Flapping My Way to the Top (Misthollow Griffin, I
Choose You!)
Hi, my name is Jeff and I am a Legacy
player. If that sounds like the intro of an AA meeting, it’s probably
because the only MTG I really play is Legacy (Editor – I know about your dirty little Tiny Leaders secret ). To me, no other format has the
great balance between sheer number of viable decks and powerful cards, so why
play anything else?
The Deck
When I heard there was an SCG Open
coming to town, I started looking for a deck to play for the Legacy 5K IQ.
In Legacy, due to the plethora of decks available, I tend to have deck
ADHD and change decks on almost a weekly basis if I’m not preparing for a large
tournament. Combine that with my tendency to play non-mainstream decks and love
of terrible cards (Necromancer’s Stockpile can really be a thing, I swear!), I
fell in love when I saw Jonathan Job’s GP New Jersey Food Chain list.
Main Deck
4 Misthollow Griffin
4 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman
2 Genesis Hydra
2 Vendilion Clique
1 Noble Hierarch
1 Tidespout Tyrant
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
4 Food Chain
4 Brainstorm
3 Manipulate Fate
2 Dig through Time
4 Force of Will
1 Misdirection
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Underground Sea
3 Tropical Island
1 Bayou
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Polluted Delta
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Forest
Sideboard
3 Duress
2 Disfigure
2 Venser, Shaper Savant
2 Leyline of the Void
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Toxic Deluge
1 Abrupt Decay
1 Karakas
Jonathan is generally regarded as the
expert on Food Chain and is well known in the Legacy community for playing and
advancing the deck.
When I first saw the list, the first
thing I noticed was no Fierce Empaths. In my previous experiences with
the deck, it had always felt so awkward as you constantly have try and balance
all the cards that are terrible without Food Chain (Fierce Empath, Aethersnipe,
Grielbrand, Emrakul, etc.) yet somehow get down Food Chain and protect it.
This list with Genesis Hydra streamlined all of that into just the 2
Genesis Hydras, Tidespout Tyrant, and Emrakul.
Another card I noticed it playing was
Dig Through Time. I believe Dig Through Time is particularly powerful in
A+B combo decks, meaning decks that require you to assemble card from set A
with card from set B - think Sneaky Show or Reanimator. Here, Dig Through
Time does a great job of finding the combo piece you’re missing and failing
that, finding plenty of quality cards for you to stay alive.
The third thing I noticed about this
deck was the general tone of the deck. To me, this particular version of
the deck plays more like a mid-range/control deck that happens to have a combo
kill option. Instead of having to rush out the combo and getting
destroyed when it fails, I found that I was actually winning most of my games
merely by grinding my opponent out with recurring Phantom Monsters.
Of course, then there’s the combo.
For those who aren’t familiar with the
Food Chain / Misthollow Griffin interaction, here’s how it works: Food
Chain allows you to exile creatures to get their CMC + 1 in mana of any color
you want with the restriction that it can only be used to cast creature spells.
Each time you exile Misthollow Griffin to Food Chain, you net 1 mana of
any color you want. See where this is going? Once you have your
arbitrarily large amount of mana, you can use it to cast a huge Genesis Hydra
(to get the Tyrant) or the Tidespout Tyrant itself if it’s in your han.
Then you use your cycling Misthollow Griffin to bounce your opponent’s
board. As a finisher, you then bounce your Genesis Hydra, recast it
getting Emrakul out, bounce Emrakul, then cast it to take your extra turn where
you attack for lethal.
Even without going infinite, Food Chain
can be extremely threatening if you have resolved a Manipulate Fate, allowing
you to get all of your exiled Misthollow Griffins onto the field at once.
In addition to that, when you have Food Chain + Misthollow Griffins
together, you can do a variety of tricks such as giving your Misthollow
Griffins vigilance by exiling and recasting them after you attack with the
flock, chump blocking / neutering Batterskull or Umezawa’s Jitte by blocking
then exiling the Misthollow Griffin before damage, or merely saving them all
from sweeper such as Terminus by exiling them in response.
Having only played the deck for about 2
months now, I am by no means an expert on the deck, but I’ll walk through my
thought processes for the changes I made.
Main Deck
4 Misthollow Griffin
4 Baleful Strix
4 Deathrite Shaman
2 Genesis Hydra
2 Vendilion Clique
1 Noble Hierarch
1 Tidespout Tyrant
1 Dimir Charm
4 Food Chain
4 Brainstorm
3 Manipulate Fate
2 Dig through Time
4 Force of Will
1 Misdirection
3 Abrupt Decay
3 Underground Sea
3 Tropical Island
1 Bayou
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Polluted Delta
1 Island
1 Swamp
1 Forest
Sideboard
3 Duress
2 Disfigure
1 Venser, Shaper Savant
2 Relic of Progenitus
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Abrupt Decay
2 Umezawa's Jitte
2 Golgari Charm
As you can see, I was very happy with
Jonathan’s main deck and only changed 1 card - the Emrakul. To me, I felt
the Emrakul was a win more card as once you bounce your opponent’s board with
Tidespout Tyrant, if they don’t concede (say you’re at < 3 life against
Burn), you can continue by recurring your Vendilion Clique until they have only
lands in their hand, then recurring your Baleful Strix until you draw as many
Force of Wills as you want. I was willing to give my opponents 1 turn to
kill me with no board and no spells in order to not have another dead (if you
aren’t going infinite with Food Chain) spell in the deck.
As for the sideboard, I prefer Relic of
Progenius over the Leylines because you can also bring it in against the Tarmogoyf
decks and it conveniently gives you another way to exile Misthollow Griffins
that made it into your yard.
With the banning of Treasure Cruise, I
expected to see the return of many old decks and cards. Golgari Charms
are there to take care of True-Name Nemesis and the Umezawa’s Jittes were for
creature decks like Death & Taxes as well as life gain for the Burn
matchup.
The Tournament
Round 1: Goodspeed, Brendan (Esper Stoneblade)
Game 1: Brendan led off with basic
Island into Scrubland -> Thoughtseize. Wow, I haven’t seen this in a
long time. I managed to cast Manipulate Fate and Food Chain’d out my
flock, but Brendan slowed me down with Lingering Souls. He eventually got
a Batterskull onto his TNN, but I had knocked him low enough on life where my
Griffins + DRS could race and kill him.
-2 Genesis Hydra, -1 Tidespout Tyrant,
-1 Dimir Charm, -1 Forest, +1 Abrupt Decay, +2 Golgari Charm, +2 Umezawa’s
Jitte
*Against decks that are pretty
disruptive like this one I don’t tend to like the full combo. Just making
a bunch of Griffins is usually enough to do the job.
Game 2: From my notes, I Force’d a T1
Thoughtseize, had my DRS StP’d, then went with a flock of Griffins beating him
down.
W (2-0)
Round 2: Baker, Daniel (Shardless BUG)
Game 1: Daniel tries to Thoughseize me
early on, but I Misdirection it back to him and he reveals Misty Rainforest,
Liliana of the Veil, Abrupt Decay, Toxic Deluge, and Tarmogoyf. He
discards the Deluge, likely thinking that I’m on combo and probably regretted
it when I Manipulate Fate later on and overwhelm him with Griffins.
-2 Genesis Hydra, -1 Tidespout Tyrant,
-1 Force of Will, +1 Abrupt Decay, +2 Disfigure, +2 Relic of Progenitus
Game 2: We grind at each other, killing
everything on the board. I Clique him at one point, seeing double Abrupt
Decay, Force of Will, and Ancestral Visions, which means I have to play
carefully to get a Food Chain to stick long enough for me to get Griffins out.
I eventually manage to get double Food Chain and have Misdirection for
his second Abrupt Decay, which let me get the Griffin flock out.
W (2-0)
Round 3: Rodriguez, Christian (RUG Delver)
Game 1: I keep a greedy hand of
Underground Sea, 2x Brainstorm, 2x FoW, Misthollow Griffin, Baleful Strix and
I’m promptly punished the way RUG does to people who are greedy.
-1 Dimir Charm, -1 Misdirection, -2
Genesis Hydra, -1 Tidespout Tyrant, +1 Abrupt Decay, +2 Disfigure, +2 Relic of
Progenitus
Game 2: Christian destroyed me with T1
Delver, Forked Bolt on my Deathrite Shaman, Lightning Bolt on my Baleful Strix,
Stifle for my 3rd land and Force backup for my Food Chain. I don’t feel
as bad as he also had dispatched Jonathan Job earlier in the tournament.
L (0-2)
Round 4: Jimener, Isaac (Burn)
Game 1: Isaac leads off with Arid Mesa
and passes. Ok… I play my land and pass. He fetches a basic
Mountain (uh oh), plays a second Mountain (damnit) and plays Eidolon of the
Great Revel. I eat 2 damage to Abrupt Decay it but he has triple PoP and
burns me out.
-2 Vendilion Clique, -3 Manipulate
Fate, -2 Dig Through Time, +1 Disfigure, +1 Abrupt Decay, +3 Duress, +2
Umezawa’s Jitte
*Clique, Manipulate Fate, and Dig
Through Time are all just too slow. If I’m going to win this matchup, I
need to disrupt and combo or get Jitte online. Raw card advantage won’t
do much for me here.
Game 2: I make sure to fetch out all my
basics, play a fetch land and never play a land for the rest of the game.
I get Umezawa’s Jitte online and he can’t kill me before I get enough
counters onto it to pull out of burn range
-1 Abrupt Decay, +1 Disfigure
*Abrupt Decay can be too slow on the
play vs their fast 1 drops
Game 3: This one is a nailbiter.
He starts burning me down but I also have Deathrite Shaman and disruption
to slow the bleeding. The game stalls with me having a Misthollow Griffin
vs his Eidolon of Great Revels and Vexing Shusher and I’m at 6 life. He
Searing Blazes my Misthollow Griffin twice over the course of two turns without
Landfall then goes for the Fireblast to my face. I have the Misdirection
for the Fireblast to send it back to his Eidolon and I get a Deathrite Shaman
and eventually a Umezawa’s Jitte online before he can finish me.
W (2-1)
Round 5: Vickers, Brandon (BUG Delver)
Game 1: I have plenty of lands and
Strixes, which is what BUG Delver doesn’t want to see. I eventually combo
off after he’s exhausted his hand.
*Same sideboarding a vs Shardless
Game 2: He’s playing the Jim Davis
build and has T1 Delver, T2 Wasteland, Stifle, and the Delver goes the
distance.
Game 3: He has a Tarmogoyf that beats
me up for a while until I get Manipulate + Food Chain and he can’t effectively
attack anymore.
W (2-1)
Round 6: Smolinski, Kenneth (UG Cloudpost)
Ken is a player at my LGS - first one I
faced at the tournament!
Game 1: I counter his spells that let
him ramp too much / find Cloudposts while I get the combo going. He has a
Repeal on my Food Chain to stall for a turn, but can’t kill me before I go off
on my next turn.
-3 Abrupt Decay, -1 Misdirection, +3
Duress, +1 Venser, Shaper Savant
*I boarded out Abrupt Decays since I
think the only thing they have that’s relevant is Candelabras or Expedition
Maps, both of which are terrible to Abrupt Decay. I wasn’t sure if the
list normally runs Phyrexian Revoker or not but I wasn’t going leave them in on
just that chance.
Game 2: I T1 Duress him and of course
he has a Phyrexian Revoker in his hand and me without a Force of Will.
Alright, we’re on Griffin beatdown plan then. He eventually drops a
Primeval Titan, but a timely Vendilion Clique allows me to strip the Emrakul
out of his hand while an earlier Dig Through Time had found me Venser to bounce
his Phyrexian Revoker and I was now free to go off.
W (2-0)
Round 7: Nelson, Erik (UWr Stoneblade)
Erik is a friend and another local
player. We consider IDing here and putting us both in a win-and-in
position next round but ultimately decide that it’s best to just guarantee one
of us into the T8.
Game 1: Erik has a great hand with
Force of Will, Stoneforge Mystic on T2, and True-Name Nemesis on T3. Mine
is just better for a T4 Food Chain kill with protection.
-1 Dimir Charm, -1 Misdirection, -1
Forest, +1 Abrupt Decay, +2 Golgari Charm
Game 2: Erik has another T2 Stoneforge
Mystic, T3 True-Name Nemesis, but I yet again have the T4 Food Chain kill with
protection.
W (2-0)
Round 8: ID into T8
Top 8:
Phillips, Jase (UWR Delver)
Game 1: I slowly start griding him out
with Baleful Strixes and Manipulate Fate but he gets down a True-Name Nemesis
that starts to kill me. I have an active Deathrite Shaman that’s keeping
me alive, but that will only last so long, especially against a red deck.
The key turn comes when he attacks me with the True-Name Nemesis and I’m
at 2 life. I activate Deathrite Shaman to exile a creature and in
response, he casts Lightning Bolt, targeting me. I snap cast the
Misdirection I’ve been holding most of the game and after a brief discussion
with the judges, they confirm for Jase that I can indeed change the target of
his Lightning Bolt to his True-Name Nemesis. Jase can’t recover from that
and I beat him down with a hardcast 4/4 Genesis Hydra.
-2 Genesis Hydra, -1 Tidespout Tyrant,
-1 Misdirection, -1 Dimir Charm, +1 Abrupt Decay, +2 Golgari Charm, +2
Disfigure
Game 2: Jase mulligans to 6 and has T2
Stoneforge Mystic. I ignore it because I have Force of Will + Misthollow
Griffin, Manipulate Fate, and a Food Chain, which goes the distance.
W (2-0)
Top 4: Hebert, Daniel (ANT)
We split in the Top 4, so both Daniel
and Andrew Sullano conceded to Shane Remelt and myself since they had long
drives home and didn’t care about the plaque. I dodged a bullet here!
Top 2:
Remelt, Shane (UWr Miracles)
Shane’s a good friend of mine, but I
wanted the shiny plaque!
Game 1: I get Strixes, Manipulate Fate,
and Griffins online before killing him with the combo.
-1 Misdirection, -1 Forest, +1 Abrupt
Decay, +1 Venser, Shaper Savant
Game 2: Long and grindy the way
Miracles likes it. According to my notes, I have a lone Baleful Strix
that manages to deal 10 damage to Shane, but he eventually grinds me out with
Jace + varying Miracles and I scoop when he Terminuses me leaving me with 0
cards to his billion in hand.
Game 3: This one is pretty quick.
I get out double Baleful Strix and a Deathrite Shaman. While
Shane’s dealing with that, I sculpt my hand for the Food Chain combo kill.
W (2-1)
Thanks for taking the time to read my
rather lengthy tournament report (this one got out of control)!
I’m Esper3k on MTGTheSource, so if
anyone would like to discuss the deck, you can find me there!
Jeff
Jeff
