MTG Salvation

I play Sculler over collector for 2 reasons. 1. He draws removal to himself, allowing the opportunity to combo more easily, and 2. He can take any card, not just an instant or sorcery. Flexibility is always good, plus he costs 1 less.

I had felt that my sideboard was going to be pretty strong against Affinity, for those cards you listed. I don’t really want to drop Thalia, heretic cathar or sin collector as there are normally a few Tron, Bant Spirit and Goblin decks. As well as, Burn, Grixis Delver and Gifts Storm (we have a very varied pool of players and no knowing who will turn up each week). Think I maybe could've mulliganed more aggressively for one of my sideboard cards... will see how it fairs next time.

@Arkaedrian
@spankz
How has voice of resurgence worked out for you?
Also, is the one-of fauna shaman worth it? I’m considering testing it, but feel I would want something faster (no idea what).

Anyone else hate the 8rack matchup? Feels like it always comes down to a topdeck war where you either win because you attacked with a Vizier 8 times or you lose because you only drew lands or chords and they attacked with mutavault 8 times.

Side note, how would you all sideboard for this? There's a pretty frequent 8rack player at my lgs. I've been boarding out viziers, scooze, and 1-2 chords and bringing in value stuff like tracker, voice of resurgence, and sin collecter. what are you thoughts?

Last week I made 4-0 with the new Bant version, Geist in the board and stuff, pretty solid list.
Tomorrow I'm going with the sample Abzan list, never played before, I don't know how to side in and out, mainly againt the popular ones (DS, Burn, Storm, Eldrazi, etc).

Needing advices please!!

Edit:
Thinking about this list:


Freebooter looks great against the bad matches, almost always Will eat a removal.

On sin collector vs tidehollow sculler:

Against decks where the discard is key early (combo) sculler is the better card most likely, right? Combo decks tend not to play much removal.

Against control I see sin collector being better. Snagging a supreme verdict or anger of the gods, right?

However, sculler is still OK against control as a way to attack their hand while adding pressure. Control decks do pack a fairly high number of spot removal spells but attacking the hand (especially before playing out a combo piece) is solid and being able to do this at a cheaper rate is preferred, right?

Any other considerations? Obviously sculler can be killed to get the card back, that's the downside. It's hard to see where to draw the line though. I don't think there's a clear best option between the two cards.

Speed vs permanence?

@purklefluff
Depends on the deck as well, not just archetype. Collector is very strong vs Storm, Sculler is better vs AdNaus, etc. Both are ok vs Control, Collector somewhat better due to exiling big spells. I prefer Collector, but depending on what decks you want to beat, Sculler might be better.

Quote from JohnBell »

Quote from Wesste »

@Arkaedrian
@spankz
How has voice of resurgence worked out for you?
Also, is the one-of fauna shaman worth it? I’m considering testing it, but feel I would want something faster (no idea what).

For me not very well...
I try it in testing playing Ageless127's List with 3x Voice of Resurgence in maindeck but it don't do anything except cumpblock Vs Tier1...
Now I want play Knight of the Reliquary strting from Torpf's List.

Fauna Shaman IMHO isn't for this type of deck... GWx Vizier isn't toolbox maverick...

Voice has worked wonders for me. Against control decks, it pretty much shuts them down or forces them to use precious removal which they would otherwise use on our combo.

Against other decks it's either a double chump blocker who can become huge, or a target for removal allowing us to combo, or a consistent beater. His ability is also amazing if an opponent tries to disrupt our combo during our turn, which will happen often.

Remember guys, different people play the deck (and the game) differently. This is even true among the Pro level players - just read one of the dozen primers on Temur Energy in standard written by Pros and see perfect example of “same deck, different strategy”.

Voice may be better for the grinder amongst us, whereas Fauna Shamam is a creature that threatens to find any missing combopiece for those who are so inclined.

Agreed- it's all about play style and the Meta.

That being said went 3-0 (Elves, Infect, and Burn) tonight again. No Rhonas, added Tireless Tracker and never needed him. I really like this deck

tbh I'm not a huge fan of tracker. I'd rather just run another recruiter since it does the same thing but better a lot of the time.

Currently playing around with Knights a bit here and there, thought I might as well keep the records here.

List



Went full-on greed here, just to see how stuff works. Considering dropping a Witness or something for the 4th Knight for testing, but not sure yet.

Played 7 matches on Xmage, went 4-1-2 (counting opp timing out as the 1 draw) against Stompy (win), RB Breach (win), RW Prison (win), BGx (win), Bgx ("draw"), Storm (loss), Grixis Shadow (loss). More importantly tho...

Combos: Combo'd 3-4 times with Finks, either causing a concession or finishing off with Anafenza, felt solid; combo'd 2-3 times with Druid, Knight was never relevant during the combo, Kessig was nice tho.
Beatdowns: Knights definately helped in some interactive MU's (GDS, BGx) and was helpful to kill off Walkers vs Prison. Finks still bought loads of time vs opposing beats, nothing new there. Kessig actually came in handy once or twice just for Bird beatdowns and similar.
Mana: Pretty solid so far, just remember one game where I'd have won the next turn if I had fetched a black source over a red source (no indicators for either colour on board atm). Shrine might get the axe, but time will tell.
Toolbox: Didn't really miss anything so far.. Ooze could be nice, but Knights fulfill the role of being a big beatstick, while Finks take care of the lifegain.

All in all the Knights felt good so far, as did Finks, as did everything else, really. Having multiple combos feels really satisfying. Gonna test more whenever I find time.

Calling voice a "double chump blocker" doesn't really make a lot of sense to me. We're a deck with a midrange plan as well - if you're just playing it to combo then there are better decks (storm, ad naus).

I wanted to comment on deck building concerning spell queller and knight. Knight comes with a cost: you need to diversify your utility lands and cut your razorsverges. She's worth it, but not unless you're on a full out knight build. And queller is similar. Having four gives company a pseudo-counterspell effect, but only playing a couple just means you're company-ing at weird times.

Just my opinion of course, but I do think if you want cards like that to be in your main strategy it makes sense to commit and run the playset

Some more testing... 6-1 (12-3 in games) today (xmage) vs Tezzerator, Grixis Shadow, 2x Mirror (abzan and abzan blue), BUG midrange, Affinity, only loss to Eldratron.
Combo'd with Druid 8 times (2 of which involved Knight/Kessig) and 3 times with Finks (one could've been prevented if the opp wasn't greedy with Ooze).

1. I need to finish the playset of Devoted Druid. Do I need playset of Vizier?
2. Is Rhonas -that- important? What about Ballista?
3. do I really need Kitchen Finks? Is it there for a second combo option?
4. Do I need Knight of the Reliquary?
5. Is Spike Feeder + Archangel of Thune necessary or not even played in this?
6. what are some good cheap cards to get for the deck?

1. No, but for starting out there's no reason not to.
2. No, it's personal preference for both. I prefer Walking Ballista, as it kills without attacking. You don't need Rhonas.
3. In my opinion, yes. It's the best at what it does, and enables the infinite life combo. You can get any old creature with persist for the infinite scry with Seer, but the life is what makes it almost an auto win instead of a really good card selection play.
4. No, another personal preference thing. Some people like having another route to victory, which Knight enables with being a big body hit off Company.
5. It's not necessary, and not really played anymore. I play it in my version because I enjoy having three combos to pivot to, but in all honesty it's more for fun than for being "good".
6. Depends entirely on what you mean. Sideboard-wise, there are a lot of cheap good hosers, like Burrenton Forge-Tender, Kataki, War's Wage, Qasali Pridemage, Eidolon of Rhetoric, etc. If you mean maindeck, it is what it is. For the Devoted Druid lists, you need Druids, you need Viziers, you need Duskwatches (1-2), and preferable 4 Birds of Paradise, 2-4 Noble Hierarchs, and 4 Kitchen Finks.

@Kaiseresc
1. Generally you want 4 of each, yes.
2. You'll need 1-2 wincons, Ballista is generally better than Rhonas, but variety has it's upsides.
3. If you want the Finks combo, yes. Otherwise, no.
4. Not necessarily.
5. Not played.
I'd suggest finding a list that looks good to you and start from there. The core will stay the same and small adjustments can be done over time.

Quote from Pathrogas »

Some more testing... 6-1 (12-3 in games) today (xmage) vs Tezzerator, Grixis Shadow, 2x Mirror (abzan and abzan blue), BUG midrange, Affinity, only loss to Eldratron.
Combo'd with Druid 8 times (2 of which involved Knight/Kessig) and 3 times with Finks (one could've been prevented if the opp wasn't greedy with Ooze).

Glad to hear your results. I am also testing Knight of reliquary but replaced Kessig wolfrun with Ghost quarters. I found them helpful in Tron matchups and decks with manlands. How do you find Kessig wolfrun? Is it worth the extra red color?

@ZEUS1478526
Absolutely worth it, wouldn't play Knight without Kessig. It's useful without the combo for punching as we generally have a bunch of mana, and having a finisher in form of a land is actually really nice and optimizes the deck even more.

@MrEyeholes
Nah man, basics are for suckers (fixed now, cheers for pointing it out)

Never liked Rallier much in anything not involving Eldritch Evolution. It's just so bad without Revolt
Seer + Finks + Vizier + Anafenza is inf. +1/+1 markers, which gives us a way of killing after resolving inf. life/scry (best case t3. inf life, t4 inf. damage).
Pontiff isn't necessary, just a question of if you want the effect or not (same goes for any SB card I guess). He's amazing vs Affinity and the mirror, as well as doing a lot against a bunch of random things (goblin and spirit tokens, all sort of dork/swarm based strats, etc.).

Lately I've been keeping most of my dorks in against BGx and cut stuff like 1 Anafenza (can't beat inf. life), 1 Vizier, 1 Seer, some Chords. Running out two things or a Finks/Knight t2 is pretty strong. Dunno if I like it more than heavily boarding out dorks, but worked decently so far.

Affinity so far really hasn't been much of a problem. Sometimes they have the nuts and we die, but otherwise... I'm mostly faster than them and half my SB is wrecks their everything.

Why cut Finks combo vs E-Tron? They beat it with Dust + Karn or Ulamog, which isn't great, but they are dead if they don't have an answer + huge thread immediately. Maybe I'm missing something? Haven't played the MU much, but outside for their god draws it seems like comboing them out is a pretty solid plan.

Not sure about my SB vs Eldratron honestly. Pharika, Mindcensor, Pulse and Qasali for sure.. maybe Decays for Cage and Relic? Spirit for combat? Ooze for stabilizing? Dunno, don't get to play the MU a lot :/ I'd start boarding out 1 Noble, 1 Chord, 1 Witness, maybe 1 Knight, rest I'd have to improvise atm. Don't like Stony in this deck at all, if I'd have something just for Eldrazi, I'd run a Spellskite.

Really don’t like stony silence in this deck. Much prefer Kataki/Abrupt decay.

Personally, with E-Tron I side the following; linvala, keeper of silence, sigarda, host of herons, qasali pridemage, thalia, heretic cathar and path to exile. Seems to work pretty well.

Kazu Negri is a hell of a deckbuilder. My friend (playing GDS) faced him in the quarterfinals. He said Distended Mindbender tore his hand apart and apparently it did well against everyone Negri faced that day.