Sadly I only have 1 student of warfare and I dont have any horizon canopy I have a another 1 costing knight its 1/1 with vigilence and I got 4 terramorphic expanse and 2 evolving wilds you think they would be good for this deck since you sack them to get land?
Lionheart Maverick thats the 1 costing knight i got i have 3 of him and 1 student of warfare im thinking of taking out Honor of the pure
Love this thread...working on my own builds of Modern and Legacy White Vial knights as we speak. Decided to come to the end of the thread to see if there was any logical reason Cavern of Souls wasn't in this. Saw the post about the update to the primer coming....looking forward to it!
What slot is Silverblade Palladin likely to take up from the current list?
Sadly I only have 1 student of warfare and I dont have any horizon canopy I have a another 1 costing knight its 1/1 with vigilence and I got 4 terramorphic expanse and 2 evolving wilds you think they would be good for this deck since you sack them to get land?
Lionheart Maverick thats the 1 costing knight i got i have 3 of him and 1 student of warfare im thinking of taking out Honor of the pure
I would definitely put in Student of Warfare, even if it's your only one. Its a good card, because it's a 1-drop and you can use any excess mana during your turn to level it up. The most common scenario with it is
Turn 1: Play land, cast Student of Warfare
Turn 2: Play land, level up Student of Warfare twice. It is 3/3 first strike. Now attack with it.
Lionheart Maverick is a weaker 1/1 Knight, because it costs so much to use its ability. It's Vigilance will probably make it a useful early blocker, however. So, I would put in Student of Warfare and remove something, either Honor of the Pure or Oblivion Ring. You probably put Oblivion Ring to stop Planeswalkers, but you have enough Knights to attack them directly. Lionheart Maverick is a toss-up.
Terramorphic Expanse and Evolving Wilds cause your basic lands to come onto the battlefield tapped, so you lose a "turn" that way. Yes, they will boost Knight of the Reliquary, but I do not feel those fetch cards are worth the cost of your basic land entering tapped, especially your first 3 turns. You're better of not using them.
I think Delver decks can flip a Delver on T2 with their access to library manipulation. I think the Falcon's dependency on a Knight or Soldier on the battlefield is its weakness. Your early soldiers and Knight have a high probability of being removed, so Falcon could become a dead draw. I understand that you want to try to brew something, and I'm open to being wrong. In the meantime, I will continue to charge with Knight of Meadowgrain to slow the life loss from Delver, hopefully buying me enough time to draw removal.
War Falcon has it's drawbacks, and you certainly pointed out valid points on him. Well, I have to admit I was trying too hard to fit War Falcon in.
Yeah, Soldiers can be deployed faster with their greater number of one-drop soldiers.
I was wondering where the Modern Soldiers thread went. It fell off the first page.
What to do. there was never much interest in Modern Soldiers so I stopped updating. I even remember getting stick from another member on playing Soldiers instead of decks such as Zoo.
Since we are so near to M13, I figured it would make sense to add the new cards in.
Since I'm putting up your Non-Vial list in the primer, I think it will be more useful to set it up as universal as possible so it is relevant to a general meta. Definitely open to further discussion on the list. So anyone feel free to comment!
Below is my list, some of the changes I made were:
I'm still not a big fan of Wall of Omens. Therefore taking it out for other creatures.
Student of Warfare upped to 4, to increase the odds of landing a opening turn knight.
Since we have removed Swords and Planeswalkers from the maindeck (partly because of Thalia and we have more offensive power with Rancor), thus reducing the mana curve substantially, I feel we could add in a few more 3cc knights in Stillmoon Cavalier and Mirran Crusader. Some protection is always good.
Rancor is so good I'm going for 3 here. I remember we have discussed before on Wrath of God and the reasons you maindeck it, but in a more univeral list, it is deemed too risky(without Vial) and situational to play here so I'm pushing it to the sideboard.
There is a single change made to the land base, to increase the G count by 1 via a fetch land so it is easier to cast Rancor - Caverns can be used for Knight of the Reliquary and Qasali Pridemage but not for Rancor.
I haven't put much thought into the sideboard. Will come back to it later.
What to do. there was never much interest in Modern Soldiers so I stopped updating. I even remember getting stick from another member on playing Soldiers instead of decks such as Zoo.
This is the "Deck Creation" thread. We can brew whatever decks we want. Geez, some people are lame.
Since we are so near to M13, I figured it would make sense to add the new cards in.
Since I'm putting up your Non-Vial list in the primer, I think it will be more useful to set it up as universal as possible so it is relevant to a general meta. Definitely open to further discussion on the list. So anyone feel free to comment!
Below is my list, some of the changes I made were:
I'm still not a big fan of Wall of Omens. Therefore taking it out for other creatures.
The only suggestion I have is to at least mention Wall of Omens. Again, it's helped my draws in games and stalls some aggro decks. I know you are not a fan of it, but for the sake of completeness, it's worth mentioning as an option.
Sadly I only have 1 student of warfare and I dont have any horizon canopy I have a another 1 costing knight its 1/1 with vigilence and I got 4 terramorphic expanse and 2 evolving wilds you think they would be good for this deck since you sack them to get land?
Lionheart Maverick thats the 1 costing knight i got i have 3 of him and 1 student of warfare im thinking of taking out Honor of the pure
Solid advice from Eriol earlier, anyway, I wouldn't play Terramorphic Expanse and Evolving Wilds. They are bad for tempo and you don't exactly need mana fixing.
You should take out Honor of the Pure, for a Vial deck you only have 21 creatures which is the barely sufficient. Besides both Vial and Honor of the Pure need creatures to be effective. So that's already 8 cards which usage is limited without creature cards.
The only suggestion I have is to at least mention Wall of Omens. Again, it's helped my draws in games and stalls some aggro decks. I know you are not a fan of it, but for the sake of completeness, it's worth mentioning as an option.
I don't really think Wall of Omens is that bad here, and it's certainty helpful against ground-based aggro deck - I can always link your full decklist with the wall in the second post.
What do you think of the non-vial decklist below? I'm thinking of removing Thalia altogether and adding in Honor of the Pure. Thalia will go into sideboard as a 4 off. The non-vial decklist doesn't seems to have a strong aggro plan, and Honor could be the factor that changes that.
Love this thread...working on my own builds of Modern and Legacy White Vial knights as we speak. Decided to come to the end of the thread to see if there was any logical reason Cavern of Souls wasn't in this. Saw the post about the update to the primer coming....looking forward to it!
What slot is Silverblade Palladin likely to take up from the current list?
Great to hear that! Do share your lists with us when they are completed. By the way I just made some minor updates to the primer. Will be making periodic updates here and there...feel free to comment and correct as you deem fit!
I don't really think Wall of Omens is that bad here, and it's certainty helpful against ground-based aggro deck - I can always link your full decklist with the wall in the second post.
I would appreciate a link to my decklist. At least, it will show what your deck is based on.
What do you think of the non-vial decklist below? I'm thinking of removing Thalia altogether and adding in Honor of the Pure. Thalia will go into sideboard as a 4 off. The non-vial decklist doesn't seems to have a strong aggro plan, and Honor could be the factor that changes that.
Are you talking about "4.3) Green & White Modern Knights (Non-Vial)"?
I never really found any room for Honor of the Pure in a G/W build, even though all creatures in this deck are white. I think the main problem I had is that Honor of the Pure was sometimes a dead draw. Honor of the Pure works really well in cheap White Weenies and token decks, but using it to buff 2 CMC or 3 CMC knights is a bit expensive, especially if they get destroyed/exiled anyway. I'd rather fill those slots with more creatures with abilities. Remember that Thalia disrupts and puts the opponent on the clock. Honor of the Pure does neither.
Honor of the Pure in a white only build is a better option.
It's understandable. Actually, since you can run a ton of pro white black knights, it's a very survivable strategy in modern. There is a lot to be said for being path proof. It's also hell on counters and red removal because of haakon. Graveyard hate remains problematic, but well, you can't have everything, and frankly, being strong against these two strategies isn't something to be ashamed of. I was looking at a mono black knights strategy, and noting liliana of the veil, I really think that the best card to pair with her would be smallpox. I understand that it will be slower, yes. However, it's also a ground out attrition war and this sort of deck would excel at that. I propose this list, noting that we are aiming for the mid to long game and this deck would be more of a long term. I will be testing it, of course.
Dark Confidant seems obvious enough, 3 liliana is hell on opposing decks, and the rest is attrition or combination. 4 Haakon for now, I'm going to assume it will be path target number one and well, nailing their paths will always be good. Beyond that, the only creature that doesn't synergize with the zombie strategy is black knight, and a 2/2 pro white first strike is still good, in my book.
I like your Mono-Black Knights list very much, so much so that I don't have much to add on or change. It looks very playable to me especially Smallpox was a great find. Do you mind if I put it up in the primer as well? This could well be a variant of Smallpox deck but I can put it up as another Variant of Modern Knights due to the presence of Haakon and the recurring knights engine.
I would appreciate a link to my decklist. At least, it will show what your deck is based on.
In that case could you create a new single post with your decklist so I can add a link below the 4.3) Green & White Modern Knights (Non-Vial) to direct to your post? It would be neater that way and you could edit that post as and when you want.
Are you talking about "4.3) Green & White Modern Knights (Non-Vial)"?
I never really found any room for Honor of the Pure in a G/W build, even though all creatures in this deck are white. I think the main problem I had is that Honor of the Pure was sometimes a dead draw. Honor of the Pure works really well in cheap White Weenies and token decks, but using it to buff 2 CMC or 3 CMC knights is a bit expensive, especially if they get destroyed/exiled anyway. I'd rather fill those slots with more creatures with abilities. Remember that Thalia disrupts and puts the opponent on the clock. Honor of the Pure does neither.
Honor of the Pure in a white only build is a better option.
Yup - 4.3) Green & White Modern Knights (Non-Vial).
I think it depends on the creatures you choose, if I run Honor of the Pure(only in a non-vial version) in a GW build, all my creatures are either White or Multicolor with White, so they all enjoy the +1/+1 bonus - I'm referring to Knight of the Reliquary and Qasali Pridemage. I might even run a singleton Stirring Wildwood, which is also a white creature.
The way you describe Honor as a dead draw sounds similar to the way you described Aether Vial previously.....
Anyway, despite all I have said that is pro-Honor, I used to be a fierce advocate for equipment Swords over Honor, IDK, we could just look at the pace of the meta and decide which to put. Honor will be for the faster meta and Swords for a slower meta? Currently, my position/stand on these cards are neutral.
I would rather use Thalia, Guardian of Thraben strictly against combo and tempo deck, and at the moment, our decklists are running 11 cards that could be affected by Thalia as well. Most of the non-creature spells does look like those we might need to cast on the same turn we cast a creature so that's pretty risky to me.
In that case could you create a new single post with your decklist so I can add a link below the 4.3) Green & White Modern Knights (Non-Vial) to direct to your post? It would be neater that way and you could edit that post as and when you want.
Isn't that spamming the forum? I know that if I post my own thread, I'm going to get a bunch of comments saying that I should have posted it here. I don't want to get into trouble over that. We're better off with you just giving me credit for the inspiration.
The way you describe Honor as a dead draw sounds similar to the way you described Aether Vial previously.....
You're right. I never thought of it that way. I think I have developed a bias against cards that don't do enough in a Knights deck. I have had a game state where I have no creatures, so neither Aether Vial or Honor of the Pure would be helpful. Even if I drew a Path of Exile, I am pretty confident in my past games to hit something with it. I've always seen Honor as a small creature or token booster rather than trying to boost 2 CMC or 3 CMC creatues.
Anyway, despite all I have said that is pro-Honor, I used to be a fierce advocate for equipment Swords over Honor, IDK, we could just look at the pace of the meta and decide which to put. Honor will be for the faster meta and Swords for a slower meta? Currently, my position/stand on these cards are neutral.
I agree that the meta will determine how tuned the deck is.
I would rather use Thalia, Guardian of Thraben strictly against combo and tempo deck, and at the moment, our decklists are running 11 cards that could be affected by Thalia as well. Most of the non-creature spells does look like those we might need to cast on the same turn we cast a creature so that's pretty risky to me.
But most of the 11 cards or so cards that would be affected by Thalia are only 1 CMC. Take out Wrath of God and a Swords....you are left with PtE, Faith's Shield, Basilisk Collar, and Rancor. If you want to use Honor of the pure, then Thalia interferes with that. If you limit your noncreature spells to 1 CMC, Knights ought to be able to survive that while messing up other aggro as well. Aggro want to drop cheap creatures and burn the opposition cheap spells. Why don't we just make that burn more costly?
In any case, Thalia can be SB. I will continue to mess around with Thalia maindeck and see where it goes. I'll drop my Sword as a result.
Isn't that spamming the forum? I know that if I post my own thread, I'm going to get a bunch of comments saying that I should have posted it here. I don't want to get into trouble over that. We're better off with you just giving me credit for the inspiration.
Nah, I'm not telling you to spam loz :rolleyes:. What I meant was for you to post in this very thread(Modern Knights) a new post with only your decklist - something like the post below but without the discussion:
You're right. I never thought of it that way. I think I have developed a bias against cards that don't do enough in a Knights deck. I have had a game state where I have no creatures, so neither Aether Vial or Honor of the Pure would be helpful. Even if I drew a Path of Exile, I am pretty confident in my past games to hit something with it. I've always seen Honor as a small creature or token booster rather than trying to boost 2 CMC or 3 CMC creatues.
I thought so, judging by your responses to these cards. Aether Vial and Honor of the Pure are useless when there are no creatures. And that is precisely why I felt we don't have the space to play 4 of each, since we have to reduce the creature count for them. I don't think we need to discuss further on the merits of Vial and Honor (I think we have done that before) - they are powerful cards in the right game state, and offer something extra to tilt the balance in our favour. You argue a good point about these cards doing nothing in certain scenarios, but we could say the same of a 2cc creature which when you draw during the later stages is not good enough for attack or even defence.
But most of the 11 cards or so cards that would be affected by Thalia are only 1 CMC. Take out Wrath of God and a Swords....you are left with PtE, Faith's Shield, Basilisk Collar, and Rancor. If you want to use Honor of the pure, then Thalia interferes with that. If you limit your noncreature spells to 1 CMC, Knights ought to be able to survive that while messing up other aggro as well. Aggro want to drop cheap creatures and burn the opposition cheap spells. Why don't we just make that burn more costly?
In any case, Thalia can be SB. I will continue to mess around with Thalia maindeck and see where it goes. I'll drop my Sword as a result.
You would be surprised how Thalia can affect us adversely as well. How many times have you encounter having only one mana available for one-drop spells like Faith's Shield and Path to Exile? Thalia in play would changes all that. Anyway, I may be too paranoid over Thalia's impact on ourselves.
That's why I was thinking of moving 4x Thalia to the sideboard totally. When sideboarding, Thalia can come in for Honor of the Pure.
This is a base build of GW without Aether Vial. My reason is that Aether Vial, while powerful, is bad in multiples. However, you need 3 or 4 of them to have any reasonable probability of getting one in your opening hand. So, I experimented with a build without it.
Card Choices
Wall of Omens
Although Wall of Omens is not a Knight, I have found it to have a useful effect in the Knights deck. It's a cantrip, providing draw power. It is a 0/4 Wall that can block ground creatures early on while you advance your game plan.
Cavern of Souls
This is a vital land for tribal decks, since it fixes your mana for casting, and it hampers counterspell-based decks. Be careful with your build, because this land produces colorless mana otherwise. For example, you cannot use Cavern of Souls to level up Student of Warfare.
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
Thalia can be maindeck or sideboard, depending on your meta. As a sideboard choice, it will hamper combo and counterspell-based decks. As a maindeck, you are primarily looking to hinder aggro-tempo deck's removal spells. This does affect your spells, so you must play cheap 1 CMC non-creature spells to use Thalia effectively. Thalia is a great 2/1 first strike with a hindering ability, which may be more appealing than Thorn of Amethyst. Yes, Thalia can be removed, but it'll cost the opponent 1 mana more to do so, which will invariably interfere with his/her tempo. The opponent was probably planning to do something else with that 1 mana and cannot do so now, essentially buying you a turn.
Wrath of God
This is strictly for my playstyle. I like to use it against untargetable creatures and it combos with Knight Exemplar. Having it in the maindeck with Thalia is a definite problem, so if I were playing competitively, it would be a sideboard card.
Nah, I'm not telling you to spam loz :rolleyes:. What I meant was for you to post in this very thread(Modern Knights) a new post with only your decklist - something like the post below but without the discussion:
Thereafter I'll link above post in the primer. Sorry for causing any kind of misunderstanding!
Done. See the post above I added my personal explanations. A pseudo primer in a primer.
Quote from Nabbydian »
I thought so, judging by your responses to these cards. Aether Vial and Honor of the Pure are useless when there are no creatures.
I agree that we don't need to discuss these cards further, and I was not really arguing to be correct. I was only arguing so an alternative reason could be presented. As we have agreed in the past, card choices depend on the meta.
While 99.9% of Knight players agree that Knight Exemplar, Knight of the Reliquary, and Path to Exile go into a GW Knights deck, everything else seems to be open to interpretation.
Quote from Nabbydian »
You would be surprised how Thalia can affect us adversely as well. How many times have you encounter having only one mana available for one-drop spells like Faith's Shield and Path to Exile? Thalia in play would changes all that. Anyway, I may be too paranoid over Thalia's impact on ourselves.
I'm aware of this, as I was playing that goblins deck a while ago. For me, I had Thalia in my hand, had a creature advantage, and had 4 lands, so I decided to gamble and cast Thalia. And I won that game barely. If I didn't cast Thalia, I would have lost for certain.
I like your Mono-Black Knights list very much, so much so that I don't have much to add on or change. It looks very playable to me especially Smallpox was a great find. Do you mind if I put it up in the primer as well? This could well be a variant of Smallpox deck but I can put it up as another Variant of Modern Knights due to the presence of Haakon and the recurring knights engine.
By all means, feel free to post it. I considered stillmoon cavalier, but at best, I find it a board card. It doesn't really do much I care about (pro black is less of an issue. yes, black removal slows you, but it in general, doesn't exile which is all we care about). Darkblast is actually something I hadn't considered and may be a good idea. Requires testing, though.
I agree that we don't need to discuss these cards further, and I was not really arguing to be correct. I was only arguing so an alternative reason could be presented. As we have agreed in the past, card choices depend on the meta.
While 99.9% of Knight players agree that Knight Exemplar, Knight of the Reliquary, and Path to Exile go into a GW Knights deck, everything else seems to be open to interpretation.
That's true. Other than the 3 cards you mentioned, which are a certain shoo-in, the other choices in the deck are pretty much still available for discussion or debate.
I'm aware of this, as I was playing that goblins deck a while ago. For me, I had Thalia in my hand, had a creature advantage, and had 4 lands, so I decided to gamble and cast Thalia. And I won that game barely. If I didn't cast Thalia, I would have lost for certain.
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben is a great creature, but she doesn't fit into every deck. That said, when play at the right timing - is absolutely massive.
By all means, feel free to post it. I considered stillmoon cavalier, but at best, I find it a board card. It doesn't really do much I care about (pro black is less of an issue. yes, black removal slows you, but it in general, doesn't exile which is all we care about). Darkblast is actually something I hadn't considered and may be a good idea. Requires testing, though.
Thanks!
By the way do share with us how your testing go, I'm already working on adding a sub-topic for "Haakon Darth Knights".
on the modern darth knights list. I've been tearing blue/white control, both tron and delver, a new one, and I'm about even (ish) against sligh variants. That one mostly depends on if I can get a haakon and a nameless inversion active, as well as any number of black knights active (first strike wrecks this one).
Current changes to my list:
-1 duress, -1 mutavault, + 2 swamp. It's been running a lot smoother, and 4 vaults is bad. 3 is about right, with 23 lands. I was sacrificing too many to the poxes and was having an issue drawing what I needed.
on the modern darth knights list. I've been tearing blue/white control, both tron and delver, a new one, and I'm about even (ish) against sligh variants. That one mostly depends on if I can get a haakon and a nameless inversion active, as well as any number of black knights active (first strike wrecks this one).
Current changes to my list:
-1 duress, -1 mutavault, + 2 swamp. It's been running a lot smoother, and 4 vaults is bad. 3 is about right, with 23 lands. I was sacrificing too many to the poxes and was having an issue drawing what I needed.
The Modern Darth Knights is one under-rated deck to be honest, I was owning Bant, Blue/White control and Black/White control with my legacy darth Knights as well. So I'm not all too surprised about your results so far - and it's also one of the main reason why I'm keen to add this variant into the primer. I can imagine a recurring Nameless Inversion taking Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre out?
The changes look good. Mutavault was likely to be the land sacrificed since you would rather keep the BB available after a Smallpox!
Here's a work in progress addition to the primer I made on Darth Knights:
This is a deck that will beat most aggro white build, can cast creatures as many times as they burn(a different story if they burn face), laugh at decks attempting to counter Haakon and his knights + zombies, immune to deck playing doom blade type of removals, any more please feel free to add on.
An opening turn discard(we run 7-8) allows us to cast Smallpox safely, meanwhile low-cost and cheap knights and zombies which are dispensable will be deployed to trade off or chump block in most situations, since they can be recurred continuously later in the game. That means the deck is typically trying to stall and stabilize during the early game with creatures such as Stromgald Crusader, Black Knight and Gravecrawler. Smallpox and Liliana of the Veil will come in shortly for the control/disrupt element and hopefully discard Haakon into the graveyard. Nameless Inversion is also a massive card here since it can be casted as many times as you have the mana for, which usually will clear the opponent board of creatures slowly but surely.
This is essentially a attrition deck, and will usually win the war when it gets to attrition stage with Haakon in play.
Key and Most important play:
Haakon's Recurring engine with Knights and Nameless Inversion.
Other Strategic plays:
Gravecrawler interaction with Haakon and Stromgald Crusader.
Smallpox synergy with Haakon.
Liliana of the Veil synergy with Haakon.
Minor plays:
Smallpox with Dark Confidant when life gets too low.
Liliana of the Veil discard with other knights, cast those discarded knights with Haakon in play.
The Modern Darth Knights is one under-rated deck to be honest, I was owning Bant, Blue/White control and Black/White control with my legacy darth Knights as well. So I'm not all too surprised about your results so far - and it's also one of the main reason why I'm keen to add this variant into the primer. I can imagine a recurring Nameless Inversion taking Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre out?
The changes look good. Mutavault was likely to be the land sacrificed since you would rather keep the BB available after a Smallpox!
To be honest, I've never managed to take down an ulamog that way yet. I've taken out emrakul with smallpox and liliana, though. The inversions just take out the various small fry while my knights and zombies beat in. At the moment, I'm considering adding in red for sideboard options and potentially blood knight.
1) Gavony Township is too-mana intensive for this deck. Drop it.
2) Since you have Knight of the Reliquary, most builds include a cheap Sejiri Steppe that Knight of the Reliquary can fetch.
3) You probably could use a 1-drop knight like Student of Warfare
4) Can you get 2x Horizon Canopy? When you sacrifice it to draw a card, it helps with the Knight of the Reliquary boosting.
Lionheart Maverick thats the 1 costing knight i got i have 3 of him and 1 student of warfare im thinking of taking out Honor of the pure
What slot is Silverblade Palladin likely to take up from the current list?
I would definitely put in Student of Warfare, even if it's your only one. Its a good card, because it's a 1-drop and you can use any excess mana during your turn to level it up. The most common scenario with it is
Turn 1: Play land, cast Student of Warfare
Turn 2: Play land, level up Student of Warfare twice. It is 3/3 first strike. Now attack with it.
Lionheart Maverick is a weaker 1/1 Knight, because it costs so much to use its ability. It's Vigilance will probably make it a useful early blocker, however. So, I would put in Student of Warfare and remove something, either Honor of the Pure or Oblivion Ring. You probably put Oblivion Ring to stop Planeswalkers, but you have enough Knights to attack them directly. Lionheart Maverick is a toss-up.
Terramorphic Expanse and Evolving Wilds cause your basic lands to come onto the battlefield tapped, so you lose a "turn" that way. Yes, they will boost Knight of the Reliquary, but I do not feel those fetch cards are worth the cost of your basic land entering tapped, especially your first 3 turns. You're better of not using them.
Nothing in the G/W Modern Knights build. I think we have enough creatures to work with. Nabbydian talked about using it in a R/W Modern Knight build.
War Falcon has it's drawbacks, and you certainly pointed out valid points on him. Well, I have to admit I was trying too hard to fit War Falcon in.
I'm still a big fan of Knight of Meadowgrain.
What to do. there was never much interest in Modern Soldiers so I stopped updating. I even remember getting stick from another member on playing Soldiers instead of decks such as Zoo.
Since we are so near to M13, I figured it would make sense to add the new cards in.
Since I'm putting up your Non-Vial list in the primer, I think it will be more useful to set it up as universal as possible so it is relevant to a general meta. Definitely open to further discussion on the list. So anyone feel free to comment!
Below is my list, some of the changes I made were:
-4 Wall of Omens
+1 Student of Warfare
+1 Mirran Crusader
+1 Stillmoon Cavalier
+1 White Knight
I'm still not a big fan of Wall of Omens. Therefore taking it out for other creatures.
Student of Warfare upped to 4, to increase the odds of landing a opening turn knight.
Since we have removed Swords and Planeswalkers from the maindeck (partly because of Thalia and we have more offensive power with Rancor), thus reducing the mana curve substantially, I feel we could add in a few more 3cc knights in Stillmoon Cavalier and Mirran Crusader. Some protection is always good.
-1 Sword of Light and Shadow (Rancor)
-2 Wrath of God
+3 Rancor
Rancor is so good I'm going for 3 here. I remember we have discussed before on Wrath of God and the reasons you maindeck it, but in a more univeral list, it is deemed too risky(without Vial) and situational to play here so I'm pushing it to the sideboard.
There is a single change made to the land base, to increase the G count by 1 via a fetch land so it is easier to cast Rancor - Caverns can be used for Knight of the Reliquary and Qasali Pridemage but not for Rancor.
I haven't put much thought into the sideboard. Will come back to it later.
4 Student of Warfare
4 Knight Exemplar
4 Knight of Meadowgrain
4 Knight of the Reliquary
1 Stillmoon Cavalier
1 Mirran Crusader
2 White Knight
2 Phyrexian Metamorph
3 Qasali Pridemage
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
Non-creatures (11)
4 Path to Exile
3 Faith's Shield
1 Basilisk Collar
3 Rancor
2 Horizon Canopy
2 Temple Garden
7 Plains
3 Forest
2 Marsh Flats
1 Arid Mesa
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Sejiri Steppe
3 Cavern of Souls
4 Tormod's Crypt
4 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Elspeth, Knight Errant
1 Qasali Pridemage
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
3 Wrath of God
It certainly was for a while, seems like things are changing again though!!!:p
Signature by Syndarion from Aeternal Studios!
[Deck/Primer] Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Darth Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Casual Knights in Legacy
[Deck/Primer] Modern Knights
[Deck/Primer] Modern Ninjas
LEGACY
Legacy Knights Variants WG,WU,WR,WB,W,B
Soldiers Stompy W
NinjaStill UB
FOWless Merfolk UW
Aggro Elves G
MODERN
Modern Knights Variants WG,BR
Modern Ninjas Variants UB,UG,UW,UWR
Modern Kithkins WR,W
This is the "Deck Creation" thread. We can brew whatever decks we want. Geez, some people are lame.
The only suggestion I have is to at least mention Wall of Omens. Again, it's helped my draws in games and stalls some aggro decks. I know you are not a fan of it, but for the sake of completeness, it's worth mentioning as an option.
Solid advice from Eriol earlier, anyway, I wouldn't play Terramorphic Expanse and Evolving Wilds. They are bad for tempo and you don't exactly need mana fixing.
You should take out Honor of the Pure, for a Vial deck you only have 21 creatures which is the barely sufficient. Besides both Vial and Honor of the Pure need creatures to be effective. So that's already 8 cards which usage is limited without creature cards.
Just add the single Student of Warfare you have, and add in some 2cc knights you can find. White Knight, White Shield Crusader or Knight of the Holy Nimbus if you have them. Lionheart Maverick is way too underwhelming.
Precisely. But what to do. Try talking sense into them.:rolleyes:
I don't really think Wall of Omens is that bad here, and it's certainty helpful against ground-based aggro deck - I can always link your full decklist with the wall in the second post.
What do you think of the non-vial decklist below? I'm thinking of removing Thalia altogether and adding in Honor of the Pure. Thalia will go into sideboard as a 4 off. The non-vial decklist doesn't seems to have a strong aggro plan, and Honor could be the factor that changes that.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showpost.php?p=6961614&postcount=2
Great to hear that! Do share your lists with us when they are completed. By the way I just made some minor updates to the primer. Will be making periodic updates here and there...feel free to comment and correct as you deem fit!
Signature by Syndarion from Aeternal Studios!
[Deck/Primer] Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Darth Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Casual Knights in Legacy
[Deck/Primer] Modern Knights
[Deck/Primer] Modern Ninjas
LEGACY
Legacy Knights Variants WG,WU,WR,WB,W,B
Soldiers Stompy W
NinjaStill UB
FOWless Merfolk UW
Aggro Elves G
MODERN
Modern Knights Variants WG,BR
Modern Ninjas Variants UB,UG,UW,UWR
Modern Kithkins WR,W
I would appreciate a link to my decklist. At least, it will show what your deck is based on.
Are you talking about "4.3) Green & White Modern Knights (Non-Vial)"?
I never really found any room for Honor of the Pure in a G/W build, even though all creatures in this deck are white. I think the main problem I had is that Honor of the Pure was sometimes a dead draw. Honor of the Pure works really well in cheap White Weenies and token decks, but using it to buff 2 CMC or 3 CMC knights is a bit expensive, especially if they get destroyed/exiled anyway. I'd rather fill those slots with more creatures with abilities. Remember that Thalia disrupts and puts the opponent on the clock. Honor of the Pure does neither.
Honor of the Pure in a white only build is a better option.
I like your Mono-Black Knights list very much, so much so that I don't have much to add on or change. It looks very playable to me especially Smallpox was a great find. Do you mind if I put it up in the primer as well? This could well be a variant of Smallpox deck but I can put it up as another Variant of Modern Knights due to the presence of Haakon and the recurring knights engine.
Some other cards for consideration:
Stillmoon Cavalier - A Zombie and a Knight, similar to Stromgald Crusader in its interaction with Haakon and Gravecrawler, but cost 1 more.
Darkblast - For digging Haakon from library directly into the graveyard. Might take a Duress out for a single Darkblast.
I rearranged your decklist into card types below for easier viewing:
4 Haakon, Stromgald Scourge
4 Black Knight
4 Stromgald Crusader
4 Gravecrawler
4 Dark Confidant
3 Liliana of the Veil
Spells [15]
4 Smallpox
4 Thoughtseize
4 Duress
3 Nameless inversion
4 Mutavault
18 Swamp
Signature by Syndarion from Aeternal Studios!
[Deck/Primer] Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Darth Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Casual Knights in Legacy
[Deck/Primer] Modern Knights
[Deck/Primer] Modern Ninjas
LEGACY
Legacy Knights Variants WG,WU,WR,WB,W,B
Soldiers Stompy W
NinjaStill UB
FOWless Merfolk UW
Aggro Elves G
MODERN
Modern Knights Variants WG,BR
Modern Ninjas Variants UB,UG,UW,UWR
Modern Kithkins WR,W
In that case could you create a new single post with your decklist so I can add a link below the 4.3) Green & White Modern Knights (Non-Vial) to direct to your post? It would be neater that way and you could edit that post as and when you want.
Yup - 4.3) Green & White Modern Knights (Non-Vial).
I think it depends on the creatures you choose, if I run Honor of the Pure(only in a non-vial version) in a GW build, all my creatures are either White or Multicolor with White, so they all enjoy the +1/+1 bonus - I'm referring to Knight of the Reliquary and Qasali Pridemage. I might even run a singleton Stirring Wildwood, which is also a white creature.
The way you describe Honor as a dead draw sounds similar to the way you described Aether Vial previously.....
Anyway, despite all I have said that is pro-Honor, I used to be a fierce advocate for equipment Swords over Honor, IDK, we could just look at the pace of the meta and decide which to put. Honor will be for the faster meta and Swords for a slower meta? Currently, my position/stand on these cards are neutral.
I would rather use Thalia, Guardian of Thraben strictly against combo and tempo deck, and at the moment, our decklists are running 11 cards that could be affected by Thalia as well. Most of the non-creature spells does look like those we might need to cast on the same turn we cast a creature so that's pretty risky to me.
Signature by Syndarion from Aeternal Studios!
[Deck/Primer] Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Darth Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Casual Knights in Legacy
[Deck/Primer] Modern Knights
[Deck/Primer] Modern Ninjas
LEGACY
Legacy Knights Variants WG,WU,WR,WB,W,B
Soldiers Stompy W
NinjaStill UB
FOWless Merfolk UW
Aggro Elves G
MODERN
Modern Knights Variants WG,BR
Modern Ninjas Variants UB,UG,UW,UWR
Modern Kithkins WR,W
Isn't that spamming the forum? I know that if I post my own thread, I'm going to get a bunch of comments saying that I should have posted it here. I don't want to get into trouble over that. We're better off with you just giving me credit for the inspiration.
You're right. I never thought of it that way. I think I have developed a bias against cards that don't do enough in a Knights deck. I have had a game state where I have no creatures, so neither Aether Vial or Honor of the Pure would be helpful. Even if I drew a Path of Exile, I am pretty confident in my past games to hit something with it. I've always seen Honor as a small creature or token booster rather than trying to boost 2 CMC or 3 CMC creatues.
I agree that the meta will determine how tuned the deck is.
But most of the 11 cards or so cards that would be affected by Thalia are only 1 CMC. Take out Wrath of God and a Swords....you are left with PtE, Faith's Shield, Basilisk Collar, and Rancor. If you want to use Honor of the pure, then Thalia interferes with that. If you limit your noncreature spells to 1 CMC, Knights ought to be able to survive that while messing up other aggro as well. Aggro want to drop cheap creatures and burn the opposition cheap spells. Why don't we just make that burn more costly?
In any case, Thalia can be SB. I will continue to mess around with Thalia maindeck and see where it goes. I'll drop my Sword as a result.
Nah, I'm not telling you to spam loz :rolleyes:. What I meant was for you to post in this very thread(Modern Knights) a new post with only your decklist - something like the post below but without the discussion:
Eriol's Green & White Modern Knights (Non-Vial)
Thereafter I'll link above post in the primer. Sorry for causing any kind of misunderstanding!
I thought so, judging by your responses to these cards. Aether Vial and Honor of the Pure are useless when there are no creatures. And that is precisely why I felt we don't have the space to play 4 of each, since we have to reduce the creature count for them. I don't think we need to discuss further on the merits of Vial and Honor (I think we have done that before) - they are powerful cards in the right game state, and offer something extra to tilt the balance in our favour. You argue a good point about these cards doing nothing in certain scenarios, but we could say the same of a 2cc creature which when you draw during the later stages is not good enough for attack or even defence.
You would be surprised how Thalia can affect us adversely as well. How many times have you encounter having only one mana available for one-drop spells like Faith's Shield and Path to Exile? Thalia in play would changes all that. Anyway, I may be too paranoid over Thalia's impact on ourselves.
That's why I was thinking of moving 4x Thalia to the sideboard totally. When sideboarding, Thalia can come in for Honor of the Pure.
Signature by Syndarion from Aeternal Studios!
[Deck/Primer] Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Darth Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Casual Knights in Legacy
[Deck/Primer] Modern Knights
[Deck/Primer] Modern Ninjas
LEGACY
Legacy Knights Variants WG,WU,WR,WB,W,B
Soldiers Stompy W
NinjaStill UB
FOWless Merfolk UW
Aggro Elves G
MODERN
Modern Knights Variants WG,BR
Modern Ninjas Variants UB,UG,UW,UWR
Modern Kithkins WR,W
3 Student of Warfare
4 Wall of Omens
3 Qasali Pridemage
4 Knight Exemplar
4 Knight of Meadowgrain
4 Knight of the Reliquary
2 Phyrexian Metamorph
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
Non-creatures (11)
4 Path to Exile
3 Faith's Shield
1 Basilisk Collar
1 Sword of Light and Shadow (Rancor)
2 Wrath of God
2 Horizon Canopy
2 Temple Garden
8 Plains
3 Forest
1 Marsh Flats
1 Arid Mesa
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Sejiri Steppe
3 Cavern of Souls
3 Ghostly Prison
4 Tormod's Crypt
4 Leyline of Sanctity
2 Elspeth, Knight Errant
1 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
1 Wrath of God
Rationale
This is a base build of GW without Aether Vial. My reason is that Aether Vial, while powerful, is bad in multiples. However, you need 3 or 4 of them to have any reasonable probability of getting one in your opening hand. So, I experimented with a build without it.
Card Choices
Wall of Omens
Although Wall of Omens is not a Knight, I have found it to have a useful effect in the Knights deck. It's a cantrip, providing draw power. It is a 0/4 Wall that can block ground creatures early on while you advance your game plan.
Cavern of Souls
This is a vital land for tribal decks, since it fixes your mana for casting, and it hampers counterspell-based decks. Be careful with your build, because this land produces colorless mana otherwise. For example, you cannot use Cavern of Souls to level up Student of Warfare.
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
Thalia can be maindeck or sideboard, depending on your meta. As a sideboard choice, it will hamper combo and counterspell-based decks. As a maindeck, you are primarily looking to hinder aggro-tempo deck's removal spells. This does affect your spells, so you must play cheap 1 CMC non-creature spells to use Thalia effectively. Thalia is a great 2/1 first strike with a hindering ability, which may be more appealing than Thorn of Amethyst. Yes, Thalia can be removed, but it'll cost the opponent 1 mana more to do so, which will invariably interfere with his/her tempo. The opponent was probably planning to do something else with that 1 mana and cannot do so now, essentially buying you a turn.
Wrath of God
This is strictly for my playstyle. I like to use it against untargetable creatures and it combos with Knight Exemplar. Having it in the maindeck with Thalia is a definite problem, so if I were playing competitively, it would be a sideboard card.
Done. See the post above I added my personal explanations. A pseudo primer in a primer.
I agree that we don't need to discuss these cards further, and I was not really arguing to be correct. I was only arguing so an alternative reason could be presented. As we have agreed in the past, card choices depend on the meta.
While 99.9% of Knight players agree that Knight Exemplar, Knight of the Reliquary, and Path to Exile go into a GW Knights deck, everything else seems to be open to interpretation.
I'm aware of this, as I was playing that goblins deck a while ago. For me, I had Thalia in my hand, had a creature advantage, and had 4 lands, so I decided to gamble and cast Thalia. And I won that game barely. If I didn't cast Thalia, I would have lost for certain.
Reprint Opt for Modern!!
FREE DIG THOROUGH TIME!
PLAY MORE ROUGE DECKS!
Oh, I didn't know I could do that. I don't even know this forum had an internal blog.
Reprint Opt for Modern!!
FREE DIG THOROUGH TIME!
PLAY MORE ROUGE DECKS!
By all means, feel free to post it. I considered stillmoon cavalier, but at best, I find it a board card. It doesn't really do much I care about (pro black is less of an issue. yes, black removal slows you, but it in general, doesn't exile which is all we care about). Darkblast is actually something I hadn't considered and may be a good idea. Requires testing, though.
Credit to DolZero for this awesome sig!
Great. Saw it. Will be adding the post into the primer soon.
That's true. Other than the 3 cards you mentioned, which are a certain shoo-in, the other choices in the deck are pretty much still available for discussion or debate.
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben is a great creature, but she doesn't fit into every deck. That said, when play at the right timing - is absolutely massive.
You are a fast mover!
Thanks!
By the way do share with us how your testing go, I'm already working on adding a sub-topic for "Haakon Darth Knights".
Signature by Syndarion from Aeternal Studios!
[Deck/Primer] Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Darth Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Casual Knights in Legacy
[Deck/Primer] Modern Knights
[Deck/Primer] Modern Ninjas
LEGACY
Legacy Knights Variants WG,WU,WR,WB,W,B
Soldiers Stompy W
NinjaStill UB
FOWless Merfolk UW
Aggro Elves G
MODERN
Modern Knights Variants WG,BR
Modern Ninjas Variants UB,UG,UW,UWR
Modern Kithkins WR,W
I took DrWorm's advice, and I created a blog entry for it. It definitely will be far easier to track it for you and update it for me.
Current changes to my list:
-1 duress, -1 mutavault, + 2 swamp. It's been running a lot smoother, and 4 vaults is bad. 3 is about right, with 23 lands. I was sacrificing too many to the poxes and was having an issue drawing what I needed.
Credit to DolZero for this awesome sig!
Yup, I saw your blog, so I'll linked it to the blog instead?
The Modern Darth Knights is one under-rated deck to be honest, I was owning Bant, Blue/White control and Black/White control with my legacy darth Knights as well. So I'm not all too surprised about your results so far - and it's also one of the main reason why I'm keen to add this variant into the primer. I can imagine a recurring Nameless Inversion taking Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre out?
The changes look good. Mutavault was likely to be the land sacrificed since you would rather keep the BB available after a Smallpox!
Here's a work in progress addition to the primer I made on Darth Knights:
Brief Introduction.
The reason we have this deck is because you want to recur knights via Hakkon, Stromgald Scourge.
This is a deck that will beat most aggro white build, can cast creatures as many times as they burn(a different story if they burn face), laugh at decks attempting to counter Haakon and his knights + zombies, immune to deck playing doom blade type of removals, any more please feel free to add on.
The other Haakon deck - UWB
How to Play.
An opening turn discard(we run 7-8) allows us to cast Smallpox safely, meanwhile low-cost and cheap knights and zombies which are dispensable will be deployed to trade off or chump block in most situations, since they can be recurred continuously later in the game. That means the deck is typically trying to stall and stabilize during the early game with creatures such as Stromgald Crusader, Black Knight and Gravecrawler. Smallpox and Liliana of the Veil will come in shortly for the control/disrupt element and hopefully discard Haakon into the graveyard. Nameless Inversion is also a massive card here since it can be casted as many times as you have the mana for, which usually will clear the opponent board of creatures slowly but surely.
This is essentially a attrition deck, and will usually win the war when it gets to attrition stage with Haakon in play.
Key and Most important play:
Haakon's Recurring engine with Knights and Nameless Inversion.
Other Strategic plays:
Gravecrawler interaction with Haakon and Stromgald Crusader.
Smallpox synergy with Haakon.
Liliana of the Veil synergy with Haakon.
Minor plays:
Smallpox with Dark Confidant when life gets too low.
Liliana of the Veil discard with other knights, cast those discarded knights with Haakon in play.
Creature choices:
Haakon, Stromgald Scourge
Black Knight
Stromgald Crusader
Gravecrawler
Dark Confidant
Spell Choices
Smallpox
Thoughtseize
Duress
Nameless inversion
Liliana of the Veil
Other probable choices:
Stillmoon Cavalier - A Zombie and a Knight, similar to Stromgald Crusader in its interaction with Haakon and Gravecrawler, but cost 1 more.
Darkblast - For digging Haakon from library directly into the graveyard. Might take a Duress out for a single Darkblast.
4 Haakon, Stromgald Scourge
4 Black Knight
4 Stromgald Crusader
4 Gravecrawler
4 Dark Confidant
3 Liliana of the Veil
Spells [15]
4 Smallpox
4 Thoughtseize
4 Duress
3 Nameless inversion
4 Mutavault
18 Swamp
Signature by Syndarion from Aeternal Studios!
[Deck/Primer] Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Darth Knights in Legacy
[Deck] Casual Knights in Legacy
[Deck/Primer] Modern Knights
[Deck/Primer] Modern Ninjas
LEGACY
Legacy Knights Variants WG,WU,WR,WB,W,B
Soldiers Stompy W
NinjaStill UB
FOWless Merfolk UW
Aggro Elves G
MODERN
Modern Knights Variants WG,BR
Modern Ninjas Variants UB,UG,UW,UWR
Modern Kithkins WR,W
To be honest, I've never managed to take down an ulamog that way yet. I've taken out emrakul with smallpox and liliana, though. The inversions just take out the various small fry while my knights and zombies beat in. At the moment, I'm considering adding in red for sideboard options and potentially blood knight.
Credit to DolZero for this awesome sig!
Please link to the blog instead. I'll be able to update it more easily.