not an issue for this deck.

Flaw #3: Lack of threat density or the ability to find threats.

This is crucial, and one of your best points I believe you outlined.  Threat intensity, specifically, is key.  If you make a solid manabase, and with such a low mana curve as this deck provides, you shouldn't have a problem 'top decking' threats like there's no tommorow.  However, intensity is a real issue for most aggro decks, and this one rarely faulters.  The worst case scenario is late game useless disruption, but this is true to any deck.  There are many times you draw wasteland when not needed, or duress is a dead card.  Same thing with root maze...oh well, eat it.  The point is your odds of the maze being dead VS the maze being tech are very low (ie. maze is usually ownage.).

Flaw #4: Making sure you don't do something another deck already does better

No deck hates better, that's for sure.  You can beat as efficiently as sligh, with the best hate available.  Your critters are annoying and nasty with rancor, and you don't care about null rods/bounce/wastlelands (running only 2 taigas)/crucilock/etc.  Your ankhs play a nice role in this (denying crucilock), and really make things tough for a fetchy-manabase.

The outline I just provided, in response to your points that aggro needs to improve upon, is only regarding RGZoo (as I call it).  There ARE other aggro/control decks out there, and that really does need to be discussed.  A friend of mine recently came 3rd in SCG (syracuse), where he lost to a top decked WoG.  This was crazy, as it was such a random play/topdeck, and yes, this card OWNS aggro.  He's been rocking the same deck for the last while, and consistantly puts up good results with silly little mongeese.

Being a good player has a lot to do with playing aggro properly, and unfortunatly beginners usually start out with something like aggro (instead of something easy to play, and redundant, like oath).  Hence, you give a weak player a hard to play deck (atleast hard to play succesfully deck), and you don't show good results.  Yes, aggro has turned towards control/aggro, but this is not a lost cause.  Aggro is what keeps magic on its toes, and continues to be fun.  It would be terrible to see a meta switch to combo VS slaver, which is what alot of metas are like.   Any deck choice should resemble a meta choice, so in the correct environments, aggro/control could post some pretty high results and suprise a lot of people

[Rico Suave]

Good article.

Flaw #1: The aggro deck is too slow or lacks significant threats.

RG has the tubbies here, there is no question.  Undercosted and synergistic fools with maaaaaaaaaad rancors.  Ha...seriously though, shaman, boa, mancer, and kird ape are enough to make any player edgey.  Not to mention good old ESG.

A key word here is significant.  I'm not sure 1 and 2 power creatures are significant.

Flaw #2: Lack of disruption and mis-assignment of what is useful disruption

My build packs more disruption than ANY deck out there; wastelands/strip, root maze, ankh, shaman, naturalize, bolt (yes, i count this as disruption), and this is just MB.  SB adds art. mutation, crypt/seal, more naturalize, pillar, etc.  Disruption is not an issue for this deck.

You have a large number of slots for disruption, but I feel comfortable playing against every one of those cards.  Are they really useful disruption?  Sometimes.  

Flaw #4: Making sure you don't do something another deck already does better

No deck hates better, that's for sure.  You can beat as efficiently as sligh, with the best hate available.  Your critters are annoying and nasty with rancor, and you don't care about null rods/bounce/wastlelands (running only 2 taigas)/crucilock/etc.  Your ankhs play a nice role in this (denying crucilock), and really make things tough for a fetchy-manabase.

I would argue that R/G could simply add Workshops, replace those 1/1 and 2/1 creatures with 5/3 and 4/4 first turn plays for a faster clock, and still pack the exact same disruption or better since now it has access to more artifact hosers.  I think this is what he meant in saying "make sure you don't do something another deck does better."

[Vegeta2711]

you should take the time to go through the R/G Hate threads, as there were some notable things mentioned there worth reading Wink I urge this, especially if you're going to make a generalization about aggro and where it's headed.

I said

I've read the R/G aggro discussions and been somewhat intrested in them. But you guys haven't been able to come to some sort of a conclusive list so I have yet to do more than prelimenary testing with it.

Same thing again, if you guys would agree on a list, it'd be much easier to do an analysis of it. For example, if we look at [FH] Negator's newest list that he played at a tourney, it looks signficantly different from others that have been posted. Off the top of my head, there were thee flaws the deck fell under. Flaws #1, #2 and #4. 2 is really dependent on which list and number 1 as well, but to a lesser extent.

Flaw #2 is dependent on which list it is, though I have to say past Root Maze and strips, your build doesn't look to have a massive amount of disruption that matters. You really should examine how useful Ankh and Shaman really are. I know Shaman is decent, but he takes time to work and that's his biggest flaw. Ankh hasn't been very good for a while now, due to the later it hits play, the worse it is.  

Flaw #1 somewhat applies. The builds that only run 14-15 non ESG  creatures are in the biggest trouble here. Why? Because they'll usually have 1/2 threats out that aren't very big or scary in the least. Rancor is a good work-around, but carries the usual problem of pump on a creature. And the problem with counting ESG as a legitmate threat is he's a really shitty threat. 2/2 vanilla for 3 mana is awful, odds are if you're hardcasting him you've already run out of GOOD threats. The 19-20 creature (Not counting ESG) builds this flaw doesn't really apply to since they have more threats. Especially the ones using Rootwalla, Mongrel or Hidden Gibbons, since those are legitmate threats that can easily become 3/3 or bigger.

That's the main problem I have with R/G right now, not the disruption, moreso the creature base. You have a bunch of dinky 1 and 2 mana threats just like Fish, but no card draw to find multiples. I think R/G can be succesful, but you should look for more efficent threats. Hidden Gibbons is a 4/4 for G and Wild Mongrel is a 2/2 for 1G that can pump with any cards in hand. Stuff that may actually give you better than a 10 turn clock.

Flaw #4 is asking if you can out-perform Workshop Aggro basically. If you think R/G is doing a signficantly different plan than Stacker or something, then you should continue with the current type of builds. If not, you should refine them until they do something effective or better than such a deck.

[TracerBullet]

I've been playing aggro for a while, and I've been winning for a while.

Feel free to share the secret to your success if these aren't 20 man scrubfest tournies. And I sincerely hope it's better than 'Root Maze r0x0rZ my boxorZ!'.

P.S. - It's aggro. Note the 2 g's.

aggro- or agri- or agr-
pref.
Field; soil: aggrology.
Agriculture: aggroindustrial.

-Zherbus, who also get's bugged when people spell things oddly.

Curiously enough, this is where we get the word Acre, as we English folk don't really like hard G sounds.  The funniest part of all this is that some scholars who think that the akr sound was the original root before the Great Consonant Shift.