Ugh. I just went into a fairly big tournament feeling pretty confident with all my matchups but ramp.
1st round. Conley Wood's Junk Ramp. I get rolled. Unfortunately this puts me in the bracket with all the other ramp decks in the tournament that are getting beaten so I verse ramp 2nd and 3rd round and get beaten both times.
It's such a coin toss. You either get the nuts aggro start or you lose. And even then, Wolf Run White and Junk Ramp are running DoJ.
I'm just finding this matchup so difficult.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Temporarily retired from the game
Thanks a bunch to Rivenor from Miraculous Recovery Signatures for the awesome sigpic!
It is a horrible matchup for sure. You have to get pretty lucky to avoid bad matchups all day in order to win a tournament. What cards do you have in your SB for the ramp matchup? I have found Thalia and Manabarbs to be particularly effective in getting wins vs the various Wolfrun Matchups.
Zealous Conscripts is probably the best card in Pod decks against Ramp. If you can knock them down to below 10 you basically win if you find a Conscripts because it deals 9 damage by stealing Titan or Elesh Norn (it gets even better if they drop an Inferno Titan), and they don't really run instant speed answers ... they just need to hope they left Inkmoths up to chump with. The difficulty is getting the early damage in. Hero of Bladehold is resilient to red sweepers, and Divine Deflection can be pretty huge after boards ... saving a crucial beater or two from a Slagstorm and burning them for a few points makes your Conscripts endgame way easier to win with.
The matchup is definitely winnable. You need to get a little lucky in that your deck probably is composed of 60% or more cards that they can deal with easily or don't care about period, so you can't keep hands that have nothing but mana dorks and Blade Splicers and expect to get there, but the cards you have that are actually good against Wolf Run are very good indeed. If they play conservatively and use sweepers early rather than ramping the Titan out on turn 4, you have more time to set up the big turns that can end the game, and if they go straight for the Titan they risk getting completely blown out by Conscripts. I know I would play carefully around Pod decks if I was playing Wolf Run right now.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Thanks to Gabgabdevo for the awesome sig image!
I'm always looking for foil Madcap Skills and Ghitu Fire-Eater, [trade thread link forthcoming]
If you want to beat Junk Ramp, your best be is to play a different deck. Of all the ramp decks (and of all decks in general), this one is probably our worst matchup. That being said, I think the best strategy for attacking the ramp is early pressure + close the game with Zealous Conscripts. Silverblade Paladin is something I've been using (at the suggestion of a friend) to help apply early pressure. If you can apply enough pressure, then you force them to have a fast titan or lose, and even if they get that titan quickly you still have Zealous Conscripts to finish them off anyway. Don't overextend into sweepers, and use a healthy does of Thalia - though note that on the draw against traditional Wolf Run Ramp, she doesn't do anything. She might still be fine against Junk Ramp on the draw, and she's still great against the Unburial Rites decks and control decks on the draw - and she's good against all of them on the play. Hero of Bladehold is excellent against traditional WRR as well. But to some extent, if you're playing this deck you're banking on dodging ramp. If that doesn't seem like a good bet, I'd switch to a strategy that is naturally stronger against them.
1st round. Conley Wood's Junk Ramp. I get rolled. Unfortunately this puts me in the bracket with all the other ramp decks in the tournament that are getting beaten so I verse ramp 2nd and 3rd round and get beaten both times.
It's such a coin toss. You either get the nuts aggro start or you lose. And even then, Wolf Run White and Junk Ramp are running DoJ.
I'm just finding this matchup so difficult.
Temporarily retired from the game
Thanks a bunch to Rivenor from Miraculous Recovery Signatures for the awesome sigpic!
Rage quit reason of the moment:
Acidic Slime
Sword of Feast and Famine
Karn Liberated
The matchup is definitely winnable. You need to get a little lucky in that your deck probably is composed of 60% or more cards that they can deal with easily or don't care about period, so you can't keep hands that have nothing but mana dorks and Blade Splicers and expect to get there, but the cards you have that are actually good against Wolf Run are very good indeed. If they play conservatively and use sweepers early rather than ramping the Titan out on turn 4, you have more time to set up the big turns that can end the game, and if they go straight for the Titan they risk getting completely blown out by Conscripts. I know I would play carefully around Pod decks if I was playing Wolf Run right now.
Thanks to Gabgabdevo for the awesome sig image!
I'm always looking for foil Madcap Skills and Ghitu Fire-Eater, [trade thread link forthcoming]