[Free Article] Vintage Avant-Garde: Rebuilding Griselbrand Oath

[forests failed you]

In this article I discuss a redesigned Griselbrand Oath list:

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/vintage/24358_Vintage_AvantGarde_Rebuilding_Griselbrand_Oath.html

There were quite a few questions in the SCG thread, so I decided to start a discussion here.

[boggyb]

Great article! Thanks for writing and posting it.

I wonder what your thoughts are on Ritual Oath, now that you've spent some time tinkering around with this controlling build.

Also, only 2 Jace? Say it ain't so! I thought that was your favorite card ever printed

[evouga]

Thanks for the article.

As a Dragon Oath player, I have the same questions about this build as I did for Demon Oath: suppose you've assembled the combo, and cheated Gristlebrand into play. Are you sure you wouldn't be happier with a hasty Emrakul?

Certainly there are situations where the answer is "no": Dredge is poised to kill you from its graveyard unless you find an answer. You are running low on life and your opponent has enough permanents in play to kill you in a counterattack. You are playing one of the few shops builds that still runs Ensnaring Bridge. And so on.

But most of the time -- I'd say more than 80% of the time, even -- the answer is "yes": you're simply better off hitting them for 15+ and annihilating their board than you are drawing 7/14 cards and trying to combo off.

What are the reasons to prefer Gristlebrand Oath over Dragon Oath? Am I off base here? Are there other advantages to the Gristlebrand build, e.g. more resilience pre-combo, harder to hate, something like that? Right now I don't see it, but I'm interested in hearing the experience of anyone who's tried the deck.

[hitman]

Is Negate strictly better in this deck than Mana Leak?

[Daenyth]

GG oath suffers from the problem that you can whiff on your instant-kill card, whereas a whiff with grisel still leaves you with a ton of cards and a beatstick that's nigh-impossible to race even by itself.

[vaughnbros]

Is Negate strictly better in this deck than Mana Leak?

Spell Pierce and Leak both seem like odd choices as it seems most players would choose to run Drain and Flusterstorm over them.

What are the reasons to prefer Gristlebrand Oath over Dragon Oath? Am I off base here? Are there other advantages to the Gristlebrand build, e.g. more resilience pre-combo, harder to hate, something like that? Right now I don't see it, but I'm interested in hearing the experience of anyone who's tried the deck.

In the ritual versions you can easily hard cast a Griselbrand even when cage is out, oath can still tutor for creatures through a cage.  I haven't tried this version yet, but I'd imagine the 4 nature's claims, which also have synergy with Griselbrand, help make it easy to take out cage.

I personally would like to hear the reasoning for why to play this version over a storm version.

[hitman]

Spell Pierce and Leak both seem like odd choices as it seems most players would choose to run Drain and Flusterstorm over them.

The reason I ask is because usually seeing a creature on the other side of the board is actually a benefit.  For the same mana cost, you could be running a hard counter for any non-creature spell instead of Mana Leak.  I'm pretty sure Spell Pierce is there so it's harder for someone to goldfish him early.  In either case, both Spell Pierce and Flusterstorm helps him do that.  His mainboard indicates that he's worried about permanents as much as or more than instants and sorceries.  It makes sense to see Spell Pierce because it has a little more utility.  He can try to counter a Sphere of Resistance or Oath of Druids with it and it isn't dead against blue decks early on, either.

[forests failed you]

The primary reason for Spell Pierce over Flusterstorm is to counter Jace, the Mindsculpter.

The reason for Leak over Drain is that I have almost nothing to Drain into, I am significantly lighter on lands than a control deck, and off color moxes make up a significant amount of my mana production.

The trade off to playing Oath in a control shell, as opposed to a combo shell, is pretty obviously that one's deck is better at surviving until you find Oath and being able to live long enough to activate it, but less broken once you get to Oath. 

[Twaun007]

The reason for Leak over Drain is that I have almost nothing to Drain into, I am significantly lighter on lands than a control deck, and off color moxes make up a significant amount of my mana production.

Has Rune Snag ever been tested? Running it in a deck that blasts cards into the graveyard and draws seven after Oath-ing seems pretty synergistic. (If you were to run 4 and no Blessing of course)

Good article though, I find it interesting how the vintage community is in an arms race to figure out the optimum Griselbrand list.

[AmbivalentDuck]

Good article though, I find it interesting how the vintage community is in an arms race to figure out the optimum Griselbrand list.

When and if that deck presents itself as a major presence in the meta, it'll be interesting to see if sideboard copies of Bribery get played.  If  and passing the turn is worthwhile, what about  to have it now?

[vaughnbros]

Good article though, I find it interesting how the vintage community is in an arms race to figure out the optimum Griselbrand list.

When and if that deck presents itself as a major presence in the meta, it'll be interesting to see if sideboard copies of Bribery get played.  If   and passing the turn is worthwhile, what about   to have it now?

I would think that stealing a griselbrand from someones deck would be a very viable post sideboard strategy.  Assuming you know their list is only running Griselbrand I personally like Telemin Performance over Bribery this way you can use it as a win con against landstill too.

The trade off to playing Oath in a control shell, as opposed to a combo shell, is pretty obviously that one's deck is better at surviving until you find Oath and being able to live long enough to activate it, but less broken once you get to Oath. 

I wouldn't really say this is less broken after activation because this one is certainly more broken when low on life or against shops.  I'd pinpoint the difference that the other version can win without ever playing oath at all.

[bisamratte]

I would think that stealing a griselbrand from someones deck would be a very viable post sideboard strategy.  Assuming you know their list is only running Griselbrand I personally like Telemin Performance over Bribery this way you can use it as a win con against landstill too.

Don't forget that you can also board Birbery against other decks to steal their BSC. Besides that, I think both cards are too expensive. Why not simply stun Griselbrand with Pithing Needle? It's a solid card in various MUs (Dredge, MUD, Weldercontrol, Turbotezz, Landstill,...). The five turn clock should not be a problem for control decks.

[arj]

I finished second today at an event with 23 people. I played the list with few changes:

-2 griesel
-1 ancient grudge
-1 blessing
-2 mana leak

For

Tinker
Colossus
Emrakul
Mana crypt
2 thoughtseize

The deck was very strong all day. Thanks for a great list.

[boggyb]

arj, how'd the GG creatures fair over Griselbrand, you think?

[arj]

The creatures worked pretty well, having to give them the turn wasn't that big of a problem. I think low life would have been a bigger problem with griesel. Also crypt plus tinker was a very nice addition. They won me a match in the quarter against shops, where no other card except crypt from a vampiric tutor could have saved me.

[AmbivalentDuck]

where no other card except crypt from a vampiric tutor could have saved me.

Including Black Lotus?

[arj]

Yes, i needed a target for tinker that gave me 2 mana. Was quite unusual I know, but crypt was good all day. Plus it works better when you're not that dependent on your life total. Anyway I havn't tested the griesel build, so I'm not saying this build is better. Just wanted to share my experience with a very similar build. All credit goes to Brian for making oath viable again.

[vaughnbros]

Yes, i needed a target for tinker that gave me 2 mana. Was quite unusual I know, but crypt was good all day. Plus it works better when you're not that dependent on your life total. Anyway I havn't tested the griesel build, so I'm not saying this build is better. Just wanted to share my experience with a very similar build. All credit goes to Brian for making oath viable again.

Oath never really stopped being viable and there were top 8's with griselbrand oath before this article came out.  This build is just focused on beating shops and fish decks like oath decks were original designed to do.

[MaximumCDawg]

Yes, i needed a target for tinker that gave me 2 mana. Was quite unusual I know, but crypt was good all day. Plus it works better when you're not that dependent on your life total. Anyway I havn't tested the griesel build, so I'm not saying this build is better. Just wanted to share my experience with a very similar build. All credit goes to Brian for making oath viable again.

Sounds like you did not miss Dragon's Breath either, huh?

[arj]

Yes, i needed a target for tinker that gave me 2 mana. Was quite unusual I know, but crypt was good all day. Plus it works better when you're not that dependent on your life total. Anyway I havn't tested the griesel build, so I'm not saying this build is better. Just wanted to share my experience with a very similar build. All credit goes to Brian for making oath viable again.

Sounds like you did not miss Dragon's Breath either, huh?

I don't think it's that essential. The list is very tight. I mean it doesn't even run sol ring

[hvndr3d y34r h3x]

I've been testing this list and it just seems like it can't beat blue based control. It takes a lot of aggressive use of shatter effects to turn on the mana leaks and pieces which doesn't seem good. On top of that, I very rarely found myself with a mana leak and not able to pay the UU required for drain. Also, I rarely found myself with mana leak up and my opponent trying to cast a spell without having 3 extra mana. The pierces did pop a few jaces but the number just didn't seem worth it compared to "I wish I could fluster storm this recall, tinker, or yawg's will.

I feel like there should be a scroll rack in here with the amount of fetches going on, and that some of the main deck shatter should be moved to the board, but I don't have any hard numbers on that. I also liked the bolts.
Gristle was completely better than any other oath dude at many many points. His lifelink won me lots of other wise lost games, and the ability to find a fow when needed was key.
I like time vault key right now, but I often found I could win games without it if I was sitting there with a combo piece and a tutor in my hand. Often the wins would be more secure if it was any type of counter spell. Mostly, they just made for junk draws if i didn't already have something good going.

I personally wouldn't take this to an event without changing it up a bit, but I do feel the need to repeat that the bolts were particularly innovative/good and I'd play them again.

[Eye_of_the_Beholder]

I played a Griselbrand Oath version at a small side-event last weekend to a top 4 split.

My maindeck had the following changes to your proposed list:

- 2 Mana Leak
- 2 Spell Pierce
- 1 Ancient Grudge
- 1 Ponder
- 1 Verdant Catacombs

+ 2 Mana Drain
+ 2 Flusterstorm
+ 1 Hurkyl’s Recall
+ 1 Jace, The Mind Sculptor
+ 1 Underground Sea

The sideboard was similar to yours:
- 2 Nihil Spellbomb
- 1 Doom Blade

+ 2 Tormod’s Crypt
+ 1 Dismember

Only 16 players. We will play 5 rounds with a cut to top 4.

Round 1 vs Oath Mirror (with Emrakul, Blightsteel, no Dragon’s Breath)
Game 1 is a quick win for me thanks to orchard advantage.
Game 2 I mull to 5 and keep a one-lander with KeyVault but I never draw a second land before his Oath goes active.
Game 3 I lose the orchard-war. But my active Jace trumps his active Oath without the Dragon’s Breath. I bounce his Blightsteel and Emrakul.  And Jace finds me the VaultKey.

Round 2 vs Sun Titan Dredge
Game 1 he mulligans to 1 without finding a Bazaar. A turn 2 Jace insures he never does.
Game 2 he has a Bazaar and some slow dredges. I spellbomb away his graveyard which buys me some time to find an Oath. Next turn he dredges for a lot and ends the turn with a Titan some 10+ Zombies. I oath up the Demon and draw 14 cards finding the Merchant Scroll for Ancestral Recall for his last 3 cards.

Round 3 vs UR Delver
Game 1 he controls my mana with wastelands but he has not a lot of pressure. A delver gets bolted and all he has for an offense are 2 Grim Lavamancers. Over the course of a few turns I give him 4 spirits while digging for an Oath with counter backup against his full grip. I can drop the Oath which enters the battlefield uncontested. He was holding a lone flusterstorm as countermagic. Griselbrand shows up and wins the game.
Game 2 he has a pair of grafdigger cages to shut down my potential oaths. I claim one and try to Yawgmoth’s Will which offcourse resolves and then does obviously nothing.  We fight over my Ancestral Recall with double mental misstep and red elemental blasts. His Force wins out. With our hands spent we go draw go for a few turns in which I draw a Lotus to hardcast Griselbrand.

Round 4 vs Oath Mirror (w Griselbrand)
Game 1 he goes Forest, Lotus Petal, Oath of Druids. I look at my hand with an orchard and let it resolve. He doesn’t draw an orchard and doesn’t preordain into one so the Demon chooses my side.
Game 2 We both start with land, artifact mana, voltaic key. I have a hand with double Nature’s Claim, double bolt and draw into mental misstep and vampiric tutor. I claim an Oath and a bolt and claim get thoughtseized. I can end of turn force through the tutor and assemble VaultKey the turn before he would get a Demonic Tutor.

Round 5 vs Oath Mirror (w Rune-Scarred Demons)
We ID for the top 4. I end up on top of the swiss. So the top 4 will be Tezzeret, RUG Delver and 2 Oath.

Semi-Finals vs Round 5 Opponent
We all agree to split and play out the semis for fun.
Game 1 He starts with 2 orchards vs 3 for me, Jace finds an Oath and wins the game.
Game 2 He drops an early Time Vault, I have an orchard and an Oath and pass the turn. He tries to Time Walk but it gets blasted. I hold a Misstep and a Nature’s Claim. His last three cards in hand don’t have a way to find and force through the Key and on my turn Griselbrand finds an easy win.

Final vs Tezzeret
Unfortunately we didn’t play out the final.

The deck played out quite smoothly. I did have to mulligan a lot of hands due to not having enough mana in my starting seven. I am going to try to work in a 23rd mana source. A lot of Oath mirrors, so maybe time to change 1 Dredge hate-card to some Mirror Tech.
Having played a lot of Oath variants through the years I feel that Griselbrand is one of the most powerful options an Oath player has. I think you want a Griselbrand over Emrakul/Blightsteel. Especially if you don’t play the Dragon’s Breath in that version. Griselbrand is certainly more powerful than Iona now, because it’s a lot better against the MUD matchup.

[Daenyth]

Nice report! Wow, in a meta like that I'd be playing something with 4 maindeck cages...

[Vennie]

Somebody did and ended up going 2-3-0.

Also i was the one playing against u in the T4 oath mirror. In the seccond game i had the key on top of the deck when u won so any form of carddraw would have won me the game at that point.