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« on: May 02, 2007, 04:58:40 am » |
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Here's the deck I've been playing on MWS lately:
// Lands
4 City of Brass
4 Gemstone Mine
1 Underground Sea
1 Bayou
// Creatures
4 Hermit Druid
2 Sutured Ghoul
4 Elvish Spirit Guide
4 Street Wraith
2 Narcomoeba
// Spells
4 Unmask
4 Cabal Therapy
4 Brainstorm
1 Dragon Breath
2 Dread Return
4 Worldly Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Black Lotus
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Sapphire
4 Pithing Needle
4 Bridge from Below
// Sideboard
SB: 2 Elvish Scrapper
SB: 4 Chalice of the Void
SB: 2 Druid Lyrist
SB: 4 Red Elemental Blast
SB: 3 Emerald Charm
The kill condition here is the usual Dread Return->Sutured Ghoul+Dragon Breath.
I believe it is superior to the Flame-kin I've seen in some other decklists for a number of reasons:
1. It is very hard to lose once Hermit Druid has been activated; the only reasonable nasty surprise is Extirpate targeting one of the win pieces. The deck can go off even with many Bridges or Narcomoebas no longer in the library, including if one of these cards got Extirpated.
2. As a result of the above, Narcomoebas can be safely cut to 2, freeing slots. A Bridge from Below might also be cuttable, but like with Dread Return and Sutured Ghoul, the extra copy gives me the flexibility to toss a copy to Unmask.
3. Unlike with Flame-kin Zealot, where insufficient Bridges means needing to attack a second time next turn to win the game, Sutured Ghoul almost always wins immediately (with the notable exception of a Darksteel Colossus playing defense), freeing up "safety valve" slots taken by Legacy Weapon or Serra Avatar.
Comments on other slots:
4 Unmask
2 Duress
This deck relies heavily on disruption to fight both combo and control. On turn 1 I much prefer Unmask to Duress; Unmask is "free" in that I can often toss a redundant combo piece, leaving my mana open for Hermit Druid, a tutor, or Pithing Needle. I'm tempted to move Duress to the sideboard, but am worried about the deck's black card count.
4 Street Wraith
Street Wraith fits perfectly in this deck: he thins the deck, accelerates tutors, pumps Sutured Ghoul, and pitches to Unmask.
4 Brainstorm
I've found that running Brainstorm considerably increases the consistency of the deck; played on turn 1 it fixes mana, finds tutors, Unmask, or Unmask fodder, and puts combo pieces back in the deck. The deck is short on shuffle effects, which led me to try Bazaar over Brainstorm, to mixed results.
4 Pithing Needle
I'm not sure at all what to put here; Pithing Needle works moderately well, as does Chalice of the Void. The Needle stops maindeck Tormod's Crypts which otherwise spell an instant loss, and when played as a follow-up to Unmask can randomly hose cards like Bazaar of Baghdad, Goblin Welder, Memory Jar, fetchlands, etc.
Leyline of the Void/Planar Void are huge problems; I can't think of any way to deal with them besides sideboarding in enchantment destruction.
I've played the deck on MWS and can report my results so far. I'm relatively new to Vintage, so please let me know if I make mistakes in my analyses.
Ichorid (6-2)
After one game, 'W7F' told me,
W7F: wtf is the point of this deck
W7F: it's so much worse than [manaless Ichorid]
That claim is probably true, but this deck has a pretty good match-up against Ichorid. Ichorid can't do much to disrupt Hermit Druid, so this deck tends to be slightly faster even when Pithing Needle doesn't randomly shut down Bazaar of Baghdad.
Fish (3-3)
The toughest match-up. This deck has absolutely no way to deal with Meddling Mage during game 1, and even when the Mage doesn't show up the Fish player usually has enough bounce and counters to weather this deck's disruption.
Post-sideboard Red Elemental Blast helps a lot, but the game still favors Fish.
Stax (3-1)
On average Stax is too slow to stop Hermit Druid. As usual Tangle Wire is the primary problem, as this deck is rather permanent-light. Fortunately Pithing Needle is very good here, shutting down Wasteland, Goblin Welder, and game-ending Triskelion.
Long (5-6)
The match against Long is almost as grim as against Fish; Long is just plain faster and is resistant to disruption. This match-up is one of the reasons I'm considering moving Chalice into the main deck.
Other decks I'm not too familiar with:
Gibbering Descent (2-0)
I'm not too sure what's suppose to happen after he spends his whole hand to play an enchantment that doesn't win; in any case Hermit Druid feels much faster.
Flash (4-0)
The combo never assembled itself fast enough, especially in the face of Unmask/Therapy.
U/R Control (3-1)
U/B Control (2-0)
B/W Control (0-1)
I don't know enough about these decks to comment.
Burn.dec (0-3)
No hope. Even with Chalices set at 1 and 2, I was pummeled by Dragon Whelp after my Hermit Druid was fried by Pyrokinesis.
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