I'm still having pretty good success with this slighty-slower than blitz but still not "midrange" naya archetype on MTGO, I've 4-0ed two dailies with it and have an win rate of 70% in the events I've played (14-6). Losses have been to jund (2), and then basically the rest have been vs aggro decks of various descriptions; most of my wins have been vs aggro, esp naya blitz, and I'd generally consider the deck very well positioned against aggro but you can certainly lose those matches especially if you lose the die roll or have mana problems.
* Medic over silverblade. I think everyone's twigged to this by now, but in such a creature heavy environment, this is just a better card and it has some play vs revelation and bonfire (which don't seem to be that common but hey). Mauler helps set up batallion too.
* Hellrider and ghor-clan over huntmaster and angel. Huntmaster would probably shore up the aggro matchup a little bit more, but you lose so much aggro potential by running it and I feel the deck is overall pretty decent against aggro. The deck floods the board pretty well, and hellrider just gives you so much potential to close out games you have no business winning. It's also amazing with medic. Ghor-clan similarly gives the deck a bit of reach when you need it.
* Smiter is not a human, but is too good vs aggro not to run it. It really is the perfect creature for this deck, provided you don't get in the awkward situation where you want to name 'soldier' with your cavern...
* mana base is super solid colour-wise, although you do pay the price for only running 22 lands sometimes. I could see the argument for cutting a spell for a 23rd land, perhaps kessig, but I just never found kessig that good when I ran it (you've lost or won by the time it becomes reelvant usually). The deck has a whole lot of play on 2 mana, and with 4 dorks, I find getting a bit greedy on the land is ok.
* Maindeck garruk. This card is just so good against naya blitz, and a lot of other random creature decks, that I couldn't leave him in the board. With 4 mana dorks, he can be accelerated into a fair bit of the time. He comes out for better removal in some matches though.
* Domri in the side. He's ok against aggro, but can be a bit slow and is really best in control matchups, while being awful against jund. In my experience there's been a real dearth of proper control decks on MTGO atm so he's relegated to the sideboard.
* No enchantment hate in the board. Just not necessary with how few detention sphere decks are around atm. Jund is a much bigger threat.
* 3x Thalia. Perfect vs jund on the play, and better re-animator hate than actual re-animator hate because she's still a body.
* Lots of non-damaging removal. Post-board I have 7 removal spells that don't do damage, which is what you need vs reckoner, aristocrat and predator ooze. Bonds of faith is not good vs resto angel decks, but it's great vs BR and GB ooze, as it also doubles as a pump if you have the mono-removal hand.
My list is pretty much these except the mainboard fiend hunters are Selesnya charm. Most likely less relevant but I find all three modes to be helpful, and if I do use it for removal most of the time its nuking a Angle of Serenity in the Junk match up. Could probably change it.
Frontline medic does work for the deck. It's the best answer to Honecker main board by forcing them into a bad position of shooting your face while they're on the defensive. Not to mention it lets you just chew up other aggro and midrange decks by pounding them with bad combat trades over and over again.
He's easily main deckable. He's not a super aggressive card in terms of power, but his ability to let you laugh at combat math, and more importantly, enemy reckoners makes him a prime three drop.
I will say he's a good card to pull out for sideboard options. He does his best work in the aggro/midrange match-up so you can side him in and out accordingly.
Orzhov-Rakdos (decadence that comes from living for too long with too much wealth)
Boros-Azorious (The Rule of Law with a military to back it up.)
Simic-Izzet (Experimentation and Progress, these guilds are two sides of the same coin)
Golgari-Dimir(The guilds of the undercity.)
Gruul-Selsnya(The raw emotion of nature, tempered by the collective benifit of community.)
I like those pairings except Gruul-Selsnya, as it's the only allied shard pairing.
Built this and 4-0 FNM with my last two rounds against UWR control and UWR tempo. Won both 2-0. Granted, only saw one supreme verdict, but my opponent was at 4 and I drew a Hellrider like a a lucky son of a *****.
The deck just explodes, and it has multiple paths to turn 3 or 4 kills. Sure it doesn't have any staying power, but it punishes any slight durdle your opponent makes and practically requires several removal spells or a a supreme verdict.
And guys, while this does suck, Hasbro is required to defend its copyright claims or it will use them. The motivating factor here isn't to be a colossal dick, it can't choose to defend copyrights in some cases and not others.
What about Faith's Shield? Allow's you to sneak attackers in, prevent two for one's of wreckoner and protects card's against removal in the late game. A sideboard consideration at least.
It majorly depends on the rest of my hand and what the matchup is.
Vs. any spell heavy deck I windmill slam her on T2.
Vs. other decks, I'll usually opt for BTE+Mauler > BTE+Mayor first, especially if I have a bunch of noncreature spells in my hand after that. However, if I have a slow-ish hand and I'm facing down an aggro deck where Thalia can hold everything off all day, I'll drop her T2 instead.
Thalia's not super amazing vs. aggro, but she's definitely not bad at all. Never underestimate the power of first strike, especially if you get a Mayor out to grant her 3 power. The only reason she's not truly optimal to leave in mainboard (if you plan on facing aggro decks all day) is due to the existence of Boros Reckoner, sadly.
This pretty much sums up my lines of play with Thalia, especially games 2 and three if I know what kind of cards/removal to expect.
All in all I prefer her mainboard, especially since last night I played against a RWU flash and RU Delver deck that both weren't very happy to see Thalia's game one.
I'll agree that the mana is pretty complex, especially for casting Boros charm. So I guess my question is, should I max out all the shocklands? I was trying to avoid it as it using two or three shocklands untapped puts you pretty far behind in the damage race against other aggro decks.
So hellriders have vanished from my local meta, as in the shop doesn't have them, and no one wants to trade them, so I'm trying to find four drop replacements.
My stopgap solution that is going to get me into FNM is Instigator Gang. That is pretty suboptimal so I'd like to find another good replacement? Any thoughts?
You all probably remember this from deck archetype from the days when Innistrad was young, it mostly died out due to the rather alarming amount of graveyard hate in the format. Generally the idea is to make your graveyard into a resource, it both fuels your spells and acts a extension of your hand.
Still I find this deck fun, and with some additions from RTR and GTC I think it could see some success at the FNM level.
The sideboard was designed to be semi-transformational, so that the deck could still compete after a rest in peace, but comments on that would be much appreciated.
A fair enough assessment. Eggs isn't a big part of the meta anyhow I guess.
My list is pretty much these except the mainboard fiend hunters are Selesnya charm. Most likely less relevant but I find all three modes to be helpful, and if I do use it for removal most of the time its nuking a Angle of Serenity in the Junk match up. Could probably change it.
Frontline medic does work for the deck. It's the best answer to Honecker main board by forcing them into a bad position of shooting your face while they're on the defensive. Not to mention it lets you just chew up other aggro and midrange decks by pounding them with bad combat trades over and over again.
Isn't that part of the reason to run Thalia mainboard? I dropped her turn two against eggs then gold fished the rest of the game.
I will say he's a good card to pull out for sideboard options. He does his best work in the aggro/midrange match-up so you can side him in and out accordingly.
Boros-Azorious (The Rule of Law with a military to back it up.)
Simic-Izzet (Experimentation and Progress, these guilds are two sides of the same coin)
Golgari-Dimir(The guilds of the undercity.)
Gruul-Selsnya(The raw emotion of nature, tempered by the collective benifit of community.)
I like those pairings except Gruul-Selsnya, as it's the only allied shard pairing.
Thanks for the responses, i think I get it now
Would unbanning Wild Nacatl break the format? Would it put Zoo over the edge so to speak?
Please speak your mind, I want to know.
The deck just explodes, and it has multiple paths to turn 3 or 4 kills. Sure it doesn't have any staying power, but it punishes any slight durdle your opponent makes and practically requires several removal spells or a a supreme verdict.
And guys, while this does suck, Hasbro is required to defend its copyright claims or it will use them. The motivating factor here isn't to be a colossal dick, it can't choose to defend copyrights in some cases and not others.
This pretty much sums up my lines of play with Thalia, especially games 2 and three if I know what kind of cards/removal to expect.
All in all I prefer her mainboard, especially since last night I played against a RWU flash and RU Delver deck that both weren't very happy to see Thalia's game one.
My stopgap solution that is going to get me into FNM is Instigator Gang. That is pretty suboptimal so I'd like to find another good replacement? Any thoughts?
Jarrad works, but Comsuming Abberation is based on your opponents graveyard.
4 Dawntreader Elk
4 Splinterfright
2 Screeching Skaab
2 Armored Skaab
3 Boneyard Wurm
3 Ghoultree
2 Havengul Lich
4 Experiment One
2 Master Biomancer
2 Deathrite Shaman
4 Tracker's Instincts
2 Mulch
2 Gnaw to the Bone
Lands(24):
4 Breeding Pool
3 Overgrown Tomb
2 Woodland Cemetery
4 Hinterland Harbor
3 Drowned Catacomb
4 Forest
2 Island
2 Nephalia Drownyard
3 Thragtusk
2 Golgari Charm
3 Dreg Mangler
2 Spider Spawning
1 Psychic Spiral
2 Gnaw to the Bone
2 Acidic Slime
You all probably remember this from deck archetype from the days when Innistrad was young, it mostly died out due to the rather alarming amount of graveyard hate in the format. Generally the idea is to make your graveyard into a resource, it both fuels your spells and acts a extension of your hand.
Still I find this deck fun, and with some additions from RTR and GTC I think it could see some success at the FNM level.
The sideboard was designed to be semi-transformational, so that the deck could still compete after a rest in peace, but comments on that would be much appreciated.