I went 10-5 this weekend at Milwaukee with my abbot zoo list I've been touting for a while - good for 55th place and making some money.
Only 2 of my losses felt out of my reach and the others were mostly due to poor draws on my part and just falling a bit short. I will put up a breakdown and list later today.
Would this be that version Patrick Chapin played a while ago? With the Mishra's Bauble and such?
I went 10-5 this weekend at Milwaukee with my abbot zoo list I've been touting for a while - good for 55th place and making some money.
Only 2 of my losses felt out of my reach and the others were mostly due to poor draws on my part and just falling a bit short. I will put up a breakdown and list later today.
Would this be that version Patrick Chapin played a while ago? With the Mishra's Bauble and such?
Nope, it's strictly naya with abbot as a value engine.
I went 10-5 this weekend at Milwaukee with my abbot zoo list I've been touting for a while - good for 55th place and making some money.
Only 2 of my losses felt out of my reach and the others were mostly due to poor draws on my part and just falling a bit short. I will put up a breakdown and list later today.
Would this be that version Patrick Chapin played a while ago? With the Mishra's Bauble and such?
Nope, it's strictly naya with abbot as a value engine.
I went 10-5 this weekend at Milwaukee with my abbot zoo list I've been touting for a while - good for 55th place and making some money.
Only 2 of my losses felt out of my reach and the others were mostly due to poor draws on my part and just falling a bit short. I will put up a breakdown and list later today.
Would this be that version Patrick Chapin played a while ago? With the Mishra's Bauble and such?
Nope, it's strictly naya with abbot as a value engine.
cleared 4-0 at a lgs that I dont normally go to. the judge that plays there has dubbed it Naya Zookeepers. Referring to the Walkers as keepers. I loe my setup, and won to lantern 2-0 finals since i run 3x MB qasali. I missed coco a tad, so with my big mana version. I put Ajani mentor in side since his +1 is a small coco and for walkers as well. here is list if anyone cares. the only time i felt dead in water was fast aggro out the door, so 2x worship is a most.
So I went 10-5 at SCG MKE over the weekend with this tweaked Abbot list. My matchups were as follows:
R1: W Kiki Chord (2-0)
fast aggression and my opponent stumbling to stick mana creatures caused a quick two game set
R2: W Burn (2-1)
G1 I played around double Eidolon horribly and was punished for such, post board this matchup feels extremely unfair in our favor.
R3: L Elves (0-2)
Opponent had amazing draws compared to my mediocre ones. G2 he played an ezuri which I bolted before alpha strike with atarka's in hand - he had one card, which was either coco or chord, he cast coco to get another ezuri and Dwynnen's Elite (+token) to give him exactly enough blockers to make my alpha not lethal and I died on the crackback.
R4: W Fish (2-1)
Dromoka's Command is a biggest blowout ever in this matchup to get rid of seas and fighting off lords with our beefy one drops. Pyroclasm is also pretty dece.
R5: W Goblins (2-0)
This matchup felt extremely unfair in our favor since every one of their creatures has a 1 butt and we have bolts/paths and creatures much larger. Domri slayed post board as well.
R6: W BW Tokens (2-0)
Opponent could have easily overwhelmed with more intangible virtues, but dromoka's command kept it in check and Pyroclasm out of the board gave me a clean alpha strike once he went hellbent.
R7: W Living End !!!!! (2-1)
I still can't believe the nacatl deck took this one down. All thanks to abbot and ooze out of the board giving me much needed value. Thalia also pulled her weight in gold here.
R8: L Abzan Company (0-2)
I played against Andrew Tenjum here, and I knew what he was on...but kept a sketchy 1 lander with a loam lion and several paths (the best card in the matchup) but took too long to find a second source and got ran over hard. G2 was well fought, but sometimes they just have all the cocos and chords anyone could ask for. Couldn't find my cage fast enough here. Tenjum went on to T8 the event.
R9: L Kiki Chord (0-2)
Drew the wrong half of my deck post board and was swiftly ran over. G1 was a long fight that involved kiki/arashin cleric shenanigans and I took care of that, only to have him find an Ewit to get kiki back and finally combo off before I could find a bolt (he was at 3)
R10: L Infect (2-1)
Infect player went full yolo at the end of G1 with a probe into a lethal crackback and found exactly Become Immense while I was tapped out. Post board were slugfests but he ultimately got there in G3 after I drew zero removal. I got to use the reach mode on atarka's command in this matchup for the first time ever, which felt like a massive blowout to his inkmoth.
R11: W Grixis Vision (2-1)
G1 I sandbagged a smiter and tossed everything else into his removal suite, eventually a thoughtseize let me cash in the smiter and abbots flipping creatures was all I needed. G2 mulled to 5 and was hit by a nasty damnation. G3 opponent kept a two lander with two inquisitions and drew nothing past that, my flurry of one drops closed it quickly before he could recover.
R12: W Jeskai Ascendancy (2-0)
Bolt the bird always works! Opponent had trouble getting anything going once his dork was gone and atarka's commanding the team closed both games in blistering fast pace.
R13: L RUG Scapeshift (0-2)
G1 my opponent remanded goyfs and then saw both his malestrom pulse and anger of the gods to keep my board clear long enough to ramp to 7 and shift me real good. G2 I kept a double thalia opener and still just got *****canned by an insane hand.
R14: W Eldrazi Ramp (2-0)
Pathing a Smasher and discarding Smiter is still a great play! Opponent had to use double Kozilek's Return to wipe my kird apes and just couldn't keep up with abbot value and that smiter discard. G2 he died before he could cast an all is dust he was holding and making me path his TKSs to help him ramp to it. Atarka's command is a hell of a magic card when you have a board full of cats and goofs.
R15: W Burn (2-0)
Lost the die roll and opponent went t1 suspend rift bolt, I was mad happy. Kird Ape and Lion are brick houses for all his 2/2s and a Lavamancer keeps his board clear to alpha. As always post board having access to thalia and helix just make it unfair. I never got to land a Firewalker all weekend, but he is also mad dope in the matchup...obviously.
Anyways, I had a great time and walked away with some cash. Was pretty disappointed with a few of my losses but only the CoCo and Scapeshift matches felt like they were fighting uphill the whole way. Building the deck around being able to pyroclasm post board is such a solid option right now with all the bushwhacker zoo, elves/merfolk, and CoCo running around. I never played against jund/junk on the weekend but they are always about a 50/50 matchup, junk being the tougher of the two due to lingering souls and rhino obviously, but abbot can really pull you out of top deck wars late game there.
If you have any questions on boarding in some matchups, let me know. A lot of times Atarka's Command comes out unless you really need to be the aggressor and win quickly. The deck is set up to play more tempo post board and keep the board clear with targeted removal while pressuring with cat/goof and gaining crazy card advantage with abbot.
I gambling with replacing 2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant for 2 Abbots, but can't figure out his "real" upside.
Elspeth does so much work and Abbot needs 4 Mana (or more) to get constantly to cast what he pitches.
I'm playing a fairly basic Small CoCo Zoo list with a light blue splash for a Retreat to Coralhelm combo finish and some Geist of Saint Traft. I don't want to go the Bushwacker suicide route for now because I have plenty of aggro decks and I'd prefer straight up Naya Burn if I'm doing that. Here's the decklist:
I'm sitting at 59 cards right now, with 1 spot left for either a Collected Company, Retreat to Coralhelm or a 26th creature which can be Kitchen Finks (and taking out something in order to run 2 of them) or a 3rd Qasali Pridemage and I'm not really sure what to run there. My gut says to go for the 3rd Retreat to make comboing happen more time, but it's not a good Modern card on it's own, so I'm also considering 4th CoCo. I've also thought of Snapcaster Mage, but only having 11 instats doesn't bode well for it.
Running 25 guys means I'm one card above 24, which is the absolute minimum, so I'm good and confident about CoCo always hitting. 8 spot removal at 1 CMC and 6 Exalted creatures means that a turn 2 Geist of Saint Traft is pretty difficult to block and can start clocking the opponent very fast.
Despite it looking like a Midrange deck, it's capable of very aggressive starts, with things like the already mentioned Hierarch into Geist, Nacatl into Pridemage, or even a turn 3 kill with a nut draw of Hierarch into Knight into Retreat, all of which usually come with removal backup. CoCo helps me at closing games against attrition decks like Jund that like to trade one for one by overwhelming them, and against Control by casting it at instant speed after a Wrath, and 4 Bolts + 2 Lavamancers are more than enough firepower to act as reach.
Scavenging Ooze is the least aggressive 2-drop, and I'm considering cutting it, but I'm not sure if I'd want to cut mainboard gravehate and lifegain, and I can't think of a better 2-drop to replace it. I've thought of Spellskite as a way to protect KotR, but that's even less aggressive.
The manabase feels good, with all fetches being able to search for all 4 colors without any problems, so the splash is not that limiting.
It's the style of list that Lantern has been recommending, with the exception that they are running a ton of Arlinn Kord(when she isn't even our best walker).
I wanted to ask you about Loam Lion and your experience with the Grull Zoo builds overall. Right now, Gruul Zoo dominates the "small" builds in the metagame, but for a while my testings have not being satisfactory. I know this build with BTE + Wacker gives the deck an edge on speed, but (and that's only my perception of the deck until now) it feels so easily breakable/inconsistent. A lot of times I got stuck at one land (something that happens often with zoo, considering the 18-19 land manabase) and wasn't able to develop my board, or got my BTE spell snared or discarded (leaving a dead Bushwacker in hand). It also feels I topdeck even worse. Playing Loam Lion instead of BTE (and goyfs/eidolons/boars/hatebears instead of wackers), even though it has its own share of drawbacks like some akward manabase once in a while, usually feels more consistent on leaving 3 creatures on board T2, easier to keep one-land hands, and even allowing me to leave mana up for removals in some matchups like affinity or infect, when disrupting is usually better than just racing. Even the 3 thoughtness feels very relevant, considering I'm able to better save my board from Anger of The Gods with Attarka's Command and holding back opposing creatures like guides, snapcasters, merfolks...
Maybe the good results of gruul bulds right now are just proving me wrong. But what do you think?
I've been having success with a variant of zoo that no one's talking about in this thread. It's a variant of little zoo I'd call one drop zoo. Most recently, I won an IQ and MO states with it.
I got a similar list from a friend about 2 years ago and have been playing it on and off since, but only recently started playing it a lot. The basic idea is to consistently put 3 two power creatures into play by turn 2, then hope that plus removal & burn is enough. Only 2 Ghor-Clans because getting flooded with them is bad. Same for Zurgo, though he's actually a very good creature in this deck. Also, same for X1, though Goyf could replace Eidolon and in that case a third is reasonable. Kytheon sometimes wins games on his own - protecting 2/3s of your team from sweepers like Anger, for example - but one toughness is a liability sometimes. Isamaru is just the 22nd best one drop in most cases (sometimes Kytheon is worse). Eidolon is sometimes insane because their removal is spread so thin, but this deck usually bolts itself twice in the first two turns of the game so it's a double edged sword. Against noninteractive combo decks Eidolon helps a lot though, often speeding you up or slowing you down by a turn. Not having Declaration in Stone in the SB over Chained in the Rocks for states was purely an oversight.
The obvious questions is why this instead of Bushwhacker zoo? I haven't found time to try Bushwhacker zoo out yet, but in the dark I think the answer is consistency. Putting 3 two power creatures into play by turn 2 in 80% of games (made up number) is incredibly powerful. The peak power level isn't as high as Bushwhacker zoo, which can have the nut BTE into BTE into Bushwhacker / more creatures draws, but I think the power floor is higher. Bushwhacker is worse if you need 3 mana & another spell to surge him (3 lands is a lot when you only run 19, and sometimes it forces you to use spells at bad times when you don't have another one drop to play), and significantly worse if you can't surge him. BTE also forces you out of white almost completely, so your non BTE draws are worse (worse one drops), and drawing BTE late is worse than drawing a 2/3 for one - especially when you want to be able to hold up mana on your opponent's turn. I think little zoo is powerful enough that I'd rather take the more consistent approach, but this is mostly theory since, like I said, I haven't tried Bushwhacker zoo yet. But I want to start the discussion because the two lists are doing pretty similar things and it's likely that one is just better than the other.
I've been having success with a variant of zoo that no one's talking about in this thread. It's a variant of little zoo I'd call one drop zoo. Most recently, I won an IQ and MO states with it.
I got a similar list from a friend about 2 years ago and have been playing it on and off since, but only recently started playing it a lot. The basic idea is to consistently put 3 two power creatures into play by turn 2, then hope that plus removal & burn is enough. Only 2 Ghor-Clans because getting flooded with them is bad. Same for Zurgo, though he's actually a very good creature in this deck. Also, same for X1, though Goyf could replace Eidolon and in that case a third is reasonable. Kytheon sometimes wins games on his own - protecting 2/3s of your team from sweepers like Anger, for example - but one toughness is a liability sometimes. Isamaru is just the 22nd best one drop in most cases (sometimes Kytheon is worse). Eidolon is sometimes insane because their removal is spread so thin, but this deck usually bolts itself twice in the first two turns of the game so it's a double edged sword. Against noninteractive combo decks Eidolon helps a lot though, often speeding you up or slowing you down by a turn. Not having Declaration in Stone in the SB over Chained in the Rocks for states was purely an oversight.
The obvious questions is why this instead of Bushwhacker zoo? I haven't found time to try Bushwhacker zoo out yet, but in the dark I think the answer is consistency. Putting 3 two power creatures into play by turn 2 in 80% of games (made up number) is incredibly powerful. The peak power level isn't as high as Bushwhacker zoo, which can have the nut BTE into BTE into Bushwhacker / more creatures draws, but I think the power floor is higher. Bushwhacker is worse if you need 3 mana & another spell to surge him (3 lands is a lot when you only run 19, and sometimes it forces you to use spells at bad times when you don't have another one drop to play), and significantly worse if you can't surge him. BTE also forces you out of white almost completely, so your non BTE draws are worse (worse one drops), and drawing BTE late is worse than drawing a 2/3 for one - especially when you want to be able to hold up mana on your opponent's turn. I think little zoo is powerful enough that I'd rather take the more consistent approach, but this is mostly theory since, like I said, I haven't tried Bushwhacker zoo yet. But I want to start the discussion because the two lists are doing pretty similar things and it's likely that one is just better than the other.
I've though once about a simmilar one drop build with isamaru, kytheon and zurgo. But it didn't worked that well for me. I think 20 is a good enough one-drop rate, and I thought I might be better go with some hateberas/goyf/flinthoof in the other slots for the t3-t4 plan.
I think ghor clan is great. It's the card I always want to draw after stablishing the board to go though the opponent goyfs/walls/chumps. In my oppinion, it's an easy 3/4-of, and works way better in Zoo than any other kind of Burn besides Atarka's Command. Never tested mutagenic growth, though. I like Eidolons a lot too. I'm currently using 3 in my list.
I've seen you've reduced the number of Experiment Ones. I know it's a really bad draw, but he is kind of a "necessary evil". Having a playset rises up the chances of him starting in your opening hand, and that's when he is really strong. Might not be ideal, but it's one of the best one drops we have.
I've though once about a simmilar one drop build with isamaru, kytheon and zurgo. But it didn't worked that well for me. I think 20 is a good enough one-drop rate, and I thought I might be better go with some hateberas/goyf/flinthoof in the other slots for the t3-t4 plan.
I think ghor clan is great. It's the card I always want to draw after stablishing the board to go though the opponent goyfs/walls/chumps. In my oppinion, it's an easy 3/4-of, and works way better in Zoo than any other kind of Burn besides Atarka's Command. Never tested mutagenic growth, though. I like Eidolons a lot too. I'm currently using 3 in my list.
I've seen you've reduced the number of Experiment Ones. I know it's a really bad draw, but he is kind of a "necessary evil". Having a playset rises up the chances of him starting in your opening hand, and that's when he is really strong. Might not be ideal, but it's one of the best one drops we have.
I like the consistency of having 22 one drops. I've even considered adding a 23rd, but the drop off to the next best one is too high. X1 is too high variance. The deck is already powerful enough, you just need to consistently do your thing. Hands clogged with X1s have trouble doing that because they have to sequence in weird ways, and if you ever draw it late, barf. I like the 3rd one a lot more if Goyfs replace Eidolons though and would probably cut Isamaru for it in that case. I don't like more than 2-3 2+ CMC creatures for the same reason - consistency. I want 3 2+ power creatures in play on turn 3 as often as possible. Outside of Eidolon, the hate bears are all too bad at beating down to be worth MDing - I do side in Thalia for Eidolon a lot, but not that much - and Boar isn't worth it until you're already maxed out on Goyf IMO. Goyf I can get behind though, but only instead of Eidolon, not in addition to.
My problem with Ghor-Clan is similar: consistency. I've lost too many games to having a Ghor-Clan stuck in my hand with 3 lands in play and no reason to bloodrush - maybe even no creatures to bloodrush on. I could see adding the 3rd in instead of one of the 1-of spells, but it depends on how you want to position yourself against the metagame. The Charm is nice sweeper protection, the Helix is an additional anti-burn card, and the Mutagenic Growth is anti bolt while also just being great. It won me 4 games during states that I would have lost had I had any other card in that spot - usually to KO my opponent the turn they're tapped out or the turn before they go off. Another I've tried in these spots is Rancor, but it also can be mopey.
Curious, I am using mostly the commonly used land at around 18-20 lands, with about 32 one and two drops with a bare minimum on burn.
However, can someone help explain more on which land like Kessig, Township, and Stronghold we should run? Not even convinced I should be mainboarding ghost quarter.
So I'm currently on Gruul Zoo, but I'm having issues with the BGx matchups. I can get them to a low life total but they just seem to be able to stabilize before I can finish them off. Any tips on how to approach these matchups and how to sideboard against them?
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4 Dryad Militant
4 Goblin Guide
4 Vexing Devil
4 Kird Ape
4 Burning-Tree Emissary
4 Reckless Bushwhacker
4 Goblin Bushwhacker
3 Atarka's Command
1 Devastating Summons
2 Arid Mesa
4 Stomping Ground
4 Wooded Foothills
8 Mountain
2 Forest
feels wrong not to have nacatl in there though...
Would this be that version Patrick Chapin played a while ago? With the Mishra's Bauble and such?
Nope, it's strictly naya with abbot as a value engine.
Still using this list?
Main board was same 60. Sideboard was heavily tweaked.
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Arid Mesa
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Hallowed Fountain
1 Steam Vents
1 Breeding Pool
1 Godless Shrine
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Forest
1 Plains
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Wild Nacatl
1 Birds of Paradise
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Qasali Pridemage
4 Geist of Saint Traft
4 Siege Rhino
15 Spells
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Path to Exile
4 Tribal Flames
2 Bant Charm
2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
1 Grim Lavamancer
3 Stony Silence
2 Negate
2 Unified Will
3 Rhox War Monk
1 Aven Mindcensor
1 Izzet Staticaster
1 Painful Truths
1 Fracturing Gust
UWR Control 2-0
Scapshift 2-1
Double ID
http://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/344772#paper
4 Windswept Heath
4 Aid Mesa
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Plains
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Horizon Canopy
2 Sacred Foundry
2 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
25 Creatures
4 Wild Nacatl
4 Kird Ape
3 Loam Lion
1 Grim Lavamancer
2 Qasali Pridemage
4 Tarmogoyf
4 Abbot of Keral Keep
3 Loxodon Smiter
4 Path to Exile
4 Lightning Bolt
3 Atarka's Command
2 Dromoka's Command
1 Seal of Fire
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2 Kor Firewakler
1 Valorous Stance
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Destructive Revelry
2 Lightning Helix
1 Domri Rade
2 Stony Silence
2 Pyroclasm
1 Grafdigger's Cage
So I went 10-5 at SCG MKE over the weekend with this tweaked Abbot list. My matchups were as follows:
R1: W Kiki Chord (2-0)
fast aggression and my opponent stumbling to stick mana creatures caused a quick two game set
R2: W Burn (2-1)
G1 I played around double Eidolon horribly and was punished for such, post board this matchup feels extremely unfair in our favor.
R3: L Elves (0-2)
Opponent had amazing draws compared to my mediocre ones. G2 he played an ezuri which I bolted before alpha strike with atarka's in hand - he had one card, which was either coco or chord, he cast coco to get another ezuri and Dwynnen's Elite (+token) to give him exactly enough blockers to make my alpha not lethal and I died on the crackback.
R4: W Fish (2-1)
Dromoka's Command is a biggest blowout ever in this matchup to get rid of seas and fighting off lords with our beefy one drops. Pyroclasm is also pretty dece.
R5: W Goblins (2-0)
This matchup felt extremely unfair in our favor since every one of their creatures has a 1 butt and we have bolts/paths and creatures much larger. Domri slayed post board as well.
R6: W BW Tokens (2-0)
Opponent could have easily overwhelmed with more intangible virtues, but dromoka's command kept it in check and Pyroclasm out of the board gave me a clean alpha strike once he went hellbent.
R7: W Living End !!!!! (2-1)
I still can't believe the nacatl deck took this one down. All thanks to abbot and ooze out of the board giving me much needed value. Thalia also pulled her weight in gold here.
R8: L Abzan Company (0-2)
I played against Andrew Tenjum here, and I knew what he was on...but kept a sketchy 1 lander with a loam lion and several paths (the best card in the matchup) but took too long to find a second source and got ran over hard. G2 was well fought, but sometimes they just have all the cocos and chords anyone could ask for. Couldn't find my cage fast enough here. Tenjum went on to T8 the event.
R9: L Kiki Chord (0-2)
Drew the wrong half of my deck post board and was swiftly ran over. G1 was a long fight that involved kiki/arashin cleric shenanigans and I took care of that, only to have him find an Ewit to get kiki back and finally combo off before I could find a bolt (he was at 3)
R10: L Infect (2-1)
Infect player went full yolo at the end of G1 with a probe into a lethal crackback and found exactly Become Immense while I was tapped out. Post board were slugfests but he ultimately got there in G3 after I drew zero removal. I got to use the reach mode on atarka's command in this matchup for the first time ever, which felt like a massive blowout to his inkmoth.
R11: W Grixis Vision (2-1)
G1 I sandbagged a smiter and tossed everything else into his removal suite, eventually a thoughtseize let me cash in the smiter and abbots flipping creatures was all I needed. G2 mulled to 5 and was hit by a nasty damnation. G3 opponent kept a two lander with two inquisitions and drew nothing past that, my flurry of one drops closed it quickly before he could recover.
R12: W Jeskai Ascendancy (2-0)
Bolt the bird always works! Opponent had trouble getting anything going once his dork was gone and atarka's commanding the team closed both games in blistering fast pace.
R13: L RUG Scapeshift (0-2)
G1 my opponent remanded goyfs and then saw both his malestrom pulse and anger of the gods to keep my board clear long enough to ramp to 7 and shift me real good. G2 I kept a double thalia opener and still just got *****canned by an insane hand.
R14: W Eldrazi Ramp (2-0)
Pathing a Smasher and discarding Smiter is still a great play! Opponent had to use double Kozilek's Return to wipe my kird apes and just couldn't keep up with abbot value and that smiter discard. G2 he died before he could cast an all is dust he was holding and making me path his TKSs to help him ramp to it. Atarka's command is a hell of a magic card when you have a board full of cats and goofs.
R15: W Burn (2-0)
Lost the die roll and opponent went t1 suspend rift bolt, I was mad happy. Kird Ape and Lion are brick houses for all his 2/2s and a Lavamancer keeps his board clear to alpha. As always post board having access to thalia and helix just make it unfair. I never got to land a Firewalker all weekend, but he is also mad dope in the matchup...obviously.
Anyways, I had a great time and walked away with some cash. Was pretty disappointed with a few of my losses but only the CoCo and Scapeshift matches felt like they were fighting uphill the whole way. Building the deck around being able to pyroclasm post board is such a solid option right now with all the bushwhacker zoo, elves/merfolk, and CoCo running around. I never played against jund/junk on the weekend but they are always about a 50/50 matchup, junk being the tougher of the two due to lingering souls and rhino obviously, but abbot can really pull you out of top deck wars late game there.
If you have any questions on boarding in some matchups, let me know. A lot of times Atarka's Command comes out unless you really need to be the aggressor and win quickly. The deck is set up to play more tempo post board and keep the board clear with targeted removal while pressuring with cat/goof and gaining crazy card advantage with abbot.
Cheers,
Zac
Still try to figure out which spot Abbot of Keral Keep is doing work for.
I gambling with replacing 2 Elspeth, Knight-Errant for 2 Abbots, but can't figure out his "real" upside.
Elspeth does so much work and Abbot needs 4 Mana (or more) to get constantly to cast what he pitches.
Green @ it's best
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Wild Nacatl
2 Grim Lavamancer
4 Tarmogoyf
2 Qasali Pridemage
2 Scavenging Ooze
4 Knight of the Reliquary
3 Geist of Saint Traft
2 Retreat to Coralhelm
Instant (11)
4 Lightning Bolt
4 Path to Exile
3 Collected Company
Land (21)
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Misty Rainforest
3 Temple Garden
2 Stomping Ground
1 Sacred Foundry
1 Breeding Pool
1 Plains
1 Mountain
1 Forest
1 Kessig Wolf's Run
I'm sitting at 59 cards right now, with 1 spot left for either a Collected Company, Retreat to Coralhelm or a 26th creature which can be Kitchen Finks (and taking out something in order to run 2 of them) or a 3rd Qasali Pridemage and I'm not really sure what to run there. My gut says to go for the 3rd Retreat to make comboing happen more time, but it's not a good Modern card on it's own, so I'm also considering 4th CoCo. I've also thought of Snapcaster Mage, but only having 11 instats doesn't bode well for it.
Running 25 guys means I'm one card above 24, which is the absolute minimum, so I'm good and confident about CoCo always hitting. 8 spot removal at 1 CMC and 6 Exalted creatures means that a turn 2 Geist of Saint Traft is pretty difficult to block and can start clocking the opponent very fast.
Despite it looking like a Midrange deck, it's capable of very aggressive starts, with things like the already mentioned Hierarch into Geist, Nacatl into Pridemage, or even a turn 3 kill with a nut draw of Hierarch into Knight into Retreat, all of which usually come with removal backup. CoCo helps me at closing games against attrition decks like Jund that like to trade one for one by overwhelming them, and against Control by casting it at instant speed after a Wrath, and 4 Bolts + 2 Lavamancers are more than enough firepower to act as reach.
Scavenging Ooze is the least aggressive 2-drop, and I'm considering cutting it, but I'm not sure if I'd want to cut mainboard gravehate and lifegain, and I can't think of a better 2-drop to replace it. I've thought of Spellskite as a way to protect KotR, but that's even less aggressive.
The manabase feels good, with all fetches being able to search for all 4 colors without any problems, so the splash is not that limiting.
Your thoughts?
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It's the style of list that Lantern has been recommending, with the exception that they are running a ton of Arlinn Kord (when she isn't even our best walker).
Maybe the good results of gruul bulds right now are just proving me wrong. But what do you think?
PS: Sorry for any english mistake
Here's the list I currently have sleeved up:
1 Forest
1 Mountain
4 Arid Mesa
2 Sacred Foundry
2 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
4 Windswept Heath
4 Wooded Foothills
Creatures (26)
2 Experiment One
2 Ghor-Clan Rampager
4 Goblin Guide
4 Kird Ape
4 Loam Lion
4 Wild Nacatl
2 Eidolon of the Great Revel
1 Isamaru, Hound of Konda
1 Kytheon, Hero of Akros
2 Zurgo Bellstriker
4 Atarka's Command
1 Boros Charm
4 Lightning Bolt
1 Lightning Helix
1 Mutagenic Growth
4 Path to Exile
2 Grim Lavamancer
2 Kor Firewalker
2 Chained to the Rocks
1 Choke
1 Stony Silence
1 Destructive Revelry
1 Dromoka's Command
1 Lightning Helix
1 Gaddock Teeg
1 Kataki, War's Wage
2 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
I got a similar list from a friend about 2 years ago and have been playing it on and off since, but only recently started playing it a lot. The basic idea is to consistently put 3 two power creatures into play by turn 2, then hope that plus removal & burn is enough. Only 2 Ghor-Clans because getting flooded with them is bad. Same for Zurgo, though he's actually a very good creature in this deck. Also, same for X1, though Goyf could replace Eidolon and in that case a third is reasonable. Kytheon sometimes wins games on his own - protecting 2/3s of your team from sweepers like Anger, for example - but one toughness is a liability sometimes. Isamaru is just the 22nd best one drop in most cases (sometimes Kytheon is worse). Eidolon is sometimes insane because their removal is spread so thin, but this deck usually bolts itself twice in the first two turns of the game so it's a double edged sword. Against noninteractive combo decks Eidolon helps a lot though, often speeding you up or slowing you down by a turn. Not having Declaration in Stone in the SB over Chained in the Rocks for states was purely an oversight.
The obvious questions is why this instead of Bushwhacker zoo? I haven't found time to try Bushwhacker zoo out yet, but in the dark I think the answer is consistency. Putting 3 two power creatures into play by turn 2 in 80% of games (made up number) is incredibly powerful. The peak power level isn't as high as Bushwhacker zoo, which can have the nut BTE into BTE into Bushwhacker / more creatures draws, but I think the power floor is higher. Bushwhacker is worse if you need 3 mana & another spell to surge him (3 lands is a lot when you only run 19, and sometimes it forces you to use spells at bad times when you don't have another one drop to play), and significantly worse if you can't surge him. BTE also forces you out of white almost completely, so your non BTE draws are worse (worse one drops), and drawing BTE late is worse than drawing a 2/3 for one - especially when you want to be able to hold up mana on your opponent's turn. I think little zoo is powerful enough that I'd rather take the more consistent approach, but this is mostly theory since, like I said, I haven't tried Bushwhacker zoo yet. But I want to start the discussion because the two lists are doing pretty similar things and it's likely that one is just better than the other.
I've though once about a simmilar one drop build with isamaru, kytheon and zurgo. But it didn't worked that well for me. I think 20 is a good enough one-drop rate, and I thought I might be better go with some hateberas/goyf/flinthoof in the other slots for the t3-t4 plan.
I think ghor clan is great. It's the card I always want to draw after stablishing the board to go though the opponent goyfs/walls/chumps. In my oppinion, it's an easy 3/4-of, and works way better in Zoo than any other kind of Burn besides Atarka's Command. Never tested mutagenic growth, though. I like Eidolons a lot too. I'm currently using 3 in my list.
I've seen you've reduced the number of Experiment Ones. I know it's a really bad draw, but he is kind of a "necessary evil". Having a playset rises up the chances of him starting in your opening hand, and that's when he is really strong. Might not be ideal, but it's one of the best one drops we have.
I like the consistency of having 22 one drops. I've even considered adding a 23rd, but the drop off to the next best one is too high. X1 is too high variance. The deck is already powerful enough, you just need to consistently do your thing. Hands clogged with X1s have trouble doing that because they have to sequence in weird ways, and if you ever draw it late, barf. I like the 3rd one a lot more if Goyfs replace Eidolons though and would probably cut Isamaru for it in that case. I don't like more than 2-3 2+ CMC creatures for the same reason - consistency. I want 3 2+ power creatures in play on turn 3 as often as possible. Outside of Eidolon, the hate bears are all too bad at beating down to be worth MDing - I do side in Thalia for Eidolon a lot, but not that much - and Boar isn't worth it until you're already maxed out on Goyf IMO. Goyf I can get behind though, but only instead of Eidolon, not in addition to.
My problem with Ghor-Clan is similar: consistency. I've lost too many games to having a Ghor-Clan stuck in my hand with 3 lands in play and no reason to bloodrush - maybe even no creatures to bloodrush on. I could see adding the 3rd in instead of one of the 1-of spells, but it depends on how you want to position yourself against the metagame. The Charm is nice sweeper protection, the Helix is an additional anti-burn card, and the Mutagenic Growth is anti bolt while also just being great. It won me 4 games during states that I would have lost had I had any other card in that spot - usually to KO my opponent the turn they're tapped out or the turn before they go off. Another I've tried in these spots is Rancor, but it also can be mopey.
However, can someone help explain more on which land like Kessig, Township, and Stronghold we should run? Not even convinced I should be mainboarding ghost quarter.
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Playing:
Death's Shadow Jund
Played:
Kiki Chord, Zoo variants, Goblins, Burn