Split the finals of an IQ today with the following list
Beat Affinity TWICE in the swiss rounds. I don't think our matchup is so bad anymore. Harbinger is an all-star, especially when they commit to using a ravager. Hurkyl's Recall in response to Day's Undoing made one guy particularly salty
Oh man. That is a hilarious Merfolk rendition of Karn's ultimate.
exactly! he realized that he was starting an entirely new game while i still had my whole board and a new hand. it was hilarious because i didn't even realize he was scooping. he picked up his whole board, hand, and graveyard, and mashed them into his library. i started drawing my 7 new cards and noticed he was desideboarding. felt great!
Split the finals of an IQ today with the following list
Beat Affinity TWICE in the swiss rounds. I don't think our matchup is so bad anymore. Harbinger is an all-star, especially when they commit to using a ravager. Hurkyl's Recall in response to Day's Undoing made one guy particularly salty
Is it ever right to tap Vial with the upkeep trigger on the stack to vial in another lord before main1, and then add the counter? Say, if I have a master of waves in hand and want to stick it next turn? Is it best to just leave it on 2 and wait it out?
Anyone use vial this way on the regular? Am I just being cute?
i do it all the time
you can use your vial 3 turns in a row to drop lord, lord, MoW. basically just skipping the 3 drop. if i have a reejerey in hand then i don't because vialing him in and then getting a trigger of him is juicy. but if you have 2 2drops then, yeah, it's a great play to vial them both in without missing the beat on the way to your wave tokens.
@Nikachu_ Do you have an updated list using Harbinger of the Tides? Im going to a PPTQ this Sat. im thinking about trying him out. Also when will we see Harbinger in some of your Merfolk in Modern videos?
Thanks!
I'm patiently waiting for Harbinger to be available for purchase or trade online. I'm sort of stalling on making videos because I don't want to make more with the old list. The new list is theoretical but it will be this and what I will play in my own PPTQ this weekend:
10 Island
4 Mutavault
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Oboro, Palace in the Clouds
1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
3 Wanderwine Hub
4 Cursecatcher
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Lord of Atlantis
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
2 Tidebinder Mage
2 Harbinger of the Tides
3 Merrow Reejerey
3 Master of Waves
4 Spreading Seas
4 Aether Vial
3 Dismember
1 Vapor Snag
2 Relic of Progenitus
Sideboard
4 Tectonic Edge
1 Harbinger of the Tides
3 Spell Pierce
2 Remand
1 Master of Waves
1 Dismember
2 Tidebinder Mage
1 Grafdigger’s Cage
1 Vapor Snag seems pretty thin. What are your thoughts on that?
http://www.mtggoldfish.com/metagame/breakdown/modern http://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/28k-games-of-modern-analyzed
Mtggoldfish just posted an interesting article in which they analysed 28k games of modern. They concluded that "Merfolk is basically the anti-Tron ; it has good matchups against most of the popular decks but really struggles against tier two options like Living End and Boggles".
In the match-up grid for the 10 most played decks, Merfolk has bad matchup against Affinity, Grixis Control, Anafenza Company, and Living End. In my opinion, the most surprising thing in this table is the fact that our worst matchup is against Anafenza Company (38.71%) and Affinity matchup is not as hopeless as I initially thought (46.43%).
For the Affinity matchup,has anyone tested Spell Snare? It hoses most of the threats in Affinity and is not a dead SB cards in other matchup.
no way are we bad against grixis control. You have island walk and 2 guys can out race them. Also run relix maindeck it stomps anything with snapcaster or delve. All you do is deal with the turn 2 tasigur or angler and win against grixis control. They have a poor long game because you have insane threat density and 10 cantrips game 1. Game 2 they can't resolve key early spells. Burn and affinity are the worst match ups imo.
it feels so good to watch them delve away their whole yard for a turn 2 Tasigur and then hitting it with a vapor snag
So Merfolk did pretty well at the SCG Premier IQ this weekend. Results are up on SCG.
The two lists that got 9th and 10th each had 3 Harbinger of the Tides, while the list at 18th had 4. So, it seems like the card is the real deal. I wonder if any of the players are regulars here and could give us their thoughts? I, for one, love the card. Jammed 4 and haven't looked back.
i played 2 in a couple events this weekend. i'm sold. breaking twin when they try to combo is awesome. the synergy with reejerey is great also. i'll probably start playing 3 in the main.
Went 3-1 (again) yesterday which might not be too interesting but I beat i few matchups which I think can be fairly difficult. So I decided to make a little report if anyone would find it interesting.
Round 1 vs Bogles 0-2 Loss Game 1: I had a big sigh when i saw he was on Bogles because I really don't like this matchup. But at least they are over quickly. I had a decent hand but Daybreak Coronet just outpaced me.
Sideboard In: 2 Chalice of the Void, 2 Swan Song. Out: 1 Kira, 2 Tidebinder, 1 Vapor Snag. I am not sure what the best route is here but my idea is to take out the two pretty weak Tidebinder bears to let me keep up a mana more for counterspells. Game 2: I opened up a great 7 card hand on the play with an Aether Vial in it, so I felt pretty good. He played a Bogle on his first turn and I followed it up with a Chalice on 1. To my dismay, on the the following turns he played Spirit Mantle, Coronet, Coronet in that order and I could not race that.
Round 2 vs Affinity 2-1 Win Game 1 Win: On the draw I felt a bit bummed after the last match seeing him playing Affinity. It did not feel better seeing him empty his entire 7 card hand on the first turn when I had to mull to 6. I did have a decent hand though and kept drawing gas, including a Spreading Seas which soon became useful. On turn 4 (I think) my opponent decided to go for the infect route so he sacrified a bunch of his stuff to Ravager putting 6 counters on his Inkmoth Nexus. He swung giving me 7 poison. On my next turn I promply Speading Seased the Nexus and I suddenly had a nice board and he basically had nothing but an Overseer and a Memnite and I easily won from there.
Sideboard In: 3 Hurkyl's Recall, 1 Echoing Truth. Out: 1 Kira, 2 Tidebinder, 1 Cursecatcher. Similar plan to the first match, I wanted Lords and some amount of interaction. Game 2 Loss: I Probed him seeing a good hand with a Galvanic Blast as only interaction which is not too scary. No Plating too to my relief since my hand was decent but a bit slow. I did keep it though since it had a Recall and and a good spell/land ratio. Except a blue source, only Caverns and Mutas. I felt I should find it with the cantrips though (Silvergill, Probe) but I did not. I kept drawing Mutas and no blue sources leaving my Spell Pierce, Recall and Spreading Seas dead i my hand. I lost after he was just faster than I was, also drawing Plating soon enough.
Sideboard In: 2 Chalice. Out: 2 Gitaxian Probe. Game 3 Win: I opened no Chalice but the hand was fast enough i thought and i kept it. He did the usual affinity thing and put a lot of things in play, but I kept a decent pace to with Vial and I kept a Pierce and Snag up for anything really dangerous. Seeing that I began to mass a dangerous amount of islandwalking lords my opponent soon went for the infect kill again. But learning from his mistake in game 1 he put counters for lethal this time, sacing most of his stuff for the kill. I responded with Vapor Snaging his Inkmoth and after that he had no chance to recover.
Round 3 vs Bogles 2-0 Win Game 1: Bogles again, really? Anyway, I was on the play and Probed him seeing only two lands, so I decided to go for the land hate strategy after a turn 1 Vial. He get an Scout out, but after that my two Spreading Seas kept him locked out of the game until turn 4-5 when he drew another land, but it was too late for him to recover by then.
Sideboard In: 2 Chalice of the Void, 2 Swan Song. Out: 1 Kira, 1 Cursecatcher, 1 Tidebinder, 1 Vapor Snag. Still not very sure about what to board out. Tempo is nice, but if he lands a Spiritdancer things usually turn awful. Game 2: He started with a Bogle and I started with Probing him seeing Scout, Path, Path, Nature's Claim and lands. I put a Vial out which he snap Claim:ed on his turn followed by the Scout. Fortunately, thanks to the Probe I drew into to a Chalice on my turn which a played on 1 and he was locked out of the game from there.
Round 4 vs Grixis Control 2-1 Win Game 1 Win: My opponent had to mull to 5 and I had a good starting 7 hand so fish did what fish does best and the game was quickly over. I only saw grixis colours and some bolts, but I felt pretty sure he was on control since that seems to have taken over my LGS the last months.
Sideboard In: 2 Swan Song, 1 Echoing Truth, 1 Tidebinder. Out: 4 Spreading Seas. Not completely sure what he was on I just wanted to protech my things from sweepers or a Splinter Twin if he was on that. Relic would have been better in hindsight I think. Tidebinder was there just a a more creature he had to deal with. Game 2 Loss: This was a very drawn out game. After Probing him I saw he had Anger of the Gods which I tried to play around not over extending and keeping counterspells up. Which he of course knew too. My hand was not too bad but the biggest problem was me not drawing enough lords to give my little dudes islandwalk and push past his Angler. He played very well Bolting and Terminating every lord I played so I could never assemble a critical mass. Eventually when he had enough mana to start chaining Snapcaster, Kolaghans and Bolts I could not keep up.
Sideboard in: 3 Relic. Out: 3 Tidebinder Mage. I really started disliking drawing useless Tidebinders which I had done the entire evening. So Relics went in instead. Game 3 Win: Game 2 was so long we had only 2 minutes left on the clock. But I really wanted to go 3-1 to get store credits, so I kept a hand full of creatures and lands hoping it would be fast enough. And it turned out to be that. Turn 1 Cursecatcher protected me from his more expensive spells and I had a mutavault there for extra tempo. Silvergill into Lord, Lord was just enough and I swung for lethal on turn 4 in the extra turns.
Reflections
Kira was mostly useless and I often really wanted a Spellskite there instead. I used to like Kira alot when Junk was popular since it was the only thing that blocked spirit tokens. Now when Jund and Grixi control is more popular it still does a great job there, but any other matchup I think I would want a Spellskite or some other creature there. Maybe they both belong in the board, I don't know.
Tidebinder was a useless bear just like the last time (facing Anafenza combo and Tron matchups) but some times you face GBx and Burn all night and then I really want them there. I guess I will keep them there until we know more about how the new Harbinger performs.
taking out dismember vs bogles seems like a no-brainer
Hiho, when building a Jeskai Tokens deck for Modern i stumbled upon Saving Grasp.
I feel like this could be a nice Sideboardcard in addition to vapor snag in matchups, that keep killing our creatures.
We can save our Lord, and then once we happen to draw a Wanderwine Hub, we can flash it back and gain Cardadvantage out of it.
I also found: Stream of Unconsciousness
Pretty much everything in our deck is a Wizard in addition to being Merfolk. Casting this on an opponents Goyf would allow us to doubleblock it without any problems. Second worst scenario, we won't be able to kill the blocked creature, because our blocker got removed. But because we get a card out of it, we go even.
Worst is obviously, not having a creature around at all or getting it removed, the moment we cast it.
Both very situational, but its nice to know these cards exist.
Oppinions?
don't forget that you're adding a Tribal card to the goyf you're talking about in this scenario
Round 4: 2-1 against Amulet Bloom combo. Game 1; dragged it on long enough to just barely lose to two double-striking Primeval Titans (Tidebinder Mage maindeck was awesome!) Game 2; Spreading Seas on Simic Growth Chamber pretty much locked my opponent out of their mulligan to 5. Game 3; same thing, but hit both Tectonic Edges by turn 3 to actually lock my opponent out of the game. Bonus! Got a deck box thrown at me (missed, though) and they trashed my deck saying it wasn't really a real deck. Jokes on them, though.
new to this deck and modern in general so forgive me if this is ignorant, but i thought spreading seas was bad in this matchup due to the fact that they'll just bounce the land. can you explain why you leave it in?
It seems i chose an interesting time to start playing modern considering merfolk is the deck i landed on. I literally just finished building it this weekend. I was hoping to fly under the radar for a little bit while i learn the format but then it has to go and win a GP! lol! It was clear to me that this deck had some serious potential but now it's clear to everyone else too. It's exciting and i can't wait to learn all the ins and outs. Been watching Nikachu's videos all week. Do you guys have any other resources or streams to help someone new to the deck/format? I've read a large portion of this thread, still going.
exactly! he realized that he was starting an entirely new game while i still had my whole board and a new hand. it was hilarious because i didn't even realize he was scooping. he picked up his whole board, hand, and graveyard, and mashed them into his library. i started drawing my 7 new cards and noticed he was desideboarding. felt great!
Beat Affinity TWICE in the swiss rounds. I don't think our matchup is so bad anymore. Harbinger is an all-star, especially when they commit to using a ravager. Hurkyl's Recall in response to Day's Undoing made one guy particularly salty
4 Silvergill Adept
4 Master of the Pearl Trident
4 Lord of Atlantis
3 Merrow Reejerey
3 Master of Waves
3 Harbinger of the Tides
2 Tidebinder Mage
4 Æther Vial
4 Spreading Seas
3 Vapor Snag
2 Dismember
3 Wanderwine Hub
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Oboro, Palace in the Clouds
1 Minamo, School at Water's Edge
10 Island
3 Spell Pierce
3 Hurkyl's Recall
3 Tectonic Edge
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Master of Waves
1 Vapor Snag
1 Tidebinder Mage
i do it all the time
you can use your vial 3 turns in a row to drop lord, lord, MoW. basically just skipping the 3 drop. if i have a reejerey in hand then i don't because vialing him in and then getting a trigger of him is juicy. but if you have 2 2drops then, yeah, it's a great play to vial them both in without missing the beat on the way to your wave tokens.
1 Vapor Snag seems pretty thin. What are your thoughts on that?
it feels so good to watch them delve away their whole yard for a turn 2 Tasigur and then hitting it with a vapor snag
i played 2 in a couple events this weekend. i'm sold. breaking twin when they try to combo is awesome. the synergy with reejerey is great also. i'll probably start playing 3 in the main.
taking out dismember vs bogles seems like a no-brainer
don't forget that you're adding a Tribal card to the goyf you're talking about in this scenario
LOL. You would have learned by now if only Merrow Harbinger was playable
good review but the G in Harbinger is pronounced like Ginger
you didn't mention the synergy with Merrow Reejerey
new to this deck and modern in general so forgive me if this is ignorant, but i thought spreading seas was bad in this matchup due to the fact that they'll just bounce the land. can you explain why you leave it in?