I am well aware of the SSg t1 landkill t2 chalice start, I have done it in various builds over the years, yeah its great vs burn, infect, storm etc. but I am also familiar with plenty of decks where that position- 2 land to one and a chalice on one- will do little, it is all about what matches you expect and even then it is down to what you are paired with. C'est Modern.
Worth noting that if anyone knows what you are on (i.e. post round 1) and they are half-decent if they have nothing to cast they will hold popping fetches back and pop them when they need to cast something taking the extra damage so you don't get that early start- it is a strange site, but I have often sat with Boom//Bust in hand, castable, an opponent on two untapped fetches. In the same way against Ad Nauseam or Affinity players we might chose to drop Chalice on 0 if you know they are on it, so its swings and roundabouts on the knowledge front.
With Firewalker I find Sanctimony better due to Skullcrack which negates preventing damage, and due to the lifegain of sanctimony being generally greater. It is another target for Destructive Revelry, etc. of course, but I try and overload that. Definitely worth trying out Sanctimony to see if you like it.
Regarding Moon, you need the white mana to cast the wear part of course- I have had the misfortune to run into a fair few other lockdown decks like Skred and Blue Moon that have powered into a t2 Moon while I sit there on 1 mana being fetchless (I run Sup Field to slow enemy fetches, so cannot use them at all). Moon really sucks, Legendary mountains with no bin triggers and destructible Citadels make for an unhappy Bust.
You could also board in S field, vs those Chord decks.
Hi all. I'm new to RW Landkill and, first off, would like to thank all of you for such a great discussion in this thread. I've not been through all of it yet, but there is a wealth of info here! I'm looking for feedback on my list, but I don't want to be that guy that just throws up a list and says "what do you guys think?" It'll probably end up being a longer read, but I'll explain my card choices below and maybe that will be of some value.
So, why am I here... Short answer: I want to punish people who play decks with greedy mana bases and crazy low mana curves. And guess what, I just so happen to have a playset of Chalice of the Void sitting on the bench that have been waiting for this day to come. And who doesn't love blowing up peoples' land, am I right?
My local metagame is infested with hyper aggressive decks and midrange/combo decks that rely on being able to resolve spells at the 1CMC slot to move their game plan forward. This is why I've decided to play the 4 Simian Spirit Guides to go with the Chalices, increasing the odds of landing Chalice @1 before the opponent gets to do much about it. I get the inherent card disadvantage, but sometimes playing your a bomb ahead of curve makes up for that. And worst case, you get your Ape beats on
I've also been really trying to find a deck in which to play Goblin Dark-Dwellers, and this seems like a good enough fit. Boom//Bust from the grave sounds delicious, and there's more where that came from!
Because of all the creature decks in my meta (Elves, Merfolk, Zoo, Abzan, even Vampires!), I've decided to run a full complement of Wrath of God main deck AND 3 Magus of the Tabernacle. I've even added a couple Anger of the Gods in the side in case I need a faster wipe or the Exile is relevant in some matchups. Am I crazy? Possibly. While Wrath doesn't have the same synergy with Goblin Dark-Dwellers that Anger has (and it kills our own creatures indiscriminately), I think being able to hit everything without question in G1 is worth the tradeoff. The deck doesn't play a lot of creatures anyway, and the ones I do play sit higher on the curve so I can often wait to deploy them until post-Wrath, or just take over the game with Planeswalkers once the board is clear. And on that note...
I've found that Gideon Jura's abilities to repeatedly fog, destroy a creature outright, or just turn the corner with a 6/6 nigh-Indestructible body has been really good. But he sits at 5 on the curve so I felt that the rest of the win conditions (walkers) needed to sit lower on the curve. I've chosen to try out a singleton of each of Elspeth, Knight-Errant, Ajani Vengeant and Chandra Pyromaster to see how that plays out. I like that they come down before Goblin Dark-Dwellers mana, meaning a flashed back Bust is more likely to seal the game than if we just have the Goblin in play. Note: I would be playing 4 Nahiri, the Harbinger here but I refuse to fork over the dough for her right now when I think it's likely that she comes down in price (hopefully) soon.
The only other main deck cards I haven't really mentioned yet are Lightning Helix and Molten Rain. Helix is great; it will usually avoid our Chalice, at least in the early game when you need it to kill something to preserve your life total a bit. If you need Chalice @ 2 bad enough (like in matchups were it basically locks your opponent out of their game), then it's a small price to pay to have a few remaining Helices shut off. Helix also kills or at least delays scary planeswalkers, provides reach, gains us some precious life so we can live to see the late game, it does it all. Oh, and GDD likes to bring them back
When combined with Boom/Magus/Ajani, Molten Rain is the perfect card to make sure your opponent stays on their back foot. Sometimes you just try to take someone off a colour or set them back a turn or two while they try to draw another land, other times you're hitting something that's more important to their deck's game plan than just adding a single mana e.g. Tron lands, Inkmoth Nexus, Gavony Township, Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle, problematic manlands that otherwise skirt our board wipes, Eldrazi Temples, Kessig Wolf Run, Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx, etc. Oh, and more often than not, it'll also deal 2 damage. 2 or 3 of these over the course of the game will contribute to your clock.
The sideboard is kind of thrown together at the moment. I know I want the Leyline of Sanctity as they've already been great in my early testing with the deck.
Suppression Field feels like it should do some real damage against a number of decks. Fetchlands are everywhere, manlands are everywhere, Aether Vials get around our land denial plan, turn 3 Liliana can ESAD, Scavenging Ooze, Viscera Seer, Tron trinkets, etc. etc. The only thing we need to watch out for is hitting our own fetchlands (we only play 4, should be ok in most games) and planeswalkers. I've found that when we get to the point where we have an active walker on the table, we're basically out of cards and don't really have anything else to spend our mana on anyway. I have not tested this card much yet so maybe in practice it will not work out so well, but the applications this card has against so many other decks in modern is pretty significant IMO.
I think just about every deck should pack some grave hate in the board, and here I'm going to try out Tormod's Crypt. Pretty unconventional, but it gets by Chalice @ 1 and it doesn't interfere with our own game plan. It also comes down very quickly, which may be relevant against a deck like Grishoalbrand that wants to try to combo you out on turn 2 or whatever. I might decide to try Rest In Peace at some point here instead to see just how much it really hurts the deck to turn off the Goblin Dark-Dwellers, but for now I'll try Crypt.
Wear//Tear = answer to stuff like Blood Moon, Ensnaring Bridge, Worship, etc. It's also an extra bit of hate against Affinity (if I ever run into it).
As mentioned, Angers are for Abzan Company and creature swarm decks in general. If I can clear the board enough in these matchups and get to the late game, I think I should be able to grind out a win in most cases. Wipe early, wipe often!
Timely Reinforcements are to stabilize against Burn, Zoo, Death's Shadow (and other hyper aggro/tribal decks) and stall the ground. Can flash them back with Dank Dwellers too.
I know that's a lot of stuff in the 75 dedicated to aggro, but is there something crucial that I'm overlooking? Oh, and because I'm sure it will come up: aside from not owning Newhiri, I also don't own Ghostly Prisons or Blood Moons either
Thanks in advance to anyone who has any advice to offer!
Edit: I don't currently own any Ajani Vengeant but my LGS has one available that I was thinking of picking up for $15 (CAD). Does it make sense to pick him up for this deck, or does it make more sense to skip him and use that money towards a Nahiri, the Harbinger instead, with the ultimate goal of acquiring a playset of her? In other words, has Nahiri basically obsoleted any need for Ajani Vengeant in the context of this deck (or in general)?
Welcome.
Observations:
Your plain count is a bit low- I would actually reduce the number of fetches, especially if you consider Sup Field in the board.
I think the SF is superb, but, and it is a huge but, it plays awfully with fetches, tormods and pws. If you are seriously considering it I would look at my list in the primer (I have never said that before, honestly) as an example of a SF list and start from there (it has top 8'd 50 player plus events, it is not perfect but it is a good starting point)- and that is because very few people play SF due to the interaction with PWs, the card simply trips you up more often than not unless you set out to minimise nonbos. I will say that SF lists are so rare.
I would not worry about RIP/dweller interactions and would go with both in the 75, over Tormod's. Dweller may come down and be a finisher regardless- when RIP comes in most decks like Jund etc deal with it and you will get max value from Dweller. Those that don't are not likely winning if the RIP is important.
Blood Moon is awful in this deck, the landkill deck works better without legendary mountains with no trigger, trust me, you are not missing out. It is a nut card in Blood Moon decks, and they may have a bit of landkill, but not in straight landkill/tax decks.
I think Ghostly is superb in Dweller/Bust lists, if you can get some do so.
4 chalice is a good call in a lot of metas.
Nahiri looks the nuts in superfriend style builds, but plenty of other RW decks of this ilk existed before her, and they have placed well in moderately big SCG lists over the past few years including this. Ajani is also optional- check the primer for the lists that have placed well- there is a big variety of well-crafted decks, some recent that do not have Nahiri. The point about Nahiri is that as the meta adjusts cards like Bribery may see more play, we will have to see. She is great, but I would wait if only because her price can't hold.
Don't worry about answering Bridge, them having no land will do that! But wear/tear is a solid board option, Leyline is essntial.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
@drmarkb: thank you for the reply. I think you make some great points, and I will defer to your expertise with the archetype and make the suggested changes immediately (-1 Mountain or Arid Mesa, +1 Plains, -2 Tormod's, +2 RiP). I'm not sure it's wise of me to go too low on the Mesas because they offer fixing to increase the likelihood of being able to cast Wrath or Anger ASAP when I need to stabilize (since I do not own Ghostly Prisons yet). Double red and double white can be a bit troublesome occasionally, and it's the reason I'm only running the 3 Citadels in my grey slots. I'd love to be able to try something like Sea Gate Wreckage or Mystifying Maze (or one of each) on top of the Citadels but it just doesn't seem wise.
The thing I'm having more trouble with is deciding on Suppression Field vs. PW win cons (+fetches). I did try Assemble the Legion for a bit to cut down on the number of activated abilities I was running, but I found the card to be sooo slow and actually lost all the games where I deployed it as my late game win con (since GDD never seems to live long). I doubt this is anything groundbreaking to you, but when I contrast ATL with Gideon on an empty board, I can't help but look at it like this:
Turn 6, 1 dmg vs 6;
Turn 7, 2 more dmg vs 6 more;
Turn 8, ATL has done a total of 6 dmg where Gideon has got in for 18 and likely finished off the opponent.
He just turns the corner so quickly. I was surprised to read that you recommend ATL so highly over 5 mana walkers like Gideon.
Don't get me wrong, I do understand the advantage of going wide with tokens, but I'm having trouble seeing where they outweigh Gideon's versatility in also being able to take pressure off your life total by forcing attacks at him (then it doesn't matter if the opposing creatures have some form of evasion) or by destroying an opposing fatty outright. He also doesn't require us to pay the Magus tax, where ATL demands 1 mana for each token every upkeep if we want to maximize our damage output. Am I missing something (besides the obvious Ghostly Prisons)? Have I dismissed ATL too quickly, or is my version of the deck just not right for the card (e.g. I also run less land kill effects so maybe my deck's "lock" is softer than yours and so opponents are sometimes able to climb back into the game if I can't finish them off quickly enough)?
The other option I could try in place of PW win cons is efficient beaters like a Baneslayer Angel type card. Provides a bit more cushion in case the opponent is able to muster up one last ditch effort to finish us off with bolts or something. Or maybe go right for the throat with a couple Inferno Titan and try to kill as quickly as possible? I dunno. I'd like to go lower on the curve rather than higher if possible though... I wonder if something like a couple Hero of Bladehold could get the job done. (sorry, kind of thinking out loud here but maybe you have an opinion to share nonetheless)
Thanks again for your insight.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
WUBG Atraxa Superfriends WRBG Saskia's Angry UBRG Yidris Valuetown WUBR Breya "not just for infinite combos anymore" Etherium Shaper
mana]W[/mana]UR Narset the Nerfed WBG Ghave counters madness BRG Prossh, Token Master UBG Tasigur Seedborn Control WU Brago Bouncy Castle WB Karlov Voltron B Erebos/Drana MBC R Feldon jank
ATL is used in the boros bridge lists over Gideon because of the conflict between Gideon and bridge. ATL's tokens slip under that. Those lists are often Magus-less, although there is not much conflict as the tokens have haste and late on they attack, before casting a card and bridge goes down to zero.
ATL is not really a great card in the landkill lists, although it has been used.
Your list is a stax-landkill type list, mainly, despite the absence of Ghostly.
Most people prefer planeswalkers over S Field, because they like playing with PWs and it gives them more options. They really don't play well together. In my list I use some Ghost Quarters (and a Crucible to recur them), that is my only real conflict with S field, although I run a Mystifying Maze which costs a stupid amount to activate with S field down, although it is sometimes relevant.
S field and Chalice is a fair chunk of disruption in my list for t2, you can view SF as working synergistically with Prisons and Landkill, as well as providing extra defense vs Chord's Viscera Seer combo, Affinity, Vial decks and Ad Nauseam game 1 (lightning storm is an activated ability) etc. I have to rely on Dwellers, Mindcensor and Magus beats for the win, so I lose out there.
Remember Ghostly does not protect Planeswalkers if you do acquire them.
Inferno titan is superb in the RG landkill builds with Arbor Elf and Sprawls to ramp. BSA might be more realistic here.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
ATL is used in the boros bridge lists over Gideon because of the conflict between Gideon and bridge. ATL's tokens slip under that. Those lists are often Magus-less, although there is not much conflict as the tokens have haste and late on they attack, before casting a card and bridge goes down to zero.
Of course, I feel pretty dense for not picking up on that. Makes complete sense.
I do have 3 Ensnaring Bridge that I thought about trying out after seeing it in so many lists, but I've honestly never been the biggest fan of the card (actually have been thinking about selling them off for a while). I mean, the card's power level is undeniable but some of the reasons I'm reluctant to run it are:
It can give you a false sense of security (or you end up having to play the whole game always thinking "ok, so assuming they blow up bridge at EoT, what's my best line to not just die to all these creatures in play?". Neither mentality is good and can lead to making bad decisions
Artifact hate is pretty common these days
The constraints it puts on deck-building means you're relegated to slower win cons. My play style seems to be: control the game as long as you need to, then turn the corner and try to win as quickly as possible. Swinging with a couple 2/x's or waiting for ATL to tick up doesn't seem like where I want to be when my lock is so soft
It only stops attacks and does nothing to prevent utility creatures from continuing to do work (e.g. Dark Confidant is still going to draw them a ton of cards until you remove him)
So I think I'll stick with a mix of board wipes (Wrath/Anger split) for now because they've been working out really well so far (on Cockatrice).
Most people prefer planeswalkers over S Field, because they like playing with PWs and it gives them more options. They really don't play well together.
This seems to be true for me as well. I've actually ditched the Elspeths for now but went up to 2 Chandra, Pyromaster and am still playing the 2 Gideon. I've decided I disliked relying on the top of my deck to feed me the right cards when I need them so I'm upping Chandra in an attempt to dig a little faster. I'm also trying out 4 Wall of Omens where I had the SSG's before to see how that goes... As much as I love the early tempo boosts when you cheat the curve, but god damn is it a terrible lategame draw. I think wall could be decent; early defence + cycle effect, and when they eventually get Wrath'd away, who cares. Protecting the walkers from ground-based threats has already won me a few games since yesterday so I'd say they have some promise.
To celebrate the promotion of RW Lockdown, I present to you an actual Lockdown build that you may not have seen before.
I give you
"Ghostlock and Taxes"
(it's a lazy name)
I'm leaning heavily on Leonin Arbiter and Aven Mindcensor here...
This deck is much more reliant on turn order and sequencing of plays than most Lockdown decks. You have to be able to maximize PtE and Ghost Quarter activation benefits. Ghost Quarter is essentially a Wasteland in the early game if Leonin Arbiter is on the table. You may want to wait a turn sometimes so that you can have one of your tax creatures on the table before you cast PtE.
The lock is a poor modern players version of Wastelock, but the presence of Blood Moon in the main means you really only need to eliminate their basic lands.
Does Blood Moon nonbo with Ghost Quarter? Not exactly. It certainly restricts what you can do once Blood Moon hits the board, but you only need to be careful about picking your spot. If you can slam a Blood Moon on turn 3 against a Jund player that has no basics, then who cares if you can't activate your Ghost Quarters? You've already got him locked out for a while.
Is Aven Mindcensor nonbo with Nahiri? Again not exactly. This is one of those situations where the interactions look more dangerous than they actually are. If Aven Mindcensor is on the board then you've got a creature you can race with (especially given Slayers' Stronghold), so you don't really need to Ultimate in that case. Just keep using Nahiri's +2. In this case the Nahiri's role would be to protect your life total and to support the Mindcensor.
Is Bonfire of the Damned nonbo with Nahiri? Not exactly. It's still a very swingy card, but if you draw it off a Nahiri then you usually have enough mana to make a better version of pyroclasm out of it, which is the card that I was originally using in that spot.
To celebrate the promotion of RW Lockdown, I present to you an actual Lockdown build that you may not have seen before.
I give you
"Ghostlock and Taxes"
(it's a lazy name)
I'm leaning heavily on Leonin Arbiter and Aven Mindcensor here...
This deck is much more reliant on turn order and sequencing of plays than most Lockdown decks. You have to be able to maximize PtE and Ghost Quarter activation benefits. Ghost Quarter is essentially a Wasteland in the early game if Leonin Arbiter is on the table. You may want to wait a turn sometimes so that you can have one of your tax creatures on the table before you cast PtE.
The lock is a poor modern players version of Wastelock, but the presence of Blood Moon in the main means you really only need to eliminate their basic lands.
Does Blood Moon nonbo with Ghost Quarter? Not exactly. It certainly restricts what you can do once Blood Moon hits the board, but you only need to be careful about picking your spot. If you can slam a Blood Moon on turn 3 against a Jund player that has no basics, then who cares if you can't activate your Ghost Quarters? You've already got him locked out for a while.
Is Aven Mindcensor nonbo with Nahiri? Again not exactly. This is one of those situations where the interactions look more dangerous than they actually are. If Aven Mindcensor is on the board then you've got a creature you can race with (especially given Slayers' Stronghold), so you don't really need to Ultimate in that case. Just keep using Nahiri's +2. In this case the Nahiri's role would be to protect your life total and to support the Mindcensor.
Is Bonfire of the Damned nonbo with Nahiri? Not exactly. It's still a very swingy card, but if you draw it off a Nahiri then you usually have enough mana to make a better version of pyroclasm out of it, which is the card that I was originally using in that spot.
Back in my day, we LIKED to hit our opponent in the face with X damage spells!
But in all seriousness - I forgot to add a few obvious scry cards. I replaced Lightning Bolt with Magma Jet. The differences in function are small for me - since they're both there primarily to keep stuff like Dark Confidant off the table and to finish off Planeswalkers that get too close to 0 loyalty. I also put the Temple of Triumph back in.
Example game: (If you're not familiar with my habit for testing against Jund, you should know that I always test against Jund first.)
Jund deck had a fairly good hand. Lightning Bolt, Dark Confidante, Tarmagoyf, Abrupt Decay, lands. I had 2 Spellskites, a Leonin Arbiter, Path to Exile and Nahiri. I kept a two-land hand because one of the two was a Temple. On the play I dropped Temple, scryed Bonfire, put it on the bottom and passed. I had Jund deck play a swamp. T2 I drew a third land and played Spellskite. Jund deck drew another Tarmagoyf, played a fetch, grabbed a forest and played Dark Confidante.
Now here's the first fun play of the match. I dropped Arbiter and used PtE on Bob. The Jund deck doesn't have any untapped lands, so there was no free land from it. This really bit Jund deck in the butt on his turn. It had lands to play, but there was no way to pay the Leonin tax AND cast the Abrupt Decay/Lightning Bolt combination it would take to overwhelm my Spellskite and kill the Leonin Arbiter all in one turn. It was also difficult for him to find a path to getting Liliana on the board for similar reasons. Jund deck settled for Abrupt Decay on the Spellskite and played the Fetch but didn't crack it.
On turn 4 I played the second Spellskite. Jund deck cracked the first fetchland, paid the tax and used a topdecked Inquisition of Kozilek to take a Bonfire that I had just drawn.
On turn 5 I played Nahiri and started counting up. Jund deck was finally on his feet enough to start playing Tarmagoyfs, but I still had a Spellskite and a Leonin Arbiter on the board. I got to my ultimate before Jund deck had enough time to break through.
I think this very nicely highlights the way the deck could work for you. I also had a Crucible of Worlds in my hand at one point and if I'd drawn a Ghost Quarter I definitely could've wastelocked him. If I had drawn a Blood Moon he would've been locked out of getting double black.
Yea I run 4 Arbiters in my Mono White build and it is very good with PtE and GQ against the greedy midrange/control decks. I just feel having 4 bonfires will sometimes lead to games where you end up with a semi-dead card in the opening hand that gets outclassed as the game drags on. Nahiri helps there with filtering but is it worth having that huge opportunity cost when you really want it as a miracle card?
What are you guys doing against heavy control lists that never tap out except at end of turn? Do you just accept that it's unwinnable and hope to dodge one of the most-played decks of late? I'm talking mostly about Jeskai Control lists that literally counter every spell I play with Snares, Leaks, Remands, Negates, Cryptics, you name it. They throw down a Nahiri, Clique or Resto Angel or something when it's safe to do so, or they just beat me down with Colonnades in the late game when they don't have to tap out to activate it.
From my list a few posts up, I've made a few changes (I can post a new list if that will help), most notably I changed 3 Magus for 3 Resto Angels of my own to give the deck a bit of its own "flash" element. Flickering Wall in the mid game or GDD in the later game is nice, but it's mostly for the Flash keyword that I'm playing it. However, even with trying to force an Angel in their end step so I can try for a Gideon Jura or GDD->Bust or something on my turn, both end up getting countered and the tempo loss from paying 4 and 5 mana for my spells while the opponent pays a total of 4 to counter both is rough.
Before I give up on the matchup completely, I'm considering trying Grand Abolishers, Vexing Shushers, Ricochet Traps or Leyline of Lifeforce to the board or something. I'm already running Chalice main and have tried a couple Defense Grid in the board but they just eat counters too. I don't like the idea of needing double White or double Red on turn 2 to play the creatures on curve, and Leyline isn't even castable lol But I just hate feeling so completely helpless against such a popular strategy. Should I just play a different deck if Jeskai Control is that prevalent?
Thanks for any insight you guys can provide. I would really like to make this deck work, because outside of the heavy control matchup, I've been having a lot of success against many other decks!
Edit: Just remembered Guttural Response as another possible option for the board.
There seems to be a lot of players who feel overwhelmed when they meet a permission deck that functions properly. I've said in other threads that most younger players are lucky they didn't play in an age when the format was balanced between counterspells and sinkholes, but even looking at those cards and knowing their power doesn't adequately express how completely they dominated the format. It's not just that those cards were powerful. You also didn't have 2 cmc Tarmagoyfs and Dark Confidant.
But enough of the old man stuff. Modern control is ridiculously feeble compared to the way it was when I was learning the game. There are ways to make it hard on them.
First is to make your lands work for you. Ghost Quarter and Mutavault (for example) avoid the permission problem.
Second is to cut off their card advantage. A card that affects the graveyard like Dryad Militant would significantly threaten their ability to recur spells.
Attacking their mana directly may prevent them from getting up to triple blue for cryptic command. Dead cards in their hand are card advantage for you. Lower cmc spells are frequently advantageous to you. If it takes 2 mana to counter your 1 cmc spell then you are building overload possibilities into your deck.
This is partly why I was pushing a small cmc creature plan (with Thraben Inspectors) and creatures that draw cards.
What are you guys doing against heavy control lists that never tap out except at end of turn? Do you just accept that it's unwinnable and hope to dodge one of the most-played decks of late? I'm talking mostly about Jeskai Control lists that literally counter every spell I play with Snares, Leaks, Remands, Negates, Cryptics, you name it. They throw down a Nahiri, Clique or Resto Angel or something when it's safe to do so, or they just beat me down with Colonnades in the late game when they don't have to tap out to activate it.
From my list a few posts up, I've made a few changes (I can post a new list if that will help), most notably I changed 3 Magus for 3 Resto Angels of my own to give the deck a bit of its own "flash" element. Flickering Wall in the mid game or GDD in the later game is nice, but it's mostly for the Flash keyword that I'm playing it. However, even with trying to force an Angel in their end step so I can try for a Gideon Jura or GDD->Bust or something on my turn, both end up getting countered and the tempo loss from paying 4 and 5 mana for my spells while the opponent pays a total of 4 to counter both is rough.
Before I give up on the matchup completely, I'm considering trying Grand Abolishers, Vexing Shushers, Ricochet Traps or Leyline of Lifeforce to the board or something. I'm already running Chalice main and have tried a couple Defense Grid in the board but they just eat counters too. I don't like the idea of needing double White or double Red on turn 2 to play the creatures on curve, and Leyline isn't even castable lol But I just hate feeling so completely helpless against such a popular strategy. Should I just play a different deck if Jeskai Control is that prevalent?
Thanks for any insight you guys can provide. I would really like to make this deck work, because outside of the heavy control matchup, I've been having a lot of success against many other decks!
Edit: Just remembered Guttural Response as another possible option for the board.
You can beat control lists in Landkill lists by
(a) playing more t2 stuff to get under the counters- Chalices and Suppression Fields. On the play on t4 you can often squeeze stuff past if you have 2 x 2cc spells vs their 3 mana. Rest in Peace can be a great main deck card in Bridge/Moon lists that do not use Dweller- it cuts of most of their CA.
(b) Boil - tapping out EOT sounds just great to me when I can cast this in response.
(c) Guttural Response and Defense Grid are options, although I would not favour them over boil which has applications against decks like Scapeshift. DG also hurts grid.
(d) Bridge/Moon lists with high enchantment counts can run a "got you" card - Obliterate for example says we restart the game, but I get to restart with some enchantments in play- they will play a lot of fetches and less real lands. I have actually done this in a Pillow Fort build and in Bridge/Moon lists vs a Twin deck@ a PPTQ and vs a Jeskai Control list in regular Mtg- I had attack taxes down, game went to 40 mins, I cast a few burn spells to kill their dudes during the game but had no way to win. I then cast one. He had 2 real lands left, and could cast my spells at will.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
There seems to be a lot of players who feel overwhelmed when they meet a permission deck that functions properly. I've said in other threads that most younger players are lucky they didn't play in an age when the format was balanced between counterspells and sinkholes, but even looking at those cards and knowing their power doesn't adequately express how completely they dominated the format. It's not just that those cards were powerful. You also didn't have 2 cmc Tarmagoyfs and Dark Confidant.
But enough of the old man stuff. Modern control is ridiculously feeble compared to the way it was when I was learning the game. There are ways to make it hard on them.
First is to make your lands work for you. Ghost Quarter and Mutavault (for example) avoid the permission problem.
Second is to cut off their card advantage. A card that affects the graveyard like Dryad Militant would significantly threaten their ability to recur spells.
Attacking their mana directly may prevent them from getting up to triple blue for cryptic command. Dead cards in their hand are card advantage for you. Lower cmc spells are frequently advantageous to you. If it takes 2 mana to counter your 1 cmc spell then you are building overload possibilities into your deck.
This is partly why I was pushing a small cmc creature plan (with Thraben Inspectors) and creatures that draw cards.
You can overload them.
Thanks. Good point re: small creatures, of which my list has 0. Instead I've been testing between 4 and 6 main deck Wraths/Angers for my (mostly) aggro meta, along with 4 main deck Chalices that I generally set at 1. Of course this means my curve is on the higher end (compared to so many other decks in modern, anyway) and perhaps is a little too all-in on the "chain together disruptive spells until you find a win condition and put it away" plan.
Games tend to go pretty well when, on turn 2, I can resolve Chalice@1 or Boom on a Flagstones/Darksteel, as this generally puts the opponent on the back foot for the rest of the game as I follow up with additional disruption. The problem is when that key turn 2 play gets countered, the game often unravels pretty quickly from there because you can be sure there's a whole whack of additional counters to back it up when they're drawing off Remand / Cryptic / EoT Electrolyze. Of course this is less of a problem on the play (though there's still at least a 2-of Spell Snare in their main), but obv we aren't always on the play and even when we are, we can't always have turn 2 disruption piece. I feel like I generally mulligain those hands when I know it's a matchup that needs turn 2 disruption, but in G1's when you don't know what your opponent's on, keeping a hand that doesn't have disruption until turn 3 will often lead to a game loss against a heavy control list because now all of their counter magic is online.
Re: the lands, I could see them working better in some builds, but probably not so much with the way I'm currently running the deck. I would have to remove the Darksteel Citadels for sure, which enable that turn 2 Boom and also leave me with additional mana sources if I need to Bust the board with a less-than-ideal boardstate. Mutavaults also die to Bolt/Helix and puts me down a land, which I don't think is where I want to be. I've tried 1-2 Needle Spires because, while they still die to everything in Jeskai, at least they fix and I can still run the Darksteels. However, ETBT when I'm running 4 Temples already is pretty terrible. Ghost Quarters would require Leonin Arbiters or Aven Mindcensor to not be counter-productive with the current game plan, and then I can't Anger/Wrath with impunity anymore. It's a conundrum I'll have to work through, I guess. Thanks for your tips.
What are you guys doing against heavy control lists that never tap out except at end of turn? Do you just accept that it's unwinnable and hope to dodge one of the most-played decks of late? I'm talking mostly about Jeskai Control lists that literally counter every spell I play with Snares, Leaks, Remands, Negates, Cryptics, you name it. They throw down a Nahiri, Clique or Resto Angel or something when it's safe to do so, or they just beat me down with Colonnades in the late game when they don't have to tap out to activate it.
From my list a few posts up, I've made a few changes (I can post a new list if that will help), most notably I changed 3 Magus for 3 Resto Angels of my own to give the deck a bit of its own "flash" element. Flickering Wall in the mid game or GDD in the later game is nice, but it's mostly for the Flash keyword that I'm playing it. However, even with trying to force an Angel in their end step so I can try for a Gideon Jura or GDD->Bust or something on my turn, both end up getting countered and the tempo loss from paying 4 and 5 mana for my spells while the opponent pays a total of 4 to counter both is rough.
Before I give up on the matchup completely, I'm considering trying Grand Abolishers, Vexing Shushers, Ricochet Traps or Leyline of Lifeforce to the board or something. I'm already running Chalice main and have tried a couple Defense Grid in the board but they just eat counters too. I don't like the idea of needing double White or double Red on turn 2 to play the creatures on curve, and Leyline isn't even castable lol But I just hate feeling so completely helpless against such a popular strategy. Should I just play a different deck if Jeskai Control is that prevalent?
Thanks for any insight you guys can provide. I would really like to make this deck work, because outside of the heavy control matchup, I've been having a lot of success against many other decks!
Edit: Just remembered Guttural Response as another possible option for the board.
You can beat control lists in Landkill lists by
(a) playing more t2 stuff to get under the counters- Chalices and Suppression Fields. On the play on t4 you can often squeeze stuff past if you have 2 x 2cc spells vs their 3 mana. Rest in Peace can be a great main deck card in Bridge/Moon lists that do not use Dweller- it cuts of most of their CA.
(b) Boil - tapping out EOT sounds just great to me when I can cast this in response.
(c) Guttural Response and Defense Grid are options, although I would not favour them over boil which has applications against decks like Scapeshift. DG also hurts grid.
(d) Bridge/Moon lists with high enchantment counts can run a "got you" card - Obliterate for example says we restart the game, but I get to restart with some enchantments in play- they will play a lot of fetches and less real lands. I have actually done this in a Pillow Fort build and in Bridge/Moon lists vs a Twin deck@ a PPTQ and vs a Jeskai Control list in regular Mtg- I had attack taxes down, game went to 40 mins, I cast a few burn spells to kill their dudes during the game but had no way to win. I then cast one. He had 2 real lands left, and could cast my spells at will.
As mentioned above, the problem isn't so bad on the play, it's on the draw, and if I fail to sneak in the first disruptive piece under counter magic, I'm often dead in the water. I'm currently playing GDD as a 3-of, so I will need to think about main deck RiPs and what I want more. Can't have my cake and eat it too, right? I'm currently playing RiP as a 2-of in the board that I often swap GDD for when I need them to completely hose a strat.
Boil is a great suggestion though, I can't believe I forgot about it. However most lists seem to be integrating more manlands, Sulfur Falls, Glacial Fortress, etc., (presumably to fix without causing so much pain to their own life total) so there's no guarantees about what you'll get. But even nailing a pair of Islands with a single spell sounds pretty sweet if you can manage to push one through... 2 going into the board immediately to try in place of Ricochet Trap Thanks!
What did you mean in bullet "c": "DG also hurts grid."
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
WUBG Atraxa Superfriends WRBG Saskia's Angry UBRG Yidris Valuetown WUBR Breya "not just for infinite combos anymore" Etherium Shaper
mana]W[/mana]UR Narset the Nerfed WBG Ghave counters madness BRG Prossh, Token Master UBG Tasigur Seedborn Control WU Brago Bouncy Castle WB Karlov Voltron B Erebos/Drana MBC R Feldon jank
Hey guys. A month and a half back I knew I wanted to start playing a deck with Boom//Bust and Nahiri, so I scoured the internet to look for something that wasn't the Jeskai deck, and found this. I've played this the past five weeks, varying maindeck and sideboard cards from week-to-week to try new stuff. This deck is GREAT. It's a lot of fun and it's actually extremely competitive. A couple weeks into my testing, Shaun McLaren started streaming using his version, which is more of a RW Control deck without the Stax/Lock pieces and more burn/Blood Moon, but I'm not sure I'm willing to sacrifice the set of maindeck Chalice in my metagame.
Here's a rough idea of my metagame:
Elves (several)
Burn/Zoo (several)
Death & Taxes
Tron (GR & Mono-U)
BtL Scapeshift
Living End
Abzan Company
Bogles
Plus other strategies that vary week-to-week (Affinity, a Lantern player that doesn't always come out, a Gerry T Gifts/Foundry deck, etc)
I'll preface this explanation by saying Magus of the Tabernacle and Chalice of the Void win me most of my matches by being the most fantastic nuisances ever, and I'm not in a position to cut either of them right now. But then again, those cards are a big part of what make this deck what it is.
I'm currently testing Aven Mindcensor as a utility creature that might randomly snuff an opponent's fetchland and can beat down a bit. I'm not convinced this card is necessary, but this is only my second week trying this card and out of eight matches I've only gotten one real use out of it other than a block here or an attack there. I might cut this.
I maindeck a singleton Anger for my metagame, as listed above. Against Elves it gives me an extra edge game one in an otherwise pretty difficult game (assuming their deck plays out the way it's supposed to).
Banishing Light and Oblivion Ring are both cards I'm trying just as more pieces of early removal and catch-all utility. I didn't get a chance to cast either of these cards tonight, so I'm not sure if they're that great or not. I'm open for suggestions on this slot, but Ghostly Prison has been pretty terrible for me the first few weeks and I don't think I want it back in the deck.
I'm considering adding a second Wrath of God to the board at the expense of an Anger of the Gods because it serves as a sort of creature deck catch-all as well. It's another way to fight the Bogles deck (barring totem armor), it can kill an Elf army that's got too many lords, and so on and so forth. Wrath helped me tonight in conjunction with Chalice because I forced my Living End opponent into waiting for Ingot Chewer and only being able to cast Demonic Dread (and not Violent Outburst), so he expended all of his resources on his turn and I untapped, Wrathed, and played another Chalice at 0 to lock the game out. I guess Wrath's incidental utility is very appealing to me.
I usually play Kor Firewalker or Sanctimony over Timely Reinforcements, but I figured since I'm running Goblin Dark-Dwellers and I usually shave some land destruction against Burn, I might as well give it a try. Didn't get a chance to tonight, so I'm not sure how good this change is either.
I'm not sure if Rugged Prairie would be better than the Clifftops straight up, if I should split them, or if I shouldn't play Prairie at all. There are a few games here and there where I don't have double red, but it doesn't happen often. Maybe I should try one or two?
Worth noting that if anyone knows what you are on (i.e. post round 1) and they are half-decent if they have nothing to cast they will hold popping fetches back and pop them when they need to cast something taking the extra damage so you don't get that early start- it is a strange site, but I have often sat with Boom//Bust in hand, castable, an opponent on two untapped fetches. In the same way against Ad Nauseam or Affinity players we might chose to drop Chalice on 0 if you know they are on it, so its swings and roundabouts on the knowledge front.
With Firewalker I find Sanctimony better due to Skullcrack which negates preventing damage, and due to the lifegain of sanctimony being generally greater. It is another target for Destructive Revelry, etc. of course, but I try and overload that. Definitely worth trying out Sanctimony to see if you like it.
Regarding Moon, you need the white mana to cast the wear part of course- I have had the misfortune to run into a fair few other lockdown decks like Skred and Blue Moon that have powered into a t2 Moon while I sit there on 1 mana being fetchless (I run Sup Field to slow enemy fetches, so cannot use them at all). Moon really sucks, Legendary mountains with no bin triggers and destructible Citadels make for an unhappy Bust.
You could also board in S field, vs those Chord decks.
4x Arid Mesa
4x Battlefield Forge
3x Darksteel Citadel
4x Flagstones of Trokair
2x Mountain
3x Plains
1x Sacred Foundry
4x Temple of Triumph
Artifact (4)
4x Chalice of the Void
Planeswalker (5)
1x Ajani Vengeant
1x Chandra, Pyromaster
1x Elspeth, Knight-Errant
2x Gideon Jura
4x Boom/Bust
4x Molten Rain
4x Wrath of God
Instant (4)
4x Lightning Helix
Creature (10)
3x Goblin Dark-Dwellers
3x Magus of the Tabernacle
4x Simian Spirit Guide
2x Anger of the Gods
3x Leyline of Sanctity
3x Suppression Field
2x Timely Reinforcements
2x Tormod's Crypt
3x Wear / Tear
So, why am I here... Short answer: I want to punish people who play decks with greedy mana bases and crazy low mana curves. And guess what, I just so happen to have a playset of Chalice of the Void sitting on the bench that have been waiting for this day to come. And who doesn't love blowing up peoples' land, am I right?
My local metagame is infested with hyper aggressive decks and midrange/combo decks that rely on being able to resolve spells at the 1CMC slot to move their game plan forward. This is why I've decided to play the 4 Simian Spirit Guides to go with the Chalices, increasing the odds of landing Chalice @1 before the opponent gets to do much about it. I get the inherent card disadvantage, but sometimes playing your a bomb ahead of curve makes up for that. And worst case, you get your Ape beats on
I've also been really trying to find a deck in which to play Goblin Dark-Dwellers, and this seems like a good enough fit. Boom//Bust from the grave sounds delicious, and there's more where that came from!
Because of all the creature decks in my meta (Elves, Merfolk, Zoo, Abzan, even Vampires!), I've decided to run a full complement of Wrath of God main deck AND 3 Magus of the Tabernacle. I've even added a couple Anger of the Gods in the side in case I need a faster wipe or the Exile is relevant in some matchups. Am I crazy? Possibly. While Wrath doesn't have the same synergy with Goblin Dark-Dwellers that Anger has (and it kills our own creatures indiscriminately), I think being able to hit everything without question in G1 is worth the tradeoff. The deck doesn't play a lot of creatures anyway, and the ones I do play sit higher on the curve so I can often wait to deploy them until post-Wrath, or just take over the game with Planeswalkers once the board is clear. And on that note...
I've found that Gideon Jura's abilities to repeatedly fog, destroy a creature outright, or just turn the corner with a 6/6 nigh-Indestructible body has been really good. But he sits at 5 on the curve so I felt that the rest of the win conditions (walkers) needed to sit lower on the curve. I've chosen to try out a singleton of each of Elspeth, Knight-Errant, Ajani Vengeant and Chandra Pyromaster to see how that plays out. I like that they come down before Goblin Dark-Dwellers mana, meaning a flashed back Bust is more likely to seal the game than if we just have the Goblin in play. Note: I would be playing 4 Nahiri, the Harbinger here but I refuse to fork over the dough for her right now when I think it's likely that she comes down in price (hopefully) soon.
The only other main deck cards I haven't really mentioned yet are Lightning Helix and Molten Rain. Helix is great; it will usually avoid our Chalice, at least in the early game when you need it to kill something to preserve your life total a bit. If you need Chalice @ 2 bad enough (like in matchups were it basically locks your opponent out of their game), then it's a small price to pay to have a few remaining Helices shut off. Helix also kills or at least delays scary planeswalkers, provides reach, gains us some precious life so we can live to see the late game, it does it all. Oh, and GDD likes to bring them back
When combined with Boom/Magus/Ajani, Molten Rain is the perfect card to make sure your opponent stays on their back foot. Sometimes you just try to take someone off a colour or set them back a turn or two while they try to draw another land, other times you're hitting something that's more important to their deck's game plan than just adding a single mana e.g. Tron lands, Inkmoth Nexus, Gavony Township, Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle, problematic manlands that otherwise skirt our board wipes, Eldrazi Temples, Kessig Wolf Run, Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx, etc. Oh, and more often than not, it'll also deal 2 damage. 2 or 3 of these over the course of the game will contribute to your clock.
The sideboard is kind of thrown together at the moment. I know I want the Leyline of Sanctity as they've already been great in my early testing with the deck.
Suppression Field feels like it should do some real damage against a number of decks. Fetchlands are everywhere, manlands are everywhere, Aether Vials get around our land denial plan, turn 3 Liliana can ESAD, Scavenging Ooze, Viscera Seer, Tron trinkets, etc. etc. The only thing we need to watch out for is hitting our own fetchlands (we only play 4, should be ok in most games) and planeswalkers. I've found that when we get to the point where we have an active walker on the table, we're basically out of cards and don't really have anything else to spend our mana on anyway. I have not tested this card much yet so maybe in practice it will not work out so well, but the applications this card has against so many other decks in modern is pretty significant IMO.
I think just about every deck should pack some grave hate in the board, and here I'm going to try out Tormod's Crypt. Pretty unconventional, but it gets by Chalice @ 1 and it doesn't interfere with our own game plan. It also comes down very quickly, which may be relevant against a deck like Grishoalbrand that wants to try to combo you out on turn 2 or whatever. I might decide to try Rest In Peace at some point here instead to see just how much it really hurts the deck to turn off the Goblin Dark-Dwellers, but for now I'll try Crypt.
Wear//Tear = answer to stuff like Blood Moon, Ensnaring Bridge, Worship, etc. It's also an extra bit of hate against Affinity (if I ever run into it).
As mentioned, Angers are for Abzan Company and creature swarm decks in general. If I can clear the board enough in these matchups and get to the late game, I think I should be able to grind out a win in most cases. Wipe early, wipe often!
Timely Reinforcements are to stabilize against Burn, Zoo, Death's Shadow (and other hyper aggro/tribal decks) and stall the ground. Can flash them back with Dank Dwellers too.
I know that's a lot of stuff in the 75 dedicated to aggro, but is there something crucial that I'm overlooking? Oh, and because I'm sure it will come up: aside from not owning Newhiri, I also don't own Ghostly Prisons or Blood Moons either
Thanks in advance to anyone who has any advice to offer!
Edit: I don't currently own any Ajani Vengeant but my LGS has one available that I was thinking of picking up for $15 (CAD). Does it make sense to pick him up for this deck, or does it make more sense to skip him and use that money towards a Nahiri, the Harbinger instead, with the ultimate goal of acquiring a playset of her? In other words, has Nahiri basically obsoleted any need for Ajani Vengeant in the context of this deck (or in general)?
WUBG Atraxa Superfriends
WRBG Saskia's Angry
UBRG Yidris Valuetown
WUBR Breya "not just for infinite combos anymore" Etherium Shaper
mana]W[/mana]UR Narset the Nerfed
WBG Ghave counters madness
BRG Prossh, Token Master
UBG Tasigur Seedborn Control
WU Brago Bouncy Castle
WB Karlov Voltron
B Erebos/Drana MBC
R Feldon jank
Observations:
Your plain count is a bit low- I would actually reduce the number of fetches, especially if you consider Sup Field in the board.
I think the SF is superb, but, and it is a huge but, it plays awfully with fetches, tormods and pws. If you are seriously considering it I would look at my list in the primer (I have never said that before, honestly) as an example of a SF list and start from there (it has top 8'd 50 player plus events, it is not perfect but it is a good starting point)- and that is because very few people play SF due to the interaction with PWs, the card simply trips you up more often than not unless you set out to minimise nonbos. I will say that SF lists are so rare.
I would not worry about RIP/dweller interactions and would go with both in the 75, over Tormod's. Dweller may come down and be a finisher regardless- when RIP comes in most decks like Jund etc deal with it and you will get max value from Dweller. Those that don't are not likely winning if the RIP is important.
Blood Moon is awful in this deck, the landkill deck works better without legendary mountains with no trigger, trust me, you are not missing out. It is a nut card in Blood Moon decks, and they may have a bit of landkill, but not in straight landkill/tax decks.
I think Ghostly is superb in Dweller/Bust lists, if you can get some do so.
4 chalice is a good call in a lot of metas.
Nahiri looks the nuts in superfriend style builds, but plenty of other RW decks of this ilk existed before her, and they have placed well in moderately big SCG lists over the past few years including this. Ajani is also optional- check the primer for the lists that have placed well- there is a big variety of well-crafted decks, some recent that do not have Nahiri. The point about Nahiri is that as the meta adjusts cards like Bribery may see more play, we will have to see. She is great, but I would wait if only because her price can't hold.
Don't worry about answering Bridge, them having no land will do that! But wear/tear is a solid board option, Leyline is essntial.
The thing I'm having more trouble with is deciding on Suppression Field vs. PW win cons (+fetches). I did try Assemble the Legion for a bit to cut down on the number of activated abilities I was running, but I found the card to be sooo slow and actually lost all the games where I deployed it as my late game win con (since GDD never seems to live long). I doubt this is anything groundbreaking to you, but when I contrast ATL with Gideon on an empty board, I can't help but look at it like this:
Don't get me wrong, I do understand the advantage of going wide with tokens, but I'm having trouble seeing where they outweigh Gideon's versatility in also being able to take pressure off your life total by forcing attacks at him (then it doesn't matter if the opposing creatures have some form of evasion) or by destroying an opposing fatty outright. He also doesn't require us to pay the Magus tax, where ATL demands 1 mana for each token every upkeep if we want to maximize our damage output. Am I missing something (besides the obvious Ghostly Prisons)? Have I dismissed ATL too quickly, or is my version of the deck just not right for the card (e.g. I also run less land kill effects so maybe my deck's "lock" is softer than yours and so opponents are sometimes able to climb back into the game if I can't finish them off quickly enough)?
The other option I could try in place of PW win cons is efficient beaters like a Baneslayer Angel type card. Provides a bit more cushion in case the opponent is able to muster up one last ditch effort to finish us off with bolts or something. Or maybe go right for the throat with a couple Inferno Titan and try to kill as quickly as possible? I dunno. I'd like to go lower on the curve rather than higher if possible though... I wonder if something like a couple Hero of Bladehold could get the job done. (sorry, kind of thinking out loud here but maybe you have an opinion to share nonetheless)
Thanks again for your insight.
WUBG Atraxa Superfriends
WRBG Saskia's Angry
UBRG Yidris Valuetown
WUBR Breya "not just for infinite combos anymore" Etherium Shaper
mana]W[/mana]UR Narset the Nerfed
WBG Ghave counters madness
BRG Prossh, Token Master
UBG Tasigur Seedborn Control
WU Brago Bouncy Castle
WB Karlov Voltron
B Erebos/Drana MBC
R Feldon jank
ATL is not really a great card in the landkill lists, although it has been used.
Your list is a stax-landkill type list, mainly, despite the absence of Ghostly.
Most people prefer planeswalkers over S Field, because they like playing with PWs and it gives them more options. They really don't play well together. In my list I use some Ghost Quarters (and a Crucible to recur them), that is my only real conflict with S field, although I run a Mystifying Maze which costs a stupid amount to activate with S field down, although it is sometimes relevant.
S field and Chalice is a fair chunk of disruption in my list for t2, you can view SF as working synergistically with Prisons and Landkill, as well as providing extra defense vs Chord's Viscera Seer combo, Affinity, Vial decks and Ad Nauseam game 1 (lightning storm is an activated ability) etc. I have to rely on Dwellers, Mindcensor and Magus beats for the win, so I lose out there.
Remember Ghostly does not protect Planeswalkers if you do acquire them.
Inferno titan is superb in the RG landkill builds with Arbor Elf and Sprawls to ramp. BSA might be more realistic here.
I do have 3 Ensnaring Bridge that I thought about trying out after seeing it in so many lists, but I've honestly never been the biggest fan of the card (actually have been thinking about selling them off for a while). I mean, the card's power level is undeniable but some of the reasons I'm reluctant to run it are:
This seems to be true for me as well. I've actually ditched the Elspeths for now but went up to 2 Chandra, Pyromaster and am still playing the 2 Gideon. I've decided I disliked relying on the top of my deck to feed me the right cards when I need them so I'm upping Chandra in an attempt to dig a little faster. I'm also trying out 4 Wall of Omens where I had the SSG's before to see how that goes... As much as I love the early tempo boosts when you cheat the curve, but god damn is it a terrible lategame draw. I think wall could be decent; early defence + cycle effect, and when they eventually get Wrath'd away, who cares. Protecting the walkers from ground-based threats has already won me a few games since yesterday so I'd say they have some promise.
Currently testing this list:
4x Battlefield Forge
1x Clifftop Retreat
4x Darksteel Citadel
4x Flagstones of Trokair
2x Mountain
1x Needle Spires
2x Plains
3x Sacred Foundry
4x Temple of Triumph
Artifact (4)
4x Chalice of the Void
3x Anger of the Gods
4x Boom/Bust
4x Molten Rain
3x Wrath of God
Creature (10)
3x Goblin Dark-Dwellers
3x Magus of the Tabernacle
4x Wall of Omens
Planeswalker (4)
2x Chandra, Pyromaster
2x Gideon Jura
Instant (4)
4x Lightning Helix
3x Leyline of Sanctity
2x Rest in Peace
2x Spellskite
2x Stony Silence
1x Timely Reinforcements
2x Torpor Orb
2x Wear / Tear
1x Wrath of God
WUBG Atraxa Superfriends
WRBG Saskia's Angry
UBRG Yidris Valuetown
WUBR Breya "not just for infinite combos anymore" Etherium Shaper
mana]W[/mana]UR Narset the Nerfed
WBG Ghave counters madness
BRG Prossh, Token Master
UBG Tasigur Seedborn Control
WU Brago Bouncy Castle
WB Karlov Voltron
B Erebos/Drana MBC
R Feldon jank
For more information on the May metagame update, please check this post in the Metagame Thread:
http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/566735-modern-metagame-discussion-thread-updated-6-7-2016?comment=1210
Seriously, to all contributors, please don't desert us now we have promotion....)
I give you
"Ghostlock and Taxes"
(it's a lazy name)
I'm leaning heavily on Leonin Arbiter and Aven Mindcensor here...
This deck is much more reliant on turn order and sequencing of plays than most Lockdown decks. You have to be able to maximize PtE and Ghost Quarter activation benefits. Ghost Quarter is essentially a Wasteland in the early game if Leonin Arbiter is on the table. You may want to wait a turn sometimes so that you can have one of your tax creatures on the table before you cast PtE.
The lock is a poor modern players version of Wastelock, but the presence of Blood Moon in the main means you really only need to eliminate their basic lands.
Does Blood Moon nonbo with Ghost Quarter? Not exactly. It certainly restricts what you can do once Blood Moon hits the board, but you only need to be careful about picking your spot. If you can slam a Blood Moon on turn 3 against a Jund player that has no basics, then who cares if you can't activate your Ghost Quarters? You've already got him locked out for a while.
Is Aven Mindcensor nonbo with Nahiri? Again not exactly. This is one of those situations where the interactions look more dangerous than they actually are. If Aven Mindcensor is on the board then you've got a creature you can race with (especially given Slayers' Stronghold), so you don't really need to Ultimate in that case. Just keep using Nahiri's +2. In this case the Nahiri's role would be to protect your life total and to support the Mindcensor.
Is Bonfire of the Damned nonbo with Nahiri? Not exactly. It's still a very swingy card, but if you draw it off a Nahiri then you usually have enough mana to make a better version of pyroclasm out of it, which is the card that I was originally using in that spot.
2x Crucible of Worlds
Creature (13)
4x Aven Mindcensor
4x Leonin Arbiter
4x Spellskite
1x Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
3x Blood Moon
Instant (8)
4x Lightning Bolt
4x Path to Exile
Planeswalker (4)
4x Nahiri
Sorcery (4)
4x Bonfire of the Damned
4x Ghost Quarter
4x Sacred Foundry
3x Slayers' Stronghold
2x Encroaching Wastes
6x Mountain
7x Plains
4 Bonfire seems a lot to me, especially when it does not trigger off Nahiri.
But in all seriousness - I forgot to add a few obvious scry cards. I replaced Lightning Bolt with Magma Jet. The differences in function are small for me - since they're both there primarily to keep stuff like Dark Confidant off the table and to finish off Planeswalkers that get too close to 0 loyalty. I also put the Temple of Triumph back in.
Example game: (If you're not familiar with my habit for testing against Jund, you should know that I always test against Jund first.)
Jund deck had a fairly good hand. Lightning Bolt, Dark Confidante, Tarmagoyf, Abrupt Decay, lands. I had 2 Spellskites, a Leonin Arbiter, Path to Exile and Nahiri. I kept a two-land hand because one of the two was a Temple. On the play I dropped Temple, scryed Bonfire, put it on the bottom and passed. I had Jund deck play a swamp. T2 I drew a third land and played Spellskite. Jund deck drew another Tarmagoyf, played a fetch, grabbed a forest and played Dark Confidante.
Now here's the first fun play of the match. I dropped Arbiter and used PtE on Bob. The Jund deck doesn't have any untapped lands, so there was no free land from it. This really bit Jund deck in the butt on his turn. It had lands to play, but there was no way to pay the Leonin tax AND cast the Abrupt Decay/Lightning Bolt combination it would take to overwhelm my Spellskite and kill the Leonin Arbiter all in one turn. It was also difficult for him to find a path to getting Liliana on the board for similar reasons. Jund deck settled for Abrupt Decay on the Spellskite and played the Fetch but didn't crack it.
On turn 4 I played the second Spellskite. Jund deck cracked the first fetchland, paid the tax and used a topdecked Inquisition of Kozilek to take a Bonfire that I had just drawn.
On turn 5 I played Nahiri and started counting up. Jund deck was finally on his feet enough to start playing Tarmagoyfs, but I still had a Spellskite and a Leonin Arbiter on the board. I got to my ultimate before Jund deck had enough time to break through.
I think this very nicely highlights the way the deck could work for you. I also had a Crucible of Worlds in my hand at one point and if I'd drawn a Ghost Quarter I definitely could've wastelocked him. If I had drawn a Blood Moon he would've been locked out of getting double black.
From my list a few posts up, I've made a few changes (I can post a new list if that will help), most notably I changed 3 Magus for 3 Resto Angels of my own to give the deck a bit of its own "flash" element. Flickering Wall in the mid game or GDD in the later game is nice, but it's mostly for the Flash keyword that I'm playing it. However, even with trying to force an Angel in their end step so I can try for a Gideon Jura or GDD->Bust or something on my turn, both end up getting countered and the tempo loss from paying 4 and 5 mana for my spells while the opponent pays a total of 4 to counter both is rough.
Before I give up on the matchup completely, I'm considering trying Grand Abolishers, Vexing Shushers, Ricochet Traps or Leyline of Lifeforce to the board or something. I'm already running Chalice main and have tried a couple Defense Grid in the board but they just eat counters too. I don't like the idea of needing double White or double Red on turn 2 to play the creatures on curve, and Leyline isn't even castable lol But I just hate feeling so completely helpless against such a popular strategy. Should I just play a different deck if Jeskai Control is that prevalent?
Thanks for any insight you guys can provide. I would really like to make this deck work, because outside of the heavy control matchup, I've been having a lot of success against many other decks!
Edit: Just remembered Guttural Response as another possible option for the board.
WUBG Atraxa Superfriends
WRBG Saskia's Angry
UBRG Yidris Valuetown
WUBR Breya "not just for infinite combos anymore" Etherium Shaper
mana]W[/mana]UR Narset the Nerfed
WBG Ghave counters madness
BRG Prossh, Token Master
UBG Tasigur Seedborn Control
WU Brago Bouncy Castle
WB Karlov Voltron
B Erebos/Drana MBC
R Feldon jank
But enough of the old man stuff. Modern control is ridiculously feeble compared to the way it was when I was learning the game. There are ways to make it hard on them.
First is to make your lands work for you. Ghost Quarter and Mutavault (for example) avoid the permission problem.
Second is to cut off their card advantage. A card that affects the graveyard like Dryad Militant would significantly threaten their ability to recur spells.
Attacking their mana directly may prevent them from getting up to triple blue for cryptic command. Dead cards in their hand are card advantage for you. Lower cmc spells are frequently advantageous to you. If it takes 2 mana to counter your 1 cmc spell then you are building overload possibilities into your deck.
This is partly why I was pushing a small cmc creature plan (with Thraben Inspectors) and creatures that draw cards.
You can overload them.
You can beat control lists in Landkill lists by
(a) playing more t2 stuff to get under the counters- Chalices and Suppression Fields. On the play on t4 you can often squeeze stuff past if you have 2 x 2cc spells vs their 3 mana. Rest in Peace can be a great main deck card in Bridge/Moon lists that do not use Dweller- it cuts of most of their CA.
(b) Boil - tapping out EOT sounds just great to me when I can cast this in response.
(c) Guttural Response and Defense Grid are options, although I would not favour them over boil which has applications against decks like Scapeshift. DG also hurts grid.
(d) Bridge/Moon lists with high enchantment counts can run a "got you" card - Obliterate for example says we restart the game, but I get to restart with some enchantments in play- they will play a lot of fetches and less real lands. I have actually done this in a Pillow Fort build and in Bridge/Moon lists vs a Twin deck@ a PPTQ and vs a Jeskai Control list in regular Mtg- I had attack taxes down, game went to 40 mins, I cast a few burn spells to kill their dudes during the game but had no way to win. I then cast one. He had 2 real lands left, and could cast my spells at will.
Games tend to go pretty well when, on turn 2, I can resolve Chalice@1 or Boom on a Flagstones/Darksteel, as this generally puts the opponent on the back foot for the rest of the game as I follow up with additional disruption. The problem is when that key turn 2 play gets countered, the game often unravels pretty quickly from there because you can be sure there's a whole whack of additional counters to back it up when they're drawing off Remand / Cryptic / EoT Electrolyze. Of course this is less of a problem on the play (though there's still at least a 2-of Spell Snare in their main), but obv we aren't always on the play and even when we are, we can't always have turn 2 disruption piece. I feel like I generally mulligain those hands when I know it's a matchup that needs turn 2 disruption, but in G1's when you don't know what your opponent's on, keeping a hand that doesn't have disruption until turn 3 will often lead to a game loss against a heavy control list because now all of their counter magic is online.
Re: the lands, I could see them working better in some builds, but probably not so much with the way I'm currently running the deck. I would have to remove the Darksteel Citadels for sure, which enable that turn 2 Boom and also leave me with additional mana sources if I need to Bust the board with a less-than-ideal boardstate. Mutavaults also die to Bolt/Helix and puts me down a land, which I don't think is where I want to be. I've tried 1-2 Needle Spires because, while they still die to everything in Jeskai, at least they fix and I can still run the Darksteels. However, ETBT when I'm running 4 Temples already is pretty terrible. Ghost Quarters would require Leonin Arbiters or Aven Mindcensor to not be counter-productive with the current game plan, and then I can't Anger/Wrath with impunity anymore. It's a conundrum I'll have to work through, I guess. Thanks for your tips.
As mentioned above, the problem isn't so bad on the play, it's on the draw, and if I fail to sneak in the first disruptive piece under counter magic, I'm often dead in the water. I'm currently playing GDD as a 3-of, so I will need to think about main deck RiPs and what I want more. Can't have my cake and eat it too, right? I'm currently playing RiP as a 2-of in the board that I often swap GDD for when I need them to completely hose a strat.
Boil is a great suggestion though, I can't believe I forgot about it. However most lists seem to be integrating more manlands, Sulfur Falls, Glacial Fortress, etc., (presumably to fix without causing so much pain to their own life total) so there's no guarantees about what you'll get. But even nailing a pair of Islands with a single spell sounds pretty sweet if you can manage to push one through... 2 going into the board immediately to try in place of Ricochet Trap Thanks!
What did you mean in bullet "c": "DG also hurts grid."
WUBG Atraxa Superfriends
WRBG Saskia's Angry
UBRG Yidris Valuetown
WUBR Breya "not just for infinite combos anymore" Etherium Shaper
mana]W[/mana]UR Narset the Nerfed
WBG Ghave counters madness
BRG Prossh, Token Master
UBG Tasigur Seedborn Control
WU Brago Bouncy Castle
WB Karlov Voltron
B Erebos/Drana MBC
R Feldon jank
Here's a rough idea of my metagame:
Here's my list:
1 Aven Mindcensor
4 Magus of the Tabernacle
3 Goblin Dark-Dwellers
1 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
Instants/Sorceries: 15
4 Boom//Bust
4 Lightning Helix
4 Stone Rain
2 Molten Rain
1 Anger of the Gods
Artifacts/Enchantments: 6
4 Chalice of the Void
1 Banishing Light
1 Oblivion Ring
4 Nahiri, the Harbinger
1 Ajani Vengeant
Lands: 25
4 Arid Mesa
4 Sacred Foundry
4 Clifftop Retreat
4 Flagstones of Trokair
3 Mountain
2 Plains
2 Ghost Quarter
2 Darksteel Citadel
1 Wear//Tear
3 Timely Reinforcements
3 Anger of the Gods
1 Wrath of God
2 Rest in Peace
2 Stony Silence
3 Leyline of Sanctity
I'll preface this explanation by saying Magus of the Tabernacle and Chalice of the Void win me most of my matches by being the most fantastic nuisances ever, and I'm not in a position to cut either of them right now. But then again, those cards are a big part of what make this deck what it is.
Let me know what you guys think.