I disagree about it being gimped UW control. That’s like saying Vengevine is bad dredge.
That being said, I agree about the rest of that. As it stands in my testing, the cascade version outperforms the non-cascade list. I’m still trying to crunch numbers and gather more data to see where the room for improvement lays. I think the cascadeless version is one puzzle piece from being as strong, but that one piece hasn’t been printed yet.
Then again, the puzzle piece could be something I’m completely overlooking, like how a simple 1-of Bow of Nylea ended up being the last dab of glue in strengthening my cascade list (that card being included in all cascade versions is the hill I’ll die on).
This is by memory as I’m not near my list: but this is the current adaptation. It’s hardly a list I’d take to an event and is still here to test different cards.
Exploring the cascadeless versions with Electrodominance seemed pleasant to me as well.
First I don't really like the greater gargadon win condition. It has often seemed unreliable.
Also with the new Electrodominance tech you are allowed to be faster and more explosive. For instance, Turn-1 borderpost into turn 2 SpiritGuide + Electrodominance + Restore balance on their draw step is almost unbeatable.
This is the list I came up with after a few iterations.
This is a spell-based version of the "Balance As Foretold" archetype
Arclight Phoenix provides a real clock
The game plan is almost always to cast a turn 2-4 Restore Balance
I tried to add Spoil of the Vaults to improve consistency and fight disruption. Proved to be very effective, despite a 15% chance of free-loss. You only cast this in 'emergency case', often to find Restore Balance, and when you find it, you'll win the game roughly 80% of the time
after casting Restore Balance, the opponent should have about 1 land and 1 card in hand. Play patiently, wait for 2 useless cards before playing a 'draw 2, discard 2' effect.
My thought on this version:
This version is powerful. In a decent percentage of games you just lock your opponent before he can play anything substancial
Card-filtering helps with consistency
Game plan is probably a bit too ambitious: the "balance" between basic lands, borderposts and spells is hard to find
Still bad matchup against humans and BGx, okay matchup versus control and spirits, good vs big mana and creature-based decks including Izzet Phoenix (I believe)
I have been doing some testing, and it appears that the blue red electro Dom version is a bit better off against bgx and more fair decks, while Cascade has a better shot against unfair decks. I believe what is holding me from playing ur right now is that I can't consistently get a good balance consistently and early enough and that greatly affects our combo match ups in a negative way. We aren't as powerful as storm as consistently and as quickly if all we do is draw 3 on turn 3 . I really like the idea of a hybrid between borderposts and electro Dom/ as foretold and cantrips. Gives us better balances, actual cards in our deck, and doesn't rely on cascading.
The thing, while in the past GG was supposed to be the win con, he's more so of an enabler now. He's designed to be a threat. You suspend him and now your opponent has to be wary of a Balance effect since your board can go from hero to zero so quickly and he has to match. If you're trying to win with him it go very far. I've noticed every opponent slow down their playstyle so quickly with a GG out because of this impact he can have, they'll try to match me land for land, won't go too wide, and even will play cards to match.
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It's easy to believe you're a god when you're twice as powerful as everyone else.
Exploring the cascadeless versions with Electrodominance seemed pleasant to me as well.
First I don't really like the greater gargadon win condition. It has often seemed unreliable.
Also with the new Electrodominance tech you are allowed to be faster and more explosive. For instance, Turn-1 borderpost into turn 2 SpiritGuide + Electrodominance + Restore balance on their draw step is almost unbeatable.
This is the list I came up with after a few iterations.
This is a spell-based version of the "Balance As Foretold" archetype
Arclight Phoenix provides a real clock
The game plan is almost always to cast a turn 2-4 Restore Balance
I tried to add Spoil of the Vaults to improve consistency and fight disruption. Proved to be very effective, despite a 15% chance of free-loss. You only cast this in 'emergency case', often to find Restore Balance, and when you find it, you'll win the game roughly 80% of the time
after casting Restore Balance, the opponent should have about 1 land and 1 card in hand. Play patiently, wait for 2 useless cards before playing a 'draw 2, discard 2' effect.
My thought on this version:
This version is powerful. In a decent percentage of games you just lock your opponent before he can play anything substancial
Card-filtering helps with consistency
Game plan is probably a bit too ambitious: the "balance" between basic lands, borderposts and spells is hard to find
Still bad matchup against humans and BGx, okay matchup versus control and spirits, good vs big mana and creature-based decks including Izzet Phoenix (I believe)
So the problem I have with this verison is few things.
Spoils of the Vault seem really bad. We already lose a lot of life due to this deck and this version being passive. That and we have to exile all the cards so we could just lose the game there if we have a poorly stacked deck.
Not a big fan of pheonix. I feel we have to burn through our deck if we want to revive him, and even then, Restore balance could just send him away again.
Chandra, not particual about this version, I feel she's too slow, and with her +1 exiling spells we could want, as well as she may be just a 4 mana deal 4 is pretty meh, I feel you could cut the Restore balances out and the deck would still play out the same way it does already, control and dig and she'd be just the finisher.
You also run only 2 basic lands, which means if you want to run posts you have to fetch for them first thing otherwise they're useless. Running 3 non-basic lands means at most your opponent keeps 3 lands which doesn't slow down Humans, Boggles, Burn, Affinity, and even Green Scales. Since they either run super cheap stuff or produce their own mana via Opals, Mana Dorks ( which is where the Phenoixs can be harmful more than benficial), and so on. Burn still beats both versions with Eidolon of the Great Revel.
Not a fan of relying on just As Foretold since it's super slow and people see it coming from far away, I know most of your spells are between 1-2 mana,but you can play it T2 (T1 Island, T2 SSGx2) at earliest, then have to wait 2 more turns to cast stuff for free. That's 4 turns just for free spells once per turn, or T2 if you have RB in hand, and even then you're devoting so much resources to this card which can be easliy stopped.
Lastly, I think you should drop the posts. Or lean more into them. This odd split of mana to post ratio carries the deck into odd directions. You have the slow ticking Foretolds so Posts aren't need, yet you run so few actual mana you need posts. You run such an odd amount of posts that their overal consistency is weird.
That's not to say your deck can't operate, but at face vaule that's what I see. And this is coming from a man who strongly believes that the cascade version is the best and is resistent to change (I'll die on this hill)
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It's easy to believe you're a god when you're twice as powerful as everyone else.
This is by memory as I’m not near my list: but this is the current adaptation. It’s hardly a list I’d take to an event and is still here to test different cards.
I like this deck, Focuses on the fact posts, GG, and casting cards are ditched for a more a control shell, I really like Mission Briefing as an option to recasting RB at the cost of losing it, but it gives of 6 RB if we really wanted it.
I love Tolaria West, a good RB tutor.
Torn on Search tbh. Both sides don't speak to me as much. The first side makes of ditch cards, and the flip side has us reveal. The point of RB is the surprise "does he have it" factor that makes the opponent debate between killing us and reserving themselves as to not get blown out. I'd say try two Bow of Nylea. The bow helps gain life to stabalize, recycles cards (Looking at you Mission Briefing, protects Restore balance from cards like Extirpate, shoots down small fliers (Ornithopers, Freebooters, etc) which free up bolt spaces for Planeswalkers and bigger threats, and gives GG +1/+1 counters to help one shot people better).
Search feels like a better Thassa in this build. I prefer surveil to scry.
As much as I love bow, it forces me hard into green and is the only payoff card.
I’m with you on Chandra. You can cast the suspend spells if As Foretold is out, but overall, it’s still on my chopping block.
As I said, this is still testing different stuff. Mission Briefing is likely dropping to a 1-of, but no less. It’s incredibly powerful at what it does, but drawing the second one oft feels bad. Chandras will probably come out to test a different threat. Maybe I’ll go old school and play Ajani Vengeant, but the card advantage was one of the key reasons to play Chandra.
Ya. Thassa is super slow. I replaced her with Monastery Siege. Not only does it loot like Search, but if I need it can be a minor protection tool as well.
Bow, as you said, can force hard green. But with my deck being with 1 basic forest, and 8 posts that produce G I don't have trouble.
I'd replace her. Her card advantage isn't good since you will always run that risk of getting a RB off the top, and even then, most of the cards are less impactful.
Ajani has been a planeswalker that has been talked about, added, removed, re-added, then found to be meh. Have you tried Kiora, the Crashing wave flexible mana cost so you don't have to worry about being locked into G. Gives you card advantage like Chandra does. I found her super useful before I replaced her with Gideon of the Trials since he gave me more staying power than Kiora.
What new/versatile tools do we have at out disposal that might help our Phoenix and jeskai match ups? I like v clique as an option for control, but not great against Phoenix. Playing in the scg classic this weekend and definitely feel they are my larger concerns currently.
What new/versatile tools do we have at out disposal that might help our Phoenix and jeskai match ups? I like v clique as an option for control, but not great against Phoenix. Playing in the scg classic this weekend and definitely feel they are my larger concerns currently.
What new/versatile tools do we have at out disposal that might help our Phoenix and jeskai match ups? I like v clique as an option for control, but not great against Phoenix. Playing in the scg classic this weekend and definitely feel they are my larger concerns currently.
Mmmm, not a fan of any of those cards except Trap. BW gives the opponent a free beater that we have to answer, and Raking Canopy is too limited in scope. But if you're concerned about the grave yard just use Ravenous Trap
I've read through a decent amount of these lists at this point and I still don't have a good answer. Why doesn't Metalwork Colossus get used in the borderpost lists? I've had a lot of success with dropping him on the cheap. A lot of decks that I play against don't have an easy answer to a 10/10 so he can often stabilize your position or be a finisher after a cascade.
Can be chumped all day by 1/1s (No inherent trample, hate, etc)
Opponents can play around him if they see him in G1
Because he's so big he can't be removed easily and thus doesn't give us consistent Restore Balance wipes (example, they have a creature out, we have metalwork, thus without a GG they can just keep their dude, which may or may not be hurting us)
Because we run him, we give up slots that could help us in other matchups
Because he's an artifact, commonly used SB material (Ancient Grudge, Nature's Claim, and so forth can stop him for way cheap since he has no inherent protection)
If we want to return him, we have to give up our mana base and unless we're super far a head, meaning we're pretty much sealed a win, we put ourselves behind.
a vanilla 10/10 doesn't do much to win games when our other 10 mana card we run constantly helps our overall game plan much better and with less drawback and can attack the turn he comes off suspend.
So what does all this mean, well this is from all my findings running him. Affinity could just keep a full board with him out and with a Arcbound Ravager out just kill me since a Restore Balance meant he could just sac it all to Ravenger or a flyer and kill me on his following turn. Humans could reflector mage him all day so I'd be left with a hand of useless 10/10s, Boggles could quickly voltron over him since by T3 they usually have Spirit Mantle out and equipped, and with how slow the deck is because you have to run a large number of posts to consistently use him early, T3 was often too slow in coming and I'd behind tempo even more, I'd just have a 10/10 gorilla out to show for it.
I also use to run Lingering Souls as well, which also didn't help me at all either.
So all in all, while a flashy and super cool concept, it doesn't fit our overall game plan since we're not an aggressive deck seeking to close out the game early, since we rely on setting them back time and time again until they concede. It's the same reason we gave up on March of the machines
Don't mean to discourge you, if you find consistent wins with him, keep him, but all of this is based on my personal findings from my LGS meta, local friend group, and other reviews online.
That's a good point. I've definitely been in the position of trying to get him off of the field before cascading before. I think that I was skewed towards the flashiness of being able to drop 20 power on turn 4.
I also was running Colossus with Gravitic Punch. It puts your opponent on a 2 turn clock unless they can remove it which is nice, or can let you finish in 1 turn if you swing with gargadon then punch which can be helpful against burn or hollow one but it didn't quite feel like it had legs.
People are working on it, just read a few pages back. It's a fairly new concept that pushes us off our old post versions. It has it's own separate pro and cons like the old version.
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It's easy to believe you're a god when you're twice as powerful as everyone else.
I’m working the Electrodominance version. Still discussing and testing new cards out. It doesn’t help that I’ve not been able to attend a modern event in a blue blood moon. I need to change up my list right now, but I’m still working out what I want to test next.
Back when as foretold came out, someone went and attempted to make a thread for it despite us discussing it here, but that thread has been dead for a while. I don’t know of a discord group.
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That being said, I agree about the rest of that. As it stands in my testing, the cascade version outperforms the non-cascade list. I’m still trying to crunch numbers and gather more data to see where the room for improvement lays. I think the cascadeless version is one puzzle piece from being as strong, but that one piece hasn’t been printed yet.
Then again, the puzzle piece could be something I’m completely overlooking, like how a simple 1-of Bow of Nylea ended up being the last dab of glue in strengthening my cascade list (that card being included in all cascade versions is the hill I’ll die on).
First I don't really like the greater gargadon win condition. It has often seemed unreliable.
Also with the new Electrodominance tech you are allowed to be faster and more explosive. For instance, Turn-1 borderpost into turn 2 SpiritGuide + Electrodominance + Restore balance on their draw step is almost unbeatable.
Land (12)
1 Blood Crypt
2 Bloodstained Mire
1 Flooded Strand
1 Island
2 Mountain
4 Scalding Tarn
1 Steam Vents
4 Simian Spirit Guide
4 Electrodominance
3 Izzet Charm
1 Noxious Revival
4 Spoils of the Vault
4 Ancestral Vision
4 Faithless Looting
4 Restore Balance
4 Serum Visions
1 Firewild Borderpost
2 Mistvein Borderpost
4 Veinfire Borderpost
1 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
This is the list I came up with after a few iterations.
So the problem I have with this verison is few things.
That's not to say your deck can't operate, but at face vaule that's what I see. And this is coming from a man who strongly believes that the cascade version is the best and is resistent to change (I'll die on this hill)
As much as I love bow, it forces me hard into green and is the only payoff card.
I’m with you on Chandra. You can cast the suspend spells if As Foretold is out, but overall, it’s still on my chopping block.
As I said, this is still testing different stuff. Mission Briefing is likely dropping to a 1-of, but no less. It’s incredibly powerful at what it does, but drawing the second one oft feels bad. Chandras will probably come out to test a different threat. Maybe I’ll go old school and play Ajani Vengeant, but the card advantage was one of the key reasons to play Chandra.
Bow, as you said, can force hard green. But with my deck being with 1 basic forest, and 8 posts that produce G I don't have trouble.
I'd replace her. Her card advantage isn't good since you will always run that risk of getting a RB off the top, and even then, most of the cards are less impactful.
Ajani has been a planeswalker that has been talked about, added, removed, re-added, then found to be meh. Have you tried Kiora, the Crashing wave flexible mana cost so you don't have to worry about being locked into G. Gives you card advantage like Chandra does. I found her super useful before I replaced her with Gideon of the Trials since he gave me more staying power than Kiora.
I used to play the old borderpost cascade versions but this seems to be heading in a good direction to me.
Raking Canopy for phoenix. Ricochet Trap and more Beast Within for Jeskai.
Mmmm, not a fan of any of those cards except Trap. BW gives the opponent a free beater that we have to answer, and Raking Canopy is too limited in scope. But if you're concerned about the grave yard just use Ravenous Trap
Metalwork Colossus
Pros:
Cons:
So what does all this mean, well this is from all my findings running him. Affinity could just keep a full board with him out and with a Arcbound Ravager out just kill me since a Restore Balance meant he could just sac it all to Ravenger or a flyer and kill me on his following turn. Humans could reflector mage him all day so I'd be left with a hand of useless 10/10s, Boggles could quickly voltron over him since by T3 they usually have Spirit Mantle out and equipped, and with how slow the deck is because you have to run a large number of posts to consistently use him early, T3 was often too slow in coming and I'd behind tempo even more, I'd just have a 10/10 gorilla out to show for it.
I also use to run Lingering Souls as well, which also didn't help me at all either.
So all in all, while a flashy and super cool concept, it doesn't fit our overall game plan since we're not an aggressive deck seeking to close out the game early, since we rely on setting them back time and time again until they concede. It's the same reason we gave up on March of the machines
Don't mean to discourge you, if you find consistent wins with him, keep him, but all of this is based on my personal findings from my LGS meta, local friend group, and other reviews online.
I also was running Colossus with Gravitic Punch. It puts your opponent on a 2 turn clock unless they can remove it which is nice, or can let you finish in 1 turn if you swing with gargadon then punch which can be helpful against burn or hollow one but it didn't quite feel like it had legs.
Back when as foretold came out, someone went and attempted to make a thread for it despite us discussing it here, but that thread has been dead for a while. I don’t know of a discord group.