Round 1 - Main Topic

[Spielkind]

One issue i'm seeing is: We're talking more about denial for Fire, but if they run sancstall as much as they did last war, our nymphcord and darkdomin are useless unless we lock them down before sanc.

But nymphcord has sofo for sanc. Thats mx reason for nymphcord against fire.

[RulacMage11]

But nymphcord has sofo for sanc. Thats mx reason for nymphcord against fire.

Good point, but a single firebolt can destroy a fresh sofo, unless they bottom deck bolts. - This is even assuming fire would run a sancstall round 1 o.o

[ddevans96]

Sancstall is insanely good, but it's really expensive for them and also we're extremely good at stallbreaking, so I wouldn't expect to see it round one. Then again Vangelios is frankly not traditional and so I think it's a possibility. I'd be willing to tack on our own sanc stall as an option against them, but I think I'd prefer the other four possibilities Spiel brought up. Of them, I'm personally leaning Nymphcord or RT splash, but I'm not quite sure.

SoP Wardens against Death also sounds good. I don't know if I like it more or less than the control mono so I'll leave it open for further discussion.

Poison Dials against Time is an option. It doesn't at all work as a curveball, though, since Raving and I have discussed it in the past and it's well known I'm fond of it. I like Speed Poison better for that matchup, but I'm not sold on either.

I don't really think the AM flooding stall is a great option for Earth - its stallbreak is NT which can falter to EQ (in fact, stalls usually do anyways), or we can make the deck bigger, which doesn't work well because AM/flooding is better as a slimmer stall, or we can maybe use a Tinkerer variant but then we risk the deck not quite being as stable. I think I'd prefer the other stalls to any of those possibilities, but especially the air stall.

Life bringing stall against us doesn't seem terribly likely. I really think teams are going to shy away from them early against us because of how much stallbreak we have now that SoP is in the equation. Also I don't think our air domin immediately falls to a stall if we include NT or SoP in it. SoP Vamps seems like a good option against them as well, though.

[JonathanCrazyJ]

OK, if we fear EQ against earth, and we think Time will expect PDials, why don't we send grabbow against earth, and something else (probably speed poison then) against Time?

[Basman-1453]

Personally, if I'm to bring GrabBow to face Earth, I'd fear the possible RT that comes out of their RTBoids (but then again, I think I read up somewhere that it's a feast or famine deck, so~ ^^;)

Somehow, I'm inclined to put a creatureless stall against Time, provided that it's actually surprising for RR.

[RulacMage11]

The more I think about it, the more I see that we should use Nymphcord for fire match-up.

SoPa Wardens, and the control mono are both excellent for the Death matchup, but I'd prefer wardens as Death's rush potential is very high.

Grabbow isn't such a bad idea vs Earth either.

Life has very fragile creatures, but strong rush potential. Air Domin, or SoPa Vamps both sound great to me.

Pdials or Speed Poison are both solid options for Time, but as Dd said, it's already a given that we have them, and will use them. But I can't think of anything else that will counter time in such a way that these could. If time expects us to counter RT with Pdials or Speed poison, why don't we use a counter(or something strong :p) against that counter? Unless they Purify splash.

[ddevans96]

Condensing suggestions (using DJSERB for each of us). I tried to go with what I understood as 'I like this possible matchup' rather than 'I think this is the best matchup' in order to get as much input consolidated as possible. If you disagree with you having a vote/not having a vote on one of these, let me know.

Death: Poison duo (S), rush mono (S), control mono (DEJB), SoP Wardens (JRDB)
Life: Air domin (SD), speed poison (E), SoP Vamps (JRD)
Time: Speed poison (RSDB), grabbow (S), serpentine (SE), poison dials (JR), sanc stall (BJ)
Fire RT splash (SD), dark domin (S), nymphcord (SDR), SoP Wardens (S), Tempest (E), NT rush (E), sanc stall (J)
Earth: sanc stall (SDE), air stall (SDEB), AM/flooding (JR), grabbow (JRB), speed poison (B)

With this, I'd like to confirm Nymphcord against Fire and SoP Vamps against Life. For the other three, Speed Poison has a majority against Time but I think there's still some loose ends, Death seems to be between the control mono and SoP Wardens, and Earth is still pretty wide open for discussion.

Basman, if you could choose preferences for the other matchups besides Time, it would be a huge help.

[Basman-1453]

If there's one highest threat I'd fear the most from Earth, it'd be Earthquake. Personally, since this is Earth we're dealing with, I'd rather risk outrushed by Shriekers than risk denied by Earthquake-related problems. I'm inclined to run either Grabbow (yes, feel free to accuse me of hypocrisy ) or Speed Poison (but there's the Time Problem) on 'em if we're going to bring them the offensive. If we are going to pull the defensive, this n00b prefers 909 over SancStall, if only because we have more pillars to work with and because we, as Espi pointed out, didn't pack Enchant Artifacts.



As someone who likes to use Fractal Flesh Recluse to farm lower Arena, I'd say their rush potential is pretty high. Their CC can bring headaches, too, especially if there are a field of Bones waiting. But I don't think a Death-dominant deck can pull both competently in the same deck.
That being said, since I don't remember we're bringing Fractal, I guess I'm going with Patient Wardens if we think they'll rush or NT-reliant tricks if we think they'll plop their Bone Walls and wait for their CC to thicken the thang.


Here we are, the RR problem. True, I think poison is going to be powerful against their lack of in-element healing, provided they don't splash Purify (but then again, I don't think Time/Water has much things going for 'em) or something, and since our other Poison-heavy trick, AdrenaPuffers, is easily outta the question, if we are going to poison Time, then by all means, Speed Poison.
If we think Earth needs the poison more urgently than Time, though, I'd rather to stall (Flooding Antimatter is outta the question, though, since I don't think they'll hesitate to Rewind their own units that have turned into Antimatter).

[JonathanCrazyJ]

I think that thinking about our Soldier skills is important.

Grabbow Mercenary 40% in element vs earth feels really solid to me.

Speed poison Tinkerer vs time could work very nicely IF they don't predict it and go hardcounter with purify. Are there any other tinkerer style ideas that could work here as a curveball? Bas mentioned a stall, that might not be a bad idea, what abuout Water/Light stall with dials? negates RT pretty well, but it's always possible they'll go fractagons.

I still think SoP Wardens with purify vs Death. Very little they can do about it Imo. BUT if we didn't use SoP wardens here, we could use Shipwrecker vs time. (Pulvy needed for Eternity)

[ddevans96]

Alright, let's run Speed Poison vs Time and SoP Wardens for me vs Death, so we just have Earth to deal with.

I think Nymphcord needs the extra upgrades, so either Lieutenant or +2 upgrades there. SoP Vamps and Speed Poison don't need anything in particular, and actually I think Tinkerer hurts us there unless we specifically intend on running NT for death nymphs. I think we should use the Sideboard for one of them, to sub out Cloak/Steal/etc if they aren't useful against Life's deck, and maybe have options for NT and BW in the Speed Poison.

For Earth, let's narrow it down to the Air stall and a merc grabbow.

[Espithel]

I don't feel competant enough to use stalls I'm not too familiar with.

If you can quickly link the air stall to me, I'll see how easy it is for me to misplay.

[ddevans96]

I don't feel competant enough to use stalls I'm not too familiar with.

If you can quickly link the air stall to me, I'll see how easy it is for me to misplay.

Sent in chat. I'll talk you through basic strategy.

EDIT: You around?