MTG Salvation

thanks for your input pokken, i'll think about these suggestions for adding in a dork or 2, but at the same time find a way to keep the same amount of decent threats, which i find important against death's shadow.

I will leave you all with a little thought on bonfire of the damned. It is a card that is obviously good against small creature decks, but also against any deck you can use it as a win condition when you go infinite with vizier druid. say X = a billion and kill them, even with a Worship in play i believe?

Bonfire does not kill through worship since the damage is all dealt at the same time and state-based actions aren't checked in the middle of resolution.

Bonfire does however let you swing for lethal after it resolves, so it's as good as a win if you have the combo on board most likely (if you can muster up even a damage).

I've played Bonfire and it's pretty good just as a card, but not something I would bet hard on. Ballista's probably good enough if you really feel that need since it can just kill everything.

How often are you bringing in the engineered explosives? I recently got a hold of 2 for a pretty good price and am curious about some their applications? I'm in the Abzan shell atm with the seer combo as well but it should still have similar applications.

I am testing a 2 of rallier atm but i only play 3 ewit in my 75 I have a love hate relationshop with Ewit.

Played 2 Fleecemane Lion last night over 2 Noble Hierarch. They took 3 games last night by forcing removal with Monstrous, occasionally taking Monstrous with infinite mana (another decent sink, if not to full potential), and just being a really solid 2 drop beater. I found it wasn't a stretch to show both Druid and Fleecemane on the board and let my opponent make the choice between an unkillable threat and infinite mana; I tried moving into EoT Monstrous leaving them room to remove the Lion, then untapping and dropping Vizier for the combo. Otherwise if they chose the Druid I can untap with an unkillable threat and begin pushing the township strategy until another opportunity presents itself.

I never Chorded for the Lion, they were just very welcome to see in Coco chains or top decked instead of mana dorks. I don't want to cut another dork for the time being but I'll drop another Flex spot to get 3 Lions in there; I do anticipate, however, picking up that flex spot again over a dork.

@Moneymakermich

so to start, i think that if you're running 22 lands like me, you can go up to a max of 3 colorless lands. I've chosen to go with 2 Kessig Wolf Run and 1 Gavony Township. In the past, i would have gone 1 Kessig and 2 Ghost quarter, but now that we are no longer afraid of Tron, (due to druid combo) i think having a good way to race certain decks is important. Ghost quarter is not that great right now that infect is off the map and eldrazi tron has overtaken regular tron. I played 1 game against affinity where i was able to attack with 2 7/7 knights on turn 4 and gave 1 of them +2+0 and trample for the win all in one turn. 16 damage was enough as opponent just played double Vault Skirge for 4 life last turn. For some reason he didnt block with vault skirge, probably forgot about wolf run. Happened a while ago. memory a bit vague of the details of that game, but it was awesome beating affinity at its own game.

Whenever you play a deck with rallier, you try as much as possible to leave up fetchlands or canopies until you cast coco or cast rallier from hand. pretty self explanatory. There is some tension with knight wanting lands in graveyard, but at the same time knight itself turns on revolt.

@Tucker_Fleabane

Engineered Explosives is kind of like a Maelstrom Pulse in that it is a catch all. It is good against Affinity, Merfolk, Elves, Jund Death Shadow, Regular jund and Abzan, Bogles, storm, and can be a preemptive measure against grafdigger's cage and rest in peace. I understand how some people don't like E.E because it can hit your own stuff too, but remember that you are in control of the card, you decide how and when to play it. Kind of like how some 3 color decks play Blood Moon.

Creatures:30
1 Walking Ballista
4 Birds of Paradise
2 Noble Hierarch
2 Viscera Seer
1 Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit
4 Devoted Druid
2 Duskwatch Recruiter
4 Vizier of Remedies
4 Eternal Witness
4 Kitchen Finks
2 Renegade Rallier

Spells:8
4 Chord of Calling
4 Collected Company

Lands:22
2 Forest
2 Gavony Township
1 Godless Shrine
2 Horizon Canopy
1 Marsh Flats
2 Overgrown Tomb
1 Plains
1 Swamp
2 Temple Garden
4 Verdant Catacombs
4 Windswept Heath

Sideboard:15
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Selfless Spirit
3 Tidehollow Sculler
1 Anafenza, the Foremost
1 Aven Mindcensor
1 Eidolon of Rhetoric
1 Reclamation Sage
2 Tireless Tracker
3 Path to Exile
1 Maelstrom Pulse




Played this last night to a 4-0 finish

Beat naya 8 whack 2-1. Lost g2 from cage
Beat Gb Devotion 2-0
Beat new mono white hatebears 2-1. Lost g2 from cage
Beat Grixis control 2-0

Deck was perfect

I mean I am obviously for dropping finks/seer but I think rallier is better

Decided to put my money where my mouth is:

The Godless Shrine was supposed to be a Hallowed Fountain but I forgot to change it since I was playing Abzan the night before.

Phantasmal Image wrecked Grixis Shadow... In G1 I held off Shadows for an extra 4-5 turns while I put together the combo; Rallier into Image chain ending in Witness to get a Rallier to set up for another chain. G2, I had Evolutionary Leap T2 and played the value train all game. I managed to pace attrition into a Monstrous Image to go with my other Lion and just held the board from there; he dropped an Anger of the Gods, but it was far too late. No combo, just consistently wide beats and unkillable blockers. Both these games were very long.

Lost to Zoo, I can't beat T3 kills when he can also Lightning Bolt my blockers. That deck was nuts, but I did manage to force him to G3.

Beat Elves Company. G1 was almost a loss, he had me next turn but I untapped with a Druid and Companied into a Vizier for the combo. I brought in the Revoker and Linvala for G2 and 3. A quick death in G2 moved us to G3. I ended up Imaging the Revoker twice to lock out all his big mana plays starting with Ezuri, Renegade Leader. I never had enough to Chord for Linvala, but I beat him down over 5 turns with double Exalted triggers.

That's all, 3 rounds.

Honestly, Image did some insane work every time I saw it. However, no-go on the Images is that I copied a Gurmag Angler in the Grixis match, Fatal Push says "if"... Let that sink in. To clarify, he can still target the Image even if it has a CMC over 2 (or 4) so the Image self sacrifices; even says so on the gatherer.

Here's my updated list. Any suggestions?

I just run 8 value dudes, 4 witness 4 rallier.

Since druid protects itself from anger I don't feel any real need to build fatties in my list. Original abzan coco didn't really play any. I also have a selfless spirit main.

The only "fair" game the deck needs is 3 Birds, 4 lands and a Gavony. A Finks or Rallier helps too.

I just run 8 value dudes, 4 witness 4 rallier.

4 Witness + 4 Rallier sounds like you get many awful opening hands and spend half of your time recurring fetchlands... I assume it's a work in progress and that you'll come back to more reasonable numbers, eventually.

4 witness/2 rallier is the most correct

Quote from headminerve »

I just run 8 value dudes, 4 witness 4 rallier.

4 Witness + 4 Rallier sounds like you get many awful opening hands and spend half of your time recurring fetchlands... I assume it's a work in progress and that you'll come back to more reasonable numbers, eventually.

I've played probably a hundred matches and have a win rate of around 70%, with FNM play record of 16-3-2 over the last couple months. While the sequence of t1 dork t2 rally back a fetchland happens sometimes it's the exception, and when it does the fetch usually enables revolt subsequently. I'd say I have a non-functional rallier or witness pretty rarely, and their late game potential more than makes up for it.

-------------------------------------------------------

Sadly I'm probably gonna have to switch back to abzan because this spoiler seems...almost too good to be true?

http://www.mtgsalvation.com/cards/hour-of-devastation/29041-banewhip-punisher

When Banewhip Punisher enters the battlefield, you may put a -1/-1 counter on target creature.
B, Sacrifice Banewhip Punisher: Destroy target creature that has a -1/-1 counter on it.

While this is not quite as good as "etb kill a creature" (because it can be killed before its ability can be activated) it's as close as we're likely to get *and* has recursion *and* probably has some kinda -1/-1 counter synergy I haven't thought up yet.

This is game changing for Abzan.

Requiring double black (To cast + activate same turn) kinda sucks and getting bolted in resp to the etb trigger also sucks. I think it's worth testing but it's not the Bone Shredder variant we were hoping for. Also while I've played fewer matches than Pokken with the 4 Ralliers, I can count on one hand the number of times I've returned a fetchland with rallier. It only happens when you need to guarantee you hit 4 mana and you don't have another land in hand.

Could there also be some form of interaction with obelisk spider with -1/-1 counters to gain infinite life and kill if we hit the combo? Or, have I got the rules slightly wrong?

Quote from FeloniousCrap »

Requiring double black (To cast + activate same turn) kinda sucks and getting bolted in resp to the etb trigger also sucks. I think it's worth testing but it's not the Bone Shredder variant we were hoping for. Also while I've played fewer matches than Pokken with the 4 Ralliers, I can count on one hand the number of times I've returned a fetchland with rallier. It only happens when you need to guarantee you hit 4 mana and you don't have another land in hand.

I mean, in a lot of ways it's better than bone shredder. It's got more power, it doesn't have an echo cost, and can kill Kalitas/Death's Shadow/Arcbound Ravager, and it can enable revolt when you want it as opposed to on your turn only.

My thinking is that it's pretty easy to build around the mana cost, if the upside is a creature that you can hit off a coco, block, then sac to kill something. It just destroys combat math. If people are forced to kill it in response to its ETB that's pretty good, and you can witness it back if needed.

I'm pretty excited. When I get back from vacation I'll probably start brewing, but the ability to play 3 of this guy over Paths and other such nonsense feels well worth the mana issues.

Quote from Wesste »

Could there also be some form of interaction with obelisk spider with -1/-1 counters to gain infinite life and kill if we hit the combo? Or, have I got the rules slightly wrong?

I believe that it would work with anafenza and finks but no other way, as it's a triggered ability that happens when the counter is actually placed.

If I'm reading it wrong and it goes infinite with druid+vizier on its own, that would be a thing of beauty, but I'm nearly positive it does not.

This is game changing for Abzan.

Really? Its a 3 mana 2/2 which CAN kill a creature if its left alone. Who does it replace? How many do we want to play? Its a 4 mana sorcery removal which can be hit by CoCo, Chord and brought back with E-wit.


Pros:
- Its a great creature to chomp block with, then trigger the ability and remove another attacker. Should be really nice against burn
- It is mainboard removal on a stick which I sorely miss (fiend hunter pseudo removal)
- Good in matchups like: Burn, B/X Death Shadow, Jund, Abzan, Eldrazi Tron, Dredge and the mirror

Cons:
- Its not really a great hit turn 3-4 with Company because you dont have the mana to kill the creature in response to the removal.
- You need to be able to Chord for 3 and have a spare land/bird to kill something right then and there
- In matchups where the opponent plays no creatures its a 3 mana 2/2....
- Horrible against Titan Shift, Ad Nauseam and every control matchup

I'm not sold, but I would love for some maindeck removal!

I don't think it goes in the main deck (except maybe as a 1-of), I think it replaces some number of removal spells in the sideboard, at least for me.

I would absolutely 100% replace a main deck fiend hunter with it if someone is running that. It has the exact same limitation fiend hunter (in terms of if they remove it, they get their creature back) but with the ability to also permanently kill something if they're tapped out or you hit at an opportune time.

Think of it more in the context of the mirror match or vs. decks you bring in path. It lets you sub in removal spells without hurting your coco count -- and can be chorded for of course. There is nothing quite like it in the game today.

All the other options have tons of restrictions, but this straight up kills something--its put a -1/-1 counter on it mode actually kills a lot of creatures just on its own. ETB kill a mana dork is decent as is.