Got two more matches vs more conventional Tron (GW and GB) in today and managed to win both without too much trouble. I find that even t3 Karn isn't that hard to beat unless there's also lots of other stuff. Early Ugins and Walking Ballistas are the real problem, but even then, far from unbeatable.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"I can call an army to my side in the blink of an eye. Best not blink."
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Haven't been chatting much in this thread as of late, excited to see someone finally moving to 20 lands. I've been on this list, with few changes for the past few months, it feels much more akin to the older versions of Company that would come to the table with a value plan and shift into combo out of nowhere and kill you if you let your guard down for a second.
Obviously I'd like to go T1 Dork, T2 Voice/Finks/Druid, T3 Finks/Voice/EWit/Rallier/Saffi/CoCo/kill you, but in competitive magic we never really get what we want do we?
What I like about this list is that it's very good at grinding against all the control decks that are so popular these days and it has an ever-surprisingly good game against Shadow decks. I'd like to find more room for hate removal like RIP and Cage, but we just don't have that kind of space in the deck these days. I have to rely on the fact that I am faster and can win games through multiple angles against those cards.
Typical cards that come out for G2 and 3 are:
- 1-2x Vizier of Remedies depending on how likely I am to combo and how likely the are to bring in Staticaster.
- 2x Noble Hierarch & 2x BoP if the game is going to be grindy, I have to be aware that I need at least 2-3 lands/dorks in my opening hand (and be able to cast them), but after that, I'll have plenty of time to draw lands and drawing dorks that don't combo is often times the worst possible draw, so leaving 2 birds in the deck feels right for these MUs.
- 3x Voice & 1-2 EWit if the game is going to be super fast and/or combo centric and Voice will never get a chance to block. Decks like Storm and Affinity leave little space for Voice to gain you value, and I don't have time to untap and gain normal value out of EWit, so I'm happy to shave 1, sometimes 2 depending on the match.
- Surprisingly - Walking Ballista against things like Scapeshift since I don't actually need to kill my opponent to win this MU, merely gaining a million life will get me there, and Walking Ballista doesn't help me do that or anything else that really matters in the MU.
- 2x Chord and 2x Company, the 1st Chord is a go-to for grindy MUs that focus on keeping my board clear of threats. I don't want to be drawing Chords with no creatures in hand and no creatures on the board, so going down to 3 or 2 is regularly a good idea. Company comes out if I see my <4 CMC creatures dropping below the 28 mark. It's rare, but sometimes I go down to 26-27 creatures, and I don't want to have 4 CoCos in that situation since the target density is too low to be worth it anymore.
Going down on lands and up on creatures has helped me to reduce flood potential, present a more relevant clock and force removal on non-optimal targets like Voice, Finks, Rallier, and Viscera Seer to open the way for a Devoted Druid threat the next turn. And vice versa, if my opponent removes my T2 druid, I don't feel as bad shifting into a value game on T3.
While I lose percentage points on how often I hit a T3 combo, I still have all the major bases covered. 4x Druid for maximum T2 Druid, 3x Vizier doesn't feel bad because Vizier is terrible when you aren't comboing anyway, 2x Recruiter has him showing up often enough to combo easily but not so often that I'm stuck with vanilla 2/2 and nothing useful for him to do, and 3x EWit has always felt right, even when going harder on the combo.
Anyway, I have always preferred this deck being deep in value options, and with Blue being so popular lately, Voice is worth his weight in gold again. Figured I'd share my list for those of you looking for a different way to approach this deck and approach the meta with it. I regularly end games against blue control decks with 2+ CoCos/Chords in hand after taking 10+ turns each. Simply presenting threat after threat after threat and forcing them to tap awkwardly and inefficiently allows me to out-value them. Comboing in those MUs is not only a lot harder to actually pull off, it's completely unnecessary if you have an effective value plan.
Question: have anyone tried Grand Abolisher? What’s the verdict? Is it good or is it bad and why?
Currently I’m playing 2of of him and it’s pretty good I feel?
Voice is just better as it actually gives you some value if they bolt/push it.
But Grand Abolisher protect you the turn you Combo?
Not really as you still need to play and wait for summoning sickness to wear off. If they have removal they'd just do it in respons to the abolisher anyway. It does basicly nothing..
Question: have anyone tried Grand Abolisher? What’s the verdict? Is it good or is it bad and why?
Currently I’m playing 2of of him and it’s pretty good I feel?
Voice is just better as it actually gives you some value if they bolt/push it.
But Grand Abolisher protect you the turn you Combo?
Not really as you still need to play and wait for summoning sickness to wear off. If they have removal they'd just do it in respons to the abolisher anyway. It does basicly nothing..
Oh ok! Thanks!
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Current Deck(s): TappedOut Would love to have more input to improve!
@Momsie
Sin Collector deals with their hand, Pharika deals with their board. Obviously Witness/Coco are amazing, so make sure that you'll get enough mana post-board (if boarding out dorks). Chord is pretty meh usually - and plays into their Denials if they keep them - so boarding them out completely is an option. Apart from that it's all combat math and such.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"I can call an army to my side in the blink of an eye. Best not blink."
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Went 1-3 at FNM with a fairly stock Abzan list. A few things I found interesting that I thought I'd share.
TL;DR: Mindbender and Pharika are great out of the board. Mirror Entity is staying in my main.
Round 1: The “new” Grixis Shadow with Bauble. Game 1 his turn 1 Thoughtseize meant not only did he nab my combo piece, he also knew exactly what I was playing right away. Some back and forth, but he eventually overpowered my team. Game 2 I managed a turn 4 Distended Mindbender which my opponent was not at all prepared for (the look on his face was priceless!). I followed it up with Pharika and I pushed through for lethal. Both cards have earned their spot in my sideboard. Game 3 he had a second turn Gurmag Angler. I did what I could to hold it off, and a timely Mindbender might have been enough, but I had fetched a basic to save on life and didn't think about the double black (in my defense, the Mindbender was a topdeck- the basic might have been the correct play with what I knew).
0-1 in matches, 1-2 games
Round two was a newer Affinity player. He hadn't seen the combo before. Game 1 I had a fairly quick Finks combo for infinite life. He scooped. Not sure if his build had infect in it or not- might have been premature. Game 2 I pulled off a natural combo turn 3 or 4 and went for the Ballista kill.
1-1 in matches, 3-2 games
Round 3 was more Grixis Shadow, but the older version with bolts. Game 1 he ripped my hand apart with turn 1 Inquisition and turn 2 Thoughtseize. I stabilized, but always felt behind, and eventually died. Game 2 was very grindy. I was able to fly over for lethal with Birds and Selfless Spirit with Mirror Entity doing the heavy lifting from the ground. I do not think I had enough mana for Rhonas to have been lethal. I like having Entity for my non-targeting kill option and this game proved it earned its spot. Game 3 was turn 2 Zombie Fish, turn 4 triple Shadow, or something close to that. It was brutal.
1-2 in matches, 4-4 in games.
Round 4 vs E-Tron. Game 1 I had the combo live early and nothing to do with it. I used two E Wits on a Horizon Canopy to dig. Finally found a Scavenging Ooze off a Company and ate a bunch of creatures from our yards. That plus two Gavony activations and I swung for lethal on the crack back when his attack didn't go as planned. Game 2 I drew all four Viziers and 3 Druids. And very, very little else. I had so many live draws and got nowhere. Game 3 I had to mull to five. I ended the game with 3 Chord of Callings in hand, but only a Vizier in play and two green sources. I could have strung Chords for Seer and Finks and won easily had I drawn any green creature or another green source in 4 turns.
1-3 matches, 5-6 games
But it was good to dust off the deck and take it for a spin.
I've been noticing more and more that GW Valuetown is putting up more finishes than counters company (looking at the recent scg open, classic, team events, and mtgo tournaments)
I compiled all the lists and noticed that there is a ton of variation between them, with the most noticable similarity being 4x courser, 4x knight.
I'm going to be testing those 8 cards in my GWr druid list. I already think knight is great, and courser is apparently winning games.
No results yet, but I figured I'd share where my head is at.
I've been noticing more and more that GW Valuetown is putting up more finishes than counters company (looking at the recent scg open, classic, team events, and mtgo tournaments)
I compiled all the lists and noticed that there is a ton of variation between them, with the most noticable similarity being 4x courser, 4x knight.
I'm going to be testing those 8 cards in my GWr druid list. I already think knight is great, and courser is apparently winning games.
No results yet, but I figured I'd share where my head is at.
Courser isn't good in a vacuum. Don't put it in your deck unless you're also including the package that recycles lands and gets like four courser triggers a turn.
Renegade rallier, ramunap excavator, azusa, ghost quarter, knight. These are the sorts of cards you want to pair with courser.
That said, courser is nice against burn.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern: G Tron, Vannifar, Jund, Druid/Vizier combo, Humans, Eldrazi Stompy (Serum Powder), Amulet, Grishoalbrand, Breach Titan, Turns, Eternal Command, As Foretold Living End, Elves, Cheerios, RUG Scapeshift
I tried Jarvis Yu's list of Abzan Company at a 21 person WNM for 4 rounds. Got pretty lucky.
Round 1 vs. RG Eldrazi. This guy usually runs Zoo. I think he got bored of Zoo, but he has shown me a 67.5% win rate with Zoo, which is better than my overall Modern win percentage by a little bit. I comboed him in game 1 right before he would kill me with Reality Smasher and he flooded severely after I Tidehollow Sculler the Thought-Knot Seer that he Ancient Stirrings for. 2-0.
Round 2 vs. GB Tron. "Tron like" games. I mull to 5 and peel lands only until a Vizier once he's exiling all my lands. In the next game, I have an explosive hand with dorks, Finks, and Phyrexian Revoker with Gavony Township, but he finds Oblivion Stone to cast and blow up on turn 4. I scoop in response to it being played. 0-2.
Round 3 vs. Grixis Death's Shadow. I have many Finks, dorks, and Gavony Township and he has no discard and very little removal. No Fatal Push! I get there in 2 games with similar hands. 2-0.
Round 4 vs. Storm. I mull to 6 and just put a board out, but he turn 4 goes off and kills me on the play. I get Ethersworn Canonist and pressure in the next one. I got the Canonist out of Bolt range. Afterward, I noticed he only had 1 Bolt, but 2 bounce spells, oh and an Izzet Charm. In the final game, I Sculler a card from him and get some pressure while Pathing a Baral. I end up getting there by casting a 1/1 Walking Ballista, pumping it up to a 2/2 the next turn while swinging with it, Finks, and Tidehollow Sculler to put him to 2. Remove the 2 counters from Ballista for lethal. 2-1.
I go 3-1, which is more than I expected with the deck. The meta seemed foul to this deck today, but I thought I'd see if I could dodge matchups, lol.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Legacy - Sneak Show, BR Reanimator, Miracles, UW Stoneblade
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/ Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander - Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build) (dead format for me)
I tried Jarvis Yu's list of Abzan Company at a 21 person WNM for 4 rounds. Got pretty lucky.
Round 1 vs. RG Eldrazi. This guy usually runs Zoo. I think he got bored of Zoo, but he has shown me a 67.5% win rate with Zoo, which is better than my overall Modern win percentage by a little bit. I comboed him in game 1 right before he would kill me with Reality Smasher and he flooded severely after I Tidehollow Sculler the Thought-Knot Seer that he Ancient Stirrings for. 2-0.
Round 2 vs. GB Tron. "Tron like" games. I mull to 5 and peel lands only until a Vizier once he's exiling all my lands. In the next game, I have an explosive hand with dorks, Finks, and Phyrexian Revoker with Gavony Township, but he finds Oblivion Stone to cast and blow up on turn 4. I scoop in response to it being played. 0-2.
Round 3 vs. Grixis Death's Shadow. I have many Finks, dorks, and Gavony Township and he has no discard and very little removal. No Fatal Push! I get there in 2 games with similar hands. 2-0.
Round 4 vs. Storm. I mull to 6 and just put a board out, but he turn 4 goes off and kills me on the play. I get Ethersworn Canonist and pressure in the next one. I got the Canonist out of Bolt range. Afterward, I noticed he only had 1 Bolt, but 2 bounce spells, oh and an Izzet Charm. In the final game, I Sculler a card from him and get some pressure while Pathing a Baral. I end up getting there by casting a 1/1 Walking Ballista, pumping it up to a 2/2 the next turn while swinging with it, Finks, and Tidehollow Sculler to put him to 2. Remove the 2 counters from Ballista for lethal. 2-1.
I go 3-1, which is more than I expected with the deck. The meta seemed foul to this deck today, but I thought I'd see if I could dodge matchups, lol.
I think the deck is pretty good in the current meta. Mostly you need to evaluate what part of the game you need to play.
Nice to see you still play the deck.
I noticed that abzan company has been putting up less results. Maybe due to the rise of control decks like jeskai and decks with lots of removal like death shadow. I am thinking of merging gw value town and abzan coco. List looks like this
30 creatures
4 birds of paradise
2 noble hierarch
4 devoted druid
3 vizier of remedies
2 duskwatch recruiter
2 voice of resurgence
2 courser or kruphix
3 tireless tracker
3 knight of the reliquary
1 rhonas
4 eternal witness
That manabase is an absolute disaster, and you're sacrificing all the good parts of value town (the land destruction plan primarily) for the vizier combo. You're trying to do way too much in my opinion.
If you wanna a value town style build you should keep it to GW, run 4 ghost quarters (or potentially field of ruin if you can't get any ramunap excavators in there), 4 renegade ralliers and see what fits from there. Probably shave down on trackers/knights to get all the ralliers in there since they bring your combo pieces back and also work with the land destruction plan.
I've done a ton of thinking on the combined deck and I think you want the playset of duskwatch instead of voices. They're deceptively very powerful when you're running more baneslayers like Knight and Tracker, as they act kind of like a spellskite, and they're great topdecks.
That manabase is an absolute disaster, and you're sacrificing all the good parts of value town (the land destruction plan primarily) for the vizier combo. You're trying to do way too much in my opinion.
If you wanna a value town style build you should keep it to GW, run 4 ghost quarters (or potentially field of ruin if you can't get any ramunap excavators in there), 4 renegade ralliers and see what fits from there. Probably shave down on trackers/knights to get all the ralliers in there since they bring your combo pieces back and also work with the land destruction plan.
I've done a ton of thinking on the combined deck and I think you want the playset of duskwatch instead of voices. They're deceptively very powerful when you're running more baneslayers like Knight and Tracker, as they act kind of like a spellskite, and they're great topdecks.
The mana base seem like a mess but it works alright with knights and birds to fix colors. Maybe thinking of dropping down black but will be losing good sideboard cards.
I totally excluded the land destruction part of the gw company and focused more on cards that give card advantage and beats. In my opinion land destruction works best if you have complete package of azusa and ramunap which I think cannot be accomodated by the deck. If you will build your version, what list are you thinking? I would like to see it. Thanks.
I think your black sideboard cards will kill you over the long term. Blooming marsh is just a terrible land with no maindeck black cards. The black sideboard cards are just not good enough to warrant that. You could pack a couple excavators or the like in the sideboard.
Here's the kind of prototype skeleton I brewed up for any straight GW list with the combo--township is interchangeable with ghost quarter, and you can shave a hierarch, a forest or canopy and a vizier for knights, I just try to work in mostly 4s and 1s when designing a "default" shell. And a pessimistic manabase of course. https://deckbox.org/sets/1720641
I've run pure Naya with Knights before as well and it is quite decent, but there's really no call for Coursers or Voices or anything imho.
I'm a little cautious to take your list at face value (it seems a bit "theory-based")
Voice and recruiter are not comparable. I know where your logic comes from but the way it plays out... They shine in completely different spots.
I like the rallier thing though. I've been considering them as a replacement for coursers. Does anyone have actual reps with that card? It seems great but I could see it being too inconsistent or making us too weak to yard hate.
It is definitely a theoretical skeleton you start from before modifying to suit meta and aggressiveness, etc. It could go down a couple lands or down a couple mana dorks, you can go to 3s/2s, etc.
Voice and Recruiter are not comparable except filling the 2 CMC spot really, but in a list heavy on baneslayers it makes a lot of sense to overload on them rather than play value creatures.
I have played Rallier a ton and it is a hugely powerful card. It gets more powerful the more you run and the more you can trigger it. I played this Naya list for quite some time: https://deckbox.org/sets/1686911
Again, not advocating for any of these lists as current meta appropriate. Presenting some ideas for the specific topic of combining Value town with the druid combo.
I do think it is feasible to consider, though a bit iffy because of how tough it is to support both the druid combo and value and land destruction in the same deck. The druid combo has a bunch of pieces that are baneslayers by nature, and the value town deck does as well (courser, tracker, knight) so you're quite vulnerable to getting ground out from a card advantage perspective.
The natural fits from a card perspective to fix some of that problem are Eternal Witness and Renegade Rallier. Both provide some card advantage, and can support the land destruction plan, and both support the combo (witness and rallier acting like extra combo pieces often).
I think that the combination of concepts might just be trying to do too much either with the beatdown creatures or with the land destruction package, but if you consider what makes GW so good it's more the streamlined manabase and the land destruction package that allows it to compete than the value oriented (but ultimately baneslayery) beatdown creatures (trackers/coursers/voices).
In a merging of the lists I think you'll find rallier a much better fit than trackers/coursers, and recruiter than voices/oozes, since they ultimately support what the joint shell is trying to do.
Maybe a tiny red splash for 1 wolf run and 1 stomping ground, because the knights take advantage of that pretty well.
Currently I’m playing 2of of him and it’s pretty good I feel?
TappedOut
Would love to have more input to improve!
Voice is just better as it actually gives you some value if they bolt/push it.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
4x Birds of Paradise
2x Noble Hierarch
Druid/Vizier Dudes (10)
4x Devoted Druid
3x Vizier of Remedies
2x Duskwatch Recruiter
1x Walking Ballista
Finks/Seer Combo (7)
4x Kitchen Finks
2x Viscera Seer
1x Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit
Bad Combo Pieces That Never Combo (2)
1x Renegade Rallier
1x Saffi Eriksdotter
Value For Days (7)
3x Eternal Witness
1x Scavenging Ooze
3x Voice of Resurgence
3x Forest
2x Gavony Township
1x Godless Shrine
2x Horizon Canopy
1x Overgrown Tomb
1x Plains
2x Temple Garden
4x Verdant Catacombs
4x Windswept Heath
Instant (8)
4x Chord of Calling
4x Collected Company
2x Aven Mindcensor
1x Burrenton Forge-Tender
1x Kataki, War's Wage
1x Linvala, Keeper of Silence
1x Orzhov Pontiff
3x Path to Exile
1x Qasali Pridemage
1x Reveillark
1x Selfless Spirit
3x Tidehollow Sculler
Obviously I'd like to go T1 Dork, T2 Voice/Finks/Druid, T3 Finks/Voice/EWit/Rallier/Saffi/CoCo/kill you, but in competitive magic we never really get what we want do we?
What I like about this list is that it's very good at grinding against all the control decks that are so popular these days and it has an ever-surprisingly good game against Shadow decks. I'd like to find more room for hate removal like RIP and Cage, but we just don't have that kind of space in the deck these days. I have to rely on the fact that I am faster and can win games through multiple angles against those cards.
Typical cards that come out for G2 and 3 are:
- 1-2x Vizier of Remedies depending on how likely I am to combo and how likely the are to bring in Staticaster.
- 2x Noble Hierarch & 2x BoP if the game is going to be grindy, I have to be aware that I need at least 2-3 lands/dorks in my opening hand (and be able to cast them), but after that, I'll have plenty of time to draw lands and drawing dorks that don't combo is often times the worst possible draw, so leaving 2 birds in the deck feels right for these MUs.
- 3x Voice & 1-2 EWit if the game is going to be super fast and/or combo centric and Voice will never get a chance to block. Decks like Storm and Affinity leave little space for Voice to gain you value, and I don't have time to untap and gain normal value out of EWit, so I'm happy to shave 1, sometimes 2 depending on the match.
- Surprisingly - Walking Ballista against things like Scapeshift since I don't actually need to kill my opponent to win this MU, merely gaining a million life will get me there, and Walking Ballista doesn't help me do that or anything else that really matters in the MU.
- 2x Chord and 2x Company, the 1st Chord is a go-to for grindy MUs that focus on keeping my board clear of threats. I don't want to be drawing Chords with no creatures in hand and no creatures on the board, so going down to 3 or 2 is regularly a good idea. Company comes out if I see my <4 CMC creatures dropping below the 28 mark. It's rare, but sometimes I go down to 26-27 creatures, and I don't want to have 4 CoCos in that situation since the target density is too low to be worth it anymore.
Going down on lands and up on creatures has helped me to reduce flood potential, present a more relevant clock and force removal on non-optimal targets like Voice, Finks, Rallier, and Viscera Seer to open the way for a Devoted Druid threat the next turn. And vice versa, if my opponent removes my T2 druid, I don't feel as bad shifting into a value game on T3.
While I lose percentage points on how often I hit a T3 combo, I still have all the major bases covered. 4x Druid for maximum T2 Druid, 3x Vizier doesn't feel bad because Vizier is terrible when you aren't comboing anyway, 2x Recruiter has him showing up often enough to combo easily but not so often that I'm stuck with vanilla 2/2 and nothing useful for him to do, and 3x EWit has always felt right, even when going harder on the combo.
Anyway, I have always preferred this deck being deep in value options, and with Blue being so popular lately, Voice is worth his weight in gold again. Figured I'd share my list for those of you looking for a different way to approach this deck and approach the meta with it. I regularly end games against blue control decks with 2+ CoCos/Chords in hand after taking 10+ turns each. Simply presenting threat after threat after threat and forcing them to tap awkwardly and inefficiently allows me to out-value them. Comboing in those MUs is not only a lot harder to actually pull off, it's completely unnecessary if you have an effective value plan.
But Grand Abolisher protect you the turn you Combo?
TappedOut
Would love to have more input to improve!
Not really as you still need to play and wait for summoning sickness to wear off. If they have removal they'd just do it in respons to the abolisher anyway. It does basicly nothing..
Oh ok! Thanks!
TappedOut
Would love to have more input to improve!
Sin Collector deals with their hand, Pharika deals with their board. Obviously Witness/Coco are amazing, so make sure that you'll get enough mana post-board (if boarding out dorks). Chord is pretty meh usually - and plays into their Denials if they keep them - so boarding them out completely is an option. Apart from that it's all combat math and such.
- Yeva, Nature's Herald
Abzan Toolbox Primer
GWBAbzan CompanyBWG
GWBUGifts RockUBWG
TL;DR: Mindbender and Pharika are great out of the board. Mirror Entity is staying in my main.
Round 1: The “new” Grixis Shadow with Bauble. Game 1 his turn 1 Thoughtseize meant not only did he nab my combo piece, he also knew exactly what I was playing right away. Some back and forth, but he eventually overpowered my team. Game 2 I managed a turn 4 Distended Mindbender which my opponent was not at all prepared for (the look on his face was priceless!). I followed it up with Pharika and I pushed through for lethal. Both cards have earned their spot in my sideboard. Game 3 he had a second turn Gurmag Angler. I did what I could to hold it off, and a timely Mindbender might have been enough, but I had fetched a basic to save on life and didn't think about the double black (in my defense, the Mindbender was a topdeck- the basic might have been the correct play with what I knew).
0-1 in matches, 1-2 games
Round two was a newer Affinity player. He hadn't seen the combo before. Game 1 I had a fairly quick Finks combo for infinite life. He scooped. Not sure if his build had infect in it or not- might have been premature. Game 2 I pulled off a natural combo turn 3 or 4 and went for the Ballista kill.
1-1 in matches, 3-2 games
Round 3 was more Grixis Shadow, but the older version with bolts. Game 1 he ripped my hand apart with turn 1 Inquisition and turn 2 Thoughtseize. I stabilized, but always felt behind, and eventually died. Game 2 was very grindy. I was able to fly over for lethal with Birds and Selfless Spirit with Mirror Entity doing the heavy lifting from the ground. I do not think I had enough mana for Rhonas to have been lethal. I like having Entity for my non-targeting kill option and this game proved it earned its spot. Game 3 was turn 2 Zombie Fish, turn 4 triple Shadow, or something close to that. It was brutal.
1-2 in matches, 4-4 in games.
Round 4 vs E-Tron. Game 1 I had the combo live early and nothing to do with it. I used two E Wits on a Horizon Canopy to dig. Finally found a Scavenging Ooze off a Company and ate a bunch of creatures from our yards. That plus two Gavony activations and I swung for lethal on the crack back when his attack didn't go as planned. Game 2 I drew all four Viziers and 3 Druids. And very, very little else. I had so many live draws and got nowhere. Game 3 I had to mull to five. I ended the game with 3 Chord of Callings in hand, but only a Vizier in play and two green sources. I could have strung Chords for Seer and Finks and won easily had I drawn any green creature or another green source in 4 turns.
1-3 matches, 5-6 games
But it was good to dust off the deck and take it for a spin.
I compiled all the lists and noticed that there is a ton of variation between them, with the most noticable similarity being 4x courser, 4x knight.
I'm going to be testing those 8 cards in my GWr druid list. I already think knight is great, and courser is apparently winning games.
No results yet, but I figured I'd share where my head is at.
Courser isn't good in a vacuum. Don't put it in your deck unless you're also including the package that recycles lands and gets like four courser triggers a turn.
Renegade rallier, ramunap excavator, azusa, ghost quarter, knight. These are the sorts of cards you want to pair with courser.
That said, courser is nice against burn.
Round 1 vs. RG Eldrazi. This guy usually runs Zoo. I think he got bored of Zoo, but he has shown me a 67.5% win rate with Zoo, which is better than my overall Modern win percentage by a little bit. I comboed him in game 1 right before he would kill me with Reality Smasher and he flooded severely after I Tidehollow Sculler the Thought-Knot Seer that he Ancient Stirrings for. 2-0.
Round 2 vs. GB Tron. "Tron like" games. I mull to 5 and peel lands only until a Vizier once he's exiling all my lands.
Round 3 vs. Grixis Death's Shadow. I have many Finks, dorks, and Gavony Township and he has no discard and very little removal. No Fatal Push!
Round 4 vs. Storm. I mull to 6 and just put a board out, but he turn 4 goes off and kills me on the play. I get Ethersworn Canonist and pressure in the next one. I got the Canonist out of Bolt range. Afterward, I noticed he only had 1 Bolt, but 2 bounce spells, oh and an Izzet Charm. In the final game, I Sculler a card from him and get some pressure while Pathing a Baral. I end up getting there by casting a 1/1 Walking Ballista, pumping it up to a 2/2 the next turn while swinging with it, Finks, and Tidehollow Sculler to put him to 2. Remove the 2 counters from Ballista for lethal. 2-1.
I go 3-1, which is more than I expected with the deck. The meta seemed foul to this deck today, but I thought I'd see if I could dodge matchups, lol.
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/
Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander -
Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build)(dead format for me)I think the deck is pretty good in the current meta. Mostly you need to evaluate what part of the game you need to play.
Nice to see you still play the deck.
How do you fill in the flex spots in the deck?
30 creatures
4 birds of paradise
2 noble hierarch
4 devoted druid
3 vizier of remedies
2 duskwatch recruiter
2 voice of resurgence
2 courser or kruphix
3 tireless tracker
3 knight of the reliquary
1 rhonas
4 eternal witness
8 spells
4 collected company
4 chord of calling
22 lands
3 forest
1 plains
2 temple garden
1 overgrown tomb
1 blooming marsh
1 stomping ground
4 windswept heath
4 verdant catacombs
1 wooded foothills
2 horizon canopy
1 gavony township
1 kessig wolfrun
Sideboard
1 burrenton forgetender
2 tidehollow sculler
2 path to exile
1 abrupt decay
1 maelstrom pulse
1 sin collector
2 kor firewalker
1 aethersworn cannonist
1 eidolon of rhetoric
1 kataki, war’s wage
1 qasali pridemage
1 orshov pontiff
It still has pretty consistent turn 3 kills but has pretty good beatdown backup plan.
If you wanna a value town style build you should keep it to GW, run 4 ghost quarters (or potentially field of ruin if you can't get any ramunap excavators in there), 4 renegade ralliers and see what fits from there. Probably shave down on trackers/knights to get all the ralliers in there since they bring your combo pieces back and also work with the land destruction plan.
I've done a ton of thinking on the combined deck and I think you want the playset of duskwatch instead of voices. They're deceptively very powerful when you're running more baneslayers like Knight and Tracker, as they act kind of like a spellskite, and they're great topdecks.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
The mana base seem like a mess but it works alright with knights and birds to fix colors. Maybe thinking of dropping down black but will be losing good sideboard cards.
I totally excluded the land destruction part of the gw company and focused more on cards that give card advantage and beats. In my opinion land destruction works best if you have complete package of azusa and ramunap which I think cannot be accomodated by the deck. If you will build your version, what list are you thinking? I would like to see it. Thanks.
Here's the kind of prototype skeleton I brewed up for any straight GW list with the combo--township is interchangeable with ghost quarter, and you can shave a hierarch, a forest or canopy and a vizier for knights, I just try to work in mostly 4s and 1s when designing a "default" shell. And a pessimistic manabase of course.
https://deckbox.org/sets/1720641
I've run pure Naya with Knights before as well and it is quite decent, but there's really no call for Coursers or Voices or anything imho.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
I'm a little cautious to take your list at face value (it seems a bit "theory-based")
Voice and recruiter are not comparable. I know where your logic comes from but the way it plays out... They shine in completely different spots.
I like the rallier thing though. I've been considering them as a replacement for coursers. Does anyone have actual reps with that card? It seems great but I could see it being too inconsistent or making us too weak to yard hate.
Voice and Recruiter are not comparable except filling the 2 CMC spot really, but in a list heavy on baneslayers it makes a lot of sense to overload on them rather than play value creatures.
I have played Rallier a ton and it is a hugely powerful card. It gets more powerful the more you run and the more you can trigger it. I played this Naya list for quite some time:
https://deckbox.org/sets/1686911
Again, not advocating for any of these lists as current meta appropriate. Presenting some ideas for the specific topic of combining Value town with the druid combo.
I do think it is feasible to consider, though a bit iffy because of how tough it is to support both the druid combo and value and land destruction in the same deck. The druid combo has a bunch of pieces that are baneslayers by nature, and the value town deck does as well (courser, tracker, knight) so you're quite vulnerable to getting ground out from a card advantage perspective.
The natural fits from a card perspective to fix some of that problem are Eternal Witness and Renegade Rallier. Both provide some card advantage, and can support the land destruction plan, and both support the combo (witness and rallier acting like extra combo pieces often).
I think that the combination of concepts might just be trying to do too much either with the beatdown creatures or with the land destruction package, but if you consider what makes GW so good it's more the streamlined manabase and the land destruction package that allows it to compete than the value oriented (but ultimately baneslayery) beatdown creatures (trackers/coursers/voices).
In a merging of the lists I think you'll find rallier a much better fit than trackers/coursers, and recruiter than voices/oozes, since they ultimately support what the joint shell is trying to do.
Maybe a tiny red splash for 1 wolf run and 1 stomping ground, because the knights take advantage of that pretty well.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall