So without going into deeper analysis, but if you compare Anguished Unmaking to Pulse, the only really important difference is that Unmaking is better tempo wise. Namely the instant vs sorcery aspect. However, if we talk about midrangey/controllish matchups, the most important aspect of the match is definitely not tempo. It is CA and grind. And if you compare both cards again, you will see if you cast Unmkaing your opponent casts effecitvely a free litghtning bolt on you. Life is also a resource. So in that sense, I think Pulse is miles better in that types of matchups your described. I think it mostly does not matter when I take out an opposing PW, they can inevidably activate the PW at least once anyway. (So it shouldn't matter if I do it EOT or in my following turn) There are some cases where it matters, but on average, I think this should not matter.
I totally get the life loss thing, it makes the card a real pain to play and it's a cost that loses me games from time to time. I disagree with the instant/sorcery thing. I often find myself in a situation where I'm very much ahead on board against most of the U/B/x or U/R/x midrange/control decks I run up against- a board of a goyf or a few tokens and a lili or something. In that position I will almost always try and not play more into open mana and force them to make the first move with less information. This means I'm often not tapped out on their turn and if their response to that board state is to put down a jace or gideon or something, I can deal with it and then have mana open on my turn to really twist the screws while they're tapped down. If I'm playing pulse I'd need to take a turn to answer back and those decks tend to win games where that main-phasing back and forth contest develops. So I do think tempo can be pretty important, just not in the conventional rushdown kind of way and specifically against other value-oriented decks.
As far as fulminator goes, I do play three in the board, but I don't think I could justify putting them in the main, whereas Beast slots in to an existing mainboard slot. Ultimately you'd probably want to rely on your deck reliably putting out creatures that make a 3/3 token look pretty harmless rather than pushing, but in matches where they're mostly removing those creatures they're unlikely to have the kind of creatures that you'd want to push, thus giving it some relevance in the matchup. I'm not saying this is a great plan, but I so often end up with a dead push in my hand G1 against jeskai or esper I can see the advantage. Based on that I'm thinking this would make more sense in the fatty abzan style with no bobs and more trackers/rhinos. I agree that in traditional abzan with bob/path it doesn't work so well.
I'd like to ask for people's thoughts on the 3 cost toolbox removal slot.
The widely established choice is Maelstrom Pulse, but there are two other cards I've toyed with recently in Anguished Unmaking and Beast Within
Anguished is instant speed and exiles, but has a slightly trickier mana cost and a steep life cost. I've been playing this one and it's proved game-winningly good a few times where maelstrom pulse would not have dug me out of a hole. Specifically, it can be held up to blow up the big planeswalkers as they come out and other resilient large threats. My meta has a fair amount of controlly-midrange going around so it has perhaps overperformed.
Beast to me seems like a really interesting choice as well in the right build of abzan. Being able to take out lands is becoming more and more relevant given how land dependent the meta is at the moment (tron, humans, 3 colour decks, valakut). Doing it instant speed seems sweet. Giving an opponent a 3/3 isn't great but if you're on the goyf/rhino/fatal push/abrupt decay/finks kind of game that blank it being able to follow up early disruption with an answer to whatever they manage to put together seems great. I'd be curious as to how one might build an abzan deck specifically tailored to let BW shine.
I imagine this is a perennial discussion and maelstrom pulse has seemed to hold the upper hand forever. I'm reluctant to play 3 cost sorcery speed removal against a lot of what I come up against.
plus ~12 removal/disruption between FP/PTE/AD/TS/IoK. ~22 lands
Bear in mind I'm a total rookie, I've followed magic for a long time but it's my first time trying to dig into a competitive format at a competitive level. The above card selections are based around supporting quickly filling the yard and pushing tempo. I've heard advice that in general playing an aggressive strategy is a good way to start, and then ease back on the throttle as you figure out the format and your meta.
Heya guys, I'm working my way towards being an abzan modern player. My goal is rather than just building a deck and playing that, to have playsets of most relevant cards so I can freely switch up my play to keep things fresh, try various different flavours of the deck. To me that's what is appealing about Junk colours, they seem to be able to be played in loads of different ways.
So pursuant to that- I've just completed my playsets of all the core cards noted in the primer (other than liliana, currently have a 2/2 split of veil and hope). Care to share what you think are some of the most important cards these days to keep a set of for tweaks and/or brewing? Personal favourites and interesting tech more than the all-time stars since I'm getting those as a matter of course.
Any tips for a newbie on approaching a local meta and adjusting to it with tweaks or style shifts within the colours?
I've read a little more, RIP seems to have been considered and tested in the very early iterations of this build with less success, though the primary reason seems to be people felt it constricted their own ability to play cards like lingering souls that RIP shuts down symmetrically. I'm enough of a Johnny not to care about that overmuch.
@FanTan444, I reckon my best bet against valakut strategies is going to be digging for my maindeck Leyline plus going up to 4 from the sideboard while doing the standard black-X hand disruption. I have 6 ways to ping a scapeshift or titan out of the hand if needed, admittedly most of those at 4 mana.
Here's where I'm at so far with a brew, no sideboard included.
What does green get me in this? I get to run Abrupt Decay, which is such a good tool for reliably clearing out whatever random tech an opponent sees fit to plop down, anything from a Chalice of the Void to a Lord of Atlantis. I get to run explore. Mindstone is ok, but I'd far prefer to get an Eldrazi temple, Ghost quarter or possibly a Cavern of souls (if I can figure out my sideboard) on the field. Commune with the Gods is mediocre, but it's one of the very few enchantment hunting tools in the format and card selection feels pretty invaluable to smoothing out some of the rougher edges on this thing.
Green also gives some extra sideboarding possibilities, though most of the sideboard is likely to be quality white enchantment tech. Still, I have an urge to see what a pocket Nylea, God of the Hunt might do to token strategies...
I admit I'm a rookie to the format and I'm not 100% sure how quickly/smoothly a lot of decks play out. My initial thought is that the deck would be weakest against Tron and R/G/X zoo type decks and Tron. Burn I'm not so worried about due to being able to play super efficiently with leyline of sanctity. As far as I know storm tends to rely on flashback to go off efficiently, so RIP combined with hand disruption ought to keep it in check.
I don't really know how capable a cheap removal package combined with hand disruption is at messing with Tron or Zoo's early game, how much extra time it gives you to get into that 3/4 mana range and start blowing them out with wasteland stranglers and thought-knot seers. My feeling is that against Tron I'd need some kind of more heavily pro-active plan supported by maximizing land disruption/hand disruption.
Coco combo and much of their value creatures are hosed by RiP, Elves and merfolk I haven't seen in action enough to know their curve/points of disruption.
Hah, funny. I'm kind of new to the modern archetype and I'm sitting here with a bunch of Rest in Peace in my binder looking at it and thinking holy ***** is there a deck this card does *not* hose. Then realizing of course there is, but it's still a brutal card against a lot of the top archetypes. I really want to build a deck that makes it shine in the mainboard, the tricky thing is it hoses SO many cards you don't leave yourself a lot to play with.
My initial thoughts are somewhat similar to B/W eldrazi, so I hope it's alright to ponder here. I'd probably be inclined to splash green for reasons that shall be given shortly.
I'd keep the core of cheap removal while adding some disruption as well (probably go with a mix of Path, abrupt decay, inquisition and thought-seize)
I'd have to tweak the creature base somewhat as I self-hose Matter Reshaper and Lingering Souls. Blight Herder, Thought-Knot Seer and Wasteland Strangler are obviously still core. Stepping away from Eldrazi,Flickerwisp or Restoration Angel for their mix of evasiveness and response-speed power. Displacer just seems a little slow to me, while these two are utterly filthy combined with the ETB processors. Mind Raker might need to be a consideration over TKS because of a slower, less colourless-friendly 3 color mana base.
Last of all, I think this deck would benefit from some ramp tools to get the RIP Rolling. I'm unsure whether ramp spells or mana dorks would be best, leaning towards the former (or a compromise with sakura tribe elder). Mind Stone is another possible compromise between the two.
In summary, the basic differences between this deck and the straight up B/W one would be
stronger emphasis on heavy disruption and locking out any kind of graveyard based value/plays ASAP.
smaller proactive creature pool but playing creatures that are reliable 2-f-1s into creatures that will likely be yielding far less value than normal
lots of flexibility when it comes to picking and hitting hate cards.
Out of curiosity, have soulsister decks been tested that are built around phyrexian mana use? It seems to me that with all the incidental life gain in the deck, rather than using that to activate a card like serra ascendant, instead using it to be able to afford to use cards like surgical extraction and dismember with impunity, and tezzeret's gambit as a cheap way of refilling the hand in a white deck. Obviously this would require some rethinking of some of the generally considered core elements of the deck, but since the supposed weakness of SS is its inability to interact, this might help a little
I've found the way to beat the various versions of the green-ramp decks is to stall out their early game as much as possible with things like decay and golgari charm, then hit their first major threat with your hard removal. If removal light, just flood and swing as much as you can. If you can get them to ten or so you can usually trick your way through to a win with something. Most of their hands are relying on a bunch of ramp and devotion chaff and one or two major threats. Deal with one of the threats and you should be able to kill them before garruk kicks in, or at the least race them effectively. I've found elspeth typically demolishes them in a board stall situation so long as they don't have nylea.
@thereisnosaurus Thanks for the in-depth reply. Gives me some food for thought.
I suppose the question then becomes what configuration is going to be the most competitive against the other control and midrange decks (assuming in any configuration we have the advantage against the smaller aggro decks)?
On paper it seems like the aggro route would be likely to have more success against the control decks, while the resilient route would be better against midrange (in an attempt to play the "control" deck in that matchup)? This is just working off the assumption that aggro (beats) -> control -> midrange -> aggro
Assuming that's the case, is our best bet to find the most overlap between those two, and then where there isn't overlap, skew our main deck towards the matchup we're most concerned with, using our sideboard to "switch" plans?
I'm unsure. I think the ideal deck against the current midrange suite (black, RG, monogreen, dega, BW, BG etc) is the second of the proposed suites- lots of extremely dangerous threats backed by good early game removal like doomblades, abrupt decays, golgari charms and so on. combine this with some good card draw in read the bones and underworld connections and you should be able to run over most decks with the sheer quality of 4-5 mana threats junk has access to. Ideally you want to be able to limit your early creatures to rampers, I love caryatid because it ramps from 2-4, where you get advent, reaper, demon etc. Ramping 1-3 is no longer that great, especially with the vulnerability of mystic. Playing a couple of voyaging satyrs in that deck might help you consistently put out a t3 demon or reaper, which is very hard to answer on the play.
Unfortunately this gameplan suffers against control since you likely will have to rely on simply casting 1-for-1 threats and hope they misplay their removal priorities so eventually you can resolve an uncontested demon or obzedat and finish them with it.
This is why I play my deck (a few pages back), because while it's not quite as reliable against the midrange decks, it's an 80% against most of the aggro decks and is far, far stronger against control. So far I've only been beaten by a control deck once (I think I'm about 6-1 in matches now)- good control decks too. I stomp all over mono black and blue/white. Esper is the most dangerous, but even that has a lot of trouble if I'm on the play. Maybe I've just been lucky, but the fact my deck demands so much quality removal AND can blow you out if you don't use it while I'm tapped out means that I feel very confident in the matchup. I can rush a control deck down or I can keep my hand and play a slower game, bait out their downfalls then resolve an elspeth, bloodbaron or vraska when they try and resolve their own finisher.
I still think there's a lot of promise in the more outright aggression/ threat curve deck using stuff like hydra and demon over reaper and bloodbaron, but I'm still figuring out tuning my style and acquiring the cards for it, so I haven't really had a chance to brew any of the others yet.
Working my way though the deck, my questions are: [SNIP]
I think that a junk deck has enough options to not simply play the best inherent value at each casting slot. You have the luxury (which not many decks do) of being able to push a very clear gameplan, and choose a suite of creatures that support this.
I think the best way of illustrating this is a creature like voice of resurgence. Its star seems to have fallen a little but I think that's because people are just jamming it for value and while it's still undeniably good in that department, it's not incredible. Voice needs the right creatures surrounding it. The key to making voice strongest, IMO, is a suite of other resilient creatures
my creature suite is exp one, voice, caryatid, fleecemane, reaper, bloodbaron. It's important to note what role fleecemane plays here, either a beater against a deck I know is removal-light, or a lategame (ideally 7 mana) creature against decks with said removal. It can act as a tempo enabler, to force someone to spend a turn removing it or risk it going monstrous and becoming yet another resilient annoyance. I don't just play it as a watchwolf with upside, the goal is always to push the gameplan of controlling the opponent's removal game and forcing the clock to proceed on my initiative rather than giving them easy choices.
However, I can equally see a suite of cards like soldier of the pantheon, fleecemane, dreg mangler, obzedat, desecration demon, shadowborn demon, kalonian hydra and so on which are far more vulnerable to removal, but far more punishing if you've drained it. That deck would have a different gameplan, to play as many 'must remove this now' threats as possible to simply overwhelm your opponent's ability to cope.
Another potential set would be a sacrifice themed deck with voice, varolz, slitherhead, shadowborn demon, cabal aristocrat, abhorrent overlord, deadbridge goliath, sin collector etc.
Each of these suites would play support cards relevant to their gameplan- my resilience suite plays a lot of cards designed to help plug gaps in my ability to keep creatures on the field- golgari charm, ready and willing etc.
The more aggressive deck might play cards like read the bones to keep the threats coming or whip of erebos to get more value out of them.
The sacrifice deck might play cards like altar's reap or even murder investigation to push that theme.
Rather than just looking at the best value to play, try and really focus on what you want your deck to do and consider every single card in that light. How does it help? does another creature at that cost help more? are you including it just because it's 'good' or because it specifically does something you want your deck to do.
There are so many good creatures in the colour set that you can afford to be picky.
If it were instant speed I'd jam it in right away, but I think just having more powerful plays is necessary in the current meta. That said, wake is really good in this deck and after testing I think it's quite likely to make it in, though I think it's actually more likely that druid's deliverance will make it since it's instant speed. I'd be willing to pay 1 more for the effect at instant even with nothing attached, and prevent all combat damage is hardly nothing.
This is a deck I've been working on developing for a week or two now, revolving around the core synergy of voice of resurgence and young pyromancer's token generation abilities.
The ability of a R/W deck to access 8 fairly cheap counter-wipes that prevent your board being angered, verdicted or ratchet bombed (since it'll mainly be tokens) make running a heavy load of tokens a lot safer that it might otherwise be. Consider further that most of the G/W token generators are instants or sorceries which trigger pyromancer and you have the potential to put an absurd amount of creatures in play very quickly- which in turn turns your voice elementals into really serious threats.
I also wanted to plot out a deck that made full use of xenagos, since he seems mostly being jammed into other decks right now rather than being a core part of a deck's main strategy. Here he excels and does exactly what the deck wants to be doing- capitalizing off having a bunch of dudes and relentlessly pumping out more of them.
Key cards:
Voice of Resurgence: in this deck, it's primarily the x/x token that makes voice a beating since it can quickly get out of control.
young pyromancer: adds value to all those instant/sorcery based token generators the deck plays, as well as letting boros charms and rootborn defenses further advance the board state rather than just trading 1 for 1
xenagos the reveler: part of the reason I wanted to build this deck, I wanted to see if I could create a deck that really fit xenagos' tools. He creates tokens and his +1 is beastly here with the amount of dudes you're capable of putting on the board. While his ult is a little mediocre, a constant stream of 2/2 satyrs is hardly inconsequential once a stalemate is established
Hammer of purphoros: helps get more value out of pyromancer tokens, centaurs, populate, you name it. Also creates yet more tokens if you need them, at instant speed without a card no less.
Purphoros: synergises incredibly well with xenagos' +1 ability and gives you reach. Never meant to be a creature in this deck, which is actually a good thing since it helps him dodge a lot of the exile removal.
@Apok: you, sir, have made my inner Johnny giggle like a madman. I will try this. The reason I'm not already doing it (running desecration demon anyway) is that my deck's choices are about resilience. This is a format with a lot of powerful removal options and there are many decks exploiting that, particularly in my meta. Thus I value creatures like voice, reaper, experiment one and caryatid as these turn many removal cards into bad trades or even complete blanks while still being a real presence on the board. Demon doesn't fit into that plan very well, since it just provides a big juicy target for all that removal that'd otherwise be sitting there uselessly.
I'm still gunna try it
@dogfromhell: I've found having turn one clear to experiment one or play out a guildgate is pretty important so far. Once I've done that I don't really need thoughtsieze, I can reliably establish a superior board presence and then tempo the game out. If I wanted to hit a thoughtsieze it would probably be turn 4-5 vs other midrange or devotion decks, so I don't think sideboarding them is out of the question, probably replacing the mistcutter hydras since they've been a little mediocre so far (I just don't get my lands reliably enough to make them a real threat and there ain't many monoblue decks around here). Part of what makes the trick/removal heavy spell suite so great is you can timewalk your opponent so often. Thoughtseize doesn't do that, it's actually a tempo hit against you in order to get with a threat you can't deal with. There aren't many threats I can't deal with. If you hit their only threat it's amazing, but otherwise it's just a one for one where I'm already able to one-for-one most stuff reliably while forcing them to burn turns playing it out so I get the tempo rolling.
As a more general observation, I feel that at the moment there are three interesting ways of building Junk in standard
1) my style of resilient-tempo, focused around hard to get rid of creatures blanking cards, getting in the way and ultimately overwhelming the opponent with value and tricks. This deck is strongest in a meta where the main battle is between control and aggro (typically in places with some established guys who can afford the expensive control decks and a bunch of people forced into aggro to compete with them on a budget), since it's very resilient against control decks and I've yet to lose an aggro matchup.
2) the control-midrange style with fewer creatures and more ramp, removal and card draw. This is where I think obzedat and blood baron shine, alongside cards like read the bones, thoughtseize, underworld connections and so on. I think this deck is the strongest in a meta where the devotion and midrange, creature heavy decks are the dominant players
3) there's a third option I've been playing around with that's a combo-aggro junk deck revolving around the incredible amount of strong 2 drops the colours give combined with immortal servitude (more a synergy deck than a combo, really). Lotleth troll and packrat act as discard enablers with solid upside, while voice, caryatid, fleecemane, cartel aristocrat, high priest of penance and voyaging satyr provide a suite of nasty, annoying 2 drops that synergise very well with each other. Believe me there is nothing like sacking your voice to an aristocrat then immortal servituding it and like 5 other creatures back into play, turning the elemental into a 7/7 or so XD. The trick is figuring out the rest of the deck, whether I want grizzly salvages, read the bones, walkers or what have you. While kind of 'cute' I actually think this deck is one of the cooler possibilities in the format. All it really needs is one more really awesome 2 drop with an ETB/sac/die effect to become seriously powerful. I like the versatility and unpredictability it offers, along with being a combo deck that can also just go on the 'punch their face in' plan half the time. Very melira-pod esque.
edit: throwing up that last deck for people to have a look at. Not exactly midrange, but still fun
> 4 or 3 golgari charm: I think that's a reasonable question to be asking. I'd probably replace it with another smiter or an advent of the wurm (I'm considering taking out my smiters for advents at the moment in any case, since caryatid ramps 2>4 rather than 1>3.), but I'm honestly never displeased to have the charms. The deck has so many resilient threats, emphasis on resilient, that you're bound to have something to work with in any scenario where you'd have a chance of winning anyway. I'm going to keep running 4 for the moment, because they've just done work for me every single game.
> putrefy/hero's downfall: I'm running a very strong core of green, with only 5 non green producing lands in the deck. This is since I'm only running 2 blood baron and 2 elspeth without green in their cost. I'm also only running 22 lands, rather than 24, so I expect to be running off 3-4 lands for a lot of the game.
The result is I'm a little uncomfortable playing things like downfall, lifebane zombie, underworld connections and similar with the double black cost. I think it's a really close run thing between downfall and putrefy. I'm honestly not that afraid of walkers given the amount of beats I can put down and the tricks I have to get damage onto them. Whip is a card I really want to be able to get rid of quickly though, because if the mono black or BW decks get their lifelink on I can't beat them. While there aren't really any significant regenerators in the format right now (it's relevant in the mirror with charm, varolz, lotleth etc), you never know when it's going to come up in the odd game.
Ultimately what pushes me over the edge is that putrefy is 1GB and downfall is 1BB. I will almost always be able to cast a putrefy when I want it, either on curve or leaving up a black for charm or abrupt decay. For downfall that's just not the case in my experience. I am thinking of switching the doomblades in my sideboard for downfalls however, since I'm starting to de-value removal which can't hit black in my meta.
> 2 godless shrines: see above. The core of my deck is green and I never want to draw a hand lacking multiple green sources if possible. However, outside of green the deck is quite forgiving on the mana and I don't feel that trading some of the plains/swamps for godless shrines would do much other than make me have to figure out whether to shock myself more regularly XD. I'm already considering lowering the number of guildgates and upping my basics to give me a smoother curve, since I'm not running into mana issues at all outside of extreme cases at the moment.
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I totally get the life loss thing, it makes the card a real pain to play and it's a cost that loses me games from time to time. I disagree with the instant/sorcery thing. I often find myself in a situation where I'm very much ahead on board against most of the U/B/x or U/R/x midrange/control decks I run up against- a board of a goyf or a few tokens and a lili or something. In that position I will almost always try and not play more into open mana and force them to make the first move with less information. This means I'm often not tapped out on their turn and if their response to that board state is to put down a jace or gideon or something, I can deal with it and then have mana open on my turn to really twist the screws while they're tapped down. If I'm playing pulse I'd need to take a turn to answer back and those decks tend to win games where that main-phasing back and forth contest develops. So I do think tempo can be pretty important, just not in the conventional rushdown kind of way and specifically against other value-oriented decks.
As far as fulminator goes, I do play three in the board, but I don't think I could justify putting them in the main, whereas Beast slots in to an existing mainboard slot. Ultimately you'd probably want to rely on your deck reliably putting out creatures that make a 3/3 token look pretty harmless rather than pushing, but in matches where they're mostly removing those creatures they're unlikely to have the kind of creatures that you'd want to push, thus giving it some relevance in the matchup. I'm not saying this is a great plan, but I so often end up with a dead push in my hand G1 against jeskai or esper I can see the advantage. Based on that I'm thinking this would make more sense in the fatty abzan style with no bobs and more trackers/rhinos. I agree that in traditional abzan with bob/path it doesn't work so well.
The widely established choice is Maelstrom Pulse, but there are two other cards I've toyed with recently in Anguished Unmaking and Beast Within
Anguished is instant speed and exiles, but has a slightly trickier mana cost and a steep life cost. I've been playing this one and it's proved game-winningly good a few times where maelstrom pulse would not have dug me out of a hole. Specifically, it can be held up to blow up the big planeswalkers as they come out and other resilient large threats. My meta has a fair amount of controlly-midrange going around so it has perhaps overperformed.
Beast to me seems like a really interesting choice as well in the right build of abzan. Being able to take out lands is becoming more and more relevant given how land dependent the meta is at the moment (tron, humans, 3 colour decks, valakut). Doing it instant speed seems sweet. Giving an opponent a 3/3 isn't great but if you're on the goyf/rhino/fatal push/abrupt decay/finks kind of game that blank it being able to follow up early disruption with an answer to whatever they manage to put together seems great. I'd be curious as to how one might build an abzan deck specifically tailored to let BW shine.
I imagine this is a perennial discussion and maelstrom pulse has seemed to hold the upper hand forever. I'm reluctant to play 3 cost sorcery speed removal against a lot of what I come up against.
As of yet I haven't built one, I'm gently devouring this thread and trying to find up to date content on the matchup.
If I were to build something, I'd be inclined to probably try an aggressive Flayer-oriented list. Something like
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Grim Flayer
3 Dark Confidant
2 Scavenging Ooze
2 Liliana of the Veil
2 Liliana, the last hope
Other
4 Lingering Souls
4 Mishra's bauble
2 Collective brutality
plus ~12 removal/disruption between FP/PTE/AD/TS/IoK. ~22 lands
Bear in mind I'm a total rookie, I've followed magic for a long time but it's my first time trying to dig into a competitive format at a competitive level. The above card selections are based around supporting quickly filling the yard and pushing tempo. I've heard advice that in general playing an aggressive strategy is a good way to start, and then ease back on the throttle as you figure out the format and your meta.
So pursuant to that- I've just completed my playsets of all the core cards noted in the primer (other than liliana, currently have a 2/2 split of veil and hope). Care to share what you think are some of the most important cards these days to keep a set of for tweaks and/or brewing? Personal favourites and interesting tech more than the all-time stars since I'm getting those as a matter of course.
Any tips for a newbie on approaching a local meta and adjusting to it with tweaks or style shifts within the colours?
@FanTan444, I reckon my best bet against valakut strategies is going to be digging for my maindeck Leyline plus going up to 4 from the sideboard while doing the standard black-X hand disruption. I have 6 ways to ping a scapeshift or titan out of the hand if needed, admittedly most of those at 4 mana.
Here's where I'm at so far with a brew, no sideboard included.
4 Thought-Knot Seer
4 Wasteland Strangler
2 Blight Herder
2 Restoration Angel
Instants (8)
2 Fatal Push
2 Abrupt Decay
4 Path to Exile
Sorceries (13)
2 Idyllic tutor
2 Commune with the Gods
4 Explore
2 Thoughtseize
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Rest in Peace
1 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Ghostly Prison
Lands (22)
2 Eldrazi Temple
4 Ghost Quarter
3 Overgrown Tomb
2 Godless Shrine
1 Temple Garden
2 Windswept Heath
2 Marsh Flats
3 Verdant catacombs
1 Plains
1 Forest
1 Swamp
What does green get me in this? I get to run Abrupt Decay, which is such a good tool for reliably clearing out whatever random tech an opponent sees fit to plop down, anything from a Chalice of the Void to a Lord of Atlantis. I get to run explore. Mindstone is ok, but I'd far prefer to get an Eldrazi temple, Ghost quarter or possibly a Cavern of souls (if I can figure out my sideboard) on the field. Commune with the Gods is mediocre, but it's one of the very few enchantment hunting tools in the format and card selection feels pretty invaluable to smoothing out some of the rougher edges on this thing.
Green also gives some extra sideboarding possibilities, though most of the sideboard is likely to be quality white enchantment tech. Still, I have an urge to see what a pocket Nylea, God of the Hunt might do to token strategies...
I don't really know how capable a cheap removal package combined with hand disruption is at messing with Tron or Zoo's early game, how much extra time it gives you to get into that 3/4 mana range and start blowing them out with wasteland stranglers and thought-knot seers. My feeling is that against Tron I'd need some kind of more heavily pro-active plan supported by maximizing land disruption/hand disruption.
Coco combo and much of their value creatures are hosed by RiP, Elves and merfolk I haven't seen in action enough to know their curve/points of disruption.
My initial thoughts are somewhat similar to B/W eldrazi, so I hope it's alright to ponder here. I'd probably be inclined to splash green for reasons that shall be given shortly.
I'd keep the core of cheap removal while adding some disruption as well (probably go with a mix of Path, abrupt decay, inquisition and thought-seize)
I'd have to tweak the creature base somewhat as I self-hose Matter Reshaper and Lingering Souls. Blight Herder, Thought-Knot Seer and Wasteland Strangler are obviously still core. Stepping away from Eldrazi,Flickerwisp or Restoration Angel for their mix of evasiveness and response-speed power. Displacer just seems a little slow to me, while these two are utterly filthy combined with the ETB processors. Mind Raker might need to be a consideration over TKS because of a slower, less colourless-friendly 3 color mana base.
Next up the core control suite of Rest in Peace supported by some mix of Commune with the Gods and Idyllic Tutor to hasten it out. Since we're digging for enchantments we could also go grab a Leyline of Sanctity against Burn and improve the effectiveness of sideboarded Stony Silence. You can also mess around with whatever kind of crazy sideboard enchantments you can come up with, fromAura of Silence to Suppression Field.
Last of all, I think this deck would benefit from some ramp tools to get the RIP Rolling. I'm unsure whether ramp spells or mana dorks would be best, leaning towards the former (or a compromise with sakura tribe elder). Mind Stone is another possible compromise between the two.
In summary, the basic differences between this deck and the straight up B/W one would be
- stronger emphasis on heavy disruption and locking out any kind of graveyard based value/plays ASAP.
- smaller proactive creature pool but playing creatures that are reliable 2-f-1s into creatures that will likely be yielding far less value than normal
lots of flexibility when it comes to picking and hitting hate cards.Shell:
3-4 ramp spells
4-7 hand disruption
6-8 kill
14-16 creatures (70/30 processor/flicker)
3 RIP
2-4 enchantment digging
1-3 tech enchantments
I'm unsure. I think the ideal deck against the current midrange suite (black, RG, monogreen, dega, BW, BG etc) is the second of the proposed suites- lots of extremely dangerous threats backed by good early game removal like doomblades, abrupt decays, golgari charms and so on. combine this with some good card draw in read the bones and underworld connections and you should be able to run over most decks with the sheer quality of 4-5 mana threats junk has access to. Ideally you want to be able to limit your early creatures to rampers, I love caryatid because it ramps from 2-4, where you get advent, reaper, demon etc. Ramping 1-3 is no longer that great, especially with the vulnerability of mystic. Playing a couple of voyaging satyrs in that deck might help you consistently put out a t3 demon or reaper, which is very hard to answer on the play.
Unfortunately this gameplan suffers against control since you likely will have to rely on simply casting 1-for-1 threats and hope they misplay their removal priorities so eventually you can resolve an uncontested demon or obzedat and finish them with it.
This is why I play my deck (a few pages back), because while it's not quite as reliable against the midrange decks, it's an 80% against most of the aggro decks and is far, far stronger against control. So far I've only been beaten by a control deck once (I think I'm about 6-1 in matches now)- good control decks too. I stomp all over mono black and blue/white. Esper is the most dangerous, but even that has a lot of trouble if I'm on the play. Maybe I've just been lucky, but the fact my deck demands so much quality removal AND can blow you out if you don't use it while I'm tapped out means that I feel very confident in the matchup. I can rush a control deck down or I can keep my hand and play a slower game, bait out their downfalls then resolve an elspeth, bloodbaron or vraska when they try and resolve their own finisher.
I still think there's a lot of promise in the more outright aggression/ threat curve deck using stuff like hydra and demon over reaper and bloodbaron, but I'm still figuring out tuning my style and acquiring the cards for it, so I haven't really had a chance to brew any of the others yet.
I think that a junk deck has enough options to not simply play the best inherent value at each casting slot. You have the luxury (which not many decks do) of being able to push a very clear gameplan, and choose a suite of creatures that support this.
I think the best way of illustrating this is a creature like voice of resurgence. Its star seems to have fallen a little but I think that's because people are just jamming it for value and while it's still undeniably good in that department, it's not incredible. Voice needs the right creatures surrounding it. The key to making voice strongest, IMO, is a suite of other resilient creatures
my creature suite is exp one, voice, caryatid, fleecemane, reaper, bloodbaron. It's important to note what role fleecemane plays here, either a beater against a deck I know is removal-light, or a lategame (ideally 7 mana) creature against decks with said removal. It can act as a tempo enabler, to force someone to spend a turn removing it or risk it going monstrous and becoming yet another resilient annoyance. I don't just play it as a watchwolf with upside, the goal is always to push the gameplan of controlling the opponent's removal game and forcing the clock to proceed on my initiative rather than giving them easy choices.
However, I can equally see a suite of cards like soldier of the pantheon, fleecemane, dreg mangler, obzedat, desecration demon, shadowborn demon, kalonian hydra and so on which are far more vulnerable to removal, but far more punishing if you've drained it. That deck would have a different gameplan, to play as many 'must remove this now' threats as possible to simply overwhelm your opponent's ability to cope.
Another potential set would be a sacrifice themed deck with voice, varolz, slitherhead, shadowborn demon, cabal aristocrat, abhorrent overlord, deadbridge goliath, sin collector etc.
Each of these suites would play support cards relevant to their gameplan- my resilience suite plays a lot of cards designed to help plug gaps in my ability to keep creatures on the field- golgari charm, ready and willing etc.
The more aggressive deck might play cards like read the bones to keep the threats coming or whip of erebos to get more value out of them.
The sacrifice deck might play cards like altar's reap or even murder investigation to push that theme.
Rather than just looking at the best value to play, try and really focus on what you want your deck to do and consider every single card in that light. How does it help? does another creature at that cost help more? are you including it just because it's 'good' or because it specifically does something you want your deck to do.
There are so many good creatures in the colour set that you can afford to be picky.
The ability of a R/W deck to access 8 fairly cheap counter-wipes that prevent your board being angered, verdicted or ratchet bombed (since it'll mainly be tokens) make running a heavy load of tokens a lot safer that it might otherwise be. Consider further that most of the G/W token generators are instants or sorceries which trigger pyromancer and you have the potential to put an absurd amount of creatures in play very quickly- which in turn turns your voice elementals into really serious threats.
I also wanted to plot out a deck that made full use of xenagos, since he seems mostly being jammed into other decks right now rather than being a core part of a deck's main strategy. Here he excels and does exactly what the deck wants to be doing- capitalizing off having a bunch of dudes and relentlessly pumping out more of them.
4 young pyromancer
4 voice of resurgence
2 purphoros, god of the forge
2 scion of vitughazi
Planeswalkers
2 xenagos the reveler
Spells (Summons)
2 hammer of purphoros
4 call of the conclave
4 advent of the wurm
4 selesnya charm
4 rootborn defences
3 boros charm
2 mizzium mortars
Lands
4 sacred foundry
4 stomping grounds
4 temple garden
3 temple of triumph
3 temple of abandon
3 forest
2 plains
3 armed/dangerous
2 trostani, selesnya's voice
2 sundering growth
1 boros charm
3 gods willing
2 mizzium mortars
2 electrickery
Key cards:
Voice of Resurgence: in this deck, it's primarily the x/x token that makes voice a beating since it can quickly get out of control.
young pyromancer: adds value to all those instant/sorcery based token generators the deck plays, as well as letting boros charms and rootborn defenses further advance the board state rather than just trading 1 for 1
xenagos the reveler: part of the reason I wanted to build this deck, I wanted to see if I could create a deck that really fit xenagos' tools. He creates tokens and his +1 is beastly here with the amount of dudes you're capable of putting on the board. While his ult is a little mediocre, a constant stream of 2/2 satyrs is hardly inconsequential once a stalemate is established
Hammer of purphoros: helps get more value out of pyromancer tokens, centaurs, populate, you name it. Also creates yet more tokens if you need them, at instant speed without a card no less.
Purphoros: synergises incredibly well with xenagos' +1 ability and gives you reach. Never meant to be a creature in this deck, which is actually a good thing since it helps him dodge a lot of the exile removal.
I'm still gunna try it
@dogfromhell: I've found having turn one clear to experiment one or play out a guildgate is pretty important so far. Once I've done that I don't really need thoughtsieze, I can reliably establish a superior board presence and then tempo the game out. If I wanted to hit a thoughtsieze it would probably be turn 4-5 vs other midrange or devotion decks, so I don't think sideboarding them is out of the question, probably replacing the mistcutter hydras since they've been a little mediocre so far (I just don't get my lands reliably enough to make them a real threat and there ain't many monoblue decks around here). Part of what makes the trick/removal heavy spell suite so great is you can timewalk your opponent so often. Thoughtseize doesn't do that, it's actually a tempo hit against you in order to get with a threat you can't deal with. There aren't many threats I can't deal with. If you hit their only threat it's amazing, but otherwise it's just a one for one where I'm already able to one-for-one most stuff reliably while forcing them to burn turns playing it out so I get the tempo rolling.
As a more general observation, I feel that at the moment there are three interesting ways of building Junk in standard
1) my style of resilient-tempo, focused around hard to get rid of creatures blanking cards, getting in the way and ultimately overwhelming the opponent with value and tricks. This deck is strongest in a meta where the main battle is between control and aggro (typically in places with some established guys who can afford the expensive control decks and a bunch of people forced into aggro to compete with them on a budget), since it's very resilient against control decks and I've yet to lose an aggro matchup.
2) the control-midrange style with fewer creatures and more ramp, removal and card draw. This is where I think obzedat and blood baron shine, alongside cards like read the bones, thoughtseize, underworld connections and so on. I think this deck is the strongest in a meta where the devotion and midrange, creature heavy decks are the dominant players
3) there's a third option I've been playing around with that's a combo-aggro junk deck revolving around the incredible amount of strong 2 drops the colours give combined with immortal servitude (more a synergy deck than a combo, really). Lotleth troll and packrat act as discard enablers with solid upside, while voice, caryatid, fleecemane, cartel aristocrat, high priest of penance and voyaging satyr provide a suite of nasty, annoying 2 drops that synergise very well with each other. Believe me there is nothing like sacking your voice to an aristocrat then immortal servituding it and like 5 other creatures back into play, turning the elemental into a 7/7 or so XD. The trick is figuring out the rest of the deck, whether I want grizzly salvages, read the bones, walkers or what have you. While kind of 'cute' I actually think this deck is one of the cooler possibilities in the format. All it really needs is one more really awesome 2 drop with an ETB/sac/die effect to become seriously powerful. I like the versatility and unpredictability it offers, along with being a combo deck that can also just go on the 'punch their face in' plan half the time. Very melira-pod esque.
edit: throwing up that last deck for people to have a look at. Not exactly midrange, but still fun
4 voice of resurgence
4 lotleth troll
4 sylvan caryatid
3 fleecemane lion
3 cartel aristocrat
2 pack rat
2 voyaging satyr
Spells
4 immortal servitude
4 thoughtsieze
3 read the bones
3 altar's reap
2 grizzly salvage
4 godless shrine
4 temple garden
4 overgrown tomb
4 temple of silence
2 golgari guildgate
2 selesnya guildgate
2 forest
Board
2 Korozda guildmage
3 duress
4 high priest of penance
2 unflinching courage
2 jarad, golgari lichlord
2 cartel aristocrat
> putrefy/hero's downfall: I'm running a very strong core of green, with only 5 non green producing lands in the deck. This is since I'm only running 2 blood baron and 2 elspeth without green in their cost. I'm also only running 22 lands, rather than 24, so I expect to be running off 3-4 lands for a lot of the game.
The result is I'm a little uncomfortable playing things like downfall, lifebane zombie, underworld connections and similar with the double black cost. I think it's a really close run thing between downfall and putrefy. I'm honestly not that afraid of walkers given the amount of beats I can put down and the tricks I have to get damage onto them. Whip is a card I really want to be able to get rid of quickly though, because if the mono black or BW decks get their lifelink on I can't beat them. While there aren't really any significant regenerators in the format right now (it's relevant in the mirror with charm, varolz, lotleth etc), you never know when it's going to come up in the odd game.
Ultimately what pushes me over the edge is that putrefy is 1GB and downfall is 1BB. I will almost always be able to cast a putrefy when I want it, either on curve or leaving up a black for charm or abrupt decay. For downfall that's just not the case in my experience. I am thinking of switching the doomblades in my sideboard for downfalls however, since I'm starting to de-value removal which can't hit black in my meta.
> 2 godless shrines: see above. The core of my deck is green and I never want to draw a hand lacking multiple green sources if possible. However, outside of green the deck is quite forgiving on the mana and I don't feel that trading some of the plains/swamps for godless shrines would do much other than make me have to figure out whether to shock myself more regularly XD. I'm already considering lowering the number of guildgates and upping my basics to give me a smoother curve, since I'm not running into mana issues at all outside of extreme cases at the moment.