Unburden does look quite tempting, Raystack. I'll pipe up with my usual thoughts on new cards catching my attention:
Bone Picker: I have a soft spot for Morbid-type effects in general. Due to how I include Insolent Neonate as a 4-of in my list (which helps alleviate the issue brought up last page with Fatal Push too), this caught my attention. Cards that have conditional cost reduction built in are at least worth a look. A deck variant focused on cards with CMCs above 3 but with workarounds combined with Eidolon of the Great Revel may have some brewing potential, although if I ever went in that direction I feel like it'd turn into a Death's Shadow hybrid.
Bontu the Glorified: See above. Hellooooo there. Being an indestructible sac outlet, if nothing else, is an attention-grabber. Deck variants running Bloodghasts may want to consider this, particularly as Bontu doesn't compete with Kalitas's CMC. A Bloodghast -> Bontu -> Kalitas sequence would be pretty hilarious.
Shadow of the Grave: This is the card I'm personally most interested in for the set. In the past, I've mentioned Delirium Skeins, and this archetype is no stranger to mutual discard effects such as Lili: Veil Edition. Any cheap-CMC card that breaks equivalence is always worth a look. Looting effects of any sort turn into flat-out card draw, and Faithless Looting is universal for us. A powerful effect, but probably difficult to wrangle with Demigod of Revenge at the same time. I'd call this fuel for potential alternative strategies, such as a renewed emphasis on power discard. This is also the perfect buddy to Collective Brutality.
Hazoret the Fervent: Another card for the discard-for-everybody variant builds. Even without being active as a creature, the repeatable 2 damage ability on an indestructible card is a very good source of constant threat. Has some potential for that alone, but in a deck that specifically tried to dump its hand and/or more control-heavy builds, this looks excellent. Ensnaring Bridge has popped up in this thread, and usually dismissed as too unreliable (rightly so in a format this loaded with ways to get rid of it), but the synergy is definitely there. All the cards we looked at back in Shadows over Innistrad regarding Madness are worth a second look too.
Soul-Scar Mage: A Red one-drop with Prowess is automatically something any Red deck in Modern should at least acknowledge. I feel as though this isn't for us, but it absolutely merits mention that Pyroclasm is the perfect complement to this.
You've probably noticed the pattern by now: This set's being quite kind to our brood of variant decks and giving more potential to alternatives. Enough to actually elevate any of them into viability? I'm skeptical of that, but if a concept or strategy goes from being, say, a 4/10 idea to a 6/10 idea, I think that's worthy of acknowledgement if only in case the potential develops further. Demigod's a good example of that process over time.
Canyon Slough: Swamp Mountain AND Cycling? No lands with those words printed on them should be overlooked. The same goes for any of these lands. Shall we call them bicycle lands, since they're dual-typed cyclers? ETB tapped hurts, no mistake, but I feel a lot better about including these as one or two-ofs due to the cycling. What I'd probably do is reduce my shockland count to one-of, and refill the rest of the slot with these. So if I had 4x Blood Crypt before, I'll likely try a 1x Blood Crypt 3x Canyon Slough mix. Or maybe 2 and 2. Either way, the flexibility of fetchland-into-shockland is preserved while drawing extras becomes less of an issue.
How do we feel about Bloodrage Brawler? Seems to have some good synergy with Demigod. I also play Bloodghast in my version of the deck, so he seems extra attractive for me.
Went 3-2 at FNM tonight, main deck is mostly the same as smashpacman's most recently posted list in this thread but
-1 Anger of the Gods
-1 Kolaghans Command
-1 Blood Moon
+1 Damnation
+1 Shriekmaw
+1 Pack Rat
Was pleasantly surprised at how little gravehate actually hurts this deck. Surgical Extraction is everywhere in my meta and surgical on Demigod really had me scared but it's honestly not hard to play around.
0 complaints about Pack Rat as a 1-of. Somehow he showed up in about half of my games and I won every time I played him except one game. Kinda like Demigod copy 5.
Missing one blood moon really didn't seem to hurt at all. I still had it for turn 3 more often than not.
Once I get my hands on another copy of Kommand I'll definitely be putting it in.
Didn't actually end up seeing Shriekmaw at all so idk if the interaction with Kommand/Lili last hope is too cute or not, but it seems good
Anyways my matches were
0-2 against Eldrazi Tron
0-2 against some weird UR Midrange deck
2-1 against Eldrazi Tron
2-1 against Abzan CoCo
2-0 against UW Spirits
First round against Eldrazi Tron was super unfortunate. Had answers to all his threats and slowed him down with turn 3 blood moon, but I dug crazy deep and only hit 1 creature and it was too little too late by that point. Game 2 thought knot seer screwed me
Lost against the weird UR deck probably due to misplays, idk.
Eldrazi Tron felt way easier the second time around. Spirits and melira were also super easy and free feeling
I'm posting this here at pizzap's suggestion... I've been considering a Goblin build of the Rakdos Aggro shell featured awhile back on MTG Goldfish . As you can see, the non-budget idea of the deck features humans to sacrifice to Falkenrath Aristocrat. The deck uses Blood Moons in the sideboard.
It basically started because I wanted to try the build but I don't have Dark Confidant and don't feel like spending $200 on a playset. The deck already played Goblin Guide and Goblin Rabblemaster, so I started thinking about taking out the human sub-theme, replacing the Aristocrat with other finishers, and adding in a couple Goblin Grenades for reach. The resulting deck is a bit more midrange.
16 goblins, 8 of whom produce token goblins, should support 2 grenades, giving reach. Legion Loyalist is a better mid-or-late game card than Monastery Swiftspear and works well with Rabblemaster tokens. The Pack Rats and Chandras should cure top-decking issues. The Bone Pickers should be very easy to cast for 1 between the elimination cards, attacking frequently, and the Mogg War Marshalls.
What do you guys think? Worth taking to the gaming shop and trying out?
I'm not sure how much control you have over the thread, but you definitely have the first post in the Primer, meaning that you are the one who can adjust it. If you can change the title of the Primer, it might be time to mention that this deck is pretty officially B/R Control labeled across many mainstream websites.
Also, it has been awhile since I've done a matchup guide, and the metagame and deck have warped pretty significantly since then. With that said, here is a bunch of information for you all to digest:
This is my current list, and easily the happiest that I have ever been with the 75. Some of the singletons might seem like "metagame" calls or might just not be your cup of tea. That is perfectly fine. If you're playing my list, the alternate options or possible changes that I would endorse (NOT ALL AT THE SAME TIME) are:
Those are all reasonable changes, though I have loved the manabase as it is, and I am perfectly happy with only seeing the Liliana options in the matchups where they are good post-board, while letting the deck flow through itself and have each card pose an equivalent threat. The only maindeck card that doesn't always have a place in a matchup is Anger of the Gods, but it is an excellent safety blanket against multiple decks. The format has become quite aggressive, and Anger of the Gods can stop many decks in their tracks.
Inquisition of Kozilek is often times strong enough by itself to disrupt the non-aggro decks as well as the aggro decks, and remains one of the best cards in the format. Having Thoughtseize in the deck felt like overkill to me, with the seven discard spells in the main deck formerly being the strategy, but nowadays many Modern decks can be crushed out of the game by one piece of hand disruption into reasonable threats. Lightning Bolt is obviously a four-of no matter what version of Rakdos you are playing. Fatal Push is the format's new superstar removal spell. Terminate is still a great all-purpose removal spell. Blood Moon always has the chance of stealing a Game 1 from many opponents, and even post-sideboard games occasionally, where the matchup would otherwise be poor. Chandra, Torch of Defiance has been hands-down the best Planeswalker and best win condition for me since the day I began testing with it.
The sideboard that I use is a bit more...unique. I try to plan for the cards I use to hit multiple decks and be part of a package against almost anything you might run into. The following is what I would do against most matchups in today's "high-tier" metagame:
Death's Shadow has become this bizarre boogeyman in the format, where it is considered one of the "best" decks in the format, yet still finds a way to be a fragile and beatable deck simply by allowing the opponent to nearly kill themselves before truly posing a threat in the majority of matchups. For us, we already have a good amount of removal for their Death's Shadow and Tarmogoyf copies in the main deck, and Demigod of Revenge is a great way to quickly swing an entire game to our win column in a single turn. I believe we have a better matchup against this deck than most of the format, and after sideboarding, it gets better in some ways but worse in others. If the opponent has not seen that we are on a Blood Moon plan, we are on a huge advantage going into the second game. They are not always prepared to fetch a basic land, but if they do have up the mana and the Abrupt Decay, then the Blood Moon plan won't always work. Fortunately, we have an enormous amount of removal. After sideboard, it gets a bit better. I like a few copies of Thoughtseize in the post-board games just to help hit their strong sideboard pieces, but not the full three package, or we wind up needing to topdeck a threat or removal spell later in the game and run too high of a risk of drawing a useless discard spell at that time. If this was a Grixis Shadow list, I would board in the third Thoughtseize over another Faithless Looting to hit their counterspells.
I'm getting this one out of the way early, because it is a miserable matchup, as you might imagine when you pit a Control deck against a Burn deck. We need a decent amount of luck to win this set, and playing a game where you take risks is the most appropriate way to win the set. If you can live until Turn 6 or 7, which is fairly ambitious, then you can usually steal the game. Beyond that, you will tend to die early. Removal heavy hands and Blood Moon are not bad options, but an already-bad matchup has just gotten worse with Boros Burn becoming the popular choice of Burn lists lately, meaning that Blood Moon has four less cards it can prevent from killing us. Landing a Kalitas on turn four is critical, and an early Inquisition of Kozilek is also essential. The only way that you will win without those cards are during the oddity draws that Burn has where they play multiple creatures into our multiple removal spells, and then simply can't answer a Bedlam Reveler, Chandra, Torch of Defiance, or Demigod of Revenge. Their strongest card is usually Boros Charm, but beware of the Searing Blaze that you can stick in their hand if your win condition becomes Chandra. Sometimes they won't cast a spell for a few turns and as soon as you cast any creature, they will kill you instantly. Fulminator Mage can keep the greedy Burn keeps down post-board if you're lucky, and there is also a leg to stand on with Surgical Extraction. When the theory is "that only works situationally," sometimes you need to get lucky. A turn one Inquisition of Kozilek into a turn two Surgical Extraction that hits an additional copy of any card in their hand is a HUGE mini-victory. The best I can say for this matchup is to practice your outs, and good luck!
This used to be an incredibly favorable matchup, but gone are the days of Devoted Druid comboing with Ezuri, Renegade Leader, and in are the days of Shaman of the Pack triggers. Of course, Devoted Druid has a new playmate with Vizier of Remedies, but that's an entirely different deck. The strategy here is simple: DO NOT LET THE ELVES LIVE. Elvish Archdruid and Heritage Druid are the most dangerous when left unchecked, but an Inquisition of Kozilek onto a Chord of Calling or a Dwynen's Elite can be backbreaking. Anger of the Gods will also usually win you the game. Just don't get arrogant and always expect them to have the Collected Company off of the top of the deck. If you are always prepared for it, they won't steal games. Also, Blood Moon is not the worst card against this deck in many circumstances, but it's also not the best. Post-board you obviously board in the hate, but I like to swap out a pair of the Blood Moons so you don't flood with multiple copies of the card, and Thoughtseize is your next-best option to take away out-of-hand Collected Company copies and Chord of Calling copies. Luckily for me, I have Elf master and local Chicagoland legend Johnny Ostrem to test against, so I know the matchup very well. I will warn you though that this is one of the most important matchups to be versed in, because if you aren't prepared you will get run over.
This is one of your best matchups in the entire format. You are essentially built to dumpster Affinity, running main deck copies of both Kolaghan's Command and Anger of the Gods to prevent their early explosive draws, while also running Lightning Bolt, Fatal Push and Terminate to get you to the third turn and begin removing any value plays they have. Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet also stonewalls the Arcbound Ravager plan. Post-sideboard especially when you have even more artifact hate, just beware of large swings with Cranial Plating and make sure you can race Etched Champion, and you're home free just about every game. Faithless Looting comes out because there's no need to dig for cards that are good in the matchup if just about every nonland card can win you the game. If you wanted to keep in the playset of Inquisition of Kozilek, feel free, and simply board out a Demigod of Revenge or a Bedlam Reveler. The percentages are hard to test on those cards because the deck scarcely loses to Affinity no matter which of those cards you swamp in or out.
This is a very strange, very volatile matchup. Chalice of the Void on turn two (countering your 1CMC spells) can be back-breaking, especially when they're on the play. On the other hand, a topdeck Chandra, Torch of Defiance after they cast Thought-Knot Seer can swing the game so far in your favor that they often times won't come back from it. Unfortunately, the ball is definitely in their court overall unless you can stick a turn three Blood Moon. That's pretty much the major game plan against this deck. The sideboard gives you access to some more unconditional removal against them, particularly the Dreadbore that can hit their big creatures and their Karn Liberated, and the Liliana of the Veil that can make the game very difficult for them if you can avoid Reality Smasher. Thoughtseize is also a big help. If you have the lead enough to deal with Reality Smasher, then the matchup is manageable, but if not, this is a rough one. Beware all of their nasty threats and do what you can to get Blood Moon into play. Also, always board out of Bedlam Reveler, because more times than not, the Relic of Progenitus out of their sideboard will be difficult enough to deal with when casting Demigod of Revenge.
This is essentially playing against an all-in combo deck. They have the colors to theoretically board in both their own hand disruption as well as their own hand protection, usually with Leyline of Sanctity and Thoughtseize. The first game will come down to whether or not a Blood Moon keeps them off of their necessary colors, and hopefully you can also hit a Pentad Prism with a Kolaghan's Command or hit an Angel's Grace with an Inquisition of Kozilek. This is a very luck-based first game, and you have to hope they don't combo off on you. The sideboard can be very different, and very difficult. We don't have a truly good way to get rid of Leyline of Sanctity if they stick one on us, so our Plan B needs to be targeting their lands with Fulminator Mage and Blood Moon, and simply killing them before they can recover. Sometimes you need to risk hitting a pair of Demigod of Revenge to put a serious clock on their game plan. Also, the Engineered Explosives comes in out of the board to hit their Pentad Prism, any sideboard cards that they board in to hate on our graveyard such as Relic of Progenitus or Pithing Needle, and if we're very lucky, we can destroy their Lotus Bloom upon resolution if we take their win condition out of their hand. In the event that you are splashing the one Godless Shrine for sideboard options, the three colors can also make Engineered Explosives destroy a Phyrexian Unlife. However, I don't believe the white splash is necessary for the current overall metagame, but it is worth noting. Overall for the matchup, if they can't stop the hand disruption, we can usually go the distance. This is still not a matchup we really want to see, however.
This matchup is a good-news, bad-news matchup. The good news is that a Blood Moon in the first four or five turns in Game 1 will usually win the game every time, and Blood Moon is essentially the anti-Scapeshift card. The bad news is that a good amount of the sideboard for their deck is specifically designed to destroy Blood Moon in the post-sideboard games, and the percentages swing heavily in their favor for Game 2 and, if necessary, Game 3. The plan is simple, you want to Inquisition of Kozilek their early ramp spells and Blood Moon them as soon as possible. This might sound similar to most combo matchups, such as Ad Nauseum, but this matchup comes with a moderate amount of interactive Magic. Their Plan B is a strong one in Primeval Titan and Obstinate Baloth, and some lists as of late have Chandra, Torch of Defiance and even the occasional Nahiri, the Harbinger as ways to win the game as well. Terminate is a necessary card in this matchup to leave in post-board, because Courser of Kruphix or Oracle of Mul Daya going unchecked can give them an insurmountable lead. This matchup for them is no different than the majority of their matchup spread, which is that the most likely way for Titan Shift to lose is to draw poorly, even though the percentage of times they will draw poorly is higher than the average deck. That is the life of ramp-deck players. At least we have Blood Moon, and many other decks simply do not.
This matchup is certainly one for the grinders. Inquisition of Kozilek is the most important card in the matchup, as garnering information from the opponent during the matchup is extremely important. The first match is heavily in your favor, as both players have a similar game plan with removal spells into difficult-to-remove threats, but Demigod of Revenge is so much better than anything the opposition can throw at you during a Game 1. Kolaghan's Command can recur Demigod of Revenge if you only see one of them in the game, Pia and Kiran Nalaar provides multiple threats, and Terminate takes out the majority of their creatures. If you take too much early damage, however, a few Snapcaster Mage into Lightning Bolt casts from your opponent will usually kill you, so be careful. A lot of this matchup hinges on the post-sideboard games. Cards like Faithless Looting and Anger of the Gods do not do enough in the matchup. Faithless Looting technically generates negative card advantage, and Anger of the Gods can only exile a Snapcaster Mage at best. On the other hand, the sideboard cards are extremely good, and there are a lot of interesting interactions in this matchup. Rakdos Charm removing the graveyard can prevent the Snapcaster Mage and Kolaghan's Command value that the opponent can generate, often times establishing a large lead, and can also remove a Grafdigger's Cage if the opponent happens to be playing one. Liliana of the Veil is an incredible card in this matchup, as the opponent will generally hinge on card advantage, and the minus ability from Liliana of the Veil can force a Tasigur, the Golden Fang or a Gurmag Angler to be sacrificed. Liliana, the Last Hope can recur creatures from the graveyard, and unchecked can force a lot of resources out of the opponent to remove. Thoughtseize is just as important as Inquisition of Kozilek for finding information, and a Blood Moon can simply end a game against three-color decks as always. If the opponent is playing and fetching for several basics, Game 3 can also let you board out a few Blood Moon copies for the Lightning Bolt copies you boarded out initially. It depends on the opponent and the flow of the first and second game. Overall, if you can avoid graveyard hate and stop the Snapcaster Mage and Kolaghan's Command chains, the matchup should be very winnable. Just be patient with spells and don't fire off important spells too soon.
This is the most tilting matchup for me personally across all formats. Playing against Tron is absolutely miserable, because they can play a Karn Liberated or a Wurmcoil Engine on turn three without ever casting another spell. Ancient Stirrings essentially functions as a Green version of Ponder, except it digs two cards deeper than Ponder does (Ponder, by the way, is banned in Modern). Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger is an unbelievable card, and can be cast on turn four behind a Karn Liberated if their draw is perfect, and easily still by turn five or six, which is usually plenty for them to win against a control deck. If we manage to dodge those bullets, they still have Ugin, the Spirit Dragon to lean on. The only way to win this matchup is to slam a Blood Moon on them before they assemble Urza's Mine, Urza's Power Plant, and Urza's Tower together, which is very easy for them to do with Ancient Stirrings, Chromatic Sphere, Chromatic Star, and especially Expedition Map digging them to their necessary pieces. Even if we manage to get a Blood Moon down early, we still need to kill them before turn seven, when they can still easily cast creatures that are nothing short of nuclear for us. Post-sideboard, things get even worse, when they bring in Relic of Progenitus to disrupt the ability to get multiple Demigod of Revenge into play early. Our strategy after the first game is to jam every threat possible into play, as well as hit an Oblivion Stone or (if we're really lucky) an Expedition Map with a Rakdos Charm or Kolaghan's Command. This matchup is generally brutal, and with the Red-Green Tron decks slowly shifting over to the Green-White strategy, they even have Path to Exile to deal with Demigod of Revenge. Miserable matchup, take risks and hope for the best.
Now that Devoted Druid and Vizier of Remedies is a viable combo of cards and is seeing results at large tournaments, it's time to respect the deck. Their general game plan is to have infinite mana, while also having an infinite life combo, and the deck similar to the old Abzan Collected Company shell. If we can prevent their infinite combo cards from being on the battlefield from the same time, then we shouldn't have trouble winning the game. Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet is also an excellent way to prevent the infinite life combo that revolves around Viscera Seer from happening, and also makes it much easier to permanently remove a Kitchen Finks. As long as the opponent isn't able to combo off, then we should win the majority of games. However, Collected Company and Chord of Calling are incredibly dangerous cards to play against, particularly at instant-speed. If you can get a lead in the game, be sure to leave up as much instant-speed removal as possible, or your lead can suddenly turn into an immediate loss. After sideboard, having some additional all-purpose removal spells isn't the worst plan, and while Blood Moon is okay against the deck, they will likely play around it after the first game, and flooding multiple Blood Moon copies is a very bad thing. The only thing it tends to do in the matchup is turn off Gavony Township. Just stick to your game plan, as our matchup against the deck is pretty solid as long as we have our removal spells.
This is a strange matchup, and there are so many random tools to know against the Living End matchup...far too many to list in a short matchup guide. The short version is that Lightning Bolt doesn't hit a lot of the creatures in their deck, such as Deadshot Minotaur, Street Wraith, and Pale Recluse, and 99% of the time it also misses their Fulminator Mage copies, the 1% coming when you have nothing but basic lands in play. This is a very strange matchup. If you can Inquisition of Kozilek their Violent Outburst or Demonic Dread, and they fail to find another copy, you can run them over. That is the dream scenario, and will not happen in most games. The best strategy for toppling them in Game 1 is to use Faithless Looting to get your creatures into the graveyard as fast as possible. If you can combat their Living End by bringing back creatures as well, you can often times steal a game, especially on the back of Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet paired with in-hand removal spells such as Terminate and, to a much lesser extent, Lightning Bolt and Fatal Push when they have legitimate targets to hit. After sideboarding, this matchup becomes much easier. If you can get to your Rakdos Charm and simply be ready for any graveyard recursion, you will win most of the time. Surgical Extraction is also helpful, but will not be nearly as effective since it does not exile an entire graveyard. Fulminator Mage can also keep them off of slow hands. The Plan C in this matchup as a whole is to slam a Blood Moon and hope that they cannot cast their Cascade spells, but the real victory card will always be Rakdos Charm in this matchup. It is so brutal for them at instant speed that it is honestly worth using multiple mulligans to find one.
I hope you appreciate and utilize this sideboard guide. I understand that there are other versions of this deck, and I am certainly one of the people who is constantly testing many other cards and builds. However, I feel that the overall options are one of the best reasons to play Black-Red right now as a color combination. Rakdos Charm out of the sideboard is a catch-all against Dredge, Affinity, and Living End, as well as having some game against several fringe decks, such as Lantern Control. Anger of the Gods is still a backbreaking card for decks like Dredge, Elves, Bushwhacker Zoo, BW Tokens, any fringe aggro deck, and also has some game against Snapcaster Mage-into-Kolaghan's Command decks by exiling Snapcaster Mage. Inquisition of Kozilek and Thoughtseize are still two of the best control-oriented cards in the entire format. Lightning Bolt will always be an incredibly powerful card. Fatal Push is the newest, hottest removal spell in Modern. With many valuable creature options to go with these removal packages and the ability to play Blood Moon (one of the most unfair cards in the format), we are certainly making a push to becoming a Tier 1 deck.
If you have any other matchups that you would like a sideboard guide for, even if your personal sideboard is different from mine, feel free to message me. I will also post occasional variations of this deck, with numerous attempts at other cards that are also in the format as well. With every set that comes out, we get more potential cards, and with BR Control being in an infancy stage in the format, there is still a great deal of room for growth as an archetype.
Always looking for the day you post stuff!
Onwards to discussion (btw, your list is almost identycal to what I've been building towards after having failed with a tempo hybrid deck with asylum visitors, bonepickers, pyromancers and smallpox(I wan't to make thsi card work but I jus't cant see it outside of 8rack))
It looks like the changes from last time are +1 Chandra instead of Lili, and +1 removal instead of a creature (Reveler in this case)
- Shouldn't the number of terminate and fatal push be swapped? Maybe I am assuming a low density of >2cm threats, but don't you feel like blood moon could make it too difficult to activate your revolt? Plus, terminate kills delve creatures and big eldrazy monsters.
- On bolt: I see you never board it out, even when it won't kill any creatures (titan, adnauseam, tron). Do you feel its worth it just for the 3 damage to the face? I could see an argument for keeping against decks with planeswalkers. Also, and following the previous train of thought, do you feel it would ever be a correct choice to not play 4x bolt MB, seeing as more and more creatures are not killed by it and we now have push, or would this just be possible in a world where there is 0 aggro (I'm assuming Bolt is a great card against aggro).
- Is the 3rd kolaghans command still worth it even tough you now have one less creature? Or is this a non issue since the card is too good by itself // you dont find a lack of creatures to recur?
- I have been thinking of adding a Goblin Dark-Dwellers to try and mitigate some late game top decking issues and recur removal. Is it worth it, or do you find you don't need the recursion thanks to the Chandras. Also, whats your opinion on a 1*of Pack rat for late game?
Thanks for the matchup insights, hoping to hear some more news!
There are occasional matchups where I will board out Lightning Bolt, but a lot of combo decks turn into a race against time after you cast your disruption spells. It's the weakest card in the matchup a lot of the time, but there aren't better cards to board it. On the bright side, it turns a turn six Demigod of Revenge into eight damage instead of five. I board them out in matchups where I simply need my entire sideboard for various reasons, such as against Grixis Control I'll usually board out two of them.
Fatal Push usually is hitting a creature with either a CMC of 1 or a CMC of 2, and when it isn't, it can easily be boarded out. I actually played 3 Terminate and 2 Fatal Push today instead of the other way around. I'm iffy on it either way, but in my local meta, I'd rather have an extra Fatal Push to deal with all of the heavy aggro decks.
I'll also be doing more matchup guides as I complete them through testing.
Smashpacman does not disappoint. That's one helluva matchup guide. Titanic. And, I gotta comment on EpeeEm's "Spring Spectacular of Coming Attractions in the Desert: Amonkhet." Insightful and entertaining as always.
@Smash: I added 'Control' to the primer name. The thread name was lacking that extra descriptor. It may drive some more traffic to our discussion. Long time contributor here at MTGsalvation, Pizzap commented on the evolution of Blitzkrieg from Heavy Discard to Mid-Range. He's right. A lot of changes since I started the thread over 2 years ago, and you know who lost out the most? Fat Buddha.
He is our patron saint of media. Fat Buddha created that lethally gorgeous banner in the Official Primer, and so few of the cards pictured remain. It's a cruel world ruled by the uncompromising realities of meritocracy. When Blightning and Wrench Mind can't stand atop the winner's podium, isn't it time for us all to take a long, hard look at ourselves? Well, we'll always have terminate...lightning bolt...and, our best girl, Lily. Sweet, innocent Liliana.
As certain card's impact value and styles of play (discard / removal / rack / creature attack) have waxed and waned in the meta, I have kept a watchful eye for the return of heavy discard. It's most effective when either Control or Combo are in vogue. Gifts/Storm, Ad Nauseam, Tron, Titanshift, U/W Control, and Breach decks are all worthy targets of a wrench mind or unburden. Is 2-for-1 discard viable in Modern? Certainly, Kolaghan's Command is an all star and the king of 2-for-1. Is it the only real option?
Hey Smash, PM the matchup guide within the 'edit' version of the post. That way it will include all of the hyperlinks and correct formatting when I put it in the Official Primer. The last big win with Blitzkrieg came with a Florida 1K by Smash. Anyone else have a premier top 8 finish to report?
@steven11788: I took note of your deck when you first posted it at the top of page 55 of this thread. When you get a chance to edit it into hyperlinks, so we can better read it, you can simply highlight the deck and hit the brown magic stacked cards icon above, or write [deck$] at the start and [/deck$] at the end. Just don't include the $ symbol, and voila.
It's a brave, new design on an oldeeeeee classic: Big Beater Tanks for late game and Quick Disruption for early game. I like the main deck Dreadbore, Anger of the Gods, Batterskull, and Relic of Progenitus. These are horses usually found in the stables of sideboard, but wisely targeting the meta in your construction. Boss.
I do wonder about a vulnerability to quick-aggro decks like Fish or Gobots/8-Wack, since you curve pretty high. I thought I'd see more early sweep and adaptable lifegain in the sideboard, but then again, you do rock (3) Dragon's Claw. Mmmmm, the more I look at it, the more I can see the synergies. If you can format it properly, I'd love to put it in the "Featured Deck List" section.
Also, you mentioned that you won a PPTQ with your list. Has that been published anywhere online?
I have never had a list published, I didn't know they did for love lewvel stuff, lol maybe it is store cause I've won several IQ and gpts. I modeled this deck after Skred as Im a Skred player. I somtimes wanna drop a k commmamd for a 3rd push. I love this list deck though, it is my Tinker project that has put up results
I went to my 2nd ever Modern tournament and went 3-0-1 with B/R, coming in 3rd. The draw conceivably could have been a win, as I was beating down without resistance under Blood Moon when turns ran out. There were 35-40 people at the tournament. The decks I played against were R/G Titanshift, UW Control, Esper Control, and Infect. I think the Demigod of Revenge and Faithless Looting builds are super interesting; however, I was worried about the collateral damage from all of the Surgical Extraction being played in basically everything nowadays. So I went with a slightly more aggressive approach:
Match 1 vs R/G Titanshift
Game 1: I am new to Modern, and unfamiliar with many of the decks/interactions. For some reason, when I drew Blood Moon, I had in my mind "Why would I want to make all his lands Mountains? Then they'll ALL trigger Valakut!!!1" So I wound up discarding 3 Blood Moons to LOTV before dying to a Primeval Titan. Pretty much right after the game ended, I realized my mistake, and asked my opponent never to tell anyone about it ever.
Game 2: He accelerates mana. I play Dark Confidant, which he bolts. I play Pack Rat, and on his T3 he uses Chandra, Torch of Defiance to minus and kill it. Then on my turn I play Goblin Rabblemaster and kill Chandra with the haste token. He stalled on 4 lands with no answers to my creature, so I won 2 turns after.
At this point I was pretty excited to even have won once.
Match 2 vs UW Control
Game 1: I went first. My opening hand had Blood Moon. My T1 Thoughtseize showed that he had 2 Flooded Strand and a Celestial Colonnade for lands. I took his 1 Serum Visions and left him with a bunch of late game cards. On my T3, I decided to not play the Blood Moon to see if he would crack the fetches for non-basics at the end of my turn, which he did. The following turn I used IOK to clear the way and then he lost because he had only Mountains.
Game 2: He stopped 2 consecutive Liliana of the Veil, but could not stop the 3rd
2-0
At this point I'm starting to believe that I'm just playing with a pile of individually powerful cards that are carrying me to victory. I don't really mind.
Match 3 vs Esper Control
Game 1: I clear the way with discard for a T3 LOTV, and start ticking up. On his T5 though, he randomly hardcasts a Leyline of Sanctity, which stops me from -6ing him the next turn. However, by that time, the game had basically already progressed to me discarding my draw to Pack Rat each turn and then +1 LOTV. He is quickly overrun. LOTV ends the game on 11 Loyalty.
Game 2: He sideboarded heavily. Even though I didn't play any moon effects in G1, he brought in Esper Charms anticipating them. He also fetched for all basics at the start of the game. Several charms and several Celestial Purge took out numerous Blood Moon and Liliana of the Veil, among other things. The thing I like about this deck is each creature can more or less win the game on its own if left unchecked. So he wound up having to use 4x Supreme Verdict, each on only a single copy of either Goblin Rabblemaster or Pack Rat. Well into the late game, when we were both nearly decked, I had an opening to play my last Pack Rat, mentally noting (and celebrating) that he'd already used up all his Supreme Verdict. And then he played Wrath of God. I lost to an Elspeth a few turns later.
Game 3: Game 2 had gone pretty long, and there was only about 6 minutes left. I got an opening hand light on threats but heavy on discard. In hindsight, I probably should have mulliganed for something more aggressive to try to win before time ran out. But at the time I was afraid of going from an all right 7 to a no land 6 or worse. On my T1, I Thoughtseize and take Celestial Purge. On T2, I Collective Brutality and take Path to Exile. On T3 I Thoughtseize again to take a 2nd Path to Exile, leaving him with a few Supreme Verdict. On T4 with the creature removal out of the way I play Magus of the Moon. His only basic is 1 plains. I start the Magus beatdowns, and even have some Lightning Bolts too, but it's not a fast enough clock to win before turn 5 in time.
2-0-1
At this point I was just happy he hadn't opened with his apparently maindecked Leylines in any of the 3 games.
Match 4 vs G/u Infect
Game 1: I have Lightning Bolt and Fatal Push for this T1 and T2 plays, and once LOTV comes down he can't really put anything together.
My deck seems pretty well-suited to dealing with his already, and so I barely sideboard at all. I take out 1 Pack Rat for my Pithing Needle for his utility lands.
Game 2: He starts off with Noble Hierarch. I Thoughseize away Spell Pierce, but leave him with 2x Vines of Vastwood. He plays Spellskite. On my turn I attempt to Fatal Push his Hierarch while he's still tapped out to avoid the Vines. He doesn't redirect with Spellskite. He doesn't have another creature to play on his turn, and my T3 LOTV eats the skite. Once again the game quickly ends with a combination of LOTV +1s and Goblin Rabblemaster.
the build looks really fun and the sb tech with platinum and madcap are really something else. Might try building this except for the sideboard, might make it a bit more responsive to affinity, tron, and abzan decks since these run rampant in my meta
Went 3-0 tonight with a very different build than what I usually use. I've come to notice that Surgical Extraction is everywhere now, including in some main decks. That's very bad for Demigod of Revenge and any other cards that I use in the deck with graveyard interaction. I tried to have a night where I strayed away from graveyard shenanigans and went strictly as a midrange deck, with the following list:
A couple of notes on the actual list tonight - Vicious Hunger is a place-holder for Collective Brutality, which I do not have and simply serves the same purpose with better effects. However, it was good enough to beat Burn tonight, which is a matchup that I have historically struggled with since switching to main-deck Blood Moon. Also, the second Smoldering Marsh should be a Dragonskull Summit. Having the one copy in the deck to fetch for is fine, but with a second copy, it consistently comes up as a land I need to play out of my hand and too many times it comes in tapped, which is not acceptable and an easy fix. Those are both fairly permanent changes, even if I reduce the number of Vicious Hunger slash Collective Brutality in the sideboard.
Tonight's list was good. Goblin Rabblemaster ran over Burn after casting a single removal spell for their Goblin Guide, and their spells had a hard time racing him as none of them were Lightning Bolt and he didn't have a land to trigger Searing Blaze. Bedlam Reveler in the deck is still insanely strong, especially when the opponent is boarding in little-to-no graveyard interaction when they don't see any cards like Demigod of Revenge or Faithless Looting. Kolaghan's Command slightly interacts with the graveyard as well, but if the opponent boards in graveyard hate when playing this list of creature and planeswalker beat-down, then it's an advantage because they are realistically wasting their time more often than not.
There are still some small changes that could be made. Four full copies of Kolaghan's Command might not be necessary, and a third Fatal Push is probably where this list should be in that slot. Goblin Rabblemaster is great when it stays alive, and at three mana, it is much more reasonable of a threat than Demigod of Revenge, but it could easily be better as it still dies to Lightning Bolt as well as many other removal spells in the format, such as Fatal Push and Kolaghan's Command, without having an impact. The next cards on my test list are Thunderbreak Regent in that slot, as well as Siege-Gang Commander as a one-of while using Goblin Rabblemaster, and having a one-of Stormbreath Dragon and maybe even a one-of Master of Cruelties in place of one of the Goblin Rabblemaster copies, or with other threats that hold the board down early and shore up weaker matches, such as Gifted Aetherborn and Desecration Demon.
The Demigod of Revenge list is still what I believe is one of the strongest iterations of the deck, but in this super-graveyard-hating format, and especially with all of the new graveyard-hating cards being printed in Hour of Devastation, I'm exploring other avenues in lieu of Demigod of Revenge to still have a massive impact on the board. I've been wanting to cut Faithless Looting for a long time as well, which was only possible with the omission of Demigod of Revenge, so having the eight new slots to play with has been pretty nice and is giving the deck a lot more options. I'm also considering another copy of both Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet and Chandra, Torch of Defiance as they have been some of the best cards in the deck and the curve of the deck overall would still be lowered.
And before anyone messes with it, The Scorpion God is a bad card, so don't waste your time. However, Bontu's Last Reckoning might be worth playing in a more aggressive format that is devoid of combo decks. Other than that, not a whole lot of new cards for us to play around with. Green is actually getting the best of the new set, in my opinion anyway.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern: BR Control BR Standard: Temur Energy RUG Pauper: Fireball Black B Commander: Kaervek the MercilessBR
I went to my 2nd ever Modern tournament and went 3-0-1 with B/R, coming in 3rd. The draw conceivably could have been a win, as I was beating down without resistance under Blood Moon when turns ran out. There were 35-40 people at the tournament. The decks I played against were R/G Titanshift, UW Control, Esper Control, and Infect. I think the Demigod of Revenge and Faithless Looting builds are super interesting; however, I was worried about the collateral damage from all of the Surgical Extraction being played in basically everything nowadays. So I went with a slightly more aggressive approach:
These are very encouraging results. I'm close to completing my own Black Moon deck, and am keen to finally take it to a Modern LGS event or two.
I'm not sure if I'll stay with one Liliana or if I should add another one or two -- it depends on finances and what else currently in the deck may be deemed superfluous. Chandra could very well be substituted for another Liliana, but I do appreciate Chandra's ability to cause damage when in a pinch; her ultimate has also won me several games and extra card draw is rarely a bad thing.
I'm most likely going to substitute the Extirpate with an additional Surgical Extraction - I just have to get my hands on one. I've mainly got Dragon's Claw in the sideboard because it appears that there's a lot of Red within my LGS meta; it can also help to prevent me necking myself with Dark Confidant (although this is a rare issue).
Also, how do you folks generally play Pack Rat? Once it's down, do you go all in with Pack Rat? Do you activate on your turn or on opponent's turn? I guess it would depend on what it is you're faced with and the general board situation.
Anyway, I don't think it needs to be changed too much, but if anyone here has any feedback I'd very much appreciate it!
Went 3-1 with the demigod of revenge list, losing only to u/b fairies deck due to a well timed surgical extraction taking out 2 demigods in the yard without me finding another one.
As some pointed out graveyard hate is very much alive and moving forward what do you guys think can we do to deal with it? Going midrange seems to be a good idea so as we can have a few more threats aside from demigod. I've been thinking of doing this for a bit just to see how it goes.
Bone Picker: I have a soft spot for Morbid-type effects in general. Due to how I include Insolent Neonate as a 4-of in my list (which helps alleviate the issue brought up last page with Fatal Push too), this caught my attention. Cards that have conditional cost reduction built in are at least worth a look. A deck variant focused on cards with CMCs above 3 but with workarounds combined with Eidolon of the Great Revel may have some brewing potential, although if I ever went in that direction I feel like it'd turn into a Death's Shadow hybrid.
Bontu the Glorified: See above. Hellooooo there. Being an indestructible sac outlet, if nothing else, is an attention-grabber. Deck variants running Bloodghasts may want to consider this, particularly as Bontu doesn't compete with Kalitas's CMC. A Bloodghast -> Bontu -> Kalitas sequence would be pretty hilarious.
Shadow of the Grave: This is the card I'm personally most interested in for the set. In the past, I've mentioned Delirium Skeins, and this archetype is no stranger to mutual discard effects such as Lili: Veil Edition. Any cheap-CMC card that breaks equivalence is always worth a look. Looting effects of any sort turn into flat-out card draw, and Faithless Looting is universal for us. A powerful effect, but probably difficult to wrangle with Demigod of Revenge at the same time. I'd call this fuel for potential alternative strategies, such as a renewed emphasis on power discard. This is also the perfect buddy to Collective Brutality.
Hazoret the Fervent: Another card for the discard-for-everybody variant builds. Even without being active as a creature, the repeatable 2 damage ability on an indestructible card is a very good source of constant threat. Has some potential for that alone, but in a deck that specifically tried to dump its hand and/or more control-heavy builds, this looks excellent. Ensnaring Bridge has popped up in this thread, and usually dismissed as too unreliable (rightly so in a format this loaded with ways to get rid of it), but the synergy is definitely there. All the cards we looked at back in Shadows over Innistrad regarding Madness are worth a second look too.
Soul-Scar Mage: A Red one-drop with Prowess is automatically something any Red deck in Modern should at least acknowledge. I feel as though this isn't for us, but it absolutely merits mention that Pyroclasm is the perfect complement to this.
You've probably noticed the pattern by now: This set's being quite kind to our brood of variant decks and giving more potential to alternatives. Enough to actually elevate any of them into viability? I'm skeptical of that, but if a concept or strategy goes from being, say, a 4/10 idea to a 6/10 idea, I think that's worthy of acknowledgement if only in case the potential develops further. Demigod's a good example of that process over time.
Canyon Slough: Swamp Mountain AND Cycling? No lands with those words printed on them should be overlooked. The same goes for any of these lands. Shall we call them bicycle lands, since they're dual-typed cyclers? ETB tapped hurts, no mistake, but I feel a lot better about including these as one or two-ofs due to the cycling. What I'd probably do is reduce my shockland count to one-of, and refill the rest of the slot with these. So if I had 4x Blood Crypt before, I'll likely try a 1x Blood Crypt 3x Canyon Slough mix. Or maybe 2 and 2. Either way, the flexibility of fetchland-into-shockland is preserved while drawing extras becomes less of an issue.
3 Pack Rat
4 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
3 Eternal Scourge
4 Blood Moon
4 Relic of Progenitus
2 Kolaghan's Command
3 Blood Crypt
4 Bloodstained Mire
9 Swamp
3 Mountain
3 Smoldering Marsh
3 Liliana of the Veil
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Damnation
2 Anger of the Gods
1 Marsh Flats
2 Wurmcoil Engine
1 Dreadbore
2 Terminate
-1 Anger of the Gods
-1 Kolaghans Command
-1 Blood Moon
+1 Damnation
+1 Shriekmaw
+1 Pack Rat
Was pleasantly surprised at how little gravehate actually hurts this deck. Surgical Extraction is everywhere in my meta and surgical on Demigod really had me scared but it's honestly not hard to play around.
0 complaints about Pack Rat as a 1-of. Somehow he showed up in about half of my games and I won every time I played him except one game. Kinda like Demigod copy 5.
Missing one blood moon really didn't seem to hurt at all. I still had it for turn 3 more often than not.
Once I get my hands on another copy of Kommand I'll definitely be putting it in.
Didn't actually end up seeing Shriekmaw at all so idk if the interaction with Kommand/Lili last hope is too cute or not, but it seems good
Anyways my matches were
0-2 against Eldrazi Tron
0-2 against some weird UR Midrange deck
2-1 against Eldrazi Tron
2-1 against Abzan CoCo
2-0 against UW Spirits
First round against Eldrazi Tron was super unfortunate. Had answers to all his threats and slowed him down with turn 3 blood moon, but I dug crazy deep and only hit 1 creature and it was too little too late by that point. Game 2 thought knot seer screwed me
Lost against the weird UR deck probably due to misplays, idk.
Eldrazi Tron felt way easier the second time around. Spirits and melira were also super easy and free feeling
It basically started because I wanted to try the build but I don't have Dark Confidant and don't feel like spending $200 on a playset. The deck already played Goblin Guide and Goblin Rabblemaster, so I started thinking about taking out the human sub-theme, replacing the Aristocrat with other finishers, and adding in a couple Goblin Grenades for reach. The resulting deck is a bit more midrange.
4x Lightning Bolt
2x Terminate
4x Inquisition of Kozilek
2x Blightning
2x Goblin Grenade
2x Chandra, Torch of Defiance
4x Legion Loyalist
4x Goblin Guide
4x Mogg War Marshall
4x Goblin Rabblemaster
3x Pack Rat
2x Bone Picker
1x Gurmag Angler
22 Lands
16 goblins, 8 of whom produce token goblins, should support 2 grenades, giving reach. Legion Loyalist is a better mid-or-late game card than Monastery Swiftspear and works well with Rabblemaster tokens. The Pack Rats and Chandras should cure top-decking issues. The Bone Pickers should be very easy to cast for 1 between the elimination cards, attacking frequently, and the Mogg War Marshalls.
What do you guys think? Worth taking to the gaming shop and trying out?
I'm not sure how much control you have over the thread, but you definitely have the first post in the Primer, meaning that you are the one who can adjust it. If you can change the title of the Primer, it might be time to mention that this deck is pretty officially B/R Control labeled across many mainstream websites.
Also, it has been awhile since I've done a matchup guide, and the metagame and deck have warped pretty significantly since then.
With that said, here is a bunch of information for you all to digest:
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Faithless Looting
3 Fatal Push
2 Terminate
3 Kolaghan's Command
3 Anger of the Gods
4 Demigod of Revenge
1 Bedlam Reveler
2 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
4 Blood Moon
4 Bloodstained Mire
4 Verdant Catacombs
3 Blackcleave Cliffs
2 Blood Crypt
1 Smoldering Marsh
1 Graven Cairns
1 Temple of Malice
1 Dragonskull Summit
5 Swamp
1 Mountain
1 Liliana, the Last Hope
1 Liliana of the Veil
1 Anger of the Gods
3 Thoughtseize
1 Sulfur Elemental
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Ratchet Bomb
1 Dreadbore
1 Engineered Explosives
3 Rakdos Charm
This is my current list, and easily the happiest that I have ever been with the 75. Some of the singletons might seem like "metagame" calls or might just not be your cup of tea. That is perfectly fine. If you're playing my list, the alternate options or possible changes that I would endorse (NOT ALL AT THE SAME TIME) are:
-1 Temple of Malice, +1 Dragonskull Summit
-1 Ratchet Bomb (SB), +1 Boil (SB)
-1 Anger of the Gods, +1 Liliana, the Last Hope
-1 Anger of the Gods, +1 Liliana of the Veil
-2 Faithless Looting, +1 Kolaghan's Command, +1 Liliana (either one)
-4 Faithless Looting, +2 Thoughtseize, +1 of each Liliana
-1 Ratchet Bomb (SB), -1 Sulfur Elemental (SB), +2 Shadow of Doubt (SB)
-1 Anger of the Gods in Main, +1 Liliana, the Last Hope in Main
Those are all reasonable changes, though I have loved the manabase as it is, and I am perfectly happy with only seeing the Liliana options in the matchups where they are good post-board, while letting the deck flow through itself and have each card pose an equivalent threat. The only maindeck card that doesn't always have a place in a matchup is Anger of the Gods, but it is an excellent safety blanket against multiple decks. The format has become quite aggressive, and Anger of the Gods can stop many decks in their tracks.
Inquisition of Kozilek is often times strong enough by itself to disrupt the non-aggro decks as well as the aggro decks, and remains one of the best cards in the format. Having Thoughtseize in the deck felt like overkill to me, with the seven discard spells in the main deck formerly being the strategy, but nowadays many Modern decks can be crushed out of the game by one piece of hand disruption into reasonable threats. Lightning Bolt is obviously a four-of no matter what version of Rakdos you are playing. Fatal Push is the format's new superstar removal spell. Terminate is still a great all-purpose removal spell. Blood Moon always has the chance of stealing a Game 1 from many opponents, and even post-sideboard games occasionally, where the matchup would otherwise be poor. Chandra, Torch of Defiance has been hands-down the best Planeswalker and best win condition for me since the day I began testing with it.
The sideboard that I use is a bit more...unique. I try to plan for the cards I use to hit multiple decks and be part of a package against almost anything you might run into. The following is what I would do against most matchups in today's "high-tier" metagame:
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Jund Death's Shadow Matchup
Important Cards - Fatal Push, Inquisition of Kozilek, Terminate, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
Sideboard Strategy - +1 Dreadbore, +1 Engineered Explosives, +2 Thoughtseize, +1 Liliana of the Veil-3 Anger of the Gods, -2 Faithless Looting
Death's Shadow has become this bizarre boogeyman in the format, where it is considered one of the "best" decks in the format, yet still finds a way to be a fragile and beatable deck simply by allowing the opponent to nearly kill themselves before truly posing a threat in the majority of matchups. For us, we already have a good amount of removal for their Death's Shadow and Tarmogoyf copies in the main deck, and Demigod of Revenge is a great way to quickly swing an entire game to our win column in a single turn. I believe we have a better matchup against this deck than most of the format, and after sideboarding, it gets better in some ways but worse in others. If the opponent has not seen that we are on a Blood Moon plan, we are on a huge advantage going into the second game. They are not always prepared to fetch a basic land, but if they do have up the mana and the Abrupt Decay, then the Blood Moon plan won't always work. Fortunately, we have an enormous amount of removal. After sideboard, it gets a bit better. I like a few copies of Thoughtseize in the post-board games just to help hit their strong sideboard pieces, but not the full three package, or we wind up needing to topdeck a threat or removal spell later in the game and run too high of a risk of drawing a useless discard spell at that time. If this was a Grixis Shadow list, I would board in the third Thoughtseize over another Faithless Looting to hit their counterspells.
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Burn Matchup
Important Cards - Inquisition of Kozilek, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
Sideboard Strategy - +1 Engineered Explosives, +1 Liliana of the Veil, +1 Fulminator Mage, +1 Surgical Extraction, -3 Anger of the Gods, -1 Terminate,
I'm getting this one out of the way early, because it is a miserable matchup, as you might imagine when you pit a Control deck against a Burn deck. We need a decent amount of luck to win this set, and playing a game where you take risks is the most appropriate way to win the set. If you can live until Turn 6 or 7, which is fairly ambitious, then you can usually steal the game. Beyond that, you will tend to die early. Removal heavy hands and Blood Moon are not bad options, but an already-bad matchup has just gotten worse with Boros Burn becoming the popular choice of Burn lists lately, meaning that Blood Moon has four less cards it can prevent from killing us. Landing a Kalitas on turn four is critical, and an early Inquisition of Kozilek is also essential. The only way that you will win without those cards are during the oddity draws that Burn has where they play multiple creatures into our multiple removal spells, and then simply can't answer a Bedlam Reveler, Chandra, Torch of Defiance, or Demigod of Revenge. Their strongest card is usually Boros Charm, but beware of the Searing Blaze that you can stick in their hand if your win condition becomes Chandra. Sometimes they won't cast a spell for a few turns and as soon as you cast any creature, they will kill you instantly. Fulminator Mage can keep the greedy Burn keeps down post-board if you're lucky, and there is also a leg to stand on with Surgical Extraction. When the theory is "that only works situationally," sometimes you need to get lucky. A turn one Inquisition of Kozilek into a turn two Surgical Extraction that hits an additional copy of any card in their hand is a HUGE mini-victory. The best I can say for this matchup is to practice your outs, and good luck!
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Elves Matchup
Important Cards - Lightning Bolt, Inquisition of Kozilek, Fatal Push, Terminate
Sideboard Strategy - +1 Anger of the Gods, +1 Liliana, the Last Hope, +1 Liliana of the Veil, +2 Thoughtseize, -3 Kolaghan's Command, -2 Blood Moon,
This used to be an incredibly favorable matchup, but gone are the days of Devoted Druid comboing with Ezuri, Renegade Leader, and in are the days of Shaman of the Pack triggers. Of course, Devoted Druid has a new playmate with Vizier of Remedies, but that's an entirely different deck. The strategy here is simple: DO NOT LET THE ELVES LIVE. Elvish Archdruid and Heritage Druid are the most dangerous when left unchecked, but an Inquisition of Kozilek onto a Chord of Calling or a Dwynen's Elite can be backbreaking. Anger of the Gods will also usually win you the game. Just don't get arrogant and always expect them to have the Collected Company off of the top of the deck. If you are always prepared for it, they won't steal games. Also, Blood Moon is not the worst card against this deck in many circumstances, but it's also not the best. Post-board you obviously board in the hate, but I like to swap out a pair of the Blood Moons so you don't flood with multiple copies of the card, and Thoughtseize is your next-best option to take away out-of-hand Collected Company copies and Chord of Calling copies. Luckily for me, I have Elf master and local Chicagoland legend Johnny Ostrem to test against, so I know the matchup very well. I will warn you though that this is one of the most important matchups to be versed in, because if you aren't prepared you will get run over.
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Affinity Matchup
Important Cards - Kolaghan's Command, Fatal Push, Lightning Bolt, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
Sideboard Strategy - +3 Rakdos Charm, +1 Engineered Explosives, +1 Ratchet Bomb, -4 Faithless Looting, -1 Inquisition of Kozilek
This is one of your best matchups in the entire format. You are essentially built to dumpster Affinity, running main deck copies of both Kolaghan's Command and Anger of the Gods to prevent their early explosive draws, while also running Lightning Bolt, Fatal Push and Terminate to get you to the third turn and begin removing any value plays they have. Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet also stonewalls the Arcbound Ravager plan. Post-sideboard especially when you have even more artifact hate, just beware of large swings with Cranial Plating and make sure you can race Etched Champion, and you're home free just about every game. Faithless Looting comes out because there's no need to dig for cards that are good in the matchup if just about every nonland card can win you the game. If you wanted to keep in the playset of Inquisition of Kozilek, feel free, and simply board out a Demigod of Revenge or a Bedlam Reveler. The percentages are hard to test on those cards because the deck scarcely loses to Affinity no matter which of those cards you swamp in or out.
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Eldrazi Tron Matchup
Important Cards - Inquisition of Kozilek, Terminate, Blood Moon, Chandra, Torch of Defiance
Sideboard Strategy - +1 Dreadbore, +1 Liliana of the Veil, +1 Fulminator Mage, +1 Surgical Extraction, +3 Thoughtseize, -1 Fatal Push, -1 Anger of the Gods, -2 Inquisition of Kozilek, -1 Bedlam Reveler, -2 Faithless Looting
This is a very strange, very volatile matchup. Chalice of the Void on turn two (countering your 1CMC spells) can be back-breaking, especially when they're on the play. On the other hand, a topdeck Chandra, Torch of Defiance after they cast Thought-Knot Seer can swing the game so far in your favor that they often times won't come back from it. Unfortunately, the ball is definitely in their court overall unless you can stick a turn three Blood Moon. That's pretty much the major game plan against this deck. The sideboard gives you access to some more unconditional removal against them, particularly the Dreadbore that can hit their big creatures and their Karn Liberated, and the Liliana of the Veil that can make the game very difficult for them if you can avoid Reality Smasher. Thoughtseize is also a big help. If you have the lead enough to deal with Reality Smasher, then the matchup is manageable, but if not, this is a rough one. Beware all of their nasty threats and do what you can to get Blood Moon into play. Also, always board out of Bedlam Reveler, because more times than not, the Relic of Progenitus out of their sideboard will be difficult enough to deal with when casting Demigod of Revenge.
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Ad Nauseum Matchup
Important Cards - Inquisition of Kozilek, Blood Moon, Kolaghan's Command
Sideboard Strategy - +3 Thoughtseize, +1 Liliana of the Veil, +1 Surgical Extraction, +1 Fulminator Mage, +1 Engineered Explosives, -2 Terminate, -3 Fatal Push, -3 Anger of the Gods
This is essentially playing against an all-in combo deck. They have the colors to theoretically board in both their own hand disruption as well as their own hand protection, usually with Leyline of Sanctity and Thoughtseize. The first game will come down to whether or not a Blood Moon keeps them off of their necessary colors, and hopefully you can also hit a Pentad Prism with a Kolaghan's Command or hit an Angel's Grace with an Inquisition of Kozilek. This is a very luck-based first game, and you have to hope they don't combo off on you. The sideboard can be very different, and very difficult. We don't have a truly good way to get rid of Leyline of Sanctity if they stick one on us, so our Plan B needs to be targeting their lands with Fulminator Mage and Blood Moon, and simply killing them before they can recover. Sometimes you need to risk hitting a pair of Demigod of Revenge to put a serious clock on their game plan. Also, the Engineered Explosives comes in out of the board to hit their Pentad Prism, any sideboard cards that they board in to hate on our graveyard such as Relic of Progenitus or Pithing Needle, and if we're very lucky, we can destroy their Lotus Bloom upon resolution if we take their win condition out of their hand. In the event that you are splashing the one Godless Shrine for sideboard options, the three colors can also make Engineered Explosives destroy a Phyrexian Unlife. However, I don't believe the white splash is necessary for the current overall metagame, but it is worth noting. Overall for the matchup, if they can't stop the hand disruption, we can usually go the distance. This is still not a matchup we really want to see, however.
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Titan Shift Matchup
Important Cards - Blood Moon, Inquisition of Kozilek
Sideboard Strategy - +1 Fulminator Mage, +1 Liliana of the Veil, +1 Surgical Extraction, -3 Anger of the Gods
This matchup is a good-news, bad-news matchup. The good news is that a Blood Moon in the first four or five turns in Game 1 will usually win the game every time, and Blood Moon is essentially the anti-Scapeshift card. The bad news is that a good amount of the sideboard for their deck is specifically designed to destroy Blood Moon in the post-sideboard games, and the percentages swing heavily in their favor for Game 2 and, if necessary, Game 3. The plan is simple, you want to Inquisition of Kozilek their early ramp spells and Blood Moon them as soon as possible. This might sound similar to most combo matchups, such as Ad Nauseum, but this matchup comes with a moderate amount of interactive Magic. Their Plan B is a strong one in Primeval Titan and Obstinate Baloth, and some lists as of late have Chandra, Torch of Defiance and even the occasional Nahiri, the Harbinger as ways to win the game as well. Terminate is a necessary card in this matchup to leave in post-board, because Courser of Kruphix or Oracle of Mul Daya going unchecked can give them an insurmountable lead. This matchup for them is no different than the majority of their matchup spread, which is that the most likely way for Titan Shift to lose is to draw poorly, even though the percentage of times they will draw poorly is higher than the average deck. That is the life of ramp-deck players. At least we have Blood Moon, and many other decks simply do not.
==========================================================================
Grixis Control Matchup
Important Cards - Inquisition of Kozilek, Demigod of Revenge, Blood Moon, Terminate, Pia and Kiran Nalaar
Sideboard Strategy - +1 Liliana of the Veil, +1 Liliana, the Last Hope, +3 Thoughtseize, +3 Rakdos Charm, +1 Dreadbore, +1 Surgical Extraction, -4 Faithless Looting, -3 Anger of the Gods, -2 Fatal Push, -1 Lightning Bolt
This matchup is certainly one for the grinders. Inquisition of Kozilek is the most important card in the matchup, as garnering information from the opponent during the matchup is extremely important. The first match is heavily in your favor, as both players have a similar game plan with removal spells into difficult-to-remove threats, but Demigod of Revenge is so much better than anything the opposition can throw at you during a Game 1. Kolaghan's Command can recur Demigod of Revenge if you only see one of them in the game, Pia and Kiran Nalaar provides multiple threats, and Terminate takes out the majority of their creatures. If you take too much early damage, however, a few Snapcaster Mage into Lightning Bolt casts from your opponent will usually kill you, so be careful. A lot of this matchup hinges on the post-sideboard games. Cards like Faithless Looting and Anger of the Gods do not do enough in the matchup. Faithless Looting technically generates negative card advantage, and Anger of the Gods can only exile a Snapcaster Mage at best. On the other hand, the sideboard cards are extremely good, and there are a lot of interesting interactions in this matchup. Rakdos Charm removing the graveyard can prevent the Snapcaster Mage and Kolaghan's Command value that the opponent can generate, often times establishing a large lead, and can also remove a Grafdigger's Cage if the opponent happens to be playing one. Liliana of the Veil is an incredible card in this matchup, as the opponent will generally hinge on card advantage, and the minus ability from Liliana of the Veil can force a Tasigur, the Golden Fang or a Gurmag Angler to be sacrificed. Liliana, the Last Hope can recur creatures from the graveyard, and unchecked can force a lot of resources out of the opponent to remove. Thoughtseize is just as important as Inquisition of Kozilek for finding information, and a Blood Moon can simply end a game against three-color decks as always. If the opponent is playing and fetching for several basics, Game 3 can also let you board out a few Blood Moon copies for the Lightning Bolt copies you boarded out initially. It depends on the opponent and the flow of the first and second game. Overall, if you can avoid graveyard hate and stop the Snapcaster Mage and Kolaghan's Command chains, the matchup should be very winnable. Just be patient with spells and don't fire off important spells too soon.
======================================================
Tron Matchup
Important Cards - Blood Moon, Kolaghan's Command, Faithless Looting
Sideboard Strategy - +3 Thoughtseize, +1 Surgical Extraction, +1 Fulminator Mage, +1 Liliana of the Veil, +1 Sulfur Elemental, +1 Dreadbore, +3 Rakdos Charm, -3 Anger of the Gods, -2 Fatal Push, -3 Terminate, -3 Lightning Bolt
This is the most tilting matchup for me personally across all formats. Playing against Tron is absolutely miserable, because they can play a Karn Liberated or a Wurmcoil Engine on turn three without ever casting another spell. Ancient Stirrings essentially functions as a Green version of Ponder, except it digs two cards deeper than Ponder does (Ponder, by the way, is banned in Modern). Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger is an unbelievable card, and can be cast on turn four behind a Karn Liberated if their draw is perfect, and easily still by turn five or six, which is usually plenty for them to win against a control deck. If we manage to dodge those bullets, they still have Ugin, the Spirit Dragon to lean on. The only way to win this matchup is to slam a Blood Moon on them before they assemble Urza's Mine, Urza's Power Plant, and Urza's Tower together, which is very easy for them to do with Ancient Stirrings, Chromatic Sphere, Chromatic Star, and especially Expedition Map digging them to their necessary pieces. Even if we manage to get a Blood Moon down early, we still need to kill them before turn seven, when they can still easily cast creatures that are nothing short of nuclear for us. Post-sideboard, things get even worse, when they bring in Relic of Progenitus to disrupt the ability to get multiple Demigod of Revenge into play early. Our strategy after the first game is to jam every threat possible into play, as well as hit an Oblivion Stone or (if we're really lucky) an Expedition Map with a Rakdos Charm or Kolaghan's Command. This matchup is generally brutal, and with the Red-Green Tron decks slowly shifting over to the Green-White strategy, they even have Path to Exile to deal with Demigod of Revenge. Miserable matchup, take risks and hope for the best.
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Selesnya Company Matchup
Important Cards - Fatal Push, Lightning Bolt, Terminate, Inquisition of Kozilek, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
Sideboard Strategy - +3 Thoughtseize, +1 Surgical Extraction, +1 Engineered Explosives, -3 Faithless Looting, -2 Blood Moon
Now that Devoted Druid and Vizier of Remedies is a viable combo of cards and is seeing results at large tournaments, it's time to respect the deck. Their general game plan is to have infinite mana, while also having an infinite life combo, and the deck similar to the old Abzan Collected Company shell. If we can prevent their infinite combo cards from being on the battlefield from the same time, then we shouldn't have trouble winning the game. Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet is also an excellent way to prevent the infinite life combo that revolves around Viscera Seer from happening, and also makes it much easier to permanently remove a Kitchen Finks. As long as the opponent isn't able to combo off, then we should win the majority of games. However, Collected Company and Chord of Calling are incredibly dangerous cards to play against, particularly at instant-speed. If you can get a lead in the game, be sure to leave up as much instant-speed removal as possible, or your lead can suddenly turn into an immediate loss. After sideboard, having some additional all-purpose removal spells isn't the worst plan, and while Blood Moon is okay against the deck, they will likely play around it after the first game, and flooding multiple Blood Moon copies is a very bad thing. The only thing it tends to do in the matchup is turn off Gavony Township. Just stick to your game plan, as our matchup against the deck is pretty solid as long as we have our removal spells.
===========================================================
Living End Matchup
Important Cards - Terminate, Inquisition of Kozilek, Faithless Looting, Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
Sideboard Strategy - +3 Rakdos Charm, +1 Surgical Extraction, +1 Liliana, the Last Hope, +1 Fulminator Mage, -2 Fatal Push, -3 Lightning Bolt
This is a strange matchup, and there are so many random tools to know against the Living End matchup...far too many to list in a short matchup guide. The short version is that Lightning Bolt doesn't hit a lot of the creatures in their deck, such as Deadshot Minotaur, Street Wraith, and Pale Recluse, and 99% of the time it also misses their Fulminator Mage copies, the 1% coming when you have nothing but basic lands in play. This is a very strange matchup. If you can Inquisition of Kozilek their Violent Outburst or Demonic Dread, and they fail to find another copy, you can run them over. That is the dream scenario, and will not happen in most games. The best strategy for toppling them in Game 1 is to use Faithless Looting to get your creatures into the graveyard as fast as possible. If you can combat their Living End by bringing back creatures as well, you can often times steal a game, especially on the back of Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet paired with in-hand removal spells such as Terminate and, to a much lesser extent, Lightning Bolt and Fatal Push when they have legitimate targets to hit. After sideboarding, this matchup becomes much easier. If you can get to your Rakdos Charm and simply be ready for any graveyard recursion, you will win most of the time. Surgical Extraction is also helpful, but will not be nearly as effective since it does not exile an entire graveyard. Fulminator Mage can also keep them off of slow hands. The Plan C in this matchup as a whole is to slam a Blood Moon and hope that they cannot cast their Cascade spells, but the real victory card will always be Rakdos Charm in this matchup. It is so brutal for them at instant speed that it is honestly worth using multiple mulligans to find one.
======================================================
I hope you appreciate and utilize this sideboard guide. I understand that there are other versions of this deck, and I am certainly one of the people who is constantly testing many other cards and builds. However, I feel that the overall options are one of the best reasons to play Black-Red right now as a color combination. Rakdos Charm out of the sideboard is a catch-all against Dredge, Affinity, and Living End, as well as having some game against several fringe decks, such as Lantern Control. Anger of the Gods is still a backbreaking card for decks like Dredge, Elves, Bushwhacker Zoo, BW Tokens, any fringe aggro deck, and also has some game against Snapcaster Mage-into-Kolaghan's Command decks by exiling Snapcaster Mage. Inquisition of Kozilek and Thoughtseize are still two of the best control-oriented cards in the entire format. Lightning Bolt will always be an incredibly powerful card. Fatal Push is the newest, hottest removal spell in Modern. With many valuable creature options to go with these removal packages and the ability to play Blood Moon (one of the most unfair cards in the format), we are certainly making a push to becoming a Tier 1 deck.
If you have any other matchups that you would like a sideboard guide for, even if your personal sideboard is different from mine, feel free to message me. I will also post occasional variations of this deck, with numerous attempts at other cards that are also in the format as well. With every set that comes out, we get more potential cards, and with BR Control being in an infancy stage in the format, there is still a great deal of room for growth as an archetype.
Standard: Temur Energy RUG
Pauper: Fireball Black B
Commander: Kaervek the Merciless BR
"Always Bolt the Bird."
There are occasional matchups where I will board out Lightning Bolt, but a lot of combo decks turn into a race against time after you cast your disruption spells. It's the weakest card in the matchup a lot of the time, but there aren't better cards to board it. On the bright side, it turns a turn six Demigod of Revenge into eight damage instead of five. I board them out in matchups where I simply need my entire sideboard for various reasons, such as against Grixis Control I'll usually board out two of them.
Fatal Push usually is hitting a creature with either a CMC of 1 or a CMC of 2, and when it isn't, it can easily be boarded out. I actually played 3 Terminate and 2 Fatal Push today instead of the other way around. I'm iffy on it either way, but in my local meta, I'd rather have an extra Fatal Push to deal with all of the heavy aggro decks.
I'll also be doing more matchup guides as I complete them through testing.
Standard: Temur Energy RUG
Pauper: Fireball Black B
Commander: Kaervek the Merciless BR
"Always Bolt the Bird."
@Smash: I added 'Control' to the primer name. The thread name was lacking that extra descriptor. It may drive some more traffic to our discussion. Long time contributor here at MTGsalvation, Pizzap commented on the evolution of Blitzkrieg from Heavy Discard to Mid-Range. He's right. A lot of changes since I started the thread over 2 years ago, and you know who lost out the most? Fat Buddha.
He is our patron saint of media. Fat Buddha created that lethally gorgeous banner in the Official Primer, and so few of the cards pictured remain. It's a cruel world ruled by the uncompromising realities of meritocracy. When Blightning and Wrench Mind can't stand atop the winner's podium, isn't it time for us all to take a long, hard look at ourselves? Well, we'll always have terminate...lightning bolt...and, our best girl, Lily. Sweet, innocent Liliana.
As certain card's impact value and styles of play (discard / removal / rack / creature attack) have waxed and waned in the meta, I have kept a watchful eye for the return of heavy discard. It's most effective when either Control or Combo are in vogue. Gifts/Storm, Ad Nauseam, Tron, Titanshift, U/W Control, and Breach decks are all worthy targets of a wrench mind or unburden. Is 2-for-1 discard viable in Modern? Certainly, Kolaghan's Command is an all star and the king of 2-for-1. Is it the only real option?
Hey Smash, PM the matchup guide within the 'edit' version of the post. That way it will include all of the hyperlinks and correct formatting when I put it in the Official Primer. The last big win with Blitzkrieg came with a Florida 1K by Smash. Anyone else have a premier top 8 finish to report?
I will when I get off
// 6 Artifact
4 Relic of Progenitus
2 Batterskull
// 11 Creature
2 Pack Rat
3 Eternal Scourge
3 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Wurmcoil Engine
2 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
// 4 Enchantment
4 Blood Moon
// 6 Instant
2 Terminate
2 Kolaghan's Command
2 Fatal Push
// 23 Land
10 Swamp
4 Bloodstained Mire
3 Blood Crypt
2 Mountain
1 Marsh Flats
3 Smoldering Marsh
// 5 Planeswalker
3 Liliana of the Veil
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
// 6 Sorcery
2 Anger of the Gods
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Dreadbore
// 15 Sideboard
// 3 Artifact
SB: 3 Dragon's Claw
// 3 Creature
SB: 3 Fulminator Mage
// 3 Instant
SB: 2 Surgical Extraction
SB: 1 Sudden Shock
// 6 Sorcery
SB: 2 Damnation
SB: 1 Collective Brutality
SB: 1 Shattering Spree
SB: 2 Thoughtseize
http://www.hareruyamtg.com/en/k/kD05409K/
Looks really interesting. I think it could be even more explosive with ssg
It's a brave, new design on an oldeeeeee classic: Big Beater Tanks for late game and Quick Disruption for early game. I like the main deck Dreadbore, Anger of the Gods, Batterskull, and Relic of Progenitus. These are horses usually found in the stables of sideboard, but wisely targeting the meta in your construction. Boss.
I do wonder about a vulnerability to quick-aggro decks like Fish or Gobots/8-Wack, since you curve pretty high. I thought I'd see more early sweep and adaptable lifegain in the sideboard, but then again, you do rock (3) Dragon's Claw. Mmmmm, the more I look at it, the more I can see the synergies. If you can format it properly, I'd love to put it in the "Featured Deck List" section.
Also, you mentioned that you won a PPTQ with your list. Has that been published anywhere online?
Care to share a list?
// 61 Maindeck
// 6 Artifact
4 Relic of Progenitus
2 Batterskull
// 11 Creature
2 Pack Rat
3 Eternal Scourge
3 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Wurmcoil Engine
2 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
// 4 Enchantment
4 Blood Moon
// 6 Instant
2 Terminate
2 Kolaghan's Command
2 Fatal Push
// 23 Land
10 Swamp
4 Bloodstained Mire
3 Blood Crypt
2 Mountain
1 Marsh Flats
3 Smoldering Marsh
// 5 Planeswalker
3 Liliana of the Veil
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
// 6 Sorcery
2 Anger of the Gods
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 Dreadbore
// 15 Sideboard
// 3 Artifact
SB: 3 Dragon's Claw
// 3 Creature
SB: 3 Fulminator Mage
// 3 Instant
SB: 2 Surgical Extraction
SB: 1 Sudden Shock
// 6 Sorcery
SB: 2 Damnation
SB: 1 Collective Brutality
SB: 1 Shattering Spree
SB: 2 Thoughtseize
3 eternal scourge
2 pack rat
3 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
1 Wurmcoil engine
ARTIFACT
2 Batterskull
4 relic of progenitis
INSTANTS
3 Fatal Push
2 terminate
SORCERIES
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
1 dreadbore
2 anger of the gods
3 Liliana of the Veil
2 chandra, torch of defiance
4 Bloodstained Mire
3 Blood Crypt
1 marsh flats
2 mountain
3 smoldering marsh
10 swamp
3 dragons's claw
3 fulimimator mage
1 sudden shock
2 surgical extraction
1 collective brutality
2 damnation
2 thoutseize
1 shattering spree
Hope that is right
I have never had a list published, I didn't know they did for love lewvel stuff, lol maybe it is store cause I've won several IQ and gpts. I modeled this deck after Skred as Im a Skred player. I somtimes wanna drop a k commmamd for a 3rd push. I love this list deck though, it is my Tinker project that has put up results
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/670631#paper
I went to my 2nd ever Modern tournament and went 3-0-1 with B/R, coming in 3rd. The draw conceivably could have been a win, as I was beating down without resistance under Blood Moon when turns ran out. There were 35-40 people at the tournament. The decks I played against were R/G Titanshift, UW Control, Esper Control, and Infect. I think the Demigod of Revenge and Faithless Looting builds are super interesting; however, I was worried about the collateral damage from all of the Surgical Extraction being played in basically everything nowadays. So I went with a slightly more aggressive approach:
4 Dark Confidant
4 Pack Rat
4 Goblin Rabblemaster
1 Magus of the Moon
SPELLS
4 Liliana of the Veil
4 Thoughtseize
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Fatal Push
2 Kolaghan's Command
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Terminate
3 Blood Moon
4 Bloodstained Mire
4 Polluted Delta
4 Swamp
4 Blood Crypt
4 Mutavault
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
2 Mountain
1 Kolaghan's Command
1 Pithing Needle
2 Rakdos Charm
2 Grafdigger's Cage
1 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Surgical Extraction
2 Anger of the Gods
1 Pyroclasm
2 Collective Brutality
1 Fulminator Mage
Match 1 vs R/G Titanshift
Game 1: I am new to Modern, and unfamiliar with many of the decks/interactions. For some reason, when I drew Blood Moon, I had in my mind "Why would I want to make all his lands Mountains? Then they'll ALL trigger Valakut!!!1" So I wound up discarding 3 Blood Moons to LOTV before dying to a Primeval Titan. Pretty much right after the game ended, I realized my mistake, and asked my opponent never to tell anyone about it ever.
Game 2: He accelerates mana. I play Dark Confidant, which he bolts. I play Pack Rat, and on his T3 he uses Chandra, Torch of Defiance to minus and kill it. Then on my turn I play Goblin Rabblemaster and kill Chandra with the haste token. He stalled on 4 lands with no answers to my creature, so I won 2 turns after.
Game 3: A T3 Blood Moon followed by a T4 Goblin Rabblemaster he can't answer makes for another quick win.
1-0
At this point I was pretty excited to even have won once.
Match 2 vs UW Control
Game 1: I went first. My opening hand had Blood Moon. My T1 Thoughtseize showed that he had 2 Flooded Strand and a Celestial Colonnade for lands. I took his 1 Serum Visions and left him with a bunch of late game cards. On my T3, I decided to not play the Blood Moon to see if he would crack the fetches for non-basics at the end of my turn, which he did. The following turn I used IOK to clear the way and then he lost because he had only Mountains.
Game 2: He stopped 2 consecutive Liliana of the Veil, but could not stop the 3rd
2-0
At this point I'm starting to believe that I'm just playing with a pile of individually powerful cards that are carrying me to victory. I don't really mind.
Match 3 vs Esper Control
Game 1: I clear the way with discard for a T3 LOTV, and start ticking up. On his T5 though, he randomly hardcasts a Leyline of Sanctity, which stops me from -6ing him the next turn. However, by that time, the game had basically already progressed to me discarding my draw to Pack Rat each turn and then +1 LOTV. He is quickly overrun. LOTV ends the game on 11 Loyalty.
Game 2: He sideboarded heavily. Even though I didn't play any moon effects in G1, he brought in Esper Charms anticipating them. He also fetched for all basics at the start of the game. Several charms and several Celestial Purge took out numerous Blood Moon and Liliana of the Veil, among other things. The thing I like about this deck is each creature can more or less win the game on its own if left unchecked. So he wound up having to use 4x Supreme Verdict, each on only a single copy of either Goblin Rabblemaster or Pack Rat. Well into the late game, when we were both nearly decked, I had an opening to play my last Pack Rat, mentally noting (and celebrating) that he'd already used up all his Supreme Verdict. And then he played Wrath of God. I lost to an Elspeth a few turns later.
Game 3: Game 2 had gone pretty long, and there was only about 6 minutes left. I got an opening hand light on threats but heavy on discard. In hindsight, I probably should have mulliganed for something more aggressive to try to win before time ran out. But at the time I was afraid of going from an all right 7 to a no land 6 or worse. On my T1, I Thoughtseize and take Celestial Purge. On T2, I Collective Brutality and take Path to Exile. On T3 I Thoughtseize again to take a 2nd Path to Exile, leaving him with a few Supreme Verdict. On T4 with the creature removal out of the way I play Magus of the Moon. His only basic is 1 plains. I start the Magus beatdowns, and even have some Lightning Bolts too, but it's not a fast enough clock to win before turn 5 in time.
2-0-1
At this point I was just happy he hadn't opened with his apparently maindecked Leylines in any of the 3 games.
Match 4 vs G/u Infect
Game 1: I have Lightning Bolt and Fatal Push for this T1 and T2 plays, and once LOTV comes down he can't really put anything together.
My deck seems pretty well-suited to dealing with his already, and so I barely sideboard at all. I take out 1 Pack Rat for my Pithing Needle for his utility lands.
Game 2: He starts off with Noble Hierarch. I Thoughseize away Spell Pierce, but leave him with 2x Vines of Vastwood. He plays Spellskite. On my turn I attempt to Fatal Push his Hierarch while he's still tapped out to avoid the Vines. He doesn't redirect with Spellskite. He doesn't have another creature to play on his turn, and my T3 LOTV eats the skite. Once again the game quickly ends with a combination of LOTV +1s and Goblin Rabblemaster.
Final record 3-0-1
The end.
the build looks really fun and the sb tech with platinum and madcap are really something else. Might try building this except for the sideboard, might make it a bit more responsive to affinity, tron, and abzan decks since these run rampant in my meta
1 Thoughtseize
4 Lightning Bolt
2 Fatal Push
3 Terminate
4 Kolaghan's Command
4 Blood Moon
4 Goblin Rabblemaster
2 Pia and Kiran Nalaar
2 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1 Bedlam Reveler
1 Liliana, the Last Hope
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
4 Bloodstained Mire
4 Verdant Catacombs
2 Blood Crypt
2 Smoldering Marsh
1 Dragonskull Summit
1 Graven Cairns
3 Blackcleave Cliffs
5 Swamp
1 Mountain
3 Vicious Hunger
4 Anger of the Gods
2 Thoughtseize
1 Surgical Extraction
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Dreadbore
3 Rakdos Charm
A couple of notes on the actual list tonight - Vicious Hunger is a place-holder for Collective Brutality, which I do not have and simply serves the same purpose with better effects. However, it was good enough to beat Burn tonight, which is a matchup that I have historically struggled with since switching to main-deck Blood Moon. Also, the second Smoldering Marsh should be a Dragonskull Summit. Having the one copy in the deck to fetch for is fine, but with a second copy, it consistently comes up as a land I need to play out of my hand and too many times it comes in tapped, which is not acceptable and an easy fix. Those are both fairly permanent changes, even if I reduce the number of Vicious Hunger slash Collective Brutality in the sideboard.
Tonight's list was good. Goblin Rabblemaster ran over Burn after casting a single removal spell for their Goblin Guide, and their spells had a hard time racing him as none of them were Lightning Bolt and he didn't have a land to trigger Searing Blaze. Bedlam Reveler in the deck is still insanely strong, especially when the opponent is boarding in little-to-no graveyard interaction when they don't see any cards like Demigod of Revenge or Faithless Looting. Kolaghan's Command slightly interacts with the graveyard as well, but if the opponent boards in graveyard hate when playing this list of creature and planeswalker beat-down, then it's an advantage because they are realistically wasting their time more often than not.
There are still some small changes that could be made. Four full copies of Kolaghan's Command might not be necessary, and a third Fatal Push is probably where this list should be in that slot. Goblin Rabblemaster is great when it stays alive, and at three mana, it is much more reasonable of a threat than Demigod of Revenge, but it could easily be better as it still dies to Lightning Bolt as well as many other removal spells in the format, such as Fatal Push and Kolaghan's Command, without having an impact. The next cards on my test list are Thunderbreak Regent in that slot, as well as Siege-Gang Commander as a one-of while using Goblin Rabblemaster, and having a one-of Stormbreath Dragon and maybe even a one-of Master of Cruelties in place of one of the Goblin Rabblemaster copies, or with other threats that hold the board down early and shore up weaker matches, such as Gifted Aetherborn and Desecration Demon.
The Demigod of Revenge list is still what I believe is one of the strongest iterations of the deck, but in this super-graveyard-hating format, and especially with all of the new graveyard-hating cards being printed in Hour of Devastation, I'm exploring other avenues in lieu of Demigod of Revenge to still have a massive impact on the board. I've been wanting to cut Faithless Looting for a long time as well, which was only possible with the omission of Demigod of Revenge, so having the eight new slots to play with has been pretty nice and is giving the deck a lot more options. I'm also considering another copy of both Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet and Chandra, Torch of Defiance as they have been some of the best cards in the deck and the curve of the deck overall would still be lowered.
And before anyone messes with it, The Scorpion God is a bad card, so don't waste your time. However, Bontu's Last Reckoning might be worth playing in a more aggressive format that is devoid of combo decks. Other than that, not a whole lot of new cards for us to play around with. Green is actually getting the best of the new set, in my opinion anyway.
Standard: Temur Energy RUG
Pauper: Fireball Black B
Commander: Kaervek the Merciless BR
"Always Bolt the Bird."
These are very encouraging results. I'm close to completing my own Black Moon deck, and am keen to finally take it to a Modern LGS event or two.
My list is as follows:
4 Dark Confidant
3 Pack Rat
4 Goblin Rabblemaster
1 Olivia Voldaren
1 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
Planeswalkers:
1 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
1 Liliana of the Veil
Spells:
3 Blood Moon
4 Fatal Push
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Kolaghan's Command
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Terminate
2 Thoughtseize
4 Blackcleave Cliffs
2 Blood Crypt
4 Bloodstained Mire
1 Dragonskull Summit
1 Mountain
2 Mutavault
4 Polluted Delta
5 Swamp
2 Anger of the Gods
2 Collective Brutality
1 Damnation
1 Extirpate
1 Grim Lavamancer
2 Rakdos Charm
2 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Pithing Needle
1 Stormbreath Dragon
1 Surgical Extraction
I'm not sure if I'll stay with one Liliana or if I should add another one or two -- it depends on finances and what else currently in the deck may be deemed superfluous. Chandra could very well be substituted for another Liliana, but I do appreciate Chandra's ability to cause damage when in a pinch; her ultimate has also won me several games and extra card draw is rarely a bad thing.
I'm most likely going to substitute the Extirpate with an additional Surgical Extraction - I just have to get my hands on one. I've mainly got Dragon's Claw in the sideboard because it appears that there's a lot of Red within my LGS meta; it can also help to prevent me necking myself with Dark Confidant (although this is a rare issue).
Also, how do you folks generally play Pack Rat? Once it's down, do you go all in with Pack Rat? Do you activate on your turn or on opponent's turn? I guess it would depend on what it is you're faced with and the general board situation.
Anyway, I don't think it needs to be changed too much, but if anyone here has any feedback I'd very much appreciate it!
Went 3-1 with the demigod of revenge list, losing only to u/b fairies deck due to a well timed surgical extraction taking out 2 demigods in the yard without me finding another one.
As some pointed out graveyard hate is very much alive and moving forward what do you guys think can we do to deal with it? Going midrange seems to be a good idea so as we can have a few more threats aside from demigod. I've been thinking of doing this for a bit just to see how it goes.
2 blood crypt
7 swamp
2 mountain
1 gavern cairns
1 smoldering marsh
3 canyon slough
1 temple of malice
2 dragonskull summit
2 kalitas, traitor of ghet
1 olivia voldaren
2 bloodline keeper
3 bloodmoon
2 call the bloodline
1 sword of feast and famine
1 sword of war and peace
3 terminate
1 dreadbore
2 fatal push
3 thoughtseize
2 inquisition of kozilek
2 collective brutality
1 kolagahn's command
4 fiery temper
1 chandra torch of defiance
Its pretty much a token sword deck but again this is just something I'm wanting to try out since there's too much yard hate.
Other creatures to consider is tasigur, bedlam, and pia and kira
For example in G2 against Ad Nauseam.