Sea Gate Wreckage looks like a nonbo with Bob. Probably don't want to get cute with your mana, just be consistent. Probably want a couple of Shambling Vents.
Spellskite is a bit weird on the curve and it lacks aggression, but I really like selfless spirit for protection. Makes me want to try Judge's Familiar as a play on turn 2 off a vial into Bob. Seems like good protection and it's cheap for Bob flips.
I really don't like playing more than 22 lands in modern unless I'm leaning heavy control where I absolutely need to hit my land drops.
I would go -2 Sea Gate Wreckage -1 Caves of Koilos -2 Thalia, Heretic Cathar -2 Spellskite +2 shambling vents +1 selfless spirit +4 Judge's familiar.
As for sideboard,not sure Sunlance is better than path or push 3-4.
Persecution should probably be Orzhov Pontiff, at least to start testing, but Haunt seems good with the 8 self sacrifice creatures, which also makes Push great. (speaking of which, IIUC, it has been argued in this threat that running a couple of fetches is feasible, which would probably mean -2 Caves of Koilos, +2 Marsh Flats).
I never liked stony silence, so I'm gonna try fragmentize because I've just wanted to play more with that card. Also, I'm gonna mess around with leonin relic-warder
Also, seems wrong not to have some lingering souls in the board. I might go something like -2 mirran crusader +2 souls. crusader is a little underpowered in modern as both BG decks have removal for it vis a vis lightning bolt or path to exile. It's great in legacy because the predominant BG deck is BUG.
As I'm thinking about it, it seems with Bob, you are playing less 3 drops, which means you can ostensibly leave Vial on 2 for a little while longer. This, however, is actually the trick to why you feel so weird about Bob: D&T is fundamentally a deck that leverages Aether Vial to play powerful 3 drops while using its lands to punish opponents. That's how it is in Legacy, and that's how it tries to be in Modern.
The fundamental tension is that Bob pushes you towards low drops while vial pushes you to 3 drops. The deck is filled with powerful cards and powerful synergies, so it's bound to do well, but this seems like a mechanical flaw.
I personally really like the 4-2 Thalia split. Having them both out at the same time is incredibly satisfying. Such a beautiful wall of first striking taxation.
I put Spellskite in because I found it amazingly useful in mono white, but it's by no means a fixture in the deck. Especially considering the Bob lifeloss making the Spellskite lifeloss even worse.
Perhaps I can get away with 22 lands thanks to Bob drawing me cards. This requires testing. I go off of the wisdom of the previous thread, which advised to never NEVER drop below 23 unless you're on G/W. That and it seems like the lists that put up competitive results all have 23.
I'm scared of Shambling Vents because I've been burned too many times by it coming in tapped >:(
Good call about sunlance vs more path/push! Totally missed that.
Thanks for the Bob weirdness insight! I'll keep thinking about this.
I fear this deck will get picked on by aggro decks. Maybe find room for finks/splicer/serraavenger/brimaz
I could do something like -2 Spellskite, +2 finks/splicer/brimaz. It's hard to tell which to go with though. Finks offsets bob lifeloss and has flicker benefits, splicer has immense flicker benefits and first strike, and brimaz is just a monster.
@CharonsObal - The point I don't get is that just about every successful DnT list to ever place well at an event has contained a full playset of Leonin Arbiter. I think that speaks a testament to its power. The card does so much more work than is ever prevalent to the DnT player. Is it a wonderful topdeck during the late game? No, that's very true, but it shines in a lot of other scenarios. I find in the Burn matchup that Leonin Arbiter is a lynchpin in locking them out in tandem with Thalia. Burn can off sputter on lands in favor of aggressive starts, and a 1-2 punch of thalia then arbiter and maybe a ghost quarter has locked out many a game against Burn.
I do think playing things like Swords/Anthems/etc. do help alleviate the issue of topdecked Arbiters.
To be clear, I'm not trying to stop people from playing Arbiter. I'm just saying that Arbiter isn't in the list I'm currently playing, and I don't miss it. This all started because darktutor posted a list without Arbiter, and I thought that it was a reasonable thing to cut. And I'm not the only one who is willing to cut Arbiter in the right metagame or list; Catmix has been running Phyrexian Revoker in its place.
I also haven't cut all of my search taxes; I'm just running Aven Mindcensor instead. I have less internal synergy now with Ghost Quarter and Path to Exile, but I'm using more powerful cards in a vacuum.
I'm also playing a very nontraditional list. That's actually the reason I seldom post my lists anymore; they're so far outside the norm that they don't encourage productive discussion in a thread that, ideally, should be focused on competitive results. For those of you currently running a classic mono-white D&T build, your mileage may vary.
@CharonsObal - The point I don't get is that just about every successful DnT list to ever place well at an event has contained a full playset of Leonin Arbiter. I think that speaks a testament to its power.
This is a textbook example of post hoc, ergo propter hoc fallacy. You're assuming that because a winning list contains a particular card, that the list's power must come from that card. I'm tempted to respond to your statement by pointing out that each list probably contains a Plains; maybe we should run 60 of them and see how that goes.
The reality is that winning lists have a lot of things going for them, including good pilots, favorable matchups, and a well-defined core, which typically does include Arbiter. But successful lists don't have to include Arbiter, as Catmix regularly shows on his stream.
The card does so much more work than is ever prevalent to the DnT player. Is it a wonderful topdeck during the late game? No, that's very true, but it shines in a lot of other scenarios. I find in the Burn matchup that Leonin Arbiter is a lynchpin in locking them out in tandem with Thalia. Burn can off sputter on lands in favor of aggressive starts, and a 1-2 punch of thalia then arbiter and maybe a ghost quarter has locked out many a game against Burn.
You sound like Spider. That's a good thing, because he seems to punish burn players for sport. But I've tried some of these lines before, and the burn players that I play against know how to respond to them. I like Thalia in the matchup, but Arbiter always feels much worse, because you can't attack or block with it; the burn players want to get rid of Arbiter (which supports your point), so they're always happy to trade anything for it. But if I can't use it to block or attack, it just sits there on the board doing nothing, except maybe slowing the Burn player down a turn or two. And if it's really a problem, the burn player just uses targeted removal to get rid of the Arbiter.
All of that said, I think that the burn matchup is an easy one to point to that justifies keeping Arbiter in the deck. Burn runs very few lands, and many of the ones that it does run are fetchlands. It's much harder to justify keeping Arbiter maindeck when you're playing against Affinity or Infect.
I do think playing things like Swords/Anthems/etc. do help alleviate the issue of topdecked Arbiters.
I haven't been running Swords or Anthems with Arbiter. I currently have a pair of anthems in my deck, which are absolutely brutal with Lingering Souls. But I cut Arbiter to make room for Voice of Resurgence, which feels like the better card against a larger part of the metagame.
Playing millions of cards every turn... Slowly and systematically obliterating any chance my opponent has of winning... Clicking the multitude of locking mechanisms into place... Not even trying to win myself until turn 10+ once I have nigh absolute control... Watching my opponent desperately trying to navigate the labyrinthine prison that I've constructed... Seeing the light of hope fade and ultimately extinguished in an excruciatingly slow manner... THAT'S fun Magic.
We have 2-3 users that are dramatically making this thread incomprehensible and non-productive for anyone else to possibly join in the discussion. This needs to change.
Every time I see [ktkenshinx] post in here, I get the impression of a stern dad walking in on a bunch of kids trying to do something dumb and just shaking his head in disappointment.
Near Mint: The same as Slightly Played, but we threw some Altoids in the box we stored it in to cover up the scent of dead mice. Slightly Played: The base condition for all MTG cards. This card looks OK, but there’s one minor annoying ding in it that will always irritate and distract you whenever you draw it. Moderately Played: This card looks like it survived the Tet Offensive tucked inside the waistband of GI underwear. It may smell like it, too. Heavily Played: This card looks like the remains of Mohammed Atta’s passport after 9/11. It may be playable if you double-sleeve it to stop the chunks from falling out. The condition formerly known as "Washing Machine Grade" Damaged: This card is the unfortunate victim of a Mirrorweave/March of the Machines/Chaos Confetti/Mindslaver combo.
[M]aking counterfeit cards is the absolute height of dishonesty. Ask yourself this question: Since most people...are totally cool with the use of proxies...what purpose do [high] quality counterfeit cards serve?
Guys, did anyone saw this list that made 5-0 in a MOL league? https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/562160
I know it's not Death and Taxes, to me it seems more like the eldrazi white lists of vintage, but it's interesting at least.
It shows that thalia and leonin are good outside of the traditionals DnT and BW eldrazi and taxes list we play, and maybe we can learn a thing or two of this kind of lists.
Maybe that is the way of build a RW variant of DnT.
Guts, did anyone saw this list that made 5-0 in a MOL league? https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/562160
I know it's not Death and Taxes, to me it seems more like the eldrazi white lists of vintage, but it's interesting at least.
It shows that thalia and leonin are good outside of the traditionals DnT and BW eldrazi and taxes list we play, and maybe we can learn a thing or two of this kind of lists.
Maybe that is the way of build a RW variant of DnT.
Stabilo posts to this forums quite a bit. I think I actually lost to him in that specific league lol.
Ended 2-5 :/ at regionals. Lost to lantern, grixis delver twice, boogles, and titanshift. I'm glad I went first big tournament in modern for me and I learned a lot. Towards the end the mental fatigue got to me and I kept bad hands but that's what happens when you don't prepare for the long haul.
What do people sideboard in against Bant Eldrazi? It feels like a bad matchup for E&T, and I realized my sideboard doesn't have anything to deal with it.
Also, is there a Discord that people here use? I know that other decks (like Faeries) have them, and it seems pretty useful.
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I use a lot of usernames for some reason, so if you see this person, it's me: Twitch: Artificier10 MTGO and Discord: PollenProphet
Guys, did anyone saw this list that made 5-0 in a MOL league? https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/562160
I know it's not Death and Taxes, to me it seems more like the eldrazi white lists of vintage, but it's interesting at least.
It shows that thalia and leonin are good outside of the traditionals DnT and BW eldrazi and taxes list we play, and maybe we can learn a thing or two of this kind of lists.
Maybe that is the way of build a RW variant of DnT.
Yeah that's me:) I play a lot of DnT but felt the need to change some things up that's why I created this deck. You are exactly right it is initially inspired by this Vintage list. Actually there is a Legacy version as well called "Thalia Stompy" on mtgthesource. I'm probably going to make a new primer on this site as I don't want to spam this thread with this kind of lists as they are missing some core pieces of DnT. But yeah deck feels great. Went 5-0 yesterday again. There is a world of difference between T1 and T2 Arbiter / Thalia.
I remember the match Scytale! Was a good one:)
Some random notes on DnT:
I tried Kytheon and Thraben Inspector and I liked them both. Having early plays is important.
I love Unified Will in the SB if you play UW. (Especially with one drops in your deck)
There is a ton of Ad Nauseam, Cheeri0s and other kinds of combo decks on mtgo (no Infect, Death Shadow etc. though). Come prepared for this kind of MUs!
I hope someone creates a dedicated Eldrazi Taxes post here, kind of hard to really discuss a specific variant of DnT when everyone talks about different things at the same time.
So, to those using Bob in EnT, how does it feel removing Reality Smasher for Bob? Better?
@Mr_bote, eldrazi n taxes is still just a flavor of death n taxes. Ideas that are pertinent to straight white or even Wg are likely relevant to each other as opposed to bant eldrazi; which shares cards with both but is a very different deck.
I've played ent on a handful of occasions and didn't care for it. I found reality smasher to be a representative of the deck overall in that it's powerful but janky. This is due to the fact that smasher is five cmc. I don't think that 22 lands are enough to support that and it's likely to be stuck in your hand.
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Your success in playing dnt/hatebears is determined largely by your ability to read and prepare for the meta that you will be playing in. Furthermore, it has an absolutely brutal learning curve. Expect to lose; a lot.
I had a nice run (6-3 for 57th place out of 300ish) yesterday at SCG Regionals Chicago with this conglomeration of Wescoe's latest list and that other one running around with Thraben Insepctors:
Highlights:
- I was really happy with how it ran.
- Praise be to thy Wisp. It is the best white card in Modern.
- Thraben Inspector was very underwhelming; would have rather had basically any other one-drop.
- Weathered Wayfarer is some sick tech.
- Honor of the Pure is gas.
- Serra Avenger is gas.
- Restoration Angel is gas. Flickering a wisp is great
- Kor Skyfisher is surprisingly versatile (can bounce lands for a pseudo ramp spell. Whitemane Lion may also fit into this slot.
Quick Recap:
- Round 1: Win vs Titanshift. These matches were surprisingly grindy. Of note, I got Wayfarer online early and was (somehow) able to ghost quarter away 3 Valakuts over the course of one game.
- Round 2: Win vs Kiki Chord. Our mana denial strategy is very strong against this deck.
- Round 3: Lose vs Boggles. I'm an idiot and thought that his Gladecover Scout was a Glistener Elf. I deserved to lose.
- Round 4: Lose vs Grixis Reanimator. I'm not upset about losing this one. Mulliganed aggressively for RiP but got Emrakul'd anyway. *shrug*
- Round 5: Win vs Jund. He never drew a Lilly which I think contributed to my ability to win. I was really happy to win this one.
- Round 6: Win vs G/W Tron. Leonin Arbiter is a heck of a card. Double Leonin Arbiter is very rude.
- Round 7: Lose vs Abzan Co-Co. Since they can combo off at instant speed, Flickerwisp is surprisingly useless. I failed to race and failed to find the right half of my disruption.
- Round 8: Win vs Ponza. Burrenton Forge Tender was the key card, locking out Anger of the Gods and Bonfire. Inferno Titan is a problem.
- Round 9: Win vs Affinity. Stony silence... We actually had a really interesting G3 when he had an Ghirapur Aether Grid online vs my Stony Silence and Honor of the Pure. The Honor of the Pure was very problematic and I would have lost had it not been for it.
@Mr_bote, eldrazi n taxes is still just a flavor of death n taxes. Ideas that are pertinent to straight white or even Wg are likely relevant to each other as opposed to bant eldrazi; which shares cards with both but is a very different deck.
I've played ent on a handful of occasions and didn't care for it. I found reality smasher to be a representative of the deck overall in that it's powerful but janky. This is due to the fact that smasher is five cmc. I don't think that 22 lands are enough to support that and it's likely to be stuck in your hand.
So, Bob is better then? I just started playing the deck (yes, I went straight to EnT rather than going thru the Mono-W DnT) and would really love to know if I should invest in the 2x Dark Confidant that I keep seeing in the recent lists that forego Reality Smasher.
@Mr_bote, I'd forego the dark confidants in favor of something cheaper if I were just starting out and didn't know the deck all that well. The confidant slots are flexible and many things could fit. I think blade splicer is good at the moment.
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Your success in playing dnt/hatebears is determined largely by your ability to read and prepare for the meta that you will be playing in. Furthermore, it has an absolutely brutal learning curve. Expect to lose; a lot.
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I personally really like the 4-2 Thalia split. Having them both out at the same time is incredibly satisfying. Such a beautiful wall of first striking taxation.
I put Spellskite in because I found it amazingly useful in mono white, but it's by no means a fixture in the deck. Especially considering the Bob lifeloss making the Spellskite lifeloss even worse.
Perhaps I can get away with 22 lands thanks to Bob drawing me cards. This requires testing. I go off of the wisdom of the previous thread, which advised to never NEVER drop below 23 unless you're on G/W. That and it seems like the lists that put up competitive results all have 23.
I'm scared of Shambling Vents because I've been burned too many times by it coming in tapped >:(
Good call about sunlance vs more path/push! Totally missed that.
Thanks for the Bob weirdness insight! I'll keep thinking about this.
I could do something like -2 Spellskite, +2 finks/splicer/brimaz. It's hard to tell which to go with though. Finks offsets bob lifeloss and has flicker benefits, splicer has immense flicker benefits and first strike, and brimaz is just a monster.
I do think playing things like Swords/Anthems/etc. do help alleviate the issue of topdecked Arbiters.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1805378396378190/
Tron
Lantern
Affinity
(Pretty Much Any Deck that Loses to Stony Silence)
good luck. This i why I'm packing eidolon of rhetoric in the board right now.
facebook.....
To be clear, I'm not trying to stop people from playing Arbiter. I'm just saying that Arbiter isn't in the list I'm currently playing, and I don't miss it. This all started because darktutor posted a list without Arbiter, and I thought that it was a reasonable thing to cut. And I'm not the only one who is willing to cut Arbiter in the right metagame or list; Catmix has been running Phyrexian Revoker in its place.
I also haven't cut all of my search taxes; I'm just running Aven Mindcensor instead. I have less internal synergy now with Ghost Quarter and Path to Exile, but I'm using more powerful cards in a vacuum.
I'm also playing a very nontraditional list. That's actually the reason I seldom post my lists anymore; they're so far outside the norm that they don't encourage productive discussion in a thread that, ideally, should be focused on competitive results. For those of you currently running a classic mono-white D&T build, your mileage may vary.
This is a textbook example of post hoc, ergo propter hoc fallacy. You're assuming that because a winning list contains a particular card, that the list's power must come from that card. I'm tempted to respond to your statement by pointing out that each list probably contains a Plains; maybe we should run 60 of them and see how that goes.
The reality is that winning lists have a lot of things going for them, including good pilots, favorable matchups, and a well-defined core, which typically does include Arbiter. But successful lists don't have to include Arbiter, as Catmix regularly shows on his stream.
You sound like Spider. That's a good thing, because he seems to punish burn players for sport. But I've tried some of these lines before, and the burn players that I play against know how to respond to them. I like Thalia in the matchup, but Arbiter always feels much worse, because you can't attack or block with it; the burn players want to get rid of Arbiter (which supports your point), so they're always happy to trade anything for it. But if I can't use it to block or attack, it just sits there on the board doing nothing, except maybe slowing the Burn player down a turn or two. And if it's really a problem, the burn player just uses targeted removal to get rid of the Arbiter.
All of that said, I think that the burn matchup is an easy one to point to that justifies keeping Arbiter in the deck. Burn runs very few lands, and many of the ones that it does run are fetchlands. It's much harder to justify keeping Arbiter maindeck when you're playing against Affinity or Infect.
I haven't been running Swords or Anthems with Arbiter. I currently have a pair of anthems in my deck, which are absolutely brutal with Lingering Souls. But I cut Arbiter to make room for Voice of Resurgence, which feels like the better card against a larger part of the metagame.
WUDeath&TaxesWG
Legacy
UBRGDredgeUBRG
UHigh TideU
URGLandsURG
WR Card Choice List
WUR American D&T
WUB Esper D&T
The Reserved List
Heat Maps
https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/562160
I know it's not Death and Taxes, to me it seems more like the eldrazi white lists of vintage, but it's interesting at least.
It shows that thalia and leonin are good outside of the traditionals DnT and BW eldrazi and taxes list we play, and maybe we can learn a thing or two of this kind of lists.
Maybe that is the way of build a RW variant of DnT.
https://www.twitch.tv/kirwansgamestore
Stabilo posts to this forums quite a bit. I think I actually lost to him in that specific league lol.
Also, is there a Discord that people here use? I know that other decks (like Faeries) have them, and it seems pretty useful.
Twitch: Artificier10
MTGO and Discord: PollenProphet
BWEldrazi and TaxesBW
GWUKnightfallGWU
UBRGrixis ShadowUBR
Yeah that's me:) I play a lot of DnT but felt the need to change some things up that's why I created this deck. You are exactly right it is initially inspired by this Vintage list. Actually there is a Legacy version as well called "Thalia Stompy" on mtgthesource. I'm probably going to make a new primer on this site as I don't want to spam this thread with this kind of lists as they are missing some core pieces of DnT. But yeah deck feels great. Went 5-0 yesterday again. There is a world of difference between T1 and T2 Arbiter / Thalia.
I remember the match Scytale! Was a good one:)
Some random notes on DnT:
I tried Kytheon and Thraben Inspector and I liked them both. Having early plays is important.
I love Unified Will in the SB if you play UW. (Especially with one drops in your deck)
There is a ton of Ad Nauseam, Cheeri0s and other kinds of combo decks on mtgo (no Infect, Death Shadow etc. though). Come prepared for this kind of MUs!
So, to those using Bob in EnT, how does it feel removing Reality Smasher for Bob? Better?
Tron
Lantern
Affinity
(Pretty Much Any Deck that Loses to Stony Silence)
I've played ent on a handful of occasions and didn't care for it. I found reality smasher to be a representative of the deck overall in that it's powerful but janky. This is due to the fact that smasher is five cmc. I don't think that 22 lands are enough to support that and it's likely to be stuck in your hand.
I had a nice run (6-3 for 57th place out of 300ish) yesterday at SCG Regionals Chicago with this conglomeration of Wescoe's latest list and that other one running around with Thraben Insepctors:
4x Blade Splicer
4x Flickerwisp
1x Kor Skyfisher
4x Leonin Arbiter
3x Restoration Angel
2x Serra Avenger
4x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4x Thraben Inspector
1x Weathered Wayfarer
4x Path to Exile
4x AEther Vial
2x Honor of the Pure
Land (23)
1x Eiganjo Castle
1x Flagstones of Trokair
4x Ghost Quarter
3x Mutavault
11x Plains
3x Tectonic Edge
3x Burrenton Forge-Tender
1x Grafdigger's Cage
2x Leonin Relic-Warder
2x Nevermore
1x Oblivion Ring
2x Rest in Peace
2x Stony Silence
2x Sunlance
Highlights:
- I was really happy with how it ran.
- Praise be to thy Wisp. It is the best white card in Modern.
- Thraben Inspector was very underwhelming; would have rather had basically any other one-drop.
- Weathered Wayfarer is some sick tech.
- Honor of the Pure is gas.
- Serra Avenger is gas.
- Restoration Angel is gas. Flickering a wisp is great
- Kor Skyfisher is surprisingly versatile (can bounce lands for a pseudo ramp spell. Whitemane Lion may also fit into this slot.
Quick Recap:
- Round 1: Win vs Titanshift. These matches were surprisingly grindy. Of note, I got Wayfarer online early and was (somehow) able to ghost quarter away 3 Valakuts over the course of one game.
- Round 2: Win vs Kiki Chord. Our mana denial strategy is very strong against this deck.
- Round 3: Lose vs Boggles. I'm an idiot and thought that his Gladecover Scout was a Glistener Elf. I deserved to lose.
- Round 4: Lose vs Grixis Reanimator. I'm not upset about losing this one. Mulliganed aggressively for RiP but got Emrakul'd anyway. *shrug*
- Round 5: Win vs Jund. He never drew a Lilly which I think contributed to my ability to win. I was really happy to win this one.
- Round 6: Win vs G/W Tron. Leonin Arbiter is a heck of a card. Double Leonin Arbiter is very rude.
- Round 7: Lose vs Abzan Co-Co. Since they can combo off at instant speed, Flickerwisp is surprisingly useless. I failed to race and failed to find the right half of my disruption.
- Round 8: Win vs Ponza. Burrenton Forge Tender was the key card, locking out Anger of the Gods and Bonfire. Inferno Titan is a problem.
- Round 9: Win vs Affinity. Stony silence... We actually had a really interesting G3 when he had an Ghirapur Aether Grid online vs my Stony Silence and Honor of the Pure. The Honor of the Pure was very problematic and I would have lost had it not been for it.
So, Bob is better then? I just started playing the deck (yes, I went straight to EnT rather than going thru the Mono-W DnT) and would really love to know if I should invest in the 2x Dark Confidant that I keep seeing in the recent lists that forego Reality Smasher.