RUG Tempo

[The Duressed]

I guess people are interested in what I'm doing with my Nimble Mongooses and my Counterbalances, so here's the list that I'll probably be running on Saturday. Questions and comments are highly appreciated.

4 Delver of Secrets
2 Snapcaster Mage
4 Nimble Mongoose
4 Tarmogoyf

4 Brainstorm
4 Ponder
1 Sensei's Divining Top

4 Lightning Bolt
3 Fire / Ice

4 Force of Will
4 Spell Snare
2 Daze
2 Spell Pierce

4 Volcanic Island
4 Tropical Island
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Flooded Strand
4 Wasteland

Sideboard:
2 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Counterbalance
3 Red Elemental Blast
2 Mind Harness
3 Surgical Extraction
2 Ancient Grudge

A couple thoughts to get you going:

In my opinion, the only reason to continue to play this deck is Nimble Mongoose. He is a ridiculous beating, answers to him are at an all-time low, and decks weak to him are at an all-time high.

Stifle, as you can see, has been cut. It's been clogging hands up for a while now, and I'll be interested to see how the deck plays out without it. It'll be even more interesting to see if people continue to play around it, which I expect they will. I'm not entirely sold on the cut, but I'm willing to try it.

I'm excited to play with Fire / Ice again. That card is probably one of my favorites, since it just does so many things.

I'm light on zoo hate in the board, but I expect that deck to recede even further than it already has.

The Counterbalance plan seems solid. The idea is essentially to board it in against most blue decks (including Storm and Reanimator). It takes up a pretty large number of my sideboard spaces, so it needs to be really good, but I think it might be. We'll see.

[Ivar]

going to guess there are at least 71 more cards, and probably like 16 or so card names lol!! ur list isnt very helpful haha

[The Duressed]

Yeah I'm not really sure what happened there, lol. The forum scooped up my post well before it was ready

[The Duressed]

I'm having a little trouble deciding on a sideboard for my deck. Here's the main I'll be playing:

4 Delver of Secrets
4 Nimble Mongoose
2 Snapcaster Mage
3 Tarmogoyf

4 Brainstorm
3 Ponder
1 Sensei's Divining Top

4 Lightning Bolt
2 Forked Bolt

4 Force of Will
3 Spell Snare
4 Daze
4 Stifle

3 Tropical Island
3 Volcanic Island
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Wasteland

These are the cards I'm pretty certain I want in my sideboard:
3 Counterbalance
2 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Submerge
3 Spell Pierce

I'm having trouble settling on the rest. I'll probably also include 2 Mind Harness, since that card is mega prosauce, but I'm just not quite sure. The meta seems to be filled with random Pox and GWB shenanigans (including a Nic Fit), but I'm just not sure what else needs to be done. Any thoughts?

[JIBBLET]

I heard surgical extraction with tiago is good.

[Pat]

That sideboard looks pretty diverse. It seems very unlikely you'll have to play against dredge. Is there any other matchup you would want to play Surgical Extraction in?

Maybe more Ancient Grudge to destroy all the equipment?

[poggydude]

NO ANCIENT GRUDGE

[The Duressed]

Surgical Extraction is fine, but I'm only playing 2 Snapcasters. Furthermore, Surgical Extraction as a plan against Dredge just doesn't work unless you're playing something like 4 Extraction, 3 Snapcaster. Really I would only play it if I expected a reasonable amount of Reanimator or Loam decks.

[Pat]

ok, I definitely agree with you about Surgical Extraction. It's usually a nice surprise when I see an opponent sideboarded it in against me.

[JIBBLET]

There were a couple of thopter decks I noticed last time, so that was a key component for my reasoning with extraction. Also, stopping the gy things that Landpox/Nic Fit does with extraction could help a lot too. And tiago isn't a must for for the extraction, but it's a nice draw when you need it and have an extraction in the gy already.

[The Duressed]

I'll probably go with 2x Sulfur Elemental, 2x Mind Harness unless someone can convince me otherwise. It's probably devoting a bit too much to Maverick hate given that it doesn't really show up, but Sulfur also messes up the Thopter-Sword plan pretty hard.

I'm not really sure what this deck can board in to salvage the games against Random Janky McBullcrap home-brew decks, though. Any suggestions?

Edit: Maybe Firespout, but that card seems like such a waste against the rest of the meta

[poggydude]

i dont see rug tempo having as hard a time against shitty homebrews as maverick does, what specifically are you worried about?

[The Duressed]

Decks that play lots of reasonably sized creatures, even if they aren't independently very good. Wolfbriar Elemental.

[Pat]

Sulfur Elemental is one of my favorite cards and it's an awesome choice. I feel like it's almost guaranteed to be relevant.

How do you feel about Pyroclasm vs Firespout?

[The Duressed]

I prefer Firespout since it can deal with creatures that have flying -- Delver of Secrets, Vendillion Clique, and, most importantly, Geist of Saint Traft. Furthermore, your own Delvers of Secrets can live through it if you're blowing up a board of Goblins or something.

[Pat]

You made me doubt myself for a second but Pyroclasm totally does kill Delver, Clique, and Geist. There aren't that many 3 toughness creatures so it might be worth it to be able to play the sweeper at 2 mana instead of 3.

Sweeping ground creatures while leaving Delvers alive is solid though.

[poggydude]

i am sooooooo tempted to link the wolfbriar person on facebook to you guys's comments

[The Duressed]

It depends on what you're trying to accomplish, but Firespout totally beats up on Nimble Mongoose though. But good points.