MTG Salvation

Quote from ccc1522 »

Does anyone else find that side boarding significantly reduces this decks consistency?

I have found that to be the case for me

Honestly you need to not over sideboard. In most games you don't want to be boarding in/out more than 4 or 5 cards. More than that and yes you will ruin the consistency

I will be more aware of this when i SB thank you

So I decided to test out Memnite last night. I only managed to get one match in as it took quite a while, but overall I liked the little critter.

I ended up playing against GW Hate Bears, and I tell you, having those Memnites really helped when my opponent chained Ghost Quarter with Renegade Rallier.

They also let me get enough creatures quickly to go wide and win with Become Immense

Whenever if it I do another set of videos, I'll basically be running with Memnites to see how they work over multiple games.

What I ended up taking out for them was:
2x Hooting Mandrills
1x Cathartic Reunion
1x Lightning Bolt

I took out the Mandrills so that they don't compete with the Become Immense as a Delve card, and as I've stated before, the first Cathartic Reunion is great, the 2nd one is usually garbage. As such I went down to 3 instead of 4. And finally I cut a Bolt because I had no idea what else to get rid of.

Quote from Killer_Manfred »

Interesting changes. What does your list look like now? Did you consider running 3 Mandrills and only 2 to 3 Memnites?

This is the current list:



Still working on changes for the sideboard.

I honestly found that If you want to run the Immense + Battle Rage combo yu probably shouldn't be running any other Delve cards, thus me cutting the Mandrills. It is important to note btw, that with Memnite in the list it makes it easier to hit Delirium for Traverse the Ulvenwald in case I decide to run it.

Quote from Killer_Manfred »

Quote from Skitzafreak »

Quote from Killer_Manfred »

Interesting changes. What does your list look like now? Did you consider running 3 Mandrills and only 2 to 3 Memnites?

It is important to note btw, that with Memnite in the list it makes it easier to hit Delirium for Traverse the Ulvenwald in case I decide to run it.

Do you think Traverse is worth it without Shadow?

I think that Traverse would shine in a list incorporating black (so a Jund list). I think being able to grab a Shadow when you need one, or being able to tutor up your sideboarded Big Game Hunter is a pretty sweet proposition. But I think that without something like Memnite you won't consistently have enough card types in the graveyard to turn on Traverse.

Hey everyone, burn player who's testing out RG vengeful one because turn 2 wins are the bomb.

I played a weekly Thursday night. My list is similar to Julian's list, except I removed 2 cathartic reunion, 1 become immense and 1 hooting mandrils for 4 traverse, and moved 2 bolts an to make room for a commands MB. I won't go through the whole night in detail but will highlight each round. ended up 2-2. Also 2 lighting ax SB. Can't rmemeber what came out for them. 2 roast removed from sB 2 lightning axe in.
R1 grixis shadow:

Mulled to 5 game one (two no landers, kind of expect it being the first time I play the deck ever), still managed to hang around long to get him down to 5.
Game 2 mulled to 6 as my opener was lightning axe, street wraith and 5 lands. 6 was more keepable, but still lost in 2.

It was after my first game with the deck I realized I wanted more discard and less traverse (more on that later)

Round 2 UB tron.

G1 I got an early hollow one and vengevine, beat down for win.

G2 he hits natural tron and I cry, though managed to get him to 5. Conceded with a mindslaver activation on the stack to conceal secrets.
G3 I destroyed him on the play. But it had nothing to do with vengevines or hollow ones. T1 goblin guide. He casts e map. Turn 2 I go swiftspear and guide, he takes 5. Turn 3 I atarkas command and bolt for the win through a bounce spell. Knowing that hand was the bomb despite not being plan 1 is partially thanks to burn experience, And god did that feel good.

R3 mono red burn.
I dealt 1 damage over the course of 2 games. Pretty much tells you how my round went. I do believe we fair slightly better against Boros or naya variants as fetching and shocking knocks them within BI/TBR range.

R4 GW allies
Game one I recognized he was on the one land two aether vial plan so I fetched and shocked aggressively to get become immense / TBR him. He thought that was the point of the deck.

Game 2 he mulls to 6, 1 land 1 aether vial and I have destructive rev and ancient grudge in hand. That's when he saw the hollow one vengevine combo.

We ended up playing some fun games against his RB relentless rats deck. Was glad to have 1 MB forest for those marches. I believe he won best of 5 but I was tired and play was sloppy.

I went back in some changes after this. Cut to 2 and eventually 1 traverse for the 2 other reunion and a bolt out of the SB back in.

Played some more games against mono red, all pre SB, but each game I got him low enough that I would have had him if he was fetching. Won one game that he had a bunch of 2 mana spells and 1 land.

The biggest problem for me was consistency. There was probably 6 or 7 times I drew vengevines off cathartic reunions, in multiples. That feels bad.

As far as where I believe the list should go? I think testing memnites is a good route, especially if playing multiple traverse. The problem with traverse was it almost always fetched a land because between delve and 20+ creatures you didn't hit delirium enough. With the extra artifsct creatures, you don't mind discarding them as much. I also liked the atarkas command as it gave hands without the combo but a flood of one mana creatures a little more life, plus it can be held up against lifegain decks. However it's worth noting a lot of this happens at sorcery speed, so choosing between holding up mana and doing things is awkward.

I'm debating between this and burn for a pptq. Convince me to play this. I dare you.

my issue was that i wasnt quite drawing things in the right order, and a lot of the times i had traverse I wanted discards/draw effects instead, so I'm going to stick with one traverse, and will also be trying skitzafreaks suggestion with the memnites

Hey guys, I'd really love to build this deck in paper, and I'd like some input from more experienced players of the archetype before I make my decision I've been lurking for awhile now, and I was curious if the BUG variant of the deck is wholly unplayable? I've been playing with BUG brew that focuses on a more midrange approach (i.e. more removal), and I've been having some success in testing on Xmage. The problem is that I either grind out long enough to explode with 12+ power, or my draws are dead with Vengevines/Amalgams in hand.

Is there something I'm missing, and if I am what is it? If not would going Jund serve me better?

(Decklist below for reference; I realize my list lacks one drops besides Gravecrawler, but I'm unsure of what to use because Hedron Crab feels bad, haha)

@Killer_Manfred
Thanks for the welcome and reply! I really only wanted to play the BUG variant (which it appears, from the information you've given me, is way outdated) because it happens to be my favorite color combo, but I have no qualms about running the Jund version if it means I get to play a more consistent deck. Thanks again for the insight and advice!

I can definitely see why would you want to play BUG.

Blue gives you access to a lot of great cards like Thought Scour, Ceremonious Rejection, [card}Stubborn Denial[/card], and Hurkyl's Recall. However at the end of the day this deck needs red to be one of it's colours.

Red gives you the most important cards in your decks: Faithless Looting, Insolent Neonate, and Cathartic Reunion. Without those 3 cards as consistent discard outlets to pitch your Vengevines, the deck kind of falls apart.



Now I was able to play a few more games running Memnite in the list. Honestly, I am quite surprised at how well it is working in the deck. I think the problem with Memnite in previous builds was that the options you had for other free creatures were Ornithopter and Hangarback Walker. Ornithopter is a *****ty 0/2 creature that doesn't push the aggro plan, and walker does nothing because it just instantly dies. When your options for free creatures are an 0/2, a 1/1, and something that dies instantly, you'll tend to try and stay away from those cards.

But with Hollow One in the roster, and with the slight subtle changes to the deck (less Dredge durdling, more aggro velocity) Memnite is actually not that bad. I honestly don't think it is 4-of good, after doing some testing with it. But I feel that it is 2-3-of good. It just helps you get those Vengevines into play that much quicker.

And after careful consideration I don't feel that Traverse the Ulvenwald is worth the deck slots. @Optimal_Hunter is a buddy of mine who has done some testing on MTGO and basically came to the conclusion that Traverse is a card that is great in a deck with either a creature toolbox, or a deck that wants 8 of a single creature like Death's Shadow or Tarmogoyf. Our deck honestly isn't either of those so it's honestly quite lackluster.

This is what my current iteration with the list looks like:



Part of me wants to find room for some Atarka's Commands because of how wide this deck can go sometimes, but I feel that they're more greedy than anything. Though they might have a place in the deck if you can find the room. I'm also fiddling around with the sideboard a bit, essentially figuring out how many of which cards I want. I ended up cutting the Domri Rade as after a while it seems more like a wishful thinking sideboard card as opposed to an actually good one.

Quote from Killer_Manfred »

However at the end of the day this deck needs red to be one of it's colours.

Red gives you the most important cards in your decks: Faithless Looting, Insolent Neonate, and Cathartic Reunion. Without those 3 cards as consistent discard outlets to pitch your Vengevines, the deck kind of falls apart.

That's true for the aggressive versions of the deck. If you want to go midrange, though, you have enough discard outlets in Liliana, Jace, LolTroll, and Collective Brutality.

I disagree. I think even if you were to aim for a Midrange list not running red will result in a definitely inferior list to one that utilizes red.

Yes, even if the list is not running [card}Hollow One[/card]. This is because I feel if you aren't running Hollow One, then you should probably in some way be running the Dredge package. And if you're running the Dredge package you'll want to be running Faithless Looting, Cathartic Reunion, and Insolent Neonate because they all work very well with Dredge cards.

That being said, I feel like not running Hollow One is a mistake. I believe that utilizing Hollow One to reanimate Vengevine is not only a good strategy, but the correct strategy going forward. It gives the deck so much more velocity, and also so much more staying power. It is really hard to deal with a 5 mana 4/4 creature in Modern. The only deck that gives us pause is Grixis Death's Shadow, where they're playing 1 mana 4/5's and 5/5's. Everything else is either playing much smaller creatures, or isn't fast enough. Hell the premier removal spell of the format, Fatal Push can't even kill Hollow One, which is a huge benefit and reason to run it.

I said it in one of my videos, but I'll restate it here. I am of the belief that every Vengevine deck going forward should start with the following 24 cards:

Quote from Skitzafreak »

Now I was able to play a few more games running Memnite in the list. Honestly, I am quite surprised at how well it is working in the deck. I think the problem with Memnite in previous builds was that the options you had for other free creatures were Ornithopter and Hangarback Walker. Ornithopter is a *****ty 0/2 creature that doesn't push the aggro plan, and walker does nothing because it just instantly dies. When your options for free creatures are an 0/2, a 1/1, and something that dies instantly, you'll tend to try and stay away from those cards.

But with Hollow One in the roster, and with the slight subtle changes to the deck (less Dredge durdling, more aggro velocity) Memnite is actually not that bad. I honestly don't think it is 4-of good, after doing some testing with it. But I feel that it is 2-3-of good. It just helps you get those Vengevines into play that much quicker.

And after careful consideration I don't feel that Traverse the Ulvenwald is worth the deck slots. @Optimal_Hunter is a buddy of mine who has done some testing on MTGO and basically came to the conclusion that Traverse is a card that is great in a deck with either a creature toolbox, or a deck that wants 8 of a single creature like Death's Shadow or Tarmogoyf. Our deck honestly isn't either of those so it's honestly quite lackluster.

This is what my current iteration with the list looks like:

RG Vengevine (We need a better name T__T)Magic OnlineOCTGN2ApprenticeBuy These Cards
Land - 18 4x Bloodstained Mire 4x Wooded Foothills 3x Stomping Ground 2x Copperline Gorge 5x Mountain	Creatures - 26 4x Hollow One 4x Insolent Neonate 4x Monastery Swiftspear 4x Street Wraith 4x Vengevine 3x Goblin GUide 3x Memnite	Spells - 16 4x Faithless Looting 4x Lightning Bolt 3x Become Immense 3x Cathartic Reunion 2x Temur Battle Rage

Part of me wants to find room for some Atarka's Commands because of how wide this deck can go sometimes, but I feel that they're more greedy than anything. Though they might have a place in the deck if you can find the room. I'm also fiddling around with the sideboard a bit, essentially figuring out how many of which cards I want. I ended up cutting the Domri Rade as after a while it seems more like a wishful thinking sideboard card as opposed to an actually good one.

awe, a shoutout :3 Thanks bud!

as Skitz said, I've been testing on modo with the following list:


I'm currently 3-0 in a friendly league, trying to find time to stream/record games when I'm not super tired. I also need to sort out the mic and quality kinks with my stream before I record and play any more matches. But when I do, I'll post the link to my stream here for people interested, as well as playthrough videos afterward.

Anyways, now that the shameless self-promotion is done...

I. Love. This. List.

I think this list is close to where we want to be, barring a major meta shift or a new card being tested and added and being very successful. Here's the reasoning on some of my card choices:

Memnite
I was talking with skitz about the deck (really i sent him 8 messages one morning before he was awake) and mentioned in there that maybe we would want ballista or Hangarback walker, to boost our chances at the artifact-creature being in the bin for traverse. He gets back to me and says that 0 cost artifacts were never good in vengevine lists. Him being the far more experienced vengevine player (I just picked it up this week) I conceded that point.

I log on to the forum a couple hours later to see he's already testing memnites, and commenting that he likes them in the deck.

My decision to go with memnite revolved around two things: the artifact type for traverse (more on that later) and the fact that, rather than hooting mandrils costing at least 1, this would lead to more nut draws where you have a 1 drop or 2 0 drops and a faithless looting to get your vines back.

In reality, as Skitz said, I realized that it also adds more go-wide to the deck, as well as not having to compete with become immense for graveyard cards. I went with a 3 of as despite the upsides, this still probably one of our weakest creatures (Neonate having menace is usefull with the BI/TBR combo) and it is an awful topdeck. I also tend to board out one or two if needed, depending on the matchup.

Atarka's command
I played this card in my burn days, already have a playset and was excited to use it in a deck that has a good chance to go wide. Also, doing the math, casting this with even 1 creature on board is 4 damage, which is what seems to make our deck consistent (getting a bunch of 4 power creatures and beating face), so it almost adds to the nut draw count. There are also some games where the skullcrack ability comes in useful.

I went with 2 because I didn't want to dilute the original list too much, and I wanted to try traverse. When I cut traverse (spoiler alert), either this will become a 3 of, or the SB bolt comes MB and one of these is added to the SB.

traverse the ulvenwald
At first glance, I thought this would be a great list for the card. a lot of discard to get you to delirium, a few too many creatures but artifact creatures help, and it lets you fetch what you need when you need it. When i first threw the list together on paper, I had 4 of. I SB most out every matchup, and when i built the list on modo decided to try one of. Having payed 3 matches in the league, I am ready to drop it compeletly from the list.

Skitz touched on some of our dislikes on the card, but I do have a few more to add:
in reality, our creature count is far too high, and none of our creatures read "you win the game". Our deck is just one that wants to load of on creatures and things in our graveyard, however it also wants to use all if it's mana to do that. the only turn we may not use all our mana is turn 1, but delirum is impossible to achieve while also casting traverse that turn. Late game, fetchign a 4/4 won't often make the difference, where an extra burn spell has a higher chance of making a difference.

Delirium and Delve are a major non-bo that comes up more than I'd wish.

This deck also wants to be very selective with what it discards, and having to discard a become immense or Temur battle rage to get delirium feels bad, especially being wincons, while traverse is just a utility card.

I will admit, one game was very useful, i was able to chain two traverse together in my old list with a swiftspear and a land and it made for a decent play, but outside of that, it doesnt support the deck enough.

2become immenseand 1 temur battle rage
I put these two together because you almost always want them together. In addition, having played this combo in standard when it was legal, having more become immense is important because it's usually a better "gotchya" card, and gets in for more damage on it's own, and TBR usually needed Immense to get ferocious online. Nothing against TBR, but usually it isn't great on it's own. This list is the exception, where the creatures your deck revolves around have 4 power and activate ferocious on their own, and it may be right to play a 2/2 split. I prefer to diversify threats, which is why I went down 1 of each to fit in the atarka's commands.

forest
two small purposes: a fetchable green source without taking damage, and a blood-moon insurance. I have been saved by both situations and have had to mulligan exactly one hand that would be perfect with a mountain. This is a meta call, depending on how often you both expect to face blood moon and how often you plan to board it in yourself. With Etron and Deaths shadow prevailent, blood moon hoses both those decks, and locally there are 2 mono red burn players who both play 4 blood moons SB.

Sideboard choices:
lightning axe
I've decided Lightning axe over dismember for a couple reasons.
Firstly, our deck doesn't mind discard, and hitting fliers at one mana for isntant speed beats the roast in the original list.
Secondly, budget
Thirdly, if we are in topdeck mode late game against a creature we need to kill, I would rather save a card in hand than pay 4 life, which we realistically may not be able to do if opponent has us dead. In addition, with cathartic reuninon, insolent neonate, and faithless looting in our deck, we want to save extra lands when we can to make sure we have discard fodder (though its worth noting discard fodder vs. thinning the deck is a legitimate arguement).

On balance, while dismember may be a better late game topdeck with an empty hand, my opinion is that the damage is too much of a payoff, considering we want to horde a card or two in hand anyway, the discard clause is not the biggest issue.

Also, the third lightning axe is likely correct as a third leyline of the void or third blood moon, meta dependant.



Potential changes

as I discussed, I'll have to finish the league before i make changes, however I would advocate for dropping the traverse and bringing lightning bolt main to increase our interaction. With this free sideboard slot, atarka's command, blood moon and leyline are all realistic choices as additional cards, meta dependant, in addition to changing one lightning axe for one of leyline or blood moon.

Hey guys,
Been brewing UBR deck list for a while, and I thought it might be timely to drop it here for scrutiny.



As a cheap looter creature, I thought Jace can fill the sweet spot of Hollow One and Vengevine. Crucially, it is cheaper than Champion of Wits and it is much more threatening than Magus of the Bazaar. Recasting Bolts and Brutalities were indeed useful during test games, and side-board plans to use Claim // Fame on him sounds sweet as well.

Otherwise, the deck does keep its blitzkrieg-recipe from Skitzafreak's 24,

Quote from Skitzafreak »

Sakura_Maple's DeckMagic OnlineOCTGN2ApprenticeBuy These Cards
4x Cathartic Reunion 4x Faithless Looting 4x Hollow One 4x Insolent Neonate 4x Street Wraith 4x Vengevine

only it replaces some reunions with Izzet Charm. It may not be the fastest of our lists, but definitely a more versatile one.

As for possible improvement, Claim // Fame does work well in this deck, if we adopt Death's Shadow and Vexing Devil in our mainboard. The Devil option seems interesting as we also plan to burn our opponent by recasting Bolts through Jace. Alternatively, if we are going to use Death's Shadow, we can cut Brutalities for Call to the Netherworld to grave extra Wraiths or looted Shadow/Angler. The options are alluring but we must cut Gravecrawler, so it would also cost us some stability with Vines. Yet I think its worth a dig.

That's what I have for now. I'm planning on taking this deck to my next weekly modern games, and I will share my result if I did make it there.

So something interesting happened over the weekend in the Modern Challenge Event

4th Place RG Vengevine

What is definitely interesting to note about this list is both the lack of Cathartic Reunions as well as the inclusion of Burning-Tree Emissary and Reckless Bushwhacker. I do generally like the combo Bushwhacker has with Vengevine, and maybe this list is where we should be headed? I'd definitely be willing to try it out, I know it's been a while since I've done any videos

I have been trying to post this for hours but keep getting an error T__T

EDIT: HOLY ***** I CAN POST THINGS

Quote from Killer_Manfred »

Guys, I just had a crazy idea. I've been looking for more viable one-drops and remembered a discard value list I saw a couple of weeks ago on Cfb. It was running Ruthless Sniper to great effect, a card I can see fitting perfectly in some of our lists; at least as a one- or two-off. Any thoughts?

I don't like it. Our deck doesn't have a lot of spare mana lying around, so we won't get much use out of the Sniper. And if we aren't getting a lot of use out of the Sniper, then it's just a really *****ty 1/1 creature. I'd rather play Raging Goblin honestly lol

What about Goblin Bushwhacker ?
It is a 1-drop when you really need to trigger Vengevine or a 2-mana anthem + haste effect when you have more mana to spare and cheated out a free Hollow One or a 1-mana dredge creature.

Quote from D90Dennis14 »

What about Goblin Bushwhacker ?
It is a 1-drop when you really need to trigger Vengevine or a 2-mana anthem + haste effect when you have more mana to spare and cheated out a free Hollow One or a 1-mana dredge creature.

Definitely not a terrible suggestion, it is a card I have been considering.

Quote from Killer_Manfred »

In exactly 4 weeks I'm going to a big tournament in Hamburg, Germany. This sadly means that I have to settle on a final list in the next one or two weeks, so that I can get all the cards I need in time. I'm planning on running a Jund list with Bloodghasts and Gravecrawler. Do any of you have final recommendations for me before I order the missing pieces? Is Lili worth a shot?

Any update on that list?


Also trying a jund list with bloodghasts right now.

Quote from Killer_Manfred »

Quote from Sakura_Maple »

Hey guys,
Been brewing UBR deck list for a while, and I thought it might be timely to drop it here for scrutiny.

UBR Sleepy Hollow (for name?)Magic OnlineOCTGN2ApprenticeBuy These Cards
Lands - 17 3 Scalding Tarn 3 Bloodstained Mire 1 Polluted Delta 3 Blackcleave Cliffs 2 Spirebluff Canal 2 Blood Crypt 1 Steam Vents 1 Watery Grave 1 Mountain	Creatures - 28 4 Hollow One 4 Vengevine 4 Street Wraith 4 Insolent Neonate 4 Gravecrawler 4 Gurmag Angler 4 Jace, Vryn's Progidy	Spells - 15 4 Faithless Looting 3 Lightning Bolt 3 Collective Brutality 3 Izzet Charm 1 Cathartic Reunion 1 Temur Battle Rage

As a cheap looter creature, I thought Jace can fill the sweet spot of Hollow One and Vengevine. Crucially, it is cheaper than Champion of Wits and it is much more threatening than Magus of the Bazaar. Recasting Bolts and Brutalities were indeed useful during test games, and side-board plans to use Claim // Fame on him sounds sweet as well.

Otherwise, the deck does keep its blitzkrieg-recipe from Skitzafreak's 24,

Quote from Skitzafreak »

Sakura_Maple's DeckMagic OnlineOCTGN2ApprenticeBuy These Cards
4x Cathartic Reunion 4x Faithless Looting 4x Hollow One 4x Insolent Neonate 4x Street Wraith 4x Vengevine

only it replaces some reunions with Izzet Charm. It may not be the fastest of our lists, but definitely a more versatile one.

As for possible improvement, Claim // Fame does work well in this deck, if we adopt Death's Shadow and Vexing Devil in our mainboard. The Devil option seems interesting as we also plan to burn our opponent by recasting Bolts through Jace. Alternatively, if we are going to use Death's Shadow, we can cut Brutalities for Call to the Netherworld to grave extra Wraiths or looted Shadow/Angler. The options are alluring but we must cut Gravecrawler, so it would also cost us some stability with Vines. Yet I think its worth a dig.

That's what I have for now. I'm planning on taking this deck to my next weekly modern games, and I will share my result if I did make it there.

Interesting deck idea, I like it. Have you considered running Liliana of the Veils? Might be worth a shot. I'm not sure how I feel about Gravecrawlers in your list, though. You have very few zombies left in your deck and Gurmag Angler might be too hard to cast early enough. You might want to consider swapping it our for Tasigurs and finding a replacement for Gravecrawler. Maybe Hedron Crab works in your list. I'm also sceptical about the Lightning Bolts. Without Swiftspear I don't see any reason in running them. Fatal Push is just better here, I think. Temur Battle Rage also seems a little sketchy.

Thanks for reply!

I did think of Liliana of the Veils, only I'm concerned that I might ganna discard her a lot more than I cast her. I really struggled to cast Champion of Wits in current configuration, thus I fear that she would be as difficult to cast. Then again, her + ability is very attractive indeed. Will keep her in mind.
Gravecrawler and Angler really are difficult package here. The crawler does lack in punch but its advantage is unique and definitely useful in a deck that loots his hand very often. If I can substitute Gravecrawlers with another card, I can cut some Anglers to Tasigur, but I'm still struggling to find one.
As for Bolts, I was hoping to leave some burn option for a final blow to our opponent, which became a lot easier now that the deck can recast them through Jace. Fatal Push is definitely a choice, but what are the cards that is killable with push that does stop our power 4s? Perhaps more useful against Jund, but against Grixis Shadow's Anglers and Tasigur (another reason to run Angler)? Personally, I prefer Bolt for now, but will watch the meta and balance with Push. Battle Rage will probably end at sideboard at best too.



By the way, I just realised how Bedlam Reveler can fill the spot between Hollow One and Vengevine (if we can replace delve cards with it), but has anyone tried them out already?