Budget deck for sanctioned.

[msg67183]

@ Lance: What would be played in place of the Power in Merfolk?

[oshkoshhaitsyosh]

The fewer moxen you run the worse your Workshop matchup will be?
Landstill runs 1-2 and does well against Workshops, ask Josh I'm sure he will agree.
RG Beats CAN run 0 moxen and be good against Workshops, Spirit Guides are a thing.
So no I don't agree with your argument.

landstill also runs 3-4 engineered Explosives which negate chalice and all the spheres workshops can play. Between this and the counter suite, landstill doesn't need a lot of artifact mana...

[AmbivalentDuck]

Landstill may not lean on Lotus as hard as Doomsday does, but the loss of the ability to drop a turn 1 Jace isn't insignificant. It seems like some/many recent builds use Moxen to drop Stoneforge Mystic on turn 1. Also, Kataki is showing up in many of them.

This is an example of a UW Standstill build with 4 Moxen.

[vaughnbros]

Landstill may not lean on Lotus as hard as Doomsday does, but the loss of the ability to drop a turn 1 Jace isn't insignificant. It seems like some/many recent builds use Moxen to drop Stoneforge Mystic on turn 1. Also, Kataki is showing up in many of them.

This is an example of a UW Standstill build with 4 Moxen.

The chance to have opening hand lotus and Jace is somewhere in the neighborhood of 4%.  Statistically this is an insignificant occurance.  We are also talking about good landstill, which is URx not UW with off color moxen.  Landstill is the deck other than maybe dredge that can actually benefit from not running artifact mana.  The lands that replace them don't blow up from explosives and can be played while standstill is in effect.

@ Lance: What would be played in place of the Power in Merfolk?

It has 4 pieces of power... 2 Blue cards and 2 islands.

[Samoht]

Landstill may not lean on Lotus as hard as Doomsday does, but the loss of the ability to drop a turn 1 Jace isn't insignificant. It seems like some/many recent builds use Moxen to drop Stoneforge Mystic on turn 1. Also, Kataki is showing up in many of them.

This is an example of a UW Standstill build with 4 Moxen.

The chance to have opening hand lotus and Jace is somewhere in the neighborhood of 4%.  Statistically this is an insignificant occurance.  We are also talking about good landstill, which is URx not UW with off color moxen.  Landstill is the deck other than maybe dredge that can actually benefit from not running artifact mana.  The lands that replace them don't blow up from explosives and can be played while standstill is in effect.

@ Lance: What would be played in place of the Power in Merfolk?

It has 4 pieces of power... 2 Blue cards and 2 islands.

4%? Ask Justin Kohler about that...

[AmbivalentDuck]

We are also talking about good landstill, which is URx not UW with off color moxen.

Unless you want to argue an enormous play bias, half of the recent placings are UW landstill. Hard to argue that one is the "better" version from the data we have.

[ModflyDesign]

Just for argument's sake, the meta game that will be making up roughly half of Vintage Champs this year hasn't shown a U/W Landstill list winning an event in it as far back as I can remember.  U/R/x on the other hand is a force in the meta. 

And for the actual topic of this thread:

A G/W Hate Bears list can be made without Lotus with no problems.  You can replace it with a number of utility lands and not worry about rolling out those Stony Silences with a deck that doesn't want to be stuck with cards in hand.  It can be very well tuned for the meta that you expect and I have played it both ways and you don't need the lotus.  Oh and a monkey can pilot it! 

[AmbivalentDuck]

winning an event

Is completely irrelevant. It's the outcome of a single match. In a world where matchups are generally within a 50/50 to 60/40 spread, the information contained in a single match's outcome borders on nil. We use top8 placings because we have no better evidenced surrogate for match win% against the field.

This particular discussion is strange since we have no data whatsoever to substantiate the question of which non-dredge build has the best match win% against a powered field when built on a budget. All we know is that dredge is competitive at ~$1k. We can further discuss how Landstill and Doomsday care less about their Moxen than other builds.

There are also strange suggestions regarding hatebear builds. They're bears. You'd rather drop them turn 1 than turn 2. Turn 1 Thalia is better than turn 2 Thalia. End of that discussion.

[ModflyDesign]

You are correct.  However, in order to find U/W Landstill's match % in a top 8, it has to be there right? That was my point.  Sorry for not explaining it properly.  Just stating that it seems to almost always be the U/R or U/R/x that is out performing the U/W.

Edit: Also why would you play a deck that is "known" that you have never seen win an event?  Seems like setting yourself up for some fail.  Or nut hands all day.  I see no middle ground.

There are plenty of ways to turn 1 a Thalia without a Black Lotus.  Lotus Petal, Moxen, Spirit Guides, they all exist.  Now it can be end of discussion.

[msg67183]

Good points Brandon. GW is pretty strong I remember you playing that deck, "Cat Jesus Beatdown" very nice.

[AmbivalentDuck]

Edit: Also why would you play a deck that is "known" that you have never seen win an event?  Seems like setting yourself up for some fail.  Or nut hands all day.  I see no middle ground.

Because the number of tournaments to win is so low? Let's say that deck X has a 51% shot against the field. That's pretty good. Given that it top8s every time, but only one person plays it, how many tourneys do you expect to have to attend before you win one? 7.5

[vaughnbros]

Edit: Also why would you play a deck that is "known" that you have never seen win an event?  Seems like setting yourself up for some fail.  Or nut hands all day.  I see no middle ground.

Because the number of tournaments to win is so low? Let's say that deck X has a 51% shot against the field. That's pretty good. Given that it top8s every time, but only one person plays it, how many tourneys do you expect to have to attend before you win one? 7.5

If your recorded data shows your is deck going 51% you... sir are probably playing the wrong deck.  If you do a confidence interval for the true match win % there will be a pretty significant chance that you are playing a deck that is actually a dog accross the field.

winning an event

Is completely irrelevant. It's the outcome of a single match. In a world where matchups are generally within a 50/50 to 60/40 spread, the information contained in a single match's outcome borders on nil. We use top8 placings because we have no better evidenced surrogate for match win% against the field.

Your example illutstrates this well.  If a deck consistantly wins then it likely has a much higher than 50% win percentage.

[AmbivalentDuck]

Your example illutstrates this well.  If a deck consistantly wins then it likely has a much higher than 50% win percentage.

As you mention, the spread on match win% from 3-5 tournies worth of data is actually pretty huge.

As to the second point: "Kai Budde doesn't lose on Sundays."