Jund plays discard and bolt. Twin plays visions and bolt. Grixis twin plays bolt, visions and discard.
That is not how proactive curves work.
You place the things you would always like to play on turn 1 in the "on curve" one drop spot. Cards like lightning bolt and path to exile do not count as 1 drops.
The turn 1 play slot for Jund is typically (or close, sometimes different numbers of manlands and sometimes 3 TS).
3 x raging ravine
2 x treetop village
2 x thoughtseize
4 x inquisition of kozilek
Jund will almost never bolt to the face turn 1, and almost never bolt a creature turn 1 unless they are on the draw or they're playing against burn in game 2 or something. Very rare jund taps a land for bolt on turn 1, so it's not really a 1 drop. It's a spell that costs 1 mana, so that factors into how many lands you play, but it doesn't talk about your curve gameplan.
I've definitely come around to the hierarch build after trying it out a bit, the thing i like about it, is that they actually adds something to each of our game plans. In terms of tempo, we get bigger attacks, in terms of control, we get to cast cryptic a turn earlier, and in terms of combo we get to go off a turn earlier. What's not to like? I disagree with the idea that we cant run it with serum visions. Having options is always helpful.
Keep on trucking with it, but watch for how often you have awkward games because of the awkward curve (and even more clunky manabase). Watch how often you would like to just fetch a basic to keep from getting burnt out but you can't, for example, because you're counting on your hierarch for blue.
Running lots of 1 mana counterspells does help the t2/t3 curve, but hierarchs also conflict with that. A lot of times you're going to have to debate: Do I run out a hierarch or do I keep up spell snare/pierce?
I seriously wish you guys luck, just also lots of caution There has never been a successful modern deck that had that much conflict at 1 that I can think of. The only deck that I can think of that's played hierarchs and visions is Infect (and you know why that is...most of their spells cost 0-1 mana, and hierarch's exalted is twice as good in infect).
Hi fellas, I am trying to build this deck in a way that works and I have encountered a couple problems with it worth discussing:
The deck never feels like it is doing anything powerfull, by this a mean that most lines of play that we can take with it (even the combo) is not impressive in this format. I shall explain:
-Our main beaters: Geist and Knight have very clear weakneses, one to almost any creature, and the other to GY disruption. So both basically fold to SCooze. That in itself souldn't be the greatest of concerns but specifically in my meta SCooze is real big. Also, lingering souls buys an insane amount of time against us (unless we have the 1x kessig in play or the combo). Let's do some calculations: with a mana dork, a T2 Knight is possible, but we need another turn to be able to fetch the kessig, and yet another turn to be able to atack with it, assuming we were luky enough to play it T2. Geist just can't attack into souls unless we have an exalted creature on the board. So being reasonably luky, we can't start pressuring the oponent untill t4. In a "T4 format" that seems underpowered.
Souls is just an example by the way, any kind of resilient creature works (finks, voice, Young pyro, even snappy can be anoying to atack into)
-The combo is not that impressive either: I haven't calculated this for every single version of the deck but we can do aproximately from 22 to 28 damage per knight when comboing off, wich means that if the oponent manages somehow to get over 25ish life we already have to think about getting another knight online before we can even start the combo. Of course we could kill them in two swings but lets be realistic, when we go off we deal a lot of damage to ourselves (at least 9 out of fetchlands), so is unlikely to be at a high enogh life to survive the following turn. And that is if our oponent is not playing any kind of unfair deck and doesn't just twins us.
-We pack very litle to almost no interaction (in the company versions): In theory we can use the tap ability on retreat to manage the oposing board but this is just not realistic. I haven tried the more controlling versions so I can't say anything about those. And with this litle interaction the deck is a real underdog against any unfair deck, yes we have a t3 combo kill, but that hand is just not reliable enough.
Example: If let's say Abzan company, goes to a million life wich you could say is a powerfull play, there are a lot of decks that can still win against them no problem (tron, twin, lantern, infect and affinity, among others) we can't deal with that neither though interaction nor with the combo.
Maybe this matchup is just bad, and there are other matchups better for the deck, but if so, wich are those matchups? Not the unfair/combo decks like infect, twin, Abzan company, tron. Not the midrange controlish decks like jund/junk, tokens or grixis, though maybe grixis may not be so bad due to their lack of enchant removal and reliable blockers. Burn and affinity are mostly a sideboard matchup anyways, So what is left? Other low interaction aggro decks, and that is pretty much it. I might be wrong though. If so please tell me and explain to me why if you are so kind ^^.
This all takes me to my second concern: Is there a viable way to play the bant or zoo version of this deck without tarmogoyf? I'm talking about those two specifically because those are the ones making the best results apparently.
-Big old goyf seems to be the only card that would help us pressure the oponent but we dont even have that much ways to grow it, so I'm not completely sure it would fix the problem.
Other 2cmc creatures are just weak:
-Qasali is not bad but a 2/2 for 2 mana that most times doesnt have a relevent abbility is not really that impressive. Many times is just a bad Watchwolf.
-Voice is fine, but on itself can't pressure lifetotals, makes oponents interaction weak, but that is it.
-And SCooze has a similar problem to goyf but magnified by our litle interaction.
I don't want to be that guy who only criticises a deck without saying something constructive, but I haven't had good results since I built the deck and I wanted to ask for your help. Maybe I'm just a bad pilot or I'm having bad luck. But I haven't played a single game where I felt I was favoured to win. I did win some games, but those were just because of bad hands or bad draws from the oponent. And the (very few) times when I assembled the combo, it allways felt like I was going to win the game anyways.
So I would love to hear your opinions to see what am I doing wrong. Maybe it's just that this is not the best deck for me. Thank you, and sorry for the long post.
Hi fellas, I am trying to build this deck in a way that works and I have encountered a couple problems with it worth discussing:
The deck never feels like it is doing anything powerfull, by this a mean that most lines of play that we can take with it (even the combo) is not impressive in this format. I shall explain:
-Our main beaters: Geist and Knight have very clear weakneses, one to almost any creature, and the other to GY disruption. So both basically fold to SCooze. That in itself souldn't be the greatest of concerns but specifically in my meta SCooze is real big. Also, lingering souls buys an insane amount of time against us (unless we have the 1x kessig in play or the combo). Let's do some calculations: with a mana dork, a T2 Knight is possible, but we need another turn to be able to fetch the kessig, and yet another turn to be able to atack with it, assuming we were luky enough to play it T2. Geist just can't attack into souls unless we have an exalted creature on the board. So being reasonably luky, we can't start pressuring the oponent untill t4. In a "T4 format" that seems underpowered.
Souls is just an example by the way, any kind of resilient creature works (finks, voice, Young pyro, even snappy can be anoying to atack into)
-The combo is not that impressive either: I haven't calculated this for every single version of the deck but we can do aproximately from 22 to 28 damage per knight when comboing off, wich means that if the oponent manages somehow to get over 25ish life we already have to think about getting another knight online before we can even start the combo. Of course we could kill them in two swings but lets be realistic, when we go off we deal a lot of damage to ourselves (at least 9 out of fetchlands), so is unlikely to be at a high enogh life to survive the following turn. And that is if our oponent is not playing any kind of unfair deck and doesn't just twins us.
-We pack very litle to almost no interaction (in the company versions): In theory we can use the tap ability on retreat to manage the oposing board but this is just not realistic. I haven tried the more controlling versions so I can't say anything about those. And with this litle interaction the deck is a real underdog against any unfair deck, yes we have a t3 combo kill, but that hand is just not reliable enough.
Example: If let's say Abzan company, goes to a million life wich you could say is a powerfull play, there are a lot of decks that can still win against them no problem (tron, twin, lantern, infect and affinity, among others) we can't deal with that neither though interaction nor with the combo.
Maybe this matchup is just bad, and there are other matchups better for the deck, but if so, wich are those matchups? Not the unfair/combo decks like infect, twin, Abzan company, tron. Not the midrange controlish decks like jund/junk, tokens or grixis, though maybe grixis may not be so bad due to their lack of enchant removal and reliable blockers. Burn and affinity are mostly a sideboard matchup anyways, So what is left? Other low interaction aggro decks, and that is pretty much it. I might be wrong though. If so please tell me and explain to me why if you are so kind ^^.
This all takes me to my second concern: Is there a viable way to play the bant or zoo version of this deck without tarmogoyf? I'm talking about those two specifically because those are the ones making the best results apparently.
-Big old goyf seems to be the only card that would help us pressure the oponent but we dont even have that much ways to grow it, so I'm not completely sure it would fix the problem.
Other 2cmc creatures are just weak:
-Qasali is not bad but a 2/2 for 2 mana that most times doesnt have a relevent abbility is not really that impressive. Many times is just a bad Watchwolf.
-Voice is fine, but on itself can't pressure lifetotals, makes oponents interaction weak, but that is it.
-And SCooze has a similar problem to goyf but magnified by our litle interaction.
I don't want to be that guy who only criticises a deck without saying something constructive, but I haven't had good results since I built the deck and I wanted to ask for your help. Maybe I'm just a bad pilot or I'm having bad luck. But I haven't played a single game where I felt I was favoured to win. I did win some games, but those were just because of bad hands or bad draws from the oponent. And the (very few) times when I assembled the combo, it allways felt like I was going to win the game anyways.
So I would love to hear your opinions to see what am I doing wrong. Maybe it's just that this is not the best deck for me. Thank you, and sorry for the long post.
Lets handle the matchups first. At least for my own zoo brew I can confidently say that Infect, Twin, Jund/Junk, grixis, pretty much all manner of control are awesome matchups. Then Abzan Company, Tron, and amulet bloom are our 50/50 matchups where my sideboard at least often wins games 2 and 3. In my experience our only truly terrible matchups are bogles, and scapeshift. I regularly take down fnm going 4-0 or 3-1 losing almost exclusively to those two decks. With that said, I think the version of zoo with the combo is the most viable version of the combo because it slots directly into an already competitive deck with some excellent matchups, 4 color zoo, and suddenly adds a way to win underneath the decks zoo traditionally struggles with. And with that said, the enchantment isn't a dead card outside the combo, I regularly win by tapping down blockers to finish them off. I've not been shy about saying that I believe my version of the deck is the most competitive version, though there are adjustments I would make in the main depending on the meta I'm entering. That brings me to the tarmogoyf question.
Tarmogoyf is an excellent card, but you're correct in realizing that it simply isn't broken in our deck like it is in jund/junk decks. The turn one discard spell into turn 2 massive goyf is simply not something we can do here. About two thirds of the time in my experience when he comes down on turn 2 he's less impactful on the board than a voice of resurgence, scooze, or a pridemage, especially in my meta. With that said, he's excellent late game when graveyards are bound to be full of card types so I've determined that 2 is the correct amount for me. I'm currently looking to get another tarmogoyf, as I only have 1 at the moment. With that said I ran the deck for the past few months with no tarmogoyfs and just voices and still won just as much. I can understand why you might underestimate voice, but in the very worst situation possible, him getting pathed on the mainphase of your opponents turn, you're still accelerating to 4 mana out of the deal which in my deck with elspeth and collect company is very strong. Even him getting removed by normal removal is usually still pretty ok, he replaces himself immediately with a creature that will generally have better stats than him all the while getting a piece of removal out of the way.
Qasali Pridemage is an excellent card in a deck with Geist, having him with any sort of exalted totally breaks that card, and I would argue that he's always far better than a watchwolf, as he sometimes packs a relevant ability and can help beef up your dudes. Do not underestimate exalted, on of the best mechanics in the last 10 years in my opinion.
Our interaction is a little on the low side, but 7 pieces of removal seems to be the minimum sweet spot with this deck, I always have an answer when I need it, and all the thinning from fetches and knight of the reliquaries makes up for the creature count being on the lower side when it comes to collect company.
I'd say play with the deck more, get to know all the little interactions. I rarely feel unfavored with this deck, it has a lot of inherently strong plays, bordering on broken. I love turn 1 nacatl into turn 2 exalted creature, swing for 4 on turn 2. Another gem is turn 1 hierarch into turn 2 geist with exalted. Then of course there's the turn 1 dork into turn 2 knight into turn 3 kill. Even when the kill is out of reach due to the limited amount of damage it can inherently do I've often comboed off to get rid of the lands in my deck, float enough mana to company for absurd value, or play other creatures from my hand, and set up a board that's definitely winning the next turn. One of the problems with this deck that I encountered and learned from was figuring out when to mulligan. If I draw into a decent 7 with lands and spells but nothing really powerful going on, I feel pretty confident in going to 6 to try to set something like the above situations up and I'm regularly rewarded for it.
I think this version of of the deck is just able to do more inherently powerful things then the bant versions of the deck, the control shells, or the combo shells. It's zoo enough that it's beating all the fair decks, but combo enough to give us game against the unfair decks. That's been my experience anyway.
Liege is a very powerful card and works with all of my creatures (including geist of saint traft because the angel gets the boost too). With previous versions i was really weak to midrange/liliana decks but voice and liege are a nightmare to liliana players.
Pridemage, paths and my 2x scavenging oozes are often enough interaction vs the unfair decks. Voice is very powerful vs the blue decks and maindeck pridemage is sweet to have against affinity and twin, although i'll admit the cat is a bolt magnet vs twin.
@Henry009dom: maybe you could post your list, there are a lot of ways to build the deck, so i think you could tweak your list according to your meta. I built the little kid one because i don'T have goyf, and even then goyf isn't used to its full potential in this deck in my opinion. Goyf is weak to the same things knight is weak to, graveyard hate and non bolt removal, so diversifying your threats's weaknesses seems like a good idea.
Obviously the mana base needs some work. Verdant Catacombs --> Misty Rainforest, 1x Temple Garden --> Kessig Wolf Run. I'm also not sure that the deck can support 3 colorless lands. Not sure if I should cut Ghost Quarter or Gavony. Leaning towards GQ. I can't remember my matches too clearly, but I'll briefly summarize them.
Match 1 vs Jund Burn: Win 2-1
Lost the roll. Identified his deck right away. Fetched for basics, got blockers down for his Guides, etc. All that wasn't enough. I stabilized the board at probably 6 life, and then died to burn to the face. Boarded in Kitchen Finks, BFTs, Thalias, Eidolon. Don't think I brought in the EE. Game 2 I cant really remember very well. I think I accelerated out a turn 2 Geist and outraced him from there. Game 3 he kept a 1 lander. I went turn 1 Forge Tender, Turn 2 Thalia, and he never drew a 2nd land. Killed him easily from there.
Match 2 vs Merfolk: Loss 0-2
Lost the roll. He started off very slowly for a merfolk deck. No Aether Vial. I had no acceleration either and went T2 Voice into T3 Smiter. He Spreading Seas my dual to give his guys islandwalk after playing the merfolk that lets him draw a card a couple times, and was able to islandwalk with lords while chumping my guys to win the race. Boarded in Chokes, Stonys, EE. Game 2 I started with a T2 Stony Silence which shut off his Aether Vial. But he Rest in Peaceed my GY to shut off my Voice/Knights. I flooded out a little bit this game and wasn't able to muster much resistance. Also made the mistake of not GQing my dual which he had a Spreading Seas on.
Match 3 vs Grixis Twin: Win 2-0
Lost the roll. Started with T1 dork into T2 Smiter, effectively timewalking his 2nd turn. He was forced to take a Knight of the Reliquary out of my hand with an IoK, and I had an early Path to Exile which I left open mana for every turn. He couldn't combo off in the face of the PtE, and stalled for time tapping down my attackers with Cryptics and Exarchs, but I grinded him out of cards and won easily. Boarded in Burrentons, Chokes, Thalias. Game 2 played out very similarly to Game 1. He saw from an Inquisition that I could drop the combo every turn, but I just slowly beat him down with Qasali/Smiter while leaving mana open to Path/Qasali his threats and he died to the pressure.
Match 4 vs UWR Control: Win 2-0
Won the roll. Accelerated into a T2 Smiter. And then a T3 Retreat. I was patient with my resources. He was forced to Path my threats one at a time (which allowed me to scry with Retreat), and eventually I landed a Geist which ran away with the game quickly. Retreat was able to smooth out my draw steps quite nicely. Boarded in BFTs, Eidolon, Thalia. Game 2 we both kept 7. I can't remember my hand too much, but I basically executed the same gameplan as the game before, and he stalled at 3 lands and couldn't find a 2nd white source for his Supreme Verdict and died quickly.
I never comboed off once in the tournament. I lacked a KWR to do so, which I'll fix ASAP. I felt very favored vs the control decks. I've jammed a lot of games vs my friends stock UR Twin list, and I think that its at least a 60-40 matchup for my build of Knightfall. Merfolk I felt pretty helpless against. Short of an early combo, I'm not too sure how we handle that deck. I was impressed with Geists/Smiters in the deck. The Scoozes seemed underwhelming. I'll need to jam more matches before I decide on any cuts to the deck though. Collected Company never failed to find 2 creatures, all of them were good that night.
I haven't posted my list because I don't have a definitive one yet. I was jamming a creature Bant version with no CoCo, but it didn't perform for me, so I decided to go for the 4c zoo version that MantisRider posted. We will see how this one goes, and I will post a list when I get close to a decent iteration.
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-Currently playing:
Modern Project AnafenzaBGW
Modern KnightfallGRUW
Recently bought 4x tarmogoyf. Considering what to play next.
-Proud Selesnyan Guildmage and Dromoka's Follower.
In addition to aggro matches like burn and zoo, I've found Rhox War monk from the SB to help in a few mid-rangey battles (jund, merfolk) with exalted and kessig wolf run. In my experience it's better here than kitchen finks.
Kessig wolf run replaces gavony as we can't afford too many colourless lands. Most situations where gavony will win eventually, kessig will win shortly.
edit: Out of curiosity, what are you boarding out for Thalia - a retreat and a company?
I ran my same list (see sig) and this time went 2-2 at FNM. Lost round 1 to RDW. Without my sideboard, it is very hard as I need Finks. After SBing, I still didn't see Spellskite or GW Command, and died to a flurry of burn.
Rounds 2 and 3 I beat a graveyard combo deck and a sun titan control deck. Basically disrupted them with Pridemage and then comboed them out. I'm getting better at using Retreat to screw with combat, and got to hit with Geist despite lots of blockers by careful use of landfall and eventually Gavony Township.
Last match was against Scapeshift and it was a total beating. I have no way to stop him other than sticking a sideboarded Aven Mindcensor, but they can easily deal with it. Spellskite just made him wait another turn for more lands in play. I'm going to need a better game plan, but am hesitant to devote more SB cards to it.
Would Bounding Krasis make more sense here for the beat-down plan? The resilience to bolt might be the salient feature here, but something to consider. Interesting hybrid imo.
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Modern Decks
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
The problem I see going that direction is, that without deck manipulation you are as likely to draw the combo, as you are to draw both twin and retreat without any of the other combo pieces, making them pretty much a dead card. I personally think that this is trying to go on too many directions, I would rather add the retreat combo to a Kiki-Chord strategy if you want to have both.
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-Currently playing:
Modern Project AnafenzaBGW
Modern KnightfallGRUW
Recently bought 4x tarmogoyf. Considering what to play next.
-Proud Selesnyan Guildmage and Dromoka's Follower.
As much as i like mashing the two combos together, man the mana seems rough! You need g/w for knights, u/w for geists and double red for twin... That could lead to very awkward situations! If you want to go that route i strongly advise you to x4 your birds and cut the dryad arbor and sejiri steppe, you want to minimize single color lands.
Speaking of sejiri steppe, it has been kind of a liability. The card feel very bad to have in your starting hand and most of the times i use it to punch through blockers. I'm considering swapping township for kessig wolf run and turning sejiri steppe into sacred foundry.
Another thing i noticed is drawing multiple retreat to coralhelm is annoying. Fortunately they stack but it still feels like a bad draw when you already have one in play. Do you guys think i could get away with only 3x, considering 4x serum visions? What is your experience with running 3x retreat or running 4x and drawing multiple retreat in a game? I'd probably add a single detention sphere instead of the 4th retreat, i side in that card all the time because it is so great.
My testing has been mainly in regards to consistency vs numbers. I think 3x Retreat is fine, but should go along Serum Visions. Ive been tinkering with a Tarmogoyf list also running Commune with the Gods as an enabler. Even though its SLOW (it is), its as if this card had been designed for this deck! Its shoe-on. It also helps digging for Retreat, and grow both Goyfs and KotR. It fits your idea of a MB Sphere. If splashing for red, another (cute?) card to consider could be Chained to the rocks... But yeah, although it synergize well, it seems to have bigger downsides than up. Anyway, keep brewing!
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MODERN Blue Lantern, UBx Tezzerator. OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
Good points. Instead of splashing red i decided to just put a rogue's passage in the board for when it matters. I'm now on 2 commune and 4 visions, should be enough digging for 3 retreat to be ok.
I have been a long time Bant Company player (well as long as Collected Company has been a card at least), and I am planning to give this combo thing another shot. I tried it when it was first revealed, but found that in my Jund heavy meta, it ended up just being a worse version of my standard Bant Company deck because I was never really able to combo without putting more effort into it than I would have needed to win with my standard beatdown plan anyways.
Now that the meta in my area has started shifting, I think that this combo is positioned to perform well for me.
Is there a consensus on what version of the deck is best? Or are people still playing various versions?
This is the list I plan to start with and slowly tune until I find it acceptable. Let me know what you guys think. Not sure if CoCo is correct with the number of creatures I run, but I mainly want it for a way to dig for Knight, even if I don't hit a second creature, the selection still feels worth it to me for now. I might move to a midrange version with a couple chords and no CoCo though. Was unsure of goyf here as well, I found that Voice of Resurgence was often a better defualt 2-drop in my Company deck due to the limited card types I played, but it might be more relevant here, so I might try to fit them in as well.
As much as i like mashing the two combos together, man the mana seems rough! You need g/w for knights, u/w for geists and double red for twin... That could lead to very awkward situations! If you want to go that route i strongly advise you to x4 your birds and cut the dryad arbor and sejiri steppe, you want to minimize single color lands.
Speaking of sejiri steppe, it has been kind of a liability. The card feel very bad to have in your starting hand and most of the times i use it to punch through blockers. I'm considering swapping township for kessig wolf run and turning sejiri steppe into sacred foundry.
Another thing i noticed is drawing multiple retreat to coralhelm is annoying. Fortunately they stack but it still feels like a bad draw when you already have one in play. Do you guys think i could get away with only 3x, considering 4x serum visions? What is your experience with running 3x retreat or running 4x and drawing multiple retreat in a game? I'd probably add a single detention sphere instead of the 4th retreat, i side in that card all the time because it is so great.
I agree on Sejiri Steppe. After 3 FNMs (12 rounds) of play, I have never used it to protect the combo. They kill Knight before you untap, or not at all. And it has screwed me twice when I've drawn it naturally.
I wouldn't cut Township, as it allows you to win off just mana dorks, and doesn't expose you to the removal that Wolf Run risks when you pump all your mana into one creature. If you are comboing, tapping all blockers and getting lethal power has never been a problem for me without Wolf Run.
When drawing multiple retreats, I've had mixed situations. It is great when you are trying to force damage through or hold off attackers with a fetchland. It also goes nuts on mana generation when you have a mana dork out to untap with the triggers. Repeated scry is also good.
But without a land in hand, it does nothing to affect the board immediately. I think 4 is the right number, because it maximizes our turn 3 three kill potentially and is rarely dead. The main thing I need to keep in mind is to not play out my last land, or even last 2 lands, as the curve is low and the effect of landfall can be critical.
Today I went 3-1 with almost the same list as MantisRider. I found that sejiri steppe is even good in the beatdown plan making unblockable a huge reliquary or just forcing the oponent to play in a weird way. It helped me win two games by simply making my 5/5 and 6/6 reliquary unblockable. So I will keep it, at least for now.
I also loved the surprise effect you get when people think you are playing just a naya company deck and then game 2 a T2 geist with exalted runs away with it in a couple of swings. I only comboed once and it felt a bit overkill to me, but it's great to be able to just win in some spots, not leaving the oponent the chance to grind us out of the game.
If you want a list I will post it later.
I do think that the deck is still weak to really fast uninteractive decks; from burn to tron. But in general the Blue splash helps those matchups with meddling mage and counters from the sb.
So in general: I prefer this deck in a more interactive "fair" meta, but I would rather be playing Project Anafenza if fast unfar decks are the norm.
One last thing; as many of you have pointed out before, holding onto a land or two when you have enough mana to play is definitely the best thing to do because you want as many trigers as you can get, also there is a lot of value in just playing the fetchlands and not cracking them to be able to have trigers on their turn for untaping blockers or tapping attackers.
There is going to be a huge Modern tournament here in Madrid this December and I'm still trying to decide wich deck I'm going to be playing. I'll keep you updated.
In addition to aggro matches like burn and zoo, I've found Rhox War monk from the SB to help in a few mid-rangey battles (jund, merfolk) with exalted and kessig wolf run. In my experience it's better here than kitchen finks.
Kessig wolf run replaces gavony as we can't afford too many colourless lands. Most situations where gavony will win eventually, kessig will win shortly.
edit: Out of curiosity, what are you boarding out for Thalia - a retreat and a company?
I do have a playset of Rhox War Monk. Maybe I'll swap my Finks for them in the sideboard. I'm just worried about them not having a quick enough impact on the game, as I run 0 Dromoka's Command in my 75. They do play around Anger of the Gods better than Finks, which I like.
Against burn, I'll side out some number of Retreats for Thalia. I probably should side out a CoCo or two, but I didn't in my last match. Against control decks, I keep both Retreat and CoCo in my deck, and remove my least powerful creatures in the match-up instead. Reason being that I like to hold onto CoCos until I've run them out of counterspells, and then capitalize by out valuing them. It's risky since you can get blown out by a dispel and lose a lot of tempo, but sometimes I'll intentionally run out a CoCo end-step to get countered and tap them out, and then main phase a second one to get a lot of board presence. Retreat lets me draw into gas a lot more frequently if both decks are low on resources, which is important, since a control deck will eventually out topdeck us.
I also like to go from 8 to 6 dorks against control decks, to minimize the impact that their Wraths have on me, and so I can draw more impactful cards. Accelerating into a T3 kill seems less viable against a control deck at any rate.
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Decks
Modern -
GWU Eldrazi
GU Infect
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That is not how proactive curves work.
You place the things you would always like to play on turn 1 in the "on curve" one drop spot. Cards like lightning bolt and path to exile do not count as 1 drops.
The turn 1 play slot for Jund is typically (or close, sometimes different numbers of manlands and sometimes 3 TS).
3 x raging ravine
2 x treetop village
2 x thoughtseize
4 x inquisition of kozilek
Jund will almost never bolt to the face turn 1, and almost never bolt a creature turn 1 unless they are on the draw or they're playing against burn in game 2 or something. Very rare jund taps a land for bolt on turn 1, so it's not really a 1 drop. It's a spell that costs 1 mana, so that factors into how many lands you play, but it doesn't talk about your curve gameplan.
Keep on trucking with it, but watch for how often you have awkward games because of the awkward curve (and even more clunky manabase). Watch how often you would like to just fetch a basic to keep from getting burnt out but you can't, for example, because you're counting on your hierarch for blue.
Running lots of 1 mana counterspells does help the t2/t3 curve, but hierarchs also conflict with that. A lot of times you're going to have to debate: Do I run out a hierarch or do I keep up spell snare/pierce?
I seriously wish you guys luck, just also lots of caution There has never been a successful modern deck that had that much conflict at 1 that I can think of. The only deck that I can think of that's played hierarchs and visions is Infect (and you know why that is...most of their spells cost 0-1 mana, and hierarch's exalted is twice as good in infect).
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
The deck never feels like it is doing anything powerfull, by this a mean that most lines of play that we can take with it (even the combo) is not impressive in this format. I shall explain:
-Our main beaters: Geist and Knight have very clear weakneses, one to almost any creature, and the other to GY disruption. So both basically fold to SCooze. That in itself souldn't be the greatest of concerns but specifically in my meta SCooze is real big. Also, lingering souls buys an insane amount of time against us (unless we have the 1x kessig in play or the combo). Let's do some calculations: with a mana dork, a T2 Knight is possible, but we need another turn to be able to fetch the kessig, and yet another turn to be able to atack with it, assuming we were luky enough to play it T2. Geist just can't attack into souls unless we have an exalted creature on the board. So being reasonably luky, we can't start pressuring the oponent untill t4. In a "T4 format" that seems underpowered.
Souls is just an example by the way, any kind of resilient creature works (finks, voice, Young pyro, even snappy can be anoying to atack into)
-The combo is not that impressive either: I haven't calculated this for every single version of the deck but we can do aproximately from 22 to 28 damage per knight when comboing off, wich means that if the oponent manages somehow to get over 25ish life we already have to think about getting another knight online before we can even start the combo. Of course we could kill them in two swings but lets be realistic, when we go off we deal a lot of damage to ourselves (at least 9 out of fetchlands), so is unlikely to be at a high enogh life to survive the following turn. And that is if our oponent is not playing any kind of unfair deck and doesn't just twins us.
-We pack very litle to almost no interaction (in the company versions): In theory we can use the tap ability on retreat to manage the oposing board but this is just not realistic. I haven tried the more controlling versions so I can't say anything about those. And with this litle interaction the deck is a real underdog against any unfair deck, yes we have a t3 combo kill, but that hand is just not reliable enough.
Example: If let's say Abzan company, goes to a million life wich you could say is a powerfull play, there are a lot of decks that can still win against them no problem (tron, twin, lantern, infect and affinity, among others) we can't deal with that neither though interaction nor with the combo.
Maybe this matchup is just bad, and there are other matchups better for the deck, but if so, wich are those matchups? Not the unfair/combo decks like infect, twin, Abzan company, tron. Not the midrange controlish decks like jund/junk, tokens or grixis, though maybe grixis may not be so bad due to their lack of enchant removal and reliable blockers. Burn and affinity are mostly a sideboard matchup anyways, So what is left? Other low interaction aggro decks, and that is pretty much it. I might be wrong though. If so please tell me and explain to me why if you are so kind ^^.
This all takes me to my second concern: Is there a viable way to play the bant or zoo version of this deck without tarmogoyf? I'm talking about those two specifically because those are the ones making the best results apparently.
-Big old goyf seems to be the only card that would help us pressure the oponent but we dont even have that much ways to grow it, so I'm not completely sure it would fix the problem.
Other 2cmc creatures are just weak:
-Qasali is not bad but a 2/2 for 2 mana that most times doesnt have a relevent abbility is not really that impressive. Many times is just a bad Watchwolf.
-Voice is fine, but on itself can't pressure lifetotals, makes oponents interaction weak, but that is it.
-And SCooze has a similar problem to goyf but magnified by our litle interaction.
I don't want to be that guy who only criticises a deck without saying something constructive, but I haven't had good results since I built the deck and I wanted to ask for your help. Maybe I'm just a bad pilot or I'm having bad luck. But I haven't played a single game where I felt I was favoured to win. I did win some games, but those were just because of bad hands or bad draws from the oponent. And the (very few) times when I assembled the combo, it allways felt like I was going to win the game anyways.
So I would love to hear your opinions to see what am I doing wrong. Maybe it's just that this is not the best deck for me. Thank you, and sorry for the long post.
Modern Project AnafenzaBGW
Modern KnightfallGRUW
Recently bought 4x tarmogoyf. Considering what to play next.
-Proud Selesnyan Guildmage and Dromoka's Follower.
-Level 1 Judge
Lets handle the matchups first. At least for my own zoo brew I can confidently say that Infect, Twin, Jund/Junk, grixis, pretty much all manner of control are awesome matchups. Then Abzan Company, Tron, and amulet bloom are our 50/50 matchups where my sideboard at least often wins games 2 and 3. In my experience our only truly terrible matchups are bogles, and scapeshift. I regularly take down fnm going 4-0 or 3-1 losing almost exclusively to those two decks. With that said, I think the version of zoo with the combo is the most viable version of the combo because it slots directly into an already competitive deck with some excellent matchups, 4 color zoo, and suddenly adds a way to win underneath the decks zoo traditionally struggles with. And with that said, the enchantment isn't a dead card outside the combo, I regularly win by tapping down blockers to finish them off. I've not been shy about saying that I believe my version of the deck is the most competitive version, though there are adjustments I would make in the main depending on the meta I'm entering. That brings me to the tarmogoyf question.
Tarmogoyf is an excellent card, but you're correct in realizing that it simply isn't broken in our deck like it is in jund/junk decks. The turn one discard spell into turn 2 massive goyf is simply not something we can do here. About two thirds of the time in my experience when he comes down on turn 2 he's less impactful on the board than a voice of resurgence, scooze, or a pridemage, especially in my meta. With that said, he's excellent late game when graveyards are bound to be full of card types so I've determined that 2 is the correct amount for me. I'm currently looking to get another tarmogoyf, as I only have 1 at the moment. With that said I ran the deck for the past few months with no tarmogoyfs and just voices and still won just as much. I can understand why you might underestimate voice, but in the very worst situation possible, him getting pathed on the mainphase of your opponents turn, you're still accelerating to 4 mana out of the deal which in my deck with elspeth and collect company is very strong. Even him getting removed by normal removal is usually still pretty ok, he replaces himself immediately with a creature that will generally have better stats than him all the while getting a piece of removal out of the way.
Qasali Pridemage is an excellent card in a deck with Geist, having him with any sort of exalted totally breaks that card, and I would argue that he's always far better than a watchwolf, as he sometimes packs a relevant ability and can help beef up your dudes. Do not underestimate exalted, on of the best mechanics in the last 10 years in my opinion.
Our interaction is a little on the low side, but 7 pieces of removal seems to be the minimum sweet spot with this deck, I always have an answer when I need it, and all the thinning from fetches and knight of the reliquaries makes up for the creature count being on the lower side when it comes to collect company.
I'd say play with the deck more, get to know all the little interactions. I rarely feel unfavored with this deck, it has a lot of inherently strong plays, bordering on broken. I love turn 1 nacatl into turn 2 exalted creature, swing for 4 on turn 2. Another gem is turn 1 hierarch into turn 2 geist with exalted. Then of course there's the turn 1 dork into turn 2 knight into turn 3 kill. Even when the kill is out of reach due to the limited amount of damage it can inherently do I've often comboed off to get rid of the lands in my deck, float enough mana to company for absurd value, or play other creatures from my hand, and set up a board that's definitely winning the next turn. One of the problems with this deck that I encountered and learned from was figuring out when to mulligan. If I draw into a decent 7 with lands and spells but nothing really powerful going on, I feel pretty confident in going to 6 to try to set something like the above situations up and I'm regularly rewarded for it.
I think this version of of the deck is just able to do more inherently powerful things then the bant versions of the deck, the control shells, or the combo shells. It's zoo enough that it's beating all the fair decks, but combo enough to give us game against the unfair decks. That's been my experience anyway.
~Modern~
BGURWhiteless Death's ShadowRUGB
GWRUSaheeli BlinkURWG
RGBUGood Ole' DredgeUBGR
~Commander~
URWNarset, Enlightened Time-TravelerWRU
UBRWBreya, Etherium ArchitectWRBU
A Prolific Loser To Blood Moon
Liege is a very powerful card and works with all of my creatures (including geist of saint traft because the angel gets the boost too). With previous versions i was really weak to midrange/liliana decks but voice and liege are a nightmare to liliana players.
Pridemage, paths and my 2x scavenging oozes are often enough interaction vs the unfair decks. Voice is very powerful vs the blue decks and maindeck pridemage is sweet to have against affinity and twin, although i'll admit the cat is a bolt magnet vs twin.
@Henry009dom: maybe you could post your list, there are a lot of ways to build the deck, so i think you could tweak your list according to your meta. I built the little kid one because i don'T have goyf, and even then goyf isn't used to its full potential in this deck in my opinion. Goyf is weak to the same things knight is weak to, graveyard hate and non bolt removal, so diversifying your threats's weaknesses seems like a good idea.
4x Windswept Heath
2x Misty Rainforest
2x Verdant Catacombs
1x Flooded Strand
3x Temple Garden
1x Breeding Pool
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Stomping Ground
3x Forest
2x Plains
1x Gavony Township
1x Ghost Quarter
4x Noble Hierarch
4x Birds of Paradise
2x Scavenging Ooze
2x Qasali Pridemage
3x Voice of Resurgence
4x Knight of the Reliquary
3x Loxodon Smiter
3x Geist of Saint Traft
1x Eternal Witness
4x Path to Exile
4x Collected Company
4x Retreat to Coralhelm
2x Stony Silence
2x Kataki, Wars Wage
2x Choke
1x Engineered Explosives
2x Burrenton Forge Tender
1x Eidolon of Rhetoric
2x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2x Kitchen Finks
1x Aven Mindcensor
Obviously the mana base needs some work. Verdant Catacombs --> Misty Rainforest, 1x Temple Garden --> Kessig Wolf Run. I'm also not sure that the deck can support 3 colorless lands. Not sure if I should cut Ghost Quarter or Gavony. Leaning towards GQ. I can't remember my matches too clearly, but I'll briefly summarize them.
Match 1 vs Jund Burn: Win 2-1
Lost the roll. Identified his deck right away. Fetched for basics, got blockers down for his Guides, etc. All that wasn't enough. I stabilized the board at probably 6 life, and then died to burn to the face. Boarded in Kitchen Finks, BFTs, Thalias, Eidolon. Don't think I brought in the EE. Game 2 I cant really remember very well. I think I accelerated out a turn 2 Geist and outraced him from there. Game 3 he kept a 1 lander. I went turn 1 Forge Tender, Turn 2 Thalia, and he never drew a 2nd land. Killed him easily from there.
Match 2 vs Merfolk: Loss 0-2
Lost the roll. He started off very slowly for a merfolk deck. No Aether Vial. I had no acceleration either and went T2 Voice into T3 Smiter. He Spreading Seas my dual to give his guys islandwalk after playing the merfolk that lets him draw a card a couple times, and was able to islandwalk with lords while chumping my guys to win the race. Boarded in Chokes, Stonys, EE. Game 2 I started with a T2 Stony Silence which shut off his Aether Vial. But he Rest in Peaceed my GY to shut off my Voice/Knights. I flooded out a little bit this game and wasn't able to muster much resistance. Also made the mistake of not GQing my dual which he had a Spreading Seas on.
Match 3 vs Grixis Twin: Win 2-0
Lost the roll. Started with T1 dork into T2 Smiter, effectively timewalking his 2nd turn. He was forced to take a Knight of the Reliquary out of my hand with an IoK, and I had an early Path to Exile which I left open mana for every turn. He couldn't combo off in the face of the PtE, and stalled for time tapping down my attackers with Cryptics and Exarchs, but I grinded him out of cards and won easily. Boarded in Burrentons, Chokes, Thalias. Game 2 played out very similarly to Game 1. He saw from an Inquisition that I could drop the combo every turn, but I just slowly beat him down with Qasali/Smiter while leaving mana open to Path/Qasali his threats and he died to the pressure.
Match 4 vs UWR Control: Win 2-0
Won the roll. Accelerated into a T2 Smiter. And then a T3 Retreat. I was patient with my resources. He was forced to Path my threats one at a time (which allowed me to scry with Retreat), and eventually I landed a Geist which ran away with the game quickly. Retreat was able to smooth out my draw steps quite nicely. Boarded in BFTs, Eidolon, Thalia. Game 2 we both kept 7. I can't remember my hand too much, but I basically executed the same gameplan as the game before, and he stalled at 3 lands and couldn't find a 2nd white source for his Supreme Verdict and died quickly.
I never comboed off once in the tournament. I lacked a KWR to do so, which I'll fix ASAP. I felt very favored vs the control decks. I've jammed a lot of games vs my friends stock UR Twin list, and I think that its at least a 60-40 matchup for my build of Knightfall. Merfolk I felt pretty helpless against. Short of an early combo, I'm not too sure how we handle that deck. I was impressed with Geists/Smiters in the deck. The Scoozes seemed underwhelming. I'll need to jam more matches before I decide on any cuts to the deck though. Collected Company never failed to find 2 creatures, all of them were good that night.
Let me know your thoughts guys.
Modern -
Modern Project AnafenzaBGW
Modern KnightfallGRUW
Recently bought 4x tarmogoyf. Considering what to play next.
-Proud Selesnyan Guildmage and Dromoka's Follower.
-Level 1 Judge
In addition to aggro matches like burn and zoo, I've found Rhox War monk from the SB to help in a few mid-rangey battles (jund, merfolk) with exalted and kessig wolf run. In my experience it's better here than kitchen finks.
Kessig wolf run replaces gavony as we can't afford too many colourless lands. Most situations where gavony will win eventually, kessig will win shortly.
edit: Out of curiosity, what are you boarding out for Thalia - a retreat and a company?
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
Rounds 2 and 3 I beat a graveyard combo deck and a sun titan control deck. Basically disrupted them with Pridemage and then comboed them out. I'm getting better at using Retreat to screw with combat, and got to hit with Geist despite lots of blockers by careful use of landfall and eventually Gavony Township.
Last match was against Scapeshift and it was a total beating. I have no way to stop him other than sticking a sideboarded Aven Mindcensor, but they can easily deal with it. Spellskite just made him wait another turn for more lands in play. I'm going to need a better game plan, but am hesitant to devote more SB cards to it.
Check out Odds//Ends - My articles on Quirky Cards and Oddball Builds
Long-time PucaTrade member and sometime author. Send me cards!
Currently playing Knight of the Reliquary - Retreat to Coralhelm Combo
1x Breeding Pool
1x Dryad Arbor
2x Flooded Strand
2x Forest
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Kessig Wolf Run
1x Mountain
1x Plains
1x Sacred Foundry
1x Sejiri Steppe
2x Stomping Ground
1x Temple Garden
4x Windswept Heath
4x Wooded Foothills
2x Birds of Paradise
3x Deceiver Exarch
3x Geist of Saint Traft
4x Knight of the Reliquary
4x Noble Hierarch
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Wild Nacatl
Instant (7)
4x Lightning Bolt
3x Path to Exile
Enchantment (5)
3x Retreat to Coralhelm
3x Splinter Twin
1x Bojuka Bog
2x Dromoka's Command
2x Kataki, War's Wage
3x Negate
1x Pithing Needle
2x Stony Silence
2x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2x Wheel of Sun and Moon
Current Decks
Standard : WB Orzhov Vampires BW GUB Sultai Constrictor BUG
Brawl : GB Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons BG
Modern : GB Golgari Elves BG GR Atarka Goblins RG
Pauper : W Heroic W GB Delve BG
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
Current Decks
Standard : WB Orzhov Vampires BW GUB Sultai Constrictor BUG
Brawl : GB Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons BG
Modern : GB Golgari Elves BG GR Atarka Goblins RG
Pauper : W Heroic W GB Delve BG
Modern Project AnafenzaBGW
Modern KnightfallGRUW
Recently bought 4x tarmogoyf. Considering what to play next.
-Proud Selesnyan Guildmage and Dromoka's Follower.
-Level 1 Judge
Speaking of sejiri steppe, it has been kind of a liability. The card feel very bad to have in your starting hand and most of the times i use it to punch through blockers. I'm considering swapping township for kessig wolf run and turning sejiri steppe into sacred foundry.
Another thing i noticed is drawing multiple retreat to coralhelm is annoying. Fortunately they stack but it still feels like a bad draw when you already have one in play. Do you guys think i could get away with only 3x, considering 4x serum visions? What is your experience with running 3x retreat or running 4x and drawing multiple retreat in a game? I'd probably add a single detention sphere instead of the 4th retreat, i side in that card all the time because it is so great.
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
4 noble hierarch
2 birds of paradise
4 qasali pridemage
4 voice of resurgence
4 knight of the reliquary
2 geist of saint traft
4 wilt-leaf liege
instants 4
4 path to exile
sorceries 6
4 serum visions
2 commune with the gods
enchantments 4
3 retreat to coralhelm
1 detention sphere
4 windswept heath
4 flooded strand
2 breeding pool
2 hallowed fountain
1 temple garden
3 forest
2 plains
2 ghost quarter
1 gavony township
1 sejiri steppe
2 kitchen finks
2 aven mindcensor
2 scavenging ooze
2 dryad militant
2 stony silence
3 dispel
1 rogue's passage
1 detention sphere
Now that the meta in my area has started shifting, I think that this combo is positioned to perform well for me.
Is there a consensus on what version of the deck is best? Or are people still playing various versions?
This is the list I plan to start with and slowly tune until I find it acceptable. Let me know what you guys think. Not sure if CoCo is correct with the number of creatures I run, but I mainly want it for a way to dig for Knight, even if I don't hit a second creature, the selection still feels worth it to me for now. I might move to a midrange version with a couple chords and no CoCo though. Was unsure of goyf here as well, I found that Voice of Resurgence was often a better defualt 2-drop in my Company deck due to the limited card types I played, but it might be more relevant here, so I might try to fit them in as well.
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Birds of Paradise
4 Voice of Resurgence
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavening Ooze
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Geist of Saint Traft
2 Courser of Kruphix
Non Creature 13
4 Path to Exile
4 Collected Company
4 Retreat to Coralhelm
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
Land 24
4 Windswept Heath
3 Misty Rainforest
2 Flooded Strand
2 Temple Garden
2 Breeding Pool
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Canopy Vista
2 Forest
2 Plains
1 Island
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Gavony Township
1 Sejiri Steppe
1 Horizon Canopy
2 Meddling Mage
3 Engineered Explosives
1 Kataki, War's Wage
2 Aven Mindcensor
1 Elspeth, Knight Errant
2 Dispel
2 Negate
2 Kitchen Finks
Modern : RGTitanshiftGR / UGWKnightfallWGU
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
I agree on Sejiri Steppe. After 3 FNMs (12 rounds) of play, I have never used it to protect the combo. They kill Knight before you untap, or not at all. And it has screwed me twice when I've drawn it naturally.
I wouldn't cut Township, as it allows you to win off just mana dorks, and doesn't expose you to the removal that Wolf Run risks when you pump all your mana into one creature. If you are comboing, tapping all blockers and getting lethal power has never been a problem for me without Wolf Run.
When drawing multiple retreats, I've had mixed situations. It is great when you are trying to force damage through or hold off attackers with a fetchland. It also goes nuts on mana generation when you have a mana dork out to untap with the triggers. Repeated scry is also good.
But without a land in hand, it does nothing to affect the board immediately. I think 4 is the right number, because it maximizes our turn 3 three kill potentially and is rarely dead. The main thing I need to keep in mind is to not play out my last land, or even last 2 lands, as the curve is low and the effect of landfall can be critical.
Check out Odds//Ends - My articles on Quirky Cards and Oddball Builds
Long-time PucaTrade member and sometime author. Send me cards!
Currently playing Knight of the Reliquary - Retreat to Coralhelm Combo
I also loved the surprise effect you get when people think you are playing just a naya company deck and then game 2 a T2 geist with exalted runs away with it in a couple of swings. I only comboed once and it felt a bit overkill to me, but it's great to be able to just win in some spots, not leaving the oponent the chance to grind us out of the game.
If you want a list I will post it later.
I do think that the deck is still weak to really fast uninteractive decks; from burn to tron. But in general the Blue splash helps those matchups with meddling mage and counters from the sb.
So in general: I prefer this deck in a more interactive "fair" meta, but I would rather be playing Project Anafenza if fast unfar decks are the norm.
One last thing; as many of you have pointed out before, holding onto a land or two when you have enough mana to play is definitely the best thing to do because you want as many trigers as you can get, also there is a lot of value in just playing the fetchlands and not cracking them to be able to have trigers on their turn for untaping blockers or tapping attackers.
There is going to be a huge Modern tournament here in Madrid this December and I'm still trying to decide wich deck I'm going to be playing. I'll keep you updated.
Modern Project AnafenzaBGW
Modern KnightfallGRUW
Recently bought 4x tarmogoyf. Considering what to play next.
-Proud Selesnyan Guildmage and Dromoka's Follower.
-Level 1 Judge
I do have a playset of Rhox War Monk. Maybe I'll swap my Finks for them in the sideboard. I'm just worried about them not having a quick enough impact on the game, as I run 0 Dromoka's Command in my 75. They do play around Anger of the Gods better than Finks, which I like.
Against burn, I'll side out some number of Retreats for Thalia. I probably should side out a CoCo or two, but I didn't in my last match. Against control decks, I keep both Retreat and CoCo in my deck, and remove my least powerful creatures in the match-up instead. Reason being that I like to hold onto CoCos until I've run them out of counterspells, and then capitalize by out valuing them. It's risky since you can get blown out by a dispel and lose a lot of tempo, but sometimes I'll intentionally run out a CoCo end-step to get countered and tap them out, and then main phase a second one to get a lot of board presence. Retreat lets me draw into gas a lot more frequently if both decks are low on resources, which is important, since a control deck will eventually out topdeck us.
I also like to go from 8 to 6 dorks against control decks, to minimize the impact that their Wraths have on me, and so I can draw more impactful cards. Accelerating into a T3 kill seems less viable against a control deck at any rate.
Modern -