Overview of Bant Midrange
Bant Midrange is a deck that looks to have all the answers while quickly pressuring with a cheap powerhouse in the form of Tarmogoyf. Efficiency of threats and answers is key for the functionality of the deck. Bant Midrange has, for most of modern, been underpowered. Decks in Bant colours have previously had to find their power by using Tribal synergies (eldrazi, spirits) or Collected company with high creature counts. This synergistic approach, while successful, carries inherent weaknesses. By incorporating a more interactive and less creature dense build, the faster decks in the format become great matchups.
Tarmogoyf and Snapcaster Mage, arguably two of the best creatures in the format, can now play on the same team. With the printings of Spell Queller and Blessed Alliance, we have new strong answer cards that pair well with snappy and help goyf finish the job. Bant Midrange stands out from other midrange decks as a more reactive midrange strategy. Instead of proactively attacking the hand and then playing out threats like BGx decks, you'll be looking to interact as much as possible on the stack and board early, before dropping a threat while keeping interaction up. Serum visions helps ensure we have the right answers, and noble gets us ahead of the curve while winning goyf mirrors.
Playing Bant Midrange
The deck plays out fairly intuitively. You'll start with serum visions/noble/creatureland, and react to your opponents' plans accordingly. Here are some tips for playing and neat interactions:
Against any Rxx deck, Meddling Mage naming lightning bolt is almost always a pain to deal with - especially effective in grixis/jund/zoo/burn. Otherwise, Meddling mage should always name the card that is most likely to kill you in any given matchup. Ad nauseam, Become Immense, Cranial Plating, Conflagrate, Reality Smasher are good examples of a card to name when playing meddling mage proactively.
If you have a spell exiled with Spell Queller while Meddling mage is in the yard, you can respond to removal from your opponent on the spell queller with Ojutai's Command to get back a Meddling Mage from the graveyard, and name whatever spell is under queller. When queller leaves with a mage on the exiled spell, the spell stays exiled.
Playing Blessed Alliance and escalating to untap can be helpful. For instance, if you have blessed alliance and path to exile in hand, you can cast blessed alliance for sac + untap, untap goyf and noble, block with goyf and cast path. Lines involving untapping your goyf/queller and noble come up more often than one might think. This also occurs with tapped creaturelands.
With snapcaster and/or goyf in the graveyard, Ojutai's command can get pretty sick. Instant speed goyf plus draw a card is pretty sick as a basic play, but it gets better with snappy as the game goes late. For instance, at 8 mana you can cast ojutai's command drawing a card and getting snappy back, then flashback ojutai's command getting goyf and drawing another card - all at flash speed. Ojutai's Command opens some interesting lines for Bant, and it can often be correct to chump block/suicide attack with snappy simply to have access to it with Ojutai's command.
Welcome to the new Bant Midrange thread. The previous Bant thread was great for early development on decks that eventually turned into Bant Company/Knightfall.
Those are all great cards. Dromoka's command and Bant Charm are two cards that got tested thoroughly, but had their problems. Bant Charm was simply too inefficient for any of its modes to be that great. Dromoka's Command was in the list recently until it was found to be dead too often - it was replaced with another negate.
Engineered Explosives has been in the SB before, and is a solid option against tokens (which can be problematic).
Meddling mage can be tricky to use, but has a very high skill ceiling. I have won more than a couple games thanks to meddling mage doing some serious work.
Great primer! I like the Spell Queller + Meddling Mage synergy. I look forward to seeing some results from Bant midrange. I must admit I am rather skeptical due to the lack of success Bant midrange has had in the past, I fear that the current meta is too quick and dirty for such a solid fair strategy. That said, I have full support for this archetype! I know that this build will certainly defeat fringe decks with ease.
There are a few cards in the upcoming set that I think may find a home in the 75 somewhere!
I'm very excited, good work!
Great primer! I like the Spell Queller + Meddling Mage synergy. I look forward to seeing some results from Bant midrange. I must admit I am rather skeptical due to the lack of success Bant midrange has had in the past, I fear that the current meta is too quick and dirty for such a solid fair strategy.
Thanks! My experience has been that the fastest decks are the best matchups. They don't benefit as much from the drawback on path to exile, and are usually super vulnerable to blessed alliance. Blessed alliance is a big part of why Bant Midrange can keep up. Even dredge isn't so scary with path, celestial purge and surgical extraction and full set of snappy to rebuy them. Rhox war monk is even unreasonably good at blocking Prized Amalgams.
Great primer! I like the Spell Queller + Meddling Mage synergy. I look forward to seeing some results from Bant midrange. I must admit I am rather skeptical due to the lack of success Bant midrange has had in the past, I fear that the current meta is too quick and dirty for such a solid fair strategy.
Thanks! My experience has been that the fastest decks are the best matchups. They don't benefit as much from the drawback on path to exile, and are usually super vulnerable to blessed alliance. Blessed alliance is a big part of why Bant Midrange can keep up. Even dredge isn't so scary with path, celestial purge and surgical extraction and full set of snappy to rebuy them. Rhox war monk is even unreasonably good at blocking Prized Amalgams.
True, Blessed Alliance is fantastic! I can see how that toolbox would give aggro decks and dredge especially a run for their money
How are you finding Tarmogoyf and Snapcaster Mage? In my experience, Bant has trouble making Tarmogoyf grow large. Other decks like Jund or Abzan can create a large goyf easily using discard and burn, but we lack those tools and don't run as many card types. Snapcaster Mage also lacks it's best friend lightning bolt, are you confident that running 4 is the right choice? From what I can tell, the ability to replay sideboard cards likely outweighs any drawback, I could see a copy being sideboard material or dropping to 3 copies in the main perhaps? It could eliminate drawing into too many copies, I'll have to do some testing of my own with your list but those are just my few cents on the topic!
Also, what is your opinion on running Noble Hierarch as an additional turn 1 play? It seems like the deck is currently committed to playing control in the early phases of the game, but I don't think that Hierarch would jeopardize that in any way. It could assist in speeding up the deck allowing a turn two 3-drop, or a 2-drop with a Spell Snare at the ready, or just better control options earlier in the game. It also gives us a play against slower decks like Tron or some of the control brews. I suppose I might be valuing a mana dork too highly here, could it be that Hierarch isn't worth the tempo commitment?
True, Blessed Alliance is fantastic! I can see how that toolbox would give aggro decks and dredge especially a run for their money
How are you finding Tarmogoyf and Snapcaster Mage? In my experience, Bant has trouble making Tarmogoyf grow large. Other decks like Jund or Abzan can create a large goyf easily using discard and burn, but we lack those tools and don't run as many card types. Snapcaster Mage also lacks it's best friend lightning bolt, are you confident that running 4 is the right choice? From what I can tell, the ability to replay sideboard cards likely outweighs any drawback, I could see a copy being sideboard material or dropping to 3 copies in the main perhaps? It could eliminate drawing into too many copies, I'll have to do some testing of my own with your list but those are just my few cents on the topic!
Tarmogoyf grows just fine - we're always the same size as the opponent in the goyf mirror, but we have noble. So in any 'mirror' goyf matchup, our goyfs are actually better. Rare is the occasion where goyf isn't out of bolt range by turn 2 - we're playing serum visions which helps with that, and a 4/5 goyf is all we ever need. Snapcaster is great, but I could see 3 being the right number. So far there have not been many occasions where I drew too many, but it does happen occasionally. Conversely, I almost always want a snapcaster in hand when I don't have one.
Also, what is your opinion on running Noble Hierarch as an additional turn 1 play? It seems like the deck is currently committed to playing control in the early phases of the game, but I don't think that Hierarch would jeopardize that in any way. It could assist in speeding up the deck allowing a turn two 3-drop, or a 2-drop with a Spell Snare at the ready, or just better control options earlier in the game. It also gives us a play against slower decks like Tron or some of the control brews. I suppose I might be valuing a mana dork too highly here, could it be that Hierarch isn't worth the tempo commitment?
Noble was in the list, but I made a formatting error in the OP that kinda hid the card - fixed! Noble is integral to the deck imo.
True, Blessed Alliance is fantastic! I can see how that toolbox would give aggro decks and dredge especially a run for their money
How are you finding Tarmogoyf and Snapcaster Mage? In my experience, Bant has trouble making Tarmogoyf grow large. Other decks like Jund or Abzan can create a large goyf easily using discard and burn, but we lack those tools and don't run as many card types. Snapcaster Mage also lacks it's best friend lightning bolt, are you confident that running 4 is the right choice? From what I can tell, the ability to replay sideboard cards likely outweighs any drawback, I could see a copy being sideboard material or dropping to 3 copies in the main perhaps? It could eliminate drawing into too many copies, I'll have to do some testing of my own with your list but those are just my few cents on the topic!
Tarmogoyf grows just fine - we're always the same size as the opponent in the goyf mirror, but we have noble. So in any 'mirror' goyf matchup, our goyfs are actually better. Rare is the occasion where goyf isn't out of bolt range by turn 2 - we're playing serum visions which helps with that, and a 4/5 goyf is all we ever need. Snapcaster is great, but I could see 3 being the right number. So far there have not been many occasions where I drew too many, but it does happen occasionally. Conversely, I almost always want a snapcaster in hand when I don't have one.
Also, what is your opinion on running Noble Hierarch as an additional turn 1 play? It seems like the deck is currently committed to playing control in the early phases of the game, but I don't think that Hierarch would jeopardize that in any way. It could assist in speeding up the deck allowing a turn two 3-drop, or a 2-drop with a Spell Snare at the ready, or just better control options earlier in the game. It also gives us a play against slower decks like Tron or some of the control brews. I suppose I might be valuing a mana dork too highly here, could it be that Hierarch isn't worth the tempo commitment?
Noble was in the list, but I made a formatting error in the OP that kinda hid the card - fixed! Noble is integral to the deck imo.
That is excellent news!!
I'll try pulling a list together in paper and running a few tournaments!
I played against a GR tron the other day and had a hard time with the matchup. I was naming Karn for Meddling Mage, should I be naming Ulamog or Ancient Stirrings?
Its purpose here isn't only to hose specific cards game 2+ (although it's still great at that); it's to turn Queller into a hard counter. It's a creative application I'd never really considered before, to be honest. You certainly wouldn't be criticized to move it to the SB in favor of either of the cards you mentioned in your particular version.
Isn't using something like Eidolon of Rhetoric a better option for this ?
That way you don't have to name specific cards and if Spell Queller gets removed the released card can't be played.
Eidolon is great but Meddling Mage works really nicely with Ojutai's Command. Playing Meddling Mage definitely comes with a learning curve but I think the pay off is there. I play against infect a lot and being able to MM Become Immense, Might of Old Krosa or any other pump spell while being able to Negate or hold up a Cryptic Command is hard to break out of. Infect and Dredge feel like the decks to beat right now and I think the match up vs Infect is very favorable.
I like Voice and Ooze and would love to find a way to play them. In magic christmas land I would love to slot Stoneforge Mystic in here, maybe one day.
I don't think that Meddling Mage is any good against "Infect" because there are too many cards that kill you and you can't name all of them anyway (you name "B.I" and they get you with "Might" or "Vines" or vice versa).
I think there is a case to be made that meddling mage has some weaknesses. That being said, with savvy use you can normally achieve a solid amount of value from the 2cmc hatebear. Naming become immense will greatly reduce the clock from infect, and you can get cute at times with things like naming blighted agent on the play if they open noble.
It would certainly be nice to be able to play sfm :P.
Meddling mage against fair decks either names the best grinding card if behind in tempo, or the best removal if ahead in tempo. Against unfair decks, meddling mage simply names the card that is going to end the game.
Anecdote: Today against ad nauseam I opened g-probe and saw double pact of negation double prism. On turn 2 I named pact of negation and had a negate and snapcaster in hand. That effectively ended the game on turn 2. Similarly, against GR ponza meddling mage naming primeval titan all but ended the game. It's not the greatest card, and sometimes you want to play it out in the dark and don't really hit anything in hand. But you basically never really miss with the card unless you name something that isn't in the deck...
edit: If you really don't like meddling mage, more qasali or a scooze could be okay. However, both of those give up considerable action against combo, ramp and midrange.
I played against a GR tron the other day and had a hard time with the matchup. I was naming Karn for Meddling Mage, should I be naming Ulamog or Ancient Stirrings?
It'll be based on your other answers in hand. If you have negate/distainful stroke/cryptic available, you'll name ulamog. Otherwise, it'll be be Karn. We can work through all of trons threats if we can line up the answers properly. Ulamog is the one threat we can't fully answer game 1, so naming it can be a great option.
That build is interesting, but I think it's a mistake to exclude Noble hierarch. Additionally, in testing Bant charm showed itself to just be too expensive to justify inclusion - nevermind eschewing the ramp that could help mitigate the issue. Ancestral Vision might be right for a slower meta, but I wouldn't want to open a hand with that against all the aggro/combo running around.
I had to replace the now banned 1-of Gitaxian probe with Traverse the Ulvenwald. Both cards performed well enough in the 5th sorcery spot in testing, but G-probe got the nod for phyrexian mana and combo with meddling mage.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern Decks
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
With Gitaxian Probe gone, I don't feel as though Meddling Mage has retained her strength. Vendilion Clique serves us pretty well but their toughness and legendary supertype are a significant weakness. Just throwing out a thought here, what about a larger midrange build with more dorks for mana fixing? I haven't done any real testing at this point, but I think if any deck were to harness the power of Torrential Gearhulk it would be us. Recasting Cryptic Command is clearly a winner and we can get there faster than other decks that don't use mana dorks. Something like Azorius Charm could cause a heavy boardstate/life swing, we could also use instants of any casting cost or color which is an idea I haven't really looked into other than perhaps Fracturing Gust as a sideboard card. In placement of the Meddling Mage + Spell Queller combo, we could go with Simic Charm or Heroic Intervention as options to keep queller alive that have the ability to be recast from the graveyard. Has anyone been working much on Bant midrange since the most recent banning announcement?
I don't think the deck wants birds of paradise, because it has nothing to do with them to gain more value late game like other GWx might have kessig wolf run or gavony township. Having excess dorks also makes your later game weaker by weakening topdecks (at least noble can attack). Overloading on MD blessed alliance is also probably not warranted because it is weak in the tron/valakut matchups.
Torrential Gearhulk was tested early, but 6 cmc means you never want more than 1, and getting to 6 while staying alive is quite the ask. I'd max out on snapcasters first, because you can snap path for 3 mana in the early game. Not including Negate makes the decks much weaker to non-creature threats like Scapeshift, Liliana of the Veil, Karn Liberated, etc. Heroic Intervention is going to be worse than negate in almost all cases.
Most people don't understand how to play Meddling mage (my impression is that such persons just haven't played the card enough to know how to use it), which might make her seems weak. I don't mean to give the impression that meddling mage is specifically here to combo with queller (that interaction, while useful isn't that good), but rather has that interaction as an ancillary benefit. With Traverse the Ulvenwald to find it, I have cut down to one copy in my latest build. That being said, the scavenging ooze that came in place of the second medding mage hasn't really been that great so far. There's some chance that a second Qasali pridemage is more appropriate in some metas. Meddling Mage is just so good vs linear/combo decks (and ok vs lightning bolt decks) that it's hard to give up. Meddling mage is often the difference between losing to lingering souls or ulamog, or buying enough time to beat down or find more answers.
Skipping Ojutai's Command also gives up very powerful lines of play which really hammer home the power of snap/goyf. Putting a goyf into play at instant speed should not be underestimated (many planeswalkers die to flash goyf). Creature-lands have also been very important for the deck, such as Lumbering Falls vs grixis/jund, and Stirring Wildwood more broadly. Celestial Colonnade has been a bit of a liability with Fatal push being a pretty big tempo swing - I'm starting to lean towards a second Wildwood in that spot.
From my perspective, your build gives up a bunch of things in order to try and make gearhulk work, where gearhulk's advantage over snapcaster is restricted to rebuying cryptic/command. Normally by the time you are snapping cryptic/command, the game is pretty much over.
One card that I have been trying out is ancestral vision. Ancestral vision felt very slow when the meta was more about infect, dredge and dsa. Now that those decks are a bit slower/weaker, Ancestral Vision is looking more promising given it's strength in midrange/control battles. Even so, it does little in the ramp matchups which need to be kept positive.
All that being said, I'd love to hear about other player's testing and assessments of the performance of various cards.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern Decks
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
Thanks for the response wpgstevo! I knew I was going out on a limb with that suggestion and I can see that I was much further out than I thought I don't have much input at this point other than I think I have to agree with all of your points. I've tried Meddling Mage again (running 2 copies with traverse and o-command) and I'm now believing its merit, it's becoming more and more useful as I learn which spells to target against each deck. Learning the best targets during game 1 in preparation for game 2 is actually fairly rewarding in itself
After analysing the emerging meta, I replaced a Meddling Mage with a scavenging ooze in the MD as a response to Goryo's and abzan, and took out a queller in favour of another spell snare to make a couple matchups a bit better on the draw. I'm still not sold on the scooze over the second mage, but it has a few benefits.
I played a few matches against Cheri0s last night, and that matchup is in our favour. Spell snare/path does lots of work game one, and the sb games are pretty easy if you keep the mox opals/creatures off the board. Meddling mage on Retract shuts them down pretty hard too. Last night's good (undefeated) session also featured wins over grixis delver, zoo, jeskai saheeli and dredge. The deck is running through brews like nothing, and still hitting at the tier 1 weight against others in that class.
Ancestral Vision is a great card, but not really needed in the matchups where it is good. In the matchups where it's bad, it's really bad. SB material at most until the meta is dominated by control/midrange imo.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern Decks
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
Hi friends! I've been experimenting with this archetype for a little while now and just discovered this thread. Is anyone still toying around with Bant all these months later?
As you can see, this list shares a lot of similarities to what was getting discussed here, but also a few big differences. I've gone for a more creature-centric build with an additional scary threat in the form of Geist of Saint Traft. Geist coming down on turn 2 is a pretty serious problem for any deck that's looking to lean on spot removal, and the exalted trigger from Noble Hierarch means it's a 3-turn clock instead of 4. Exalted also allows you to swing into obnoxious 2-power blockers like Snapcaster Mage. Simic Charm is another big departure, but so far it seems like a pretty good include. The Unsummon is a great tool in a meta full of Gurmag Anglers, and the Giant Growth can turn your Geist into a real terror. Hexproof mode can even save your creatures from Abrupt Decay.
One of my concerns when brewing was the weakness of threat-light builds against midrange-crushing decks like Tron and Valakut. Tron is another big reason I went for the Geist plan, since the ghost gives us a better chance of being able to race them before they start dropping unanswerable bombs. Spreading Seas in the sideboard also can buy us a bit more breathing room, and it's useful against Valakut as well. On the other hand, I guess Meddling Mage and a more flexible counterspell package (plus more Snapcaster Mages) are effective against those strategies as well.
So the list I am going try tonight is a lot different than these. I put it together as sort of one extreme end of the spectrum. I am trying to dial into the best cards in these colors. I want to test a few different versions of the deck(s) and sort of pull it all together in the end with the cards that make the most impact.
The idea behind this is that I wanted to test a lot of fliers and counter spells that all hopefully work well with each other with Restoration Angel.
What I expect:
I expect this deck to be pretty bad. 1) I don't expect there to me enough damage in my threats to close out the game quickly enough. 2) I think there are too many counterspells at such a high cost (4 cmc) that the decks that are able to cast multiple spells in a turn will just overwhelm me (especially if I'm only running 4 mana dorks instead of 6). 3) I suspect that the only cards that are going to stand out to me are going to be Spell Queller, Restoration Angel, and maybe Wall of Omens. However, I am being pretty liberal with the term "stand out" when talking about Wall of Omens. While the card is fine as a blocker, I just don't think it will be impactful enough on the game. 4 I suspect that the fliers are just going to be too slow at closing out the game while the ground creatures are just going to get run over and have the game end quick.
The side board is sort of a mess but I wanted to try out a lot of different cards and sort of see what ones are "needed" or wanted most of the time. I don't expect that to be dialed in at all. It's more of a blanket "these are good cards" kind of sideboard.
I Expect that there will need to be some sort of big threat in this Archetype that will help push it over the top. Maybe something like Knight of the Reliquary or Tarmogoyf or maybe something like Gideon Jura.
Overview of Bant Midrange
Bant Midrange is a deck that looks to have all the answers while quickly pressuring with a cheap powerhouse in the form of Tarmogoyf. Efficiency of threats and answers is key for the functionality of the deck. Bant Midrange has, for most of modern, been underpowered. Decks in Bant colours have previously had to find their power by using Tribal synergies (eldrazi, spirits) or Collected company with high creature counts. This synergistic approach, while successful, carries inherent weaknesses. By incorporating a more interactive and less creature dense build, the faster decks in the format become great matchups.
Tarmogoyf and Snapcaster Mage, arguably two of the best creatures in the format, can now play on the same team. With the printings of Spell Queller and Blessed Alliance, we have new strong answer cards that pair well with snappy and help goyf finish the job. Bant Midrange stands out from other midrange decks as a more reactive midrange strategy. Instead of proactively attacking the hand and then playing out threats like BGx decks, you'll be looking to interact as much as possible on the stack and board early, before dropping a threat while keeping interaction up. Serum visions helps ensure we have the right answers, and noble gets us ahead of the curve while winning goyf mirrors.
Some newer cards which powered up the archtype include Ojutai's Command, Botanical Sanctum, Lumbering Falls and Summary Dismissal.
Decklist
4 Tarmogoyf
1 Meddling Mage
1 Scavenging ooze
1 Qasali Pridemage
4 Snapcaster Mage
2 Spell Queller
1 Vendilion Clique
4 Path to Exile
4 Serum Visions
1 Traverse the Ulvenwald
2 Spell snare
1 Dispel
2 Blessed Alliance
3 Negate
2 Ojutai's Command
2 Cryptic Command
2 Windswept Heath
2 Flooded Strand
1 Temple Garden
2 Breeding Pool
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Botanical Sanctum
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Forest
1 Plains
2 Island
1 Stirring Wildwood
1 Lumbering Falls
1 Celestial Colonnade
2 Summary Dismissal
1 Rhox War Monk
1 Stony silence
2 Blessed Alliance
2 Celestial Purge
2 Disdainful Stroke
3 Natural State
2 Surgical Extraction
Playing Bant Midrange
The deck plays out fairly intuitively. You'll start with serum visions/noble/creatureland, and react to your opponents' plans accordingly. Here are some tips for playing and neat interactions:
Against any Rxx deck, Meddling Mage naming lightning bolt is almost always a pain to deal with - especially effective in grixis/jund/zoo/burn. Otherwise, Meddling mage should always name the card that is most likely to kill you in any given matchup. Ad nauseam, Become Immense, Cranial Plating, Conflagrate, Reality Smasher are good examples of a card to name when playing meddling mage proactively.
If you have a spell exiled with Spell Queller while Meddling mage is in the yard, you can respond to removal from your opponent on the spell queller with Ojutai's Command to get back a Meddling Mage from the graveyard, and name whatever spell is under queller. When queller leaves with a mage on the exiled spell, the spell stays exiled.
Playing Blessed Alliance and escalating to untap can be helpful. For instance, if you have blessed alliance and path to exile in hand, you can cast blessed alliance for sac + untap, untap goyf and noble, block with goyf and cast path. Lines involving untapping your goyf/queller and noble come up more often than one might think. This also occurs with tapped creaturelands.
With snapcaster and/or goyf in the graveyard, Ojutai's command can get pretty sick. Instant speed goyf plus draw a card is pretty sick as a basic play, but it gets better with snappy as the game goes late. For instance, at 8 mana you can cast ojutai's command drawing a card and getting snappy back, then flashback ojutai's command getting goyf and drawing another card - all at flash speed. Ojutai's Command opens some interesting lines for Bant, and it can often be correct to chump block/suicide attack with snappy simply to have access to it with Ojutai's command.
Matchups
Good matchups: grixis, tron, valakut, cherios, ad nauseam
even matchups: abzan, bant eldrazi, jund
Bad matchups: Uw control, bw tokens
Sideboarding
Suicide Bloo: In: 2 Blessed Alliance, 1 Rhox War Monk Out: 2 Ojutai's Command, 1 Vendilion Clique
Death's Shadow Aggro: In: 2 Blessed Alliance, 2 Celestial Purge, 1 Rhox War Monk Out: 2 Ojutai's Command, 2 Cryptic Command, 1 Vendilion Clique
Dredge: In: 2 Celestial Purge 2 Surgical Extraction 1 Rhox War monk Out: 2 negate, 2 spell quller, 1 Vendilion Clique
Affinity: In: 2 Blessed Alliance, 3 Natural State, 1 Stony Silence, 1 Rhox war monk Out: 2 Ojutai's Command, 2 cryptic command, 1 dispel, 1 traverse, 1 vendilion clique
Burn: In: 2 Blessed Alliance 1 Celestial Purge 1 Rhox War Monk Out: 2 Cryptic Command, 1 Vendilion Clique, 1 traverse
valakut: In: 2 disdainful stroke, 2 summary dismissal Out: 2 Ojutai's Command, 2 Blessed Alliance
Jund: In: 2 Celestial Purge, 1 Rhox war monk Out: 1 Negate, 1 Qasali Pridgemage, 1 Vendilion Clique
Grixis: In: 2 Celestial Purge, 1 Rhox war monk Out: 1 Qasali Pridgemage, 1 Cryptic Command, 1 Vendilion Clique
Tron: In: 2 disdainful stroke, 2 summary dismissal, 1 stony silence, 1 Natural State Out: 2 Ojutai's Command, 2 Blessed Alliance, 1 Spell Queller, 1 Dispel
Feb 22/17
Here's the build I'm looking at should SFM get unbanned soon - I expect this deck to turn into Bant Stoneblade should SFM become available.
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Stoneforge Mystic
3 Snapcaster Mage
2 Spell Queller
1 Batterskull
1 Sword of Feast and Famine
1 Sword of Light and Shadow
4 Path to Exile
4 Serum Visions
2 Spell Snare
1 Dispel
2 Blessed Alliance
3 Negate
1 Ojutai's Command
1 Cryptic Command
2 Windswept Heath
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Horizon Canopy
2 Botanical Sanctum
1 Temple Garden
2 Breeding Pool
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Forest
1 Plains
2 Island
2 Stirring Wildwood
1 Lumbering Falls
3 Natural State
2 Celestial Purge
2 Disdainful Stroke
1 Disenchant
2 Blessed Alliance
2 Vendilion Clique
1 Summary Dismissal
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
Engineered Explosives has been in the SB before, and is a solid option against tokens (which can be problematic).
Meddling mage can be tricky to use, but has a very high skill ceiling. I have won more than a couple games thanks to meddling mage doing some serious work.
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
There are a few cards in the upcoming set that I think may find a home in the 75 somewhere!
I'm very excited, good work!
Renegade Rallier is probably more suited to decks using collected company or eldritch evolution. Ojutai's command is just better for that effect in this deck (3cmc ramp spell at sorcery is bad here).
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
How are you finding Tarmogoyf and Snapcaster Mage? In my experience, Bant has trouble making Tarmogoyf grow large. Other decks like Jund or Abzan can create a large goyf easily using discard and burn, but we lack those tools and don't run as many card types. Snapcaster Mage also lacks it's best friend lightning bolt, are you confident that running 4 is the right choice? From what I can tell, the ability to replay sideboard cards likely outweighs any drawback, I could see a copy being sideboard material or dropping to 3 copies in the main perhaps? It could eliminate drawing into too many copies, I'll have to do some testing of my own with your list but those are just my few cents on the topic!
Also, what is your opinion on running Noble Hierarch as an additional turn 1 play? It seems like the deck is currently committed to playing control in the early phases of the game, but I don't think that Hierarch would jeopardize that in any way. It could assist in speeding up the deck allowing a turn two 3-drop, or a 2-drop with a Spell Snare at the ready, or just better control options earlier in the game. It also gives us a play against slower decks like Tron or some of the control brews. I suppose I might be valuing a mana dork too highly here, could it be that Hierarch isn't worth the tempo commitment?
Noble was in the list, but I made a formatting error in the OP that kinda hid the card - fixed! Noble is integral to the deck imo.
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
I'll try pulling a list together in paper and running a few tournaments!
why not use Scavenging Ooze (or Voice of Resurgence) instead ?
Its purpose here isn't only to hose specific cards game 2+ (although it's still great at that); it's to turn Queller into a hard counter. It's a creative application I'd never really considered before, to be honest. You certainly wouldn't be criticized to move it to the SB in favor of either of the cards you mentioned in your particular version.
CG
That way you don't have to name specific cards and if Spell Queller gets removed the released card can't be played.
I like Voice and Ooze and would love to find a way to play them. In magic christmas land I would love to slot Stoneforge Mystic in here, maybe one day.
It would certainly be nice to be able to play sfm :P.
Meddling mage against fair decks either names the best grinding card if behind in tempo, or the best removal if ahead in tempo. Against unfair decks, meddling mage simply names the card that is going to end the game.
Anecdote: Today against ad nauseam I opened g-probe and saw double pact of negation double prism. On turn 2 I named pact of negation and had a negate and snapcaster in hand. That effectively ended the game on turn 2. Similarly, against GR ponza meddling mage naming primeval titan all but ended the game. It's not the greatest card, and sometimes you want to play it out in the dark and don't really hit anything in hand. But you basically never really miss with the card unless you name something that isn't in the deck...
edit: If you really don't like meddling mage, more qasali or a scooze could be okay. However, both of those give up considerable action against combo, ramp and midrange.
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
I had to replace the now banned 1-of Gitaxian probe with Traverse the Ulvenwald. Both cards performed well enough in the 5th sorcery spot in testing, but G-probe got the nod for phyrexian mana and combo with meddling mage.
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
2x Birds of Paradise
4x Noble Hierarch
2x Snapcaster Mage
4x Tarmogoyf
4x Spell Queller
2x Torrential Gearhulk
Instant (16)
4x Blessed Alliance
4x Cryptic Command
2x Heroic Intervention
4x Path to Exile
2x Spell Snare
4x Serum Visions
Land (22)
3x Botanical Sanctum
1x Breeding Pool
2x Flooded Strand
1x Forest
1x Hallowed Fountain
3x Island
4x Misty Rainforest
1x Mystic Gate
2x Plains
1x Tectonic Edge
1x Temple Garden
2x Windswept Heath
Torrential Gearhulk was tested early, but 6 cmc means you never want more than 1, and getting to 6 while staying alive is quite the ask. I'd max out on snapcasters first, because you can snap path for 3 mana in the early game. Not including Negate makes the decks much weaker to non-creature threats like Scapeshift, Liliana of the Veil, Karn Liberated, etc. Heroic Intervention is going to be worse than negate in almost all cases.
Most people don't understand how to play Meddling mage (my impression is that such persons just haven't played the card enough to know how to use it), which might make her seems weak. I don't mean to give the impression that meddling mage is specifically here to combo with queller (that interaction, while useful isn't that good), but rather has that interaction as an ancillary benefit. With Traverse the Ulvenwald to find it, I have cut down to one copy in my latest build. That being said, the scavenging ooze that came in place of the second medding mage hasn't really been that great so far. There's some chance that a second Qasali pridemage is more appropriate in some metas. Meddling Mage is just so good vs linear/combo decks (and ok vs lightning bolt decks) that it's hard to give up. Meddling mage is often the difference between losing to lingering souls or ulamog, or buying enough time to beat down or find more answers.
Skipping Ojutai's Command also gives up very powerful lines of play which really hammer home the power of snap/goyf. Putting a goyf into play at instant speed should not be underestimated (many planeswalkers die to flash goyf). Creature-lands have also been very important for the deck, such as Lumbering Falls vs grixis/jund, and Stirring Wildwood more broadly. Celestial Colonnade has been a bit of a liability with Fatal push being a pretty big tempo swing - I'm starting to lean towards a second Wildwood in that spot.
From my perspective, your build gives up a bunch of things in order to try and make gearhulk work, where gearhulk's advantage over snapcaster is restricted to rebuying cryptic/command. Normally by the time you are snapping cryptic/command, the game is pretty much over.
One card that I have been trying out is ancestral vision. Ancestral vision felt very slow when the meta was more about infect, dredge and dsa. Now that those decks are a bit slower/weaker, Ancestral Vision is looking more promising given it's strength in midrange/control battles. Even so, it does little in the ramp matchups which need to be kept positive.
All that being said, I'd love to hear about other player's testing and assessments of the performance of various cards.
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
Good luck with testing everyone!
I played a few matches against Cheri0s last night, and that matchup is in our favour. Spell snare/path does lots of work game one, and the sb games are pretty easy if you keep the mox opals/creatures off the board. Meddling mage on Retract shuts them down pretty hard too. Last night's good (undefeated) session also featured wins over grixis delver, zoo, jeskai saheeli and dredge. The deck is running through brews like nothing, and still hitting at the tier 1 weight against others in that class.
Ancestral Vision is a great card, but not really needed in the matchups where it is good. In the matchups where it's bad, it's really bad. SB material at most until the meta is dominated by control/midrange imo.
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
Here's what I've been working with:
2 Botanical Sanctum
2 Breeding Pool
2 Celestial Colonnade
4 Flooded Strand
1 Forest
1 Ghost Quarter
2 Hallowed Fountain
2 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Plains
1 Temple Garden
1 Windswept Heath
Spells (16)
2 Blessed Alliance
2 Cryptic Command
4 Path to Exile
4 Serum Visions
2 Simic Charm
2 Spell Snare
3 Geist of Saint Traft
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Restoration Angel
2 Snapcaster Mage
4 Spell Queller
4 Tarmogoyf
1 Thragtusk
Artifacts (1)
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Celestial Purge
1 Ceremonious Rejection
1 Dispel
1 Grafdigger's Cage
2 Kitchen Finks
2 Negate
1 Reclamation Sage
2 Spreading Seas
2 Stony Silence
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
As you can see, this list shares a lot of similarities to what was getting discussed here, but also a few big differences. I've gone for a more creature-centric build with an additional scary threat in the form of Geist of Saint Traft. Geist coming down on turn 2 is a pretty serious problem for any deck that's looking to lean on spot removal, and the exalted trigger from Noble Hierarch means it's a 3-turn clock instead of 4. Exalted also allows you to swing into obnoxious 2-power blockers like Snapcaster Mage. Simic Charm is another big departure, but so far it seems like a pretty good include. The Unsummon is a great tool in a meta full of Gurmag Anglers, and the Giant Growth can turn your Geist into a real terror. Hexproof mode can even save your creatures from Abrupt Decay.
One of my concerns when brewing was the weakness of threat-light builds against midrange-crushing decks like Tron and Valakut. Tron is another big reason I went for the Geist plan, since the ghost gives us a better chance of being able to race them before they start dropping unanswerable bombs. Spreading Seas in the sideboard also can buy us a bit more breathing room, and it's useful against Valakut as well. On the other hand, I guess Meddling Mage and a more flexible counterspell package (plus more Snapcaster Mages) are effective against those strategies as well.
Today my list looks like this:
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Wall of Omens
2 Snapcaster Mage
4 Spell Queller
3 Mystic Snake
3 Restoration Angel
Instant/Sorcery
4 Path to exile
3 Cryptic Command
4 Remand
3 Vapor Snag
1 Sphinx's Revelation
4 Flooded Strand
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Hallowed Fountain
2 Breeding Pool
1 Forest
1 Plains
3 Island
2 Botanical Sanctum
1 Hinterland Harbor
4 Celestial Colonnade
1 Gavony Township
2 Stony Silence
3 Kitchen Finks
2 Ceremonious Rejection
2 Meddling Mage
1 Blessed Alliance
1 Celestial Purge
1 Thrun, the Last Troll
2 Dispel
1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion
The idea behind this is that I wanted to test a lot of fliers and counter spells that all hopefully work well with each other with Restoration Angel.
What I expect:
I expect this deck to be pretty bad.
1) I don't expect there to me enough damage in my threats to close out the game quickly enough.
2) I think there are too many counterspells at such a high cost (4 cmc) that the decks that are able to cast multiple spells in a turn will just overwhelm me (especially if I'm only running 4 mana dorks instead of 6).
3) I suspect that the only cards that are going to stand out to me are going to be Spell Queller, Restoration Angel, and maybe Wall of Omens. However, I am being pretty liberal with the term "stand out" when talking about Wall of Omens. While the card is fine as a blocker, I just don't think it will be impactful enough on the game.
4 I suspect that the fliers are just going to be too slow at closing out the game while the ground creatures are just going to get run over and have the game end quick.
The side board is sort of a mess but I wanted to try out a lot of different cards and sort of see what ones are "needed" or wanted most of the time. I don't expect that to be dialed in at all. It's more of a blanket "these are good cards" kind of sideboard.
I Expect that there will need to be some sort of big threat in this Archetype that will help push it over the top. Maybe something like Knight of the Reliquary or Tarmogoyf or maybe something like Gideon Jura.
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Creature (11)
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
2 Snapcaster Mage
2 Nissa, Vastwood Seer
2 Courser of Kruphix
1 Emrakul, the Promised End
Sorcery (11)
4 Serum Visions
2 Explore
1 Wrath of God
1 Supreme Verdict
3 Time Warp
Instant (11)
4 Path to Exile
2 Remand
1 Bant Charm
3 Cryptic Command
1 Sphinx's Revelation
1 Search for Azcanta
Land (23)
3 Island
2 Plains
2 Forest
3 Flooded Strand
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Temple Garden
1 Breeding Pool
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Prairie Stream
2 Flooded Grove
1 Celestial Colonnade
2 Field of Ruin
1 Porphyry Nodes
1 Dispel
1 Relic of Progenitus
2 Negate
2 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
1 Celestial Purge
1 Rhox War Monk
1 Day of Judgment
1 Obstinate Baloth
1 Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
1 Wurmcoil Engine
some strange choices but i dig the use of STE as an anti- blood moon measure