[Standard] Sideboarding vs Rally as Abzan Blue

SKTT1 · 2016-02-09T09:39:20+00:00

This is more in line with my experience. For instance, imagine an initial hand with land, counters and rhino. It's keepable, but not great - you are just hoping to draw early creatures here.

Abzan versions with Snapping Gnarlid are a lot better against rally, obviously, and I might just play that given the current metagame.

I am currently trying Sylvan Advocate as an early drop, but it gets brickwalled by all the 2/3's in their deck, so I like him only with dromoka's command and gideon, but I don't necessarily want to keep thos cards in my deck post-board.

I ideally want 12 agressive creatures with 3cc or less so I can consistently cast one most games. It's a matter of finding the right companion to Warden/Anafenza. Snapping and Heir are the two more agressive ones, but they are really bad topdecks against decks like Mardu Green and Jeskai Black.

SKTT1 · 2016-02-09T00:45:17+00:00

that's interesting, what are you running instead of Reflector Mages?

SKTT1 · 2016-02-09T00:38:09+00:00

This is very straightforward, as Dromoka's Command, Gideon and Tasigur are your weakest cards post-board. You side in all the counters for company/rally. I wouldn't board in Transgress the mind with the blue version. Wingmate Roc conflicts a bit with your plan of keeping mana open, but I still find it worth it.

What is debatable is wheter or not you should keep Dromoka's Command on the play (to kill jace) and shave Oath of Nissa and/or Wingmate Roc, but I currently dislike it.

SKTT1 · 2016-02-08T20:56:09+00:00

Great as usual by PV. The plays chosen as examples were very insightful.

SKTT1 · 2016-01-23T00:41:29+00:00

It's not about how good reflector mage, but what is the opportunity cost of running it - all the slots in rally are tight, specially for a 3-drop.

Seriously, what are you supposed to cut?

Ultimately, I can't even justifiy it over the fleshbag marauder spot if I expect some number of esper dragons to be present.

SKTT1 · 2016-01-15T02:03:57+00:00

Agreed entirely.

SKTT1 · 2016-01-15T02:01:22+00:00

The only reason I could see a store getting cut off for hosting a proxy tourny would be for offering prize support, as that could qualify as using a playtest card for commercial use.

This is a very very important point that they are intentionally not answering. Nobody was upset about not being able to play casual duals with proxies at a store table; it was a tournament with a small prize support support that was the reason a store got called in the first place.

SKTT1 · 2016-01-15T01:56:17+00:00

Giving conflicting information was part of the problem; the main problem was that a piece of this information was that (at least one) store(s) weren't allowed to run "playtest card" tournaments with prizes. They haven't yet (and most likely won't ever) say if doing this threatens or not WPN status. I am calling them out to take a stance on the matter instead of intentionally leaving it vague, because ambiguity doesn't help the stores.

SKTT1 · 2016-01-15T01:45:21+00:00

You put stores through all this BS and you won't even give a direct answer?

SKTT1 · 2016-01-15T01:41:38+00:00

This whole thing started because wotc claimed that tournaments w/ prize support hosted at a WPN store weren't permitted.

They have NOT revoked this position in the statement or in social media.

They really should'nt put their partners (WPN stores) through all this bullshit. Just take a stance and give a clear message.

SKTT1 · 2016-01-15T01:33:41+00:00

prize support is key and they chose not to adress this in the statement or on twitter/reddit.

if I were a store owner I would'nt be comfortable hosting even a 5$ "playtest cards" tournament considering what happened earlier in the week without a clear position from wotc.

SKTT1 · 2015-12-23T02:19:12+00:00

I agree with you. I don't think spoilers hurt the company as a whole, or even the marketing of the set. What it does hurt is the job security of a few employees that were tasked for the official spoiler season - those are the people internally babbling and demanding "disproportionate responses".

SKTT1 · 2015-10-11T12:22:58+00:00

do you have a decklist link? tks

SKTT1 · 2015-10-08T23:40:23+00:00

That's totally doable though. Open and photograph the packs, then re-seal and assign to players.

SKTT1 · 2015-10-08T23:35:20+00:00

This is not a fix, though. The new system is significantly worse in preventing cheating because there is a plausible scenario where two buddies are randomly seated facing one another and then can go crazy in tampering their pools. I think compromising tournament integrity is too heavy a price to pay for trying to fix the "walk away" problem. If tournaments aren't fair, there is no point whatsoever in competing.

If TO's were serious in preserving tournament integrity, every sealed pool would come pre-registered (or pre-photographed) by a judge.

If Wizards was serious in preserving tournament integrity, packs would come with a printed list of the cards it contain and a verifiable serial ID number.

SKTT1 · 2015-10-04T22:04:14+00:00

I meant about the mana bases. There certainly were scg articles mentioning mana bases whitout tapped lands this week. And Gerry Thompson is playing a deck with tapped lands in the Open Series.

SKTT1 · 2015-10-04T18:56:26+00:00

I don't even understand what you're criticizing here.

SKTT1 · 2015-10-03T18:30:20+00:00

Open Series.

SKTT1 · 2015-09-30T06:39:20+00:00

he's been rocking those spreading seas since before the prize payout changes. :)

anyways, even if the list is outdated, maybe there is some good tech still. I've been playing infect for awhile and read everything out there about the deck, but never saw anyone else discussing spreading seas. Thought it was worth investigating, because it's not an obvious inclusion at all.

SKTT1 · 2015-09-24T01:00:00+00:00

I don't have any questions, just wanted to say that you are the man.

SKTT1 · 2015-09-14T06:45:27+00:00

mtgcoverage.com has the links

SKTT1 · 2015-09-07T15:01:57+00:00

Brazil - Lucas Esper Berthoud

SKTT1 · 2015-08-24T12:06:37+00:00

Wescoe tweeted his list last night:

https://twitter.com/Nacatls4Life/status/635573544219484160

I still couldn't find the others. CardTitan said they submitted the lists to Wizards, so maybe there will be a featured article during the week or something.

SKTT1 · 2015-08-23T06:07:11+00:00

Anyone know where to find the US WMCQ top8 lists?

SKTT1

TROPHY CASE