With all the rainbow rocks and the green splash for decay now has anyone considered white and running tidehollow again? White opens doors to better side board options too. Like disenchant and timely reinforcements. Instant speed tidehollow on their draw seems pretty good and it helps with tron matchups
Not sure tidehollow sculler is better than just straight one mana discard. Your opponent will have plenty of time to kill it and get the card back. It is cute with thopter foundry but thats a lot of effort to get a slightly better effect than inquisition of kozilek.
/e: Also, saw some other spice mentioned elsewhere: Azorius Guildmage to combat Tron. Like, shuts down their whole deck. Not synergistic with ours at all but hey, it's worth keeping on the radar if you ever really, really wanna go after Tron.
Azorius guildmage is intriguing. The only thing i fear is how good of a gameplan is holding 3 mana for the rest of the game? This mean not developping our board... I'm not sure who would have the advantage in the end of just turbo slowing down the game for you and the tron player. They'll get to two activations evetually so i don't know.
But then i have no experience playing vs tron so maybe thats just fine.
Pithing needle, quick silver fountain, ghost quarter, crucible of the worlds, lost legacy, negate, and putting them on a clock. Those are our best options
Gifts is fighting for precious setup slots (as these are limited by the artifact number and interaction cards we have to run) already occupied by Whir of Invention, that could also be Glint-Nest Crane and/or Serum Visions -- And Mishra's Bauble also fits in there, while being over-the-top synergistic. You can try it out but it's likely going to unbalance this current iteration of the deck.
Just to throw my 2¢ into this discussion. I understand the want/need to add a third color. I've been on and off Tezz for some time now but haven't sleeved a Whir version yet. Anyway, I've tried 3-colors in the past and feel that anyone trying to make that work should probably abandon the GQ/mana-denial portion of the deck and concentrate more on the fixing. I think an easy swap is Crucible of Worlds for Chromatic Lantern. This goes a long way in fixing your mana while also pulling double-duty against Blood Moon. Obviously you'll have to figure out your land needs for GQ.
While I'm typing, has anyone tried Ceremonious Rejection in the side? Helps vs tron, eldrazi, robots, some other decks. I'm thinking I may cut 2x Vendilion Clique in the side for negates or this.
It's been discussed and we came to the conclusion that 1-for-1'ing the Tron opponent is really just part of what we need to be doing, as you gotta to be putting steady pressure on them if you're going to go that route. In that sense, Clique seems superior IMO as you have Ghost Quarter and Quicksilver Fountain that, as far as specific bullets, already puts them waaay further off their gameplan than 1-for-1'ing them ever will. Also you have Thoughtseize which also works toward keeping them off the plan proactively, and answers any card as well, but with way wider applications in other match-ups, including snatching public enemy no. 1 Stony Silence off oppnents' hands. In other words, Rejection is more damage-control mode rather than win-the-game for us. It's ok but as far as specific SB slots for against Tron go, simple 1-for-1's are will only get you so far as they likely just lead you into a topdeck war and their topdecks eat yours alive. Targeting a colorless heavy meta with Eldrazi and such, I can totally see the argument though.
Hey Folks. Been a while since I posted on here because I've been too busy to game for the last three weeks. But I did play four rounds last night, and I thought I'd share some thoughts.
I don't own fatal pushes right now, though with this month's paycheck I should be able to pick some up. This let me to splitting 2 Abrupt Decay and 2 Inquisition of Kozilek main deck to compensate for the removal issues.
Report:
My opponent spent all night insisting that his deck was NOT death and taxes. His opening G1 of: t1 inquisition, t2 Tidehollow sculler, t3 Tidehollow sculler, t4 Thought-knot Seer, t5 Thought-knot Seer left me extremely skeptical. And dead to rights. I think I resolved a single executioner's capsule this game. G2 was a bit better. He was way to slow to get under the bridge with not nearly enough discard. Tezzeret took him from 20 to 0 asap. G3 was another tragic slew of discard which left me with no action, and while I could have scraped on for another turn if I kept mana open for an echoing truth on his lingering souls tokens correctly,
it was ultimately a futile endeavor.
The best trick my opponent pulled this match was Game 2, where a Tezz ult that should've killed him was prevented from doing so when he cast a zealous persecution to kill enough thopters to leave him at two. He didn't have a follow up, but if he had I could've been in real trouble for a hot second. Something to remember.
I've played this guy on burn quite a few times before. When I got thopter-sword together at 2 life with a Whir in G1, he knew enough to scoop up his cards. This worked out for him, as in G2 his board at the end of turn three was a goblin guide and two Eidolon of the Great Revel. What little I could do was not enough, since every action cost me four life. G3 went long, since even though I had him locked out fairly early, with a board of Bridge, Thopter-sword, Trading Post, and Witchbane Orb, he held on since he knew he had outs. Unfortunately for him, Burn is not a grindy deck. Of note, Even though I ended the game at 19 life,
he showed me a grip of 7 cards worth a heap of damage, probably about 25, which he had been sandbagging hoping to hit a Destructive Revelry. Scary prospect.
This is a fun match up. I had played against DS Jund once before with a previous opponent and it had been about as close as this one. Overall I think we have good game against DS Jund, we just have to get in the right mindset, and draw well. I had the first one down at least. G1 despite a pretty good discard sequence on his part, I drew into a bridge which protected me fairly well this game.
My board was essentially just a bridge, a Sword of the Meek, and a Tezzeret, but since he had lowered his life down to four, the tezzeret ultimate killed him. This is one reason we probably have a pretty good game against these decks: we don't need to assemble 10 artifacts, 5 or fewer will probably do. G2 was close, but my rustiness cost me this one. I could have played more conservatively to use a Relic of Progenitus to make his Goyf a 0/1, but played to aggressively with it and got punished by an Ancient Grudge while tapped out, even though I had a Welding Jar. G3 was another close one, but he drew a lot better, after I was forced to mulligan down to 5 after two 0-land hands.
This 22-land, 4 Opal build can sometimes be very tight on lands. I generally am not a "lucky" person, and I think I fared better on 23 lands. This version of the deck has a lot of explosive power, but it can also struggle with mulligans and our old enemy, bad topdecking. Exasperated by my lack-o-luck.
"Oh wow, I have a flawless reckord against dredge, should be ez-pz, expecially now that I have "5" Relic of progenitus main!"-famous last words. G1 I didn't know what my opponent was on so I kept an interactive hand that should beat up on an unknown opponent's game plan,
albeit without advancing myself too much: 2 Collective Brutality, 1 Inquisition of Kozilek, 1 Mishra's Bauble, 3 land. Discard doesn't really do much against dredge, and CB's -2/-2 doesn't faze prized amalgam. Oops. What do you all think of this as a keep against an unknown opponent in general? G2, in spite of his sideboard hate doing a lot of work, I was able to keep a bridge up, and put together exactly enough artifacts to deal him 18 while I was at 2. He probably didn't read tezz right, but I'll take it. People often underestimate Tezz's -1 and -4, and I think that can me a marked advantage of the deck, although this won't always be true. G3 was a strange game. I kept a 1-lander with two pentad prisms. I had everything: Tezz, Thopter, Sword, Bridge, Whir, and more if I recall. I figured that even if I stumbled for two turns, this hand would beat my opponent, and I stand by that. Especially because my opponent did not seem to notice that I only had one land all game. He played VERY conservatively, taking about 7 turns and taking very sub-optimal routes. Nonetheless, He took the game with ease as in the top 17 cards of my deck (which includes cards I looked at after the game), there was only the one land in my opening hand.
I promptly dropped at 1-3.
Overall, win or lose, I have FUN playing this deck. I love interacting with other players, discussing there deck choices, and trying to solve the one-in-a-billion unique puzzles provided to me by magic and this deck we share.
That said, something was very off with this version of the deck for me. Before trying to bend around the lack of Fatal-Push I used to run 4 Pyrite spellbomb in that slot. It's an artifact for Opal, it's cheap and colorless out your hand for Bridge, you can draw it with Tezz, and in a really crappy situation, it lets you draw. And although the card technically makes you three-color, it doesn't demand that third color in every application, unlike abrupt decay.
Further, I feel like I love the pentad prisms, but I'm more than comfortable with just 2. I really felt the lack of a 23rd land more than I expected. I think the "turbo" version of the deck is a bit too steep for me. Maybe my metagame is a bit more interactive at times (not just last night's matchups in general, but the overall philosophy of my store), but I felt the reduced threat-density in a big way, more than I ever expected.
I think I'm going to work on a new middle ground for this deck that works better for me; one that's less swingy and feels more like other decks in consistently drawing powerful action or vital support, and move away from a more explosive style to one that is more fundamentally both active and interactive.
Great report, thanks! And fun. Unfo, your run seem to have went kinda bad. 1 land in the 17 top cards dang? Did you shuffle sufficiently? A couple of points you're raising have been adressed in the last couple pages, maybe you could read back a little. Regarding mana-base and topdecks, notably. Maybe it's true that this version of the deck is particularly unforgiving because so many elements must be «in tension» in order for your mana base to come online. However, I do believe that the «ceiling» of the deck is also way high. Mana issues in these kind of list usually have less to see with mana quantity but rather with quality (fixing) in my experience, and tight shuffling and mulligan'ing should get you there reliably in the long run. Thought I immediately noticed the MB Abrupt Decays along the 3x GQs and went «Oh boy». Keep us posted on your middle-ground version development, although to be fair, I think you should maybe give the turbo-whir version more play time to get a better idea of its power and consistency and not just dismiss it over a bad night. This being said, I do like Pyrite Spellbomb. But Fatal Push will change your life, forever.
Just to throw my 2¢ into this discussion. I understand the want/need to add a third color. I've been on and off Tezz for some time now but haven't sleeved a Whir version yet. Anyway, I've tried 3-colors in the past and feel that anyone trying to make that work should probably abandon the GQ/mana-denial portion of the deck and concentrate more on the fixing.[/card]
Amen to concentrating on the fixing. I think some mix of Spire of Industry and Glimmervoid along fetches could make rainbow mana more accessible also. May the force be with you
im not sure adding more "meat" is necessary though. perhaps you're whirring for stuff then not drawing into more whirs/other pieces that you need, thus making you feel like the deck doesn't do enough? i've had no issues getting what i need when i need it. perhaps you need to be a bit more conservative with your whirs and think a bit more about what you actually need and more importantly WHEN you need it.
If when talking about the "meat" of the deck we're talking about numbers of copies of Foundry/Sword, I would argue for a higher meat count. I play 4 Foundries, 3 Swords online, and think that the extra copies are extremely relevant in some match-ups (especially match-ups which will pose typically more challenging games 1). Death's Shadow decks run 8 discard spells, so a combo piece WILL be stripped from your opener, and often a whir the following turn, so redundancy is very important against them (and the deck is everywhere online). Against UW control, landing a turn two foundry is hugely important to get it under countermagic. Lastly, against burn and zoo, I want a foundry asap and am often saccing baubles and the like along the way to survive before a whir or bridge becomes relevant.
@Ravenwatch: quote «The main problem I experience is when I am forced to use it to get a bridge down, and only then do I topdeck the other relevant piece of the combo, leaving me with say, a sword and a bridge, and only my thumbs to twiddle while I wait for a live topdeck.» -- One of the principles of these Whir lists is that timing is crucial and often unintuitive. Whir gives us some reactive power but also somewhat forces us in this weird mix of being reactive, with our proactive tools. So sometimes I'll take 2-3 Goyf hits (because I can afford it) just to see what options get unlocked within my 3 next topdecks. The obvious example which you seem to imply you're grasping allright is then topdecking a Sword and going for the combo. But sometimes you also just topdeck Fatal Push and suddenly you've got even more time than you thought. BTW adressing the match-up, Push will really make a huge difference as it's 4 new hard answers to Goyfs and Shadows, do it.
In my experience, Death's Shadow Jund is still just a Jund deck, overloading on discard and fatties. And fortunately for us shorter on MB artifact removal than ole midrange version are. So we have no problem dealing with fatties, protect one Bridge and you're golden. Push kills 'em all and Damnation is top notch here, even Engineered Explosives. The tricky part is navigating through discard. So we have to rely on redundancy in the opener and topdecks. Good for us, many of them topdecks snowball out of control pretty quick; they're SUPER high impact. However their countless cantrip gives them just a tad more density. So just side-in all the business you can and favour openers with multiple business pieces or enablers rather than being all in on one of our stupidly powerful haymakers. Also, obv. take out all / don't bring in discard. Keep it up
This being said, new tech from Reddit from this guy and his «Extreme Tezzerator» :
If anything I'd just run 2. 4 seems way too many.i mean if u wanna run tezz gifts it's fine which might not be too crazy with the slower format. But idk about 4 in the whir build
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OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XP64XUJBj0k&list=PL04lbfeNAaS-AMzSwiJc_9l5LpusaDU5X&index=2
@Ciri80: If you are here tell us about your deck!
Sultai Midrange
Anything Innovative
Gee these japanese guys know the meaning of funk: MB Liar's Pendulum. Nuf' said.
More funk inside: http://www.hareruyamtg.com/en/k/kD07221W/
/e: Also, saw some other spice mentioned elsewhere: Azorius Guildmage to combat Tron. Like, shuts down their whole deck. Not synergistic with ours at all but hey, it's worth keeping on the radar if you ever really, really wanna go after Tron.
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
But then i have no experience playing vs tron so maybe thats just fine.
That being said, it's good to see Lili get some field time again.
May the god of topdecks be with you monday! Please report back
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
Ill add the list I have been working on: http://tappedout.net/mtg-decks/tezerator-modern/
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.
If when talking about the "meat" of the deck we're talking about numbers of copies of Foundry/Sword, I would argue for a higher meat count. I play 4 Foundries, 3 Swords online, and think that the extra copies are extremely relevant in some match-ups (especially match-ups which will pose typically more challenging games 1). Death's Shadow decks run 8 discard spells, so a combo piece WILL be stripped from your opener, and often a whir the following turn, so redundancy is very important against them (and the deck is everywhere online). Against UW control, landing a turn two foundry is hugely important to get it under countermagic. Lastly, against burn and zoo, I want a foundry asap and am often saccing baubles and the like along the way to survive before a whir or bridge becomes relevant.
@mcgimp - How has the duskmantle guildmage / mindcrank combo out of the board been working for you?
In my experience, Death's Shadow Jund is still just a Jund deck, overloading on discard and fatties. And fortunately for us shorter on MB artifact removal than ole midrange version are. So we have no problem dealing with fatties, protect one Bridge and you're golden. Push kills 'em all and Damnation is top notch here, even Engineered Explosives. The tricky part is navigating through discard. So we have to rely on redundancy in the opener and topdecks. Good for us, many of them topdecks snowball out of control pretty quick; they're SUPER high impact. However their countless cantrip gives them just a tad more density. So just side-in all the business you can and favour openers with multiple business pieces or enablers rather than being all in on one of our stupidly powerful haymakers. Also, obv. take out all / don't bring in discard. Keep it up
This being said, new tech from Reddit from this guy and his «Extreme Tezzerator» :
https://www.reddit.com/r/ModernMagic/comments/689ybd/5_round_fmn_with_extreme_tezzarator_311/?st=j23hjnj7&sh=a1333bcb
And hey... I think our official name is slowly but inevitably becoming «Tezzerator» guys.
OLD SCHOOL 93/94 «The Pain Train» Black Sligh, Esper «Machine Gun» Artifacts, Jund «Psycho» Ponza-Disko.