Actually standstill was already tested a while back an it was quite successful. There was a reason for it to be cut tho, but ATM I can't recall it. I think it was a meta call. Back when Survival of the Fittest and Vengevine were going rampant. Maybe it's time to give it a second try. Right now I'm on vacations so I don't have my lists available. However later I'll put up a quick list and download cockatrice so I give it a couple runs.
Hello Control-Aff playtesters!
I'm new to the deck, and actually to Affinity, even. I think FoW is the only way for the deck to survive, and tried derping about getting new tech in there. I think the 1-drop tapper looks really cool, but it does look like he dies to every removal in legacy, including artifacts (equip) unless he's resolved before it hits the field.
So... mind if I pose a quick decklist? I literally haven't playtested, just shuffled and goldfished a bit, and as my playgroup's being dull and annoying, wanted to brainstorm some new tech for the deck:
I really enjoy the idea of dropping Canonist MD in this kind of deck, as it forces your opponent to choose what 1 spell they'll counter... and you can keep playing most of your spells, anyway. More importantly, when your opponent goes to *** or Energy Flux, what have you, your single FoW overpowers any Daze/Pierce/FoW your opponent may have to make it land and screw your world.
Erayo + Canonist is pretty nice, I think. If I drop T1 Erayo, my opponent should always FoW against this deck, cause even a slight chance of flipping spells near doom for them. Also pitches to FoW, and even becomes another Ornithopter to suit up (even with a flipped enchant) - never really dead. The only out to that is Mox + Eng Ex @ 0 (plus FoW if I have counter in hand) -> not many decks can do all that, and it doesn't even wipe my dudes from board.
I stayed away from 1-drops cause I'm thinking maybe Chalice of the Void in the board will work (not easy to T1 it, but possible), Tangle Wire should come down early enough to wreak havoc, and maybe you could even run something crazy like Opposition, combo with random Winter Orb/ Meekstone effects (tho not with Master - Etched Champ def in board).
Scroll Rack - pitch your Temps in during upkeep, 'cause you don't draw off the Rack. I think the tempo in this deck could be huge, considering your opponent can easily TD a Flux and hate you out in a single turn. Sieve ain't great, but can eat up extra Opals and triggered Scullers, might bait a FoW under Canonist. I almost tried a couple Second Sunrise with it, but maybe in the board (unlike Temp Mast, 2nd SR is not easy to splash and also ain't blue...)
That said, it's as optimal as 2-3 hrs will allow, and some hands are brutally sluggish. 4x for now until I figure out what I want to really keep in, but thoughts for other MD tech or serious SB strategies to consider? I'd like to start playtesting a more serious version at the end of the week. Thanks!
The new Bird looks pretty interesting. Mind that besides drawing a card, having evasion, can carry a plating very well, having deathtouch (No need to say why this is useful), it also ups your count for pitchable cards to FoW.
That is also one thing I am curious about FoW in the MD here.
For FoW to be really useful you need at least 16 blue card sources. But, many decks posted here have far less than that.
How does FoW fare for you?
I am currently building around this deck list as an affinity control build and I now find this bird to be a really good addition. Especially since it also costs 2 CMC and fits nicely with Vial on 2 for most other dudes.
Some people talk about Shardless Agent, but honestly I do not believe it to be worthy on second thought.
Besides the need of green mana it has plenty of positive aspects it can cascade into.
All 2 drops are nice to cascade into.
Playing Agent into SfM into Plating... sound really nice for instance.
This already seals it for me. Too much gambling and too situative IMHO to be a consistent card.
If you can minimize the gambling I might reconsider. Still... green mana
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"It is good to be bad"
"This is the infernal spawn of the infernal spawn of evil!"
Out of those cards at some point or another this deck has shared all the above artifact lands + both Modern moxen and Inkmoth/Blinkmoth. On the creature base it shares MoE, and Champion. Even more so, nowadays some Affinity builds also run SFM as well. As for the other cards, we also run Cranial Platings, Moxen, Thoughcast. All in all both decks share well over 40 cards.
All the above, IMHO qualifies the deck as an affinity deck, for the only thing it doesn't share with your average aggro affinity is the "aggro" part, be it the cheap cards such as Memnites, Ornithopters and Pests. Replacing them with more pro-active cards such as Dispatch, FoW and Revokers.
So in the end we have that whereas Aggro Affinity bets on the cheap and potentially explosive startup, we bet on a more controlled scenario with much more efficient cards that could potentially do more on their own. We don't fold to board wipes nor we do to Combo either. So even tho the game plan differs a lot from your average affinity deck, this one build has a better performance on much more scenarios than that of Aggro Affinity.
EDIT: For the Record, I also call this "NeoFinity" rather than Affinity. So even the name shares almost the same letters as the original deck (:
Yes but that list is not the average ravager affinity list.
Looking at a real average affinity list and this "neofinity", Lands aside the only cards that are shared is the thoughtcast, etched champion and plating.
Mox aside, there are no similarities to call it affinity of any sort. Its an artifact control deck.
i know its kinda lame to yagger on about a decks name but calling it neofinity is implying its another type of aggro deck.
This deck has more ties to stoneblade than affinity.
Yes but that list is not the average ravager affinity list.
Looking at a real average affinity list and this "neofinity", Lands aside the only cards that are shared is the thoughtcast, etched champion and plating.
Mox aside, there are no similarities to call it affinity of any sort. Its an artifact control deck.
i know its kinda lame to yagger on about a decks name but calling it neofinity is implying its another type of aggro deck.
This deck has more ties to stoneblade than affinity.
Hey Aluren! I am really interested in playing this deck and since you haven't posted in awhile, I was wondering what your current build for neofinnity is and how you're doing against current tier 1 decks.
Sadly I've been off the Magic scene lately. As of now I gotta say I lost track of how the meta. I blame it on Innistrad tho, TBH I really disliked the whole block. Odds are I'll be back soon to be a part of Ravnica.
So as to your question, there is not much insight I can offer; I haven't touched my deck needless to say play with it in well over 3 months time. Feel free to post your findings/ideas here tho!
I think you mean Glimmervoid, not Glimmerpost there, since 'Post taps for colorless and is fixing no mana.
Anyway, I have been thinking about a version similar to the recent SCG Legacy Affinity-Control brew that played Dimir Signet and Talisman of Dominance and Sol Lands to ramp into T2 Tezzeret or JTMS, since I think that's pretty among the most powerful things that you can do in this format. I think that Durward's list is a bit slower than I want to go, so I want to take his list and streamline it just a bit into an aggro-control list instead of dedicated control
Here's my proposal for a midrange Affinity deck. It's just a draft, so expect it to be unrefined and less-than-optimal.
Rather than go for a pure control strategy like Durward, I chose to retain a number of Cranial Platings and some midrange creatures in Master of Etherium and Etched Champion, allowing this deck to take either a quick offensive with Plating or use the planeswalkers for a quick clock. Trinket Mage serves as card advantage engine, getting either a hate card when we need it or a land if we don't. As such, this deck is prepared to take either the aggro or the control role in any given matchup as need be.
Dimir Signet and Talisman of Dominance are 2 mana rocks that can be played turn 1 off a Sol Land, and which enable me to drop a Planeswalker on turn 2 - if Mind Sculptor is powerful on turn 4, imagine how good it is on turn 2! Although this deck is lacking in shuffle effects, Tezzeret's impulse allows us to remove unwanted cards from the top of our library. Darkslick Shores is our 4 of land because we often don't need more than 3 lands anyway, and because it stops Merfolk from getting their Islandwalk.
With 20+ blue spells, Force of Will is rarely dead, and a single Spell Pierce lets us mise out of problematic spells without needing to have card disadvantage.
The hate cards are pretty self explanatory, and the sideboard gives outs to a wide variety of cards. The biggest advantage of this list over other versions of Affinity is its reduced reliance on artifacts, and therefore less susceptibility. This list gives up the versatility of Mox Opal and Thoughtcast as a tradeoff though.
I'd appreciate any thoughts on this build.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Former Level 2 Judge (Retired / Renounced)
Went to a new shop from a friend's recommendation, DQ'ed for willful violation of CR 100.6b.
Drifting Skies- I played against a deck very very similar to that one 3 times yesterday. I personally was playing a midranged bant list but I can give you my opinions on it from the opponents perspective. I went 2-1 against it, but the first loss was before I made some major changes to my list.
I won one of the matches thanks to my opponent having a very greedy manabase. Wasteland locked him out of the game 2 games in a row. Once with help of KOTR.
The list that beat me ran a lot more basics giving up some speed for resiliency and I honestly believe that's the way to go. Adding in artifact lands and tons of nonbasics makes the deck just as all-in as basic affinity which is a mistake for such a slow deck. Pulverize/Ancient Grudge would have crushed my first opponent just as badly as my Wastelands did.
Strix is an awesome card, but it only fits into a slow control type deck. If you want to go all in on a T2 planeswalker (which IMO isn't enough/a great plan) you don't want him. If you want to play out talismans and play defensive for a few turns he is the perfect card. IMO fight over the planeswalker turn 3-5 after you have the mana and counters to make the threat stick.
TLDR- Run more basics, and less non ramp/control artifacts. Forget master of Etherium and Cranial plating and Tezz ultimate. Win with removal/counters/card draw first. Then let Tezz turn a talisman into the win condition.
Thanks for the analysis, and I can definitely see where you're coming from. I want to be able to play the aggro deck or the control deck, but I can see how the deck would turn into a jack-of-all-trades, Master of none sort of build if I try too hard to do both, but I would rather be a more controlling deck than the more aggressive one as a matter of personal preference, and I'd prefer to modify the deck in that direction.
My inspiration was Caleb Durward's Tezzerator list, but designed to be more streamlined and a bit quicker; in the process, I lose some control elements, which may not be correct. Assuming that I take out the 3 Master of Etherium and 3 Cranial Plating (the most aggressive 6 cards in the list), what would you consider adding in place of them? I would think it would be either more card draw (Thirst), more counterspells (maybe another Spell Pierce and perhaps a Mana Leak or two), or perhaps more removal?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Former Level 2 Judge (Retired / Renounced)
Went to a new shop from a friend's recommendation, DQ'ed for willful violation of CR 100.6b.
A team should be as happy as a meal - TEAM HAPPYMEAL
EDH - UWGrand Arbiter Agustin IV UBW Oloro, Ageless Ascetic Modern - Mono U tron / Polymorph / NFTW (ninja for the win)GR tronGR
Buy All the planeswalkers!!!
Buy All the Dual Lands!!!
Buy All the fetches!
Create tons of EDH Decks!!!
Eat Nothing but Oats!! (LOL, not true)
Train MMA!!!
Marry My girlfriend!!!
Get her Pregnant only Once!
Teach my Son/Daughter Sports and magic cards!!!
Continue my legacy son!!!/Daughter!!
I've been messing with affinity for a long time now. Originally had a traditional list, then a swarm list. Didn't like how fragile it was, moved to NeoFinity. Then made some changes and came up with a 'Metalforge' build (metalcraft and stoneforge, since there is no affinity cards in it). Here's what I've come up with:
Etched Champions make great sword carriers. The great thing about this is that if you have a springleaf drum, you can drop a stoneforge T2 and have a spell pierce backup. Also a Stoneforge T1 and Batterskull T2 is devastating against certain decks. 8 discards also help when they side hate in.
I found Vedalken Centarch to not cut it. The Master of Etheriums were replaced with the Etched Champions. Them and Vault Skirges are very good equipment carriers. Also the springleaf drums and Mox opals helps against wastelands and bloodmoon effects so that you will still have access to mana.
Still playtesting and I do not have too big a pool to test it against. Seems to fair pretty well against most decks. Might replace the one Pithing Needle and a Tezzeret with something else.
Not too sure about the sideboard.
Also I don't think Shardless belongs in here. There are too many bad things it can cascade into. Thought about the new bird. However I think that the lifelink of Vault Skirge and the fact that it can drop T1 is much more valuable, especially in a deck that has other ways of dealing with everything.
i like the idea... first why 4x mox opal?? legendary and no way to sac them...
other than the possibility of board wipers of artifact hating folk.. why not glimmervoid > city of brass??? save some life...
zero spot removal??
and with 16 land and 7 mana artifacts... and a hard cc average of somewhere around 2.4-3.2 thats pretty out there...
and idk not fast not slow... needs more cowbell i think...
actually, that is now a good thing with the new legend rule update, now he can mox opal tap to add a mana play the other sac the tapped one and keep ramping. soo yeah, thanks wizards -_- not to mention dealing with geist of St. Traft is going to be a pain too, again thanks wizards.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
\m/ Device \m/
Decks i'm currently running
Standard BUGW BUG Control (With a splash of white) WUG Midrange Lifegain
Modern
Death and Taxes
Legacy RG Valakut Lands WG Maverick R Burn
EDH G Azusa, Lost but Seeking
The list performed well (I have unfortunately forgotten what I played against, but I didn't drop a match), although I will be swapping the main-board Canonists with sideboard Revokers as there is much less combo in my meta than I was expecting. A Sword of Feast and Famine in the board wouldn't be amiss, as the Elves matchup is annoying beyond belief (Wirewood Symbiote > this deck). A second Detention Sphere would also be nice considering the prevalence of Counterbalance.dec in my meta. Thoughts?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Legacy: UBRGW T.E.S. UUUSpiral Tide
Modern: UBR Grixis Control
EDH: UB Oona, Queen of the Fae
Combo is a part of magic. If you cant deal with combo then your not a magic player.
It wants to ramp up to 2 mana for SFM or Chalice ideally, but can also drop a T1 Cranial and equip it to Ornithopter/ Phyrexian Walker T2. Cranial can be insane pressure for like combo MUs, which are a breeze, and I've found SFM usually goes further than Cranial does. BUG tends to be a lot harder, because Decay can hit everything... I luckily haven't had to face Deed yet.
But yeah, it's nice, and Thopter Combo is just totally nuts against control. It took like a year to build, but I like it a lot. (BTW, it runs the minimal # of Chrome imprint and FoW pitch cards, so SB'ing can be tricky). Suggestions are most welcome. There's a further discussion at this link on The Source:
I've come at this from the "Mix Tezzerator and Affinity" and reached something close to this thread.
Still developing it quite a bit; though Chromatic star is pretty awesome; and Mishra's Factory makes this build feel much safer for miracles (while still turning into a 5/5 off of tezz when you want)
This is the list I've been working on. So far in testing it actually fares pretty well against the majority of tiered legacy decks. Etched Champion is TNN that doesn't die to Golgari Charm (though you've got to watch out for Jitte), AEther Vial helps accelerate out all the 2-drops (flashing in Strix in their combat or "Clique-ing" them with Sculler is pretty sweet). And as everyone already knows, Tezz is just a house; in the right deck he can rival Jace in terms of power.
NeoFinnity... A Control Affinity Primer
Actually standstill was already tested a while back an it was quite successful. There was a reason for it to be cut tho, but ATM I can't recall it. I think it was a meta call. Back when Survival of the Fittest and Vengevine were going rampant. Maybe it's time to give it a second try. Right now I'm on vacations so I don't have my lists available. However later I'll put up a quick list and download cockatrice so I give it a couple runs.
NeoFinnity... A Control Affinity Primer
I'm new to the deck, and actually to Affinity, even. I think FoW is the only way for the deck to survive, and tried derping about getting new tech in there. I think the 1-drop tapper looks really cool, but it does look like he dies to every removal in legacy, including artifacts (equip) unless he's resolved before it hits the field.
So... mind if I pose a quick decklist? I literally haven't playtested, just shuffled and goldfished a bit, and as my playgroup's being dull and annoying, wanted to brainstorm some new tech for the deck:
21 land (3 opal, 2 chrome, 0 Drum - 4x UWB Darksteel)
Sculler 3
Master 4
Ornith 4
Erayo 4
Canonist 4
FoW 4
Thoughtcast 4
Temporal Mastery 4
Cranial x4
Scroll Rack 2
Time Sieve 2
I really enjoy the idea of dropping Canonist MD in this kind of deck, as it forces your opponent to choose what 1 spell they'll counter... and you can keep playing most of your spells, anyway. More importantly, when your opponent goes to *** or Energy Flux, what have you, your single FoW overpowers any Daze/Pierce/FoW your opponent may have to make it land and screw your world.
Erayo + Canonist is pretty nice, I think. If I drop T1 Erayo, my opponent should always FoW against this deck, cause even a slight chance of flipping spells near doom for them. Also pitches to FoW, and even becomes another Ornithopter to suit up (even with a flipped enchant) - never really dead. The only out to that is Mox + Eng Ex @ 0 (plus FoW if I have counter in hand) -> not many decks can do all that, and it doesn't even wipe my dudes from board.
I stayed away from 1-drops cause I'm thinking maybe Chalice of the Void in the board will work (not easy to T1 it, but possible), Tangle Wire should come down early enough to wreak havoc, and maybe you could even run something crazy like Opposition, combo with random Winter Orb/ Meekstone effects (tho not with Master - Etched Champ def in board).
Scroll Rack - pitch your Temps in during upkeep, 'cause you don't draw off the Rack. I think the tempo in this deck could be huge, considering your opponent can easily TD a Flux and hate you out in a single turn. Sieve ain't great, but can eat up extra Opals and triggered Scullers, might bait a FoW under Canonist. I almost tried a couple Second Sunrise with it, but maybe in the board (unlike Temp Mast, 2nd SR is not easy to splash and also ain't blue...)
That said, it's as optimal as 2-3 hrs will allow, and some hands are brutally sluggish. 4x for now until I figure out what I want to really keep in, but thoughts for other MD tech or serious SB strategies to consider? I'd like to start playtesting a more serious version at the end of the week. Thanks!
Cost only two mana, and draw a card as well.
Nexus MTG News // Nexus - Magic Art Gallery // MTG Dual Land Color Ratios Analyzer // MTG Card Drawing Odds Calculator
Want to play a UW control deck in modern, but don't have jace or snaps?
Please come visit us at the Emeria Titan control thread
That is also one thing I am curious about FoW in the MD here.
For FoW to be really useful you need at least 16 blue card sources. But, many decks posted here have far less than that.
How does FoW fare for you?
I am currently building around this deck list as an affinity control build and I now find this bird to be a really good addition. Especially since it also costs 2 CMC and fits nicely with Vial on 2 for most other dudes.
Some people talk about Shardless Agent, but honestly I do not believe it to be worthy on second thought.
Besides the need of green mana it has plenty of positive aspects it can cascade into.
All 2 drops are nice to cascade into.
Playing Agent into SfM into Plating... sound really nice for instance.
BUT, it can also cascade into:
Aether Vial (Could be OK)
Mox Opal
Dispatch
This already seals it for me. Too much gambling and too situative IMHO to be a consistent card.
If you can minimize the gambling I might reconsider. Still... green mana
"This is the infernal spawn of the infernal spawn of evil!"
Thank you for this sig image @myself
Its artifact control/blade deck
Affinity is aggro
I would get a new name.
Decks I play and stuff.
Legacy Burn
Modern Mono U Tron
I went through this quite some time ago, but here comes again:
Ill pop in your average Ravager Affinity build in here:
4 Vault of Whispers
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Tree of Tales
4 Arcbound ravager
4 Master of Etherium
4 Ornithopter
4 Memnite
4 Signal Pest
4 Etched Champion
2 Vault Skirge
4 Mox Opal
4 Thoughtcast
4 Frogmite
2 Myr Enforcer
Out of those cards at some point or another this deck has shared all the above artifact lands + both Modern moxen and Inkmoth/Blinkmoth. On the creature base it shares MoE, and Champion. Even more so, nowadays some Affinity builds also run SFM as well. As for the other cards, we also run Cranial Platings, Moxen, Thoughcast. All in all both decks share well over 40 cards.
All the above, IMHO qualifies the deck as an affinity deck, for the only thing it doesn't share with your average aggro affinity is the "aggro" part, be it the cheap cards such as Memnites, Ornithopters and Pests. Replacing them with more pro-active cards such as Dispatch, FoW and Revokers.
So in the end we have that whereas Aggro Affinity bets on the cheap and potentially explosive startup, we bet on a more controlled scenario with much more efficient cards that could potentially do more on their own. We don't fold to board wipes nor we do to Combo either. So even tho the game plan differs a lot from your average affinity deck, this one build has a better performance on much more scenarios than that of Aggro Affinity.
EDIT: For the Record, I also call this "NeoFinity" rather than Affinity. So even the name shares almost the same letters as the original deck (:
NeoFinnity... A Control Affinity Primer
Looking at a real average affinity list and this "neofinity", Lands aside the only cards that are shared is the thoughtcast, etched champion and plating.
Mox aside, there are no similarities to call it affinity of any sort. Its an artifact control deck.
i know its kinda lame to yagger on about a decks name but calling it neofinity is implying its another type of aggro deck.
This deck has more ties to stoneblade than affinity.
Decks I play and stuff.
Legacy Burn
Modern Mono U Tron
Let the man call his deck what he wants to.
Thanks!
So as to your question, there is not much insight I can offer; I haven't touched my deck needless to say play with it in well over 3 months time. Feel free to post your findings/ideas here tho!
NeoFinnity... A Control Affinity Primer
This way you get the explosive early game, and a strong mid-late if it takes longer?
Draw Engine 2.0
4 Thoughtcast
4 Dark Confidant
4 Puresteel paladin
2 Tezzeret
Equipment = 4 Cranial Plating, 4 Paradise Mantle (drum 2.0), 4 Bonesplitter, 4 flayer husk (screw arcbound worker/signal pest/ornithopter)
The only downside is you have to run 4 glimmerpost instead of other artifact lands in order to help mana fix.
Anyway, I have been thinking about a version similar to the recent SCG Legacy Affinity-Control brew that played Dimir Signet and Talisman of Dominance and Sol Lands to ramp into T2 Tezzeret or JTMS, since I think that's pretty among the most powerful things that you can do in this format. I think that Durward's list is a bit slower than I want to go, so I want to take his list and streamline it just a bit into an aggro-control list instead of dedicated control
Here's my proposal for a midrange Affinity deck. It's just a draft, so expect it to be unrefined and less-than-optimal.
4 Baleful Strix
3 Master of Etherium
3 Etched Champion
2 Trinket Mage
Planeswalkers (6)
2 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
4 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
Spells (21)
4 Force of Will
2 Spell Pierce
1 Chalice of the Void
1 Pithing Needle
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Dimir Signet
3 Cranial Plating
3 Talisman of Dominance
2 Thirst for Knowledge
1 Thoughtcast
4 Darkslick Shores
3 City of Traitors
3 Ancient Tomb
2 Seat of the Synod
2 Island
1 Vault of Whispers
1 Swamp
2 Underground Sea
2 Polluted Delta
2 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Annul
1 Steel Sabotage
3 Darkblast
1 Night of Soul's Betrayal
3 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Vedalken Certarch
1 Spell Pierce
Rather than go for a pure control strategy like Durward, I chose to retain a number of Cranial Platings and some midrange creatures in Master of Etherium and Etched Champion, allowing this deck to take either a quick offensive with Plating or use the planeswalkers for a quick clock. Trinket Mage serves as card advantage engine, getting either a hate card when we need it or a land if we don't. As such, this deck is prepared to take either the aggro or the control role in any given matchup as need be.
Dimir Signet and Talisman of Dominance are 2 mana rocks that can be played turn 1 off a Sol Land, and which enable me to drop a Planeswalker on turn 2 - if Mind Sculptor is powerful on turn 4, imagine how good it is on turn 2! Although this deck is lacking in shuffle effects, Tezzeret's impulse allows us to remove unwanted cards from the top of our library. Darkslick Shores is our 4 of land because we often don't need more than 3 lands anyway, and because it stops Merfolk from getting their Islandwalk.
With 20+ blue spells, Force of Will is rarely dead, and a single Spell Pierce lets us mise out of problematic spells without needing to have card disadvantage.
The hate cards are pretty self explanatory, and the sideboard gives outs to a wide variety of cards. The biggest advantage of this list over other versions of Affinity is its reduced reliance on artifacts, and therefore less susceptibility. This list gives up the versatility of Mox Opal and Thoughtcast as a tradeoff though.
I'd appreciate any thoughts on this build.
Went to a new shop from a friend's recommendation, DQ'ed for willful violation of CR 100.6b.
Have played duals? I have PucaPoints for them!
(Credit to DarkNightCavalier)
$tandard: Too poor.
Modern:
- GW Birthing Pod(?)
Legacy:
- UWR Delver
I won one of the matches thanks to my opponent having a very greedy manabase. Wasteland locked him out of the game 2 games in a row. Once with help of KOTR.
The list that beat me ran a lot more basics giving up some speed for resiliency and I honestly believe that's the way to go. Adding in artifact lands and tons of nonbasics makes the deck just as all-in as basic affinity which is a mistake for such a slow deck. Pulverize/Ancient Grudge would have crushed my first opponent just as badly as my Wastelands did.
Strix is an awesome card, but it only fits into a slow control type deck. If you want to go all in on a T2 planeswalker (which IMO isn't enough/a great plan) you don't want him. If you want to play out talismans and play defensive for a few turns he is the perfect card. IMO fight over the planeswalker turn 3-5 after you have the mana and counters to make the threat stick.
TLDR- Run more basics, and less non ramp/control artifacts. Forget master of Etherium and Cranial plating and Tezz ultimate. Win with removal/counters/card draw first. Then let Tezz turn a talisman into the win condition.
My inspiration was Caleb Durward's Tezzerator list, but designed to be more streamlined and a bit quicker; in the process, I lose some control elements, which may not be correct. Assuming that I take out the 3 Master of Etherium and 3 Cranial Plating (the most aggressive 6 cards in the list), what would you consider adding in place of them? I would think it would be either more card draw (Thirst), more counterspells (maybe another Spell Pierce and perhaps a Mana Leak or two), or perhaps more removal?
Went to a new shop from a friend's recommendation, DQ'ed for willful violation of CR 100.6b.
Have played duals? I have PucaPoints for them!
(Credit to DarkNightCavalier)
$tandard: Too poor.
Modern:
- GW Birthing Pod(?)
Legacy:
- UWR Delver
EDH - UWGrand Arbiter Agustin IV
UBW Oloro, Ageless Ascetic
Modern - Mono U tron / Polymorph / NFTW (ninja for the win)GR tron GR
Buy All the Dual Lands!!!
Buy All the fetches!
Create tons of EDH Decks!!!
Eat Nothing but Oats!! (LOL, not true)
Train MMA!!!
Marry My girlfriend!!!
Get her Pregnant only Once!
Teach my Son/Daughter Sports and magic cards!!!
Continue my legacy son!!!/Daughter!!
Mana Sources (23):
Creatures (15):
Instants/Sorceries (11):
Artifacts (6):
Others (4):
4 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
Sideboard (15):
Etched Champions make great sword carriers. The great thing about this is that if you have a springleaf drum, you can drop a stoneforge T2 and have a spell pierce backup. Also a Stoneforge T1 and Batterskull T2 is devastating against certain decks. 8 discards also help when they side hate in.
I found Vedalken Centarch to not cut it. The Master of Etheriums were replaced with the Etched Champions. Them and Vault Skirges are very good equipment carriers. Also the springleaf drums and Mox opals helps against wastelands and bloodmoon effects so that you will still have access to mana.
Still playtesting and I do not have too big a pool to test it against. Seems to fair pretty well against most decks. Might replace the one Pithing Needle and a Tezzeret with something else.
Not too sure about the sideboard.
Also I don't think Shardless belongs in here. There are too many bad things it can cascade into. Thought about the new bird. However I think that the lifelink of Vault Skirge and the fact that it can drop T1 is much more valuable, especially in a deck that has other ways of dealing with everything.
actually, that is now a good thing with the new legend rule update, now he can mox opal tap to add a mana play the other sac the tapped one and keep ramping. soo yeah, thanks wizards -_- not to mention dealing with geist of St. Traft is going to be a pain too, again thanks wizards.
Decks i'm currently running
Standard
BUGW BUG Control (With a splash of white)
WUG Midrange Lifegain
Modern
Death and Taxes
Legacy
RG Valakut Lands
WG Maverick
R Burn
EDH
G Azusa, Lost but Seeking
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Spellskite
4 Etched Champion
4 Master of Etherium
3 Mox Opal
2 Mox Diamond
4 Chalice of the Void
1 Umezawa's Jitte
3 Cranial Plating
1 Batterskull
4 Thoughtcast
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Ancient Den
2 Darksteel Citadel
2 Inkmoth Nexus
2 Blinkmoth Nexus
3 Tundra
4 Tormod's Crypt
3 Phyrexian Revoker
3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Thorn of Amethyst
2 Oblivion Ring
1 Detention Sphere
The list performed well (I have unfortunately forgotten what I played against, but I didn't drop a match), although I will be swapping the main-board Canonists with sideboard Revokers as there is much less combo in my meta than I was expecting. A Sword of Feast and Famine in the board wouldn't be amiss, as the Elves matchup is annoying beyond belief (Wirewood Symbiote > this deck). A second Detention Sphere would also be nice considering the prevalence of Counterbalance.dec in my meta. Thoughts?
UBRGW T.E.S.
UUUSpiral Tide
Modern:
UBR Grixis Control
EDH:
UB Oona, Queen of the Fae
Combo is a part of magic. If you cant deal with combo then your not a magic player.
It wants to ramp up to 2 mana for SFM or Chalice ideally, but can also drop a T1 Cranial and equip it to Ornithopter/ Phyrexian Walker T2. Cranial can be insane pressure for like combo MUs, which are a breeze, and I've found SFM usually goes further than Cranial does. BUG tends to be a lot harder, because Decay can hit everything... I luckily haven't had to face Deed yet.
But yeah, it's nice, and Thopter Combo is just totally nuts against control. It took like a year to build, but I like it a lot. (BTW, it runs the minimal # of Chrome imprint and FoW pitch cards, so SB'ing can be tricky). Suggestions are most welcome. There's a further discussion at this link on The Source:
http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?24165-Balls-of-Steel-The-200-Solution
4x Ornithopter
4x Memnite
4x Signal Pest
4x Vedalken Certarch
3x Etched Champion
1x Arcbound Ravager
Accelerators
4x Cranial Plaitng
4x Thoughtcast
3x Springleaf Drum
3x Mox Opal
3x Spell Pierce
2x Standstill
1x Bonesplitter
6x Island
4x Darksteel Citadel
4x Seat of the Synod
4x Blinkmoth Nexus
2x Ancient Tomb
4x Spell Snare
4x Flusterstorm
3x Pithing Needle
3x Annul
1x Spell Pierce
Still developing it quite a bit; though Chromatic star is pretty awesome; and Mishra's Factory makes this build feel much safer for miracles (while still turning into a 5/5 off of tezz when you want)
2 Ethersworn Canonist
4 Master of Etherium
4 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Tidehollow Sculler
4 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
2 Dimir Signet
3 Mox Opal
2 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Spell Pierce
2 Sword of the Meek
3 Talisman of Dominance
3 Thopter Foundry
3 Ancient Den
2 Ancient Tomb
4 Mishra's Factory
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Vault of Whispers
Look, Fetch, Draw, Look
Draw
Fetch
Look
1 Cranial Plating
3 Mox Opal
1 Sword of the Meek
3 Thopter Foundry
4 Baleful Strix
4 Etched Champion
2 Ethersworn Canonist
4 Master of Etherium
4 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Tidehollow Sculler
4 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
2 Thoughtcast
1 Academy Ruins
4 Ancient Den
3 Ancient Tomb
4 Glimmervoid
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Vault of Whispers
This is the list I've been working on. So far in testing it actually fares pretty well against the majority of tiered legacy decks. Etched Champion is TNN that doesn't die to Golgari Charm (though you've got to watch out for Jitte), AEther Vial helps accelerate out all the 2-drops (flashing in Strix in their combat or "Clique-ing" them with Sculler is pretty sweet). And as everyone already knows, Tezz is just a house; in the right deck he can rival Jace in terms of power.
UMerfolkU
UWRJeskai Ascendancy / Geist / ControlUWR
Legacy:
UMerfolkU
UWRJeskai StonebladeUWR
2 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
Creatures:
4 Baleful Strix
2 Etched Champion
4 Ornithopter
4 Vault Skirge
2 Master of Etherium
2 Stoneforge Mystic
Sorcery:
4 Thoughtcast
Instant:
4 Force of Will
Artifact:
4 Chalice of the Void
4 Cranial Plating
4 Mox Opal
2 Thopter Foundry
2 Springleaf Drum
1 Sword of the Meek
4 Seat of Synod
4 Vault of Whispers
4 Glimmervoid
3 Ancient Tomb
1 Ancient Den
1 Etched Champion
1 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
3 Ensnaring Bridge
3 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Phyrexian Revoker
2 Rest in Peace
3 Whipflare
I beat U/R delver 2-1, Poison 2-1, RUG Delver 2-0, Esper Control 2-0
Changes I am making are -1 Stoneforge, +1 Thopter Foundry main.
Sideboard -1 Whipflare, -1 Etched champion, +2 Perish.
I will let you know how it goes.