Tournament Report: 10th @ SCG Classic with Punishing Maverick, 9/23/18

Miracles has reared its ugly head once again with a victory at GP Richmond. The deck was certain to become more popular as a result. Bad news for Maverick players. In order to have a fighting chance in this matchup, I needed to seriously re-evaluate some of my card choices. After consulting other Punishing Maverick and Miracles players, this is the list I arrived at for this year's SCG Legacy Open in Baltimore:

Punishing Maverick, 9/22/18
Creature Spells (21) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Noble Hierarch 1x Birds of Paradise 3x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 1x Scavenging Ooze 1x Voice of Resurgence 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (16) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 3x Punishing Fire 2x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Fire and Ice 1x Batterskull
Lands (23) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 2x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Plateau 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Horizon Canopy	SB: 2x Choke SB: 2x Pyroblast SB: 2x Crop Rotation SB: 2x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben SB: 1x Surgical Extraction SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Council's Judgment SB: 1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant SB: 1x Nissa, Vital Force

• The 2nd Sylvan Library is one of the best cards against Miracles, and is fantastic right now with fewer Abrupt Decays, Leovolds, and Lightning Bolt-based Delver decks in the format than before. 

• Thalia, Guardian of Thraben has replaced Ethersworn Canonist as a threat that is also good against combo, but far superior against control.

• Pyroblasts have joined Choke as general anti-Blue cards.

• Council's Judgment has replaced Fiery Justice due to its ability to reliably answer Jace, or Back to Basics/Counterbalance if necessary.

• Nissa, Vital Force has joined Elspeth as another high-impact, resilient threat. Nissa might be one of the best threats against Miracles: she hits fast and hard, and can buy back troublesome cards like Library and Choke.

Conveniently, most of this technology lines up well against Grixis Control and Sneak & Show, two other prominent decks. The cost of these modifications is that we have given up ground against Death & Taxes, Elves, Reanimator, Shadow, and Storm.

My Saturday did not go very well.

Round 1: Grixis Control (1-2)
Round 2: UWR Mentor (0-2)
Round 3: A.N.T. (0-2)
Round 4: No show!
Round 5: RUG Landstill (2-0)
Round 6: UB Shadow (2-1)
Round 7: Miracles (2-1)
Round 8: UB Shadow (1-2)

After the first three rounds, my tournament was the poster child of "things gone wrong". I had some mopey draws against Grixis. I mis-identified what turned out to be a Mentor aggro deck as Miracles. My Storm opponent cantripped into a kill after a seemingly poor Ad Nauseam down to 1 life. The only highlight of the day was triumphing over actual Miracles.

Nevertheless, I decided to play the same 75 in the Classic on Sunday, believing it was still a good place to be. Around 120 players showed up for the event so was 7 rounds. Here's how my matches went:

Round 1: Sneak & Show (2-0)
Round 2: Omni-Tell (2-1)
Round 3: Eldrazi Post (2-1)
Round 4: Eldrazi Aggro (2-1)
Round 5: UW Delver (2-0)
Round 6: ID
Round 7: BR Griselbrand (0-2)

Final Record: 5-1-1, 10th place

Unfortunately I was paired down in the final round and had to play what turned out to be a bad matchup. So it goes.

Interestingly, despite the prevalence of Miracles it failed to place in the top 32 of the Open or the top 16 of the Classic. We'll see how well Miracles fares in the weeks leading up to Eternal Weekend in what is likely a meta well prepared for it. For now, I will more or less stick with my current configuration and see where things end up.

Props to Mark and TK for putting Punishing Maverick on the map in day 2 of the Open - playing Dire Fleet Daredevil in their decks no less!!

Maverick in GP Richmond Side Events

Unfortunately, I couldn't take the time off work to compete in the main event at GP Richmond. Nonetheless, I went up to Richmond to hang out and jam some Legacy side events.

It was natural to start with Punishing Maverick, as I hadn't played it since the banning of Deathrite Shaman.

Punishing Maverick, 9/1/18
Creature Spells (21) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Noble Hierarch 1x Birds of Paradise 3x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 1x Scavenging Ooze 1x Voice of Resurgence 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (15) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 3x Punishing Fire 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Fire and Ice 1x Batterskull
Lands (24) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 2x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Plateau 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Horizon Canopy 1x Maze of Ith	SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 2x Choke SB: 2x Crop Rotation SB: 2x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Fiery Justice SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Wear / Tear SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Event 1, Saturday Double-Up
Lands 2-1
Grixis Control 2-0
UWR Delver 2-1

Event 2, Sunday Double-Up
Lands 2-1
Moon Stompy 2-0
Eldrazi 2-1

Apparently winning with Punishing Maverick is too easy, so I decided to play a last event on hardmode with GW Maverick. My list was inspired by Julian Knab's recent MTGO 5-0:

GW Maverick, 9/2/18
Creature Spells (25) 4x Mother of Runes 4x Noble Hierarch 3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben 3x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 1x Scavenging Ooze 1x Voice of Resurgence 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 4x Knight of the Reliquary 1x Sigarda, Host of Herons	Noncreature Spells (13) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 2x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Fire and Ice 1x Batterskull
Lands (22) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 4x Savannah 2x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 1x Karakas 4x Wasteland 1x Horizon Canopy 1x Gaea's Cradle	SB: 3x Surgical Extraction SB: 2x Choke SB: 2x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Scavenging Ooze SB: 1x Oblivion Ring SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Pithing Needle SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Path to Exile SB: 1x Always Watching

This deck was put together in a hurry and wasn't exactly optimized. There should have been another fetchland instead of the 3rd Mystic, with Sword of Light and Shadow instead of Batterskull. Also, Phyrexian Revoker in the sideboard should have been an Elspeth or Armageddon (I forgot my Armageddons at home, doh!).

Event 3, Sunday Regular
Esperblade 2-1
Aggro Loam 2-0
Miracles 1-2

This event went slightly worse. Notably, I won a game against Loam with Always Watching and Sigarda equipped with Sword of Fire and Ice. My round 3 pairing against Miracles made the "bug" in my sideboard super punishing.

In total, I won 1,200 tickets which I turned into over $200 in cash. A chunk of this cash was exchanged for signatures by Christopher Moeller. I visited his booth about four times on Sunday because I kept discovering cards he had illustrated!

Some conclusions reached over the weekend:

• Reanimator seems to be on the downtick (especially with the presence of maindeck copies of Reanimate in the Death's Shadow decks) and Lands is still a fantastic matchup (haven't lost a sanctioned match against Lands since Jan 2017). Therefore, I think the 2nd Surgical and 2nd Ooze aren't needed in the 75 of Punishing Maverick.
• I suspected Voice of Resurgence would get way worse in the new meta, but there is enough Grixis and Delver that its still fine.
• Maze of Ith is not worth running without Ramunap Excavator or Loam.
• Owen Turtenwald's UW Delver deck looks sweet. I'm not sure when I'll have a chance to try it though.
• The side event structure at GPs has gotten way worse than it was in the past. The $20 events are horrible EV unless you go 3-0, and while the $35 ones are better in that regard, spending $20-35 to play only three rounds of Magic is off-putting.
• Mama J's is good (get the fried catfish), but not worth a 1 hour+ wait if you're hungry.

Tournament Report: Top8 @ Giga-Bites Legacy Quarterly with Punishing Maverick, 6/23/18

A significant change occurred in my life this April: I moved from Massachusetts to Florida for work reasons. Unfortunately, Northeast Florida doesn't exactly have a thriving Legacy scene. There's a monthly event at Jax Game Center in Jacksonville, but any other regular Legacy event is several hours away from me. As a result, I'm not playing much paper Legacy these days. MTGO just isn't as satisfying as paper Magic, so I've actually started going to a Modern FNM - more on that later!

Craving Legacy, I journeyed 6 hours up to Atlanta last weekend to sling old pieces of cardboard in the Giga-Bites Cafe Legacy Quarterly Win-a-Mox.

Punishing Maverick, 6/23/18
Creature Spells (21) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Noble Hierarch 1x Birds of Paradise 3x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 2x Scavenging Ooze 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (15) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 4x Punishing Fire 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Fire and Ice 1x Batterskull
Lands (23) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 2x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Plateau 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Horizon Canopy	SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 2x Choke SB: 2x Crop Rotation SB: 2x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Voice of Resurgence SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Wear / Tear SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant

The only significant change I've made to my list recently is going down to 23 lands. After cutting the Dark Depths combo a few months ago I decided to maintain the same number of mana-producing lands (24), but eventually noticed that I was flooding often and could afford to cut one. This has been a fine change so far, but I'm still uncertain if  Horizon Canopy is better than a 3rd Savannah. The advantages of Savannah over Canopy are that it is painless, fuels Knight/Scryb Ranger activations, and is another fetchable dual land against Wasteland-heavy decks.

A healthy attendance of 91 players meant there would be 7 rounds of swiss. Here's how my rounds went:

Round 1: Oops, All Spells! (2-1)
Round 2: BUG Control (2-1)
Round 3: Grixis Delver (2-1)
Round 4: Czech Pile (2-0)
Round 5: MUD Post (2-0)
Round 6: ID
Round 7: ID
Quarterfinal: Czech Pile (0-2)

Both games of the QF were winnable had I played better, but oh well. I won some cash which covered the cost of the Airbnb and gas and got to head back home earlier. Giga-Bites had a great event and I look forward to attending future ones.

Tournament Report: 44th @ SCG Worcester with Punishing Maverick, 3/4/2018

Here's what I played at this year's SCG Worcester:

Punishing Maverick, 3/3/18
Creature Spells (21) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Noble Hierarch 1x Birds of Paradise 3x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 2x Scavenging Ooze 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Voice of Resurgence 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (15) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 4x Punishing Fire 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Batterskull
Lands (24) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 3x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Plateau 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Horizon Canopy	SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 2x Choke SB: 2x Crop Rotation SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Sword of Fire and Ice SB: 2x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Blessed Alliance SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Kitchen Finks

I committed the heresy of cutting Scryb Ranger from my 75 in order to move Voice of Resurgence to the main and free up a sideboard slot for another anti-nonsense card, which became the Phyrexian Revoker. I know I can be quoted in various places saying I'd never play Maverick without Scryb Ranger and hope this sin can be forgiven. The other change I made was fitting Blessed Alliance into the sideboard. TNN is very popular right now and this card also looks reasonable against random aggro and fatty decks. Didn't cast it all weekend (in fact, it ate two Thoughtseizes) so can't say how good it is. I inspired another Maverick player (Thunderknight on The Source) to run it in the Legacy Classic on Sunday and it was good for him.

Day 1
There were 722 players in the tournament.

• Round 1: Dredge (2-1)
• Round 2: Miracles (2-1)
• Round 3: Elves (2-1)
• Round 4: GWb Maverick (0-2)
• Round 5: Eldrazi (2-0)
• Round 6: Esperblade (2-0)
• Round 7: Bant Deathblade (1-1)
• Round 8: Czech Pile (1-1)
• Round 9: Esper Miracles (2-1) 

The cutoff for Day 2 was 19 points - with 20 I got in at 60-somethingth place.

Day 2

• Round 10: Burn (1-2)
• Round 11: Lands (2-1)
• Round 12: Food Chain (2-0)
• Round 13: BUG Control (1-2)
• Round 14: GWb Maverick (2-0)
• Round 15: Aggro Loam (1-2)

Final Record after 15 grueling rounds of Magic: 9-4-2, 44th place

I encountered a mix of good matchups (Lands, Dredge, Eldrazi, Blade) and bad matchups (Elves, Burn, Miracles, Food Chain). Every sideboard card was brought in at least once over the over the weekend. However, in hindsight this 75 feels underpowered without Deathrite Shaman, Thalia, Scryb Ranger, Dark Depths, or the 4th Wasteland. One to two of these elements should be included in any Punishing Maverick deck.

Maverick was somewhat well-represented on day 2, with myself and two other GWb players - both of whom I faced over the weekend! I'm very bad at navigating the mirror but managed to win one of these two matches. The player I lost to on day 1 made it to 32nd place.

Also, props to Tommy Kessler for being my only friend to day 2 and stick it out with me. He got 29th place so congrats to him as well.

This was the last big event on my schedule for a while as I won't be attending GP Seattle next month. Maybe I'll be Brainstorming again for the foreseeable future. 

Double Tournament Report: Top16 and Top8 Weekend with Punishing Maverick, 2/17-2/18/18

I played Punishing Maverick in back to back events last Saturday and Sunday and placed 11th and 2nd in them respectively.

There were a few unusual sideboard cards I wanted to test so I ended up playing the same 75 in both events:

Punishing Maverick, 2/17/18
Creature Spells (21) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Noble Hierarch 1x Birds of Paradise 3x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 2x Scavenging Ooze 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (15) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 4x Punishing Fire 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Batterskull
Lands (24) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 3x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Plateau 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Horizon Canopy	SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 2x Choke SB: 2x Crop Rotation SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Sword of Fire and Ice SB: 2x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Dromoka's Command SB: 1x Voice of Resurgence SB: 1x Kitchen Finks

My list has changed a bit since I last overviewed it a few months ago. Most of these changes were motivated by a desire to improve the matchup vs Bob Huang-style Grixis Delver decks, which I found myself losing to a lot. Here are some of the changes:

• Kitchen Finks: Intended to be a threat that's good in both aggressive and grindy matchups. In the past I tried to play more removal in the sideboard for these matchups like Fiery Justice, Pyroblast, and Council's Judgment, but I found having too many reactive cards creates awkward draws and makes it hard to close out games. In the case of Grixis Delver, you're often able manage their threats, but then lose the damage race to TNN. Finks is resilient against efficient spot removal unlike your other threats, and can pressure the opponents life total while bolstering your own.

• Dromoka's Command: This versatile little card can be creature removal, enchantment removal, a combat trick, and a counterspell of sorts. I felt that it warranted testing in the slot I previously dedicated to Wear / Tear. 

• Batterskull: I expanded the Stoneforge Mystic package to 3 Mystics + Batterskull main, moving Sword of Fire and Ice to the sideboard. Batterskull makes your Mystics more threatening and is just a card that suits my playstyle. This card should also improve the Delver matchups.

• Voice of Resurgence: This card has been in my maindeck for a while, but I decided swap it with the 2nd Ooze in the sideboard. I believe Ooze is the more versatile maindeck card and is one you'll want to naturally draw in many game 1s.

• Dark Depths: I've played the Thespian's Stage + Dark Depths combo in all my Punishing Maverick lists for almost two years now, but lately have been doubting its effectiveness. Of the games you win with this combo, only a small percentage would have been unwinnable without it. The majority of these games were winnable through other means, but it was quicker and easier to win with the combo. Furthermore, my theory envisioning the use of Crop Rotation to quickly assemble the combo against non-interactive decks hasn't been as effective as I hoped. Often, given the opportunity to assemble the combo with Knight or Crop Rotation, I found myself wanting to Wasteland the opponent instead. Perhaps going up to 3 Crop Rotations makes this theory more viable, and I know some players who have tried this. The benefit of removing Thespian's Stage + Dark Depths is that you can make room for either two more spells, or another spell and a different utility land/dual land instead (I essentially chose to replace Dark Depths with the 3rd Stoneforge Mystic and Thespian's Stage with Horizon Canopy). The Crop Rotation sideboard plan becomes less versatile without access to the combo, but with Wasteland, Karakas, and Bojuka Bog still should afford a solid range of interaction - I'm currently evaluating weather this is true. There are some unfavorable matchups in which Dark Depths is clearly one of your best win conditions including Burn, Elves, and Food Chain. At least for the Burn matchup, incorporating Batterskull, Kitchen Finks, and Dromoka's Command compensates for the absence of Depths.

• Choke: I don't have much experience playing this card, but am trying it as a tool primarily against Czech Pile and the increasingly popular Miracles deck. While Pyroblast is good in these matchups, Choke is a way less "fair" card, capable of both winning games on its own and contorting the opponent's gameplay by its mere presence. It also overloads opposing disenchant effects along with Sylvan Library and Equipments. I've been in several games where I have Choke and Library out and my opponent is forced to destroy the Choke - and then loses to Library. Choke also has some legs against random Blue combo decks like Sneak & Show, High Tide, and even Storm. While slow and often ineffective in these matchups, its typically better than other cards in your 75 and can potentially cripple the opponent. Part of the reason I historically favored Pyroblast over Choke its superiority against Delver - however, it has turned out to be lackluster against Grixis Delver as a reactive and restricted card in the matchup.

Here's a rundown of how the events went:

Saturday, 2/17/2018: 2k @ GamingEtc, 95 players
This event was originally a 1k but due to the high turnout was upgraded to a 2k.

• Round 1: UR Delver (2-1)
• Round 2: Punishing Dack Control (0-2)
• Round 3: Mono-Red Human Stompy (2-0)
• Round 4: Infect (2-0)
• Round 5: Mono-Red Sneak Attack (2-0)
• Round 6: Czech Pile (2-1)
• Round 7: Grixis Delver (0-2)

Final Record: 5-2, 11th place


Sunday, 2/18/2018: 1k @ The Complex, 55 players

• Round 1: Burn (2-0)
• Round 2: UB Mill (2-1)
• Round 3: T.E.S. (2-1)
• Round 4: Elves (0-2)
• Round 5: Junkblade (2-0)
• Round 6: Canadian Threshold (2-1)
• Quarterfinal: BUG Shardless Aluren (2-1)
• Semifinal: Manaless Dredge (2-1)
• Final: Grixis Delver (1-2)

Final Record: 7-2, 2nd place


Ironically, I lost both my matches against Grixis Delver despite my efforts to improve the matchup, so my current approach needs to be re-evaluated. At least after losing my win and in on Saturday some redemption was salvaged on Sunday (even if it meant a two hour drive and total exhaustion by the end of it)...on the whole, it was a great weekend.

DECK: Punishing Maverick, 1/19/18

In January 2018, I finally finished acquiring all the significant foils I planned on having in my Punishing Maverick deck. Here is the result:

Creatures

Noncreatures

Lands

Sideboard

Imgur album w/ full-size images

In the maindeck, the basics, Karakas, and Sylvan Library remain un-foiled. This is intentional, and I don't plan on acquiring foil versions of these. For Karakas and Library, Legends is more pimp than any foil version in my opinion. In this sideboard, and my pool of Maverick sideboard cards, there are still a number of non foils. While I might pick up foils of some of these here and there, its not something I'm actively pursuing. As such, I consider the foiling of this deck to be finished. It took over 3 years, with my first Maverick foils being purchased at GP New Jersey in November 2014. As for my next pimp project...maybe I'll be upgrading my dual lands, who can say.

Punishing Maverick Update

After a few months of playing mostly Stoneblade decks, I reached the conclusion that Stoneblade was virtually unplayable as the format shook out to be dominated by Czech Pile. Considering the power of Punishing Fire in a sea of Deathrite Shaman + X decks, it was only natural that I returned to Punishing Maverick.

I've now been playing Punishing Maverick almost exclusively for over two months and testing all sorts of configurations. One thing that quickly became apparent was that the 4th Punishing Fire is necessary in this meta. Another reality of the meta is that Stoneforge Mystic is a flimsy threat in a non-Blue deck against the various Kolaghan's Command decks, and even against Grixis Delver due to cards like Stifle, Cabal Therapy, and Ancient Grudge.

These conclusions led me to do significant testing of lists without Stoneforge Mystic, in order to accommodate the 4th Fire + some other grindy cards. Here are some cards I tried in the slots normally occupied by Stoneforge Mystics and Equipment:

• Tireless Tracker - I got Tracker out in maybe 8 games but it never felt backbreaking. There was one spot I recall Zenithing for it instead of Knight to immediately make some Clues. This card definitely has potential and I'm willing to try it again. There's something to be said for having a continuous source of actual card draw.

• Ramunap Excavator - Adding to the long list of recently printed 3-drops fighting over flex slots in Maverick, Excavator has some strong synergies with the deck. My main concern with this card is that its another engine that is graveyard-based like Knight and Punishing Fire. For this reason, I generally prefer Tracker as it attacks from a slightly different angle. 

• Domri Rade - Any 3 mana planeswalker warrants a serious look in Legacy. I played Domri in a few events in 2014 and 2015 and he was never stellar. The +1 ability "misses" a lot since Punishing Maverick doesn't have a very high creature count. However, it enables you to bootleg some library manipulation in tandem with shuffle effects. The -2 ability has interesting implications with Exalted, Mother of Runes, and Punishing Fire, but isn't a reliable source of removal. One advantage I consider Domri has over a different grindy noncreature, nonartifact permanent like the 2nd Sylvan Library is that he functions against a Leovold. In testing Domri did tremendous work against a totally unexpected deck - Lands. I resolved him against Lands in 3 different games and won all of them...2 of them with the emblem! It turns out that once you have an active Knight and Scavenging Ooze, it becomes very hard for Lands to kill you or Domri. From this position its easy to make the Emblem, which evades Maze of Ith and makes all your creatures hit much harder. In the third game, I used Domri to immediately fight down a Tracker with my Knight, and my opponent scooped shortly after.

• Voice of Resurgence - While appearing to be a killer of control decks, Voice of Resurgence was downright embarrassing against the Swords to Plowshares/Terminus/Counterbalance combination out of Miracles, rendering it unplayable. However, in the new meta of control decks playing Fatal Push and Kolaghan's Command, this card's stock has increased drastically. It is also very effective against Delver and Burn.

After trying these cards I realized that while not always good, Stoneforge Mystic is a fairly efficient threat and has applications against an impressive range of strategies. Jitte ruins many creature-based decks and you're frequently happy to have more "looks" at it via Stoneforge Mystic. Playing against combo? Grab your Sword. Blood Moon or Ensnaring Bridge? No problem. Most of the cards I replaced Stoneforge Mystic with were either too clunky or too narrow. So I concluded the best course was to play the 4th Punishing Fire and limit the SFM package to 2 Mystics/1 Jitte/1 Sword.

All this being said, here is my current list:

Punishing Maverick, 9/30/17
Creature Spells (20) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Noble Hierarch 1x Birds of Paradise 2x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 1x Scavenging Ooze 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 1x Voice of Resurgence 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (15) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 4x Punishing Fire 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Fire and Ice
Lands (25) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 3x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Plateau 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Thespian's Stage 1x Dark Depths	SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 2x Pyroblast SB: 2x Crop Rotation SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Grafdigger's Cage SB: 2x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Wear / Tear SB: 1x Scavenging Ooze SB: 1x Fiery Justice

The only spicy card that has stuck around is Voice of Resurgence, which is efficient enough and good enough in the right matchups that I think it warrants a maindeck slot over the 2nd Ooze, which I have moved to the SB.

Here are some updates on other cards I was testing:

• Always Watching - This has been a nice card and functions as intended. I've had it out in about 5 games and only lost 1 of those. However, hitting WW to cast it has been a slight concern. This card got squeezed out of the 75 to fit the SFM package, Voice of Resurgence, 2 Oozes, and the Cage.

• Wear / Tear - I honestly haven't drawn this card much, but it still feels useful and I bring it in often.

• Sudden Demise - I've switched this slot back to Fiery Justice. While Sudden Demise is stronger against "wide" strategies like Elves and Death & Taxes, Fiery Justice is still good against these decks while being way better vs Delver and generic midrange decks.
  

• Sword of Feast and Famine - This card is still worse than Sword of Fire and Ice overall.

Overall, my current run with the deck has been quite successful at the local level, producing over $200 of store credit so far. Notably I am 9-0 vs Lands and 5-0 vs Burn in sanctioned matches...playing 0 Deathrite Shamans! This should demonstrate that Deathrite Shaman isn't as crucial as some people think. There's an argument that you should play Deathrite Shaman in this deck right now mainly to interfere with your opponent's Shamans - but this interference goes both ways, and as a mana-hungry deck we don't like to have useless mana dorks.

Deck Tech: Punishing Maverick by morticiansunion (MTGO)

MTGO user morticiansunion (Ethan Gaieski) has recently been having successes with Punishing Maverick lists.

Here is the most recent iteration of his list

He later made a post about the deck on the MtG Legacy subreddit.

The post attracted a decent amount of attention and Ethan did a great job of explaining the deck's theory, advantages, and matchups.

I just wanted to share a few thoughts on his list:

The Good

6 dorks - Mana dorks are the bread and butter of Maverick, and Ethan has clearly embraced this. Playing this many mana dorks informs many of the deckbuilding choices. It makes the 4th Wasteland much better, and also increases the stock of Sanctum Prelate as a 2-of in the sideboard. While powerful, Sanctum Prelate can be slow compared to CMC2 hatebears like Thalia, Canonist, and G. Teeg. However, with 6 dorks you have a good enough chance of deploying her on your second turn that she's worth running over other options.

Elspeth Knight-Errant and Chandra Pyromaster - These are my two favorite Planeswalkers to play in a Naya deck and I'm glad Ethan appreciates their power . Chandra is notably better in Ethan's list than mine since he has more Red sources in the form of +3 Birds and the 4th Grove.


The Not as Good

4 Birds/2 Hierarch split - I first played Punishing Maverick with 4 Birds because I thought its ability to make Red mana was indispensable. I quickly learned through playing the deck that Noble Hierarch is generally a better card due to the Exalted trigger, despite not producing Red. Birds is still useful and good enough that I always play 1, but I've hardly ever wanted a second. I have to think that a 4 Hierarch/2 Birds split is superior.

Too Many 1-toughness creatures? - The list has a whopping 15 1-toughness creatures. For reference, I typically play 10, and regard this as one of the biggest weaknesses of omitting Deathrite Shaman from Punishing Maverick. Cards like Zealous Persecution, Golgari Charm, Marsh Casualties, Umezawa's Jitte, Liliana, the Last Hope, and more can be crippling to such a creature base. Ethan clearly doesn't share this concern, and maybe he's correct that the benefits of these creatures outweigh their vulnerability.

Maverick in GP Vegas Side Events

After a lacking 3-4 drop performance playing Punishing Zoo in the GP main event, I decided I would try my luck playing Maverick in side events for the rest of the week. There were several Legacy "Double-Up" events scheduled, which were capped at 4 rounds, run at Regular REL, and awarded prize wall tickets based on record. I was determined to craft a 75 for my first Double-Up on Friday afternoon that would have good matchups VS Burn and BR Griselbrand, which had been incredibly popular strategies in the main event. This motive led me to play GWb Maverick for the first time in around one year. Here is the list I came up with:

GWb Maverick, 6/16/17
Creature Spells (26) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Deathrite Shaman 2x Noble Hierarch 3x Stoneforge Mystic 3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben 2x Qasali Pridemage 2x Scavenging Ooze 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 4x Knight of the Reliquary 1x Courser of Kruphix	Noncreature Spells (12) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Fire and Ice 1x Batterskull
Lands (22) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Verdant Catacombs 3x Savannah 1x Bayou 1x Scrubland 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 1x Gaea's Cradle 1x Karakas 1x Horizon Canopy 4x Wasteland	SB: 3x Surgical Extraction SB: 3x Thoughtseize SB: 2x Zealous Persecuion SB: 1x Enlightened Tutor SB: 1x Grafdigger's Cage SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker  SB: 1x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Path to Exile

I don't have much to say about the list, but I just want to bring attention to one card: Courser of Kruphix. While not flashy its a powerful advantage engine in long games. However, in the pre-Top banning meta Courser was incredibly bad against Wear / Tear out of Miracles, to the point that I deemed it uplayable. With Miracles significantly diminished I believe this card is a very viable option for a supplemental 3-drop once again. Tireless Tracker and Renegade Rallier have legs in this slot as well, but I don't own and haven't tested either of those cards yet.

My matches in this event went as follows:

Round 1: BUG Aluren (2-1)
Round 2: BUG Depths (2-1)
Round 3: A.N.T. (2-0)
Round 4: BR Griselbrand (2-1)

I offered a split to my Round 4 opponent but he wanted to play it out for more tix, so winning that round gave me the added satisfaction of being a "dream crusher". While rusty with GWb Maverick I think I played OK overall. Resting on the laurels of my 4-0, I was content to play Punishing Maverick in the next Legacy Double-Up on Saturday, combo decks be damned.

Punishing Maverick, 6/17/17
Creature Spells (21) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Noble Hierarch 1x Birds of Paradise 2x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 2x Scavenging Ooze 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 4x Knight of the Reliquary 1x Courser of Kruphix	Noncreature Spells (14) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 3x Punishing Fire 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Feast and Famine
Lands (25) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 3x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Plateau 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Thespian's Stage 1x Dark Depths	SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 2x Pyroblast SB: 2x Crop Rotation SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 2x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Wear / Tear SB: 1x Always Watching SB: 1x Sudden Demise

This list incorporated several new cards I wanted to test:

• Wear / Tear: I recently tried this card out in Zoo as a Disenchant-type effect to supplement Qasali Pridemage and Reclamation Sage. While those are great cards and can be tutored with GSZ, they can be a bit inefficient so I saw the need for cheaper interaction. Krosan Grip and Ancient Grudge were considered but Wear / Tear is the most flexible overall.

• Sudden Demise: Sweepers can be awkward to slot into Maverick due to its creature-heavy nature but are very useful to have in some matchups where your spot removal isn't efficient enough or is taxed too heavily.  I've played Electrickery and Fiery Justice in this role before but am exploring Sudden Demise since it minimally impacts your own board in many situations due to its selective nature and is particularly potent VS multi-colored Leovold decks. Unfortunately, there is still no efficient Red sweeper that kills True-Name Nemesis.

• Always Watching: This is interesting technology a friend was thinking of trying in Bant Deathblade. Its well-suited to a Maverick deck since the anthem effect reduces your exposure to -1/-1 effects, and Vigilance pairs nicely with all your creatures with tap abilities. I put this card in the SB slot I typically reserve for a grindy Planeswalker as it has applications VS similar decks including Stoneblade, Shardless, Czech Pile, Death & Taxes, and Lands.

• Sword of Feast and Famine: I have played this card in Maverick sporadically over the years, and eventually concluded there was no reason to play it over Sword of Fire and Ice or Sword of Light and Shadow in a Miracles-dominated meta. Now that Miracles is diminished it may have a chance to shine again, but after playing it regularly in Stoneblade decks over the last month I'm still struggling to justify running it as the Sword of choice.

My matches in this second event went as follows:

T.E.S. (1-2)
Ur Omni-Tell (2-1)
Omni-Sneak (2-1)
Death & Taxes (2-0)

I ended up playing against a bunch of combo decks anyway, but managed to triumph over two of them and only narrowly lost to the third. Wear / Tear was great VS Death & Taxes and Omni-Sneak (got to pick off a Lotus Petal). I only brought Always Watching in against D&T but unfortunately never drew it.

This event brought my final record with Maverick decks over the weekend to 7-1 with 1400 tix worth of winnings, which I was able to convert into about $250 of cash via "alternative channels". Maverick is the greatest after all.

Bant Maverick Update

Last week I decided to sleeve up a Bant Maverick deck again for the first time in years. After playing some Modern recently I just wanted to Geist people out.

I crafted a pretty stock list with no Brainstorms, but went off the deep end with the 2 flex slots, playing a Dromoka's Command and an Elspeth Knight-Errant. While Dromoka's Command was a sweet blowout against Burn, I realized playing some anti-combo Blue cards maindeck was a luxury I could afford.

I changed the 2 flex slots into Spell Pierces and took the deck to a Dual land tournament the next day, going 3-3 (Wins: BUG Control, UR Stax, Grixis Delver. Losses: GWb Maverick, Omni-Sneak, Miracles).

While I got to Geist some people out which was awesome, the reality is time has not been kind to my angel-toting friend. A relentless string of widely adopted printings have eroded Geist's playability in Legacy to the point that it is all but obsolete. These include:
True-Name Nemesis
Council's Judgment
Gurmag Angler
Monastery Mentor
Thought-Knot Seer, Reality Smasher, etc.
Leovold, Emissary of Trest
...and more I probably forgot.

Geist may still find its way into my decks once in a while, but its competitive time over. Ironically, one recent printing looks like a perfect replacement for Geist even in this deck.

As soon as I saw Spell Queller spoiled I practically screamed "BANT MAVERICK!!!":

• Can be protected by Mother of Runes to negate its drawback
• Maindeckable combo interaction that's still relevant in fair matchups
• Flying, 3-toughness body is great with Equips & Exalted

After the Dual land event I decided to get my hands on some Spell Qullers and simply swap the 3 Geists for them. Here is the list:

Bant Maverick, 2/27/17
Creature Spells (23) 4x Mother of Runes 4x Noble Hierarch 2x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 2x Scavenging Ooze 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 3x Spell Queller 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (14) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 2x Spell Pierce 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Fire and Ice 1x Sword of Light and Shadow
Lands (23) 4x Windswept Heath 4x Misty Rainforest 3x Savannah 2x Tropical Island 1x Tundra 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 1x Gaea's Cradle 1x Karakas 4x Wasteland	SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 1x Grafdigger's Cage SB: 1x Swan Song SB: 1x Negate SB: 1x Path to Exile SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Pithing Needle SB: 1x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Winter Orb SB: 1x Enlightened Tutor SB: 1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant SB: 1x Council's Judgment

One way to look at this deck is as a stock GWb list with 3 Quellers and 2 Pierces replacing 4 Thalia and the 5th mana dork. A land in the manabase I miss a lot when playing Punishing Maverick is Gaea's Cradle-the card is insane in Maverick decks, and makes the 2nd Ooze and 2nd Sword very appealing. I'd also like to point out another card I used to play in Bant Maverick that got upgraded: Envelop. Invasive Surgery is now a strictly better option. However, I'm currently on the more versatile Swan Song in this slot. Very much looking forward to playing and refining this list more.

Tournament Report: Top8 @ Winter 1K with Punishing Maverick, 1/28/17

I ventured up to the frozen wastes of Southern Maine this weekend to sling old pieces of cardboard.

Here is the list I played:

Punishing Maverick, 1/28/17
Creature Spells (21) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Noble Hierarch 1x Birds of Paradise 3x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 2x Scavenging Ooze 1x Gaddock Teeg 1x Scryb Ranger 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (14) 4x Green Sun's Zenith 4x Swords to Plowshares 3x Punishing Fire 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Batterskull
Lands (25) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 3x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Plateau 1x Forest 1x Plains 1x Dryad Arbor 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Thespian's Stage 1x Dark Depths	SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 2x Pyroblast SB: 2x Crop Rotation SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Pithing Needle SB: 1x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Sword of Fire and Ice SB: 1x Garruk Relentless SB: 1x Council's Judgment

A few comments on the direction of the list:

• Lately I've been playing without Deathrite Shaman and haven't really missed it. Despite the versatility of Deathrite Shaman I always find myself coming back to Noble Hierarch due its its consistency as a mana creature. The surge in BR Reanimator may make this shift look foolhardy, but in testing the matchup Deathrite Shaman had almost zero impact even turn 1 on the play, either because they had a Chancellor reveal or turn 1 fatty. The expected uptick in TNN after GP Louisville could mean more x/1 hate in sideboards which is very good against mono-1 toughness mana dorks, but I think people already have this hate due to the presence of Death & Taxes and Young Pyromancer.

• I think Pyroblast is well-positioned right now due to the presence of Show & Tell, Leovold, TNN, and Miracles. Council's Judgment is another card that has utility against the same decks. Also, it is worth noting that classic Sneak & Show has emerged as the dominant variant of S& T in the post-GP Louisville meta, which is great news for Maverick since Omniscience-based S&T is one of our worst matchups.

• Dark Depths is also relevant against the many TNN decks as it allows you to "go over the top" of those decks if you can't interact with TNN. It looks strong against the GP Louisville winning True-Name BUG deck in particular. Another route to try would be maindeck Sword of Fire and Ice instead of Dark Depths. This would also greatly improve game 1 against Miracles.

• Horizon Canopy hasn't been doing it for me lately in this deck. Cycling is good, but the damage it inflicts as well and the cost of losing a land (I'd often have Canopy out but wouldn't cycle it because I needed the mana) are relevant factors. I almost never searched for Canopy with Knight, but there were plenty of spots I wanted to search for a 3rd Savannah. 

There were 38 players at the event, so it would be 6 rounds with a cut to Top8. Here is how my swiss rounds went:

Round 1: Death & Taxes (2-0)
In both games I had a good mix of interaction and threats while my opponent flooded. I made a few blatant misplays (I'm often rusty during round 1 in the morning) but didn't really get punished for them.

Round 2: Burn: (2-0)
Game 1 was tight but I managed to get a sizeable Knight and Ooze in play while my opponent ran out of gas. I took an interesting line using Knight for mana to Zenith out Teeg instead of attacking with it one turn to cut off Fireblast as a draw for him. Game 2 my opponent had a somewhat slow hand and I had lots of good plays: turn 1 Hierarch (Bolted) into turn 2 Hierarch + Plow his creature into turn 3 QPM away his Vortex (waiting for him to take 2 of course). I landed SFM and + Jitte and got 2 counters, which trumped his Ensnaring Bridge.

Round 3: Mono-G Cloudpost (2-1)
I quickly died game 1 to Needle on Wasteland + Ugin despite having a turn 2 Knight backed up by another Knight. Candelabra is a hell of a card. Games 2 and 3 my opponent foundered in the face of Wasteland + Exalted beats.

Round 4: Miracles (0-2)
Game 1 he was on a mulligan and after some turn 3 Batterskull beatdowns he stabilized and I was inundated by his threats. Somehow I managed to fight through multiple Mentors and Angel tokens with Punishing Fire and Jitte. I ran out of gas though and succumbed to Jace. Game 2 I was on a 5 card hand that quickly lost to Counterbalance backed up by Mentor. This matchup is gross.

Round 5 RGu Lands (2-0)
I had great tools for the matchup in both games: multiple Knights in game 1 and Knight and Ooze in game 2.

Round 6: ID

The meta had a ton of Burn and BUG variants (Shardless, Team America, Aluren, TNN, etc.), with only 3 Miracles decks and 0 Eldrazi decks. The super interesting Top8 was:

My short-lived Top8 ended in the Quarterfinal vs RG Lands (0-2). I had anemic draws in both games that couldn't get it done. The final would be Lands vs Miracles 1 with Miracles 1 taking it down.

Overall, the event was solid: would drive 2 hours to Maine for Legacy again.

DECK: Punishing Maverick, 1/8/17

This is the latest Punishing Maverick list I'm tinkering with:

Creatures

Noncreatures

Lands

Sideboard & Tokens

Imgur Album with full-size images

Tournament Report: 11th @ SCG Worcester with Punishing Maverick, 7/9/16

Playing Legacy at the DCU Center in Worcester is something I look forward to all year. However, during the week leading up the event I began to have serious doubts about playing Punishing Maverick as originally planned. I thought maybe I should just play GWb Maverick, or even a different archetype altogether. I actually played Zoo at FNM the night before, and went to sleep still undecided.

When I woke up on Saturday morning I decided to stick with Punishing Maverick. I had faced this same dilemma before GP New Jersey in 2014: I chose to play GWb Maverick at that event even though I wanted to play Punishing Maverick, and ended up regretting it. While Punishing Maverick isn't the best deck choice objectively, I concluded it was the best deck choice for me. I tried out a few different things with the list recently but ultimately settled on something very similar to what I played at EE4:

PUNISHING MAVERICK, 7/9/16
Creature Spells (21) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Deathrite Shaman 1x Birds of Paradise 1x Noble Hierarch 3x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 1x Scavenging Ooze 1x Scryb Ranger 1x Gaddock Teeg 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (14) 4x Swords to Plowshares 4x Green Sun's Zenith 3x Punishing Fire 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Batterskull
Lands (25) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 2x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Bayou 1x Plateau 1x Dryad Arbor 1x Forest 1x Plains 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Thespian's Stage 1x Dark Depths	SB: 3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 1x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Scavenging Ooze SB: 1x Crop Rotation SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Krosan Grip SB: 1x Winter Orb SB: 1x Fiery Justice

I finished sleeving up the deck at home, and when I got to the site I completed the deck registration without any hesitation. My primary goal at that point was to make it to Day 2.


Day 1

Round 1 - Canadian Thresh (2-1)
Game 1: I had good spells but was too light on mana to get things going.
Games 2 & 3: Scavenging Ooze did a lot of work in conjunction with removal.

Round 2 - Merfolk (2-1)
Game 1: Turned into a race. I appeared ahead but made a serious blunder by forgetting to give a Knight Protection before attacking one turn, and fell behind to multiple True-Name Nemeses.
Game 2: A quick affair with Scryb Ranger + Jitte.
Game 3: I had removal to keep his creatures at bay but no pressure, and time in the round was running out. I drew Stage and went on the Depths plan, managing to untap with a Knight and fade Submerge to kill him with Marit Lage.

Round 3 - RG Lands (2-0)
Game 1: My opponent this round appeared quite nervous, which was possibly adversely affecting his play. Despite having an active Loam and Exploration, he was never able to interact in a way that could protect his combo from my toolboxing Knight. Eventually I made my own Marit Lage at the end of his turn by copying his Depths with my Stage, and on my turn Wasted his Maze and bounced his Marit Lage with Karakas to swing for lethal.
Game 2: I had a solid hand with Hierarch, Rec. Sage, and Crop Rotation. He stalled as I Stone Rained his Mox and then bricked on Loam for a turn. He played out a Depths, which I copied with my Stage off Crop Rotation to kill him with Marit Lage again.

Round 4 - Eldrazi (2-0)
Game 1: Ended quickly after I untapped with a large Knight and drew Thespian's Stage.
Game 2: My opponent kept a slow hand with Leyline of the Void, a classic mistake in this matchup. I got out a turn 2 Knight, and drawing Stage again, decided to go for the combo. He cast All is Dust to destroy my board, and while I could tutor Depths up in response, I only had one other land so I couldn't make Marit Lage that turn after All is Dust resolved. I still felt confident, as I basically just had to draw a land before he stuck Pithing Needle (if it was in his 75), got Endbringer on-line, or killed me with running Reality Smashers. I drew a land on my next draw step to kill him with Marit Lage.

Round 5 - UB Reanimator (2-0)
Game 1: On the play my opponent had an explosive opening hand that cost almost all his cards to put Griselbrand into play. Fortunately, I had Karakas in my opener, which was a total blowout. I continued to develop my board as he dug for more action. He managed to put Grave Titan into play, but his life total was too low to survive Mother of Runes + attacker.
Game 2: He appeared to be in a lot of trouble after I Wasted his only land with a turn 2 Knight. He was able to put Tidespout Tyrant into play but by then I had a sizeable board presence including a Mother. The turn after he tapped out to Reanimate Tyrant I chose to cast another Knight instead of Thalia, which turned out to be a huge mistake. He had been stockpiling spells in hand and was started to go to work bouncing my board. Mother of Runes proved to be a hindrance to this plan however, and I was able to continuously keep enough things in play to pressure him, eventually swinging past his Tyrant for lethal.

Round 6 - Grixis Delver (2-0)
Game 1: Involved a drawn-out fight over Punishing Fire with multiple opposing Deathrite Shamans. He was able to get rid of the first one but I drew another and he conceded shortly after if I remember correctly.
Game 2: I resolved an early Stoneforge for Batterskull with Mother of Runes protection. I made a sloppy play by leaving the activation up to use on his end step. After seeing Cabal Therapy in game 1 I wasn't very afraid of Stifle, and figured if he had a Grudge it would be better to force him to use all of his two mana on that turn to cast it. After the match he told me he had a Clique but needed to find a 3rd land that turn. Had he found it I might have been in trouble.

Round 7 - Death & Taxes (2-0) @ Table #1
Game 1: A confusing affair with clogged board states on both sides, but he didn't have the tools to stave off my large Knights.
Game 2: My opponent resolved Rest in Peace but didn't have a lot of action and I was able to get the beats going with a motely crew that included Legacy all-stars Squire (formerly a Deathrite Shaman) and Grizzly Bear (formerly a Scavenging Ooze). Batterskull and Qasali Pridemage joined the party to finish him off.

Round 8 - Dredge (2-1)
Game 1: My opponent was on five cards with no lands, and I had a relatively quick Marit Lage to end things, despite chump-blocking Narcomoebas.
Game 2: He had an explosive draw that put nine Zombies and Iona into play on his second turn against my lone Deathrite Shaman.
Game 3: I had Surgical and Crop Rotation in my opening hand. He went all in after I used Surgical on Narcomoeba, resulting in about 3/4 of his Library getting savagely blown out by Bojuka Bog. A follow-up Scavenging Ooze sealed his fate.

Round 9 - Shardless BUG (1-1)
After playing two grindy games we couldn't finish the third. I think we both played at a reasonable pace so it couldn't really be helped. Props to Marit Lage for taking down game 1.

I finished Day 1 in 3rd place with an 8-0-1 record.


Day 2

Round 10 - Eldrazi (1-1)
Game 1: An extremely drawn-out affair where I was able to get huge Knights in play but was at too low of a life total to make safe attacks into his horde (my kingdom for Kessig Wolf Run). Eventually he got Endbringer on-line, but conceded once I had Marit Lage and three 14/14 Knights.
Game 2: I couldn't hang on after my Germ had to chump-block Reality Smasher and he kept me off mana to equip Batterskull to my Knight. We just finished resolving mulligans for game 3 when time was called. A judge was at our table and ended the match in a draw since we hadn't started yet. I could have messed up here by not being aggressive enough to finish the first game in a timely manner.

Round 11 - Lands (1-2)
This was an extremely swingy match that ended in about ten minutes.
Game 1: My opponent had a fast Marit Lage I couldn't answer.
Game 2: He led with a tapped Tranquil Thicket against my Deathrite into Thalia + Wasteland.
Game 3: He had a fast combo I couldn't answer again. So it goes. I was honestly relieved this one ended relatively painlessly considering how grindy this matchup can be.

Round 12 - BR Reanimator (2-1)
Game 1: I mulliganed to five and was facing down Sire of Insanity and Griselbrand on his first or second turn. I scooped up all my cards instead of discarding my hand.
Game 2: I got multiple Deathrite Shamans active that he couldn't seem to deal with.
Game 3: I had Surgical and Bog in my opening hand. He had an Unmask on his second turn so I had to use Surgical on a Thoughtseize he discarded to Faitless Looting. I got to check out his deck and saw that Massacre was his only way of killing my creatures, and also saw his hand was light on action. I was able to keep him pinned on mana while building towards a Depths kill with Knight, all while playing around Massacre by using a Hierarch for White.

Round 13 - UG Infect (1-2)
Game 1: Don't remember well, but I died pretty quickly.
Game 2: I had a removal heavy draw that lined up well against his threat light draw.
Game 3: I kept a hand with a Krosan Grip and Punishing Fire for interaction. He ran out an Inkmoth pretty early, so I comitted to leaving up Grip mana to get rid of it. Unfortunately, I was a bit light on mana, and he was unwilling to activate Inkmoth into my open mana (could he have gotten a read on Grip?), resulting in huge tempo losses for me as I was barely developing my board. Eventually he ran out a Corrupter and when I passed my following turn he Crop Rotated away his Inkmoth. He untapped and attacked confidently with his Corrupter. At zero poison and with Fire still in hand I declared no blocks. He had Invogorate + Vines + Berserk to kill me real good through it.

Round 14 - UG Infect (2-1)
Game 1: Felt the same as the first game of last round.
Game 2: A weird one, but I was never put under much pressure and was able to find a path to victory.
Game 3: I had a very strong draw and my opponent had a few stumbles.

Round 15 - Miracles (2-1)
Game 1: My opponent led on Volcanic and Ponder, and missed his next land drop. I assumed he was on Grixis Delver. However, he discarded a Terminus to hand size, making my board of Mother of Runes and Birds of Paradise look pretty embarrassing. He wiped my board with a Terminus and I conceded to the follow-up Mentor. I couldn't believe the irony of dodging Miracles all weekend only to finally face it in the most crucial match.
Game 2: I established an early board of Mother, Thalia and G. Teeg. My heart sunk when he cast a Preordain, suggesting he was on an aggressive build with four Mentors and no Jaces, which requires a different sideboard plan (Gaddock Teeg is noticeably worse against this version). Surely enough, he landed a Mentor and was poised to go crazy on his next turn but I had Fiery Justice right on time. He had 3 monks left but they were ineffective in the face of Thalia + Mother and he conceded.
Game 3: This one swung back and forth until we were both playing draw-go with piles of lands out. It was one of the last games happening so a large crowd was beginning to gather around us. He got Mentor going and it looked like that was it for me. However, Dark Depths rolled off the top of my library, and with my Stage already in play he was suddenly facing lethal next turn. He attacked with everything and I went down to four after being forced to make Marit Lage to block. On my turn he had a Vendilion Clique to attempt a block, but Punishing Fire paved the way for Marit Lage to reduce his life total to zero. What a way to end the event!

Final Record: 11-2-2


My record turned out to be good for 11th place. After my rough start during the first two rounds of Day 2, I thought Top 8 had already slipped out of reach for me. As it turned out, I came incredibly close-one more win could have put me in a position to make it.

The words from this post I wrote a few weeks ago regarding deck choices in Legacy turned out to be weirdly prophetic. I'll be honest: I'm a mediocre Magic player. In hindsight, it was my intimacy with the deck and the Legacy metagame, plus a healthy dose of luck, that enabled me to achieve this result. As friends and acquaintances repeatedly expressed their surprise (and congratulations) at how well I was performing throughout the event, I could only say one thing to explain it: "I'm just playing cards I like".

My deck got a shout-out in this article, check it out!

DECK: Punishing Maverick, 7/3/16

I'm continuing to test Maverick in preparation for the SCG Legacy Open in Worcester this coming Saturday. I sleeved up GWb Maverick for a few events, but was pretty unsatisfied with it overall, so I'm going back to Punishing Maverick. Punishing Maverick is probably a "worse" deck, but suits me much better, which is ultimately quite important.

This time around, I've decided to try dropping the maindeck Loam and Dark Depths combo to play a 4th Wasteland and a full Equipment package of 3 SFM + 1 Jitte + 1 Sword + 1 Batterskull. The Loam was ok, but never quite pulled its weight. One reason I decided to play Loam was to have the ability to buy back the Dark Depths combo, but this situation never arose in the many games I played with it. While Dark Depths has been great, I sometimes miss having all 4 Wastelands.

In the sideboard I'm trying Xenagos, the Reveler in place of Garruk Relentless. I'll definitely play Garruk at Worcester, but Xenagos might not be terrible. Another card I'm trying is Winter Orb, which I've never played before. It looks solid against unfavorable matchups like Miracles, Lands, and Cloudpost while fitting into an E-Tutor package.

Creature Spells

Noncreature Spells

Lands

Sideboard

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Tournament Report: Eternal Extravaganza 4 with Punishing Maverick, 6/18/16

I'd been looking forward to this event since it was first announced months ago. When the date for the U.S. Legacy GP was fixed to be the weekend immediately before EE4, at first I thought I would go to the GP instead. However, I settled on going to EE4 since it was only a ~5 hour drive away. As things happened, our group reached the hotel at 2AM after a 7 hour drive plagued with traffic and other mishaps. I wasn't as rested as I wanted but still arrived at the venue later that morning eager to put the Punishing Maverick deck I'd been honing for weeks to the test. The well-used, A/C-less hall coupled with 90 degree heat outside promised some level of discomfort, but everyone was happy to be there playing Legacy. The event had ~320 players so it was going to be the full 9 rounds. Here is the 75 I registered:

PUNISHING MAVERICK, 6/18/16
Creature Spells (20) 4x Mother of Runes 3x Deathrite Shaman 1x Birds of Paradise 1x Noble Hierarch 2x Stoneforge Mystic 2x Qasali Pridemage 1x Scavenging Ooze 1x Scryb Ranger 1x Gaddock Teeg 4x Knight of the Reliquary	Noncreature Spells (15) 4x Swords to Plowshares 4x Green Sun's Zenith 3x Punishing Fire 1x Life from the Loam 1x Sylvan Library 1x Umezawa's Jitte 1x Sword of Fire and Ice
Lands (25) 4x Windswept Heath 3x Wooded Foothills 2x Savannah 2x Taiga 1x Bayou 1x Plateau 1x Dryad Arbor 1x Forest 1x Plains 3x Grove of the Burnwillows 1x Karakas 3x Wasteland 1x Thespian's Stage 1x Dark Depths	SB: 3x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben SB: 2x Surgical Extraction SB: 1x Ethersworn Canonist SB: 1x Gaddock Teeg SB: 1x Phyrexian Revoker SB: 1x Reclamation Sage SB: 1x Scavenging Ooze SB: 1x Crop Rotation SB: 1x Bojuka Bog SB: 1x Krosan Grip SB: 1x Garruk Relentless SB: 1x Fiery Justice

After testing without Dark Depths a little, I quickly went back to it and continue to maintain its a strong choice for most builds of Maverick. Another tweak I made in the manabase was dropping the Horizon Canopy for a basic Plains, which I've been satisfied with so far.

For the Equipment package, I decided to go with 2 SFM + Jitte + Sword despite my preference for 3 SFM + Jitte + Batterskull. I thought a Sword was better positioned against Miracles and Shardless and wasn't expecting a whole lot of Delver decks. Its also worth noting that Batterskull isn't the slam dunk it used to be against the predominant Grixis Delver game 1 now that maindeck Therapies have become common.

Round 1: UG Infect (0-2)
My opponent is a known Infect player, so I kept a hand on the play with a turn 2 Jitte. Jitte is quite strong against Infect and in game 1 they have no way of removing it. Unfortunately, my Jitte got countered by Force of Will. I realized I had overlooked a crucial component of my opening hand: Gaddock Teeg. Since my opponent led on Noble Hierarch I could not die on turn 2. Therefore, the superior play would have been to lead on Gaddock Teeg before casting Jitte, which at that point would be both Force and Daze proof. I would also have the mana to equip it the same turn and start attacking. As it turned out, I drew no more interaction and died pretty quickly.
Game 2 I had a solid interactive draw and felt poised to take over the game, but my opponent Brainstormed into Invigorate + Berserk to kill me with his last threat a turn before I could get Jitte going.

Round 2: Grixis Painter (2-0)
These games were pretty similar. My opponent was digging a lot with Top and cantrips but never seemed find what he needed in the face of my hodge-podge of creatures and removal.

Round 3: Esper Deathblade (2-1)
Game 1 was a grindfest and my opponent eventually got the better of it after landing Jace and protecting it for several turns.
Game 2 I blew up his hand with a Wasteland and quickly ended the game with Exalted beats.
Game 3 I was on a mulligan but could present a relatively quick Marit Lage that he wasn't able to answer.

Round 4: Death & Taxes (1-1)
I played too slowly and conservatively this round, resulting in a draw in turns despite me being overwhelmingly favored to win game 3.

Round 5: ANT (1-2)
Game 1 my opponent had to sweat it on Ad Nauseam flips after 2 life and 1 life, but found what he needed to get there.
Game 2 I mulliganed to a hand with a turn 2 Knight and a Wasteland as my only potential interaction. I managed to fade a turn 2 kill and destroyed both his lands.
Game 3 I had a promising mulligan to 5 with Mother into Revoker, but it was blown up by Dread of Night into Chain of Vapor into Tendrils for 20.

Round 6: Esper Control (2-0)
My opponent is someone I'm familiar with from Massachsetts. I know he's on an Esper Control brew (Planeswalkers, Painful Truths, Vindicates, no Stoneforge Mystic or True-Name Nemesis) that lines up very poorly against my deck based on our previous matches. This time is no different.

Round 7: Miracles (2-1)
Game 1 he gets Mentor + double Top going and I die to a swarm of Monks a turn before I can make Marit Lage to swing for lethal.
Game 2 on a mulligan I have a quick Marit Lage he can't answer.
Game 3 he has Top into Counterbalance, but I'm able to resolve Scryb Ranger and Stoneforge Mystic for Jitte after seeing a Mentor floating around. He gets aggressive with Mentor and I go down to 2 life, but Scryb Ranger + Jitte is able to decimate all his Monks. We end extra turns with no clear conclusion and I'm prepared to draw, but my opponent decides to concede and drop.

Round 8: Gw Cloudpost (0-2)
Once again I know what my opponent is on, and keep a hand with a potential turn 2 Knight. Unfortunately, no lands are fetched so my Deathrite Shaman-turned-Squire is unable to bring my hand together. Without another land I decide to spend my second turn Zenithing for Noble Hierarch only to have Thought-Knot Seer exile my Knight, totally blowing up my game plan. I was able to strap on both my Equipments to my Squire and get some pressure going, but he resolved Primeval Titan, with Glimmerposts and my Plow giving him enough time to resolve Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger.
Game 2 I have a mulligan with a Wasteland. I use it on his Ancient Tomb instead of Savannah, and  savagely topdeck my Loam next turn. I go after his tapped Cloudpost but get blown out by Crop Rotation. Oops. He resolves Rest in Peace on his next turn, and is quickly able to demonstrate an infinite turn loop.

At this point I am out of prize contention and in a zombie-like state from exhaustion so I drop.


Final Record: 4-3-1

While not the best result, I feel good about the deck, which was limited not by its power but by my poor play in several spots. Looking ahead, I am hoping to attend SCG Worcester in July. At this point I will probably just hold course and play some kind of Maverick deck.

DECK: Punishing Maverick, 5/22/16

I have a few bigger events coming up this Summer and I'm strongly considering playing some kind of Punishing Maverick deck, so I've been playing the it extensively for the last few weeks. I tried to come up with a build that had game against Miracles, Shardless BUG, Lands, and Eldrazi. This pile was the result:

Creature Spells

Noncreature Spells

Lands

Sideboard

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The list felt pretty good overall. I'm still on the fence about whether Deathrite Shaman should be played in Punishing Maverick. I do often miss the cleaner manabase of a pure Naya version with a basic Plains, and the intermittent mana production of Deathrite Shaman can sometimes be a liability in a deck that wants to make a lot of mana. However, Deathrite's sheer versatility as a hedge against random stuff can't be ignored and is probably best for a large, unknown meta.