If you're worried about Esper draw-go, the answer IMO is to play at instant speed. I've been a big fan of Vendillion Clique and I think the card would be great in that matchup, especially combined with Spell Queller/Collected Company. Not to mention, Voice seems like a slam dunk (good against wraths and black removal; or they have to Path him during their turn, giving us a land. Playing 3 Selfless Spirit could help as well as they're very good against wraths. And yes, Geist could be very strong, but it's a little vulnerable to being countered or Wrath'd. Watch out for Snapcaster blocks as well.
Wait, you're already playing 15 3-drops (including Retreats), and you want to add two more at the expense of two 2-drops...?
Modern is way too fast for that. I personally play a total of 12 3-drops including 2 Retreats (see my list on the last page) and at most I would consider adding one more, but any more than that is IMO too slow. If you start without a manadork, or if your manadork gets killed, you're gonna have a bad time.
Honestly, I feel like "too many 3-drops" is a problem in a lot of the builds I see on this thread and elsewhere.
I'm more concerned about the tron matchup and the other matchups where we need to end the game quickly tbh
But how do planeswalkers help against Tron? you drop your Elspeth or Gideon, it gets literally eaten alive by a Karn or Ugin, or even Oblivion Stone. If you play them after a Karn or Ugin, you likely don't have a board, so all you can do is spend your turn making a 1/1 or 2/2 token, but your planeswalker still dies the next turn to Karn, while Ugin happpily wipes the token and the planeswalker away. In contrast, you'd much rather be in the spot where they Ugin/Karn your board and you rebuild at end of turn with a Collected Company or (here I go again) Vendillion Clique. Even an end-of-turn Spell Queller can be decent.
In games where you need to end it quickly (like... Ad Nauseam, maybe?), Elspeth *might* have some merit, but it's very marginal and IMO not enough to warrant running her.
My 2 cents @RPD on the match ups you listed. Against B/W Eldrazi/Death and Taxes they key is keeping their Eldrazi Displacer off the battlefield. You can actually match up with everything else in terms of Power and Toughness but their ability to gain CA and to be aggressive with Displacer on the table is very prominent. I will actually hold Path to Exile until I see an Eldrazi Displacer unless I have to use it somewhere else.
DO NOT BOARD IN ARTIFACT HATE. Your goal is to go longer then them because you can decrease their ability to have CA after about turn 4. Aether Vial is great for getting them ahead, but if you board in very narrow artifact hate your are effectively increasing your chances of mulliganing. If you don't believe me go read some of the Eldrazi Taxes and Merfolk forums on this very site. They love when people dilute their decks post-board to bring in answer to their non creatures.
The hardest part of the match up is knowing when to fetch and how to order your lands as getting blown out by Leonin Arbiter does not feel good. Obviously our mana dorks help mitigate this to a degree.
Against Draw/Go opponents the key is the number of flash creatures you have in your 75. Obviously playing Collected Company at instant speed at the End of the Turn is the standard practice against Control. I want to add to that, HOLD Company until you have a CA creature in your hand. This can be a Tireless Tracker, Courser of Kruphix, Eternal Witness, etc. There is no point in casting Collect Company, having them kill your creatures and not getting any benefits the turn after. More or less, drop Flash/Instants into open mana and CA/Unkillable Threats into closed mana.
@deus837 I agree that side boarding planeswlakers is a mistake. Against Tron I actually board in a Tectonic Edge that was suggested many posts ago (its been awesome) and an Eldritch Evolution. Both of these cards help make Knight of the Reliquary the key card in the match up; as both disruption (get the lands you need to blow them up) and clock. I also board out some Path to Exiles and board in Unified Will and Negate. Some of you are like, "WHAT?! Taking out Path to Exile versus Tron?!?!?!" But if you think about it, other than Wurmcoil Engine, what is a legitimate target for our Paths? They are often dead cards as the Tron player is trying to find Karn or Ugin not a creature. If you draw 2 Path to Exiles versus Tron you are effectively dead.
Against, Eldrazi Tron, this argument does not work, as that deck is trying to kill you with creatures. I keep them in for that match up.
@rogue_LOVE I agree for CA the 1st Courser is better than the 3rd Tracker. But currently I am only running 2 CA creatures in my 60. With a Courser of Kruphix in the board.
I've tried a moorland haunt just before GP Vancouver and i can tell that in the grindy matchup i felt like this card was another cheap way to outgrind midrange and control , especialy with kessig wolf run and to a lesser extent gavony township
It was maindeck because i wanted to test it but it could get in the sideboard
I have cut the ghost quarter to make place in the main
I will not make a definitive statement about the card but boy, in conjunction with kessig wolf run made my jeskai opponent run out of answer quick. and a lot of the time it was the card i wanted to fetch with my knight
It also turn useless bird of paradise and noble hierach into threat after a chump block
I am planning on playing this deck at GP Vancouver this weekend, and am looking for some thoughts on my list. I am currently trying to decide on a couple flex slots MB + tuning the SB.
With a relatively uncertain meta that is in flux, I am aiming to have the best match up against the largest number of decks (hoping for lower percentage gains against some decks post-SB, but opting for cards that are more useful against more decks). That being said, I am also hoping to shore up the tougher match ups of Urza-Tron, Valakut, Ad-Nauseum and Goryo's and am finding it hard to balance those two goals. I am entering this GP with 2 byes, so I am hoping that I have a lower chance of getting paired with fringe decks and want to tune my list as best as possible. Due to the nature of playing in a GP instead of a 3 - 5 round tournament, I am curious as to all of your thoughts on how to tweak this list for a longer tournament. I am playing this deck due to its resiliency to a large number of decks, have experience playing it, and feel that it is well-suited to large tournaments.
I am loving Tireless Tracker, but am thinking about running a single Renegade Rallier in one of the flex slots to help out against Tron and Valakut. It just seems so good to be able to recur a Ghost-Quarter in these match ups. I am worried this might be a bit too much of a corner case, as it would require having both copies of a one-of G1. My plan post-board currently is to board in the counters + Stony Silence + Ghost Quarter vs. Tron (cutting 1 retreat, 4x path and 1x other creature). Against Valakut the plan is to board in counters + Ghost Quarter and cut a mix of 4x path/retreat, but need to see if Worship merits consideration as well. The problem here is that I am adding so many non-creatures, I really don't want to dilute my Coco too much. Any thoughts on how to better prepare for these matchups? I was considering adding 1x Crumble to Dust to the board as it completely hoses both decks, but am not sure if this is the correct use of a SB slot.
Against Goryo's I was thinking of switching one unified will for a Spell Pierce, but besides this I am mostly just hoping that they don't go off too early. Scooze + Bojuka Bog are great here, so the main worry is preparing for their early combo-kill. As for Ad-Nauseum decks Spell Queller and the Pridemages play a big role here, but do you think Surgical Extraction might be useful against these strategies?
My 2 cents @RPD on the match ups you listed. Against B/W Eldrazi/Death and Taxes they key is keeping their Eldrazi Displacer off the battlefield. You can actually match up with everything else in terms of Power and Toughness but their ability to gain CA and to be aggressive with Displacer on the table is very prominent. I will actually hold Path to Exile until I see an Eldrazi Displacer unless I have to use it somewhere else.
DO NOT BOARD IN ARTIFACT HATE. Your goal is to go longer then them because you can decrease their ability to have CA after about turn 4. Aether Vial is great for getting them ahead, but if you board in very narrow artifact hate your are effectively increasing your chances of mulliganing. If you don't believe me go read some of the Eldrazi Taxes and Merfolk forums on this very site. They love when people dilute their decks post-board to bring in answer to their non creatures.
The hardest part of the match up is knowing when to fetch and how to order your lands as getting blown out by Leonin Arbiter does not feel good. Obviously our mana dorks help mitigate this to a degree.
Against Draw/Go opponents the key is the number of flash creatures you have in your 75. Obviously playing Collected Company at instant speed at the End of the Turn is the standard practice against Control. I want to add to that, HOLD Company until you have a CA creature in your hand. This can be a Tireless Tracker, Courser of Kruphix, Eternal Witness, etc. There is no point in casting Collect Company, having them kill your creatures and not getting any benefits the turn after. More or less, drop Flash/Instants into open mana and CA/Unkillable Threats into closed mana.
@deus837 I agree that side boarding planeswlakers is a mistake. Against Tron I actually board in a Tectonic Edge that was suggested many posts ago (its been awesome) and an Eldritch Evolution. Both of these cards help make Knight of the Reliquary the key card in the match up; as both disruption (get the lands you need to blow them up) and clock. I also board out some Path to Exiles and board in Unified Will and Negate. Some of you are like, "WHAT?! Taking out Path to Exile versus Tron?!?!?!" But if you think about it, other than Wurmcoil Engine, what is a legitimate target for our Paths? They are often dead cards as the Tron player is trying to find Karn or Ugin not a creature. If you draw 2 Path to Exiles versus Tron you are effectively dead.
Against, Eldrazi Tron, this argument does not work, as that deck is trying to kill you with creatures. I keep them in for that match up.
@rogue_LOVE I agree for CA the 1st Courser is better than the 3rd Tracker. But currently I am only running 2 CA creatures in my 60. With a Courser of Kruphix in the board.
Agree with pretty much everything you said. Evolution is interesting as a sideboard plan. If I were playing Evolution I would want to have Eidolon of Rhetoric in the board as well.
Re: BW Eldrazi & Taxes: I've never found this to be a hard matchup. Leonin Arbiter is annoying but if we crack our fetches early or land dorks he's a minor annoyance at most. Don't forget, he also makes our Paths into Swords to Plowshares++ and Ghost Quarters into Wastelands. Other than that, our creatures are just better. The power level in our deck is leagues above theirs.
I have cut the ghost quarter to make place in the main
This is just a mistake. You make your Tron, Affinity, Infect, Eldrazi (Bant and D&T) and Valakut matchups much worse, to name a few. As for the grindy matchups like Jund, IMO a Ghost Quarter to kill their Raging Ravine is still much better than a Moorland Haunt.
I agree with you with you deus on all except for the raging ravine case,
I think the flyer is worth more to finish the opponent and/or chump the raging ravine than delaying the inevitable loss you will suffer against jund late game(except if the also have an ooze)
They need to sink 4-5 mana into the ravine while you only put 2-3 in the moorland haunt so you can advance your board while they can't
I also noted that i put it maindeck because i wanted to test it that night, so it will probably goes in the sideboard. I don't see myself replacing the gavony towninp or the wolfrun for it.
I mean i have seen list with ormendal and the moorland haunt seems a little better
Wow, so much feedback. I'll try to answer it all...
@goldenregis
I thought about slayer's stronghold because it turns every creature topdeck into damage. As I said, probably not good, but I thought it was worth mentioning. It has cute sinergies with Knight too (attack with vigilance, then activate for more damage). Activation cost is less than gavony too.
After playing some time with them, I concluded that geist wasn't good in this deck. If you want a good geist deck, check bant spirits. Knightfall has almost zero tools to protect knight (only path) , and geist requires enabling to work well. It can be countered too, spirits has cavern.
@deus
This morning I was theorycrafting about our bad matchups and which cards are useful against them and vendilion came as more versatile than I expected. I'll test two copies again, definitely.
@fatkiddestroyers
I agree on the artifact hate. Wouldn't board in stony, but qasali probably stays in.
I definitely played really poor against the arbiters. As a friend advised me, leave 2 mana up unless you are facing pressure. If you aren't under a clock, there's no need to risk your mana.
Boarding out 2-4 path against regular tron is correct, maybe even all of them, depending on the number of retreat that you run. Notice that you can tap wurmcoil with retreat, it's a much cleaner way to deal with it and doesn't risk you into drawing dead cards. As you said, other than wurmcoil they have no creatures (maybe some worldbreakers or tks, but like one or two copies)
@bigunp
moorland is a great way to outgrind people, but I don't know if there's space for it. Definitely not in the place of ghost quarter. We just added 2-3 mana sinks to the deck (trackers) so adding more mana intensive cards might not be the way to go.
Wanted to share a game I just played against Eldrazi Tron (on Cockatrice) that IMO really showcases the power of playing at instant speed. This is a post-board game (I won game 1 by landing the combo on turn 4 with a Spellskite out). I'm running 4 Knight 4 Queller 2 Clique 2 Retreat.
Sideboarding:
IN 2 Unified Will, 1 Ghost Quarter, 1 Reflector Mage
OUT 2 Scavenging Ooze, 2 Spell Queller
My opener is the nuts: Noble Hierarch x2, 2 lands, 1 Path, 1 Knight, 1 Unified Will.
Turn 1: he plays Wastes + Expedition Map. I draw GQ, play Forest + Hierarch
Turn 2: he plays GQ, passes. I play Noble Hierarch, keep 2 mana up with Unified Will in hand. He cracks map for Eldrazi Temple.
Turn 3: he plays Matter Reshaper, which I counter with Unified Will. He then plays Pithing Needle naming Knight (I love it when opponents over-sideboard against the combo). It's worth noting that if my opponent had gone for Thought-Knot Seer this turn, it would have been even more of a tempo swing. On my turn, I play a Ghost Quarter and kill his temple, holding up Collected Company.
Turn 4: He plays another Matter Reshaper. I cast Collected Company revealing Knight x2, Quasali Pridemage. My knights are 4/4 beaters at this point, so I decide to ignore needle and pick what is effectively double Loxodon Smiters. During my turn I draw Vendillion Clique and attack for 8, he chumps with Matter Reshaper, getting an extra land in play. He's now at 5 lands but no Tron or Temple (thanks to GQ)
Turn 5: I Clique him after draw step, revealing a hand of land, land, Reality Smasher, Endbringer, All is Dust. I take the All is Dust, which is by far the most dangerous card. It's worth noting that if it weren't for this play, he could have All is Dusted my board on Turn 6 and would have been back in the game. He plays a Reality Smasher and keeps it back to block. At this point I draw Pridemage, unlocking my Knights. My opponent concedes.
--
So there you have it. This game really highlights the power of tempo and playing at instant speed. The deck feels very powerful in this configuration and in this environment, and it's a blast to play. I highly recommend it.
Nice report, deus837! I used to be on 2 Vendilion Clique before we got Selfless Spirit, Spell Queller, and Tireless Tracker. The store I used to play at exclusively is very heavy on gridny decks, so I like the value package of Witness/Tracker/Courser there. But my closest store turns out to be mostly Tron (RG and Eldrazi) with some Fish, Affinity, and Burn. There, the value package seems much weaker, which makes me think I'll go back on the 2-Clique plan and see how it works.
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Playing UX Mana Denial until Modern gets the answers it needs.
WUBRG Humans BRW Mardu Pyromancer UW UW "Control" UR Blue Moon
1.- I've tried Renegade Rallier and most of the times it just doesnt click. Getting back a fetchland (which happened ike 75%+ of the times) when we need to be proactive is just BAD.
2.- Secodnly I tried jace and he is decent, much better than what I thought he would be (I thought he would be really really bad). He still doesnt click right though (his -3 is not always useful), so if you are trying him instead of Vendillion or something else, I would stick with the latter.
3.- I tried Tracker. He is good. He eats removal like a champ and his clues are most of the times useful. I think that the discussion between him and Courser is just a matter of what is your plan and what's the meta. If you play in a heavy burn or aggro meta, I would stick with Courser. However if you need to be proactive and there are a lot of grixis and jund decks, then Tracker is the way to go. Still flavors for a highly customizable deck.
Naturally this is very different from traditional lists with Spell Queller/Vendillion Clique (and to be clear I'm still a huge fan of that approach). This is less disruptive and tempo-based, more grindy and with a solid beatdown plan. More importantly, FOUR copies of Ghost Quarter that can be returned by Ralliers, which makes it more solid against Tron than virtually any other creature deck (Except maybe D&T? I don't really know) It looks good on paper, and making it a Knightfall list is as easy as adding a Hallowed Fountain and Breeding Pool and swapping three 3-drops for 1 Knight and 2 Retreat. We could also play around with the 2-drops to skew it more toward disruption with Selfless Spirit etc. over Goyf (Goyf has always seemed underwhelming to me in GW/Naya/Bant decks). I also can't fathom not playing a fourth Collected Company; I'd probably remove the Whisperwood Elemental for that, especially if we have Selfless Spirit which does the job of protecting our team better.
Yeah I saw this list. I think the creator is really looking to get max value out of rallier. I think rallier is good but not that good. I also in all my lists have two retreat. I think it has too much application in so many matches.
Interesting nuance that the renegade rallier builds feature improved tron matchups. I agree the GW company build would be improved as a Knightfall build. Here's how I'd build it:
I piloted the deck at yesterdays FNM for the first time since the new bannings. Went 2-2; I won the first round 2-1 in a Knightfall Mirror, which was a very grindy, intensive game. At the end, Worship won me the game. In the second round, i lost to GW-Hatebears in the last extra turn 1-2, which I could've/should've turn it into a draw but made some mistakes during the final turns. Round 3, i won against Tron 2-0 by simply attacking him constantly, he never drew an Oblivion stone or All is dust. The last round, i lost against Goblins 0-2 with two very strong t4's with two bushwacker and i only drew lands.
I felt very confortable with the deck in general. I tried out the new Tamiyo instead of a third Retreat in the maindeck. I can't say anything since i never drew the card (maybe it's a mistake and i should've played 2x Tamiyo's and 1x Retreat) but my MVP was definetly Tireless Tracker. One i'm not sure at is the sideboard. I tried eldritch evolution in the sideboard and with it, more creatures in the sideboard than usual. I can post the list later, our LGS is doing a special Modern-Weekend, hope i can playtest and update the list during the weekend alongside the stream.
Good luck to you all playing this weekend at the GP's!
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Modern: GWUKnightfall WUSpirits GWBCounters Company
Legacy: WBGR Aggro Loam
Guys please opinions on japanese cards. Lost a 3/3 creature against Japan celestial colonade. This guy played all creatures and spells in english cards, but some cards in his manabase was japanese. I dont registrated this really ( my brain say its all fine and all english to me lets attack his empty board)...and i am sure it is a Kind of legal cheating. It is not ok, but i know legal. I Hate such people. I never forget colonade normally, but with this Tricks it can happen one time in 3 years and such people take advantage of this
If I am a customer spending premium amount of dollars, I expect a premium service. Jund falls into the category of a premium deck costing more dollars than a majority of the rest of the format. I'm not getting the desired performance ratio per dollars spent out of the Jund deck because WOTC decided to make the format more diverse.
Guys please opinions on japanese cards. Lost a 3/3 creature against Japan celestial colonade. This guy played all creatures and spells in english cards, but some cards in his manabase was japanese. I dont registrated this really ( my brain say its all fine and all english to me lets attack his empty board)...and i am sure it is a Kind of legal cheating. It is not ok, but i know legal. I Hate such people. I never forget colonade normally, but with this Tricks it can happen one time in 3 years and such people take advantage of this
If I am a customer spending premium amount of dollars, I expect a premium service. Jund falls into the category of a premium deck costing more dollars than a majority of the rest of the format. I'm not getting the desired performance ratio per dollars spent out of the Jund deck because WOTC decided to make the format more diverse.
Wait, you're already playing 15 3-drops (including Retreats), and you want to add two more at the expense of two 2-drops...?
Modern is way too fast for that. I personally play a total of 12 3-drops including 2 Retreats (see my list on the last page) and at most I would consider adding one more, but any more than that is IMO too slow. If you start without a manadork, or if your manadork gets killed, you're gonna have a bad time.
Honestly, I feel like "too many 3-drops" is a problem in a lot of the builds I see on this thread and elsewhere.
But how do planeswalkers help against Tron? you drop your Elspeth or Gideon, it gets literally eaten alive by a Karn or Ugin, or even Oblivion Stone. If you play them after a Karn or Ugin, you likely don't have a board, so all you can do is spend your turn making a 1/1 or 2/2 token, but your planeswalker still dies the next turn to Karn, while Ugin happpily wipes the token and the planeswalker away. In contrast, you'd much rather be in the spot where they Ugin/Karn your board and you rebuild at end of turn with a Collected Company or (here I go again) Vendillion Clique. Even an end-of-turn Spell Queller can be decent.
In games where you need to end it quickly (like... Ad Nauseam, maybe?), Elspeth *might* have some merit, but it's very marginal and IMO not enough to warrant running her.
GWU Knightfall Spirit Company GWU
GWB Abzan Evolution GWB
DO NOT BOARD IN ARTIFACT HATE. Your goal is to go longer then them because you can decrease their ability to have CA after about turn 4. Aether Vial is great for getting them ahead, but if you board in very narrow artifact hate your are effectively increasing your chances of mulliganing. If you don't believe me go read some of the Eldrazi Taxes and Merfolk forums on this very site. They love when people dilute their decks post-board to bring in answer to their non creatures.
The hardest part of the match up is knowing when to fetch and how to order your lands as getting blown out by Leonin Arbiter does not feel good. Obviously our mana dorks help mitigate this to a degree.
Against Draw/Go opponents the key is the number of flash creatures you have in your 75. Obviously playing Collected Company at instant speed at the End of the Turn is the standard practice against Control. I want to add to that, HOLD Company until you have a CA creature in your hand. This can be a Tireless Tracker, Courser of Kruphix, Eternal Witness, etc. There is no point in casting Collect Company, having them kill your creatures and not getting any benefits the turn after. More or less, drop Flash/Instants into open mana and CA/Unkillable Threats into closed mana.
@deus837 I agree that side boarding planeswlakers is a mistake. Against Tron I actually board in a Tectonic Edge that was suggested many posts ago (its been awesome) and an Eldritch Evolution. Both of these cards help make Knight of the Reliquary the key card in the match up; as both disruption (get the lands you need to blow them up) and clock. I also board out some Path to Exiles and board in Unified Will and Negate. Some of you are like, "WHAT?! Taking out Path to Exile versus Tron?!?!?!" But if you think about it, other than Wurmcoil Engine, what is a legitimate target for our Paths? They are often dead cards as the Tron player is trying to find Karn or Ugin not a creature. If you draw 2 Path to Exiles versus Tron you are effectively dead.
Against, Eldrazi Tron, this argument does not work, as that deck is trying to kill you with creatures. I keep them in for that match up.
@rogue_LOVE I agree for CA the 1st Courser is better than the 3rd Tracker. But currently I am only running 2 CA creatures in my 60. With a Courser of Kruphix in the board.
It was maindeck because i wanted to test it but it could get in the sideboard
I have cut the ghost quarter to make place in the main
I will not make a definitive statement about the card but boy, in conjunction with kessig wolf run made my jeskai opponent run out of answer quick. and a lot of the time it was the card i wanted to fetch with my knight
It also turn useless bird of paradise and noble hierach into threat after a chump block
My list is
3 bird of paradise
2 voice of resurgence
2 quasali pridemage
4 knight of the reliquary
2 tireless tracker
3 selfless spirit
2 scavanging ooze
4 spell queller
4 path to exile
4 collected compagny
2 retreat to coralhelm
1 Moorland haunt
1 kessig wolfrun
1 Horizon canopy
Here is my list + sideboard for reference.
3x Noble Hierarch
2x Voice of Resurgence
2x Qasali Pridemage
2x Scavenging Ooze
2x Selfless Spirit
1x Spellskite
4x Knight of the Reliquary
4x Spell Queller
2x Tireless Tracker
1x Vendilion Clique
1x Eternal Witness
1x Gavony Township
1x Kessig Wolf Run
1x Ghost Quarter
1x Horizon Canopy
1x Bojuka Bog
2x Worship
2x Negate
2x Unified Will
2x Kitchen Finks
2x Izzet Staticaster
1x Blessed Alliance
2x Stony Silence
With a relatively uncertain meta that is in flux, I am aiming to have the best match up against the largest number of decks (hoping for lower percentage gains against some decks post-SB, but opting for cards that are more useful against more decks). That being said, I am also hoping to shore up the tougher match ups of Urza-Tron, Valakut, Ad-Nauseum and Goryo's and am finding it hard to balance those two goals. I am entering this GP with 2 byes, so I am hoping that I have a lower chance of getting paired with fringe decks and want to tune my list as best as possible. Due to the nature of playing in a GP instead of a 3 - 5 round tournament, I am curious as to all of your thoughts on how to tweak this list for a longer tournament. I am playing this deck due to its resiliency to a large number of decks, have experience playing it, and feel that it is well-suited to large tournaments.
I am loving Tireless Tracker, but am thinking about running a single Renegade Rallier in one of the flex slots to help out against Tron and Valakut. It just seems so good to be able to recur a Ghost-Quarter in these match ups. I am worried this might be a bit too much of a corner case, as it would require having both copies of a one-of G1. My plan post-board currently is to board in the counters + Stony Silence + Ghost Quarter vs. Tron (cutting 1 retreat, 4x path and 1x other creature). Against Valakut the plan is to board in counters + Ghost Quarter and cut a mix of 4x path/retreat, but need to see if Worship merits consideration as well. The problem here is that I am adding so many non-creatures, I really don't want to dilute my Coco too much. Any thoughts on how to better prepare for these matchups? I was considering adding 1x Crumble to Dust to the board as it completely hoses both decks, but am not sure if this is the correct use of a SB slot.
Against Goryo's I was thinking of switching one unified will for a Spell Pierce, but besides this I am mostly just hoping that they don't go off too early. Scooze + Bojuka Bog are great here, so the main worry is preparing for their early combo-kill. As for Ad-Nauseum decks Spell Queller and the Pridemages play a big role here, but do you think Surgical Extraction might be useful against these strategies?
Agree with pretty much everything you said. Evolution is interesting as a sideboard plan. If I were playing Evolution I would want to have Eidolon of Rhetoric in the board as well.
Re: BW Eldrazi & Taxes: I've never found this to be a hard matchup. Leonin Arbiter is annoying but if we crack our fetches early or land dorks he's a minor annoyance at most. Don't forget, he also makes our Paths into Swords to Plowshares++ and Ghost Quarters into Wastelands. Other than that, our creatures are just better. The power level in our deck is leagues above theirs.
This is just a mistake. You make your Tron, Affinity, Infect, Eldrazi (Bant and D&T) and Valakut matchups much worse, to name a few. As for the grindy matchups like Jund, IMO a Ghost Quarter to kill their Raging Ravine is still much better than a Moorland Haunt.
GWU Knightfall Spirit Company GWU
GWB Abzan Evolution GWB
I think the flyer is worth more to finish the opponent and/or chump the raging ravine than delaying the inevitable loss you will suffer against jund late game(except if the also have an ooze)
They need to sink 4-5 mana into the ravine while you only put 2-3 in the moorland haunt so you can advance your board while they can't
I also noted that i put it maindeck because i wanted to test it that night, so it will probably goes in the sideboard. I don't see myself replacing the gavony towninp or the wolfrun for it.
I mean i have seen list with ormendal and the moorland haunt seems a little better
@goldenregis
I thought about slayer's stronghold because it turns every creature topdeck into damage. As I said, probably not good, but I thought it was worth mentioning. It has cute sinergies with Knight too (attack with vigilance, then activate for more damage). Activation cost is less than gavony too.
After playing some time with them, I concluded that geist wasn't good in this deck. If you want a good geist deck, check bant spirits. Knightfall has almost zero tools to protect knight (only path) , and geist requires enabling to work well. It can be countered too, spirits has cavern.
@deus
This morning I was theorycrafting about our bad matchups and which cards are useful against them and vendilion came as more versatile than I expected. I'll test two copies again, definitely.
@fatkiddestroyers
I agree on the artifact hate. Wouldn't board in stony, but qasali probably stays in.
I definitely played really poor against the arbiters. As a friend advised me, leave 2 mana up unless you are facing pressure. If you aren't under a clock, there's no need to risk your mana.
Boarding out 2-4 path against regular tron is correct, maybe even all of them, depending on the number of retreat that you run. Notice that you can tap wurmcoil with retreat, it's a much cleaner way to deal with it and doesn't risk you into drawing dead cards. As you said, other than wurmcoil they have no creatures (maybe some worldbreakers or tks, but like one or two copies)
@bigunp
moorland is a great way to outgrind people, but I don't know if there's space for it. Definitely not in the place of ghost quarter. We just added 2-3 mana sinks to the deck (trackers) so adding more mana intensive cards might not be the way to go.
L: Maverick
Sideboarding:
IN 2 Unified Will, 1 Ghost Quarter, 1 Reflector Mage
OUT 2 Scavenging Ooze, 2 Spell Queller
My opener is the nuts: Noble Hierarch x2, 2 lands, 1 Path, 1 Knight, 1 Unified Will.
Turn 1: he plays Wastes + Expedition Map. I draw GQ, play Forest + Hierarch
Turn 2: he plays GQ, passes. I play Noble Hierarch, keep 2 mana up with Unified Will in hand. He cracks map for Eldrazi Temple.
Turn 3: he plays Matter Reshaper, which I counter with Unified Will. He then plays Pithing Needle naming Knight (I love it when opponents over-sideboard against the combo). It's worth noting that if my opponent had gone for Thought-Knot Seer this turn, it would have been even more of a tempo swing. On my turn, I play a Ghost Quarter and kill his temple, holding up Collected Company.
Turn 4: He plays another Matter Reshaper. I cast Collected Company revealing Knight x2, Quasali Pridemage. My knights are 4/4 beaters at this point, so I decide to ignore needle and pick what is effectively double Loxodon Smiters. During my turn I draw Vendillion Clique and attack for 8, he chumps with Matter Reshaper, getting an extra land in play. He's now at 5 lands but no Tron or Temple (thanks to GQ)
Turn 5: I Clique him after draw step, revealing a hand of land, land, Reality Smasher, Endbringer, All is Dust. I take the All is Dust, which is by far the most dangerous card. It's worth noting that if it weren't for this play, he could have All is Dusted my board on Turn 6 and would have been back in the game. He plays a Reality Smasher and keeps it back to block. At this point I draw Pridemage, unlocking my Knights. My opponent concedes.
--
So there you have it. This game really highlights the power of tempo and playing at instant speed. The deck feels very powerful in this configuration and in this environment, and it's a blast to play. I highly recommend it.
GWU Knightfall Spirit Company GWU
GWB Abzan Evolution GWB
WUBRG Humans
BRW Mardu Pyromancer
UW UW "Control"
UR Blue Moon
2.- Secodnly I tried jace and he is decent, much better than what I thought he would be (I thought he would be really really bad). He still doesnt click right though (his -3 is not always useful), so if you are trying him instead of Vendillion or something else, I would stick with the latter.
3.- I tried Tracker. He is good. He eats removal like a champ and his clues are most of the times useful. I think that the discussion between him and Courser is just a matter of what is your plan and what's the meta. If you play in a heavy burn or aggro meta, I would stick with Courser. However if you need to be proactive and there are a lot of grixis and jund decks, then Tracker is the way to go. Still flavors for a highly customizable deck.
3 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Noble Hierarch
1 Qasali Pridemage
3 Renegade Rallier
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Tireless Tracker
3 Voice of Resurgence
1 Whisperwood Elemental
4 Courser of Kruphix
2 Plains
1 Gavony Township
4 Ghost Quarter
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Stomping Ground
2 Temple Garden
4 Windswept Heath
3 Wooded Foothills
3 Collected Company
1 Dromoka's Command
4 Path to Exile
1 Burrenton Forge-Tender
1 Oracle of Mul Daya
3 Blood Moon
3 Stony Silence
3 Blessed Alliance
3 Surgical Extraction
Naturally this is very different from traditional lists with Spell Queller/Vendillion Clique (and to be clear I'm still a huge fan of that approach). This is less disruptive and tempo-based, more grindy and with a solid beatdown plan. More importantly, FOUR copies of Ghost Quarter that can be returned by Ralliers, which makes it more solid against Tron than virtually any other creature deck (Except maybe D&T? I don't really know) It looks good on paper, and making it a Knightfall list is as easy as adding a Hallowed Fountain and Breeding Pool and swapping three 3-drops for 1 Knight and 2 Retreat. We could also play around with the 2-drops to skew it more toward disruption with Selfless Spirit etc. over Goyf (Goyf has always seemed underwhelming to me in GW/Naya/Bant decks). I also can't fathom not playing a fourth Collected Company; I'd probably remove the Whisperwood Elemental for that, especially if we have Selfless Spirit which does the job of protecting our team better.
Thoughts?
GWU Knightfall Spirit Company GWU
GWB Abzan Evolution GWB
3 Birds of Paradise
4 Tarmogoyf
3 Voice of Resurgence
1 Qasali Pridemage
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Spellskite
1 Selfless Spirit
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Spell Queller
2 Renegade Rallier
1 Courser of Kruphix
4 Path to Exile
4 Collected Company
4 Windswept Heath
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Temple Garden
1 Breeding Pool
1 Stomping Ground
1 Hallowed Fountain
3 Forest
2 Plains
1 Horizon Canopy
1 Kessig Wolf Run
3 Ghost Quarter
2 Izzet Staticaster
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Rhox War Monk
1 Kataki, War's Wage
1 Meddling Mage
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Stony Silence
2 Blessed Alliance
1 Ghost Quarter
1 Bojuka Bog
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
I felt very confortable with the deck in general. I tried out the new Tamiyo instead of a third Retreat in the maindeck. I can't say anything since i never drew the card (maybe it's a mistake and i should've played 2x Tamiyo's and 1x Retreat) but my MVP was definetly Tireless Tracker. One i'm not sure at is the sideboard. I tried eldritch evolution in the sideboard and with it, more creatures in the sideboard than usual. I can post the list later, our LGS is doing a special Modern-Weekend, hope i can playtest and update the list during the weekend alongside the stream.
Good luck to you all playing this weekend at the GP's!
GWUKnightfall
WUSpirits
GWBCounters Company
Legacy:
WBGR Aggro Loam
Kelvin Chew played Knightfall to an 11th place finish at Brisbane. Pretty stock no-frills list.
Yeah. The guy in question is a poster in the zoo thread