If this is really something that is going to be pursued, protecting the As Foretold is 100% key. More of the denial spells like Gigadrowse in turns 1-2 so we keep them off spells would be important. It feels like one of the only cards to mess up your day, in this case, would be abrupt decay. I'm sure there are other instant speed cards that would really goof you up, but none that come to mind ATM.
Those are all solid options, but I think ultimately the key will be building it closely in parallel to the more 'stock' lists but with a different sort of engine to get you going.
Correct, if they have the removal for the first As Foretold, then you just have to play another. These are not bad in multiples like other cards tend to be. Except when your opp has the maelstrom pulse
Just got my new art foil playsets; Opt and Spell Pierce so I'm all ready for FNM!
If this is really something that is going to be pursued, protecting the As Foretold is 100% key. More of the denial spells like Gigadrowse in turns 1-2 so we keep them off spells would be important. It feels like one of the only cards to mess up your day, in this case, would be abrupt decay. I'm sure there are other instant speed cards that would really goof you up, but none that come to mind ATM.
Those are all solid options, but I think ultimately the key will be building it closely in parallel to the more 'stock' lists but with a different sort of engine to get you going.
Correct, if they have the removal for the first As Foretold, then you just have to play another. These are not bad in multiples like other cards tend to be. Except when your opp has the maelstrom pulse
Just got my new art foil playsets; Opt and Spell Pierce so I'm all ready for FNM!
At least Maelstom Pulse can be countered, unlike Abrupt Decay. I do agree, however, that just playing the normal disruption and countermagic is the best plan. Hopefully, you have more As Foretolds than the enemy has Abrupt Decays if you come across it.
On a different note, chalice on x=1 destroys this deck, so we probably won't be playing chalice ourselves. What are good sideboard options for this version as the one posted is frankly awful? Do you guys think anything really needs to change from normal mono U sideboard builds?
Hey guys, if some of you can "prove it" with As Foretold, more power to you. This version of the deck very much lives and dies by whether or not As Foretold sticks around, and plays a lot of otherwise suboptimal cards banking on that chance. The fact that you're looking into cards like Greater Auramancy to try to justify As Foretold is just taking you further down the rabbit hole of dependent, individually worthless cards, away from competitive viability.
In my experience, the decks that are fast and streamlined, as well as robust and resilient, are the ones that end up sticking around in the end. Sure, multiple copies of As Foretold aren't redundant to the point of worthlessness on the board. The bigger concern is how variance, especially with how popular early discard and disruption are, can deny your ability to land As Foretold when you need it...yes, even with twelve cantrips. Add to this the fact that it does nothing to immediately interact with your opponent if you tap out to drop it on the ideal (and critical) turn three, and nearly the same on turn four...yeah, cantripping or drawing three cards that you're staring at as your opponent finishes you off isn't what I want to be doing with this deck. It seems fun, but too cute for its own good.
Again, though...make me a believer.
EDIT: Ancestral Vision pairs about as well with Thing in the Ice as it does with everything else in the deck; the later it comes, the worse it is. I certainly don't want to be drawing into AV with Titi on the board. And if we were worried about Chalice after adding Opt, imagine how scary life would be against it with twelve cantrips.
Hey guys, if some of you can "prove it" with As Foretold, more power to you. This version of the deck very much lives and dies by whether or not As Foretold sticks around, and plays a lot of otherwise suboptimal cards banking on that chance. The fact that you're looking into cards like Greater Auramancy to try to justify As Foretold is just taking you further down the rabbit hole of dependent, individually worthless cards, away from competitive viability.
In my experience, the decks that are fast and streamlined, as well as robust and resilient, are the ones that end up sticking around in the end. Sure, multiple copies of As Foretold aren't redundant to the point of worthlessness on the board. The bigger concern is how variance, especially with how popular early discard and disruption are, can deny your ability to land As Foretold when you need it...yes, even with twelve cantrips. Add to this the fact that it does nothing to immediately interact with your opponent if you tap out to drop it on the ideal (and critical) turn three, and nearly the same on turn four...yeah, cantripping or drawing three cards that you're staring at as your opponent finishes you off isn't what I want to be doing with this deck. It seems fun, but too cute for its own good.
Again, though...make me a believer.
EDIT: Ancestral Vision pairs about as well with Thing in the Ice as it does with everything else in the deck; the later it comes, the worse it is. I certainly don't want to be drawing into AV with Titi on the board. And if we were worried about Chalice after adding Opt, imagine how scary life would be against it with twelve cantrips.
Ok, to address your general concerns:
1) I never suggested greater Auramancy or other 'parasitic' cards. Someone did, but I suggested it was probably not worth it, and a better idea to stick more to 'stock' lists and just look at modifying the engine of the deck instead of messing with what we know to work.
2) yes, clearly this proposed, prototype version can't run chalice & if loaded up on cantrips can get roadblocked by it as well. That's something to bear in mind.
3) dropping it down on turn three is about the turn we want to be interacting somehow, or maybe slamming a dictate EoT. Or perhaps it's the turn we want to be playing howling mine while holding up Path. I'd say it's a bit tricky to ascertain whether or not you are distinctly disadvantaged by wanting to play a "combo piece" on turn three in modern. The real crux of the matter is whether or not you have anything to do on turns 1 and 2, right? And I think, even in a prototype build running as Foretold, you want to be running a splash for interaction. You biggest worries will be small creatures, so fatal push seems better than Path here.
4) I don't think you'd have to sacrifice the core of the deck to try an As Foretold version. Let's say you drop 2x snapcaster and 2x howling mine, there's your engine tweaked. Mine #3, one cryptic, one gigadrowse and 1 PtW become 4x ancestral vision.
I'm not suggesting that this is *the* new direction for the deck. I'll even go so far as saying Shaun McLaren's lists are objectively worse than the tweaked and current 'stock' lists many are currently running here. As Foretold has issues as an engine, such as requiring you to run less mines in your deck and more cantrips. Maybe though, that's all you need.
And that's my point. In its current state the as Foretold version is a crude, mess of a pile, but I saw some potential in the way that the pilot can handle certain bits of sequencing that made me wonder if there isn't something to it. I think it has potential, that's all. It could be objectively worse. I think the onus rests on us, established turns players, to see if it actually works. I mean nobody else will haha.
Tl;dr, I'm being sensible about how to proceed with As Foretold. It could be rubbish. It needs to be considered competitively (which I don't think Shaun did particularly well). The list's we've seen have been like a rough gem, waiting to be cut and polished. More than anything, the powerful sequencing enabled by As Foretold is what's got me interested. Sort of gives the list another dimension it didn't have previously. It may be the case that the deck loses too much in the effort to fit this new engine in. Time will tell.
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Modern: G Tron, Vannifar, Jund, Druid/Vizier combo, Humans, Eldrazi Stompy (Serum Powder), Amulet, Grishoalbrand, Breach Titan, Turns, Eternal Command, As Foretold Living End, Elves, Cheerios, RUG Scapeshift
Did anyone get to try out a new build at FNM? I was going to but my wife was canned yesterday, and being the awesome husband I am, opted to have a date night to help ease the sting. Maybe next week 🤷♂️
Did anyone get to try out a new build at FNM? I was going to but my wife was canned yesterday, and being the awesome husband I am, opted to have a date night to help ease the sting. Maybe next week
I did, to a 2-2 record. Weird night...same list I posted before, but with Gemstone Caverns back in (left my other Island at home), and a sideboard with three each of Spell Snare, Dispel, Remand, Spreading Seas, and Thing in the Ice. Lucked out Caverns three times, which was nuts.
Beat Mill (only because he screwed up with using Surgical too early), lost to Seismic Swans (on a wild last game), lost to Vizier Company (game three she had the combo naturally on turn three...Dispel was my next card, but her Chord fetched her win-con), then beat BW Tokens soundly.
The only sideboard card that never came in was Spreading Seas. Had a fun time swapping decks with opponents and playtesting between rounds; my Company opponent in particular really liked the deck, and was loving Opt except when she used it turn one to scry away a Temporal Mastery (still a good use of the Opt there, but feels bad). More than any other deck I have played in Modern, the sideboard choices are so difficult. Everything plays with so much synergy that disrupting any part of it feels wrong. Titi and Seas underwhelmed me, but I'll keep testing.
Opt in the main still felt wonderful, and allowed me to win two games off of digging an extra card deep into Mastery during an opponent's turn. The best was a turn four Serum Visions that drew an Opt, then scryed two copies of Temporal Mastery. It was glorious lol.
Have we seen our eminent thread-owner in the last couple of weeks? I'm able to put a little time back into it now (had to give it up because of family member's health and some job shenanigans. Now I'm buying my first house! Haha)
I won't take back control but I'll send a few bits & pieces to the OP to lend a helping hand and keep things moving. We all understand that life can get in the way of these sort of things!
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Modern: G Tron, Vannifar, Jund, Druid/Vizier combo, Humans, Eldrazi Stompy (Serum Powder), Amulet, Grishoalbrand, Breach Titan, Turns, Eternal Command, As Foretold Living End, Elves, Cheerios, RUG Scapeshift
What deck do we bring in thing in the ice against? Like burn? Affinity?
I ask myself if their plan is to win with combat damage caused by creatures. If yes then Thing comes in (Burn and Affinity both fall into this category). If no then I usually leave it in my side (Scapeshift and Ad Nauseum).
I also eventually decided that against BlackDecks it was a good idea to run leverage card heavy so they usually come in there.
Basically since my mainboard is built to blankremoval (not named path to exile), then I expect them to take out their removal while I bring in Things. Although now that more people have seen how our deck works this is becoming less reliable. (I have actually been testing lists without things recently)
I hope these reasons help clarify why to bring them in. Which should help you answer better for yourself, "when to bring them in?" The bigger mystery is sometimes "What do I take out?" and again you will eventually develop a series of shortcuts to follow to help you successfully make those decisions (and shuffle) in under 3 minutes.
Can anyone say whether Opt improves Thing by a lot? Because those two sound like they should work very well together.
As I haven't tested it yet, cannot say, but it really feels like it should make it much better! Flipping thing on their turn could be backbreaking. Although I'd still keep it in the board so they're more likely to board out removal.
With luck, I'll be hitting up FNM tomorrow night and will sling some turns!
Edit: not slinging any cardboard tonight 😢
Went 3-1 at FNM with this. It's only been a single night, but I'm very attached to the black splash. The sideboard lines are so much better (both in terms of power and how apparent the swaps are), and it's nice to have real game against faster aggressive or combo decks.
I had three Drowned Catacomb and two Sunken Hollow originally, but in early testing I found that the pair of Hollow tripped me up a bit more than I like. It might be worth changing that fourth Catacomb for another Island, but even with the full set I never had mana problems over the night (both during rounds, and in-between games).
This list is not what I ran at first; it was -1 Push, -1 Tasigur, +2 Thing in the Ice. My first two matches were against faster aggressive decks (one was very similar to Stompy, but with hoplites that get counters, and Temur Battle Rage; the other was a RB Zombie deck with tons of one- and two-drops), and Thing in the Ice just always felt a bit slow. I only flipped it once, despite all of the cantrips and cheap interaction, and most of the time it was just a wall. I made the swap to the extra Push and lone Tasigur between rounds against the same opponents, and it felt so much better. We split the last round for store credit, so I went ahead and left the swap permanent (against Abzan), and it paid off well.
I had underestimated how good Tasigur is in here, and had been so attached to making Titi work with the addition of cards like Opt and Fatal Push that I had overlooked the simple fact that sometimes it's just not reliable as anything more than a two mana 0/4 wall. So I'm sad that Titi is now cut, but much happier that the deck is better for it.
There were times that I would sideboard out the fourth Temporal Mastery on the draw to make room for the third Fatal Push against the aggro decks, and that worked out alright. This made me consider whether or not the fourth Mastery might be better as that third Push or the fourth Gigadrowse in the main. There were a few times when, with only ten Warp effects, I felt like I was whiffing a little more often, so for now I will leave the fourth Mastery, and know that I can flex it as needed.
What I won't be doing is cutting any copies of Howling Mine below three. Even with eight one-mana cantrips and seven Mine effects, there were times when I was digging pretty desperately to hit one (to emphasize, this happened more than once in a single night). The fact that most artifact and enchantment destruction comes in post-board really seals this slot at where it is for me.
The card that did the most work out of my sideboard was easily Engineered Explosives. With the pair, as well as all of the cheap interaction, I had the sweeping against fast aggro covered, and unlike cards like Darkness (which is amazing in aggro-heavy metas, especially with Snapcaster Mage), EE is also solid against decks like Storm and Lantern Control. Very glad I packed the set.
There are a few cards like Commandeer, Snapback, and the various graveyard-hate cards that might be solid in certain metas, but I just don't feel make the cut at this time. Snapback is mostly just worse than Fatal Push against most decks. Commandeer can be a house, but we're never really casting it any other way than by chucking a bunch of cards for it, and I feel like Remand and the rest of the established interaction buy us the time we need without it. We can also handle most graveyard-based decks with the tools we already have as well, so I'd rather not dedicate slots for those.
Even against the faster aggressive decks loaded with one-drops (I played against Norin Sisters with Impact Tremors, and that RB Zombie deck packed with Gravecrawlers), I never missed Chalice of the Void. Yes, it's an amazing card, and yes, at some point I will jam it just to make sure, but I really don't feel like this is a critical card for us (as good as it can be at times). I don't feel the risk of shutting off the cards I know work well is worth it.
So apparently what they say is true; I just love the black splash, and I don't ever see myself going back to mono blue. Please try it out if you have the means, and good luck to you!
I have found also that CotV only comes in against burn now. I feel like there must be a better replacement.
I wonder if Prism Ring, Sun Droplet, or Dragon's Claw might be an option if you want to target beating burn more. You could also try playing 3 Leyline of Sanctity if you wanted to, which though completely dead if not in your opening hand, can shut down burn and also hand disruption.
I have found also that CotV only comes in against burn now. I feel like there must be a better replacement.
I wonder if Prism Ring, Sun Droplet, or Dragon's Claw might be an option if you want to target beating burn more. You could also try playing 3 Leyline of Sanctity if you wanted to, which though completely dead if not in your opening hand, can shut down burn and also hand disruption.
Just some food for thought.
Prism Ring actually sounds like a great idea
^^This is why it's a good idea to get together on these forums and share ideas. I didn't even know Prism Ring existed. Now I'm about to go dig through my bulk in storage before I go down to my local store and finish a playset to test. I am thinking 3 in the side should help out pretty well against burn. It will also clearly help us against decks that can only deal finite amount of damage(Ad Nauseum?) It becomes a little less clear to side it in against decks like scapeshift, where staying above 18 life is critical, but getting to like 40+ doesn't really help as much as one might think.
What's more important for your win percentage against the tough matchups, having those extra cantrips or having chalice.
It's not an easy question!
Indeed! Also EE on 1 is a regular play in those match ups too. So even without the Opts, you are still looking at 8-9 very important cards that are hit by it. With Opts included it's 1 in 6 cards, sometimes even more.
That's a lot of cards to be losing.
You can play EE for one through a Chalice set to one by paying two mana of the same color to cast it.
The extra cantrips give you better game against everything (besides possibly other Chalice decks). The real question is whether or not we have the other tools to beat the decks we would have otherwise been bringing Chalice in against. With the black splash, I haven't missed Chalice yet, but it's honestly too early to make such a call.
In my U/R build I think Chalice is to valuable to not sideboard even though I am down to only 2 copies, from 3, in my side. However I am only running 4 Serum Visions and 3 Gigadrowse in my CMC 1 slot, and Gigadrowse can be cast through Chalice. I Personally dont think Turns is a deck that needs to be running 8-9 1 mana cantrips. I think balancing out your card draw throughout your curve is what is best. Thats what make the 2 drop slot in our deck so important. Finding the right turn 2 interaction that also says draw a card. Because turn 3 and beyond is just gas. Thats why I recommend the red splash so much, you get Izzet Charm, Sweltering Suns, By Force, and Blood Moon post SB. Throw that on top of some graveyard hate and Chalice of the Void and you couldn't ask for a better sideboard for this deck. For U/B, I dont think there is a better card against burn (or any of our bad matchups really) than Collective Brutality so I would be going all in on that. Its also not bad against Ad Nauseam so that is a plus.
Also, I am in love with Disrupting Shoal. I think it is the perfect card for this deck and would recommend testing it.
I Personally dont think Turns is a deck that needs to be running 8-9 1 mana cantrips. I think balancing out your card draw throughout your curve is what is best. Thats what make the 2 drop slot in our deck so important. Finding the right turn 2 interaction that also says draw a card. Because turn 3 and beyond is just gas.
I used to think the same thing, until I ran Opt over Remand and Spreading Seas. It gives the deck better consistency by getting answers, lands, Mines, or Warps as we need. It's especially potent with Serum Visions to set up Temporal Mastery, as well as Snapcaster Mage and Fatal Push tricks, and it's always proactive and cheap. I definitely don't feel like we get enough from Sleight of Hand or any of the two-mana spells like Telling Time, Peer Through Depths, or Anticipate to justify those over anything else we're already playing, but Opt does some really nice things here.
Corroto, I'm glad you're liking the red splash. You're really going prison lockout before you go off, which is cool, though I'm wary of the double-red on Sweltering Suns (even in a list that can run Blood Moon). You are right about Collective Brutality; just like how GR Tron went to GB with the printing of that, along with Fatal Push and the already strong discard spells, Turns benefits similarly. Combo and Burn giving you fits? Black's just great.
I will politely disagree with you on Disrupting Shoal, though; although it is good in some decks, we need to be pitching the cheaper cards to really get the value early against decks we need to outpace. That's always a 2-for-1 against us, and our cheap spells are usually the ones we wish we could keep to play in such matches. Now if you could chuck extra early copies of Time Warp effects, that would be amazing, but as is, I think we can do better with our slots than this. I did playtest it pretty thoroughly back in the day, and as excited as I began, after a few weeks I was pretty sour on it in Turns. Same thing happened to me with a number of cards, like Ancestral Vision, and Unsubstantiate (though Unsub is the closest to playable in a typical Turns deck due to its versatility).
I Personally dont think Turns is a deck that needs to be running 8-9 1 mana cantrips. I think balancing out your card draw throughout your curve is what is best. Thats what make the 2 drop slot in our deck so important. Finding the right turn 2 interaction that also says draw a card. Because turn 3 and beyond is just gas.
I used to think the same thing, until I ran Opt over Remand and Spreading Seas. It gives the deck better consistency by getting answers, lands, Mines, or Warps as we need. It's especially potent with Serum Visions to set up Temporal Mastery, as well as Snapcaster Mage and Fatal Push tricks, and it's always proactive and cheap. I definitely don't feel like we get enough from Sleight of Hand or any of the two-mana spells like Telling Time, Peer Through Depths, or Anticipate to justify those over anything else we're already playing, but Opt does some really nice things here.
Corroto, I'm glad you're liking the red splash. You're really going prison lockout before you go off, which is cool, though I'm wary of the double-red on Sweltering Suns (even in a list that can run Blood Moon). You are right about Collective Brutality; just like how GR Tron went to GB with the printing of that, along with Fatal Push and the already strong discard spells, Turns benefits similarly. Combo and Burn giving you fits? Black's just great.
I will politely disagree with you on Disrupting Shoal, though; although it is good in some decks, we need to be pitching the cheaper cards to really get the value early against decks we need to outpace. That's always a 2-for-1 against us, and our cheap spells are usually the ones we wish we could keep to play in such matches. Now if you could chuck extra early copies of Time Warp effects, that would be amazing, but as is, I think we can do better with our slots than this. I did playtest it pretty thoroughly back in the day, and as excited as I began, after a few weeks I was pretty sour on it in Turns. Same thing happened to me with a number of cards, like Ancestral Vision, and Unsubstantiate (though Unsub is the closest to playable in a typical Turns deck due to its versatility).
I also like Unsubstantiate. IMO the only reason for sweltering suns is you can cycle it if you don't have the 2 red, otherwise I don't think its playable. I personally don't even play it but was using it as an example. However I have tested it an when you do have the 2 red it is a total blowout and will almost certainly get you there against Aggro.
I have had a distinctly different experience than almost everyone else testing Disrupting Shoal. It has won so many games for me since I've been running it. The whole idea is the low end of my curve is disruption anyway (Gigadrowse, Boomerang, Exhaustion) so pitching the low end stuff to Shoal essentially gives me the same outcome. It gives me more options. Late game it is awesome to hard cast. For example just at this last fnm, I had 4 mana up and shoal in hand with a good curve of cards in hand. It let me tap out for Chandra with confidence. OP then Gifts at my end step for Iona and Unburial Rites, taps out for it main phase and I Shoal it with a Time Warp and it was GG. Obvously that is only one example but it has been very clutch for me more times than I can count. Its also the head games that I love. To blow out OP game one with Shoal makes them second guess every play in game 2/3 when in reality I sided them out for hate.
Correct, if they have the removal for the first As Foretold, then you just have to play another. These are not bad in multiples like other cards tend to be. Except when your opp has the maelstrom pulse
Just got my new art foil playsets; Opt and Spell Pierce so I'm all ready for FNM!
At least Maelstom Pulse can be countered, unlike Abrupt Decay. I do agree, however, that just playing the normal disruption and countermagic is the best plan. Hopefully, you have more As Foretolds than the enemy has Abrupt Decays if you come across it.
On a different note, chalice on x=1 destroys this deck, so we probably won't be playing chalice ourselves. What are good sideboard options for this version as the one posted is frankly awful? Do you guys think anything really needs to change from normal mono U sideboard builds?
In my experience, the decks that are fast and streamlined, as well as robust and resilient, are the ones that end up sticking around in the end. Sure, multiple copies of As Foretold aren't redundant to the point of worthlessness on the board. The bigger concern is how variance, especially with how popular early discard and disruption are, can deny your ability to land As Foretold when you need it...yes, even with twelve cantrips. Add to this the fact that it does nothing to immediately interact with your opponent if you tap out to drop it on the ideal (and critical) turn three, and nearly the same on turn four...yeah, cantripping or drawing three cards that you're staring at as your opponent finishes you off isn't what I want to be doing with this deck. It seems fun, but too cute for its own good.
Again, though...make me a believer.
EDIT: Ancestral Vision pairs about as well with Thing in the Ice as it does with everything else in the deck; the later it comes, the worse it is. I certainly don't want to be drawing into AV with Titi on the board. And if we were worried about Chalice after adding Opt, imagine how scary life would be against it with twelve cantrips.
Ok, to address your general concerns:
1) I never suggested greater Auramancy or other 'parasitic' cards. Someone did, but I suggested it was probably not worth it, and a better idea to stick more to 'stock' lists and just look at modifying the engine of the deck instead of messing with what we know to work.
2) yes, clearly this proposed, prototype version can't run chalice & if loaded up on cantrips can get roadblocked by it as well. That's something to bear in mind.
3) dropping it down on turn three is about the turn we want to be interacting somehow, or maybe slamming a dictate EoT. Or perhaps it's the turn we want to be playing howling mine while holding up Path. I'd say it's a bit tricky to ascertain whether or not you are distinctly disadvantaged by wanting to play a "combo piece" on turn three in modern. The real crux of the matter is whether or not you have anything to do on turns 1 and 2, right? And I think, even in a prototype build running as Foretold, you want to be running a splash for interaction. You biggest worries will be small creatures, so fatal push seems better than Path here.
4) I don't think you'd have to sacrifice the core of the deck to try an As Foretold version. Let's say you drop 2x snapcaster and 2x howling mine, there's your engine tweaked. Mine #3, one cryptic, one gigadrowse and 1 PtW become 4x ancestral vision.
I'm not suggesting that this is *the* new direction for the deck. I'll even go so far as saying Shaun McLaren's lists are objectively worse than the tweaked and current 'stock' lists many are currently running here. As Foretold has issues as an engine, such as requiring you to run less mines in your deck and more cantrips. Maybe though, that's all you need.
And that's my point. In its current state the as Foretold version is a crude, mess of a pile, but I saw some potential in the way that the pilot can handle certain bits of sequencing that made me wonder if there isn't something to it. I think it has potential, that's all. It could be objectively worse. I think the onus rests on us, established turns players, to see if it actually works. I mean nobody else will haha.
Tl;dr, I'm being sensible about how to proceed with As Foretold. It could be rubbish. It needs to be considered competitively (which I don't think Shaun did particularly well). The list's we've seen have been like a rough gem, waiting to be cut and polished. More than anything, the powerful sequencing enabled by As Foretold is what's got me interested. Sort of gives the list another dimension it didn't have previously. It may be the case that the deck loses too much in the effort to fit this new engine in. Time will tell.
Beat Mill (only because he screwed up with using Surgical too early), lost to Seismic Swans (on a wild last game), lost to Vizier Company (game three she had the combo naturally on turn three...Dispel was my next card, but her Chord fetched her win-con), then beat BW Tokens soundly.
The only sideboard card that never came in was Spreading Seas. Had a fun time swapping decks with opponents and playtesting between rounds; my Company opponent in particular really liked the deck, and was loving Opt except when she used it turn one to scry away a Temporal Mastery (still a good use of the Opt there, but feels bad). More than any other deck I have played in Modern, the sideboard choices are so difficult. Everything plays with so much synergy that disrupting any part of it feels wrong. Titi and Seas underwhelmed me, but I'll keep testing.
Opt in the main still felt wonderful, and allowed me to win two games off of digging an extra card deep into Mastery during an opponent's turn. The best was a turn four Serum Visions that drew an Opt, then scryed two copies of Temporal Mastery. It was glorious lol.
3x Exhaustion
3x Part the Waterveil
4x Serum Visions
1x Sleight of Hand
4x Temporal Mastery
4x Time Warp
Enchantment (5)
4x Dictate of Kruphix
1x Search for Azcanta
Artifact (2)
2x Howling Mine
Instant (12)
3x Cryptic Command
3x Fatal Push
2x Gigadrowse
4x Opt
3x Drowned Catacomb
1x Inkmoth Nexus
8x Island
1x Mikokoro, Center of the Sea
4x Polluted Delta
2x Prairie Stream
2x Sunken Hollow
1x Watery Grave
2x Collective Brutality
3x Dispel (flex spot?)
1x Engineered Explosives
1x Laboratory Maniac
4x Leyline of Sanctity
4x Thing in the Ice
so many things im not sure about.
for example whats thing in the ice for
I won't take back control but I'll send a few bits & pieces to the OP to lend a helping hand and keep things moving. We all understand that life can get in the way of these sort of things!
I ask myself if their plan is to win with combat damage caused by creatures. If yes then Thing comes in (Burn and Affinity both fall into this category). If no then I usually leave it in my side (Scapeshift and Ad Nauseum).
I also eventually decided that against Black Decks it was a good idea to run leverage card heavy so they usually come in there.
Basically since my mainboard is built to blank removal (not named path to exile), then I expect them to take out their removal while I bring in Things. Although now that more people have seen how our deck works this is becoming less reliable. (I have actually been testing lists without things recently)
I hope these reasons help clarify why to bring them in. Which should help you answer better for yourself, "when to bring them in?" The bigger mystery is sometimes "What do I take out?" and again you will eventually develop a series of shortcuts to follow to help you successfully make those decisions (and shuffle) in under 3 minutes.
Uw Taking Turns
The Bad Moon
Small Mardu Midrange
Big Mardu Midrange
Grixis Waste Not Combo
Bw 8-Rack
Bw Midrange
As I haven't tested it yet, cannot say, but it really feels like it should make it much better! Flipping thing on their turn could be backbreaking. Although I'd still keep it in the board so they're more likely to board out removal.
With luck, I'll be hitting up FNM tomorrow night and will sling some turns!
Edit: not slinging any cardboard tonight 😢
4 Polluted Delta
4 Drowned Catacomb
1 Sunken Hollow
1 Watery Grave
1 Swamp
1 Mikokoro, Center of the Sea
1 Inkmoth Nexus
2 Fatal Push
3 Gigadrowse
4 Opt
4 Serum Visions
3 Exhaustion
2 Cryptic Command
4 Time Warp
3 Part the Waterveil
4 Temporal Mastery
3 Howling Mine
4 Dictate of Kruphix
1 Fatal Push
1 Tasigur, the Golden Fang
2 Engineered Explosives
2 Dispel
2 Inquisition of Kozilek
2 Hurkyl’s Recall
2 Remand
3 Collective Brutality
Went 3-1 at FNM with this. It's only been a single night, but I'm very attached to the black splash. The sideboard lines are so much better (both in terms of power and how apparent the swaps are), and it's nice to have real game against faster aggressive or combo decks.
I had three Drowned Catacomb and two Sunken Hollow originally, but in early testing I found that the pair of Hollow tripped me up a bit more than I like. It might be worth changing that fourth Catacomb for another Island, but even with the full set I never had mana problems over the night (both during rounds, and in-between games).
This list is not what I ran at first; it was -1 Push, -1 Tasigur, +2 Thing in the Ice. My first two matches were against faster aggressive decks (one was very similar to Stompy, but with hoplites that get counters, and Temur Battle Rage; the other was a RB Zombie deck with tons of one- and two-drops), and Thing in the Ice just always felt a bit slow. I only flipped it once, despite all of the cantrips and cheap interaction, and most of the time it was just a wall. I made the swap to the extra Push and lone Tasigur between rounds against the same opponents, and it felt so much better. We split the last round for store credit, so I went ahead and left the swap permanent (against Abzan), and it paid off well.
I had underestimated how good Tasigur is in here, and had been so attached to making Titi work with the addition of cards like Opt and Fatal Push that I had overlooked the simple fact that sometimes it's just not reliable as anything more than a two mana 0/4 wall. So I'm sad that Titi is now cut, but much happier that the deck is better for it.
There were times that I would sideboard out the fourth Temporal Mastery on the draw to make room for the third Fatal Push against the aggro decks, and that worked out alright. This made me consider whether or not the fourth Mastery might be better as that third Push or the fourth Gigadrowse in the main. There were a few times when, with only ten Warp effects, I felt like I was whiffing a little more often, so for now I will leave the fourth Mastery, and know that I can flex it as needed.
What I won't be doing is cutting any copies of Howling Mine below three. Even with eight one-mana cantrips and seven Mine effects, there were times when I was digging pretty desperately to hit one (to emphasize, this happened more than once in a single night). The fact that most artifact and enchantment destruction comes in post-board really seals this slot at where it is for me.
The card that did the most work out of my sideboard was easily Engineered Explosives. With the pair, as well as all of the cheap interaction, I had the sweeping against fast aggro covered, and unlike cards like Darkness (which is amazing in aggro-heavy metas, especially with Snapcaster Mage), EE is also solid against decks like Storm and Lantern Control. Very glad I packed the set.
There are a few cards like Commandeer, Snapback, and the various graveyard-hate cards that might be solid in certain metas, but I just don't feel make the cut at this time. Snapback is mostly just worse than Fatal Push against most decks. Commandeer can be a house, but we're never really casting it any other way than by chucking a bunch of cards for it, and I feel like Remand and the rest of the established interaction buy us the time we need without it. We can also handle most graveyard-based decks with the tools we already have as well, so I'd rather not dedicate slots for those.
Even against the faster aggressive decks loaded with one-drops (I played against Norin Sisters with Impact Tremors, and that RB Zombie deck packed with Gravecrawlers), I never missed Chalice of the Void. Yes, it's an amazing card, and yes, at some point I will jam it just to make sure, but I really don't feel like this is a critical card for us (as good as it can be at times). I don't feel the risk of shutting off the cards I know work well is worth it.
So apparently what they say is true; I just love the black splash, and I don't ever see myself going back to mono blue. Please try it out if you have the means, and good luck to you!
I wonder if Prism Ring, Sun Droplet, or Dragon's Claw might be an option if you want to target beating burn more. You could also try playing 3 Leyline of Sanctity if you wanted to, which though completely dead if not in your opening hand, can shut down burn and also hand disruption.
Just some food for thought.
^^This is why it's a good idea to get together on these forums and share ideas. I didn't even know Prism Ring existed. Now I'm about to go dig through my bulk in storage before I go down to my local store and finish a playset to test. I am thinking 3 in the side should help out pretty well against burn. It will also clearly help us against decks that can only deal finite amount of damage(Ad Nauseum?) It becomes a little less clear to side it in against decks like scapeshift, where staying above 18 life is critical, but getting to like 40+ doesn't really help as much as one might think.
I am looking for a reliable way to beating burn while we are on the draw. Has anyone found the recipe for that? Does it involve Spell Snare? Timely Reinforcements? Disrupting Shoal? Wall of Essence?
Uw Taking Turns
The Bad Moon
Small Mardu Midrange
Big Mardu Midrange
Grixis Waste Not Combo
Bw 8-Rack
Bw Midrange
So then I guess the important question is:
What's more important for your win percentage against the tough matchups, having those extra cantrips or having chalice.
It's not an easy question!
The extra cantrips give you better game against everything (besides possibly other Chalice decks). The real question is whether or not we have the other tools to beat the decks we would have otherwise been bringing Chalice in against. With the black splash, I haven't missed Chalice yet, but it's honestly too early to make such a call.
Also, I am in love with Disrupting Shoal. I think it is the perfect card for this deck and would recommend testing it.
Corroto, I'm glad you're liking the red splash. You're really going prison lockout before you go off, which is cool, though I'm wary of the double-red on Sweltering Suns (even in a list that can run Blood Moon). You are right about Collective Brutality; just like how GR Tron went to GB with the printing of that, along with Fatal Push and the already strong discard spells, Turns benefits similarly. Combo and Burn giving you fits? Black's just great.
I will politely disagree with you on Disrupting Shoal, though; although it is good in some decks, we need to be pitching the cheaper cards to really get the value early against decks we need to outpace. That's always a 2-for-1 against us, and our cheap spells are usually the ones we wish we could keep to play in such matches. Now if you could chuck extra early copies of Time Warp effects, that would be amazing, but as is, I think we can do better with our slots than this. I did playtest it pretty thoroughly back in the day, and as excited as I began, after a few weeks I was pretty sour on it in Turns. Same thing happened to me with a number of cards, like Ancestral Vision, and Unsubstantiate (though Unsub is the closest to playable in a typical Turns deck due to its versatility).
I also like Unsubstantiate. IMO the only reason for sweltering suns is you can cycle it if you don't have the 2 red, otherwise I don't think its playable. I personally don't even play it but was using it as an example. However I have tested it an when you do have the 2 red it is a total blowout and will almost certainly get you there against Aggro.
I have had a distinctly different experience than almost everyone else testing Disrupting Shoal. It has won so many games for me since I've been running it. The whole idea is the low end of my curve is disruption anyway (Gigadrowse, Boomerang, Exhaustion) so pitching the low end stuff to Shoal essentially gives me the same outcome. It gives me more options. Late game it is awesome to hard cast. For example just at this last fnm, I had 4 mana up and shoal in hand with a good curve of cards in hand. It let me tap out for Chandra with confidence. OP then Gifts at my end step for Iona and Unburial Rites, taps out for it main phase and I Shoal it with a Time Warp and it was GG. Obvously that is only one example but it has been very clutch for me more times than I can count. Its also the head games that I love. To blow out OP game one with Shoal makes them second guess every play in game 2/3 when in reality I sided them out for hate.