So, I've had a migraine a majority of the day, but I figure I would at least let you guys know how the IQ went.
Abzan Chord Combo (Vizier/Druid, Anafenza/Finks, Spike/Angel) 2-1
Abzan Humans 2-0
Naya Burn 2-1
Esper Control 2-1
Counters Company 1-2
ID
TOP 8:
2-1 Eldrazi Tron
0-2 Grixis Shadow
Placed 3/4th with list mentioned above. If you have any questions about a specific matchup, I'll try my best to remember, but I didn't keep any notes and I've had a massive headache since round 3.
@TALGARDO
I think the problem with it is that if you build the deck, you have around 3-5 flex slots depending on what you want to do, and our flex slots tend to be something that advances our main gameplan (Courser/Azusa#4) or slows the opponents game plan (Spell Pierce/Walking Ballista). The problem with millrock is it does neither, but helps with another angle of attack. Unfortunately, it does so very slowly, compared to Hive Mind, where it would just win on the spot. I think if you want a mill option, you could play land number 27/28 depending on your list, and play 1-2 Nephalia Drownyard, but it probably isn't the best idea, because both mill options require you to play a Primeval Titan to actually do anything with them, and if you play titan, you are probably winning off the titan before the mill becomes important. If you have a list where you can "cheat" multiple permanents into play in a single turn (like Caketaro's old Scout/Knightfall list) where you can infinitely play lands, it would work, but it would work better if you were to just take your infinite mana from Lotus Cobra/Amulet and play something else, like walking ballista or titan. Again, this is just from my experience with Scoutfall and traditional lists, but I could be wrong and there could be a way to make it do more in the mainboard.
Edit: @DaviusMinimus, you were 100% right on Damnation today. I sided it in multiple times, and never cast it because of the double black mana cost. I think I lost 3 games because of it as well. Not because Mine vs Hub, but because I had a single rot farm or a single hub, and not 2/both.
@davius Congrats man! I've been wanting to try groves but the only cut-able land I could find was botanical sanctum and it makes tolaria west pretty tough to transmute pre-titan. What did you cut for the groves?
Also how good has radiant fountain been for you? I cut it from mine a while ago and haven't missed it at all but I'm still doing spinerock-emrakul as a win con so I generally win on the spot when titan attacks against burn.
no relevant match notes really other than root maze was extremely disappointing, both match losses I had a maze in play and was just flooding out so I think explore would have been better. I still really like the spinerock/breach package to help vs blood moon and combo decks that you will lose if you give them another turn after a titan attack.
First round against a variant of grixis -Its a grixis deck with tasigur fish and bone picker with white splash for lingerine souls.
The deck is great to start appling pressure since turn 3, He Kolaghans Command my azusa and amulet of vigor. I clear up tokens, remove gaveyard, land a Titan and grabbing Slayer's Stronghold and a Boros garrison. Then I attacked with the titan is got killed, next turn I just won with a hasted titan.
Second match, I sided out 2 Serum Visions, 2 Amulet, 1 Summoners Pact and 1 or 2 Sakura's. Sided in 2 Bone fire, 1 Hornet Queen, 2 tracker and 1 dismember and a swan song.
During the game the deck performed just great, ramped with azusa, it she got killed afterwords, and the Sakura landed the bounced lands, managed to cast a tracker and obtaining 2 Clues, then Casted a Hornet Queen. He stabilized with lingerine souls and Bone picker and next turn I draw a walking ballista (5counters) and killing all his stuff. And started a clock and finish the game 2 turns later. 2-0
Second round I faced Counters Company, first game I had to mulligan, and second hand was really poor... My opponent neither have a good hand, but he killed me by pumping with Govony Township their mana dorks. Next game I had to mulligan, I managed to control a little bit when I got my titan on board, he top deck the last piece of the combo. 0-2
Third against affinity, I had to mulligan both games, but keep good hands, first game started with explosives and walking ballista. Second game I got a brutal hand, 2 amulets, 1 explorer vesuva forest and a karoo. Started with a forest and Sakura, I draw a titan next turn and then a summoners pact. Played both amulet. He put me on heavy pressure (cranial on skirge put me at 7 and he on 24).
On turn 3 I played 1 titan, with 1 searched for a tolaria and simic growth, (6 mana) and casted a Titan, fetched for boros garrison and slayer's stronghold, hate to both titans. Then I missplayed horrible, I gave both titans double strike. But it is impossible to do that, I realized when I got home. The proper play would be to gave 1 titan double strike, and with the other trigger, look for 1 simic growth and a tolaria, after the attack, transmute for explosives, and trigger it on his turn for 2 killing all his stuff.
I was able to do thr tolarian trick after combat. I have the explorer untapped so I was able to generate 7 mana (4 from simic + 3 gemstone and simic landed by 2nd titan) mana to transmute. ( got a tolaria in hand, crazy game indeed)
I liked Visions, a friend also uses explore. Relic is very strong maybe I will use 3 visions and 3 relic for saturday tournament.
I also saw kanister's list. It seems he cut ghost quarter and the second basic forest to make room for the groves. I'm currently playing just two groves, but when I had 1 in my opener vs grixis shadow, it felt great, so I could see playing more of them due to the prevalence of the deck online. Even if it somewhat hinders other matchups, it could be worth it.
I've been on vacation - everyone's adaptations for the current Shadow-abundant meta are amazing, the Amulet community is strong, nice job everyone! @daviusminimus, great results! What are your #'s on cantrips after some testing? Just for kicks, here's the list I'm going to try. Trinket Mage seems like even more of an all-star in this iteration! I cut forest number two rather than GQ since Eldrazi Tron is en vogue after Todd Stevens' victory.
Hey all, I'm new to this sub, but not to Amulet. I have it built both online and in paper and enjoy it quite a bit, although I'm not sure if I'm confident enough to take it to a competitive event over all the other options I have in paper. The current list I'm in a league with is this: http://imgur.com/a/KhVme I had to make some concessions due to limited mtgo funds, like no second EE and no Ballista. I've never really been that happy with tracker, but I've also not been able to find a suitable replacement. I'm definitely feeling the loss of diversity of threats as I got hit with a Lost Legacy in the first round of my league (although his vault of the archangel + souls tokens was making any number of threats without trample pretty ineffectual). I still took the match, but it was clear that a value threat is definitely needed and tracker is probably that card so I will have to put them back in next league. Of course, as soon as I move to the Grove/Relic build I stop facing GY based strategies....I really love how many lines we have (especially with ballista in the list =/ ) and how often our opponents don't know how to make the correct plays against the deck.. Anyways, I just wanted to introduce myself (online tag dmk510) and say I play on putting in more reps with this deck and hopefully can add some valuable content to this page. See ya'll online!
@daviusminimus Are you having trouble transmuting or casting Visions when you need it? E.g. have you had a stale visions in your hand, or have you not been able to pact for Cavern before casting Titan? That is my fear - I have won games solely because I can transmute for EE, Chalice or Ballista and use it as early as turn 3, and it will be much harder with Groves. That said, I can't ignore the Death's Shadow-sized elephant in the room - if we don't adapt, it won't matter how good our match-ups are against the rest of the meta. Also, how much more useful is Relic on turn 1/2 than after? I'm thinking about doing a 4 Stirrings, 4 Visions, 1 Relic split, with the benefit of finding the Relic with Stirrings, and the Trinket Mage serving as a 2nd copy so to speak, most likely on turn 3 as I probably wouldn't keep a hand without an amulet or an accelerant. Do you think that's frequent enough? The list would look something like below. The benefit here is you still get the speed of the old version (albeit with only 11 blue sources, 12 counting Vesuva, as opposed to previous 13/14), and you minimize the chances of drawing Relic as a bad cantrip against match-ups that don't use the graveyard. I really don't care for Explore.
Also, I would like to suggest two cards that might be useful, but I am not sure where I would put them - Condescend and Mystic Speculation. The idea is that with this deck, raw card advantage is not as important as selection (we need 4 combo pieces, sometimes 3, so rather than needing quantity, we usually just need that one bounceland or that one amulet to go off). The reason I suggest these cards is actually due to my experience with Explore - drawing a random unfiltered card is usually not very helpful. How often do you actually hit the exact combo piece you need? Every once in awhile you hit a bounceland you had about a 9/51(17%, assumption is turn 2 and not having seen a bounceland yet) chance in hitting, but usually it's not what you want, and if you hit the combo lands it's sometimes just bad as you have to waste the land drop. Mystic Speculation is almost strictly worse than Serum Visions, but the buyback is interesting, and I think there's an argument for it being better than Sleight of Hand in this deck. Condescend is more interesting to me though - at worst it's an instant speed Scry 2 for one U, assuming your opponent plays a spell during their turn. At best, it's a counterspell we can usually make big enough to make it a hard counter, and you get to dig for more gas. I'm picturing it in place of Serum Visions, so it's probably worse. But how much worse? The thought of countering a Gurmag Angler or Tasigur, the Golden Fang after they delve away the graveyard and scrying into the amulet we need sounds great, doesn't it?
@daviusminimus So you are off the 2 Visions/2 Relic split then, just explores? That was my fear and why I was asking, Visions seems untenable with the Groves. But I think jamming a couple Groves, replacing good cantrips like Visions with Relics, and reducing the overall number of cantrips below 8 post-board just to remove useless Relics makes the deck worse against so many match-ups just to catch up to Death's Shadow, and even then the match-up is still pretty even. I'm trying to figure out how to fix that, and I think we all are. Replacing Visions with Explore feels much worse to me. The early Relic being crucial also confirmed my fears...
The thing I like about Condescend is against hand disruption, where they're going to rip your turn 2/3 play sometimes and leave you with open mana, at least you threaten them on their turn before scrying for the pieces you need for turn 3. It's very narrow, for sure, but trying to figure out what could give me less feelbads than Explore - Oath of Nissa can't grab artifacts, Vessel of Nascency is a little expensive but great, except for the chance you find utility lands or x2 Titans or something you need that end up in the bin, nothing else is great. The Remand experience is helpful, good comparison, thanks for sharing.
Good point on Mystic Speculation - the other variables I would factor in are 1) the % of hitting the exact card you want, which goes up some % when you want to scry top 3 to the bottom, but you probably get better % points with Sleight in that case, you are correct; and 2) you don't necessarily need to cast the card the turn you scry it - sometimes you can cast an amulet, but more often you will find the S-Pact/Titan/Azusa/Bounceland you need for turn 3, or sometimes you will find an amulet and still be able to go off on turn 3. So I would factor in getting the card vs just placing on top a little less - the % points better in your case come more from seeing an extra card the NEXT turn, which could offer additional benefit, in my opinion. I don't think either card is better than Visions at first glance though, and unfortuntately we can't play many/any of any of them because Death's Shadow. Boo.
Thanks for all your experience and testing - great to have a dedicated player to bounce ideas off of.
So I just got time to start a competitive league for the first time in a couple weeks, running x2 Relic, x2 Botanical Sanctum and a Grove of the Burnwillows in place of the maindeck Ghost Quarter. I just played two matches straight against Grix DS - match 1 the Groves killed 4 Death's Shadows (once, with an amulet out, I pulled Vesuva off the top and played as a Grove to get my opponent from 11 to 13, which was sexy), but even Relic to start just felt like it put a small dent in their delving. I think long term value is good, since it gets the early hand disruption out of the graveyard so they can't snap it back when we're sitting around with a Titan just waiting to get 6 mana. I definitely am happier to see Grove than Relic, but both are nice. I lost match 1 game 3 because I pulled the Radiant Fountain for the Bog, and I had stabilized on 3 life and was fetching non-value lands since I had them all on the board already, and they ripped their 1 or 2 of Lightning Bolt off the top, which hurt. I am not sure which land to pull between Radiant Fountain and Cavern of Souls to bring in the Bog - opinions? I won match 2 game 3 by ripping a Hornet Queen off the top, though. It's a tough match and I figure we'll see a lot of it on MTGO, so I think I am going to try Explores and x3 Groves next. It is a super fun deck to play against, as an aside.
The result was 3-3, It felt kind of salty cause I faced 1 Blue Moon, and 1 BG Rock deck that were really tunned to face big mana decks.
Overall the deck performed just fine, The videos of daviusminimus were really helpfull, Every time I got 2 amultes, Chained 2 titans and doublestrike them ;).
1st round I won against Bant Reliquary 2-0.
2nd rounde, I loose 1-2 against Affinity. First game was really close. Ravager made the difference. Second game I went to mulligan 5 and being able to win really brutally. On third game, I pay the price of being newby with the deck. I got tolaria and summoners pact on hand, He got ravager and 2 inkmoth nexus on play. I killed the ravager and he transferred the counters to his Mothland. The proper play would be to transmute for ghost quarter and play it nex turn, but I realized of it after the game was over.
Then I went right to Blue moon deck and was really frustrating, but I think we are the predelict enemy for them. Second game I look strong to counter their blood moon, situation that he played arround. Maybe I should look for an aggressive hand and try to win faster.
4th round I faced BG Rock, he had early pressure and enough discard to put me of the game. Second game I was just always behind and kept a bonefire in hand. Maybe I sideboarded wrong on this game, again, more playtesting required.
5th round, I faced Counter Company, I beat him 2-0. This is a game that I was prepared for, never let him keep 1 piece of the combo on board if he uses collected company.
6th round, I faced WB japanese eldrazi list, I was able to manage the situation, my last play was tolaria for a Negation Pact, and attack with a Titan.
In conclusion, Never sided in Chalice, need advice on using this tool, Bonefire is fun but not always worth.
the split of explore/serum is very good, I' thinking on playing 3 explore, 3 sakura and 2 serum. The explorer-snake-girl get's killed most of the time.
Nice job man! Good that you had a couple bumps you learned from - Affinity is hard, because you need answers quickly and there are a lot of options (if you have Trinket Mage or a T-West to transmute, you need to determine if EE/Walking Ballista is best, if you need GQ for flier, or go all-in on ramping into Titan. It's a tough match-up for sure, I would recommend mulliganing aggressively for fast Titans or a sideboard card to quell the first Cranial Plating or Ravager.
Regarding Chalice, I am in the minority of people who play it on this forum, but here are some match-ups I bring it in for:
- Grix Death's Shadow on 1 - turns on their Kommands even more, but it turns off like 25 maindeck cards so I think it's worth it, plus that means they aren't targeting an amulet, just make sure to stick an amulet or a Scout first before you set it on 1
- Ad Naus on 3 - to turn off Lightning Storm and Lab Maniac, or 0 to counter the Lotus to buy a turn in a pinch)
- Lantern on 1 - before they assemble the lock pieces is a win unless they find one of one or two removal spells
- Burn on 1 usually slows them down long enough to stabilize (this may be a case of a card being sided in/out based on play/draw, as turn 2 on the play might be too late for this)
- U/R Gifts Storm on 2 - makes it hard for them to combo off, but unless you find an accelerant they can sometimes race the Chalice
- Cheerios on 0 (duh)
- 8-Rack on 1 turns off Rack and all discard, backbreaking
- Living End, Restore Balance and all As Foretold decks on 0
- Bogles on 1
I also have played around with bringing it in against all Scapeshift decks to set on 4, since you really just bring in counterspells in the match-ups anyway, so bringing in Chalice in place of your 8th or 9th cantrip or 27th land is a card that with a nuts draw of 8 mana on turn 3 is basically a 12th Titan (aka a near-guaranteed win). Hope this is helpful.
@daviusminimus I was hoping your playtesting would yield these results. I feel like the combination of losing Serum Visions and not having enough blue to transmute on early turns isn't worth the few points you gain vs deaths shadow (and lose vs like, bant and eldrazi tron, when you spot them 5 life from an early Grove). I agree with everything you've said. What do you think of one Groves mainboard you can grab with Titan or transmute in place of the mainboard ghost quarter? The GQ definitely has better utility, especially being an out to game 1 blood moon, but you get to keep your Visions that way
hi all, huge fan of this deck, played it since justin cohen got 2nd at the PT until Summer Bloom got banned. recently picked this deck up again in preparation for upcoming modern PPTQ.
does anyone miss slaughter pact? i have faced a few vizier-variant decks recently and i could really use a tutor-able kill spell, even though i don't think this is an unfavorable matchup.
@davis thanks for updating on your testing, i have been questioning whether are the grooves worth playing for the deathshadow matchup because of the cost and i personally prefer casting serum visions. are you playing full playset of azusa currently?
@daviusminimum Thanks man - I appreciate your guidance, you helped quite a bit! My LGS doesn't have many of certain decks (Dredge, for instance), so your guidance was helpful. My girlfriend was sleeping, which was why I didn't have the mic on, but going forward I will mic up, since it cost me a match due to time out this last time
Sorry, but I take your words as gospel, nothing you can do about it! I hear what you're saying - the match-ups with Relic is good, it's great, but then there are aggro and fast combo matches where you need to see more cards and combo quicker, and Relic probably feels terrible in those matches compared to Visions. I personally am sticking with 3 Visions/2 Relics, my pet card Trinket Mage and 2 Sanctums, and I'm putting the Bojuka back main and running just the one GQ in the side. I'm going to try to find someone on MTGO who would like to jam like 10 matches of Living End or Grixis DS and see how it really feels, as I feel like our results have been too small of sample sizes to yield good conclusions.
Congrats on all your 4-1's, you're printing tix with Amulet, that's great news for us all
I'm not going to answer many if any questions about this. Once I start helping people, it's hard for me to stop.
Here is what Edgar and I played at GP Las Vegas. Jake played a 4th Relic and 3rd Explore over the Bojuka Bog and Walking Ballista. Our lists are all identical otherwise.
Main Deck
Qty Cardname
4 Azusa, Lost but Seeking
4 Primeval Titan
4 Sakura-Tribe Scout
1 Walking Ballista
4 Amulet of Vigor
4 Ancient Stirrings
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Explore
1 Pact of Negation
3 Relic of Progenitus
4 Summoner's Pact
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Boros Garrison
1 Cavern of Souls
2 Forest
4 Gemstone Mine
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
3 Gruul Turf
1 Khalni Garden
1 Radiant Fountain
1 Selesnya Sanctuary
4 Simic Growth Chamber
1 Slayers' Stronghold
1 Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion
3 Tolaria West
1 Vesuva
60 Total
Sideboard
Qty Cardname
3 Dismember
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Hornet Queen
2 Kozilek's Return
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Ruric Thar, the Unbowed
3 Swan Song
1 Thragtusk
2 Tireless Tracker
15 Total
yey! bobby's back! thanks for the inputs. which do you think are our worst matchups now? how was your tournament result? anything you'd like to change with your list?
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It is too fancy to try to mill in addition to the main strategy?
Abzan Chord Combo (Vizier/Druid, Anafenza/Finks, Spike/Angel) 2-1
Abzan Humans 2-0
Naya Burn 2-1
Esper Control 2-1
Counters Company 1-2
ID
TOP 8:
2-1 Eldrazi Tron
0-2 Grixis Shadow
Placed 3/4th with list mentioned above. If you have any questions about a specific matchup, I'll try my best to remember, but I didn't keep any notes and I've had a massive headache since round 3.
@TALGARDO
I think the problem with it is that if you build the deck, you have around 3-5 flex slots depending on what you want to do, and our flex slots tend to be something that advances our main gameplan (Courser/Azusa#4) or slows the opponents game plan (Spell Pierce/Walking Ballista). The problem with millrock is it does neither, but helps with another angle of attack. Unfortunately, it does so very slowly, compared to Hive Mind, where it would just win on the spot. I think if you want a mill option, you could play land number 27/28 depending on your list, and play 1-2 Nephalia Drownyard, but it probably isn't the best idea, because both mill options require you to play a Primeval Titan to actually do anything with them, and if you play titan, you are probably winning off the titan before the mill becomes important. If you have a list where you can "cheat" multiple permanents into play in a single turn (like Caketaro's old Scout/Knightfall list) where you can infinitely play lands, it would work, but it would work better if you were to just take your infinite mana from Lotus Cobra/Amulet and play something else, like walking ballista or titan. Again, this is just from my experience with Scoutfall and traditional lists, but I could be wrong and there could be a way to make it do more in the mainboard.
Edit: @DaviusMinimus, you were 100% right on Damnation today. I sided it in multiple times, and never cast it because of the double black mana cost. I think I lost 3 games because of it as well. Not because Mine vs Hub, but because I had a single rot farm or a single hub, and not 2/both.
Contratulations ln your results at the IQ. Im curious on How does performed Glissa?
Also how good has radiant fountain been for you? I cut it from mine a while ago and haven't missed it at all but I'm still doing spinerock-emrakul as a win con so I generally win on the spot when titan attacks against burn.
I went 4-2 at Nerd Rage's $1k event:
rd 1: abzan midrange 2-0
rd 2: affinity 2-0
rd 3: burn 2-1
rd 4: grixis shadow 0-2
rd 5: burn 1-2
rd 6: grixis shadow 2-1
no relevant match notes really other than root maze was extremely disappointing, both match losses I had a maze in play and was just flooding out so I think explore would have been better. I still really like the spinerock/breach package to help vs blood moon and combo decks that you will lose if you give them another turn after a titan attack.
4 Primeval Titan
4 Sakura-Tribe Scout
1 Courser of Kruphix
1 Walking Ballista
4 Ancient Stirrings
4 Serum Visions
1 Pact of Negation
4 Summoner's Pact
4 Amulet of Vigor
2 Relic of Progenitus
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Boros Garrison
2 Botanical Sanctum
1 Cavern of Souls
4 Gemstone Mine
1 Ghost Quarter
3 Gruul Turf
1 Khalni Garden
1 Radiant Fountain
1 Selesnya Sanctuary
4 Simic Growth Chamber
1 Slayers' Stronghold
2 Forest
1 Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion
3 Tolaria West
1 Vesuva
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Ghost Quarter
2 Swan Song
2 Dismember
2 Bonefire of Damned
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Nature's Claim
2 Tireless Tracker
1 Obstinate Baloth
1 Hornet Queen
1 Chalice of the Void
First round against a variant of grixis -Its a grixis deck with tasigur fish and bone picker with white splash for lingerine souls.
The deck is great to start appling pressure since turn 3, He Kolaghans Command my azusa and amulet of vigor. I clear up tokens, remove gaveyard, land a Titan and grabbing Slayer's Stronghold and a Boros garrison. Then I attacked with the titan is got killed, next turn I just won with a hasted titan.
Second match, I sided out 2 Serum Visions, 2 Amulet, 1 Summoners Pact and 1 or 2 Sakura's. Sided in 2 Bone fire, 1 Hornet Queen, 2 tracker and 1 dismember and a swan song.
During the game the deck performed just great, ramped with azusa, it she got killed afterwords, and the Sakura landed the bounced lands, managed to cast a tracker and obtaining 2 Clues, then Casted a Hornet Queen. He stabilized with lingerine souls and Bone picker and next turn I draw a walking ballista (5counters) and killing all his stuff. And started a clock and finish the game 2 turns later. 2-0
Second round I faced Counters Company, first game I had to mulligan, and second hand was really poor... My opponent neither have a good hand, but he killed me by pumping with Govony Township their mana dorks. Next game I had to mulligan, I managed to control a little bit when I got my titan on board, he top deck the last piece of the combo. 0-2
Third against affinity, I had to mulligan both games, but keep good hands, first game started with explosives and walking ballista. Second game I got a brutal hand, 2 amulets, 1 explorer vesuva forest and a karoo. Started with a forest and Sakura, I draw a titan next turn and then a summoners pact. Played both amulet. He put me on heavy pressure (cranial on skirge put me at 7 and he on 24).
On turn 3 I played 1 titan, with 1 searched for a tolaria and simic growth, (6 mana) and casted a Titan, fetched for boros garrison and slayer's stronghold, hate to both titans. Then I missplayed horrible, I gave both titans double strike. But it is impossible to do that, I realized when I got home. The proper play would be to gave 1 titan double strike, and with the other trigger, look for 1 simic growth and a tolaria, after the attack, transmute for explosives, and trigger it on his turn for 2 killing all his stuff.
Im back on ramping B-)
(sorry for my english)
I was able to do thr tolarian trick after combat. I have the explorer untapped so I was able to generate 7 mana (4 from simic + 3 gemstone and simic landed by 2nd titan) mana to transmute. ( got a tolaria in hand, crazy game indeed)
I liked Visions, a friend also uses explore. Relic is very strong maybe I will use 3 visions and 3 relic for saturday tournament.
1 Boros Garrison
1 Cavern of Souls
1 Forest
4 Gemstone Mine
1 Ghost Quarter
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
3 Gruul Turf
1 Khalni Garden
1 Radiant Fountain
1 Selesnya Sanctuary
4 Simic Growth Chamber
1 Slayers' Stronghold
1 Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion
3 Tolaria West
1 Vesuva
4 Azusa, Lost but Seeking
4 Primeval Titan
4 Sakura-Tribe Scout
1 Trinket Mage
1 Walking Ballista
Artifacts:
4 Amulet of Vigor
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Relic of Progenitus
Spells:
4 Ancient Stirrings
3 Explore
1 Pact of Negation
4 Summoner's Pact
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Chalice of the Void
1 Dismember
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Hornet Queen
1 Kozilek's Return
1 Nature's Claim
1 Obstinate Baloth
1 Pact of Negation
1 Reclamation Sage
2 Swan Song
2 Tireless Tracker
Also, I would like to suggest two cards that might be useful, but I am not sure where I would put them - Condescend and Mystic Speculation. The idea is that with this deck, raw card advantage is not as important as selection (we need 4 combo pieces, sometimes 3, so rather than needing quantity, we usually just need that one bounceland or that one amulet to go off). The reason I suggest these cards is actually due to my experience with Explore - drawing a random unfiltered card is usually not very helpful. How often do you actually hit the exact combo piece you need? Every once in awhile you hit a bounceland you had about a 9/51(17%, assumption is turn 2 and not having seen a bounceland yet) chance in hitting, but usually it's not what you want, and if you hit the combo lands it's sometimes just bad as you have to waste the land drop. Mystic Speculation is almost strictly worse than Serum Visions, but the buyback is interesting, and I think there's an argument for it being better than Sleight of Hand in this deck. Condescend is more interesting to me though - at worst it's an instant speed Scry 2 for one U, assuming your opponent plays a spell during their turn. At best, it's a counterspell we can usually make big enough to make it a hard counter, and you get to dig for more gas. I'm picturing it in place of Serum Visions, so it's probably worse. But how much worse? The thought of countering a Gurmag Angler or Tasigur, the Golden Fang after they delve away the graveyard and scrying into the amulet we need sounds great, doesn't it?
1 Boros Garrison
1 Cavern of Souls
2 Forest
4 Gemstone Mine
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
3 Gruul Turf
1 Khalni Garden
1 Radiant Fountain
1 Selesnya Sanctuary
4 Simic Growth Chamber
1 Slayers' Stronghold
1 Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion
3 Tolaria West
1 Vesuva
4 Azusa, Lost but Seeking
4 Primeval Titan
4 Sakura-Tribe Scout
1 Trinket Mage
1 Walking Ballista
Artifacts:
4 Amulet of Vigor
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Relic of Progenitus
Spells:
4 Ancient Stirrings
4 Serum Visions
1 Pact of Negation
4 Summoner's Pact
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Chalice of the Void
1 Dismember
1 Engineered Explosives
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Hornet Queen
1 Kozilek's Return
1 Nature's Claim
1 Obstinate Baloth
1 Pact of Negation
1 Reclamation Sage
2 Swan Song
2 Tireless Tracker
The thing I like about Condescend is against hand disruption, where they're going to rip your turn 2/3 play sometimes and leave you with open mana, at least you threaten them on their turn before scrying for the pieces you need for turn 3. It's very narrow, for sure, but trying to figure out what could give me less feelbads than Explore - Oath of Nissa can't grab artifacts, Vessel of Nascency is a little expensive but great, except for the chance you find utility lands or x2 Titans or something you need that end up in the bin, nothing else is great. The Remand experience is helpful, good comparison, thanks for sharing.
Good point on Mystic Speculation - the other variables I would factor in are 1) the % of hitting the exact card you want, which goes up some % when you want to scry top 3 to the bottom, but you probably get better % points with Sleight in that case, you are correct; and 2) you don't necessarily need to cast the card the turn you scry it - sometimes you can cast an amulet, but more often you will find the S-Pact/Titan/Azusa/Bounceland you need for turn 3, or sometimes you will find an amulet and still be able to go off on turn 3. So I would factor in getting the card vs just placing on top a little less - the % points better in your case come more from seeing an extra card the NEXT turn, which could offer additional benefit, in my opinion. I don't think either card is better than Visions at first glance though, and unfortuntately we can't play many/any of any of them because Death's Shadow. Boo.
Thanks for all your experience and testing - great to have a dedicated player to bounce ideas off of.
On Saturday I went to a monthly modern event on my city (57 peers).
The result was 3-3, It felt kind of salty cause I faced 1 Blue Moon, and 1 BG Rock deck that were really tunned to face big mana decks.
Overall the deck performed just fine, The videos of daviusminimus were really helpfull, Every time I got 2 amultes, Chained 2 titans and doublestrike them ;).
1st round I won against Bant Reliquary 2-0.
2nd rounde, I loose 1-2 against Affinity. First game was really close. Ravager made the difference. Second game I went to mulligan 5 and being able to win really brutally. On third game, I pay the price of being newby with the deck. I got tolaria and summoners pact on hand, He got ravager and 2 inkmoth nexus on play. I killed the ravager and he transferred the counters to his Mothland. The proper play would be to transmute for ghost quarter and play it nex turn, but I realized of it after the game was over.
Then I went right to Blue moon deck and was really frustrating, but I think we are the predelict enemy for them. Second game I look strong to counter their blood moon, situation that he played arround. Maybe I should look for an aggressive hand and try to win faster.
4th round I faced BG Rock, he had early pressure and enough discard to put me of the game. Second game I was just always behind and kept a bonefire in hand. Maybe I sideboarded wrong on this game, again, more playtesting required.
5th round, I faced Counter Company, I beat him 2-0. This is a game that I was prepared for, never let him keep 1 piece of the combo on board if he uses collected company.
6th round, I faced WB japanese eldrazi list, I was able to manage the situation, my last play was tolaria for a Negation Pact, and attack with a Titan.
In conclusion, Never sided in Chalice, need advice on using this tool, Bonefire is fun but not always worth.
the split of explore/serum is very good, I' thinking on playing 3 explore, 3 sakura and 2 serum. The explorer-snake-girl get's killed most of the time.
Loving the deck <3!
Regarding Chalice, I am in the minority of people who play it on this forum, but here are some match-ups I bring it in for:
- Grix Death's Shadow on 1 - turns on their Kommands even more, but it turns off like 25 maindeck cards so I think it's worth it, plus that means they aren't targeting an amulet, just make sure to stick an amulet or a Scout first before you set it on 1
- Ad Naus on 3 - to turn off Lightning Storm and Lab Maniac, or 0 to counter the Lotus to buy a turn in a pinch)
- Lantern on 1 - before they assemble the lock pieces is a win unless they find one of one or two removal spells
- Burn on 1 usually slows them down long enough to stabilize (this may be a case of a card being sided in/out based on play/draw, as turn 2 on the play might be too late for this)
- U/R Gifts Storm on 2 - makes it hard for them to combo off, but unless you find an accelerant they can sometimes race the Chalice
- Cheerios on 0 (duh)
- 8-Rack on 1 turns off Rack and all discard, backbreaking
- Living End, Restore Balance and all As Foretold decks on 0
- Bogles on 1
I also have played around with bringing it in against all Scapeshift decks to set on 4, since you really just bring in counterspells in the match-ups anyway, so bringing in Chalice in place of your 8th or 9th cantrip or 27th land is a card that with a nuts draw of 8 mana on turn 3 is basically a 12th Titan (aka a near-guaranteed win). Hope this is helpful.
does anyone miss slaughter pact? i have faced a few vizier-variant decks recently and i could really use a tutor-able kill spell, even though i don't think this is an unfavorable matchup.
@davis thanks for updating on your testing, i have been questioning whether are the grooves worth playing for the deathshadow matchup because of the cost and i personally prefer casting serum visions. are you playing full playset of azusa currently?
Sorry, but I take your words as gospel, nothing you can do about it! I hear what you're saying - the match-ups with Relic is good, it's great, but then there are aggro and fast combo matches where you need to see more cards and combo quicker, and Relic probably feels terrible in those matches compared to Visions. I personally am sticking with 3 Visions/2 Relics, my pet card Trinket Mage and 2 Sanctums, and I'm putting the Bojuka back main and running just the one GQ in the side. I'm going to try to find someone on MTGO who would like to jam like 10 matches of Living End or Grixis DS and see how it really feels, as I feel like our results have been too small of sample sizes to yield good conclusions.
Congrats on all your 4-1's, you're printing tix with Amulet, that's great news for us all
Decklist - https://deckbox.org/sets/1662958
I'm not going to answer many if any questions about this. Once I start helping people, it's hard for me to stop.
Here is what Edgar and I played at GP Las Vegas. Jake played a 4th Relic and 3rd Explore over the Bojuka Bog and Walking Ballista. Our lists are all identical otherwise.
Main Deck
Qty Cardname
4 Azusa, Lost but Seeking
4 Primeval Titan
4 Sakura-Tribe Scout
1 Walking Ballista
4 Amulet of Vigor
4 Ancient Stirrings
1 Engineered Explosives
2 Explore
1 Pact of Negation
3 Relic of Progenitus
4 Summoner's Pact
1 Bojuka Bog
1 Boros Garrison
1 Cavern of Souls
2 Forest
4 Gemstone Mine
3 Grove of the Burnwillows
3 Gruul Turf
1 Khalni Garden
1 Radiant Fountain
1 Selesnya Sanctuary
4 Simic Growth Chamber
1 Slayers' Stronghold
1 Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion
3 Tolaria West
1 Vesuva
60 Total
Sideboard
Qty Cardname
3 Dismember
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Hornet Queen
2 Kozilek's Return
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Ruric Thar, the Unbowed
3 Swan Song
1 Thragtusk
2 Tireless Tracker
15 Total
Board plans:
Grixis Death's Shadow
-4 Amulet -4 Scout +2 Tracker +1 Hornet Queen +3 Dismember +1 Thragtusk +1 Ghost Quarter
Affinity
-3 Relic -1 Pact Negation -1 Bojuka Bog -1 Primeval Titan -1 Azusa Play Scout Draw +1 Hornet Queen +2 Kozilek’s Return +1 Rec Sage +1 Ghost Quarter +2 Dismember
Eldrazi Tron
-1 Bojuka Bog -3 Relics -1 Walking Ballista -2 Summoner’s Pact -1 Pact of Negation -1 Azusa
+3 Dismember +1 Reclamation Sage +1 Hornet Queen +1 GQ +2 Tireless Tracker +1 Thragtusk
Burn
-1 EE -2 Relics -1 Bog -1 Ballista +2 Kozilek’s Return +1 Thragtusk +1 Rec Sage +1 Ruric Thar
Dredge
-1 Pact of Negation +1 Thragtusk
Counters Company
-1 Pact of Negation -1 Summoner’s Pact -1 Relic -1 Cavern of Souls -1 Azusa +3 Dismember +2 Kozilek’s Return
Gifts Storm
+3 Swan Song +1 Ruric Thar +3 Dismember -1 Walking Ballista -1 Khalni Garden -1 Radiant Fountain -2 Primeval Titan -2 Explore
Titan Shift
-1 Walking Ballista -1 EE -1 Bojuka Bog -1 Relic +3 Swan Song +1 Ghost Quarter
Jund Shadow
-4 Amulet -4 Scout +2 Tracker +1 Hornet Queen +3 Dismember +1 Thragtusk +1 Ghost Quarter
Living End
-1 Khalni Garden -1 EE -1 Walking Ballista -1 Azusa +1 Hornet Queen +3 Swan Song
Eldrazi & Taxes
+2 Kozilek’s Return +1 Hornet Queen +2 Tireless Tracker +1 Thragtusk +3 Dismember
-3 Relic of Progenitus -2 Summoner’s Pact -1 Pact of Negation -2 Azusa -1 Selesnya Sanctuary
Jeskai Control
+3 Swan Song +3 Dismember +2 Tireless Tracker +1 Thragtusk +1 GQ +1 Ruric Thar
-1 EE -1 Walking Ballista -4 Tribe-Scout -4 Amulet -1 Khalni Garden
Tron
-1 Bog -1 Ballista +1 GQ +1 Rec Sage
Humans Company
-1 Pact of Negation -1 Summoner’s Pact -1 Relic -1 Cavern of Souls -1 Azusa +3 Dismember +2 Kozilek’s Return
Abzan
-4 Amulet -4 Scout +2 Tracker +1 Hornet Queen +3 Dismember +1 Thragtusk +1 Ghost Quarter
U/W Control
+3 Swan Song +2 Tireless Tracker +1 Thragtusk +1 GQ +1 Ruric Thar +1 Rec Sage
-4 Tribe-Scout -4 Amulet -1 Radiant Fountain
Knightfall
-3 Dismember -2 Relics -1 Pact of Negation
Abzan Traverse
-4 Amulet -4 Scout +2 Tracker +1 Hornet Queen +3 Dismember +1 Thragtusk +1 Ghost Quarter
Jund
-4 Amulet -4 Scout +2 Tracker +1 Hornet Queen +3 Dismember +1 Thragtusk +1 Ghost Quarter
Ad Nauseam
-1 Primeval Titan -1 Walking Ballista -1 Bojuka Bog -1 Radiant Fountain +3 Swan Song +1 Reclamation Sage
Bant Eldrazi
-1 Bojuka Bog -3 Relics -1 Walking Ballista -1 Pact of Negation -1 Azusa
+3 Dismember +1 Hornet Queen +2 Tireless Tracker +1 Thragtusk
Gw Elves
-1 Pact of Negation -1 Summoner’s Pact -1 Relic -1 Bog -1 Azusa +3 Dismember +2 Kozilek’s Return
Amulet Titan
-1 Bog -1 Fountain -1 Khalni Garden -3 Relics -1 EE -1 Ballista +3 Dismember +1 GQ +3 Swan Song +1 Reclamation Sage
Merfolk
+3 Dismember +1 GQ +1 Rec Sage +2 Kozilek’s Return +1 Hornet Queen
-1 Summoner’s Pact -3 Relics -2 Explore -1 Pact of Negation -1 Bojuka Bog
Bogles
+1 Rec Sage +3 Swan Song -1 Bog -1 Ballista -1 Relic -1 Pact of Negation
Lantern Control
+1 Ruric Thar +2 Trackers +1 Rec Sage +1 GQ -3 Azusa -1 Radiant Fountain -1 Cavern
W/R Prison
-3 Relic -1 Ballista -1 Radiant Fountain -1 Cavern -1 Bog +3 Swan Song +1 Rec Sage +2 Tireless Tracker +1 Ruric Thar
"He traded sand for skins, skins for gold, gold for life. In the end, he traded life for sand."
—Afari, Tales