Testing 1, 2, 3: February Edition #2

Posted on February 12, 2010 by Jeph Foster

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  1. Hmm, just curious, but do you know why the Valakut video is 3 times larger than the other two?

    Haven’t watched them yet but I enjoy this series a lot in all forms.

  2. *Kor Armory*
    Outfitter -> Master seems like a nature as they are both mediocre without equipment but Master is just nuts in this deck.

    What level does Vampires have to drop to before lightcaster stops making the cut for you? I’ve already swapped mine into the side.

    Game 1 – Rogue surprise! You had to smell the harrow coming though, right? You were so far ahead that I’m surprised you didn’t lead with the hookmaster. I know you wanted to keep elements mana up, but the only way he was going to win was off of Ob and tapping him down for two turns should have been GG.

    Game 2 sideboarding – Most of his vamps don’t block anyway, so leaving out blazing torch was the right call.

    Game 3 – Topdeck!

    *Valakut*

    Any thoughts on Worldwake changes? Do you see Explore as having a place at the table? I like the Dragon a lot with the decrease in Vamps, nice call. The I like the 4th Lavaball over one of the shamblers in the SB.

    Vs. Mirror

    Sideboarding – Seems like you want to count on gladehearts comings in and find some room in game 2 for punishing fire. I still am not sure how good they are in the mirror though.

    Game 2 – Ouch – now that the trap tech is out of the bag the mirror becomes a much more delicate dance. Gotta play around that whenever possible.

    Vs. Vampires

    Sideboarding – Not sure I agree with your assessment of fire > burst in this matchup. Burst can kill all of his creatures without lifegain help, and without needing to be drawn in multiples. Could you expand on why you prefer the fire? I like your second plan of more removal much better.

  3. Hmm, doesn’t valakut get significantly worse post worldwake. I’m sure with all the man lands people will likely be running that many players will add in tectonic edge. Perhaps if they are only running edge and no one runs spreading seas (also turns off man lands).

  4. *UW Sphinxes*

    Sideboarding + Game 2 – I would rather see the journey’s in place of the two pierces you left in. Sometimes they catch early equipment, but usually they are just dead. You misplayed by not dropping the refuge at the first opportunity.

    Game 3 – On turn 4 I think you want to play crossroads and sanctifiers and then dig for the judgment with spinx on turn 5. Guy overextends and then concedes, so it doesn’t matter, but I think that is the safer play.

  5. The beauty of this type of Valakut build is that it isn’t nearly as all in on the Valukt “combo”, so more LD shouldn’t make it that much worse. I haven’t really carefully looked at how WWK is going to change the block meta though.

  6. I kind of wish you played 2 mans for your video matches. Should increase the quality, in your UW match your opponent just quit for no reason. I don’t know what he had but you were not exactly in great shape. I’m highly suspicious of your side boarding strategy vs. that armory deck. Seems like there are a few ways to go.
    We know kor sanctifiers and pitfall trap are going to be good but what do you take out?

    1-take out spreading seas- (not very exciting in this matchup but you don’t run a lot of land in this build so they may need to always stay in)
    2-take out spell pierce- I’m not convinced this is a viable card vs. armory. You’ll have a hard time countering brave the elements. It is not a reliable card at all and on the draw you eliminate the possibility of countering a t1 equipment. If you don’t have it in your opening hand I can’t imagine it countering a spell more then a fraction of the time, assuming they aren’t running pledge.
    3-Take out luminarch- Seems pretty obvious we don’t want these. so we need 4 more slots for your 7 sb cards.
    4-Take out slower cards- An opening hand with 3 sphinxes is pretty scary so I think it is reasonable to cut 1-2. Rite of replication is good vs vampires because you have nighthawk, bloodwitch and most importantly lightcaster as good targets. Vs. armory your best target is likely emeria angel but otherwise it seems a little to clunky.

  7. In game 1 with Kor Armory you could have played the Master and equipped him with the Gear to get 2 extra dmg from Skyfisher. Was there a particular reason like saving that 1 mana for the next turn or something else?

  9. Game two I saw two play mistakes when you were playing with UW Control. In game 2, you waited a turn to play Kor Sanctifiers and blow of up 1 of his two adventuring gear. Even if he draws explorer’s scope, he still doesn’t have a creature on board yet and he’s stuck on a single land and you have into the roil. Why did you wait a turn? Then on a subsequent turn you drew Serije Refuge and played a plains instead, and you tapped you blue not leaving up spell pierce and you played a plains so you didn’t have UU until two turns after.

  10. Game 1 of valakut. I think maybe you just hadn’t realized how big your geopede was going to be the next turn. If you had, would you suggest that not cracking your fetchland in order to give geopede protection from burst lightning might be the better play that turn you play the map?

  11. you had a 2nd rite gm1 vs armory why not use it to start eating his board instead u concede although the island pierce pierce draw would have made that a moot point

  12. Thanks everyone for all the replies. Next week, I will be moving to 2-man Queues and Daily Events, since the deck quality is a bit better.

    Anonymous, I have noticed that, when playing U/W, equipments can become a huge problem, so I like to deal with equipments whenever possible. My opponent was having issues, and I felt the pace was slow enough to play draw-go until I could get rid of it. With U/W control, I feel there is no real need to drop threats, unless your opponent gives you a reason to. I like to play the deck in a pretty reactionary fashion.

    While I may be okay playing with Combo and Control decks, I don’t laud myself as the best player around, and I typically do better with Aggro. This column is as much to help me become a better player as it is to help you guys become better. I feel that strategies only form well when many minds are involved. RoninX, thanks for your extensive feedback, and I may try your sideboard strategies next week. Extensive preparation for the MOCS had spread my attention a bit thin (having to juggle four decks at one time), but I will be focusing on Zendikar Block Constructed heavily for this final week of Testing: One, Two, Three this month.