I made the changes that I had talked about, swapping the Dark Confidant/Bitterblossom counts, cut a Kolaghan's Command for another land, an extra Shadow Guildmage in the board.
In the first round, I faced a Blue/White Aethermage's Touch deck with lots of scrying and Emrakuls. The plan was to Aethermage's Touch on end step into Emrakul, then Restoration Angel or Flickerwisp it on their own turn after attacking to really get em. It did not seem good, but it did seem awesome, and while I would have loved to see this dude Emrakul someone else, I used a bunch of discard to make sure he didn't Emrakul me, specifically.
In round two I squared off against a friend, Adam Perkins, playing Storm. I think I should have won all three games had I played a little differently, but I took unnecessarily risky lines in games two and three and got punished. For what it's worth, I think it's a super good matchup, not intrinsically but with my build the way that I've got it now. I've got lots of graveyard hate, lots of discard, removal for their Electromancers and Barals, good threats, and even Damping Spheres. In the very next round, I was paired against Storm again and this time took it down pretty convincingly.
I played against Grixis Death's Shadow in round 4. My opponent mulliganned a bunch in game one, but I still had to get lucky to rip Liliana to kill a turn 2 Zombie Fish, then take over with said Planeswalker. In game two it was more of the same. I feel like the way the deck is set up now, if I hit my land drops, I'm a pretty significant favorite here, especially post-board. Their stuff is so much cheaper, though, so if you stumble a little bit it could be too late The inevitability is definitely on our side, as long as you keep Zombie Fishes and one mana 6/6s in mind when figuring out your removal suite.
Round 5 was pretty much a win-and-in, and I faced off against a really cool Green/Black aggro Death's Shadow brew. My opponent's deck was full of stuff like Experiment One, Putrid Leech, Narnam Renegade, Greenwheel Liberator, Strangleroot Geist (swoon!), Death's Shadow, and Avatar of the Resolute, to go along with some removal and Street Wraiths. Game one was a long protracted ordeal but I hid behind Goyfs and Bitterblossom until my Liliana could ultimate and kill a bunch of his dudes so that I could turn the corner. In the second, I had a Bitterblossom again and used it, Liliana, removal spells, and Hissing Quagmire to block and kill stuff and eventually win.
I drew into the top 8 and had time to go obliterate a burrito from Bueno y Sano.
In the first round of the Top 8, I faced off against Blue-Red stuff. Like, when people call decks "Abzan Cards" and "Sultai Cards I Own" this was the Blue-Red version of that. Snapcasters, Young Pyromancers, Remands, Cryptics, Bolts, Serum Visions, Opts, Jaces. In the first game we got to a pretty good stalemate with Liliana taking all our cards away until I topdecked a Huntmaster and took over. I lost the second game, in which I kept four lands and two Tarmogoyfs, kept an Inquisition on top, then never drew a spell. In the third, I was kinda sorta on the back foot for a while due to Vendilion Cliques and my own Dark Confidant, but I made sure to have answers to both Jaces that he played and eventually won a close one after some clutch Scavenging Ooze lifegain.
In the semifinals, I played against Burn and got extremely lucky in game one. At 6 life, I had a Huntmaster in hand but would need to take 2 damage from an Overgrown Tomb to cast it on turn four. I got shot down to three, then had to fade any burn spells for three turns, which I did and snuck away with one. In the second, we both mulliganned (which definitely favors the Jund player) and I made him discard a bunch of stuff, then attacked him to death with dorky creatures.
I faced off against Humans in the finals, and it was not to be. I had a good start in the first game with removal into Bob, but I still couldn't really deploy all my stuff in time and died to a Mantis Rider. In the second I made the punt of a lifetime by totally forgetting about Noble Hierarch's exalted when blocking, but I don't think I was going to win that one anyways. I ended the game with three lands in play and two Huntmasters in hand, which would have been great but never worked out. My opponent had fantastic draws in both games, but it's Humans, their plan is so straightforward that it's hard not to have awesome draws.
So you would think that coming in 2nd wouldn't make me feel like I need to re-think the list, but that ain't me. The Death's Shadow dude got me thinking about Narnam Renegade. I think I would have to do a little work on the mana to ensure Revolt when I need it, but I think I could actually play that card and we could see what happens. It's cheap, it's at least a little aggressive, it trades with gigantic Champion of the Parishes and Thalia's Lieutenants and blocks or attacks into pretty much everything else in the Humans deck. I felt like the exact card choices against the Humans deck isn't what does you in, it's the tempo that they gain from Hierarchs, Vial, and Thalia, and so I just want to make the deck faster by adding cards that are quick, but hopefully still have some late game utility. I think it'll be good against Death's Shadow and Hollow One as well.
It's important to note that late game, most of the time, I can still turn revolt on when necessary. Because of Tracker and Fatal Push, I'm already just leaving excess fetchlands around and not cracking them on my opponent's end step very often. I think that's an important thing to keep in mind when tuning a deck, these little play patterns that push you to make one decision or another. Pairing Tireless Tracker with Fatal Push and Narnam Renegade will really solidify the idea that we should be keeping those lands around and not cracking them. Having an extra basic land or two in the deck helps facilitate this, because you are still going to want that mana from time to time but not want to take 2 to cast stuff.
I also want to play an extra Fatal Push. I didn't really play against anything where Fatal Push wasn't good, and it'll make the mana costs cheaper. Also, the Dark Confidant swap I made seemed awesome as well.
I had pipe dreams of adding Liliana the Last Hope to the deck, but after this event I'm not sure. It wouldn't have been good against much that I faced because it's slow, and even against Humans that has a million one-toughness creatures, you can't expect them to still be one-toughness by the time Liliana comes down. I still like my Shadow Guildmages a lot out of the board.
Thanks for reading, and check out the youtube page here where I just finally actually uploaded three videos I made from a while back. Enjoy some cube!
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