@the_nobodys The deck looks bad but puts up great results. I'd suggest trying to play the deck before commenting on its quality. It would add merit to your observations.
@racing089 I accidentally tagged reedy instead of you. Hate to sound like a broken record but you should try the list before judging it, at least for me it's damn near exactly the modern list I've been looking for since tezAoB rotated out of standard (where I played a deck that everyone said had no wincons that I won about 5k with)
@the_nobodys The deck looks bad but puts up great results. I'd suggest trying to play the deck before commenting on its quality. It would add merit to your observations.
Fair enough, I should test before making blanket statements. I have played this deck in Legacy, at least - 4 Tezz AoB, 3 Lili, 3 JtMS as basically the only win-cons, and no cantrips because it played chalice, so I understand how effective PW + bridge are and how they slowly constrict the opponent until you win. I made it to day 2 at GP new jersey as a newbie legacy player on the stregth of that gameplan. But in legacy, I was playing 7 sol lands and 6 mana rocks so it would often be a turn 2-3 PW.
I'm happy if the modern version of this deck is fast enough and consistent enough to win. Unfortunately, the discussion on this deck and one with thopter/sword/whir/serum visions is just so different. To omit any copies of thopter/sword/whir/serum visions does mean several things - 0 cantrips and cheap tutors for less consistency, multiples of sometimes dead cards like needle or relic, and the lack of thopter/sword to offer a shut-down gameplan if resolved against tier 1 decks like jeskai and affinity, matches I would see the PW version struggling against.
On another note, I stuck a few copies of Dark Confidant into my build, and am surprisingly happy with the result. It's entirely possible that I play a Jund-esque gameplan to victory between goyf, bob, decay, discard and lili, while never tipping my hand. I did this game one vs eldrazi tron and rw prison yesterday, though I did get super lucky/sneaky with bob reveals. I also had a fun game vs Jund, where I out-junded him both games and he got salty. It is very important to have a plan B other than the combo, whatever that may look like.
Oh, and if anyone was wondering about my testing Culling Scales vs lantern, I have and it's decent. It won me a game 2, but didn't win me a game 3 because he was able to recur bauble over and over with academy ruins, which completely hoses scales (saccing bauble in response to trigger). Needling ruins is key, I guess.
@the_nobodys I played that deck too in legacy, too. It was a really fun glass hammer that could occasionally out-nut every deck in the format. Caleb Durward is a friend of mine and just writes off the deck as a fun-but-not-serious deck.
As for the conversation in this forum - the two philosophies are very different yet we are discussing the best way to accomplish a viable Tezzeret control build in modern. It's not an either or to me, Tezzeret is a viable centerpiece to a control build and he has two uses:
He can dig for combo pieces or dig for bullets.
The most powerful combo piece plan he can work with is thopter sword, however that plan is so flimsy because of where the meta is. If the meta shifts with bannings/new printings etc. I think thopter sword could be relevant again, but right now there's too much splash damage from artifact/GY hate. Also using him in this mode is unstable, it requires several specifically named cards to line up correctly.
As for his other mode, answer digging - he is much more reliable in this role. He's not like an Elspeth where he can come down and bring order to a board single handedly, but if he lands on a stable board he's probably the best PW in modern. When the game is not raging out of control he simultaneously ticks up to remove your opponents various outs, and provides two really great ways to end the game with his -4 and -1 abilities. Not to mention that you can play both tezzes at the same time, which synergies as well if not better than the triplicate Gideon package. The main perk is this functionality of Tezzeret is the most stable. You need to land him, and all you need to hit is a type of card - not specifically named. Less moving parts with a similar amount of payout.
Basically, when a deck is tuned to optimize Tezzeret in his most stable and powerful functionality, the deck looks like it doesn't do much. So before speculating about the deck's bad matchups (jeskai and affinity are easy matchups), take the deck for a spin.
The most powerful combo piece plan he can work with is thopter sword, however that plan is so flimsy because of where the meta is. If the meta shifts with bannings/new printings etc. I think thopter sword could be relevant again, but right now there's too much splash damage from artifact/GY hate.
What?? This just isn't true. If anything, sideboards have been kinder to thopter sword recently, as jund and abzan and dredge aren't really a thing right now, and stony and grudge are the big bad boys.
And GY hate rarely shuts down thopter/sword. Relic and spellbomb, the preferred hate recently, might as well read: target opponent sacs a bauble, gains a life, puts a 1/1 flier into play, and you feel bad.
And the thing to realize is, the amount of resources you invest in playing a thopter sword, and the incremental advantage you generate before they deal with it, usually means you're ahead or even on resources.
The most powerful combo piece plan he can work with is thopter sword, however that plan is so flimsy because of where the meta is. If the meta shifts with bannings/new printings etc. I think thopter sword could be relevant again, but right now there's too much splash damage from artifact/GY hate.
What?? This just isn't true. If anything, sideboards have been kinder to thopter sword recently, as jund and abzan and dredge aren't really a thing right now, and stony and grudge are the big bad boys.
And GY hate rarely shuts down thopter/sword. Relic and spellbomb, the preferred hate recently, might as well read: target opponent sacs a bauble, gains a life, puts a 1/1 flier into play, and you feel bad.
And the thing to realize is, the amount of resources you invest in playing a thopter sword, and the incremental advantage you generate before they deal with it, usually means you're ahead or even on resources.
I agree with this. I have been tearing up friendly leagues on mtgo with thopter/sword. It is a little less competitive than the competitive leagues but not by much. In my last 50~ games I have not ONCE lost after resolving just a foundry and getting a sword into play or into my graveyard. Stony silence is annoying but that is why we have abrubt decay. I won a game last night through 3 copies of cast out, 1 stony silence, and a rip. The combo is the farthest from flimsy and that is why it is so good. It just doesn't win immediately.
@boomforest: I will sleeve it up and try it but when I look at the tier 1 meta, and I look at the list it just doesn't add up to me.
Jeskai Control - A decent game 1 by overloading their counter spell suite, punching holes with discard and slamming witchbane orb. However thier sideboard is straight fire against you with cards like wear/tear, negate, stony silence, spell pierce. Thopter/Sword is near unbeatable for them game 1 and they have to warp their deck to beat it post board.
Affinity - 1 ballista and the 3 damnations are your only hope. Ensnaring bridge helps but then you also have to needle plating and kill before they can rebound. Sideboard they have cards like ancient grudge that are going to bust open the bridge and make games very difficult for you.
UR Storm - You have speed bumb cards like IOK/Brutallity/Relic/Witchbane Orb. But outside or Witchbane Orb they will still have you dead on T5 through most of that disruption. Overall though, they are just 2 turns faster than you and you can do little to stop them. Turbo Whir decks find the hate they need ASAP. Some are even main decking grafdigger's cage for this reason.
Humans- Game 1 is great for you if they don't land T2 Thalia. Games 2/3 are going to be much more difficult without Ensnaring Bridge reliably holding down the fort. But still slightly in your favor.
Death's Shadow - Without Thopter/Sword you might as well back it up. You only have a handful of cards they even care about plus they main deck k command and stubborn denial.
Tron- We all suck here.
Burn- 4 Collective Brutallity and Witchbane Orb are great but without Thopter/Sword you are easily worse off.
Titanshift - 3 More Tezzerets for pressure might be better here than Thopter/Sword but I am unsure.
I am not trying to be cynical. I have played Tezzeret decks for a long time. Before Thopter/Sword I played variants similar to this with lilly/tezz/damnation. Within 10 cards of the list you are proposing. They were fun but had a problem beating decks that could circumvent Ensnaring Bridge, go over the top of us, or go under us. These versions of the deck were built to prey on anyone doing something fair. Abzan and Jund (Before K Command). Cryptic Command decks. Birthing Pod decks. Etc. I wish we lived in that Modern but we just don't anymore. Whir of Invention and Thopter/Sword allowed us to beat the decks that got under us. Not playing them almost certainly has to be wrong.
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@racing089 I'm talking about this deck. It seems a little crazy to me that you'd do an imaginary projection matchup to matchup without even trying the deck. If you don't want to play the deck that's something, but commenting on a deck you haven't played is a waste of everyone's time.
Well if you guys are not having any problems with games two and three and winning a lot, keep rocking it. For me Stony/Rip... two of the most common SB cards stop the deck dead. Not to mention, Kataki/Shatterstrom/Ancient Grudge/Pithing Needle/Hurkyl's Recall/Vandalblast/Shattering Spree/Relic/Surgical Extraction/Leyline of the Void/Kambal/Ferocidon/Engineered Explosives/Nature's Claim/Ratchet Bomb/Chalice on 2
All of these are pretty common mainboard/SB cards.
We have to assemble thopter/sword, get them into relevant zones and have answers to any of these cards. It's too many hoops to jump through and too much pressure on 3-4 abrupt decays.
@racing089 - Do yourself a favor and switch to the competitive league. The prize structure is so much more in your favor, you face fewer janky brews, and you learn how to play against more skilled players. Personally, I love crushing selfeisek's mardu burn/pyromancer list that he has taken to a ridiculous 22 or so 5-0's, which I have done several times (he must play like all the time).
One thing the PW list made me realize is that The Rack is a perfect anti-lantern card. Too bad it's the most overpriced card on MTGO.
Well if you guys are not having any problems with games two and three and winning a lot, keep rocking it. For me Stony/Rip... two of the most common SB cards stop the deck dead. Not to mention, Kataki/Shatterstrom/Ancient Grudge/Pithing Needle/Hurkyl's Recall/Vandalblast/Shattering Spree/Relic/Surgical Extraction/Leyline of the Void/Kambal/Ferocidon/Engineered Explosives/Nature's Claim/Ratchet Bomb/Chalice on 2
All of these are pretty common mainboard/SB cards.
We have to assemble thopter/sword, get them into relevant zones and have answers to any of these cards. It's too many hoops to jump through and too much pressure on 3-4 abrupt decays.
This is just anti-productive hyperbole. Yes, people play 2-3 SB cards that destroy or otherwise hate on artifacts, but when I lose in games 2-3, it's almost always because the other deck executed its normal, main game-plan better than I did, not because of excessive and unbeatable hate. It's for this reason that when I IoK an opener and see several hate cards, I'm usually happy, because my deck isn't one dimensional and their opener isn't streamlined for what they really want to be doing.
Hey guys! Great discussion. I'm following closely, although I can't get involved as much as I'd like as I'm missing many expensive pieces from the Meltiin design (namely: Lilies).
Anyways, I thought it would be worth mentioning that mister Sam Black has ran über-hot at the SCG Invitational this week-end piloting the blue (Whir) version of Lantern control, AND PLOT TWIST : following champion Piotr Kanister's lead, he is now rocking our grand etherium shadowmaster Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas as a 2-of in the board!
These most up to date deck designs also bring the number of Bridges down to three (because Whir makes it an effective 7) and also from the board we bring in some more Decays and Pulses (along some Search for Azcanta) to circumvent or deal with the hate, which skews the prison/lockdown strategy toward a more control oriented approach in post-board games.
My point being that Lantern control is slowly and progressively, really becoming Lantern / Tezzerator!
Hey guys! Great discussion. I'm following closely, although I can't get involved as much as I'd like as I'm missing many expensive pieces from the Meltiin design (namely: Lilies).
Anyways, I thought it would be worth mentioning that mister Sam Black has ran über-hot at the SCG Invitational this week-end piloting the blue (Whir) version of Lantern control, AND PLOT TWIST : following champion Piotr Kanister's lead, he is now rocking our grand etherium shadowmaster Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas as a 2-of in the board! Overall deck design also brings the number of Bridges down to three (because Whir makes it an effective 7) and from the board we bring in some more Decays and Pulses (along some Search for Azcanta) to circumvent or deal with the hate, but this also skews the lockdown strategy toward a more control oriented approach in post-board games.
My point being that Lantern control is slowly and progressively, really becoming Lantern / Tezzerator!
Lantern is so much better with Whir it's scary, and the ability to turn Lantern control into a toolbox-like Tezzerator-esque deck is actually kinda enjoyable to see. They don't need thopter sword to win because of lock pieces, but they can still 'get there' with tezzeret, aob from the board.
I also saw Sam Blacks lists. The more I think about it, the more I like it. Not to mention Sam Black is an incredible deck builder and I have won tournaments playing multiple brews of his.
Whenever I am building tezzxerator I think to myself "I wish I had more 0 and 1 cost artifacts that were good enough on their own that could also enable Mox Opal and Whir of Invention". Jamming the lantern package may be the most efficient way to do that.
So I looked at Sam's list and the decks floating around here and thought what if I just cut the fat from Sam's lists to play the best cards from our shells? Lantern lists don't NEED anything we offer, but maybe some of our best tools are better than their worst tools. I haven't played with or against Lantern too awful much but this is what I will be testing tomorrow evening:
From Sam's list
- 1 Mishra's Bauble
- 1 Pithing Needle
- 1 Abrubt Decay
- 1 Inquistion of Kozelik
- 1 Pyrite Spellbomb
- 3 Botanical Sanctum
- 2 Darkslick Shores
+ 1 Sword of the Meek
+ 2 Thopter Foundry
+ 2 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
+ 3 Polluted Delta
+ 1 Watery Grave
+ 1 Breeding Pool
The mana base switch could be wrong. I figured that if we are playing lantern and bauble effects than fetch lands provide additional looks at new cards. You also gain more effective black and green sources this way at the cost of a small amount of life which has been proven to be acceptable in Modern. Am I missing something? Are fetches actively bad for some reason?
The proposed changes trim around the edges of the deck only completely eliminating the spellbomb and abrupt decay. I can't think of many instances where the Abrubt Decay is needed in game 1 and I am guessing it is moved to the maindeck to free up sideboard slots.
Aside from affinity and maybe Tron 2 main deck pithing needle seems overkill when Whir provides +4 virtual copies anyway.
Pyrite Spellbomb is typically an alternate win condition so it makes sense cutting it for the new alternate win conditions.
2 Mishra's Baubles in my opening hand always makes me sad. I think trimming 1 isn't going to slow Mox and Whir given the density of one drop artifacts.
Cutting the 7th hand disruption spell could be wrong. The sweet spot for most Modern decks is 6 but Lantern is not like most decks. This was the last card I cut to squeeze in the 2/1 split of the thopter/sword.
From what I understand, one of the easiest ways to do poorly in a tournament with Lantern is for games to drag on and end up with unintentional draws. These changes should help in that regard while also giving the deck a sense of speed in it's poor match ups like Burn or Titanshift.
Apart from the more obvious sideboard changes of:
+ 1 Pithing Needle
+ 1 Abrubt Decay
- 2 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
I don't know what I should be running since I don't play Lantern but I will likely try what Sam had and test from there.
This may lead to concluding that what we are doing is just worse than a lantern centered build. If that is true we may have to rethink our approach to metagame and try play on axis other decks can't. Like becoming a Chalice deck more akin to Legacy Tezzerator.
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@racing089 ooohh let's put in goblin guides and be a burn deck too!
I switched 2 cards between the main deck and sideboard while trimming 3 cards for a combo that works well within the context of the deck. Then slightly changed the manabase which I stated could be the wrong thing to do.
This is a developing competitive thread. If you have interest in developing a competitive deck please continue to do so by engaging in productive conversations. Nobody is stooping you from playing whatever it is you want to play, but most of us have interest in talking about decks that are taking down big tournaments more than anything else.
I think collectively we want to see Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas take someone to the pro tour. Either by getting them into top 8 of a GP or grinding the RPTQ circuit. The list currently up for discussion had the best run out of any lists we have seen for a long time. Therefore this is the direction myself and others are likely to take. If you don't agree with it than please explain to us how you are a better deck builder than Sam Black, or at the very least how whatever list you propose is more likely to win a GP than the list I proposed?
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Mr Meltiin, if you'are around, please speak up! ::)
So if anyone have some tips about how to play vs 8 rack and specially vs tron, you are more than welcome to post it
Tonight FNM result :
round 1) won 2-0 vs mono red control. First game he was on the play and managed to put a chandra turn one while I had pithing in my opening hand
round 2) won 2-0 vs ponza
Round 3) lost 2-0 vs burn
round 4) won 2-0 gren/white vizier combo
I am giving myself 2 months of practice and if things keep improving, I might try it at the nest GP in february
Look like tron is a hard matchup and MonoU tron almost impossible so I was thinking of adding 2 ceremonial rejection in sideboard. Anyone else tried it already and what would you replace for it ??
Yay this Lantern control build feat. Whir and Tezzeret actually topped ALL the SCG events this week-end! Top 8-ed the modern segment of the SCG Invitational (Sam Black), then top 8-ed the SCG Classic (BBD) aaand then top 16-ed the SCG Open (Ali Aintrazi). What a run!
But @Racing089: make no mistake, even if Sam Black indeed is a grandmasterbrewer, he did (all the guys actually did) take Piotr Kanister’s exact 75 list, to a 1 or max 2 cards difference.
I’ve watched Kanister stream day after day and try alternate wincons and eventually double up on Tezzes. Its been a very long thought process over the past two months and he’s been super generous in sharing his findings, and tons of insight with his viewerbase / the world, while shredding 5-0s on MTGO. He deserves his rightful credit. For those who are interested in this, I suggest y’all check out his twitch channel.
This being said, i think that the changes you’re proposing may work (except the fetches — Lantern is in for the long[est] game and with the top control package digging you so hard, stacking your deck from the bottom up is actually, like, a thing. And also arent Tropical Islands better than fetches + shocks?
— But im not sure that its best you move the Tezzes to the main. Simply because the deck dont *need* it. The MB gameplan is scarily effective, fast and consistent, in G1. You wouldnt be fixing any problem. And in postboard games, Tezz comes to solve most of the problems we know artifact decks have. Its a sound gameplan already.
By all means, let’s experiment! But im not sure that the deck needs such a change; that we wouldnt be forcing it, here. On the other hand, to my knowledge, they havent given much testing time to Thopter-Sword.
Also, lastly, Pyrite Spellbomb = not just a wincon but very relevant as recurrable removal vs Noble Hierarchs, Thalias and other critters that can be ennoying even from across a Bridge.
You guys seem to be much more knowledgeable than me about lantern/whir lists so I'll take your advice and not jam thopter/sword in the deck.
The trinisphere/chalice front is where my brain has been for a while but I can't quite seem to make it work. Mox Opal is one of our most powerful tools and it is difficult to play it without 1 drops or with an average cmc above 3. If we shift up the whole mana curve than we need cards that enable that. Legacy gets sol lands. What do we have?
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Fair enough, I should test before making blanket statements. I have played this deck in Legacy, at least - 4 Tezz AoB, 3 Lili, 3 JtMS as basically the only win-cons, and no cantrips because it played chalice, so I understand how effective PW + bridge are and how they slowly constrict the opponent until you win. I made it to day 2 at GP new jersey as a newbie legacy player on the stregth of that gameplan. But in legacy, I was playing 7 sol lands and 6 mana rocks so it would often be a turn 2-3 PW.
I'm happy if the modern version of this deck is fast enough and consistent enough to win. Unfortunately, the discussion on this deck and one with thopter/sword/whir/serum visions is just so different. To omit any copies of thopter/sword/whir/serum visions does mean several things - 0 cantrips and cheap tutors for less consistency, multiples of sometimes dead cards like needle or relic, and the lack of thopter/sword to offer a shut-down gameplan if resolved against tier 1 decks like jeskai and affinity, matches I would see the PW version struggling against.
Oh, and if anyone was wondering about my testing Culling Scales vs lantern, I have and it's decent. It won me a game 2, but didn't win me a game 3 because he was able to recur bauble over and over with academy ruins, which completely hoses scales (saccing bauble in response to trigger). Needling ruins is key, I guess.
As for the conversation in this forum - the two philosophies are very different yet we are discussing the best way to accomplish a viable Tezzeret control build in modern. It's not an either or to me, Tezzeret is a viable centerpiece to a control build and he has two uses:
He can dig for combo pieces or dig for bullets.
The most powerful combo piece plan he can work with is thopter sword, however that plan is so flimsy because of where the meta is. If the meta shifts with bannings/new printings etc. I think thopter sword could be relevant again, but right now there's too much splash damage from artifact/GY hate. Also using him in this mode is unstable, it requires several specifically named cards to line up correctly.
As for his other mode, answer digging - he is much more reliable in this role. He's not like an Elspeth where he can come down and bring order to a board single handedly, but if he lands on a stable board he's probably the best PW in modern. When the game is not raging out of control he simultaneously ticks up to remove your opponents various outs, and provides two really great ways to end the game with his -4 and -1 abilities. Not to mention that you can play both tezzes at the same time, which synergies as well if not better than the triplicate Gideon package. The main perk is this functionality of Tezzeret is the most stable. You need to land him, and all you need to hit is a type of card - not specifically named. Less moving parts with a similar amount of payout.
Basically, when a deck is tuned to optimize Tezzeret in his most stable and powerful functionality, the deck looks like it doesn't do much. So before speculating about the deck's bad matchups (jeskai and affinity are easy matchups), take the deck for a spin.
What?? This just isn't true. If anything, sideboards have been kinder to thopter sword recently, as jund and abzan and dredge aren't really a thing right now, and stony and grudge are the big bad boys.
And GY hate rarely shuts down thopter/sword. Relic and spellbomb, the preferred hate recently, might as well read: target opponent sacs a bauble, gains a life, puts a 1/1 flier into play, and you feel bad.
And the thing to realize is, the amount of resources you invest in playing a thopter sword, and the incremental advantage you generate before they deal with it, usually means you're ahead or even on resources.
I agree with this. I have been tearing up friendly leagues on mtgo with thopter/sword. It is a little less competitive than the competitive leagues but not by much. In my last 50~ games I have not ONCE lost after resolving just a foundry and getting a sword into play or into my graveyard. Stony silence is annoying but that is why we have abrubt decay. I won a game last night through 3 copies of cast out, 1 stony silence, and a rip. The combo is the farthest from flimsy and that is why it is so good. It just doesn't win immediately.
@boomforest: I will sleeve it up and try it but when I look at the tier 1 meta, and I look at the list it just doesn't add up to me.
Jeskai Control - A decent game 1 by overloading their counter spell suite, punching holes with discard and slamming witchbane orb. However thier sideboard is straight fire against you with cards like wear/tear, negate, stony silence, spell pierce. Thopter/Sword is near unbeatable for them game 1 and they have to warp their deck to beat it post board.
Affinity - 1 ballista and the 3 damnations are your only hope. Ensnaring bridge helps but then you also have to needle plating and kill before they can rebound. Sideboard they have cards like ancient grudge that are going to bust open the bridge and make games very difficult for you.
UR Storm - You have speed bumb cards like IOK/Brutallity/Relic/Witchbane Orb. But outside or Witchbane Orb they will still have you dead on T5 through most of that disruption. Overall though, they are just 2 turns faster than you and you can do little to stop them. Turbo Whir decks find the hate they need ASAP. Some are even main decking grafdigger's cage for this reason.
Humans- Game 1 is great for you if they don't land T2 Thalia. Games 2/3 are going to be much more difficult without Ensnaring Bridge reliably holding down the fort. But still slightly in your favor.
Death's Shadow - Without Thopter/Sword you might as well back it up. You only have a handful of cards they even care about plus they main deck k command and stubborn denial.
Tron- We all suck here.
Burn- 4 Collective Brutallity and Witchbane Orb are great but without Thopter/Sword you are easily worse off.
Titanshift - 3 More Tezzerets for pressure might be better here than Thopter/Sword but I am unsure.
I am not trying to be cynical. I have played Tezzeret decks for a long time. Before Thopter/Sword I played variants similar to this with lilly/tezz/damnation. Within 10 cards of the list you are proposing. They were fun but had a problem beating decks that could circumvent Ensnaring Bridge, go over the top of us, or go under us. These versions of the deck were built to prey on anyone doing something fair. Abzan and Jund (Before K Command). Cryptic Command decks. Birthing Pod decks. Etc. I wish we lived in that Modern but we just don't anymore. Whir of Invention and Thopter/Sword allowed us to beat the decks that got under us. Not playing them almost certainly has to be wrong.
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All of these are pretty common mainboard/SB cards.
We have to assemble thopter/sword, get them into relevant zones and have answers to any of these cards. It's too many hoops to jump through and too much pressure on 3-4 abrupt decays.
One thing the PW list made me realize is that The Rack is a perfect anti-lantern card. Too bad it's the most overpriced card on MTGO.
This is just anti-productive hyperbole. Yes, people play 2-3 SB cards that destroy or otherwise hate on artifacts, but when I lose in games 2-3, it's almost always because the other deck executed its normal, main game-plan better than I did, not because of excessive and unbeatable hate. It's for this reason that when I IoK an opener and see several hate cards, I'm usually happy, because my deck isn't one dimensional and their opener isn't streamlined for what they really want to be doing.
Anyways, I thought it would be worth mentioning that mister Sam Black has ran über-hot at the SCG Invitational this week-end piloting the blue (Whir) version of Lantern control, AND PLOT TWIST : following champion Piotr Kanister's lead, he is now rocking our grand etherium shadowmaster Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas as a 2-of in the board!
These most up to date deck designs also bring the number of Bridges down to three (because Whir makes it an effective 7) and also from the board we bring in some more Decays and Pulses (along some Search for Azcanta) to circumvent or deal with the hate, which skews the prison/lockdown strategy toward a more control oriented approach in post-board games.
My point being that Lantern control is slowly and progressively, really becoming Lantern / Tezzerator!
See list : http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=117665
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
Lantern is so much better with Whir it's scary, and the ability to turn Lantern control into a toolbox-like Tezzerator-esque deck is actually kinda enjoyable to see. They don't need thopter sword to win because of lock pieces, but they can still 'get there' with tezzeret, aob from the board.
Whenever I am building tezzxerator I think to myself "I wish I had more 0 and 1 cost artifacts that were good enough on their own that could also enable Mox Opal and Whir of Invention". Jamming the lantern package may be the most efficient way to do that.
So I looked at Sam's list and the decks floating around here and thought what if I just cut the fat from Sam's lists to play the best cards from our shells? Lantern lists don't NEED anything we offer, but maybe some of our best tools are better than their worst tools. I haven't played with or against Lantern too awful much but this is what I will be testing tomorrow evening:
From Sam's list
- 1 Mishra's Bauble
- 1 Pithing Needle
- 1 Abrubt Decay
- 1 Inquistion of Kozelik
- 1 Pyrite Spellbomb
- 3 Botanical Sanctum
- 2 Darkslick Shores
+ 1 Sword of the Meek
+ 2 Thopter Foundry
+ 2 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
+ 3 Polluted Delta
+ 1 Watery Grave
+ 1 Breeding Pool
The mana base switch could be wrong. I figured that if we are playing lantern and bauble effects than fetch lands provide additional looks at new cards. You also gain more effective black and green sources this way at the cost of a small amount of life which has been proven to be acceptable in Modern. Am I missing something? Are fetches actively bad for some reason?
The proposed changes trim around the edges of the deck only completely eliminating the spellbomb and abrupt decay. I can't think of many instances where the Abrubt Decay is needed in game 1 and I am guessing it is moved to the maindeck to free up sideboard slots.
Aside from affinity and maybe Tron 2 main deck pithing needle seems overkill when Whir provides +4 virtual copies anyway.
Pyrite Spellbomb is typically an alternate win condition so it makes sense cutting it for the new alternate win conditions.
2 Mishra's Baubles in my opening hand always makes me sad. I think trimming 1 isn't going to slow Mox and Whir given the density of one drop artifacts.
Cutting the 7th hand disruption spell could be wrong. The sweet spot for most Modern decks is 6 but Lantern is not like most decks. This was the last card I cut to squeeze in the 2/1 split of the thopter/sword.
From what I understand, one of the easiest ways to do poorly in a tournament with Lantern is for games to drag on and end up with unintentional draws. These changes should help in that regard while also giving the deck a sense of speed in it's poor match ups like Burn or Titanshift.
Apart from the more obvious sideboard changes of:
+ 1 Pithing Needle
+ 1 Abrubt Decay
- 2 Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
I don't know what I should be running since I don't play Lantern but I will likely try what Sam had and test from there.
This may lead to concluding that what we are doing is just worse than a lantern centered build. If that is true we may have to rethink our approach to metagame and try play on axis other decks can't. Like becoming a Chalice deck more akin to Legacy Tezzerator.
Sultai Midrange
Anything Innovative
I switched 2 cards between the main deck and sideboard while trimming 3 cards for a combo that works well within the context of the deck. Then slightly changed the manabase which I stated could be the wrong thing to do.
This is a developing competitive thread. If you have interest in developing a competitive deck please continue to do so by engaging in productive conversations. Nobody is stooping you from playing whatever it is you want to play, but most of us have interest in talking about decks that are taking down big tournaments more than anything else.
I think collectively we want to see Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas take someone to the pro tour. Either by getting them into top 8 of a GP or grinding the RPTQ circuit. The list currently up for discussion had the best run out of any lists we have seen for a long time. Therefore this is the direction myself and others are likely to take. If you don't agree with it than please explain to us how you are a better deck builder than Sam Black, or at the very least how whatever list you propose is more likely to win a GP than the list I proposed?
Sultai Midrange
Anything Innovative
Look like tron is a hard matchup and MonoU tron almost impossible so I was thinking of adding 2 ceremonial rejection in sideboard. Anyone else tried it already and what would you replace for it ??
But @Racing089: make no mistake, even if Sam Black indeed is a grandmasterbrewer, he did (all the guys actually did) take Piotr Kanister’s exact 75 list, to a 1 or max 2 cards difference.
I’ve watched Kanister stream day after day and try alternate wincons and eventually double up on Tezzes. Its been a very long thought process over the past two months and he’s been super generous in sharing his findings, and tons of insight with his viewerbase / the world, while shredding 5-0s on MTGO. He deserves his rightful credit. For those who are interested in this, I suggest y’all check out his twitch channel.
This being said, i think that the changes you’re proposing may work (except the fetches — Lantern is in for the long[est] game and with the top control package digging you so hard, stacking your deck from the bottom up is actually, like, a thing. And also arent Tropical Islands better than fetches + shocks?
— But im not sure that its best you move the Tezzes to the main. Simply because the deck dont *need* it. The MB gameplan is scarily effective, fast and consistent, in G1. You wouldnt be fixing any problem. And in postboard games, Tezz comes to solve most of the problems we know artifact decks have. Its a sound gameplan already.
By all means, let’s experiment! But im not sure that the deck needs such a change; that we wouldnt be forcing it, here. On the other hand, to my knowledge, they havent given much testing time to Thopter-Sword.
Also, lastly, Pyrite Spellbomb = not just a wincon but very relevant as recurrable removal vs Noble Hierarchs, Thalias and other critters that can be ennoying even from across a Bridge.
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
The trinisphere/chalice front is where my brain has been for a while but I can't quite seem to make it work. Mox Opal is one of our most powerful tools and it is difficult to play it without 1 drops or with an average cmc above 3. If we shift up the whole mana curve than we need cards that enable that. Legacy gets sol lands. What do we have?
Sultai Midrange
Anything Innovative