I did forget to mention taking turns too, though I don't actually think it's a good deck.
the thing with turns is that its power depends a lot from the meta since the deck itself is kinda "solved." right now it has good matchups against tier 1 decks so that's why he did good at scg charlotte and gp vegas.
problem with the deck is that a very very small number of players like its strategy so he will never be played by a good portion of the players, even if it happens to be a tier 0 deck (obviously it will never be that, just a point about how much it would be played)
After watching this weekend's tournament, Grixis is definitely a blue deck, and I want people to stop whining that it's a black deck. Those snapcasters, snap+K Command combos, counters, serum visions and thoughtscours are all very blue.
Jeskai is bad, and has been bad
UW Control has faded away, it's not a good deck
U/R Storm is being thrown out of the meta by Grixis Shadow
Turns is a tier 3 deck that made one lucky push
Merfolk is a blue deck, on a technical level, but it's an aggro deck that uses no blue cards shared by other control decks
Grixis shadow's existence itself could be dangerous to unban tools for it to use. No one on this forum can really ask for a preordain/Jace unban anymore (Well, not that I hope Jace is unbanned, ever).
If not for Grixis Shadow, blue would be in an awful spot and a horrible color
The other decks you mentioned are not fine though, they're all tier 3 (Not counting Merfolk), and Merfolk really isn't a blue deck outside of a technical scale.
EDIT: U/R Storm is definitely tier 2, it's just being drowned out by Grixis. U/R Storm getting preordain would be scary though
You realize that the point is the only reason for the blue cards is to get to/protect the black ones. This doesn't mean blue is strong it means black is strong and people will use whatever gets them to the strong cards.
Zak's blue steel deck was the only deck that showed the power of blue last weekend in modern. Then the blue deck couldn't handle t2/3 combos.
No, you're reaching.
Snapcaster was doing work all day, snap into thoughtseize or push was fantastic. Snap was totally a scary card everytime it was on camera
Blue thoughtscours/serum made the deck consistent
K-Command may be a Red-black card, but we've only seen it truly used well in blue decks. It's blue in the way you almost would think of Splinter Twin as a blue card
K-Command in Jund hasn't utilized that card anywhere like blue decks has
Gurmag angler is a horrible card without blue to power it up.
a 1 mana counterspell made everyone scared to play things with just 1 mana open, that's a very powerful mind game.
I'm sorry, but Grixis is very much a blue deck to me now, I believe adding the 1 mana counterspell pushed that opinion for me.
You realize that the point is the only reason for the blue cards is to get to/protect the black ones. This doesn't mean blue is strong it means black is strong and people will use whatever gets them to the strong cards.
What's wrong with that? Being a strong enabler/supporting color is a perfectly valid argument for a color's strength.
I think this argument about what color Grixis Shadow really is is a useless argument. It's blue identity is definitely strong, as counters and card filtering is pretty much what blue is all about. Saying the blue cards are just there to protect the black one's is ridiculous. In Jeskai Control, the blue cards are there to protect your win cons, it doesn't make them less valid. Grixis Shadow is definitely blue (and black. I'd say red is it's 'softest' color). That said, it's not the style of blue decks that people are wanting (myself included). It's a very proactive deck that uses counters purely as disruption to protect it's main threat, similar to delver decks. The people calling for blue decks are really just calling for reactive control style decks. UW saw a resurgence, and Jeskai had an ok showing this weekend, but they are still far from viable given all the different avenues proactive modern decks attack from.
Not to beat a dead Twin horse, but one of the reasons us salty twin players want it back is because it forced other decks to interact, which I don't think anyone would argue is bad (even if you hated twin, you probably still agree that interaction is inherently a good thing). Additionally, all of the reasons people tend to give to defend death's shadow and why those decks are good for the format are exactly the same reasons why twin was good, so it stings a little (at least it does to me) that shadow survives but twin is cold and dead. I used to love modern, but I just can't get excited for any deck these days. Depending on how the next ban announcement or two go, I might just have to accept that it's not the format for me. Legacy is policed by Force of Will, which keep degenerate combo decks in check. It seems that Thoughtseize fullfills the same role in Modern, and that's fine, just not for me.
Also, in regards to the 'warping the meta' arguments I've heard, specifically in regards to how twin warped the meta (again, I do not mean to ***** and moan about twin, I'm just using twin as it's the most repeated argument in this thread) but twin didn't warp the meta. Having to run answers to the top decks is not meta warping, it's just respecting the decks that exist. Having to run artifact hate to deal with affinity doesn't warp the meta. Eldrazi winter warped the meta, when it was either play eldrazi or find a specific deck that was so narrow that it only beat eldrazi. Learning the meta and coming prepared is part of the game and one of the reasons why control struggles these days. There's just too much to fight and not enough good ways to find it.
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Modern: UWR Breach, UWB Esper control
Legacy: UW RiP/Helm, UR Sneak and Show
After watching this weekend's tournament, Grixis is definitely a blue deck, and I want people to stop whining that it's a black deck. Those snapcasters, snap+K Command combos, counters, serum visions and thoughtscours are all very blue.
Jeskai is bad, and has been bad
UW Control has faded away, it's not a good deck
U/R Storm is being thrown out of the meta by Grixis Shadow
Turns is a tier 3 deck that made one lucky push
Merfolk is a blue deck, on a technical level, but it's an aggro deck that uses no blue cards shared by other control decks
Grixis shadow's existence itself could be dangerous to unban tools for it to use. No one on this forum can really ask for a preordain/Jace unban anymore (Well, not that I hope Jace is unbanned, ever).
If not for Grixis Shadow, blue would be in an awful spot and a horrible color
The other decks you mentioned are not fine though, they're all tier 3 (Not counting Merfolk), and Merfolk really isn't a blue deck outside of a technical scale.
EDIT: U/R Storm is definitely tier 2, it's just being drowned out by Grixis. U/R Storm getting preordain would be scary though
You realize that the point is the only reason for the blue cards is to get to/protect the black ones. This doesn't mean blue is strong it means black is strong and people will use whatever gets them to the strong cards.
Zak's blue steel deck was the only deck that showed the power of blue last weekend in modern. Then the blue deck couldn't handle t2/3 combos.
No, you're reaching.
Snapcaster was doing work all day, snap into thoughtseize or push was fantastic. Snap was totally a scary card everytime it was on camera
Blue thoughtscours/serum made the deck consistent
K-Command may be a Red-black card, but we've only seen it truly used well in blue decks. It's blue in the way you almost would think of Splinter Twin as a blue card
K-Command in Jund hasn't utilized that card anywhere like blue decks has
Gurmag angler is a horrible card without blue to power it up.
a 1 mana counterspell made everyone scared to play things with just 1 mana open, that's a very powerful mind game.
I'm sorry, but Grixis is very much a blue deck to me now, I believe adding the 1 mana counterspell pushed that opinion for me.
Snapcaster is powerful because of push and ts that's what I said lol. Jund didn't use k command well? Did you play k command in jund?
You realize that the point is the only reason for the blue cards is to get to/protect the black ones. This doesn't mean blue is strong it means black is strong and people will use whatever gets them to the strong cards.
What's wrong with that? Being a strong enabler/supporting color is a perfectly valid argument for a color's strength.
I think this argument about what color Grixis Shadow really is is a useless argument. It's blue identity is definitely strong, as counters and card filtering is pretty much what blue is all about. Saying the blue cards are just there to protect the black one's is ridiculous. In Jeskai Control, the blue cards are there to protect your win cons, it doesn't make them less valid. Grixis Shadow is definitely blue (and black. I'd say red is it's 'softest' color). That said, it's not the style of blue decks that people are wanting (myself included). It's a very proactive deck that uses counters purely as disruption to protect it's main threat, similar to delver decks. The people calling for blue decks are really just calling for reactive control style decks. UW saw a resurgence, and Jeskai had an ok showing this weekend, but they are still far from viable given all the different avenues proactive modern decks attack from.
Not to beat a dead Twin horse, but one of the reasons us salty twin players want it back is because it forced other decks to interact, which I don't think anyone would argue is bad (even if you hated twin, you probably still agree that interaction is inherently a good thing). Additionally, all of the reasons people tend to give to defend death's shadow and why those decks are good for the format are exactly the same reasons why twin was good, so it stings a little (at least it does to me) that shadow survives but twin is cold and dead. I used to love modern, but I just can't get excited for any deck these days. Depending on how the next ban announcement or two go, I might just have to accept that it's not the format for me. Legacy is policed by Force of Will, which keep degenerate combo decks in check. It seems that Thoughtseize fullfills the same role in Modern, and that's fine, just not for me.
Also, in regards to the 'warping the meta' arguments I've heard, specifically in regards to how twin warped the meta (again, I do not mean to ***** and moan about twin, I'm just using twin as it's the most repeated argument in this thread) but twin didn't warp the meta. Having to run answers to the top decks is not meta warping, it's just respecting the decks that exist. Having to run artifact hate to deal with affinity doesn't warp the meta. Eldrazi winter warped the meta, when it was either play eldrazi or find a specific deck that was so narrow that it only beat eldrazi. Learning the meta and coming prepared is part of the game and one of the reasons why control struggles these days. There's just too much to fight and not enough good ways to find it.
I wasn't arguing that it isn't a blue deck I'm saying just because it's a blue deck doesn't mean that blue is fine. Twin was a blue deck splashing colors to help/complete it. YOu had to have the blue spells for the deck to work, you don't in the case of grixis ds.
The argument just keeps changing based on the needs of the person presenting it. First we didn't have any blue decks in tier one. Then we did so it became they didn't run enough blue cards to be considered blue. Then they did so now the blue cards they run aren't blue enough. Cantrips and Counterspells are central to blues color identity and a deck using multiple different blue cards in a blue way makes it blue.
I agree with the above. Grixis Control swaps 4 cards for Death's Shadow, and now it's no longer a control deck? I don't buy that logic. Most lists are running about 17 "control" cards (discard, counters, removal) with about 14 mono blue spells. That's a lot of blue, and a lot of control, in the consensus best deck in the format. But please do keep telling everyone how bad blue is.
This whole "not a blue deck" argument is really all over the place. When we say "blue deck", or "red deck" or "selesnya deck" we should be referring to the feel of the deck. Grixis DS is about as solidy in the "grixis" camp as you can get.
As described on the MTG wiki "The three colors of Grixis are red, black, and blue, which embody some of the most twisted and inhuman ideals out of all the colors (such as rage from red, ruthlessness from black and deception from blue)".
Grixis is supposed to be mainly focused in black, which GDS clearly is. It also clearly has signs of blue in the game plan, as grixis should. But to label it "a blue deck" would be missing a lot of the point. When I say what is the difference between dimir and grixis, or azorious and bant, I think we all understand the feeling I am trying to get at.
Burn, no matter what colors it splashes, is a red deck. Affinity, no matter what color spells it actually plays, is a colorless deck. You cannot separate the fact that grixis DS fits completely into the grixis mold and to call it a "blue deck" would be misleading.
Now of course it is "a blue deck" by nature of containing blue cards, but when we say "blue deck" or "white deck" we are references the identity that is supposed to make the color unique from other colors and combinations and in this way grixis DS is certainly not a blue deck because it has those aspects of black and red, in addition to blue, that makes it solidly grixis. I think Magic as a whole has pretty defined lines of what each shard/wedge/guild/color represents even if decks are not always so cut and dry; in this one instance it is. Grixis death shadow is a grixis deck, in name, in color identity, and most importantly, in play style.
Now using this method of calling a deck whatever color based on the feeling of the deck as opposed to the literal color identity means that of course there are going to be identities not represented because we are never going to have 21 unique feeling tier 1 decks. I think taking turns fills this "blue deck" role pretty well. I just believe it is the other identities containing blue that are lacking somewhat and the identities containing white are struggling the most.
I see the "well then infect was blue" argument brought up all the time. It wasn't. Infect is about as defining of what the simic color combination represents as I could possibly imagine. Whacky, rules bending but not very strong creatures, weird protection effects, and just a general sense of strangeness in its matches. Now if infect comes back and splashes red for bolt it doesn't all of a sudden change the feeling of the deck to be temur. It would just be a simic deck playing bolt.
After watching this weekend's tournament, Grixis is definitely a blue deck, and I want people to stop whining that it's a black deck. Those snapcasters, snap+K Command combos, counters, serum visions and thoughtscours are all very blue.
No one's whining about anything, it's undeniable that the deck is a core black deck with blue as a secondary color. The typical maindeck is 22 black cards and 15 blue cards. I'm not saying the cantrips, Denial, and Snapcaster aren't good, I'm saying they aren't the core reason why the deck is as good as it is. It's the busted black creatures, Fatal Push, and the discard spells. That doesn't mean that it's not a "blue deck" in the way that most people use that term.
If not for Grixis Shadow, blue would be in an awful spot and a horrible color
I agree, but I think it's still overall in a bad spot. We have one good blue deck that represents the tempo/midrange style, but the control decks are still floundering, which is why I think something to help them that wouldn't automatically slot into Shadow would be nice. I'm not sure if Shadow would play Jace, I would probably try to play a copy or two in my sideboard, so he might not be ok. I think the best answer is just better counterspells. I'm not sure Grixis Shadow would even play Counterspell if they printed it into Modern. They already have access to Deprive, which is almost better in Shadow, but few people play that. I don't think they could play Dig Through Time because you can't support that many Delve cards, although that card is another debate entirely.
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Modern UBR Grixis Shadow UBR UR Izzet Phoenix UR UW UW Control UW GB GB Rock GB
Commander BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
I think taking turns fills this "blue deck" role pretty well.
it mostly is a mono U deck that plays 0 creatures if not one or two snapcaster. i actually play turns for this specific reason, i just hate creatures and i like to cast spells. i also like islands
''Yes Grixis shadow is tier 1, even though a third of its cards suck (the blue ones), it just gets carried by the black ones. We need to unban Jace because my pet deck(control) could use it...uhm because blue sucks I mean. I only want to make this format a better place, I swear''
Is it fun to make up your own quotes and then try to attribute them to other people? Reread what I said, you completely missed the sense. I didn't say the blue cards sucked, I said that Grixis Shadow is primarily carried by the black cards, and the blue ones are secondary, and the best blue card in the deck isn't even playable in other blue decks because of its mechanics. If you didn't want honest answers, why did you even bother posting here?
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Modern UBR Grixis Shadow UBR UR Izzet Phoenix UR UW UW Control UW GB GB Rock GB
Commander BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
''Yes Grixis shadow is tier 1, even though a third of its cards suck (the blue ones), it just gets carried by the black ones. We need to unban Jace because my pet deck(control) could use it...uhm because blue sucks I mean. I only want to make this format a better place, I swear''
Is it fun to make up your own quotes and then try to attribute them to other people? Reread what I said, you completely missed the sense. I didn't say the blue cards sucked, I said that Grixis Shadow is primarily carried by the black cards, and the blue ones are secondary, and the best blue card in the deck isn't even playable in other blue decks because of its mechanics. If you didn't want honest answers, why did you even bother posting here?
How about if we call it RuB and put the u in lowercase so everyone knows it's not as important?
The argument just keeps changing based on the needs of the person presenting it. First we didn't have any blue decks in tier one. Then we did so it became they didn't run enough blue cards to be considered blue. Then they did so now the blue cards they run aren't blue enough. Cantrips and Counterspells are central to blues color identity and a deck using multiple different blue cards in a blue way makes it blue.
The arguments never changed, it's just that people meant different things when they were talking about the struggles of blue decks. Some people meant it in a more broad term, including blue tempo and midrange decks, while some people meant specifically blue control. I'm satisfied having a good blue tempo/midrange deck to play, but I think it's perfectly reasonable for someone who wants a good blue control deck to not be satisfied. All the people on here telling these people that they shouldn't be unsatisfied are the ones being unreasonable.
I agree with the above. Grixis Control swaps 4 cards for Death's Shadow, and now it's no longer a control deck? I don't buy that logic. Most lists are running about 17 "control" cards (discard, counters, removal) with about 14 mono blue spells. That's a lot of blue, and a lot of control, in the consensus best deck in the format. But please do keep telling everyone how bad blue is.
Grixis Control is nowhere close to Grixis Shadow. They only share like 35-40 cards out of their typical 75s. That's a pretty huge difference.
How about if we call it RuB and put the u in lowercase so everyone knows it's not as important?
It's importance doesn't matter, but people trying to point to the deck and say, "See, blue is fine because Grixis Shadow is good" are missing the point. It's the same Twin obfuscation all over again. Just because Twin was good didn't mean blue in general was good back then. Twin was good because of an instant speed 2 card combo, not because the blue cards were so good. Grixis Shadow is good because of its busted black creatures and Legacy-level powerful discard spells, not the blue cards. If it was because of the blue cards, it wouldn't be the only top tier blue deck! I think you could make an argument that Grixis is better than Jund Shadow because the blue cards turn out to be better against the meta than the green ones for these particular decks, though.
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Modern UBR Grixis Shadow UBR UR Izzet Phoenix UR UW UW Control UW GB GB Rock GB
Commander BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
2-3 interactive blue spells and 0 threats. The deck plays blue exclusively to find black cards and ramp them out (thought scour). It is clearly a splash.
It's about the same splash as Jund to green except it seems bigger because it wants to use serum visions to find its land drops so there's a moderately heavier blue commitment.
The way blue is played in modern tells you that its threats and answers are miserable, because no one really plays any of those types of cards. It's pure filtering. If a deck ran 8 discard spells and then nothing but green creatures, green planeswalkers and green removal, it'd be a green deck not a black deck.
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Another thing you can thing you can think about is that the best modern removal spells (excepting terminate) are played in legacy - bolt, push, abrupt decay.
The best blue answer spells (force, counterspell, daze) don't exist in modern. Of corresponding blue cards in modern the only ones to see any legacy play are spell snare (extremely fringe) and spell pierce (usually only in combo decks). Mana leak obviously sees no play in legacy.
I'm not sure exactly what to take away from this except to say that it has always felt somewhat unfair to me that blue's answer spells get lumped in with their overpowered filtering spells from legacy.
My inclination is to say that blue needs an answer based powerup in modern and I would do this long before considering loosing improved filtering on the format.
One of the reasons for this is that blue filtering like Preordain or Ponder would see pretty much the same treatment as we see in Death's Shadow -- people playing blue exclusively to shrink the virtual size of their decks.
Nah.
Control, Aggro and combo describe the feel of the deck. Grixis describes an objective property of the deck: It's actual colors.
Yeah, because if I tell you I am playing a "aggro combo control deck" you'll have a better idea of what I am talking about than if I tell you I am playing a grixis deck
I mentioned that the colors in the deck don't always match the color identity the deck represents. It just so happens that it normally is the case.
Snapcaster was doing work all day, snap into thoughtseize or push was fantastic. Snap was totally a scary card everytime it was on camera
Blue thoughtscours/serum made the deck consistent
K-Command may be a Red-black card, but we've only seen it truly used well in blue decks. It's blue in the way you almost would think of Splinter Twin as a blue card
K-Command in Jund hasn't utilized that card anywhere like blue decks has
Gurmag angler is a horrible card without blue to power it up.
a 1 mana counterspell made everyone scared to play things with just 1 mana open, that's a very powerful mind game.
I'm sorry, but Grixis is very much a blue deck to me now, I believe adding the 1 mana counterspell pushed that opinion for me.
I played Shadow in a bunch of events all week at the GP and other than randomly countering something with Denial or Rejection (usually Tron, which I saw tons of), the blue cards are just there to facilitate black cards.
Snapcaster Mage is only "doing work" because casting Thoughtseize or Fatal Push or Kolaghan's Command twice is "doing work." Flashing back a Serum Visions or Thought Scour feels so bad every time. Feels like you're "wasting" your Snap because you need to filter into those good black cards. The only time Snap was actually good with blue cards was like as mentioned above with Stubborn Denial or Ceremonious Rejection. But outside of the first few turns, Denial is pretty bad without a black fatty on the board and Rejection is purely a sideboard card that people have to cast into anyway and hope you don't have it. Gurmag Angler and Tasigur, the Golden Fangare pretty bad without Scour, but again, we're just using mediocre blue cards to facilitate amazing black cards. You better believe if we had a black Goyf or Scooze we'd be playing that instead.
I can say that I won a small side event's last round with a K command to return Snap, Snap/Bolt for the win. That felt really good, but is an extremely rare case. Nearly every game is won by beating in with big black creatures after discarding their hand with black discard spells and killing their stuff with black removal.
The whole discussion is pointless, the people that criticize Grixis DS want a tier 1 deck that plays counterspells as its primary form of interaction not black discard, that's all there is to it.
The whole discussion is pointless, the people that critize Grixis DS want a tier 1 deck that plays counterspells as its primary form of interaction not black discard, that's all there is to it.
I don't mind that Grixis Shadow is a T1 deck. I actually have grown to enjoy playing the deck and enjoy playing a powerful deck for the first time in a long time. But as someone who enjoys playing the Snap/Bolt game, and as someone who has been waiting for a good Snap/Bolt deck since the banning of Twin, it's been a long and pretty miserable wait. Even current builds of Shadow are running between 0-1 Bolts because other cards (like black removal) are just better. If I can't play a meaningful control deck with Snaps and Bolts, I'd at least like to play a tempo/burn strategy. Instead, all "we" have available is this black, discard/creature attrition deck.
Most of it stems back to the Twin ban because, regardless of the REAL reasons for banning, the words they put in the announcement were that it was banned to open up all these suppressed similar decks like "Jeskai and Temur." All the while, URx-based reactive decks have gotten worse and worse with every new set while powerful broken strategies got better and better. So it's a combination of these kinds of decks being objectively weak AND other proactive strategies becoming so much better, faster, powerful, and resilient.
Nah.
Control, Aggro and combo describe the feel of the deck. Grixis describes an objective property of the deck: It's actual colors.
Yeah, because if I tell you I am playing a "aggro combo control deck" you'll have a better idea of what I am talking about than if I tell you I am playing a grixis deck
I mentioned that the colors in the deck don't always match the color identity the deck represents. It just so happens that it normally is the case.
No, but if you tell me you're playing an aggro control grixis deck I instantly know you're playing a deck that wants to attack me and control the board somehow while being in the colors of Black Blue and Red. Which I'm fairly certain is an accurate description of Grixis shadow.
Nah.
Control, Aggro and combo describe the feel of the deck. Grixis describes an objective property of the deck: It's actual colors.
Yeah, because if I tell you I am playing a "aggro combo control deck" you'll have a better idea of what I am talking about than if I tell you I am playing a grixis deck
I mentioned that the colors in the deck don't always match the color identity the deck represents. It just so happens that it normally is the case.
No, but if you tell me you're playing an aggro control grixis deck I instantly know you're playing a deck that wants to attack me and control the board somehow while being in the colors of Black Blue and Red. Which I'm fairly certain is an accurate description of Grixis shadow.
This has nothing to do with what I was getting at. I was trying to add some definition to all this is Grixis shadow a "blue deck" discussion. My point was dealing with color identity (in the sense of how the deck plays, not the actual color identity in the EDH sense) not archetype identity.
If I say "red deck" you know generally what I mean, regardless of format or what actual cards are in the deck. If they had enough functional reprints of psionic blast you could play a mono blue "red deck".
Grixis Death's Shadow is not a blue deck, and that is fine. It still showcases some strong blue cards and does help blue's prevalence as a color. The deck can do that without being defined as "blue". When I say "blue deck" you don't think of a suicide deck playing big creatures that trade resources for power, lots of removal, and some filtering and protection for said big creatures. Those are all really defining features of what I would expect a "Grixis" deck to look like.
Grixis DS is clearly primarily black, borrowing some rage from red and some deception from blue. Ya know, like the description of what Grixis represents that I posted above.
To be clear, a deck doesn't necessarily get fairly described as "black" just for having a majority black cards, it just so happens that a deck playing primarily one color of cards will more often than not take on the identity of the color.
Another example: Dredge is pretty clearly a "Golgari" deck. I don't care what colors its lands produce.
Nah.
Control, Aggro and combo describe the feel of the deck. Grixis describes an objective property of the deck: It's actual colors.
Yeah, because if I tell you I am playing a "aggro combo control deck" you'll have a better idea of what I am talking about than if I tell you I am playing a grixis deck
I mentioned that the colors in the deck don't always match the color identity the deck represents. It just so happens that it normally is the case.
No, but if you tell me you're playing an aggro control grixis deck I instantly know you're playing a deck that wants to attack me and control the board somehow while being in the colors of Black Blue and Red. Which I'm fairly certain is an accurate description of Grixis shadow.
This has nothing to do with what I was getting at. I was trying to add some definition to all this is Grixis shadow a "blue deck" discussion. My point was dealing with color identity (in the sense of how the deck plays, not the actual color identity in the EDH sense) not archetype identity.
If I say "red deck" you know generally what I mean, regardless of format or what actual cards are in the deck. If they had enough functional reprints of psionic blast you could play a mono blue "red deck".
Grixis Death's Shadow is not a blue deck, and that is fine. It still showcases some strong blue cards and does help blue's prevalence as a color. The deck can do that without being defined as "blue". When I say "blue deck" you don't think of a suicide deck playing big creatures that trade resources for power, lots of removal, and some filtering and protection for said big creatures. Those are all really defining features of what I would expect a "Grixis" deck to look like.
Grixis DS is clearly primarily black, borrowing some rage from red and some deception from blue. Ya know, like the description of what Grixis represents that I posted above.
To be clear, a deck doesn't necessarily get fairly described as "black" just for having a majority black cards, it just so happens that a deck playing primarily one color of cards will more often than not take on the identity of the color.
Another example: Dredge is pretty clearly a "Golgari" deck. I don't care what colors its lands produce.
It has everything to do with what you're getting at, because you're using objective descriptors to try and describe subjective properties and I'm telling you we already have a series of descriptors for that. A deck either is or is not blue based on the color of cards contained within. There are rules of the game that clearly define what a blue deck is. If I tell my opponent I'm playing a blue deck it doesn't tell them anything. Illusions was a blue aggro deck. MUC was a blue control deck. Polymorph is a blue combo deck. They're all blue because being blue doesn't describe how the deck plays, and if you think it does then you haven't been playing against a wide enough array of decks. The only reason why we call it Grixis instead of RUB is because one rolls off the tongue and the other I feel embarrassment over even though it's my favorite local bbq place. How a deck plays is only tangentially related to its colors, and if blue decks not playing blue enough for you is the hill you wish to die then so be it. Personally I wish we would stop using them too, but that's because I think the names from Tarkir were really cringey.
The whole discussion is pointless, the people that critize Grixis DS want a tier 1 deck that plays counterspells as its primary form of interaction not black discard, that's all there is to it.
I don't mind that Grixis Shadow is a T1 deck. I actually have grown to enjoy playing the deck and enjoy playing a powerful deck for the first time in a long time. But as someone who enjoys playing the Snap/Bolt game, and as someone who has been waiting for a good Snap/Bolt deck since the banning of Twin, it's been a long and pretty miserable wait. Even current builds of Shadow are running between 0-1 Bolts because other cards (like black removal) are just better. If I can't play a meaningful control deck with Snaps and Bolts, I'd at least like to play a tempo/burn strategy. Instead, all "we" have available is this black, discard/creature attrition deck.
Most of it stems back to the Twin ban because, regardless of the REAL reasons for banning, the words they put in the announcement were that it was banned to open up all these suppressed similar decks like "Jeskai and Temur." All the while, URx-based reactive decks have gotten worse and worse with every new set while powerful broken strategies got better and better. So it's a combination of these kinds of decks being objectively weak AND other proactive strategies becoming so much better, faster, powerful, and resilient.
UR turns with 4 bolts and 4 snapcasters and some blood moons is cool i promise. try it out! it also opens you for mudcap experiment combos after side
the thing with turns is that its power depends a lot from the meta since the deck itself is kinda "solved." right now it has good matchups against tier 1 decks so that's why he did good at scg charlotte and gp vegas.
problem with the deck is that a very very small number of players like its strategy so he will never be played by a good portion of the players, even if it happens to be a tier 0 deck (obviously it will never be that, just a point about how much it would be played)
URW PillowFort Stasis (costruction)
modern:
U
pauper:
UB Servitor Control
xenob8 : you know you are going to have a bad time when opponent starts with snow covered island
No, you're reaching.
Snapcaster was doing work all day, snap into thoughtseize or push was fantastic. Snap was totally a scary card everytime it was on camera
Blue thoughtscours/serum made the deck consistent
K-Command may be a Red-black card, but we've only seen it truly used well in blue decks. It's blue in the way you almost would think of Splinter Twin as a blue card
K-Command in Jund hasn't utilized that card anywhere like blue decks has
Gurmag angler is a horrible card without blue to power it up.
a 1 mana counterspell made everyone scared to play things with just 1 mana open, that's a very powerful mind game.
I'm sorry, but Grixis is very much a blue deck to me now, I believe adding the 1 mana counterspell pushed that opinion for me.
I think this argument about what color Grixis Shadow really is is a useless argument. It's blue identity is definitely strong, as counters and card filtering is pretty much what blue is all about. Saying the blue cards are just there to protect the black one's is ridiculous. In Jeskai Control, the blue cards are there to protect your win cons, it doesn't make them less valid. Grixis Shadow is definitely blue (and black. I'd say red is it's 'softest' color). That said, it's not the style of blue decks that people are wanting (myself included). It's a very proactive deck that uses counters purely as disruption to protect it's main threat, similar to delver decks. The people calling for blue decks are really just calling for reactive control style decks. UW saw a resurgence, and Jeskai had an ok showing this weekend, but they are still far from viable given all the different avenues proactive modern decks attack from.
Not to beat a dead Twin horse, but one of the reasons us salty twin players want it back is because it forced other decks to interact, which I don't think anyone would argue is bad (even if you hated twin, you probably still agree that interaction is inherently a good thing). Additionally, all of the reasons people tend to give to defend death's shadow and why those decks are good for the format are exactly the same reasons why twin was good, so it stings a little (at least it does to me) that shadow survives but twin is cold and dead. I used to love modern, but I just can't get excited for any deck these days. Depending on how the next ban announcement or two go, I might just have to accept that it's not the format for me. Legacy is policed by Force of Will, which keep degenerate combo decks in check. It seems that Thoughtseize fullfills the same role in Modern, and that's fine, just not for me.
Also, in regards to the 'warping the meta' arguments I've heard, specifically in regards to how twin warped the meta (again, I do not mean to ***** and moan about twin, I'm just using twin as it's the most repeated argument in this thread) but twin didn't warp the meta. Having to run answers to the top decks is not meta warping, it's just respecting the decks that exist. Having to run artifact hate to deal with affinity doesn't warp the meta. Eldrazi winter warped the meta, when it was either play eldrazi or find a specific deck that was so narrow that it only beat eldrazi. Learning the meta and coming prepared is part of the game and one of the reasons why control struggles these days. There's just too much to fight and not enough good ways to find it.
Legacy: UW RiP/Helm, UR Sneak and Show
Snapcaster is powerful because of push and ts that's what I said lol. Jund didn't use k command well? Did you play k command in jund?
I wasn't arguing that it isn't a blue deck I'm saying just because it's a blue deck doesn't mean that blue is fine. Twin was a blue deck splashing colors to help/complete it. YOu had to have the blue spells for the deck to work, you don't in the case of grixis ds.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
RGTron
UGInfect
URStorm
WUBRAd Nauseam
BRGrishoalbrand
URGScapeshift
WBGAbzan Company
WUBRGAmulet Titan
BRGLiving End
WGBogles
As described on the MTG wiki "The three colors of Grixis are red, black, and blue, which embody some of the most twisted and inhuman ideals out of all the colors (such as rage from red, ruthlessness from black and deception from blue)".
Grixis is supposed to be mainly focused in black, which GDS clearly is. It also clearly has signs of blue in the game plan, as grixis should. But to label it "a blue deck" would be missing a lot of the point. When I say what is the difference between dimir and grixis, or azorious and bant, I think we all understand the feeling I am trying to get at.
Burn, no matter what colors it splashes, is a red deck. Affinity, no matter what color spells it actually plays, is a colorless deck. You cannot separate the fact that grixis DS fits completely into the grixis mold and to call it a "blue deck" would be misleading.
Now of course it is "a blue deck" by nature of containing blue cards, but when we say "blue deck" or "white deck" we are references the identity that is supposed to make the color unique from other colors and combinations and in this way grixis DS is certainly not a blue deck because it has those aspects of black and red, in addition to blue, that makes it solidly grixis. I think Magic as a whole has pretty defined lines of what each shard/wedge/guild/color represents even if decks are not always so cut and dry; in this one instance it is. Grixis death shadow is a grixis deck, in name, in color identity, and most importantly, in play style.
Now using this method of calling a deck whatever color based on the feeling of the deck as opposed to the literal color identity means that of course there are going to be identities not represented because we are never going to have 21 unique feeling tier 1 decks. I think taking turns fills this "blue deck" role pretty well. I just believe it is the other identities containing blue that are lacking somewhat and the identities containing white are struggling the most.
I see the "well then infect was blue" argument brought up all the time. It wasn't. Infect is about as defining of what the simic color combination represents as I could possibly imagine. Whacky, rules bending but not very strong creatures, weird protection effects, and just a general sense of strangeness in its matches. Now if infect comes back and splashes red for bolt it doesn't all of a sudden change the feeling of the deck to be temur. It would just be a simic deck playing bolt.
I agree, but I think it's still overall in a bad spot. We have one good blue deck that represents the tempo/midrange style, but the control decks are still floundering, which is why I think something to help them that wouldn't automatically slot into Shadow would be nice. I'm not sure if Shadow would play Jace, I would probably try to play a copy or two in my sideboard, so he might not be ok. I think the best answer is just better counterspells. I'm not sure Grixis Shadow would even play Counterspell if they printed it into Modern. They already have access to Deprive, which is almost better in Shadow, but few people play that. I don't think they could play Dig Through Time because you can't support that many Delve cards, although that card is another debate entirely.
UBR Grixis Shadow UBR
UR Izzet Phoenix UR
UW UW Control UW
GB GB Rock GB
Commander
BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG
BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
Control, Aggro and combo describe the feel of the deck. Grixis describes an objective property of the deck: It's actual colors.
it mostly is a mono U deck that plays 0 creatures if not one or two snapcaster. i actually play turns for this specific reason, i just hate creatures and i like to cast spells. i also like islands
URW PillowFort Stasis (costruction)
modern:
U
pauper:
UB Servitor Control
xenob8 : you know you are going to have a bad time when opponent starts with snow covered island
UBR Grixis Shadow UBR
UR Izzet Phoenix UR
UW UW Control UW
GB GB Rock GB
Commander
BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG
BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
Grixis Control is nowhere close to Grixis Shadow. They only share like 35-40 cards out of their typical 75s. That's a pretty huge difference.
It's importance doesn't matter, but people trying to point to the deck and say, "See, blue is fine because Grixis Shadow is good" are missing the point. It's the same Twin obfuscation all over again. Just because Twin was good didn't mean blue in general was good back then. Twin was good because of an instant speed 2 card combo, not because the blue cards were so good. Grixis Shadow is good because of its busted black creatures and Legacy-level powerful discard spells, not the blue cards. If it was because of the blue cards, it wouldn't be the only top tier blue deck! I think you could make an argument that Grixis is better than Jund Shadow because the blue cards turn out to be better against the meta than the green ones for these particular decks, though.
UBR Grixis Shadow UBR
UR Izzet Phoenix UR
UW UW Control UW
GB GB Rock GB
Commander
BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG
BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
It's about the same splash as Jund to green except it seems bigger because it wants to use serum visions to find its land drops so there's a moderately heavier blue commitment.
The way blue is played in modern tells you that its threats and answers are miserable, because no one really plays any of those types of cards. It's pure filtering. If a deck ran 8 discard spells and then nothing but green creatures, green planeswalkers and green removal, it'd be a green deck not a black deck.
-------------------------------------
Another thing you can thing you can think about is that the best modern removal spells (excepting terminate) are played in legacy - bolt, push, abrupt decay.
The best blue answer spells (force, counterspell, daze) don't exist in modern. Of corresponding blue cards in modern the only ones to see any legacy play are spell snare (extremely fringe) and spell pierce (usually only in combo decks). Mana leak obviously sees no play in legacy.
I'm not sure exactly what to take away from this except to say that it has always felt somewhat unfair to me that blue's answer spells get lumped in with their overpowered filtering spells from legacy.
My inclination is to say that blue needs an answer based powerup in modern and I would do this long before considering loosing improved filtering on the format.
One of the reasons for this is that blue filtering like Preordain or Ponder would see pretty much the same treatment as we see in Death's Shadow -- people playing blue exclusively to shrink the virtual size of their decks.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
Yeah, because if I tell you I am playing a "aggro combo control deck" you'll have a better idea of what I am talking about than if I tell you I am playing a grixis deck
I mentioned that the colors in the deck don't always match the color identity the deck represents. It just so happens that it normally is the case.
I played Shadow in a bunch of events all week at the GP and other than randomly countering something with Denial or Rejection (usually Tron, which I saw tons of), the blue cards are just there to facilitate black cards.
Snapcaster Mage is only "doing work" because casting Thoughtseize or Fatal Push or Kolaghan's Command twice is "doing work." Flashing back a Serum Visions or Thought Scour feels so bad every time. Feels like you're "wasting" your Snap because you need to filter into those good black cards. The only time Snap was actually good with blue cards was like as mentioned above with Stubborn Denial or Ceremonious Rejection. But outside of the first few turns, Denial is pretty bad without a black fatty on the board and Rejection is purely a sideboard card that people have to cast into anyway and hope you don't have it. Gurmag Angler and Tasigur, the Golden Fang are pretty bad without Scour, but again, we're just using mediocre blue cards to facilitate amazing black cards. You better believe if we had a black Goyf or Scooze we'd be playing that instead.
I can say that I won a small side event's last round with a K command to return Snap, Snap/Bolt for the win. That felt really good, but is an extremely rare case. Nearly every game is won by beating in with big black creatures after discarding their hand with black discard spells and killing their stuff with black removal.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
I don't mind that Grixis Shadow is a T1 deck. I actually have grown to enjoy playing the deck and enjoy playing a powerful deck for the first time in a long time. But as someone who enjoys playing the Snap/Bolt game, and as someone who has been waiting for a good Snap/Bolt deck since the banning of Twin, it's been a long and pretty miserable wait. Even current builds of Shadow are running between 0-1 Bolts because other cards (like black removal) are just better. If I can't play a meaningful control deck with Snaps and Bolts, I'd at least like to play a tempo/burn strategy. Instead, all "we" have available is this black, discard/creature attrition deck.
Most of it stems back to the Twin ban because, regardless of the REAL reasons for banning, the words they put in the announcement were that it was banned to open up all these suppressed similar decks like "Jeskai and Temur." All the while, URx-based reactive decks have gotten worse and worse with every new set while powerful broken strategies got better and better. So it's a combination of these kinds of decks being objectively weak AND other proactive strategies becoming so much better, faster, powerful, and resilient.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
No, but if you tell me you're playing an aggro control grixis deck I instantly know you're playing a deck that wants to attack me and control the board somehow while being in the colors of Black Blue and Red. Which I'm fairly certain is an accurate description of Grixis shadow.
This has nothing to do with what I was getting at. I was trying to add some definition to all this is Grixis shadow a "blue deck" discussion. My point was dealing with color identity (in the sense of how the deck plays, not the actual color identity in the EDH sense) not archetype identity.
If I say "red deck" you know generally what I mean, regardless of format or what actual cards are in the deck. If they had enough functional reprints of psionic blast you could play a mono blue "red deck".
Grixis Death's Shadow is not a blue deck, and that is fine. It still showcases some strong blue cards and does help blue's prevalence as a color. The deck can do that without being defined as "blue". When I say "blue deck" you don't think of a suicide deck playing big creatures that trade resources for power, lots of removal, and some filtering and protection for said big creatures. Those are all really defining features of what I would expect a "Grixis" deck to look like.
Grixis DS is clearly primarily black, borrowing some rage from red and some deception from blue. Ya know, like the description of what Grixis represents that I posted above.
To be clear, a deck doesn't necessarily get fairly described as "black" just for having a majority black cards, it just so happens that a deck playing primarily one color of cards will more often than not take on the identity of the color.
Another example: Dredge is pretty clearly a "Golgari" deck. I don't care what colors its lands produce.
It has everything to do with what you're getting at, because you're using objective descriptors to try and describe subjective properties and I'm telling you we already have a series of descriptors for that. A deck either is or is not blue based on the color of cards contained within. There are rules of the game that clearly define what a blue deck is. If I tell my opponent I'm playing a blue deck it doesn't tell them anything. Illusions was a blue aggro deck. MUC was a blue control deck. Polymorph is a blue combo deck. They're all blue because being blue doesn't describe how the deck plays, and if you think it does then you haven't been playing against a wide enough array of decks. The only reason why we call it Grixis instead of RUB is because one rolls off the tongue and the other I feel embarrassment over even though it's my favorite local bbq place. How a deck plays is only tangentially related to its colors, and if blue decks not playing blue enough for you is the hill you wish to die then so be it. Personally I wish we would stop using them too, but that's because I think the names from Tarkir were really cringey.
UR turns with 4 bolts and 4 snapcasters and some blood moons is cool i promise. try it out! it also opens you for mudcap experiment combos after side
URW PillowFort Stasis (costruction)
modern:
U
pauper:
UB Servitor Control
xenob8 : you know you are going to have a bad time when opponent starts with snow covered island