Of all the post-Conflux deck ideas I’d been kicking around, the tweaked B/G Elves deck seemed like the strongest right out of the box. While the other deck ideas were certainly more interesting and different from what’s currently doing well in the metagame, they also obviously needed lots of playtest time to see what truly worked and what just seemed good on paper. I had a Standard FNM to play coming up quick, and so I decided to give B/G Elves a whirl. Its baseline has been proven good enough to win, but I also worked in enough Conflux to be able to judge whether the new cards were as good as I hoped. This is what I brought to the tournament, pretty much the same as what I posted last week, with a few sideboard changes:
The Fugees
4 Scattershot Archer
3 Thoughtseize
2 Scepter of Fugue
4 Wren’s Run Vanquisher
4 Nameless Inversion
4 Imperious Perfect
3 Nyxathid
3 Eyeblight’s Ending
4 Wilt-Leaf Liege
2 Liliana Vess
3 Profane Command
3 Treetop Village
4 Mutavault
4 Gilt-Leaf Palace
4 Llanowar Wastes
2 Twilight Mire
2 Swamp
5 Forest
Sideboard
4 Filigree Fracture
2 Mind Shatter
1 Thoughtseize
3 Faerie Macabre
1 Nyxathid
2 Cloudthresher
2 Mycoloth
My operating theory was that a moderate hand destruction package of Thoughtseize, Scepter of Fugue, and Liliana Vess complements the already good aggression of the Elf package, and plays perfect counterpoint to Nyxathid: if they hold back cards to keep Nyxathid smaller, then your hand destruction stays relevant throughout the game; if they play out into topdeck mode, then Nyxathid is a stone cold beating stick they have to hope to top deck into an answer for. And of course worrying about wiggling out of that rock and hard place gives me more opportunity to let Profane Command just come out of nowhere and win.
Scattershot Archers maindeck seemed perfectly fine in this deck, since it’s an Elf with occasional benefits. Trumping Bitterblossom, Spectral Procession, and Birds of Paradise seems like a good gamble to bet on in the main.
The sideboard is admittedly a mess, with the Faerie Macabres holding down spots for what should have been three Necrogenesis – how do I of all people keep forgetting about a Black and Green Saproling-generating enchantment? [insert facepalm here]
The Mycoloths/Nyxathid were here for additional fat, replacing what had originally been some additional removal (Terror). I somehow convinced myself that I had plenty of removal in the maindeck already (Inversions, Eyeblights, Profane) along with pre-removal in Thoughtseize and Scepters.
Okay, so here’s a quick recap of how the FNM went; we had 16 players, 4 rounds of Swiss with a cut to the Top 4.
Round 1 versus Anthony with Esper Affinity
Anthony was playing an unsleeved homebrew looking to take advantage of the various artifact synergies the Esper shard employs in Shards and Conflux. Turn 1 I Thoughtseize and see what’s up, snagging Tezzeret and playing a Vanquisher the next turn that goes all the way, with my instant speed removal making sure he can get no block-and-trades. The second game my Filigree Fractures come in and just have a field day, as they are custom made to punish Esper Affinity even though I had them in the board for Bitterblossom.
Win 2-0, Record 1-0
Round 2 versus Harrison with Jund Ramp
Another turn 1 Thoughtseize yields gold, taking his early play and leaving him a bunch of expensive stuff while I get my Elf beats going. He tries to stabilize with a Broodmate Dragon, but a ping from Scattershot plus a Nameless Inversion takes down one Dragon while Eyeblight’s Ending takes down the other. Game 2 I have the rather ridiculous start of turn 1 Scattershot, turn 2 Vanquisher, turn 3 Perfect, turn 4 Perfect, turn 5 Perfect. Harrison ramps up into double Chameleon Colossus that end up having to block and kill 4/4 Elf Warrior tokens.
Win 2-0, Record 2-0
Round 3 versus Chris with Naya Bloom
Turn 1 Thoughtseize shows Bloom Tender, Finks, Thoctar and lands. With no creature removal in hand, I take out the Tender in hopes to slow him down. My quick aggression comes to a halt once Finks and Thoctars start hitting the board. Eventually he out-muscles me. Game 2 I get another Thoughtseize start, see a Naya Charm, two Bloom Tenders and a Thoctar. I take the Thoctar in hopes of slowing him down and forcing the Time Walk while he Charms back the Thoctar. I get the dream aggression of Vanquisher, Perfect, and Wilt-Leaf and finish the game before he finds his fat creatures. Game 3 is his revenge, no Thoughtseize this time, he starts with turn 2 Tender, turn 3 Thoctar, turn 4 Realm Razer. I take some bone-crushing blows while top decking some lands, manage to kill his Razer but he plays another one. I don’t draw another land before he buries me in fat creatures. This is the game I really wish I’d kept my Terrors in the board…
Lose 1-2, Record 2-1
Round 4 versus Allen with B/W Tokens
We go to three games, and they mostly play out the same, with me getting early pressure, and then him stabilizing with tokens and Cloudgoat Ranger and threatening to go large with Glorious Anthem until eventually one of us manages to push the advantage. I get extremely lucky in the first game when I bluff a removal spell that keeps him from sending both his Cloudgoat Rangers over my army for lethal damage, and am able to make a dude on his end step and then going all out attack for exactly lethal. If he’d called the bluff he might have swept me, since he won the second game.
Win 2-1, Record 3-1
Semifinals versus Jessica with Aggro Tokens
More tokens! Between Jessica and Allen I’m convinced I need to find some room in my sideboard for Infests. While I have a good amount of creatures that could die to Infest, I also have larger creatures that don’t, and if I have two Perfects in play nobody dies. Game 1 I get an extremely aggressive draw, managing to take her down in five attacks even with a Kitchen Finks thrown out to stem the bleeding. Game 2 is a struggle; she comes out relatively strong with Tukatongue Thallids and Sprouting Thrinaxs and keeps me on the defensive for a long while before finally pushing things through. I make a huge mistake here thinking I could win with a Profane Command giving my Nyxathid fear and draining life from her, forgetting that Thrinax is black and can block fear (and in fact would love to block and die to make a bunch of tokens). Game 3 turns into an epic stall out, with me making Elf Warrior tokens with Imperious Perfect and her making lots and lots of tokens as her deck does. Luckily for me I had an early Scattershot that neutralized the threat of Bitterblossom, though perhaps I should have held the Scattershot until the turn after she cast in it order to turn the enchantment into a huge liability. Scepter of Fugue was invaluable here, forcing her to play off the top of her deck while I always had options in hand, and eventually I had Liliana Vess fetch up all of the Lieges to rush in with an army of giant Elves.
Win 2-1, Record 4-1
Finals versus Allen with B/W Tokens
Here we go again! The first two games were brawls, with me getting the advantage the first game and he finally getting the advantage in the second. The third he has to double mulligan and ends up with a slow hand, and I manage to get aggressive with multiple Perfects. Elves win!
Win 2-1, Record 5-1
It’s been a little while since I had a Standard FNM victory, so that certainly felt good! The Elf deck felt very strong and yet also unpolished, so I’m figuring with some tweaking it might be just the thing to run at the StarCityGames.com $5000 Standard Open in a couple of weekends. Speaking of which, I have some news for the Elder Dragon Highlander fans out there — StarCityGames.com is willing to run some 4-man EDH games as side events for the $5K and Sunday’s PTQ! Just come up and ask to sign-up, they’ll make an announcement and determine prizes, and as soon as three others sign up you can throw down some EDH. Even if you plan on taking down the $5K or PTQ, I’d bring an EDH deck or two with me as a solid Plan B if things go awry…
So, back to the Elf deck. My takeaways are as follows:
Thoughtseize, Scepter of Fugue, and Nyxathid are a great combination for Elves! Putting pressure on their hand and pressure on their removal with a large Black threat simultaneously is a great supplement to the Elf tribal synergies. I was less impressed with Liliana Vess, who comes down too late in the game to really feel like she contributed much.
Filigree Fracture is amazing! This card was just golden, cantripping off Bitterblossom, Tidehollow Sculler, Gravepact, and even “cycled” off my own Scepter when I was digging for an answer (and found it). I was also more than happy to go one-for-one with Glorious Anthem.
Scattershot Archer is just fine in the main, thank you very much! Looking at the other decks in the Top 4, two of them ran Bitterblossom, one ran Spectral Procession, and another ran Birds of Paradise. Also, with Perfect and Liege boost, that extra point of toughness came in handy.
Okay, so Elves has some strong Conflux goodies to play with. Now my task is to strengthen the maindeck and sideboard. Ideally, I’d get together with my playtest buddies and we’d start running dozens and dozens of games against a gauntlet of Tier 1 decks. Sadly, I don’t live in an ideal world, so I decided to analyze some of the recent successful builds of pre-Conflux Elves. I picked from Top 8 decks from recent events: Chesire County Champs, Wintermercadiade, Pre-Gold Rush Tournament, “Top Standard Decks” from Worlds (decks by Eduardo Sajgalik, Jimmy Sam, Petrykin Alexey, Albert Bayrante, Edwin Ebon, Brian Davis, Tobias Dreger, Ryan Fuller). I realize some of these tournaments were small, but I wanted a cross-section sample between small, medium and big tournaments (like Worlds). I also tossed in recent B/G Elves decks from Premium writers Gerry Thompson and Adrian Sullivan. What are the common elements of these decks?
100% aggreement: 4 Llanowar Elves, 2-4 Civic Wayfinder.
Llanowar offers acceleration, the Wayfinders offers fixing and a guaranteed fourth mana. With Chameleon Colossus, Garruk, and Profane you can certainly see the appeal.
Strong aggreement (70-90%): 4 Wren’s Run Vanquisher, 3-4 Profane Command, 2-4 Chameleon Colossus, 1-4 Eyeblight’s Ending, 2-4 Garruk Wildspeaker, 4 Thoughtseize.
Vanquisher is no doubt a lynchpin card, and Thoughtseize proves its worth again and again. Profane Command is a fantastic finisher, Garruk is an all-star, and Eyeblight’s Ending is just fantastic removal. The Colossus is situationally awesome, though I suspect in a post-Path to Exile environment his value somewhat plummets (and anyone who’s played the deck has to acknowledge the occasional awkwardness of not being able to give your Colossus fear with Profane).
Borderline aggreement (40-60%): 2-4 Nameless Inversion, 4 Imperious Perfect, 4 Wolf-Skull Shaman, 3-4 Kitchen Finks, 3-4 Cloudthresher.
All of these are quality cards, but you can certainly see not all of them immediately jump out as “must-plays.” I know the conventional wisdom is against Imperious Perfect right now, since the new sweeper of choice, Volcanic Fallout, nails him. I paid particular attention to this in my match against Jund Ramp, and I found that typically in the course of playing Fallout was only going to get 1-2 cards in the early game since Vanquisher is too big, and if you dropped another Perfect or a Liege then suddenly none of your team dies to the Fallout.
After all these considerations, this is how the deck currently stands:
Creatures (19)
Planeswalkers (2)
Lands (24)
Spells (15)
Sideboard
“Personally, I don’t think Elves is positioned well enough to make a full comeback, but it has some interesting features.”
Patrick Chapin, Standard Decks Built in a Post-Conflux World
If you read Patrick’s recent article, he obviously wasn’t very high on Elves but he did have an interesting take on a Green-based mid-range deck. On a whim, I decided to take some of his ideas there and meld them into the Elf deck:
Creatures (22)
- 4 Doran, the Siege Tower
- 4 Wren's Run Vanquisher
- 4 Wilt-Leaf Liege
- 2 Ranger of Eos
- 4 Noble Hierarch
- 4 Scattershot Archer
Lands (24)
Spells (14)
Are 18 elves enough to run Vanquisher? Obviously she’s one of the best two-drops in the game, but she’s not so great as a five-drop. Maybe I should drop the Rangers for two Civic Wayfinders? I do like the idea of fetching up two Hierarchs to go nuts with Exalted. While I miss the Perfects, it’s hard to argue with Doran, especially when he makes your Scattershots attack for two. How about turn 1 Hierarch, turn 2 Doran, turn 3 Liege, attack with Doran for eight? Eight!
Patrick also reminded me how much I loved Tower Above when I played the mono-Green Elf deck in block. His deck and this deck certainly look like a lot of fun.
Bonus Esper Deck!
For those who are thinking Elves is a bit too conventional, I’ve recently stumbled across a strange deck that has a lot of potential if I had more time to devote to its development. It came about when I started kicking around the idea of running Master Transmuter with Thousand-Year Elixir:
Creatures (24)
- 2 Grim Poppet
- 2 Scarecrone
- 4 Etherium Sculptor
- 2 Sharuum the Hegemon
- 4 Tidehollow Strix
- 4 Esperzoa
- 3 Ethersworn Adjudicator
- 3 Master Transmuter
Lands (24)
Spells (11)
I’ve been trying a lot of things, popping in and out… I suspect I want some Mind Stones in here but haven’t figured out what to cut ouf of this configuration… the Elixir has been as good as I’d hoped, giving the Transmuter a real shot at doing crazy things, and of course there’s the Transmute for Adjudicator and then immediately be able to Mortify something. The Obelisk has been surprisingly good, and I may actually cut the Warhammers for another Obelisk. Transmuting it in is the hotness! You typically can gain 5 life, give something -2/-2, or Loot with your colors, though if you got Vivid/Pool going you turn on all five color options for the Obelisk. Even if you don’t transmute it, paying five mana for it through the Sculptor isn’t bad either.
The Sigil is amazing in this deck… between feeding Esperzoa and Transmuter, either for zero mana or with a little boost to a creature along the way, or even dropping it on turn 3 and equipping your Sculptor +3/+3 to hold the fort (or go on attack), it feels like the lynchpin to the deck.
The Strix may seem like a random card, but I think the early Deathtouch is handy for defense, and a two-drop 2/1 flier isn’t too shabby to start swinging through the air, maybe with some Sigil boost.
I started with a more “aggro” version of this deck (with Court Homunculus), but it kept feeling like it wasn’t nearly as aggro as other options in Standard so I kept drifting more towards the crazy artifact synergy you can pull off with some of the “tricky” stuff, and you can still get some serious beats going with Esperzoa/Sigil. I think this list is something like 4-8 cards away from being a contender.
Finally, a special shout-out to The Problem With MODO, by Adrian Sullivan. As someone who finds the social elements of the Magic Community so important, it was particularly heartening to read this from one of the game’s deep thinkers, especially since I know his audience is a wide one.
That wraps things up for this week; join me next week when I talk about what decks I’ve decided to run for the StarCityGames.com $5000 Standard Open and the Richmond PTQ being held the very next day. Have a great Valentine’s Day weekend!
Bennie
starcitygeezer AT gmail DOT com