Dealing with Fish

[King_minos]

Alright. I play in a heavy fish metagame. I played five rounds last local tournament, and four of them were against fish variants. I was playing with oath of druids at the time, but only one game did I find a way to easily beat the fish. He was running mono-black fish and all his creatures were cc2. I chaliced at 2 (can't play oath) and hardcasted Platinum Angel. Every other time it was just a race and I got beat down when I didn't get lots of early power. I went 2-3 as my final record. Right now I have the cards to build Oath, Slaver, and Gifts. Which do you think has the best advantage against fish and what cards would be good choices against all the different variants of fish that exist.

[Khahan]

Check out the vintage improvement forum. There are about 5 active fish threads right now and a few of them have some very good, in-depth discussions about fishes various match ups.

[Dakkon]

Oath with sb'd or MD Simic Sky Swallowers. The fish player cannot deal with untargetable creatures. and Oath should have enough counter back-up to protect oath when it gets into play.

What problems were you having in the match-up when you were playing Oath? you are faster then the fish player, what were you racing against?

[PipOC]

CS with SBed FTKs is probably the best choice.  FTK will destroy Fish's midgame, and then you can play with all your big spells in the late game.

[Implacable]

While I know that FTK is the latest rage, I've found that a bunch of 1-of Wraths (Pyroclasm, Massacre, and Rolling Earthquake being the best) are more effective than FTK.  Because Fish packs 4x Swords, creatures that can be removed often just make the worthless spells that they've been building up in their hands important.  However, I am a Gifts player, so it's obvious why I prefer 1-ofs and a more reactive plan.

[Yames]

In all honesty the only fish that gives oath problems is U/W because they are pre boarded against you with swords and seals main. In the other matches all you should be worrying about is resolving an oath and then protecting it. You don't need to look for a orchard early because their only route to victory is little men.

So I think it may be more important to ask what build of oath were you running, or how where you playing it wrong.

If I was heading into a fish full meta I would take oath as my first choice. The only exception is if it's all OFM style fish. That's just a beating.

[King_minos]

I played 2 rounds against B/W fish, which hit my creatures with swords. One round I played some strange mono-black fishy deck which i beat. and one round was against a U/B fish deck which hit my creatures with extract after I used force of will to protect oath.

[AJFirst]

If you want to, MD SSS. My suggestion would be if you can't beat'em, join'em.

URBana Fish by Becker is a great deck that beats up on a lot of major archtypes (has some problems with combo from what I've seen, but nothing that's not sideboardable), and absolutely kills the Fish mirror.

Waterfront Bouncers and FTKs with the availability to planar void and duress, rack and ruin and blasts, and the blue power and countermagic makes it very flexible in every match-up post-board and the ability to win aggro-control style is awsome. I recomend testing it.
-AJ

[Gekoratel]

The Oath vs. UW Fish matchup pre-board is probably 55/45 in favor of Oath and much better post board.  In the sideboard if you run Tinker/Colossus, 2 Massacre, and 2 Simic Sky Swallower you shouldn't be having any trouble against Fish decks.  I honestly would keep playing Oath over your other options because Oath has a better matchup against Fish than those decks.  Game 1 the only card that matters from fish is Meddling Mage because they need 2x Swords for StP to be relevant.  If you run the 6 sideboard cards I suggested then you'll just roll over fish because Tinker trumps Mage, SSS trumps StP, and Massacre > X/2's.  When I played Oath back in the day I usually boarded out something like -2 Null Rod -1 Akroma -1 Razia -2 Chalice for the 6 cards above.

Playing against creature based strategies that can't disrupt you should be Oath's easiest matchups.  Also could you explain what version of Oath you were playing; more control style(ICBM) or more aggro(GWS).  I haven't been keeping up with Oath so I don't know if anyone even plays GWS Oath any more.

[Harlequin]

Fish has become such a wide term, that its really hard to ask the question "what beats fish?"  The true answer is that Anything and everything can beat fish.   Fish can essentially gear itself to beat ANY deck in the format, but no ALL decks in the format.  As the fish player bolsters answers to deck/architype X, they loose ground with deck Y.  So essentially "Deck Y" is the answer to "what beats fish?"

It sounds like from your meta that the fish decks need to be geared to beat other fish decks.  So your probable up against Vial/Chalice/Jite rather than NullRod/Extract/Duress type of fish.  If thats the case then Control Slaver or any combo deck is a great choice.  If there is also a heavy CS or Combo meta surrounding the fish then that is probably the worst deck you could choose, because the fish decks will be packing Null Rods, extracts, and other nasty stuff.  If that is true, then Shop Agro is probably a solid bet.

The real question is: what are the fish decks in your area running, and what are they all trying to fish out of the meta.  Are they hateing on eachother? are they hateing on Combo? are they hateing on Artifacts?  then just play whatever they are weak against.  Sounds simple right?

[Meddling Mike]

I've seen people use Ancient Hydra to ruin fish back in the day. Doesn't really matter if they have STP/Other removal for it because he implodes on himself to avoid getting removed and then comes back thanks to Gaea's Blessing. He can also usually wipe out a team of fish single-handedly.

Just a thought, I'm a bit out of the loop on what current fish incarnations are like.

[Harlequin]

If your sticking to Oath:

Ancient Hydra is definately my baby.  I pioleted Oath to many a tournement top8 and I will NEVER play oath without a Hydra in the Board.  In addition to ruleing the fish match, he is a great auxilary win against Stax.  Stax will sometimes have a hate board against oath (because its a bad much up for them).  Hydra gives you answers to both Welder + Dupe (for he evades Dupe and takes the welder with him) AND Ensnareing bridge (by giving you a fireball every turn).  When stax throws in 2-3 Dupes, and 1-3 Bridges... Hydra is the reigning champ.

Run Tinker -> DSC.  This gives you an alternate win against fish if they can keep you off oath of druids (but don't have a STP in hand).

Also run repeal.  Its a great answer to chalice and Meddling mage... better than Rushing River IMO.

[forests failed you]

CS with SBed FTKs is probably the best choice.  FTK will destroy Fish's midgame, and then you can play with all your big spells in the late game.

why not just play Fire Imp?  He costs one less, still kiss all of their guys, and still trades with one of their dudes.

[zeus-online]

What is a fire imp? Can't find it on gatherer?

/Zeus

[twiggy]

What is a fire imp? Can't find it on gatherer?

/Zeus

Check here :
http://sales.starcitygames.com/carddisplay.php?product=15830

[zeus-online]

Ah i see! thx

Well it dosn't kill the grunt, its not much of a clock in itself, and i'd imagine that its far harder to get a fire imp then an FTK.

/Zeus

[Meddling Mike]

I dunno, seems like you'd be better off just running old man of the sea in slaver's board. Maybe not so great with the grunts running around these days, maybe seasinger would be better? You could steal grunts with seasinger, "neglect" to pay the upkeep cost for grunt then just focus on the little guys.

[Namingway]

Another good alternative could be Threads of Disloyalty. It doesn't have summoning sickness, and it doesn't die to Fire/Ice, StP and other cards the way Seasinger/Old Man does.

[Implacable]

Another good alternative could be Threads of Disloyalty. It doesn't have summoning sickness, and it doesn't die to Fire/Ice, StP and other cards the way Seasinger/Old Man does.

They're what I'm running sideboard in Gifts right now (just testing, but they're awfully good so far).  They work against just about everything, and Threadsing a Welder in the Stax matchup makes it hilariously easy to win.

[brianpk80]

Another good alternative could be Threads of Disloyalty. It doesn't have summoning sickness, and it doesn't die to Fire/Ice, StP and other cards the way Seasinger/Old Man does.

Threads can be effective.  A few things to watch out for are that sometimes, it really doesn't matter who controls the Meddling Mage or Kataki, War's Wage so long as its effect is still affecting the game state.  Also, if you steal an opponent's True Believer, while this may help you resolve Gifts Ungiven, you will not be able to Ancestral Recall yourself.  And if you steal a Dark Confidant, it's going to kill you a lot more quickly than it would kill a Fish player.  If you really want to get rid of Fish post-sideboard, you might want to borrow a rogue trick from Slaver and run The Abyss.  Fish won't be expecting it, it's devastating unless Oath of Ghouls is online, and most Fish decks won't have any reliable enchantment removal against Gifts post-sideboard.  Note that The Abyss kills Welders, Auriok Salvagers, Angels, and other Oath targets (except SSS) and has no affect on your own Colossus because it's an artifact creature.  If I were playing Gifts in today's Fish heavy metagame, I might even maindeck The Abyss.  Night of Soul's Betrayal is a similar option for Fish exclusively that has been used in at least one successful Gifts list, maindeck.  Good luck.

-BPK

[Purple Hat]

the abyss doesn't kill akroma either, she's prot black.

[scutakicker]

I'd just place a Slaver list that's meta'd well--maindeck Fire/Ice, Burning Wish for Rolling Earthquake etc. And then run your choice of Pentavus/Triskelion/Triskelavus maindeck. Hydra dies to Darkblast, can't be Tinkered or welded and can't beat down for too many turns (dies to blockers etc).

[brianpk80]

the abyss doesn't kill akroma either, she's prot black.

Good point.  It would only kill Razia, Tidepout Tyrant, Auriok Salvagers, and some other popular Oath of Druids targets, but not Akroma herself or Spirit of the Night.  Pardon my earlier overstatement,

-BPK

[King_minos]

I'm working on my creatures for CS. I'm having trouble deciding whether to have 2 Pentavus or A trike and a pentavus. I like the tech of making blockers and putting them back with pentavus, but the trike is working well too. What do you think would work best in a fish heavy meta

[brianpk80]

I'm working on my creatures for CS. I'm having trouble deciding whether to have 2 Pentavus or A trike and a pentavus. I like the tech of making blockers and putting them back with pentavus, but the trike is working well too. What do you think would work best in a fish heavy meta

Triskelion without a doubt.
Pentavus is a good defense and an ideal way to recur Mindslaver, but after you Slave Fish once or twice, you shouldn't need to do it anymore.  Make them Swords their guys and attack into your robot (Titan, Trike, etc.).  Welding a Triskelion over and over against Fish is a massacre.  A lot of Fish builds tie up your mana so getting that extra 1 to activate Pentavus or Triskelavus could be annoying. 

After being a Fish player for about a year, Triskelion is probably the card I hate most to see.  The Abyss is also good in the sideboard for emergencies if you're willing to sacrifice Welder advantage. 

-BPK

[Purple Hat]

Someone mentioned this card I'd never heard of over on the SCG boards.  I think it's called Lightning Dart

whatever it is here are the stats:

1R
instant
deal 1 damage to target creature
if that creature is white or blue deal 4 damage to it instead.

that kills everything in fish as well as goblin welder.  Might be worth looking into.

[Metman]

Someone mentioned this card I'd never heard of over on the SCG boards.  I think it's called Lightning Dart

whatever it is here are the stats:

1R
instant
deal 1 damage to target creature
if that creature is white or blue deal 4 damage to it instead.

that kills everything in fish as well as goblin welder.  Might be worth looking into.

That's a cool card, is it in the new set or has it been around a while.  The only problem I see with it is that it doesn't due what the other removal spells do.  Pyroclasm for the same cost kills the same amount of creatures or more.  Usually it's a two for one.  Massacre, Earthquake, and Fire//Ice are the same way.  This card is a 1 for 1 always, although its a very efficiant way of taking care of Grunt which the others don't do.

[zeus-online]

Urh what does this card do that smother dosn't do=

/Zeus

[brianpk80]

Urh what does this card do that smother dosn't do=

Kills Auriok Salvagers.

[zeus-online]

Damn you got me! Hmm but it dosn't kill stuff like phyrexian dreadnought...but then again, i don't see a whole lot of those anyways.

/Zeus