Thanks for the response, Is it safe to just replace the falls with a spirebluff? I found the falls a little awkward in my games a few times but on the flipside games with Thing Ascension can drag on. Just wanted a 2nd opinion as I see renowned players such as Pascal Wagner play with 2 Spirebluff. Also, has anyone run the noxious cryptic build over the helix build? I feel the former isnt as stable but has a lot of potential
Hey folks, I've been wondering if its worth it to play the full set of Spirebluff Canals instead of sulfur falls and a few fetches? I've been thinking about immunity to choke and a smoother manabase against Aggro is worth it, we cap out at 3-4 lands generally anyways
I have been testing with 4 spirebluffs, and I'm not going back. They are an absolute godsend for the deck in my testing. Just won my third straight win-a-box night with this deck. I've actually just added a one of inspiring vantage as well. These new lands are the reason decks like jeskai aggro are a thing now, and they care about drawing gas just as much if not more than we do. In such a aggro heavy meta 2-6 life being saved is massive..
Has anyone played the old Pascal Wagner list with 2 cryptic commands and the noxious manamorphose infinite to win with thoughtscour/inf bolts? Just wondering if its worth the negative card advantage for a higher ceiling on the deck.
Has anyone played the old Pascal Wagner list with 2 cryptic commands and the noxious manamorphose infinite to win with thoughtscour/inf bolts? Just wondering if its worth the negative card advantage for a higher ceiling on the deck.
You would have to change the manabase according. Mind posting a list? Also I always had the feeling that we somehow lose the ability to be a bit more grindy. Because let's face it: If you want to play combo, play storm (But please try it and tell us how it works )
On a random sidenote: I am not satisfied with the manabases you build with Spirebluff Canal. Sure, you lose a bit of the self damage, but I think the base is inappropriate for the deck. Some point this week I will try to write about it (involving math and featuring Frank Karsten)
It is interesting for sure but it's is just too reliant on the GY and on Pyromancer's Ascension. The only reason the deck took off is because of Thing which is another win con that doesn't have the weakness of Pyro Ascension.
Game one I wouldn't be super worried about graveyard hate, and game two it looks like they have plenty to bring in in the form of mentors and pyromancers. I'd personally be more worried about not finding an ascension game one.
Going with this plan makes me think of classic UR Storm. They bring in Empty the Warrens post game 1 (some use the Madcap-Emperion combo but in my experience, its not very good) to avoid graveyard hate. Not sure if this no-Thing UWR Ascension plan is better than classic Storm though, deserves some testing to confirm.
5-0'd with a build focused more on the ascension combo. 4 thing in the ices were the only creatures in the main, also eschewed lightning helix. In those spots I played 3 remand, 2 cryptic, and a third noxious revival. Also got fairly lucky on the matchups (possibility storm, scapeshift zoo, grixis controlx2, lantern control) and some of the draws.
Highlight was when the possibility storm guy cast an emrakul turn three and I instant speed flipped thing in the ice before he could attack with it.
Generally targets manamorphose, which lets me combo kill with ascension. Early on you can also cast a cantrip (with another in your yard), hold priority and noxious the copy in your yard on top to draw it and cast it for the second counter on ascension.
Un-Storm is a perfectly serviceable archetype that has game versus just about anything as long as it has either a Pyro or a plan to get a Pyro on board. I actually played a very "pure" version of it for a long time, because it literally can't do anything without an engine card (un-storm quietly has one of the most devastating transformational sideboard plans in the form of Young Pyromancer). Since delaying an opponent with Remands and Cryptics is pointless when you have nothing to do without an Ascension or Pyromancer, I replaced those with as many cantrips as possible, up to and including Quicken and Commune with the Gods at different points.
(I left out Tarns and Rain Forests because they're $$$.)
The sideboard is designed to work well with Commune with the Gods. Blood Moon, Outpost Seige, and Spellskite come in against BGx to increase staying power and divert public enemy #1, Abrupt Decay.
Edit: I've tested this list a bit more, and tweaked it to be more appropriate. My previous comments are a bit null, so here's the update.
Commune with the Gods might seem like an odd choice. However, it's my favorite option that going true RUG gives us. With 9 win conditions in the deck, it finds threats like no other, and playing it on turn 2 to find a Pyro Ascension means our graveyard is already set up to get things going. The sideboard options that accompany Commune are also pertinent - Blood Moon is infamously mean, Spellskite keeps your wins secure, and Outpost Siege helps grind things out while being immune to Iquisitions and Abrupt Decays. (Though Keranos, God of Storms might be stronger, 4 CMC is already a lot to ask in this list.) Another benefit is that we can easily dump 5-6 cards to hit 20 and level up to Ancestral Recall more frequently.
Gitaxian Probe is pretty essential to these versions that are more focused on the Ascension combo, as they enable way more turn 3 wins. Additionally, not paying mana for card draw means whiffing is that much less of a concern during the big play.
A notable disadvantage to not playing white is a much worse burn matchup. While Lightning Helix never made or broke the deck, losing Rest for the Weary and Timely Reinforcements out of the board really sucks in this scenario. A personal favorite that we no longer get to play is Celestial Purge as an answer to Liliana of the Veil, which hurts a lot more than you'd think, especially since we're now vulnerable to her -2. Green doesn't offer a ton of quality answers to this problem. Stream of LifeDawnglow Infusion is possibly our best bet here, but it's only really worth it if we're comboing, as its mana requirement is otherwise prohibitive. Healing Leaves might just be better... which isn't saying much.
To me, the question is whether I want Commune for a more consistent and inevitable plan A or white sideboard cards for better contingencies.
Sorry for the double post, but it looks like the thread is pretty inactive, and I have a contribution that's substantively different from my previous post. (I also remembered that Feed the Clan exists, but c'est la vie.)
Remand and Faithless Looting are bad. I know these cards are very popular, especially in RUG Un-Storm and UWR Thing Ascension builds, but after a long time as an Un-Storm player, I've got some real analysis here.
First, Remand. Let's go over perceived benefits in these shells:
1) Spellbounce softlock
For those unfamiliar with the more counterintuitive combos Ascensions enable: With two Asecnsions and a Remand, you can bounce the opponent's spell with your first copy, then bounce your own Remand with the second copy before the original resolves and hits the grave. Rinse and repeat while drawing two cards with each iteration.
The reason this shouldn't steer you towards actually playing Remand is fairly simple: you should already be winning with one active Ascension, let alone two.
2) Holding up Remand slows us down.
Holding up two mana is prohibitive in an archetype that only runs 18 lands on a good day. You'll slow yourself down way more than you'll slow them down by waiting for a disruptive opening.
3) We race better.
Furthermore, slamming our own threat will almost always have more impact on the board than the probable Tarmogoyf, Vendilion Clique, or Liliana of the Veil on their end – Goyfs, Cliques, and Lilis accrue incremental value. Ascensions, Things, and Revelers end games. As such, we want our win cons on the board as soon as possible, because they often require an additional turn of setup or summoning sickness. And skipping a turn to Remand their play not only gives them another chance to draw an answer to our threat, but simply delays both players by a turn, which is a net neutral in terms of racing each other.
4) Remand can't protect us.
Pure and simple, Remand just can't stop the answers to our threats. Spell Snare is one mana, which is easily replayable. Abrupt Decay, possibly the most relevant of all these, dodges Remand completely. Mana Leak and opposing Remands are marginally more open to our disruption, but they're still easily recastable, and we just spent two mana protecting one threat instead of digging for one of our many replacements. Terminate and Path to Exile are similarly cheap and recastable.
Cryptic Command and Nahiri, the Harbinger are the only answers that we really have a hope of putting off with Remand. Even then, once either resolves, we're either Time Walked from a Cryptic bounce or screwed anyway because of Nahiri's -2. But the one or even half turn you get from this Remand could be enough to win, assuming you have the resources. So there's that.
Additionally, almost every relevant discard spell in the format is played on turn 1, before countermagic is even a factor in the game. And yet again we run into the problem of Inquisition of Kozilek and Thoughtseize costing one mana in in later turns, the only saving grace here being that most decks that run these spells are tricolor and might not have another black source. I would be willing to bet that they probably have more black sources than you have Remands, however.
5) Remand is a dead draw (if you're looking to combo)
This is priority one if you're eschewing Thing in the Ice and Bedlam Reveler in favor of a traditional Storm setup or the Noxious Revival Un-Storm combo, because drawing Remand during your combo turn is functionally the same as drawing a second or third land. It's a feelbad that voids your valuable cantrips.
I think that suitably covers my bases with Remand.
Put simply, it's one of the worst cantrips available. It's even worse than Quicken in longer matchups. It's always card disadvantage, and I don't even buy the argument that it's indispensable for setting up Ascensions. Gitaxian Probe being "free" does a lot more for that cause; Looting seems to be seeing play as a 3-of, which curtails its own ability to count towards Ascension; and you really just don't need it to get a quick Ascension, regardless of the two free grave spots it gives. Looting even kind of sucks with an active Ascension, as it doesn't build a critical mass of spells.
Really, just play Sleight of Hand and Visions of Beyond. The first digs just as deep, and the second pushes the deck'a ceiling way up, especially in grindy matchups that want to trade one-for-one with us. And neither puts you at an active disadvantage.
These choices actually played a big part in steering me towards the Un-Thing list I posted above. (That and my diehard penchant for RUG strategies.) Hope you got something of value out of the analysis.
I never have a problem going off without Looting, and the entire point of including TiTi and Reveler in the deck is that you don't have to go off to win. If Ascension is the deck's only win condition, then yes, it makes sense to include Looting, but that's not the case. For me, Reveler and Commune with the Gods fill the graveyard up much more proactively, and Commune finds threats much more consistently.
You didn't address the points I brought up about Remand? I went through the most relevant answers to our engines in the format and elaborated on why Remand isn't particularly good at answering any of them, as well as why Remand is subpar at disrupting an opponent (especially when our combo kill isn't as clean as Scapeshift and our game plan doesn't have as many outs as Blue Moon, USA, or the old Twin lists, which made the best use of Remand in the format's history.) Furthermore, using Remand to respond to 2 mana counters is sketchy unless you already have an Ascension on the board from a previous turn – holding up Remand + a threat means you're waiting until turn 4 to get the ball rolling.
I'll concede your point on remand, I will argue on the faithless looting one though. Not so much for setting up ascensions, but because of the hands it lets us keep, and its power when comboing.
In a deck with 17 or 18 lands, I will happily play a looting turn one off a one lander to find the land drops we need, or inversely as the game goes later pitch excess lands for actual cards. Once we're comboing we have plenty of lands that we don't need, and it becomes a functional draw 2, which I think is much better than visions of beyond (which is usually a draw one, and its only real advantage is its instant speed which is less of a factor if you aren't playing remand).
Visions has always seemed like a win-more to me. If it's drawing us 3, we're probably winning anyway (unless it's some sort of topdeck war with jund, but we have plenty of ways to get out of that that aren't visions)
That is a fair point on Looting, actually. Another consideration is that it allows you to keep hands with a red source, but not a blue source, which become auto-mulligans when you don't run Looting. With these points considered I'd feel better about running it in UWR builds since mulligans can be disastrous if we whiff on a blue source in the second hand.
I agree that Visions can often be win-more, but I think we need to take what we can get as far as advantages over BGx. Really, I'm not too worried about our other matchups, as they don't have nearly the same history of oppressing this archetype in its various forms. Even Burn has some silver bullets against it that swing the match.
I'm having a hard time imagining this deck without Probe, sadly. It does too much for activating Ascension and flipping Thing, nevermind the Peek effect.
Why don't we think about what we could be doing instead of abandoning the deck? We have playable outs, and a slower format is probably quite good for us. Plus, the Troll's banning is fantastic for our game plan because it means we can expect way less grave hate. (I highly doubt that people will commit to four maindeck surgical extractions in those hyper-aggressive decks, mostly because SE doesn't replace itself.)
Realistically, this means we play 4 Faithless Looting and 4 Sleight of Hand.
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I have been testing with 4 spirebluffs, and I'm not going back. They are an absolute godsend for the deck in my testing. Just won my third straight win-a-box night with this deck. I've actually just added a one of inspiring vantage as well. These new lands are the reason decks like jeskai aggro are a thing now, and they care about drawing gas just as much if not more than we do. In such a aggro heavy meta 2-6 life being saved is massive..
1 Hallowed Fountain
2 Island
1 Mountain
1 Inspiring Vantage
1 Sacred Foundry
4 Scalding Tarn
4 Spirebluff Canal
1 Steam Vents
That's what I'm testing currently, and it feels pretty good!
Lands - 18
3 Polluted Delta
3 Flooded Strand
1 Bloodstained Mire
2 Steam Vents
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Sacred Foundry
4 Spirebluff Canal
2 Island
1 Mountain
Care to share the whole list?
You would have to change the manabase according. Mind posting a list? Also I always had the feeling that we somehow lose the ability to be a bit more grindy. Because let's face it: If you want to play combo, play storm (But please try it and tell us how it works )
On a random sidenote: I am not satisfied with the manabases you build with Spirebluff Canal. Sure, you lose a bit of the self damage, but I think the base is inappropriate for the deck. Some point this week I will try to write about it (involving math and featuring Frank Karsten)
Greetings
King
UWRWorking on: Pyromancer AscensionUR
18 LANDS
1 Breeding Pool
2 Flooded Strand
1 Hallowed Fountain
4 Island
1 Mountain
4 Scalding Tarn
2 Spirebluff Canal
3 Steam Vents
38 INSTANTS and SORC.
2 Cryptic Command
1 Faithless Looting
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Manamorphose
3 Noxious Revival
4 Remand
4 Serum Visions
4 Sleight of Hand
4 Thought Scour
4 Visions of Beyond
4 OTHER SPELLS
4 Pyromancer Ascension
SIDEBOARD
2 Ancient Grudge
3 Monastery Mentor
2 Pyroclasm
3 Swan Song
2 Timely Reinforcements
1 Wear / Tear
2 Young Pyromancer
Highlight was when the possibility storm guy cast an emrakul turn three and I instant speed flipped thing in the ice before he could attack with it.
Here's my take on an Un-Thing list:
2 Thing in the Ice
3 Bedlam Reveler
Spells:39
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Noxious Revival
4 Gitaxian Probe
4 Serum Visions
4 Sleight of Hand
4 Thought Scour
4 Visions of Beyond
3 Commune with the Gods
4 Manamorphose
4 Pyromancer Ascension
1 Breeding Pool
4 Flooded Strand
2 Island
1 Forest
2 Spirebluff Canal
2 Steam Vents
1 Stomping Ground
3 Wooded Foothills
2 Spellskite
1 Thing in the Ice
2 Dispel
2 Echoing Truth
1 Negate
2 Anger of the Gods
3 Blood Moon
2 Outpost Siege
(I left out Tarns and Rain Forests because they're $$$.)
The sideboard is designed to work well with Commune with the Gods. Blood Moon, Outpost Seige, and Spellskite come in against BGx to increase staying power and divert public enemy #1, Abrupt Decay.
Edit: I've tested this list a bit more, and tweaked it to be more appropriate. My previous comments are a bit null, so here's the update.
Commune with the Gods might seem like an odd choice. However, it's my favorite option that going true RUG gives us. With 9 win conditions in the deck, it finds threats like no other, and playing it on turn 2 to find a Pyro Ascension means our graveyard is already set up to get things going. The sideboard options that accompany Commune are also pertinent - Blood Moon is infamously mean, Spellskite keeps your wins secure, and Outpost Siege helps grind things out while being immune to Iquisitions and Abrupt Decays. (Though Keranos, God of Storms might be stronger, 4 CMC is already a lot to ask in this list.) Another benefit is that we can easily dump 5-6 cards to hit 20 and level up to Ancestral Recall more frequently.
Gitaxian Probe is pretty essential to these versions that are more focused on the Ascension combo, as they enable way more turn 3 wins. Additionally, not paying mana for card draw means whiffing is that much less of a concern during the big play.
A notable disadvantage to not playing white is a much worse burn matchup. While Lightning Helix never made or broke the deck, losing Rest for the Weary and Timely Reinforcements out of the board really sucks in this scenario. A personal favorite that we no longer get to play is Celestial Purge as an answer to Liliana of the Veil, which hurts a lot more than you'd think, especially since we're now vulnerable to her -2. Green doesn't offer a ton of quality answers to this problem.
Stream of LifeDawnglow Infusion is possibly our best bet here, but it's only really worth it if we're comboing, as its mana requirement is otherwise prohibitive. Healing Leaves might just be better... which isn't saying much.To me, the question is whether I want Commune for a more consistent and inevitable plan A or white sideboard cards for better contingencies.
Remand and Faithless Looting are bad. I know these cards are very popular, especially in RUG Un-Storm and UWR Thing Ascension builds, but after a long time as an Un-Storm player, I've got some real analysis here.
First, Remand. Let's go over perceived benefits in these shells:
1) Spellbounce softlock
For those unfamiliar with the more counterintuitive combos Ascensions enable: With two Asecnsions and a Remand, you can bounce the opponent's spell with your first copy, then bounce your own Remand with the second copy before the original resolves and hits the grave. Rinse and repeat while drawing two cards with each iteration.
The reason this shouldn't steer you towards actually playing Remand is fairly simple: you should already be winning with one active Ascension, let alone two.
2) Holding up Remand slows us down.
Holding up two mana is prohibitive in an archetype that only runs 18 lands on a good day. You'll slow yourself down way more than you'll slow them down by waiting for a disruptive opening.
3) We race better.
Furthermore, slamming our own threat will almost always have more impact on the board than the probable Tarmogoyf, Vendilion Clique, or Liliana of the Veil on their end – Goyfs, Cliques, and Lilis accrue incremental value. Ascensions, Things, and Revelers end games. As such, we want our win cons on the board as soon as possible, because they often require an additional turn of setup or summoning sickness. And skipping a turn to Remand their play not only gives them another chance to draw an answer to our threat, but simply delays both players by a turn, which is a net neutral in terms of racing each other.
4) Remand can't protect us.
Pure and simple, Remand just can't stop the answers to our threats. Spell Snare is one mana, which is easily replayable. Abrupt Decay, possibly the most relevant of all these, dodges Remand completely. Mana Leak and opposing Remands are marginally more open to our disruption, but they're still easily recastable, and we just spent two mana protecting one threat instead of digging for one of our many replacements. Terminate and Path to Exile are similarly cheap and recastable.
Cryptic Command and Nahiri, the Harbinger are the only answers that we really have a hope of putting off with Remand. Even then, once either resolves, we're either Time Walked from a Cryptic bounce or screwed anyway because of Nahiri's -2. But the one or even half turn you get from this Remand could be enough to win, assuming you have the resources. So there's that.
Additionally, almost every relevant discard spell in the format is played on turn 1, before countermagic is even a factor in the game. And yet again we run into the problem of Inquisition of Kozilek and Thoughtseize costing one mana in in later turns, the only saving grace here being that most decks that run these spells are tricolor and might not have another black source. I would be willing to bet that they probably have more black sources than you have Remands, however.
5) Remand is a dead draw (if you're looking to combo)
This is priority one if you're eschewing Thing in the Ice and Bedlam Reveler in favor of a traditional Storm setup or the Noxious Revival Un-Storm combo, because drawing Remand during your combo turn is functionally the same as drawing a second or third land. It's a feelbad that voids your valuable cantrips.
I think that suitably covers my bases with Remand.
Now, as for Faithless Looting, things are a lot less complicated.
Put simply, it's one of the worst cantrips available. It's even worse than Quicken in longer matchups. It's always card disadvantage, and I don't even buy the argument that it's indispensable for setting up Ascensions. Gitaxian Probe being "free" does a lot more for that cause; Looting seems to be seeing play as a 3-of, which curtails its own ability to count towards Ascension; and you really just don't need it to get a quick Ascension, regardless of the two free grave spots it gives. Looting even kind of sucks with an active Ascension, as it doesn't build a critical mass of spells.
Really, just play Sleight of Hand and Visions of Beyond. The first digs just as deep, and the second pushes the deck'a ceiling way up, especially in grindy matchups that want to trade one-for-one with us. And neither puts you at an active disadvantage.
These choices actually played a big part in steering me towards the Un-Thing list I posted above. (That and my diehard penchant for RUG strategies.) Hope you got something of value out of the analysis.
You didn't address the points I brought up about Remand? I went through the most relevant answers to our engines in the format and elaborated on why Remand isn't particularly good at answering any of them, as well as why Remand is subpar at disrupting an opponent (especially when our combo kill isn't as clean as Scapeshift and our game plan doesn't have as many outs as Blue Moon, USA, or the old Twin lists, which made the best use of Remand in the format's history.) Furthermore, using Remand to respond to 2 mana counters is sketchy unless you already have an Ascension on the board from a previous turn – holding up Remand + a threat means you're waiting until turn 4 to get the ball rolling.
In a deck with 17 or 18 lands, I will happily play a looting turn one off a one lander to find the land drops we need, or inversely as the game goes later pitch excess lands for actual cards. Once we're comboing we have plenty of lands that we don't need, and it becomes a functional draw 2, which I think is much better than visions of beyond (which is usually a draw one, and its only real advantage is its instant speed which is less of a factor if you aren't playing remand).
Visions has always seemed like a win-more to me. If it's drawing us 3, we're probably winning anyway (unless it's some sort of topdeck war with jund, but we have plenty of ways to get out of that that aren't visions)
I agree that Visions can often be win-more, but I think we need to take what we can get as far as advantages over BGx. Really, I'm not too worried about our other matchups, as they don't have nearly the same history of oppressing this archetype in its various forms. Even Burn has some silver bullets against it that swing the match.
Realistically, this means we play 4 Faithless Looting and 4 Sleight of Hand.