Interesting. In some of my more recent testing, Meddling Mage has gotten even better for me. There were several recent games I was able to blow wide open by keeping the opponent off a sweeper for an extra turn or naming a card I saw with Freebooter. I think MM is a very tricky card to play, but is great when utilized to its potential. I often find myself in situations where I have my opponent down to just 1 or maybe 2 outs and actually wishing I had more MMs to lock them out of such draws. You mentioned in your tournament report that you named Lightning Helix after seeing a basic mountain from your opponent, but no T1 play and no further info. I think that both playing Meddling Mage when there was another card you could play (Thalia's Lieutenant) and naming Lightning Helix were mistakes. Here's why:
- Meddling Mage is best when you have information, so it's generally good practice to play it as late as possible when you know what you're wanting to hit at that specific point in the game. Lieutenant was the play to make on that turn, IMO. I know it's a feel-bad to play her early, but it's often not as bad as you'd think. She ends up growing quick and getting out of control, just like Champ. Next turn you would have seen their T2 play and been able to make a much more informed decision with MM.
- Disregarding the first point, lets say the opponent was on burn and you had no other play. Lightning Helix was probably one of the worst cards to name. It is far more inefficient than both Lightning Bolt and Searing Blaze, either of which would have been better choices. I usually choose Searing Blaze because I'm totally ok with them wasting a burn spell on a creature that doesn't also hit me at the same time. If you don't choose Blaza and they kill your MM with Blaze, they haven't lost anything. If you name Blaze and they have to use a bolt or helix or whatever on it, they've lost the face damage of the card they used to kill it.
My point being, Meddling Mage is a tricky card because you have to know what cards to name in what matchups. I can see why someone would dislike the card, but I think playing it optimally makes it a very powerful card. Just look back at my original Bant Black test videos. Multiple times I could have made the card much more powerful just by making better decisions with it (two specific instances were when I didn't realize I could lock out the 2-3 Lingering Souls in the op's graveyard and another game where I should have assumed that the UR deck was on Storm). There were other times in those videos where I was able to lock out key cards from the opponent, like Oketra's Monument and Hollow One (yes, those are fringe decks, but the general idea applies to any matchup).
I think it is hard to say if lieutenant turn two is the right play here. I drew additional humans afterwards and I think it is better to play a lieutenant later on a board full of humans (which I did in this game). In regards to naming with Meddling Mage, I think that you are correct about searing blaze but not about lightning bolt. Lightning Helix helps them in a race like against burn much more than lightning bolt. That was my reasoning. I still think that in this situation I was forced to play Meddling mage because I assumed that I have to race faster which I think is more likely if I play the lieutenant on a board full of creatures.
Btw. Do you miss your Sin collectors main? Two weeks ago I went 5-0 with your list playing 4 Freebooter, 2 MM, 3 Sin Collector, 2 Anafenza.
I think it is hard to say if lieutenant turn two is the right play here. I drew additional humans afterwards and I think it is better to play a lieutenant later on a board full of humans (which I did in this game).
It's debatable, but I often see people getting caught up with the need to get max value out of Lieutenant's ETB effect. I have found that, worst case scenario, a 2 mana Champion of the Parish is still good. Against decks that run Anger of the Gods, it's important to get at least 1 creature out of range. In other scenarios, it is often better to play Lieutenant before other humans that are less likely to attack (dorks, mayor, sometimes MM).
In regards to naming with Meddling Mage, I think that you are correct about searing blaze but not about lightning bolt. Lightning Helix helps them in a race like against burn much more than lightning bolt. That was my reasoning. I still think that in this situation I was forced to play Meddling mage because I assumed that I have to race faster which I think is more likely if I play the lieutenant on a board full of creatures.
That's fair, but I will say that I have never tried to race burn. In my experience, it's all about stabilizing then quickly turning the corner. We're very much the control deck in the matchup.
Btw. Do you miss your Sin collectors main? Two weeks ago I went 5-0 with your list playing 4 Freebooter, 2 MM, 3 Sin Collector, 2 Anafenza.
So far I haven't. I hated when it was a dead card in the main. Thalia helps in a lot of matchups and the 4th Freebooter has been fantastic (and offsets some of the loss of the mainboard Collectors).
I miss Kessig Wolf Run though, maybe it has to force its slot instead of the 7th fetchland. I know this manabase can fairly support 5 colors anyway. The idea is there's no point playing only 4C because of the mana if 5C is stronger.
My feedback on Anafenza, the Foremost in a list with already 4 Mantis is that she doesn't represent a very astonishing option. I have even results with Sunscourge Champion or Lyev Skyknight for example (it's completely MU dependant), and I assume Knight of the Reliquary or Eternal Witness can have their good MUs as well. It means that at this point, she's a good filler but I hope for a future new 3-drop staple, which woud be good in any MU. Otherwise choosing the extra 3-drops is kind of a neverending story.
Kitesail Freebooter is a staple. It steals so many G1s against so many decks, it strips most of the cards we lose to. The card is unbelievably well designed for the archetype without being flashy.
Reflecting Pool seems unnecessary in the sense that if we have a Cavern / Territory, we already fixed the mana. Only Mantis would be tricky at this point, along with a Forest, which happens rarely.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Pioneer - A bunch of stuff Modern - Humans Legacy - Grixis Phoenix / Death & Taxes
In terms of consistency of mana sources, if you run 4x Hierarchs + 3x Pilgrims with that land list you get the following untapped sources:
18x Green + 4x from Dorks
19x White + 7x from Dorks
16x Blue + 4x from Dorks
16x Red
16x Black
That seems like it's probably consistent enough to me based upon the Karsten calculations. It would be nice to be base-green instead of base-white in your fetch-shock scheme to have a slightly higher chance of nabbing a basic forest to cast CoCo through Blood Moon but I think that would probably throw everything off too much in a 4-5c list.
I've been less active in the thread for a while as I've waited for more reasonably priced Caverns... not sure when that will happen. =/
Here's what I would like to test in paper if possible:
I miss Kessig Wolf Run though, maybe it has to force its slot instead of the 7th fetchland. I know this manabase can fairly support 5 colors anyway. The idea is there's no point playing only 4C because of the mana if 5C is stronger.
Looks solid. If we can get it as stable as the 4C mana base, then yeah, 5C would be the way to go. I think that's easier said than done, but this looks promising. I'll test it out once I get my hands on some Arid Mesas on MTGO. Kessig Wolf Run is extremely risky in such a color-heavy deck and really doesn't seem necessary when we're running 8 flyers.
My feedback on Anafenza, the Foremost in a list with already 4 Mantis is that she doesn't represent a very astonishing option. I have even results with Sunscourge Champion or Lyev Skyknight for example (it's completely MU dependant), and I assume Knight of the Reliquary or Eternal Witness can have their good MUs as well. It means that at this point, she's a good filler but I hope for a future new 3-drop staple, which woud be good in any MU. Otherwise choosing the extra 3-drops is kind of a neverending story.
I would argue that a 4/4 for 3 with relevant upside will always be good regardless of matchup whereas those other creatures you listed are much more situational and matchup dependent. But I do agree that access to Mantis Rider reduces the attractiveness of Anafenza.
Kitesail Freebooter is a staple. It steals so many G1s against so many decks, it strips most of the cards we lose to. The card is unbelievably well designed for the archetype without being flashy.
Hey guys, just wanted to throw a quick "tournament" report in here while it's fresh on my mind. I just got back from a local FNM, which was my first time playing paper magic in about a year. It was a small turnout, but all of my opponents ended up being familiar local grinders who always run tiered decks, so there definitely wasn't a shortage of competition. The list I ran is the same list I've been championing in MTGO:
Match 1 - Grixis Control - WIN 2-0
-----------------------------------------------
Game 1 started off with a bang with me on the play. T1 Champion of the Parish into T2 Champion of the Parish / Noble Hierarch into T3 Anafenza, the Foremost. So yeah, the opponent got run over. The downside is that I didn't get any real info about what version of Grixis he was running, so I played it safe with -2 Path to Exile +2 Sin Collector as the sideboard plan (I assumed it was the control variant, but wasn't 100% certain). Game 2 was a bit slower, me on the draw. No T1 play. My opponent clearly represents Terminate on T2 so I play Meddling Mage naming it. I start building a board presence with Thalia's Lieutenant and Thalia, Heretic Cathar (he plays a Tasigur), so by the time he was able to draw out from under the Meddling Mage, I had done enough damage and had enough on-board that I was able to squeak through the last bit of damage before he could pull ahead with his Tasigur, the Golden Fang and card advantage. A timely Sin Collector in the midgame was able to nab a Cryptic Command as well, which was one of his few outs later in the game. G2 was a good example of what a good read with Meddling Mage can do.
Match 2 - Sultai Death's Shadow - WIN 2-0
-----------------------------------------------
I was on the draw in Game 1. Kept a hand with some nice stuff like Noble, Lieutenant and Freebooter. My opponent snipes Freebooter with an early Inquisition of Kozilek. My next couple of turns consist of playing Meddling Mage on Fatal Push (which once again ended up being a good read) and Thalia's Lieutenant. My opponent plays a Tarmogoyf and suits it up with a fun-of Rancor while he's stuck on 2-3 lands. After a few turns of waiting on a Path to Exile or Reflector Mage, I cast a Thalia, Heretic Cathar that I drew, which made my Lieutenant big enough to at least trade with the monstrous 6/5 Goyf. I attack and he accepts the trade. Naturally, I draw Reflector Mage the following turn. Either way, that same turn Thalia, Heretic Cathar knocked him down to 2 life in a very interesting sequence where my opponent was unable to kill it with Snapcaster Mage/Fatal Push due to the fact that Snap had to enter tapped and couldn't trigger revolt. I play Reflector Mage post combat, awkwardly bouncing his Snapcaster, but he was still stuck on 3 mana and couldn't actually utilize it. We then went onto game 2, where I once again named Fatal Push with Meddling Mage, which helped open the door for me to produce more threats than he had answers (thanks to Freebooter later on as well) and cruise to victory. He did have a Death's Shadow towards the end, but Freebooter was pinging him in the air for 3 damage a turn. and his hand was just useless disruption spells.
At this point, I was feeling great! Undefeated in both matches and all 4 games. Onto the finale...
Match 3 - Affinity - WIN 2-1
------------------------------------------------
I was on the draw once again for Game 1. I knew my opponent was on Affinity from hearing about the deck earlier. My opening hand was along the lines of Noble/Freebooter/Lieutenant/Path, which seemed quite reasonable. Unfortunately, he was able to pretty much dump his hand before Freebooter came out on T2, but that's to be expected sometimes. I was holding onto the path like it was pure gold, especially when my opponent was able to put out a pair of Arcbound Ravagers. We played a bit of a game of chicken, trying to see who would flinch first as we traded some damage back and forth. It all changed when I drew a Collected Company and was able to force his hand with double Reflector Mage targeting both Ravagers along with the Path to Exile sitting in my hand. He responds by putting a bunch of counters on a Vault Skirge, which I Path EOT. He was unable to recover as I was swinging for immense amounts of damage by that point. Game 2, I kept a slow hand on the draw and died to a suited up Inkmoth Nexus. I knew better than to keep that hand, so that was definitely on me. In game 3, we both mulled to 6 and I was on the play. I kept a hand with 2 lands, Champion of the Parish, Thalia's Lieutenant, Reflector Mage and Path to Exile. I see a 3rd land with my scry and happily keep it on top. This time it was my turn to be the aggro deck, so I started the beatdowns and had to do a little bit of early racing against a Vault Skirge before the pressure + Reflector Mage + Path to Exile + 2nd Path to Exile that I later drew proved to be too much. I main phased my final Path to Exile on his large Vault Skirge because I felt at that point, the main way I could lose was by getting too fancy and letting my Path get hit with a Stubborn Denial. After the game, my opponent confirmed that he did indeed have a Denial in hand. We played a fun match afterwards with him playing a Jeskai Control deck and the ol' Humans punched right through that as well.
When all was said and done, I was incredibly happy with how the deck ran. It constantly attacked my opponents from multiple angles and taxed their draw steps, their mana, their blocks, you name it. I skipped over a few smaller details, like how Mayor of Avabruck was putting in some great work in multiple games tonight (had quite a few "hey can I read what his backside does? Oh...I should probably kill that) and how Anafenza, the Foremost was doing a great job of punching through damage and ending games, but I just wanted to hit the main points. I was also pleased with my own performance; I don't recall any noticeable punts, even with Meddling Mage and I was able to stay on top of all the various triggers/abilities like Mayor, Anafenza (both the counter and the exile effect) and the fact that Reflector Mage delays the re-casting of the card for a turn. The deck ran great, I played great and I was able to head home with a nice $40 in my wallet. Not a bad way to shake off the rust!
i am really glad my suggestions of unclaimed territory and kitesail freebooter+meddling mage (but not the eldrazi displacer, lol!) was well received, and even improved by some of you! good job guys! the deck seems really fun and extremely competitive! I love its proactivity!
Not to be a party pooper, but the idea was floating around a couple of weeks before you joined the thread
The main test for [Kitesail Freebooter] is to figure out whether opponents will target that guy instead of the other faster clocks. Champ often eats Push, our 3-drops are the primary targets for spot removal then. Meddling Mage is also a maindeckable card...
Haha! Meddling Mage is quite hilarious alongside Freebooter (and Reflector Mage). Freebooter is most definitely a card worth testing since it fills a spot in the curve that the bant black deck desperately needed and may provide enough disruption to make up for its slower clock when compared to the bant red lists. It also provides evasion, which is something I was searching for in my previous testing of the bant black deck, as I have posted about on here. It's an exciting card, but it's not a for sure slam dunk. Too early to tell. I do think that the bant black deck will most certainly go in an almost hatebears-esque direction, using stuff like Freebooter, Meddling Mage, Reflector Mage and whichever Thalia(s) you want to run.
Either way, I think the fact that so many of us were able to merge our ideas and generally agree on a shell after so many pages of back and forth means quite a bit.
Also, has anyone been watching SCG Cinci? there's a 5 color Ancient Ziggurat Humans deck running Aether Vial. Reminds me a lot of the original 5 color list from last year with the obvious new improvements like Freebooter and Unclaimed Territory. No Paths or CoCo or anything of the sort. One thing to note is with only Vial as a non-creature spell, Thalia 1.0 is much better here.
As someone who's picking up the deck and possibly playing it at Regionals in a couple weeks, I'm curious about peoples thoughts on Aether Vial vs. Collected Company. Is the former really so much better than the latter? It's so weird to me to see an undefeated Humans listed without CoCo because of the explosiveness it brings to the table. Did he ever explain why he decided to cut Company from his list?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
EDH GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG UBRNicol Bolas and his SuperfriendsPawnsUBR
Modern UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW WUBRGHumansWUBRG BGMidrangeBG
Even without dedicated lifegain it has 12 pain-free rainbow lands and a full playset of Thalia V1, Meddling Mage, and Kitesail Freebooter as well as Vial to dance around Eidolon’s shock trigger. Could also swap out Ethersworn Canonist for Kambal?
The scg list is 5 colors supported by 12 creature/type specific lands. The manabase just doesn’t support colored non-creature spells, that’s all. Personally, I think CoCo is stll great, I would say better in most decks that could run one or the other. Vial is a terrible top deck and sucks in multiples.
Not quite.
Notice the vial list hast a much higher concentration of 2-drops v 3-drops whereas the coco builds usualy have more value at the 3-drop slot to maximize coco value.
Collins Mullens is a fried of mine but he didn't tell me that he picked up humans. I am not sure about aether vial..I have to test it. I believe that the coco build brings more creatures on the table but to flash in a freebooter eot followed by a mm seems strong. I saw that list on YouTube two weeks ago. I believe that you want a tireless tracker main in such a list. I think this deck is also good in the humans mirror since they can name humans
Yeah I've been watching his games and it's performing well. His list seems to address the conundrum we were trying to solve with how to create a 5 color manabase that is consistent. He did so by cutting the colored spells and going pure rainbow creature lands. Very interesting.
I think the Vial list is cool because you can finally run Thalia 1.0 without it hurting much. However, the deck loses a lot of its ability to interact along with its ability to recover from being grinded out. I do think that Vial is better with something like Necromancer which is a great trick to have against sweepers and removal. Being able to draw step a Freebooter seems nice too. My personal opinion is that I'd rather have CoCo (much better for card advantage, great top deck, great in multiples etc), but I can see the merits of a Vial build. I do think the success of this 5C build further validates the 4c and 5c shells we've been working on, despite it having some differences. The card interactions are all the same and the power of these cards is on full display.
I've been perusing the humans thread for a little while now cuz I love the idea and tribal theme behind this decktype and being 4 and 5 colours is so rad. Really curious to see how this Mullens list does again today because it's right up my alley and I'm so tempted to start acquiring the pieces.
I've been perusing the humans thread for a little while now cuz I love the idea and tribal theme behind this decktype and being 4 and 5 colours is so rad. Really curious to see how this Mullens list does again today because it's right up my alley and I'm so tempted to start acquiring the pieces.
Welcome to the club! Feel free to browse the pages and see which version you like the most. There are plenty to choose from!
So Mullens is 13 or 14-0 atm. can we start considering his list as tier 1 now?:D
On the other hand, how does humans look at Burn matchup ?(if i noticed correctly he doesnt have any protection from red other than meddling/this new 2 drop that exiles etc.
It usually takes more than 1 SCG performance to break into T1. In modern, just about any reasonably competitive deck can go on a big run, which is what makes the format so great. Repetitive big performances is what makes a deck T1. As for his burn matchup, Thalia 1.0 helps but I don't think he has any lifegain. Luckily, burn hasn't been doing great this weekend, so he's seemingly been able to dodge it.
Burn is always a though race but i fell actually pretty good against it with my Abzan build. Also post board i add more disruption with Sin Collector alongside Kambal, Consul of Allocation which is always valueable against burn as a two-for-one.
I also swap out some easy to kill threats for Fiendslayer Paladin. This card is the most narrow card in my board, though I haven't found reason to drop it yet.
Question: In an Abzan list with 1-mana disruptionspells, would Fatal Push be prefarable over Path to Exile?
Please share your thoughts.
Ulvenwald Tracker? Gotta love those fun-ofs. Can't play around that card being in the deck, nope!
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Legacy - Sneak Show, BR Reanimator, Miracles, UW Stoneblade
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/ Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander - Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build) (dead format for me)
Collins is going to the finals. The deck has looked great on camera and Mantis Rider seems really strong in the shell. He's just gotta get through gifts storm and Humans is gonna take it all
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
4c Traverse Shadow, RG Eldrazi, Death and Taxes
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
- Meddling Mage is best when you have information, so it's generally good practice to play it as late as possible when you know what you're wanting to hit at that specific point in the game. Lieutenant was the play to make on that turn, IMO. I know it's a feel-bad to play her early, but it's often not as bad as you'd think. She ends up growing quick and getting out of control, just like Champ. Next turn you would have seen their T2 play and been able to make a much more informed decision with MM.
- Disregarding the first point, lets say the opponent was on burn and you had no other play. Lightning Helix was probably one of the worst cards to name. It is far more inefficient than both Lightning Bolt and Searing Blaze, either of which would have been better choices. I usually choose Searing Blaze because I'm totally ok with them wasting a burn spell on a creature that doesn't also hit me at the same time. If you don't choose Blaza and they kill your MM with Blaze, they haven't lost anything. If you name Blaze and they have to use a bolt or helix or whatever on it, they've lost the face damage of the card they used to kill it.
My point being, Meddling Mage is a tricky card because you have to know what cards to name in what matchups. I can see why someone would dislike the card, but I think playing it optimally makes it a very powerful card. Just look back at my original Bant Black test videos. Multiple times I could have made the card much more powerful just by making better decisions with it (two specific instances were when I didn't realize I could lock out the 2-3 Lingering Souls in the op's graveyard and another game where I should have assumed that the UR deck was on Storm). There were other times in those videos where I was able to lock out key cards from the opponent, like Oketra's Monument and Hollow One (yes, those are fringe decks, but the general idea applies to any matchup).
Anyways, MM aside, if you really want to grind people out, you could also look at Eternal Witness, Duskwatch Recruiter and Jace, Vryn's Prodigy. I've had some success with grindier builds using these cards.
Btw. Do you miss your Sin collectors main? Two weeks ago I went 5-0 with your list playing 4 Freebooter, 2 MM, 3 Sin Collector, 2 Anafenza.
It's debatable, but I often see people getting caught up with the need to get max value out of Lieutenant's ETB effect. I have found that, worst case scenario, a 2 mana Champion of the Parish is still good. Against decks that run Anger of the Gods, it's important to get at least 1 creature out of range. In other scenarios, it is often better to play Lieutenant before other humans that are less likely to attack (dorks, mayor, sometimes MM).
That's fair, but I will say that I have never tried to race burn. In my experience, it's all about stabilizing then quickly turning the corner. We're very much the control deck in the matchup.
So far I haven't. I hated when it was a dead card in the main. Thalia helps in a lot of matchups and the 4th Freebooter has been fantastic (and offsets some of the loss of the mainboard Collectors).
4 Unclaimed Territory
4 Windswept Heath
3 Arid Mesa
1 Stomping Ground
1 Godless Shrine
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Temple Garden
1 Forest
1 Plains
I miss Kessig Wolf Run though, maybe it has to force its slot instead of the 7th fetchland. I know this manabase can fairly support 5 colors anyway. The idea is there's no point playing only 4C because of the mana if 5C is stronger.
My feedback on Anafenza, the Foremost in a list with already 4 Mantis is that she doesn't represent a very astonishing option. I have even results with Sunscourge Champion or Lyev Skyknight for example (it's completely MU dependant), and I assume Knight of the Reliquary or Eternal Witness can have their good MUs as well. It means that at this point, she's a good filler but I hope for a future new 3-drop staple, which woud be good in any MU. Otherwise choosing the extra 3-drops is kind of a neverending story.
Kitesail Freebooter is a staple. It steals so many G1s against so many decks, it strips most of the cards we lose to. The card is unbelievably well designed for the archetype without being flashy.
Reflecting Pool seems unnecessary in the sense that if we have a Cavern / Territory, we already fixed the mana. Only Mantis would be tricky at this point, along with a Forest, which happens rarely.
18x Green + 4x from Dorks
19x White + 7x from Dorks
16x Blue + 4x from Dorks
16x Red
16x Black
That seems like it's probably consistent enough to me based upon the Karsten calculations. It would be nice to be base-green instead of base-white in your fetch-shock scheme to have a slightly higher chance of nabbing a basic forest to cast CoCo through Blood Moon but I think that would probably throw everything off too much in a 4-5c list.
I've been less active in the thread for a while as I've waited for more reasonably priced Caverns... not sure when that will happen. =/
Here's what I would like to test in paper if possible:
3x Avacyn's Pilgrim
4x Noble Hierarch
4x Champion of the Parish
4x Kitesail Freebooter
4x Thalia's Lieutenant
1x Mayor of Avabruck
4x Mantis Rider
4x Reflector Mage
2x Anafenza, the Foremost
1x Thalia, Heretic Cathar
Instant (8)
4x Path to Exile
4x Collected Company
4x Unclaimed Territory
4x Windswept Heath
3x Arid Mesa
1x Godless Shrine
1x Hallowed Fountain
1x Stomping Ground
1x Temple Garden
1x Plains
1x Forest
2x Meddling Mage
2x Rest in Peace
2x Stony Silence
2x Eternal Witness
1x Izzet Staticaster
2x Kambal, Consul of Allocation
1x Reclamation Sage
3x Sin Collector
Looks solid. If we can get it as stable as the 4C mana base, then yeah, 5C would be the way to go. I think that's easier said than done, but this looks promising. I'll test it out once I get my hands on some Arid Mesas on MTGO. Kessig Wolf Run is extremely risky in such a color-heavy deck and really doesn't seem necessary when we're running 8 flyers.
I would argue that a 4/4 for 3 with relevant upside will always be good regardless of matchup whereas those other creatures you listed are much more situational and matchup dependent. But I do agree that access to Mantis Rider reduces the attractiveness of Anafenza.
Indeed. It's precisely the 2 drop we needed.
4 Champion of the Parish
2 Avacyn's Pilgrim
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Mayor of Avabruck
4 Kitesail Freebooter
2 Meddling Mage
4 Thalia's Lieutenant
2 Thalia, Heretic Cathar
4 Reflector Mage
3 Anafenza, the Foremost
Spells (8)
4 Collected Company
4 Path to Exile
4 Cavern of Souls
4 Unclaimed Territory
3 Windswept Heath
2 Flooded Strand
1 Plains
1 Forest
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Breeding Pool
1 Island
1 Temple Garden
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Godless Shrine
2 Vithian Renegades
2 Rest in Peace
1 Kataki, War's Wage
2 Kambal, Consul of Allocation
1 Izzet Staticaster
3 Arashin Cleric
3 Sin Collector
1 Sacred Foundry
Without further ado, here's the rundown:
Match 1 - Grixis Control - WIN 2-0
-----------------------------------------------
Game 1 started off with a bang with me on the play. T1 Champion of the Parish into T2 Champion of the Parish / Noble Hierarch into T3 Anafenza, the Foremost. So yeah, the opponent got run over. The downside is that I didn't get any real info about what version of Grixis he was running, so I played it safe with -2 Path to Exile +2 Sin Collector as the sideboard plan (I assumed it was the control variant, but wasn't 100% certain). Game 2 was a bit slower, me on the draw. No T1 play. My opponent clearly represents Terminate on T2 so I play Meddling Mage naming it. I start building a board presence with Thalia's Lieutenant and Thalia, Heretic Cathar (he plays a Tasigur), so by the time he was able to draw out from under the Meddling Mage, I had done enough damage and had enough on-board that I was able to squeak through the last bit of damage before he could pull ahead with his Tasigur, the Golden Fang and card advantage. A timely Sin Collector in the midgame was able to nab a Cryptic Command as well, which was one of his few outs later in the game. G2 was a good example of what a good read with Meddling Mage can do.
Match 2 - Sultai Death's Shadow - WIN 2-0
-----------------------------------------------
I was on the draw in Game 1. Kept a hand with some nice stuff like Noble, Lieutenant and Freebooter. My opponent snipes Freebooter with an early Inquisition of Kozilek. My next couple of turns consist of playing Meddling Mage on Fatal Push (which once again ended up being a good read) and Thalia's Lieutenant. My opponent plays a Tarmogoyf and suits it up with a fun-of Rancor while he's stuck on 2-3 lands. After a few turns of waiting on a Path to Exile or Reflector Mage, I cast a Thalia, Heretic Cathar that I drew, which made my Lieutenant big enough to at least trade with the monstrous 6/5 Goyf. I attack and he accepts the trade. Naturally, I draw Reflector Mage the following turn. Either way, that same turn Thalia, Heretic Cathar knocked him down to 2 life in a very interesting sequence where my opponent was unable to kill it with Snapcaster Mage/Fatal Push due to the fact that Snap had to enter tapped and couldn't trigger revolt. I play Reflector Mage post combat, awkwardly bouncing his Snapcaster, but he was still stuck on 3 mana and couldn't actually utilize it. We then went onto game 2, where I once again named Fatal Push with Meddling Mage, which helped open the door for me to produce more threats than he had answers (thanks to Freebooter later on as well) and cruise to victory. He did have a Death's Shadow towards the end, but Freebooter was pinging him in the air for 3 damage a turn. and his hand was just useless disruption spells.
At this point, I was feeling great! Undefeated in both matches and all 4 games. Onto the finale...
Match 3 - Affinity - WIN 2-1
------------------------------------------------
I was on the draw once again for Game 1. I knew my opponent was on Affinity from hearing about the deck earlier. My opening hand was along the lines of Noble/Freebooter/Lieutenant/Path, which seemed quite reasonable. Unfortunately, he was able to pretty much dump his hand before Freebooter came out on T2, but that's to be expected sometimes. I was holding onto the path like it was pure gold, especially when my opponent was able to put out a pair of Arcbound Ravagers. We played a bit of a game of chicken, trying to see who would flinch first as we traded some damage back and forth. It all changed when I drew a Collected Company and was able to force his hand with double Reflector Mage targeting both Ravagers along with the Path to Exile sitting in my hand. He responds by putting a bunch of counters on a Vault Skirge, which I Path EOT. He was unable to recover as I was swinging for immense amounts of damage by that point. Game 2, I kept a slow hand on the draw and died to a suited up Inkmoth Nexus. I knew better than to keep that hand, so that was definitely on me. In game 3, we both mulled to 6 and I was on the play. I kept a hand with 2 lands, Champion of the Parish, Thalia's Lieutenant, Reflector Mage and Path to Exile. I see a 3rd land with my scry and happily keep it on top. This time it was my turn to be the aggro deck, so I started the beatdowns and had to do a little bit of early racing against a Vault Skirge before the pressure + Reflector Mage + Path to Exile + 2nd Path to Exile that I later drew proved to be too much. I main phased my final Path to Exile on his large Vault Skirge because I felt at that point, the main way I could lose was by getting too fancy and letting my Path get hit with a Stubborn Denial. After the game, my opponent confirmed that he did indeed have a Denial in hand. We played a fun match afterwards with him playing a Jeskai Control deck and the ol' Humans punched right through that as well.
When all was said and done, I was incredibly happy with how the deck ran. It constantly attacked my opponents from multiple angles and taxed their draw steps, their mana, their blocks, you name it. I skipped over a few smaller details, like how Mayor of Avabruck was putting in some great work in multiple games tonight (had quite a few "hey can I read what his backside does? Oh...I should probably kill that) and how Anafenza, the Foremost was doing a great job of punching through damage and ending games, but I just wanted to hit the main points. I was also pleased with my own performance; I don't recall any noticeable punts, even with Meddling Mage and I was able to stay on top of all the various triggers/abilities like Mayor, Anafenza (both the counter and the exile effect) and the fact that Reflector Mage delays the re-casting of the card for a turn. The deck ran great, I played great and I was able to head home with a nice $40 in my wallet. Not a bad way to shake off the rust!
Not to be a party pooper, but the idea was floating around a couple of weeks before you joined the thread
Either way, I think the fact that so many of us were able to merge our ideas and generally agree on a shell after so many pages of back and forth means quite a bit.
Also, has anyone been watching SCG Cinci? there's a 5 color Ancient Ziggurat Humans deck running Aether Vial. Reminds me a lot of the original 5 color list from last year with the obvious new improvements like Freebooter and Unclaimed Territory. No Paths or CoCo or anything of the sort. One thing to note is with only Vial as a non-creature spell, Thalia 1.0 is much better here.
4 Champion of the Parish
4 Kitesail Freebooter
4 Mantis Rider
3 Mayor of Avabruck
4 Meddling Mage
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Reflector Mage
4 Thalia's Lieutenant
4 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Thalia, Heretic Cathar
1 Plains
4 Ancient Ziggurat
4 Cavern of Souls
1 Hallowed Fountain
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Temple Garden
4 Unclaimed Territory
3 Windswept Heath
Spells (4)
4 Aether Vial
2 Ethersworn Canonist
2 Fiend Hunter
2 Izzet Staticaster
1 Mirran Crusader
1 Reflector Mage
2 Tireless Tracker
2 Vithian Renegades
2 Xathrid Necromancer
1 Anafenza, the Foremost
...and here's the deck tech from earlier in the day: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xtKxWvzQcs
GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW
UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW
UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG
UBRNicol Bolas and his Super
friendsPawnsUBRModern
UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW
WUBRGHumansWUBRG
BGMidrangeBG
Not quite.
Notice the vial list hast a much higher concentration of 2-drops v 3-drops whereas the coco builds usualy have more value at the 3-drop slot to maximize coco value.
Modern: WUBRG Humans - GBW Traverse - GWU Knightfall - GRW Bushwhacker Zoo -
I think the Vial list is cool because you can finally run Thalia 1.0 without it hurting much. However, the deck loses a lot of its ability to interact along with its ability to recover from being grinded out. I do think that Vial is better with something like Necromancer which is a great trick to have against sweepers and removal. Being able to draw step a Freebooter seems nice too. My personal opinion is that I'd rather have CoCo (much better for card advantage, great top deck, great in multiples etc), but I can see the merits of a Vial build. I do think the success of this 5C build further validates the 4c and 5c shells we've been working on, despite it having some differences. The card interactions are all the same and the power of these cards is on full display.
Welcome to the club! Feel free to browse the pages and see which version you like the most. There are plenty to choose from!
It usually takes more than 1 SCG performance to break into T1. In modern, just about any reasonably competitive deck can go on a big run, which is what makes the format so great. Repetitive big performances is what makes a deck T1. As for his burn matchup, Thalia 1.0 helps but I don't think he has any lifegain. Luckily, burn hasn't been doing great this weekend, so he's seemingly been able to dodge it.
I also swap out some easy to kill threats for Fiendslayer Paladin. This card is the most narrow card in my board, though I haven't found reason to drop it yet.
Question: In an Abzan list with 1-mana disruptionspells, would Fatal Push be prefarable over Path to Exile?
Please share your thoughts.
Modern: WUBRG Humans - GBW Traverse - GWU Knightfall - GRW Bushwhacker Zoo -
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/
Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander -
Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build)(dead format for me)