Hi. Newbie for B/W tokens. I get the gist of the idea of why Tron hurts the deck a lot but I've never personally faced any version of Tron since I'm pretty new to playing Modern and no one in my lgs is playing it iirc. I have been interested in hearing about the red splash for Blood Moon in the sideboard and was wondering if the card Hide//Seek would also be a good consideration for sideboards if using red splash. It answers problematic Enchantments and Artifacts by placing them at the bottom of the deck and can also be used to take away some of the problematic cards from tron decks and gaining life. The Seek part is pretty limited but could hurt combo decks if they only use a few win conditions to win the game with. With all the discard we play plus the Hide//Seek it might make the matchup with Tron not as difficult. Also helps that both side is 2 cmc each.
As for the above discussion of Infernal Tutor, I feel you could play 1-3 Mainboard/Sideboard to just get redundant token generators or even anthem effects. You could also use them to grab redundant sideboard cards that you would want 2 of in your hand in game 2 or 3. I especially like the idea of using Infernal Tutor just to grab more lingering souls.
Infernal Tutor is a bit slow unless you're using it in the grindiest of match-ups like against BGx.
Blood Moon splash can work but you have to substitute spectral procession somehow. We also run 4 concealed courtyard to get as many painless black sources as possible and this is a non-bo with Blood Moon. Actually, I don't think Blood Moon is that insane right now either.
Hide/Seek is a good card which I used to run in Mardu but it wouldn't be worth a splash on its own.
I don't think Spectral Procession being taken out when Blood Moon comes in isn't that necessary. It does have the alternate cost of paying 2 for each of the white you can't pay for it. Not optimal yes but it's still possible to cast it.
I don't think Spectral Procession being taken out when Blood Moon comes in isn't that necessary. It does have the alternate cost of paying 2 for each of the white you can't pay for it. Not optimal yes but it's still possible to cast it.
Casting spectral procession without two basic plains is difficult. We really don't want to be casting this for 5-mana. When playing the blood moon game, we need to be prioritizing at least one plains and one swamp. Chances are, you are not going to draw enough fetches in time to get three basics in play in addition to a red source.
When boarding a blood moon, the plan would be to reduce the number of spectral procession, depending on the match-up. I think it could work just fine if we run 2 godless shrine and 1 sacred foundry. Not sure it is worth running, but it may be interesting trying.
Using Blood Moon would require changes to the mana-base. I wouldn't touch a splash without at least three sources and there's no way one wouldn't reduce the reliability of the mana with the changes necessary.
If one eliminated colorless sources completely, it'd probably be okay, but it's tough for three-color decks to play colorless lands or EtB-tapped-lands.
If a side-board Blood Moon is the only R needed, a single source isn't unreasonable, but it has to fetch-able and then one has a shock-land that's generally not worth fetching or playing untapped.
Blood Moon isn't good enough against Tron to bother with. There are some decks it shuts down but Tron is merely inconvenienced by it. It would hurt BW tokens much more than it hurts Tron.
Blood Moon is for heavy-R decks, not three-color decks with a light R splash.
If you want to play Blood Moon, you should play something different. If you really need to beat Tron, you really need to play something different. Every decks has bad match-ups, one has to pick his poison.
Blood Moon is for heavy-R decks, not three-color decks with a light R splash.
If you want to play Blood Moon, you should play something different. If you really need to beat Tron, you really need to play something different. Every decks has bad match-ups, one has to pick his poison.
+1. A Blood Moon splash is neither particularly desirable nor particularly feasible in BW Tokens.
With all this talking about mana concerns and potential splashes for various sideboard strategies, I'm interested to know exactly what you guys are running for lands. I'm mainly asking since I'm currently running a full playset both pain and check lands, and I'm looking to find the best trade-off between having the right color when you need it, some added utility, and minimal drawbacks. Currently my mana base looks like so:
I just picked up the Marsh Flats this afternoon, and those are my big target for upping my mana base's power level. My plan is to cut another swamp and a plains for the two I'm missing. Shocks are the next logical upgrade after I complete the fetches.
I'll vote against blood moon for the tron match too.
The best chance I've had against tron still is Ghost Quarter into Surgical, or turn 2 stony silence to buy enough time and they don't land an ugin on turn 4/5.
Terrible odds, but still not as bad as Elves vs Titanshift.
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Yeah regarding Blood Moon... just don't. Completely not worth it, screws up the deck way too much and really doesn't do much against Tron. If you wanted to splash and really screw up Tron just run Gaddock Teeg (Mainly joking).
With all this talking about mana concerns and potential splashes for various sideboard strategies, I'm interested to know exactly what you guys are running for lands. I'm mainly asking since I'm currently running a full playset both pain and check lands, and I'm looking to find the best trade-off between having the right color when you need it, some added utility, and minimal drawbacks. Currently my mana base looks like so:
That land base has a MAJOR flaw. Between the Concealed Courtyard, Caves of Koilos, Shambling Vent, Ghost Quarter, and Isolated Chapel, you have 16(!) cards that do not fulfill Isolated Chapel's check requirement. That is way too much potential for tapland, which is really bad for BW Tokens in all but the smallest doses. The Vents can stay, but those Chapels have to go.
Secondly, if you want to run Fatal Push (I assume you're not at the moment), then you need to run significantly more fetches. This also will save you life compared to 4x Pain Lands + 4x Shock Lands and it'll be helpful against opponents that you know are running Blood Moon among other things.
With all this talking about mana concerns and potential splashes for various sideboard strategies, I'm interested to know exactly what you guys are running for lands. I'm mainly asking since I'm currently running a full playset both pain and check lands, and I'm looking to find the best trade-off between having the right color when you need it, some added utility, and minimal drawbacks. Currently my mana base looks like so:
I just picked up the Marsh Flats this afternoon, and those are my big target for upping my mana base's power level. My plan is to cut another swamp and a plains for the two I'm missing. Shocks are the next logical upgrade after I complete the fetches.
Until your full complement fetches and shocks are in, I'd refrain from running the checklands (chapels). As another user has pointed out, this is going to be a tapped land often given the budget manabase (i've been there).
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While it's not been a crippling occurrence, it's definitely something I noticing playing tabletop all afternoon. While I think I've about hit the limit I can spend for a few weeks on cardboard, I'm still testing a few things out and getting more comfortable with recent additions. I've decided on running six removal mainboard, so that will include two Fatal Pushes. Next thing I plan on picking up is the other half of my fetches playset, and then probably shock from there. I'm wondering a few things:
I want to squeeze Vault of the Archangel back into the list as another mana sink. Is this worthwhile?
Once I get my fetches, shocks are the next lands to grab. What's a solid number to run, and which land should they replace?
Until I can afford to make the expensive changes of the last fetches and later shocks, what would be suggested for holdovers? Just some basics?
Here's how my list is looking in my head, minus lands:
While it's not been a crippling occurrence, it's definitely something I noticing playing tabletop all afternoon. While I think I've about hit the limit I can spend for a few weeks on cardboard, I'm still testing a few things out and getting more comfortable with recent additions. I've decided on running six removal mainboard, so that will include two Fatal Pushes. Next thing I plan on picking up is the other half of my fetches playset, and then probably shock from there. I'm wondering a few things:
I want to squeeze Vault of the Archangel back into the list as another mana sink. Is this worthwhile?
Once I get my fetches, shocks are the next lands to grab. What's a solid number to run, and which land should they replace?
Until I can afford to make the expensive changes of the last fetches and later shocks, what would be suggested for holdovers? Just some basics?
Here's how my list is looking in my head, minus lands:
With all this talking about mana concerns and potential splashes for various sideboard strategies, I'm interested to know exactly what you guys are running for lands. I'm mainly asking since I'm currently running a full playset both pain and check lands, and I'm looking to find the best trade-off between having the right color when you need it, some added utility, and minimal drawbacks. Currently my mana base looks like so:
I just picked up the Marsh Flats this afternoon, and those are my big target for upping my mana base's power level. My plan is to cut another swamp and a plains for the two I'm missing. Shocks are the next logical upgrade after I complete the fetches.
Six-plus fetches are indicated. The Heath's are nice, but not critical. Three Shrines is okay if you don't use Heath, but two is enough otherwise. Four Shrines is just wrong.
Caves should be one-of maximum and Chapel should be zero-of. I'd run the Cave only if I didn't have the Heaths. I'd run one extra Shrine and one Cave in place of the Heaths. But I'd recommend the Heaths.
Two Swamps is not a good idea unless you have BB casting costs.
Three Vents is not a bad idea and I may do that myself.
The Vault is a flex-spot; Ghost Quarter could be run instead. If I felt I needed two Quarters, I'd probably go up to twenty-four lands.
I'm currently running 23 lands and it works just fine to me. Going to 24 would be also perfectly acceptable, in any case. Actually I might add a plains (ghost quarter activations justify that). I run 3 ghost quarter because tron dominates my LGS, sadly... I swapped 1 spectral procession for an extra timely reinforcements, because of the ghost quarter and some troubles against aggro decks. I play 3 taplands: 2 shambling vents and 1 windbrisk Heights and I think it is the right number/combination. If I could afford it, I would probably run only 1 ghost quarter and 1 vault of the archangel, but, as I said before, tron is unforgiving...
In general, I think I am pretty happy with how it works.
Would you figure it's safe to run three colorless-only sources and be more basic-heavy until I can get my last two fetches and some shocks?In an ideal world, I see my current setup having four land enter tapped: two of the courtyards and the vents. That potentially could spike to a maximum of six, but that's relatively unlikely. I take it I should cut some chapels for plains and maybe another swamp?
My initial plan was to keep trimming down basics as I get fetches, and cut out chapels and caves as I get my shocks and other non-Marsh Flats fetches. So I'm guessing for the time being my lands should look more like this:
Another question: Temple of Silence is a card I've been mulling over because, while it is slow, it's a two-color land that lets us potentially avoid a dead draw on the next turn due to the trade-off of giving us a scry for it entering tapped. Since chapel appears to get a bit better once we're running shocks (we can cascade a fetch into a shock that lets chapel enter in untapped), would it be worth experimenting with where in my current build I cut chapel entirely for two temples? Should I just run Caves in the final mana base instead?
I've been looking at my sideboard a lot lately and I can't decide on which cards to play. Notably, I've been thinking long and hard on jongsl5's recommendation on removing the Stony Silence altogether. I always ran a combination of this card and Kataki, War's Wage at 3 specifically for affinity and Lanter control, and I must admit it was out of pure habitude, and sided them extremely rarely otherwise. I could really use the space for other options against other decks, namely Eldrazi, as it's growing in my meta, or simply to cover some of the deck's weaknesses.
Running a lot of Artifact/Enchantment hate because, well I hate Floodgate type cards like Ensnaring Bridge and Worship. My deck is constructed so if those get out game 1, I just scoop and go straight to game 2 with proper answers to those. I'm probably overkilling it though... Runed Halo and Blessed Alliance saved my rear many time against Eldrazi, Boggle and infect. Halo also served me well against some combo decks (Ad nauseum) and Alliance helps a lot against Burn, especially if they play aggro. I currently consider them my extra spot removal of choice, but again, two of each might be overkill.
The rest is self-explainatory. Some grave hate for Dredge and Living end And Selfless Spirit for sweeper protection. Pithing needle mostly for problematic lands/Planeswalkers, occasionnally a creature. I could replace it with more discard, but this little needle stops way more stuff than I thought. Probably gonna stay at two, since it stops Engineered explosives and I don't have Stony silence anymore for that.
I've also took a quick peek at some of the decklist in everybody's signature and I have a couple questions on sideboard card choice:
-Is Damping Matrix Good? I see it as a potential Mega Pithing Needle, but it not affecting planeswalkers or land really bugs me.
-Ghostly Prison Worth a try? My meta is kind of high on aggro decks.
-I feel like Memoricide is better than Stain the mind, But I don't really like either. Lost Legacy Is where I'd put my money on. Or maybe I should stick to the classic Discard effect/Ghost Quarter + Surgical Extraction? Dunno. I don't really miss the card, and I'm not really looking for land disruption as no one is playing tron and few play Titan shift/valakut in my meta. Combo decks are more popular.
-Why the Celestial Purge? Is it because of Nahiri? Blood Moon? What else relevant does it stops?
-Flaying Tendrils?? Is Wrath of god not better? Or is the exile clause relevant?
-How do you deal with siding-in Worship? Do you removes some or all of your Bitterblossom or do you leave then in hoping you'll get one or the other? Just want to know because I already killed myself by doing the lather out of pure curiosity.
-Any recommendations? I mostly want something good against eldrazies.
Would you figure it's safe to run three colorless-only sources and be more basic-heavy until I can get my last two fetches and some shocks?In an ideal world, I see my current setup having four land enter tapped: two of the courtyards and the vents. That potentially could spike to a maximum of six, but that's relatively unlikely. I take it I should cut some chapels for plains and maybe another swamp?
My initial plan was to keep trimming down basics as I get fetches, and cut out chapels and caves as I get my shocks and other non-Marsh Flats fetches. So I'm guessing for the time being my lands should look more like this:
I think you're missing the point regarding the Chapels. If you draw a two land opening hand containing a Chapel and a Courtyard, Cave, Vent, Ghost Quarter, Vault, or another Chapel, then your Chapel is entering the battlefield tapped, which is generally pretty crippling. In both of those lists, the Chapels need to be replaced with (ideally) Windswept Heath. You can pick them up for ~$11 now, but the longer you wait, the more you are going to pay because they are trending up pretty strongly in price at the moment.
Personally, I think a total of three EtB AND colorless lands is the limit. One might allow four with twenty-four lands.
I would not count Concealed Courtyard in that total but I would absolutely count Isolated Chapel. If one is playing six or seven Plains, a Swamp, and several Godless Shrines, then Chapel isn't so bad, but most of us do not and should not do that any more.
Infernal Tutor is a bit slow unless you're using it in the grindiest of match-ups like against BGx.
Blood Moon splash can work but you have to substitute spectral procession somehow. We also run 4 concealed courtyard to get as many painless black sources as possible and this is a non-bo with Blood Moon. Actually, I don't think Blood Moon is that insane right now either.
Hide/Seek is a good card which I used to run in Mardu but it wouldn't be worth a splash on its own.
Casting spectral procession without two basic plains is difficult. We really don't want to be casting this for 5-mana. When playing the blood moon game, we need to be prioritizing at least one plains and one swamp. Chances are, you are not going to draw enough fetches in time to get three basics in play in addition to a red source.
BW BW Tokens
RG Dredgeplendid Reclamation
RW Boros Burn
GB Elves
RB Dark Goblins
WU Azorius' Relic
If one eliminated colorless sources completely, it'd probably be okay, but it's tough for three-color decks to play colorless lands or EtB-tapped-lands.
If a side-board Blood Moon is the only R needed, a single source isn't unreasonable, but it has to fetch-able and then one has a shock-land that's generally not worth fetching or playing untapped.
Blood Moon isn't good enough against Tron to bother with. There are some decks it shuts down but Tron is merely inconvenienced by it. It would hurt BW tokens much more than it hurts Tron.
Blood Moon is for heavy-R decks, not three-color decks with a light R splash.
If you want to play Blood Moon, you should play something different. If you really need to beat Tron, you really need to play something different. Every decks has bad match-ups, one has to pick his poison.
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn
+1. A Blood Moon splash is neither particularly desirable nor particularly feasible in BW Tokens.
BW BW Tokens
BUW Esper Shadow
BUR Grixis Shadow
4 Caves of Koilos
4 Isolated Chapel
2 Marsh Flats
2 Shambling Vent
2 Ghost Quarter
4 Plains
2 Swamp
I just picked up the Marsh Flats this afternoon, and those are my big target for upping my mana base's power level. My plan is to cut another swamp and a plains for the two I'm missing. Shocks are the next logical upgrade after I complete the fetches.
My Modern Playlist:
BWTokens | GBElves
The best chance I've had against tron still is Ghost Quarter into Surgical, or turn 2 stony silence to buy enough time and they don't land an ugin on turn 4/5.
Terrible odds, but still not as bad as Elves vs Titanshift.
BGW Elves BGW|BW Tokens BW|WBR Sword&ShieldWBR|BUG DelverBUG|UWR Kiki UWR | UR Storm UR
That land base has a MAJOR flaw. Between the Concealed Courtyard, Caves of Koilos, Shambling Vent, Ghost Quarter, and Isolated Chapel, you have 16(!) cards that do not fulfill Isolated Chapel's check requirement. That is way too much potential for tapland, which is really bad for BW Tokens in all but the smallest doses. The Vents can stay, but those Chapels have to go.
Secondly, if you want to run Fatal Push (I assume you're not at the moment), then you need to run significantly more fetches. This also will save you life compared to 4x Pain Lands + 4x Shock Lands and it'll be helpful against opponents that you know are running Blood Moon among other things.
BW BW Tokens
BUW Esper Shadow
BUR Grixis Shadow
Until your full complement fetches and shocks are in, I'd refrain from running the checklands (chapels). As another user has pointed out, this is going to be a tapped land often given the budget manabase (i've been there).
BGW Elves BGW|BW Tokens BW|WBR Sword&ShieldWBR|BUG DelverBUG|UWR Kiki UWR | UR Storm UR
Here's how my list is looking in my head, minus lands:
2 Sorin, Solemn Visitor
1 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
Creature (4)
4 Wall of Omens
Sorcery (15)
3 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Thoughtseize
4 Lingering Souls
4 Spectral Procession
1 Collective Brutality
4 Path to Exile
4 Raise the Alarm
2 Fatal Push
Enchantment (4)
4 Intangible Virtue
2 Blessed Alliance
2 Hour of Reckoning
2 Timely Reinforcements
2 Extirpate
2 Rest in Peace
3 Stony Silence
2 Pithing Needle
My Modern Playlist:
BWTokens | GBElves
My bad i didnt read rta. Overall good but 3 push is a minimum standard. Omen is interesting
2 Fetid Heath
2 Godless Shrine
4 Marsh Flats
3 Plains
2 Shambling Vents
1 Swamp
1 Vault of the Archangel
4 Windswept Heath
Six-plus fetches are indicated. The Heath's are nice, but not critical. Three Shrines is okay if you don't use Heath, but two is enough otherwise. Four Shrines is just wrong.
Caves should be one-of maximum and Chapel should be zero-of. I'd run the Cave only if I didn't have the Heaths. I'd run one extra Shrine and one Cave in place of the Heaths. But I'd recommend the Heaths.
Two Swamps is not a good idea unless you have BB casting costs.
Three Vents is not a bad idea and I may do that myself.
The Vault is a flex-spot; Ghost Quarter could be run instead. If I felt I needed two Quarters, I'd probably go up to twenty-four lands.
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn
In general, I think I am pretty happy with how it works.
3x Ghost Quarter
3x Godless Shrine
3x Plains
2x Shambling Vent
1x Swamp
1x Windbrisk Heights
6x Fetches
BW BW Tokens
RG Dredgeplendid Reclamation
RW Boros Burn
GB Elves
RB Dark Goblins
WU Azorius' Relic
My initial plan was to keep trimming down basics as I get fetches, and cut out chapels and caves as I get my shocks and other non-Marsh Flats fetches. So I'm guessing for the time being my lands should look more like this:
4 Caves of Koilos
2 Isolated Chapel
2 Marsh Flats
2 Shambling Vent
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Vault of the Archangel
6 Plains
1 Swamp
Which will eventually finalize into something like this:
4 Marsh Flats
2 Windswept Heath
2 Godless Shrine
2 Shambling Vent
2 Isolated Chapel
2 Ghost Quarter
1 Vault of the Archangel
4 Plains
1 Swamp
Another question: Temple of Silence is a card I've been mulling over because, while it is slow, it's a two-color land that lets us potentially avoid a dead draw on the next turn due to the trade-off of giving us a scry for it entering tapped. Since chapel appears to get a bit better once we're running shocks (we can cascade a fetch into a shock that lets chapel enter in untapped), would it be worth experimenting with where in my current build I cut chapel entirely for two temples? Should I just run Caves in the final mana base instead?
My Modern Playlist:
BWTokens | GBElves
Here's a quick draft of my sideboard
2x Pithing Needle
2x Selfless Spirit
2x Fragmentize
2x Sundering Growth
2x Runed Halo
2x Blessed Alliance
2x Rest in peace
1x Nihil Spellbomb
Runed Halo and Blessed Alliance saved my rear many time against Eldrazi, Boggle and infect. Halo also served me well against some combo decks (Ad nauseum) and Alliance helps a lot against Burn, especially if they play aggro. I currently consider them my extra spot removal of choice, but again, two of each might be overkill.
The rest is self-explainatory. Some grave hate for Dredge and Living end And Selfless Spirit for sweeper protection.
Pithing needle mostly for problematic lands/Planeswalkers, occasionnally a creature. I could replace it with more discard, but this little needle stops way more stuff than I thought. Probably gonna stay at two, since it stops Engineered explosives and I don't have Stony silence anymore for that.
I've also took a quick peek at some of the decklist in everybody's signature and I have a couple questions on sideboard card choice:
-Is Damping Matrix Good? I see it as a potential Mega Pithing Needle, but it not affecting planeswalkers or land really bugs me.
-Ghostly Prison Worth a try? My meta is kind of high on aggro decks.
-I feel like Memoricide is better than Stain the mind, But I don't really like either. Lost Legacy Is where I'd put my money on. Or maybe I should stick to the classic Discard effect/Ghost Quarter + Surgical Extraction? Dunno. I don't really miss the card, and I'm not really looking for land disruption as no one is playing tron and few play Titan shift/valakut in my meta. Combo decks are more popular.
-Why the Celestial Purge? Is it because of Nahiri? Blood Moon? What else relevant does it stops?
-Flaying Tendrils?? Is Wrath of god not better? Or is the exile clause relevant?
-How do you deal with siding-in Worship? Do you removes some or all of your Bitterblossom or do you leave then in hoping you'll get one or the other? Just want to know
because I already killed myself by doing the latherout of pure curiosity.-Any recommendations? I mostly want something good against eldrazies.
(W/B)BW Tokens(W/B) | (B/R)Rakdos Burn(B/R) | (U/R)Gift Storm(U/R)
I think you're missing the point regarding the Chapels. If you draw a two land opening hand containing a Chapel and a Courtyard, Cave, Vent, Ghost Quarter, Vault, or another Chapel, then your Chapel is entering the battlefield tapped, which is generally pretty crippling. In both of those lists, the Chapels need to be replaced with (ideally) Windswept Heath. You can pick them up for ~$11 now, but the longer you wait, the more you are going to pay because they are trending up pretty strongly in price at the moment.
BW BW Tokens
BUW Esper Shadow
BUR Grixis Shadow
I would not count Concealed Courtyard in that total but I would absolutely count Isolated Chapel. If one is playing six or seven Plains, a Swamp, and several Godless Shrines, then Chapel isn't so bad, but most of us do not and should not do that any more.
Frenzy-Affinity-Ghost Quarter-Rock-Tokens- RGWPhyrexian Zoo- WVial KnightsStandard:
BW Knights(Rotated)Pioneer: RW Knights - BW Rally Zombies - UW Heroes
Commander:WUG
Jenara, Asura of War- WGSigarda, Host of HeronsCasualties of economicsLegacy: Good-night, sweet prince. Mono-R Burn