Daily FaB  

Man. I am unexcited about playing into Zen on Talishar. Even running Pankaj's Nuu list that's tech'd specifically for Zen it is such a gnarly match and you can just get blown up out of nowhere it feels like

The biggest problem I see with zen is not that he is unbeatable, but he’s impossible to consistently beat with any deck. This means at a big tournament like the pt, it should converge to a higher zen play rate than we saw even for stronger but more targetable decks in the past.

I can’t exactly work it out this early in the morning, but I wonder if there was a better line on that 1st art of war turn that involved estrike draw, giving go again with the transcend.

Notes: Turn 1: Cool.. Turn 2: Tiger Swipes value is being a 0-4 go again with combo, Shuko trigger, and 3 block. While most want the crazy make a bunch of tiger effect, that's not its goal in this deck Turn 2: Correct blocks, In a longer game where you expect to see the majority of transcend cards you can always Preserve one back. Turn 3: perfect play. Turn 3: Saving the two points of life to block with the Red gustwave is fine, but now you're banking on getting a preserve. I think either play is fine, but it's a coinflip if it's correct. Turn 4: Only play you could really make. Good play. Turn 4: There's the preserve, you made the right call blocking with the red descendant. I don't see the world you block with the Estrike. Here is where I take a different line though. Without knowing what your hand will look like, I would have considered blocking with Stride here. Being able to AOW before Zen really allows you to sculpt better. Depending on what you draw I'll make my comments off that. I also run Mauling Qi as a note, so my decision making isn't perfect for your deck. Turn 5: lmao bink a red bonds. What a play. Your line threatened 25 damage with no equipment usage and a path in arsenal. Obviously insanly good, but ridiculously lucky. I think this is how I would have played that out had I blocked with Stride. I'll assume I sequenced this properly to only be able to play off guaranteed card knowledge. Double transcend putting descendant back on bottom. 2 float. AOW banishing the tiger, and I draw Bonds and Path. 1 float. Pitch to Zen, grabbing descendant. Play Estrike bottoming the other tiger for 6 draw a card. I'll assume the card is a bauble with no pitch value for worst case. Path for go again, transcend, gain a resource, 2 float. Hand is Estrike, Chi, Bonds, Bauble, and a playable descendant in banish. Descendant>Bonds> SWK>Staff pitching Chi- 1 float> estrike for 6 draw a card bottoming the bauble. That's 28 damage, lost stride, and guaranteed an arsenal still in the worst possible case scenario. Now, assuming that draw helps me in anyway it only gets stronger, and I didn't have to pray to the fab gods to draw a Bonds. I wont use your draw up as a reference for what could have been. Turn 5: Good call on an obvious pummel. No block is correct here in my opinion. Toss the Harmony. All good. My comments will return to how you played. Turn 6: Double Bonds here is probably correct under the chokeslam. Turn 6: This is the point in the game where I would need to start evaluating whats left in my deck. More than likely you'll have played a good portion of reds and will draw blues more regularly. (I'm not counting lol) I would see do I need the buff from Shuko more or the Kasaya resource more. You have a guaranteed shuko trigger in your hand/arsenal + Zen + harmony. I would give traverse and hundred winds, or Traverse and Kasaya. Let's assume I give Kasaya for the line I give. Turn 7: Your line presented 14 damage, kept harmony in arsenal, and generated a Zen state. My line goes hundred winds, let it resolve, drop after resolution, pitch to Zen, grab chase, Harmony pitching chi, 2 float, 3 total playable tigers. tiger (shuko), Chase, Tiger, Levels choosing Draw + go again. Under the assumption I draw a chi as you did Staff, and Tiger. That's presenting 18 damage, leaving a tiger in Arsenal and me with Shukos. That Victor is now at 3, or you've taken some of the remaining equipment, or you stripped the last card from their hand and is at 6. If my only threat is a hammer, I'm trying to present as much as possible. Turn 7: Lol at the all reds after my Kasaya comment. Oh well it would be a non-factor.Just hammer, blocking with stride is fine here, but I would like it better if you kept Shukos. Turn 8: The line you ended up taking threatened 16 damage, and left you with a tiger in arsenal. I like this play better if you had done a bit more the turn before. Assuming I blocked with Stride here I think the line I take is more like your original, but I would go pitch to zen, then Descendant (pitch SWK)>Bonds>Tiger>Swipe>Estrike bottoming the other tiger. This keeps the Harmony in Arsenal and still threatens 16. if you still have shukos its 17 with the tiger dealing a ping. At this point you would be stripping the Victor clean almost every turn Turn 8: Yikes what a hand. Now, I'm under the impression Victor shouldn't be holding on to two cards at this point, but that's not the case and let's see. Also, Ykes. Perfectly binks a Golden Son on the first gold to be able to play it with overpower. I don't really have any comments on what you did defensively. I assume I double AOW as well, but I'm not going into all the things that could have been done. Played it right to get what you needed. Turn 8: The line plays itself. Not losing both trounces is kinda wild. I mean you knew you wouldn't lose the second but wild. The last few hands I'm just grouping together. TROM and Wind Chakra are bad. NAA's in Zen are truthfully not great and even some decks have lowered Shifting to 2 because 3 is too hard to pull off. Ancestral Harmony is like the only one that I think should be a must play IMO. Main point is reps. The more you play the more you'll see. Good Game!

I think on the aow turn you go estrike draw, use go again, then estrikes again for max DMG