For a good amount of time I have joked with my friends about the interaction between Goryo's Vengeance and Obzedat, Ghost Council, but last weekend when my friends and I missed day 2 at GP OKC in the last round of the day, myself and my friend actually sat down and began to brew up and test out proxied versions of this deck concept. Everyone knows Obzedat is Ghost Dad, but in my playgroup this naming convention somehow warped around to dubbing Griselbrand "the Grisel-father." I ultimately dont understand nor could I hope to guess how this happened, but through this "Father's Day" was born. Obviously taken to its logical conclusion, Baby Jace is the baby and Elesh Norn has now been dubbed "the Norn-Mother." Maybe Iona is the cool Aunt? Anyway. Decklist.
Ultimately, this is a reanimator deck with elements of combo, and control. The way it achieves this is with reanimating a bomb that puts you ahead while blanking your opponent's gameplan. The early and midgame of the deck rely entirely around the looting engines and Goryo's Vengeance.
In the deck, Goryo's Vengeance isn't just a reanimator spell. It is the most ridiculous and versatile Charm in the game. It does everything.
Effectively, here are its modes:
1) Put an Obzedat, Ghost Council into play. If it's your turn, keep him forever.
2) Fog a creature, draw a card then discard a card, then put a Jace, Telepath Unbound into play. (Likely this means flashing back Goryo's or Ideas unbound next turn)
3) Until the end of turn your opponents creatures get -2/-2, your creatures get +2/+2 and you get a 4/7 body with haste and vigilance for either attacking or blocking
4) Gain 7 life. Until the end of the turn you may pay 7 life to draw 7 cards. Occasionally this mode either forces a block or trades with an attacking creature as well.
5) Put an Iona into play to either ensure lethal or prevent lethal, but this is the least common mode.
This is why I call it a Goryo's Vengeance toolbox deck. Depending on your draws and correct looting, it plays well both ahead and while behind in order to control the pace of the game until you can just Unburial Rites a nonsense card into play permanently, assuming the game lasts that long.
The basic idea is to stack your graveyard and use Goryo's Vengeance to either net you a 5/5 hasting stabilization engine, a surprise double-Zealous-Persectution with a hasting 4/7 vigilance attached, a Draw 7-14, or a flash blocking planeswalker. If doing this doesnt win you the game outright, an Unburial rites on Iona, Griselbrand, or Elesh Norn seals most games up.
We were worried in original builds that the deck would fold to aggro but after a lot of affinity and elves testing, we've found that it doesnt. You'll get stomped if they can rush out a double lord effect quickly or Steel Overseer gets the team over the Norn effect before she peaks her head out of the graveyard, but Flash Norn, Jace, and Lingering Souls with the 4 removal spells and remands keep the early game from getting out of hand most of the time. However, in the post board you get to run a wrath package to solve the boards that Norn cant.
This is about the fourth version of the deck. The first versions ran no scry lands, Thought Scours, Esper Charm, Forbidden Alchemy, and less removal in the main. What we found was that Thoughtscour didn't bin anything with consistency and often pitched cards we wanted, and Forbidden Alchemy almost never flashed back. I then brought up Ideas Unbound, as it was a 2 mana version of 2 Esper charm modes (we were running it to be able to mind rot ourselves if need be or just draw cards), we cut the scours and charms, ran 4 Ideas Unbound to tear through the deck and get dudes in the yard, and since we had no real turn 1 plays, added in the scry lands. The Alchemy's got cut for the full playset of Jaces as we wanted more looting and found him to be an exceptionally good Goryo's target. The scry lands and jaces have actually tested very well so far, but we aren't 100% sold on all aspects of the build yet.
The sideboard in particular is very tentative but we haven't tested against the entire field so we arent sure what matchups need the most help. So far the deck has been very fun and powerful, so we wanted to share it.
The general gameplan is aggressive looting and handsculpting with turn 2 Jace or Ideas Unbound to set up for a Goryo's > Obzedat Ghost Council/Griselbrand early, or at least a turn 4 unburial Rites/Gifts lockout. When the proactive plan stumbles you have remands, Lingering Souls, and Elesh Norns to pitch > Goryo's to keep boards clear and make value trades with her or souls tokens.
My friend and I'd be happy to hear any input, criticism, or ideas to further push this idea.
I remember reading on The Meadery that Jeff Hoogland built a deck similar to yours that also runs the Jace VP-Goryo's-Obzedat engine. By any chance, have you tested with him before?
I havent. Its funny though, when we showed the deck to our playgroup that night one of them was watching hoogland stream the deck and sent us a decklist. He was running lots of spot discard and lilis. There were some eerie similarities like 4x Jace, 3x Obzedat, 3/1 Split on path and murderous cut, but some big differences like only 1 Norn and Iona only in the side, as well as him running MB wraths and no Griselbrand. One of the biggest differences in the deck was our inclusion of Ideas Unbound as well as the 3 Norns to allow an early "wrath" use of a Norn without excluding the possibility of a Rites Norn later in the game.
As far as cutting Ideas Unbound, it's a massive enabler for the deck, and while we have thougth about running Lili's they just arent for the same task. We have 9+ish creatures that need to make it to the grave and fast. Ideas puts them there while finding reanimation spells.
I've played both Hoogland's list and this and I just have to say...
This list is hot.
Like really really ******* hot.
I'm looking for an excuse to play Snapcaster Mage to play well with Gifts and to chain more Goryo's.
I agree with you on Idea Unbound, it's a must. It makes it so much better when you remember that you can splice Goryo's to it, dump the card, and still cast it from Jace. I love the card selection and top deck power it affords us. In the right hands, it basically reads "draw three". If we can make Gifts say "tutor for four cards", Ideas will also be great, and I can't imagine dropping it.
My only gripe is that Scavenging Ooze is really annoying.
Thanks! We are of the opinion that we are on to something with this. But yeah, Scooze is really annoying. We haven't tested it much in the last week but I think one of the major problems for the deck is having a plan through grave hate. We were considering 3 Geist of Saint Traft sideboard but I'm not sure if that would be more effective than simply running hate protection for the deck's game plan. Before we went to 4x Jace we had a 2x Split with Jace and Snap for some intermediate version. It might be right to get more snaps in there somehow, it's just unclear what to cut.
Any cards that felt weak in the main? I go back and forth on the remands (should they be cheeper/harder permission? The theory was to just have main board protection to ensure a reanimation spell sticks).
Remand and Lingering Souls feel exceptional in certain match ups and abysmal in others. I'm thinking about cutting to two each and having more spot removal and Snapcasters to test out. I'll be trying out Dismember and Slaughter Pact. Casting Slaughter Pact and then flashing it back somehow to kill two things for free and having a free swing seems great.
I also want to try out both Sudden Spoiling and Sudden Death to get around Scavenging Ooze and to be able to kill everything without a counter with Norn. Three mana is kind of meh though.
Sudden Spoiling in particular sounds spicy as hell. It may be right to run some number of Spell Snares in Remand slots as well to blunt crazy turn 2s (summer bloom, Goyf, Eidolon, etc) while also retaining answers to Remand/Leak on our reanimation targets.
I have a hard time cutting Souls because its one of my favorite cards in the game, but also because it never feels bad to pitch it to Ideas or a Jace loot. It's also nuts in the BGx matchup where I find we can take a pretty big hit to our first few turns from a Seize. That said you're right that 1/1 flyers don't feel great against stuff like Tron or Amulet.
I love the idea of this thread. As a possible inclusion, consider Esper Charm. In a pinch, it can let you discard something you want to reanimate, or draw you two, or stay as a mainboard hate for Rest in Peace, which I expect to make a comeback since Grishoalbrand was the breakout deck recently, and because we still see Dredge and Living End (and, of course, to hate out on Snapcasters when the deck can't afford to run Dryad Militant).
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As the proud owner of 4 foil Esper Charms, I love the card and think if there are spare slots for it it is a very powerful use of those slots. Original builds ran 2-ish but they got cut along the way for Ideas Unbound, which essentially does the first two modes at once, albeit sorcery speed. That said it very well could be a good include.
One big way to explore getting more cards into the deck is shaving lands. The deck may be able to afford cutting 1 or 2, potentially adding more scry lands (4 seems to be working well, who knows if 5 or 6 would overburden the mana though) in order to utilize more slots for business spells.
Chalice seems good as we are often worried about Path, but I just decided to play some combination of Thoughtseize and Inquisition. Hand attack is just better overall tools to attack combo decks, removal where Remand can't stop, counterspells, and slows down most plans to allow us to comfortably make a winning board state. I find counter spells to be generally poor in this format as much of Modern is centralized around creatures and removal.
In Legacy, there is much less spot removal in general and more counters to stop combo and control decks and allows for Goblin Guild to be powerful, whereas there are more removal cards being played to counter the creature heavy strategies. Even a majority of combo decks can be stopped by a single Path. With our strategy being creature heavy I'm focusing on having more hand attack and removal over counter spells as they are more utilitarian.
I'm running 2 Remand, 2 Lingering Souls, 3 Inquisition, 1 Thoughtseize. I'll test this out and see what changes.
Chalice seems good as we are often worried about Path, but I just decided to play some combination of Thoughtseize and Inquisition. Hand attack is just better overall tools to attack combo decks, removal where Remand can't stop, counterspells, and slows down most plans to allow us to comfortably make a winning board state. I find counter spells to be generally poor in this format as much of Modern is centralized around creatures and removal.
In Legacy, there is much less spot removal in general and more counters to stop combo and control decks and allows for Goblin Guild to be powerful, whereas there are more removal cards being played to counter the creature heavy strategies. Even a majority of combo decks can be stopped by a single Path. With our strategy being creature heavy I'm focusing on having more hand attack and removal over counter spells as they are more utilitarian.
I'm running 2 Remand, 2 Lingering Souls, 3 Inquisition, 1 Thoughtseize. I'll test this out and see what changes.
I'm liking the idea of spot discard a lot actually, as it gives us 1 drops and lets us be proactive about reanimation. using jace to flashback remand is also less than ideal. Self discarding off of seize is another possible applications since occasionally we don't want to wait until end of turn to discard off of ideas unbound, but thats fringe. I'm likely going to test that same split of discard but -4 remand instead of -2/-2. I'm a sucker for the value of discarding flashback and Norn plays very well with souls.
Thanks. The theory behind remand was that its protection and disruption that cantrips us toward gas, but in my experience I agree that it has been the weakest card in the 75. We have tons of library manipulation at the 2 drop slot and with Griselbrand and Gifts, so I'm inclined to believe that spot discard is just better for us than remand, with harder protection like dispel and negate coming out of the board (or just more discard?).
Mangara of Corondor is exactly the kind of card we are looking to abuse in this deck, so I think some number is definitely playable. Maybe some split main and side? The fact that it hits Graffdiggers Cage, Rest in Peace, Leyline of the Void, etc. alone makes it a very attractive include even if only in the sideboard.
EDIT: I just read your post and am currently at work, but I'm pretty excited about that card as tech. It might be reasonable to remove Terastodon and a Disenchant for 2 of them in the board at least. They serve as land hate since it is basically flash vindicate+ as well as removal for graveyard hosers and, while slow, are very easy for us to hard cast.
This is my most recent version, its a little less combo more control. I would like to think of this deck as a Esper control deck with the combo finish. It just grinds so hard.
Used to run some number of Mangara of Corondor in the list but cut them. They werent as efficient at removing threats as i initially thought. Really only good against the grindy decks and we can just grind better most of the time anyways. Blood Baron of Vizkopa is the man. The only deck i have had problems with is the Junk matchup, between the Decays and Paths we can hardly land a threat and with this guy that matchup isnt a problem. Souls + this guy is a tough time. Batterskull is great at grinding and the lifegain is great. With all the souls in the deck we can keep using him late game. Jund and Grixis matchups we dont bring in the Batterskull. Devour Flesh i wish i could play more. Bogles hates it, its really only awful against Affinity and Tokens. Gives us an out to an Emrakul from Tron. Disenchant is the most used SB card. Gets rid of Leyline (both W and B), RiP, Cage, as well as being good in the Affinity matchup and hits Blood Moon.
This deck really doesnt want to be "all in" on the combo. Grinding with efficient removal and threats that are hard to deal with is the way to go. The hand disruption is really important though the damage is huge. Inquisition hits Path/Dispel/Terminate/most threats. The 1 of fun of Forbidden Alchemy was a flex spot and i really wanted to run another card that digs and fills the yard. It can turn over 3 cards, sometimes a dude, and grab us a reanimation spell, puts souls in the grave, fuels Murderous Cut, or dump some extra lands to keep us from flooding.
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Active Modern Decks
U Tron GW Bogles RG Loam UR Blue Breach RBU Grixis Goryo BRU Grixis Delver GBR Jund GBW Junk
This is my most recent version, its a little less combo more control. I would like to think of this deck as a Esper control deck with the combo finish. It just grinds so hard.
Used to run some number of Mangara of Corondor in the list but cut them. They werent as efficient at removing threats as i initially thought. Really only good against the grindy decks and we can just grind better most of the time anyways. Blood Baron of Vizkopa is the man. The only deck i have had problems with is the Junk matchup, between the Decays and Paths we can hardly land a threat and with this guy that matchup isnt a problem. Souls + this guy is a tough time. Batterskull is great at grinding and the lifegain is great. With all the souls in the deck we can keep using him late game. Jund and Grixis matchups we dont bring in the Batterskull. Devour Flesh i wish i could play more. Bogles hates it, its really only awful against Affinity and Tokens. Gives us an out to an Emrakul from Tron. Disenchant is the most used SB card. Gets rid of Leyline (both W and B), RiP, Cage, as well as being good in the Affinity matchup and hits Blood Moon.
This deck really doesnt want to be "all in" on the combo. Grinding with efficient removal and threats that are hard to deal with is the way to go. The hand disruption is really important though the damage is huge. Inquisition hits Path/Dispel/Terminate/most threats. The 1 of fun of Forbidden Alchemy was a flex spot and i really wanted to run another card that digs and fills the yard. It can turn over 3 cards, sometimes a dude, and grab us a reanimation spell, puts souls in the grave, fuels Murderous Cut, or dump some extra lands to keep us from flooding.
Another possibility is cutting the Disfigure and Forbidden Alchemy for 2 Monastery Siege. Can loot every turn or protect our dudes, Burn has to take it into consideration if we put it on Dragons.
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U Tron GW Bogles RG Loam UR Blue Breach RBU Grixis Goryo BRU Grixis Delver GBR Jund GBW Junk
Monastery Siege is a card/idea that I love, but I haven't been able to play much magic at all much less test this deck in the past 1.5-2 months. I'm glad there seem to be people sticking with the idea though.
I've always found disfigure to be a pretty narrow card in general so I could easily see dropping it for a Siege if it were me. Between Souls and Norn we don't have the worst game against aggro.
Monastery Siege is a card/idea that I love, but I haven't been able to play much magic at all much less test this deck in the past 1.5-2 months. I'm glad there seem to be people sticking with the idea though.
I've always found disfigure to be a pretty narrow card in general so I could easily see dropping it for a Siege if it were me. Between Souls and Norn we don't have the worst game against aggro.
Disfigure was mainly their to deal with the fast aggro decks on turn 1 without using Path. I feel like Darkblast would be much better. It makes the Infect matchup much easier.
I will be taking this list to a few tournaments this month and post my results as well as any changes to the deck i may make in the mean time. I feel like part of the reason that this deck idea isnt taking off is due to the high cost of most of the staples of the deck. The owners of Snaps dont own Jace or Goryo for example. I feel like this deck has potential, its incredibly grindy, just hope more people jump on board and test different versions.
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Having Gifts let me play around with certain 1-ofs for testing. Thirst for Knowledge, Delay, Geist of Saint Traft, and a few others have been in and out of the main and side as tests.
Overall it's been a lot of fun to play, and I've not done worse than 2-2 in a fairly competitive 4 round FNM with it. There's an insane variety of lines to play, which keeps it interesting, unlike a lot of the more linear combo decks I tend to gravitate towards.
Having Gifts let me play around with certain 1-ofs for testing. Thirst for Knowledge, Delay, Geist of Saint Traft, and a few others have been in and out of the main and side as tests.
Overall it's been a lot of fun to play, and I've not done worse than 2-2 in a fairly competitive 4 round FNM with it. There's an insane variety of lines to play, which keeps it interesting, unlike a lot of the more linear combo decks I tend to gravitate towards.
How are you liking Remands? It seems like Discard can be very strong for us so I'm interested in your choice.
How are you liking Remands? It seems like Discard can be very strong for us so I'm interested in your choice.
They're a necessary evil for me. I don't especially like Remand in general; I'd vastly prefer to permanently deal with threats. But this deck plays more on the control-ing end of midrange, and not so much like a straight combo deck like most Goryo's decks. So it desperately wants to get to turn 4 or 5 with 4 lands on board and the option to do things like endstep Gifts and then untap and Unburial, or cast Ideas Unbound and hold up a Goryo's or another counter. Late game, not many decks can outpower this one, but getting there is the trick.
Discard often gets the best card out of their hand, but it doesn't tie up their mana, and often they've got another threat that might not be quite as good, but is still good. Take their Goyf on T1, and they'll still cast Bob or Voice or whatever on T2. Plus, discard also can't do anything about top decks. About the only real advantages for discard as that all the usual options are only 1 mana as opposed to 2, and they can be used on yourself in an emergency as an outlet to get a fattie in the bin for a reanimation.
Late game, going with counters over discard also means you have lines like gifts for a couple of counters and a snapcaster to do something about a top deck or sandbagged threat, while you can't instant speed gifts and discard in response to the same.
Remand, specifically, also helps draw into action (or another land), ties up their mana for a turn, and often means you know exactly what they're going to do next turn (jam it again, because you clearly didn't want them to do it the first time!), and can plan around it. A lot of times I don't even care what I'm remanding on turn 2 or 3. Anything will do, just to cycle me into something relevant and keep them from advancing their board.
See, i really liked Ideas Unbound until i actually played the deck in a paper event. Spell Snare is a very real card, my meta is infested with different Grixis and UWR strategies so i dont run it anymore. Plus getting double blue for it and also being able to hardcast an Obzedat (which happens pretty often) is difficult to do without taking too much damage or opening yourself up to Blood Moon. And in regards to Jace, counter magic is worse than hand disruption. I would NOT play counter spells in a deck with Jace, especially when the only good cards to flashback in your deck that doesnt come with flashback is Path to Exile or Goryo. Jace plays well with hand disruption and it serves the same sort of role in the deck. Being able to grind some decks out of the game with hand disruption is really powerful.
EDIT: Not to mention, what happens when you cast your Ideas Unbound into a Remand on turn 2? It also takes away your two mana to hold up your own counterspell. You need to wait til turn 4 to have enough mana to hold both up. Where as an early hand disruption spell can take their counter or removal and stay on curve.
I will grant that discard is better than counters if you've got an active Jace.
However, my experience has been that Jace tends to die almost immediately, and if I'm going to flash something back, it's almost always a Goryo's or a dig spell (Ideas, Gifts) first, or a Path second. I can count on one hand the number of times I've gotten to use any one Jace a second time. I don't really mind, since he's drawing removal or burn that would otherwise be hitting more important things. But the end result is that I rarely can "waste" a Jace -3 for something that's at best a 1-for-1.
Part of this is that my meta is pretty varied. There's a lot of linear aggro decks like Burn, Zoo and Affinity that are going to kill my Jace with bolts, helixes, galvanics or the like before it flips or kill it with more creatures than I can kill if it does. Plus, discard tends to be pretty bad against these decks mid to late game, while counters at least retain some amount of relevancy.
But there's also a lot of Grixis, Mono-U tron, and UW-control type decks, which oddly seem not care much if I resolve an Ideas (probably because most people have to read it and don't necessarily realize how important it is to this deck), but rarely let a Jace resolve, and if they do, will almost always bolt, terminate, k-command, or electrolyze it if they can. Discard is certainly good against those decks, which is why I still keep some in the sideboard.
That said, when I'm playing the deck, I definitely play far more like a control deck with a large graveyard based toolbox, rather than a jund-esque midrange deck that's trying to grind incremental advantage. I'm not sure either is "right" or "wrong", or even "better". I suspect a lot of it is playstyle and local meta.
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2 Temple of Enlightenment
2 Temple of Deceit
4 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
1 Marsh Flats
2 Hallowed Fountain
2 Watery Grave
1 Godless Shrine
1 Glacial Fortress
1 Drowned Catacomb
2 Island
1 Swamp
1 Plains
1 Ghost Quarter
3 Path to Exile
1 Murderous Cut
4 Ideas Unbound
4 Remand
4 Lingering Souls
4 Goryo's Vengeance
2 Gifts Ungiven
2 Unburial Rites
Creatures (13)
4 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
3 Obzedat, Ghost Council
3 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
2 Griselbrand
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Path to Exile
1 Dismember
2 Dispel
2 Negate
3 Disenchant
1 Wrath of God
1 Damnation
1 Supreme Verdict
1 Gifts Ungiven
1 Terastodon
Ultimately, this is a reanimator deck with elements of combo, and control. The way it achieves this is with reanimating a bomb that puts you ahead while blanking your opponent's gameplan. The early and midgame of the deck rely entirely around the looting engines and Goryo's Vengeance.
In the deck, Goryo's Vengeance isn't just a reanimator spell. It is the most ridiculous and versatile Charm in the game. It does everything.
Effectively, here are its modes:
1) Put an Obzedat, Ghost Council into play. If it's your turn, keep him forever.
2) Fog a creature, draw a card then discard a card, then put a Jace, Telepath Unbound into play. (Likely this means flashing back Goryo's or Ideas unbound next turn)
3) Until the end of turn your opponents creatures get -2/-2, your creatures get +2/+2 and you get a 4/7 body with haste and vigilance for either attacking or blocking
4) Gain 7 life. Until the end of the turn you may pay 7 life to draw 7 cards. Occasionally this mode either forces a block or trades with an attacking creature as well.
5) Put an Iona into play to either ensure lethal or prevent lethal, but this is the least common mode.
This is why I call it a Goryo's Vengeance toolbox deck. Depending on your draws and correct looting, it plays well both ahead and while behind in order to control the pace of the game until you can just Unburial Rites a nonsense card into play permanently, assuming the game lasts that long.
The basic idea is to stack your graveyard and use Goryo's Vengeance to either net you a 5/5 hasting stabilization engine, a surprise double-Zealous-Persectution with a hasting 4/7 vigilance attached, a Draw 7-14, or a flash blocking planeswalker. If doing this doesnt win you the game outright, an Unburial rites on Iona, Griselbrand, or Elesh Norn seals most games up.
We were worried in original builds that the deck would fold to aggro but after a lot of affinity and elves testing, we've found that it doesnt. You'll get stomped if they can rush out a double lord effect quickly or Steel Overseer gets the team over the Norn effect before she peaks her head out of the graveyard, but Flash Norn, Jace, and Lingering Souls with the 4 removal spells and remands keep the early game from getting out of hand most of the time. However, in the post board you get to run a wrath package to solve the boards that Norn cant.
This is about the fourth version of the deck. The first versions ran no scry lands, Thought Scours, Esper Charm, Forbidden Alchemy, and less removal in the main. What we found was that Thoughtscour didn't bin anything with consistency and often pitched cards we wanted, and Forbidden Alchemy almost never flashed back. I then brought up Ideas Unbound, as it was a 2 mana version of 2 Esper charm modes (we were running it to be able to mind rot ourselves if need be or just draw cards), we cut the scours and charms, ran 4 Ideas Unbound to tear through the deck and get dudes in the yard, and since we had no real turn 1 plays, added in the scry lands. The Alchemy's got cut for the full playset of Jaces as we wanted more looting and found him to be an exceptionally good Goryo's target. The scry lands and jaces have actually tested very well so far, but we aren't 100% sold on all aspects of the build yet.
The sideboard in particular is very tentative but we haven't tested against the entire field so we arent sure what matchups need the most help. So far the deck has been very fun and powerful, so we wanted to share it.
The general gameplan is aggressive looting and handsculpting with turn 2 Jace or Ideas Unbound to set up for a Goryo's > Obzedat Ghost Council/Griselbrand early, or at least a turn 4 unburial Rites/Gifts lockout. When the proactive plan stumbles you have remands, Lingering Souls, and Elesh Norns to pitch > Goryo's to keep boards clear and make value trades with her or souls tokens.
My friend and I'd be happy to hear any input, criticism, or ideas to further push this idea.
As far as cutting Ideas Unbound, it's a massive enabler for the deck, and while we have thougth about running Lili's they just arent for the same task. We have 9+ish creatures that need to make it to the grave and fast. Ideas puts them there while finding reanimation spells.
This list is hot.
Like really really ******* hot.
I'm looking for an excuse to play Snapcaster Mage to play well with Gifts and to chain more Goryo's.
I agree with you on Idea Unbound, it's a must. It makes it so much better when you remember that you can splice Goryo's to it, dump the card, and still cast it from Jace. I love the card selection and top deck power it affords us. In the right hands, it basically reads "draw three". If we can make Gifts say "tutor for four cards", Ideas will also be great, and I can't imagine dropping it.
My only gripe is that Scavenging Ooze is really annoying.
Modern: Top Control -- UWx Titan -- Loam Pox -- Footsteps Hulk
Legacy: Doomsday -- Death and Taxes -- UR Stasis -- Sylvan Plug
Pauper: UB Teachings -- UR Nivix Control
Any cards that felt weak in the main? I go back and forth on the remands (should they be cheeper/harder permission? The theory was to just have main board protection to ensure a reanimation spell sticks).
I also want to try out both Sudden Spoiling and Sudden Death to get around Scavenging Ooze and to be able to kill everything without a counter with Norn. Three mana is kind of meh though.
Modern: Top Control -- UWx Titan -- Loam Pox -- Footsteps Hulk
Legacy: Doomsday -- Death and Taxes -- UR Stasis -- Sylvan Plug
Pauper: UB Teachings -- UR Nivix Control
I have a hard time cutting Souls because its one of my favorite cards in the game, but also because it never feels bad to pitch it to Ideas or a Jace loot. It's also nuts in the BGx matchup where I find we can take a pretty big hit to our first few turns from a Seize. That said you're right that 1/1 flyers don't feel great against stuff like Tron or Amulet.
One big way to explore getting more cards into the deck is shaving lands. The deck may be able to afford cutting 1 or 2, potentially adding more scry lands (4 seems to be working well, who knows if 5 or 6 would overburden the mana though) in order to utilize more slots for business spells.
In Legacy, there is much less spot removal in general and more counters to stop combo and control decks and allows for Goblin Guild to be powerful, whereas there are more removal cards being played to counter the creature heavy strategies. Even a majority of combo decks can be stopped by a single Path. With our strategy being creature heavy I'm focusing on having more hand attack and removal over counter spells as they are more utilitarian.
I'm running 2 Remand, 2 Lingering Souls, 3 Inquisition, 1 Thoughtseize. I'll test this out and see what changes.
Modern: Top Control -- UWx Titan -- Loam Pox -- Footsteps Hulk
Legacy: Doomsday -- Death and Taxes -- UR Stasis -- Sylvan Plug
Pauper: UB Teachings -- UR Nivix Control
I'm liking the idea of spot discard a lot actually, as it gives us 1 drops and lets us be proactive about reanimation. using jace to flashback remand is also less than ideal. Self discarding off of seize is another possible applications since occasionally we don't want to wait until end of turn to discard off of ideas unbound, but thats fringe. I'm likely going to test that same split of discard but -4 remand instead of -2/-2. I'm a sucker for the value of discarding flashback and Norn plays very well with souls.
Mangara of Corondor is exactly the kind of card we are looking to abuse in this deck, so I think some number is definitely playable. Maybe some split main and side? The fact that it hits Graffdiggers Cage, Rest in Peace, Leyline of the Void, etc. alone makes it a very attractive include even if only in the sideboard.
EDIT: I just read your post and am currently at work, but I'm pretty excited about that card as tech. It might be reasonable to remove Terastodon and a Disenchant for 2 of them in the board at least. They serve as land hate since it is basically flash vindicate+ as well as removal for graveyard hosers and, while slow, are very easy for us to hard cast.
Goryo's getting back Venser, Sharper Savant turns Goryo's Vengeance a into a counter.
The Unspeakable gets back Goryo's or Ideas Unbound from the yard.
Wrexial, the Risen Deep idk
Tromokratis lol creatures
Modern: Top Control -- UWx Titan -- Loam Pox -- Footsteps Hulk
Legacy: Doomsday -- Death and Taxes -- UR Stasis -- Sylvan Plug
Pauper: UB Teachings -- UR Nivix Control
4 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
3 Obzedat, Ghost Council
2 Snapcaster Mage
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Thoughtseize
3 Lingering Souls
1 Unburial Rites
4 Goryo's Vengeance
3 Gifts Ungiven
1 Forbidden Alchemy
4 Path to Exile
1 Dismember
1 Murderous Cut
1 Disfigure
2 Liliana of the Veil
4 Flooded Strand
2 Marsh Flats
2 Polluted Delta
2 Godless Shrine
2 Hallowed Fountain
1 Watery Grave
2 Darkslick Shores
1 Seachrome Coast
1 Isolated Chapel
1 Vault of the Archangel
2 Swamp
2 Plains
1 Island
Sideboard
3 Stony Silence
2 Timely Reinforcements
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Blood Baron of Vizkopa
1 Batterskull
2 Disenchant
1 Celestial Purge
1 Devour Flesh
1 Damnation
1 Wrath of God
1 Supreme Verdict
Used to run some number of Mangara of Corondor in the list but cut them. They werent as efficient at removing threats as i initially thought. Really only good against the grindy decks and we can just grind better most of the time anyways. Blood Baron of Vizkopa is the man. The only deck i have had problems with is the Junk matchup, between the Decays and Paths we can hardly land a threat and with this guy that matchup isnt a problem. Souls + this guy is a tough time. Batterskull is great at grinding and the lifegain is great. With all the souls in the deck we can keep using him late game. Jund and Grixis matchups we dont bring in the Batterskull. Devour Flesh i wish i could play more. Bogles hates it, its really only awful against Affinity and Tokens. Gives us an out to an Emrakul from Tron. Disenchant is the most used SB card. Gets rid of Leyline (both W and B), RiP, Cage, as well as being good in the Affinity matchup and hits Blood Moon.
This deck really doesnt want to be "all in" on the combo. Grinding with efficient removal and threats that are hard to deal with is the way to go. The hand disruption is really important though the damage is huge. Inquisition hits Path/Dispel/Terminate/most threats. The 1 of fun of Forbidden Alchemy was a flex spot and i really wanted to run another card that digs and fills the yard. It can turn over 3 cards, sometimes a dude, and grab us a reanimation spell, puts souls in the grave, fuels Murderous Cut, or dump some extra lands to keep us from flooding.
U Tron
GW Bogles
RG Loam
UR Blue Breach
RBU Grixis Goryo
BRU Grixis Delver
GBR Jund
GBW Junk
Active Legacy Decks
BR Reanimator
Another possibility is cutting the Disfigure and Forbidden Alchemy for 2 Monastery Siege. Can loot every turn or protect our dudes, Burn has to take it into consideration if we put it on Dragons.
U Tron
GW Bogles
RG Loam
UR Blue Breach
RBU Grixis Goryo
BRU Grixis Delver
GBR Jund
GBW Junk
Active Legacy Decks
BR Reanimator
I've always found disfigure to be a pretty narrow card in general so I could easily see dropping it for a Siege if it were me. Between Souls and Norn we don't have the worst game against aggro.
Disfigure was mainly their to deal with the fast aggro decks on turn 1 without using Path. I feel like Darkblast would be much better. It makes the Infect matchup much easier.
I will be taking this list to a few tournaments this month and post my results as well as any changes to the deck i may make in the mean time. I feel like part of the reason that this deck idea isnt taking off is due to the high cost of most of the staples of the deck. The owners of Snaps dont own Jace or Goryo for example. I feel like this deck has potential, its incredibly grindy, just hope more people jump on board and test different versions.
U Tron
GW Bogles
RG Loam
UR Blue Breach
RBU Grixis Goryo
BRU Grixis Delver
GBR Jund
GBW Junk
Active Legacy Decks
BR Reanimator
As an aside I've also been flirting with the idea of 1x Nepahlia Drownyards as a utility land for self mill/alt win con.
4 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
1 Venser, Shaper Savant
3 Obzedat, Ghost Council
1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
2 Griselbrand
1 Iona, Shield of Emeria
1 Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur
Sorceries:8
4 Ideas Unbound
2 Lingering Souls
2 Unburial Rites
Instants:15
1 Dispel
3 Path to Exile
4 Goryo's Vengeance
1 Negate
3 Remand
2 Gifts Ungiven
1 Murderous Cut
1 Drowned Catacomb
3 Flooded Strand
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Glacial Fortress
1 Godless Shrine
2 Hallowed Fountain
2 Island
1 Marsh Flats
1 Plains
4 Polluted Delta
1 Swamp
2 Temple of Deceit
2 Temple of Enlightenment
2 Watery Grave
2 Mangara of Corondor
1 Venser, Shaper Savant
1 Terastodon
2 Thoughtseize
1 Damnation
1 Supreme Verdict
1 Wrath of God
1 Dispel
1 Path to Exile
2 Negate
1 Dismember
1 Gifts Ungiven
Having Gifts let me play around with certain 1-ofs for testing. Thirst for Knowledge, Delay, Geist of Saint Traft, and a few others have been in and out of the main and side as tests.
Overall it's been a lot of fun to play, and I've not done worse than 2-2 in a fairly competitive 4 round FNM with it. There's an insane variety of lines to play, which keeps it interesting, unlike a lot of the more linear combo decks I tend to gravitate towards.
How are you liking Remands? It seems like Discard can be very strong for us so I'm interested in your choice.
They're a necessary evil for me. I don't especially like Remand in general; I'd vastly prefer to permanently deal with threats. But this deck plays more on the control-ing end of midrange, and not so much like a straight combo deck like most Goryo's decks. So it desperately wants to get to turn 4 or 5 with 4 lands on board and the option to do things like endstep Gifts and then untap and Unburial, or cast Ideas Unbound and hold up a Goryo's or another counter. Late game, not many decks can outpower this one, but getting there is the trick.
Discard often gets the best card out of their hand, but it doesn't tie up their mana, and often they've got another threat that might not be quite as good, but is still good. Take their Goyf on T1, and they'll still cast Bob or Voice or whatever on T2. Plus, discard also can't do anything about top decks. About the only real advantages for discard as that all the usual options are only 1 mana as opposed to 2, and they can be used on yourself in an emergency as an outlet to get a fattie in the bin for a reanimation.
Late game, going with counters over discard also means you have lines like gifts for a couple of counters and a snapcaster to do something about a top deck or sandbagged threat, while you can't instant speed gifts and discard in response to the same.
Remand, specifically, also helps draw into action (or another land), ties up their mana for a turn, and often means you know exactly what they're going to do next turn (jam it again, because you clearly didn't want them to do it the first time!), and can plan around it. A lot of times I don't even care what I'm remanding on turn 2 or 3. Anything will do, just to cycle me into something relevant and keep them from advancing their board.
EDIT: Not to mention, what happens when you cast your Ideas Unbound into a Remand on turn 2? It also takes away your two mana to hold up your own counterspell. You need to wait til turn 4 to have enough mana to hold both up. Where as an early hand disruption spell can take their counter or removal and stay on curve.
U Tron
GW Bogles
RG Loam
UR Blue Breach
RBU Grixis Goryo
BRU Grixis Delver
GBR Jund
GBW Junk
Active Legacy Decks
BR Reanimator
However, my experience has been that Jace tends to die almost immediately, and if I'm going to flash something back, it's almost always a Goryo's or a dig spell (Ideas, Gifts) first, or a Path second. I can count on one hand the number of times I've gotten to use any one Jace a second time. I don't really mind, since he's drawing removal or burn that would otherwise be hitting more important things. But the end result is that I rarely can "waste" a Jace -3 for something that's at best a 1-for-1.
Part of this is that my meta is pretty varied. There's a lot of linear aggro decks like Burn, Zoo and Affinity that are going to kill my Jace with bolts, helixes, galvanics or the like before it flips or kill it with more creatures than I can kill if it does. Plus, discard tends to be pretty bad against these decks mid to late game, while counters at least retain some amount of relevancy.
But there's also a lot of Grixis, Mono-U tron, and UW-control type decks, which oddly seem not care much if I resolve an Ideas (probably because most people have to read it and don't necessarily realize how important it is to this deck), but rarely let a Jace resolve, and if they do, will almost always bolt, terminate, k-command, or electrolyze it if they can. Discard is certainly good against those decks, which is why I still keep some in the sideboard.
That said, when I'm playing the deck, I definitely play far more like a control deck with a large graveyard based toolbox, rather than a jund-esque midrange deck that's trying to grind incremental advantage. I'm not sure either is "right" or "wrong", or even "better". I suspect a lot of it is playstyle and local meta.