I almost never preferred to dredge a thug over an imp, and since the thug ability is kind of not too good enough i think, i switched it out. This was real early in testing, now i know how the deck works, so i probably am missing out. i MIGHT retry the thug and make a 2-2 split thug and imp.
1 loam is amazingly... not too few. After playing with conflagrate lists, i was under the impression that i needed a minimum of 2 to work, but one has been working pretty well. It´s not uncommon to only have 2-3 lands all game, but against some matches you kind of have to switch gears at times, and it´s possible to stall until then.
I actually cut 1 gargadon, because i needed a slot for haunted dead. I might trim a land instead, in which case i kind of want another loam. I´ll have to see. 3 gargadon has felt pretty good too. This list only runs 4 looting as card draw, so it´s less likely you´ll get to see extra copies of the card, which is a shame. Gargadon is a card you´d like to see 1 copy of every game, i think 3 copies is fine.
@Jwelt
So, the most common thing i do when i don´t have a gargadon in the opening is: just keep going. People are forgetting that shriekhorn makes it so that the deck (in this case) can have 12 1 mana enablers, that´s a lot of milling. You don´t NEED the gargadon. It´s great when you have it, but not game over if you don´t. The list added pay off cards in the form of bridge from below, so that milling is more attractive. Bridge is inherently broken in this deck, and modern is about that. It blanks targeted removal, makes trading go in your favor, completely blanks wraths (completely), most players kinda don´t get how it works and is an built in "free" win con. Gargadon makes the card go over the top of course (like it´s not even fun), but it´s still a great card to mill over. So the plan without the gargadon is to kinda...just keep going. Most main decks arent built to deal with this configuration, most removal that targets our creatures are dead cards because of the nature of the deck. Control decks are a joke because of this. You don´t even have to do anything. Don´t think i´ve lost a game against U based control decks yet, with or without gargadon
@khaosknight69
Game 1 at least. Although it depends if they have ugin. Basically you can sooooort of power through a karn, an oblivion stone or a wurmcoil... but ugin is lights out unless you can fetch 2nd main, return 2 bloodghast and 2 amalgam (something along those lines), but usually that won´t be the safest plan g2 since they have relics and cages. Overall, pretty tough. I suppose you can not recur your narcomoebas and such, and conflagrate for a bunch, but that´s to deal with 1 card. I´ve had a lot of problems beating tron.
I've been struggling with the shriekhorn vs tormenting voice question and after much testing I've settled on a 2-2 split. I like it a lot. More shriekhorn would result in not enough ability to discard/dredge more, but more tormenting voice would make 1 land opening hands with a tormenting voice awkward. Voice is great if the pieces fall together but makes 1 land hands a lot less keepable, which are common. For example, a hand with 1 land, 1 shriekhorn, and 1 other enabler is keepable but 1 land, 1 tormenting voice, and 1 other enabler not so much.
Burning Inquiry still remains an excellent card in my deck I am not sure what you guys are experiencing when your playing it but I am always happy to have it in hand. If BI is your only enabler sure you mull, however If shriekhorn, tormenting voice are your only enabler its a mull as well. BI is a blow out as a turn 2 play with dredgers in the yard, theres not a better card you could play IMO. Unless a conflagrate is needed to slow down a board.
Tryring to dig a sideboard card just to have it discarded by the random clause is something that can make someone want to tear the card in half. (personal experience)
Also, I fail to see how it is “the best thing to be doing at turn 2”, unless you have 3 dredgers on the grave (a very uncommon scenario on T2), it’s extra value compared to faithless looting is marginal (You get an extra card, but run the risk of discarding unwanted cards), with 1 dredger on the grave it’s not even much better than tormenting voice (and can be a lot worse discarding wrong cards). Yes, it can be the perfect thing, but it can also screw you pretty bad.
Not to mention that it is not a T1 play. It’s not on the same league as faithless looting, insolent neonate and shriekhorn, those are T1 enablers. Inquiry is on the same league as Tormenting Voice. It’s only better when you have 2 dredgers on the grave, wich is not the most common scenario. But inquiry is worse in terms of consistency, and it’s not very uncommon to discard/keep unwanted cards. If you hand has lands and dredge cards you always want to discard dredges and keep lands, but it can backfire on the random clause.
And depending on your hand, you can keep a hand with only Tormenting Voice, But a hand with only inquiry is almost never keepable. Even a hand with 2 lands, 1 inquiry and the rest of dredge cards, and it still has the chance of backfire if you cast on turn 2 (you can draw 3 lands and discard the 3 lands)
Maybe you’re on the good side of the inquiry variance and not discarding the wrong cards to it. But it’s randomness can be an issue to a deck that is only “ok” in terms of consistency.
On Tron, I really wanted to run 2 Ghost Quarter main, it not only slow tron, but hit infect/affinity manlands, and you can even lock some more greedy decks with Loam, but the manabase is being so good right now that I don't want to mess with it.
And now that wizards set the red looting identity as "discard before draw" I hope they do a reverse faithless looting so we can ditch all those "not-so-good-enablers-but-its-all-we-have"
You don't have to run gargadon with bridge. Bridge is a really good card in the deck on its own. I don't know if I like a full playset in the MD because they exile when a creature your opponent controls dies. So you really only want 1 in the yard at a time unless you're playing against a deck with few creatures. Personally I run 1 MD with another 1-2 in the sb.
It's also noteworthy that bridge gives you extra game against Graf diggers cage as well
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Burning Inquiry still remains an excellent card in my deck I am not sure what you guys are experiencing when your playing it but I am always happy to have it in hand. If BI is your only enabler sure you mull, however If shriekhorn, tormenting voice are your only enabler its a mull as well. BI is a blow out as a turn 2 play with dredgers in the yard, theres not a better card you could play IMO. Unless a conflagrate is needed to slow down a board.
Tryring to dig a sideboard card just to have it discarded by the random clause is something that can make someone want to tear the card in half. (personal experience)
Also, I fail to see how it is “the best thing to be doing at turn 2”, unless you have 3 dredgers on the grave (a very uncommon scenario on T2), it’s extra value compared to faithless looting is marginal (You get an extra card, but run the risk of discarding unwanted cards), with 1 dredger on the grave it’s not even much better than tormenting voice (and can be a lot worse discarding wrong cards). Yes, it can be the perfect thing, but it can also screw you pretty bad.
Not to mention that it is not a T1 play. It’s not on the same league as faithless looting, insolent neonate and shriekhorn, those are T1 enablers. Inquiry is on the same league as Tormenting Voice. It’s only better when you have 2 dredgers on the grave, wich is not the most common scenario. But inquiry is worse in terms of consistency, and it’s not very uncommon to discard/keep unwanted cards. If you hand has lands and dredge cards you always want to discard dredges and keep lands, but it can backfire on the random clause.
And depending on your hand, you can keep a hand with only Tormenting Voice, But a hand with only inquiry is almost never keepable. Even a hand with 2 lands, 1 inquiry and the rest of dredge cards, and it still has the chance of backfire if you cast on turn 2 (you can draw 3 lands and discard the 3 lands)
Maybe you’re on the good side of the inquiry variance and not discarding the wrong cards to it. But it’s randomness can be an issue to a deck that is only “ok” in terms of consisten
I think we must be playing different decks I never cast BI to look for cards I am playing dredge I want to dredge cards, Turn 2 I play a land play BI and dredge normally its set up turn 1 to have at least one dredger in the yard and pretty good chance you hit another with first dredge on BI. After I have two lands on that field there is nothing in my hand I want to keep so BIs random discard is really a non issue. My sideboard is full of stuff that you can play from the GY the only card is vengeful pharaoh that if I hit it with BI and then don't discard it. BI is almost always worse for our opponents then it is for us on the discard end. Shriekhorn is 6 cards in the yard (all random)takes 3 rounds. BI is 3-18 can be done on t2 and then still have mana open to play something else. Honestly what are we even arguing about I honestly cant fathom how you all don't see BI as a better card. I am however play testing both but my deck will always contain some number of BIs.
The main problem I see with Burning Inquiry is with the relatively low density of quality dredgers (only 8 plus loams), it's not likely enough to be able to consistently set up a turn 2 Inquiry to blast through your deck to make it worth playing imo. Sometimes you draw a hand with two lands, a dredger, a neonate and an inquiry and you T4 them no problem, but a lot of the time Inquiry is your only enabler and you're forced to mulligan. If we had a one mana discard outlet creature in the style of Putrid Imp or Tireless Tribe, we'd instantly cut out all Shriekhorns and probably all Tormenting Voices to play 4 Inquiry and play 4 thugs to capitalise on it better, but until then I think it's probably best to stick with the slower but more consistent enablers. We're still fast enough to beat a lot of modern decks with tormenting voice and shriekhorn
Don't know why you're concerned about discarding sideboard cards to inquiry though, it should be the first card you side out imo
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Dredge (117-70 W/L in games) (Pre-GGT ban: 103-70 W/L in games)
I think we must be playing different decks I never cast BI to look for cards I am playing dredge I want to dredge cards, Turn 2 I play a land play BI and dredge normally its set up turn 1 to have at least one dredger in the yard and pretty good chance you hit another with first dredge on BI.
So you're just assuming the best case scenario, where you wlaways have a T1 enabler that always throw 2 or more dedge cards on the grave so inquiry can be always better than Tormenting Voice.
Analyzing card efficiency by the best case scenarios has been proved several times to be wrong (unless this best case scenario wins the game on the spot, wich is not the case here).
Also, you're assuming that you never will need to dig for answers... where you play people don't use grave hate sideboard? Or you're again assuming the best case scenario where you will always have the anti hate card when you need so you don't need to dig for it?
Shriekhorn is 6 cards in the yard (all random)takes 3 rounds. BI is 3-18 can be done on t2 and then still have mana open to play something else.
But shriekhorn is a Turn 1 play, while Inquiry is horrendous at turn 1. All your scenarios are made with the assumption that you always have a T1 enabler but with only 8 turn 1 enablers, it's pretty optmistic to think that you always have one available. Also you're assuming that you always hit 2+ dredgers with it (because dredging only once is not much better than Tormenting Voice).
And with shiriekhorn you start the turn with 4 cards on the grave, so if a single dredge is among them, you will get to the main phase with 8-9 cards on the grave with all open mana.
Also you're assuming that what you discard doesn't matter, but you don't want to discard lands at the early turns while keeping dredge cards on the hand (because this happens with inquiry) neither want to discard some important cards, such as SB cards that can't be used from the grave (or that can, but won't be usable once the opponent plays their hate).
Honestly what are we even arguing about I honestly cant fathom how you all don't see BI as a better card.
I can answer that with a two words: random discard. Like I said, maybe you're on the good side of the random clause. But as someone that has been on the bad side of it more than I would like, I really think that inquiry is bad, very bad.
Alright I'm fully behind this deck now. I was playing a random game against super friends, and was horribly screwed. I took a dumb opener, since I was cocky and a game up.
I ended up beating an Ajani, gideon, elspeth, Xenagos, and Gurrak that was out, by main phase 2 bringing back ghasts, which brought all the prized to join my haunted dead and narcamemba, then loam conflaged all the blockers, and devil unearthing for over kill.
I was litterally down the whole game, but the deck as able to support me getting mana screwed, missing dredges, and being blasted with turn after turn of walkers's and their tokens through sheer card draw and toolboxing. That SHOULDNT happen. I was out card advantaging a deck that was casting 4ish "free" spells a turn through the walkers abilities. The tools are clearly here.
Inquiry is not bad, this card has very high powerlevel but the problem is consistency - in modern we don't have enough enough turn 1 discard outlets to support Inquiry. Also note that unlike in Legacy version we are forced to use lands so randomness will be so much painful for us. It's better to play safe and always do good but not broken stuff then sometimes go wild and sometimes fizzle horribly.
I could have sworn I saw Lantern's list up here for a hot minute - what happened? lol
How has collective brutality been working for you?
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Legacy:B The Gate // B Pox Modern:RGB Dredge // RBG Goblins // B The Gate // UBR Tezz AoB Control // RBG Prison Pox EDH:RBU Thraximundar // R Norin the Wary // RWB Kaalia of the Vast // BUR Grixis Combos // BU Gisa and Geralf Tribal Tiny Leaders:BUW Sydri, Galvanic Genius // R Feldon of the Third Path
I guess we just agree to disagree my win rate with my BI deck is 76% out of 87 rounds so my numbers are very favorable. I am not suggesting shriekhorns a bad card I am saying BI needs a place in the deck for what it can do. I play 2 loams and 2 darkblasts 2 dakmors so dredging really has never been an issue for me I would say its rare I don't have a turn 2 dredge. I mull a lot yes but then this is a deck that you should be mulling a lot with. If people are running into issues I would suggest they aren't mulling effectively. I do run into graveyard hate frequently as I play online and it competitive events and the best plan is to ignore it and go on consistently dredging. I do side in ancient grudges sometimes, but majority of my sideboard is dedicated to the tough matches like deaths shadow zoo. I personally think BI is one of our best cards against combo decks as you almost always get something they need. Ad Naus is a tough match without it unless your relying on sideboarding in thoughtseizes and then just hoping for a 1 of 4 to be in your opening hand and that you have acquired black mana essentially meaning you need green red and black mana to be effective. I know you guys don't like the random clause but with a deck like dredge its discard 3 cards in your hand you don't need vs discarding 3 cards in opponents hand that they more then likely need because they kept the hand. Anywho my testing and results heavily favor the use of BI but I'm don't talking about it. The decks good and I know many people putting up great results with dredge are using BIs very effectively.
I could have sworn I saw Lantern's list up here for a hot minute - what happened? lol
How has collective brutality been working for you?
Click back a page (post #455).
I love Burning Inquiry as a card (have always wanted a deck that could use it) but I have to agree that the random discard is too variable for a deck that needs things to align on the early turns. For that reason, I'm trying out Shriekhorn and a couple Tormenting Voice (either a 4-2 split or 3-3 split) because those are more consistent options, albeit less explosive.
I guess we just agree to disagree my win rate with my BI deck is 76% out of 87 rounds so my numbers are very favorable. I am not suggesting shriekhorns a bad card I am saying BI needs a place in the deck for what it can do.
The point is that the deck don't *NEED* it. It's your choice to use, and good if it not screwing you. But if there is something this deck don't need is MORE inconsistency. And this is what inquiry is: inconsistent. It can be the best thing, it can be the worse. the problem is that a good part of being bad or good is not up to your decisions, but to a gamble. The deck has enough gamble running on to "need" another one.
I do run into graveyard hate frequently as I play online and it competitive events and the best plan is to ignore it and go on consistently dredging.
Also "the best plan is to ignore it and consistently dedgring"... how do you dredge over a T0 Leyline or T2 Rest in Peace on the draw? Don't see those? Very lucky of you.
The decks good and I know many people putting up great results with dredge are using BIs very effectively.
The opposite is also true. People not using are also putting good results. The way you saying you're implying that the deck is worse without it, wich is simply not true. The deck can do as good, or better without it.
According to MTG top 8 data, there was 6 deck that top 8 on events with 2 or more stars, from those 6, 4 don’t use Inquiry.
According to mtg goldfish, only 24% of the dredge decks runs Inquiry.
So I don’t see how the deck “needs” inquiry to be better, using it is a personal choice and the data says that there are more succesful decks not running it than running.
I could have sworn I saw Lantern's list up here for a hot minute - what happened? lol
How has collective brutality been working for you?
Back a page. Its been fine in opener. Some times I wish I had a single thug to grab it back outta the grave, but without reliable sacs in the deck (maybe it works better in the bridge version? I havent played it) Its one of those, if it was in my hand then its been awesome deals. With the deck having 4 faithless, 4 Neonate, 2 voice, Ive been pretty happy with my draw/dredge rates. 10 seems to be the magic number in that deck, so that leaves me with my flex spell slots, and colective has done a fine enough job there.
Again, in my opener? Its awesome! slightly above darkblast and lightning axe, since it lets me discard more than axe, and kill basically the same things as darkblast. Its worse at killing than axe, and worse once in the grave as darkblast, so I suppose Id rate them all evenly overall. I might cut it for a main deck Devil to try, since thats "always on" because of milling.
I guess we just agree to disagree my win rate with my BI deck is 76% out of 87 rounds so my numbers are very favorable. I am not suggesting shriekhorns a bad card I am saying BI needs a place in the deck for what it can do.
The point is that the deck don't *NEED* it. It's your choice to use, and good if it not screwing you. But if there is something this deck don't need is MORE inconsistency. And this is what inquiry is: inconsistent. It can be the best thing, it can be the worse. the problem is that a good part of being bad or good is not up to your decisions, but to a gamble. The deck has enough gamble running on to "need" another one.
I do run into graveyard hate frequently as I play online and it competitive events and the best plan is to ignore it and go on consistently dredging.
Also "the best plan is to ignore it and consistently dedgring"... how do you dredge over a T0 Leyline or T2 Rest in Peace on the draw? Don't see those? Very lucky of you.
The decks good and I know many people putting up great results with dredge are using BIs very effectively.
The opposite is also true. People not using are also putting good results. The way you saying you're implying that the deck is worse without it, wich is simply not true. The deck can do as good, or better without it.
According to MTG top 8 data, there was 6 deck that top 8 on events with 2 or more stars, from those 6, 4 don’t use Inquiry.
According to mtg goldfish, only 24% of the dredge decks runs Inquiry.
So I don’t see how the deck “needs” inquiry to be better, using it is a personal choice and the data says that there are more succesful decks not running it than running.
Right, getting smashed by a turn 2 rip is pretty aweful. But I've actually played around it while dredging before. Often in my games, I'll start with a dredge, just to ensure the oppoenent MUST RiP me, but not over extend into the yard. Then, if no RiP happenes, I'll get as much value out of the yard while still playing around it. Getting back ghasts, or prized, or haunted dead, maybe even loaming to get my hand lands 4-5. Generally if you get hit with RIP by a control deck but you slipped out 2-3 creatures, you can win. At least, thats how I've been working with RiP in mind. I'm still dredging, but alot more carefully.
Lantern, ive been testing your list and I have to say I like it a lot. The ratios seem good for dredge, enablers, and payoff. The two haunted dead add a lot to the deck.
The only change I would make is to subtract a mountain and add back the fourth imp. Sometimes i found a shortage of quality dredgers.
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... have a T1 enabler that always throw 2 or more dedge cards on the grave so inquiry can be always better than Tormenting Voice....
Do you know that when you play burning inquiry you can dredge the second and third draw using the cards that you just dredged in the first draw? So, you don't need 2~3 dredgers on your yard when you play burning inquiry, you just need one dredger and a good amount of dredgers on your deck.
I made 10x0 in a pptq using 14 dredgers and 13 enablers (loothing, neonate, 2 inquiry and 3 shriekhorn). I'm not saying inquiry is the best possible card, but I can say that it is not as bad as you guys are saying. It has pro and cons comparing to tormenting voice.
Sometimes, people just bash the card without testing it, this was me when I first saw shriekhorn, but after using it I saw how interesting the card can be on this deck.
For me burning inquiry is like, "win target game if you have at lest one dredge 5~6 on your yard and if you aren't unlucky". That is why I have two on my list. Tormenting voice is more consistence, but it is also way slower because you lose the bloodghast trigger.
I think the point they're trying to make is that you won't always have burning inquiry as your second enabler. A lot of games you'll only get 1 enabler in your starting hand. What if you cast inquiry and you discard your second land? What if your first land doesn't produce green? now you can't dredge into dakmor salvage into loam to keep your land drops coming. What if you grow a pair and roll the dice with 2 bloodghasts and a land in your hand with some other junk and discard the land and none of the bloodghasts?
For the most part this deck wants most of it's cards in the gy, but there are a lot of cards that you have to keep in your hand or be able to sequence. Burning inquiry can seriously hinder those plans. If you're playing burning inquiry for ANY reason, it's the fact that it can really mess your opponent up a lot worse than you. Just be ok with the fact that you're going to lose a game or 2 to bad inquiry beats over the course of a tournament. Personally I'm not ok with that and I'm pretty sure anyone who wants to play a competitive tournament with at least 5 rounds isn't ok with it either.
Anyway, in other news I really like the protection that greater gargadon provides against stuff like anger of the gods and path to exile and such. I don't really like the gargadon/bridge plan going into an open field though (bridge is really bad in the aggressive matchups in my experience) So I'm running 3 in the SB with another bridge to bring in against stuff like jund and control decks:
I also dropped a vengeful pharaoh for a ghost quarter main. Not really sure how I'm going to like that but I'm trying it right now. It's really good against tron and even the mirror oddly enough. It's also really good against suicide zoo and a slew of other decks with really heavy color requirments. Even against burn you can keep them off of atarka's command or boros charm.
So the question was raised about a page back about tron. I just dredged like normal and won pretty easily every time.
this is how some games are going to go, but GR tron is pretty consistent at assembling tron at least by turn 4. Wurmcoil, Ugin, and ulamog are all decently good against us. Stuff like oblivion stone and karn doesn't do much.
doesn't tron play 4 relics? post-board that seems pretty tough to beat if they see a few of them.
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Current standard deck:
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Modern:
Twinning End
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4 Golgari Grave-Troll
3 Greater Gargadon
4 Insolent Neonate
4 Narcomoeba
4 Prized Amalgam
4 Stinkweed Imp
1 haunted dead
3 Mountain
2 Blood Crypt
2 Dakmor Salvage
2 Mana Confluence
2 Copperline Gorge
2 Stomping Ground
4 Wooded Foothills
2 bloodstained mire
4 Bridge from Below
1 Life from the loam
4 Faithless Looting
2 Darkblast
2 Gnaw to the Bone
3 Engineered Explosives
3 Thoughtseize
2 lightning axe
I almost never preferred to dredge a thug over an imp, and since the thug ability is kind of not too good enough i think, i switched it out. This was real early in testing, now i know how the deck works, so i probably am missing out. i MIGHT retry the thug and make a 2-2 split thug and imp.
1 loam is amazingly... not too few. After playing with conflagrate lists, i was under the impression that i needed a minimum of 2 to work, but one has been working pretty well. It´s not uncommon to only have 2-3 lands all game, but against some matches you kind of have to switch gears at times, and it´s possible to stall until then.
I actually cut 1 gargadon, because i needed a slot for haunted dead. I might trim a land instead, in which case i kind of want another loam. I´ll have to see. 3 gargadon has felt pretty good too. This list only runs 4 looting as card draw, so it´s less likely you´ll get to see extra copies of the card, which is a shame. Gargadon is a card you´d like to see 1 copy of every game, i think 3 copies is fine.
@Jwelt
So, the most common thing i do when i don´t have a gargadon in the opening is: just keep going. People are forgetting that shriekhorn makes it so that the deck (in this case) can have 12 1 mana enablers, that´s a lot of milling. You don´t NEED the gargadon. It´s great when you have it, but not game over if you don´t. The list added pay off cards in the form of bridge from below, so that milling is more attractive. Bridge is inherently broken in this deck, and modern is about that. It blanks targeted removal, makes trading go in your favor, completely blanks wraths (completely), most players kinda don´t get how it works and is an built in "free" win con. Gargadon makes the card go over the top of course (like it´s not even fun), but it´s still a great card to mill over. So the plan without the gargadon is to kinda...just keep going. Most main decks arent built to deal with this configuration, most removal that targets our creatures are dead cards because of the nature of the deck. Control decks are a joke because of this. You don´t even have to do anything. Don´t think i´ve lost a game against U based control decks yet, with or without gargadon
@khaosknight69
Game 1 at least. Although it depends if they have ugin. Basically you can sooooort of power through a karn, an oblivion stone or a wurmcoil... but ugin is lights out unless you can fetch 2nd main, return 2 bloodghast and 2 amalgam (something along those lines), but usually that won´t be the safest plan g2 since they have relics and cages. Overall, pretty tough. I suppose you can not recur your narcomoebas and such, and conflagrate for a bunch, but that´s to deal with 1 card. I´ve had a lot of problems beating tron.
A huge thanks to Argetlam and the guys at Hakai studios for this awesome banner
Also, I fail to see how it is “the best thing to be doing at turn 2”, unless you have 3 dredgers on the grave (a very uncommon scenario on T2), it’s extra value compared to faithless looting is marginal (You get an extra card, but run the risk of discarding unwanted cards), with 1 dredger on the grave it’s not even much better than tormenting voice (and can be a lot worse discarding wrong cards). Yes, it can be the perfect thing, but it can also screw you pretty bad.
Not to mention that it is not a T1 play. It’s not on the same league as faithless looting, insolent neonate and shriekhorn, those are T1 enablers. Inquiry is on the same league as Tormenting Voice. It’s only better when you have 2 dredgers on the grave, wich is not the most common scenario. But inquiry is worse in terms of consistency, and it’s not very uncommon to discard/keep unwanted cards. If you hand has lands and dredge cards you always want to discard dredges and keep lands, but it can backfire on the random clause.
And depending on your hand, you can keep a hand with only Tormenting Voice, But a hand with only inquiry is almost never keepable. Even a hand with 2 lands, 1 inquiry and the rest of dredge cards, and it still has the chance of backfire if you cast on turn 2 (you can draw 3 lands and discard the 3 lands)
Maybe you’re on the good side of the inquiry variance and not discarding the wrong cards to it. But it’s randomness can be an issue to a deck that is only “ok” in terms of consistency.
On Tron, I really wanted to run 2 Ghost Quarter main, it not only slow tron, but hit infect/affinity manlands, and you can even lock some more greedy decks with Loam, but the manabase is being so good right now that I don't want to mess with it.
And now that wizards set the red looting identity as "discard before draw" I hope they do a reverse faithless looting so we can ditch all those "not-so-good-enablers-but-its-all-we-have"
It's also noteworthy that bridge gives you extra game against Graf diggers cage as well
Modern:
Twinning End
Commander:
Mayael the Anema
I think we must be playing different decks I never cast BI to look for cards I am playing dredge I want to dredge cards, Turn 2 I play a land play BI and dredge normally its set up turn 1 to have at least one dredger in the yard and pretty good chance you hit another with first dredge on BI. After I have two lands on that field there is nothing in my hand I want to keep so BIs random discard is really a non issue. My sideboard is full of stuff that you can play from the GY the only card is vengeful pharaoh that if I hit it with BI and then don't discard it. BI is almost always worse for our opponents then it is for us on the discard end. Shriekhorn is 6 cards in the yard (all random)takes 3 rounds. BI is 3-18 can be done on t2 and then still have mana open to play something else. Honestly what are we even arguing about I honestly cant fathom how you all don't see BI as a better card. I am however play testing both but my deck will always contain some number of BIs.
Don't know why you're concerned about discarding sideboard cards to inquiry though, it should be the first card you side out imo
Dredge (117-70 W/L in games) (Pre-GGT ban: 103-70 W/L in games)
Analyzing card efficiency by the best case scenarios has been proved several times to be wrong (unless this best case scenario wins the game on the spot, wich is not the case here).
Also, you're assuming that you never will need to dig for answers... where you play people don't use grave hate sideboard? Or you're again assuming the best case scenario where you will always have the anti hate card when you need so you don't need to dig for it?
But shriekhorn is a Turn 1 play, while Inquiry is horrendous at turn 1. All your scenarios are made with the assumption that you always have a T1 enabler but with only 8 turn 1 enablers, it's pretty optmistic to think that you always have one available. Also you're assuming that you always hit 2+ dredgers with it (because dredging only once is not much better than Tormenting Voice).
And with shiriekhorn you start the turn with 4 cards on the grave, so if a single dredge is among them, you will get to the main phase with 8-9 cards on the grave with all open mana.
Also you're assuming that what you discard doesn't matter, but you don't want to discard lands at the early turns while keeping dredge cards on the hand (because this happens with inquiry) neither want to discard some important cards, such as SB cards that can't be used from the grave (or that can, but won't be usable once the opponent plays their hate).
I can answer that with a two words: random discard. Like I said, maybe you're on the good side of the random clause. But as someone that has been on the bad side of it more than I would like, I really think that inquiry is bad, very bad.
I ended up beating an Ajani, gideon, elspeth, Xenagos, and Gurrak that was out, by main phase 2 bringing back ghasts, which brought all the prized to join my haunted dead and narcamemba, then loam conflaged all the blockers, and devil unearthing for over kill.
I was litterally down the whole game, but the deck as able to support me getting mana screwed, missing dredges, and being blasted with turn after turn of walkers's and their tokens through sheer card draw and toolboxing. That SHOULDNT happen. I was out card advantaging a deck that was casting 4ish "free" spells a turn through the walkers abilities. The tools are clearly here.
How has collective brutality been working for you?
Modern: RGB Dredge // RBG Goblins // B The Gate // UBR Tezz AoB Control // RBG Prison Pox
EDH: RBU Thraximundar // R Norin the Wary // RWB Kaalia of the Vast // BUR Grixis Combos // BU Gisa and Geralf Tribal
Tiny Leaders: BUW Sydri, Galvanic Genius // R Feldon of the Third Path
Projects:
Gisa and Geralf Extreme-Tribal EDH
Esper Eldrazi Processor Control
Brewing with Kuldotha Forgemaster
Primer: "The Gate" - Mono Black in Modern
Modern Prison Pox - building a better plague
Click back a page (post #455).
I love Burning Inquiry as a card (have always wanted a deck that could use it) but I have to agree that the random discard is too variable for a deck that needs things to align on the early turns. For that reason, I'm trying out Shriekhorn and a couple Tormenting Voice (either a 4-2 split or 3-3 split) because those are more consistent options, albeit less explosive.
Modern:
Dredge | Restore Balance | Titanshift
My [360][Unpowered][Modern-Frame] Cube
Also "the best plan is to ignore it and consistently dedgring"... how do you dredge over a T0 Leyline or T2 Rest in Peace on the draw? Don't see those? Very lucky of you.
The opposite is also true. People not using are also putting good results. The way you saying you're implying that the deck is worse without it, wich is simply not true. The deck can do as good, or better without it.
According to MTG top 8 data, there was 6 deck that top 8 on events with 2 or more stars, from those 6, 4 don’t use Inquiry.
According to mtg goldfish, only 24% of the dredge decks runs Inquiry.
So I don’t see how the deck “needs” inquiry to be better, using it is a personal choice and the data says that there are more succesful decks not running it than running.
Again, in my opener? Its awesome! slightly above darkblast and lightning axe, since it lets me discard more than axe, and kill basically the same things as darkblast. Its worse at killing than axe, and worse once in the grave as darkblast, so I suppose Id rate them all evenly overall. I might cut it for a main deck Devil to try, since thats "always on" because of milling.
Right, getting smashed by a turn 2 rip is pretty aweful. But I've actually played around it while dredging before. Often in my games, I'll start with a dredge, just to ensure the oppoenent MUST RiP me, but not over extend into the yard. Then, if no RiP happenes, I'll get as much value out of the yard while still playing around it. Getting back ghasts, or prized, or haunted dead, maybe even loaming to get my hand lands 4-5. Generally if you get hit with RIP by a control deck but you slipped out 2-3 creatures, you can win. At least, thats how I've been working with RiP in mind. I'm still dredging, but alot more carefully.
The only change I would make is to subtract a mountain and add back the fourth imp. Sometimes i found a shortage of quality dredgers.
Modern: RGB Dredge // RBG Goblins // B The Gate // UBR Tezz AoB Control // RBG Prison Pox
EDH: RBU Thraximundar // R Norin the Wary // RWB Kaalia of the Vast // BUR Grixis Combos // BU Gisa and Geralf Tribal
Tiny Leaders: BUW Sydri, Galvanic Genius // R Feldon of the Third Path
Projects:
Gisa and Geralf Extreme-Tribal EDH
Esper Eldrazi Processor Control
Brewing with Kuldotha Forgemaster
Primer: "The Gate" - Mono Black in Modern
Modern Prison Pox - building a better plague
Do you know that when you play burning inquiry you can dredge the second and third draw using the cards that you just dredged in the first draw? So, you don't need 2~3 dredgers on your yard when you play burning inquiry, you just need one dredger and a good amount of dredgers on your deck.
I made 10x0 in a pptq using 14 dredgers and 13 enablers (loothing, neonate, 2 inquiry and 3 shriekhorn). I'm not saying inquiry is the best possible card, but I can say that it is not as bad as you guys are saying. It has pro and cons comparing to tormenting voice.
Sometimes, people just bash the card without testing it, this was me when I first saw shriekhorn, but after using it I saw how interesting the card can be on this deck.
For me burning inquiry is like, "win target game if you have at lest one dredge 5~6 on your yard and if you aren't unlucky". That is why I have two on my list. Tormenting voice is more consistence, but it is also way slower because you lose the bloodghast trigger.
I think the point they're trying to make is that you won't always have burning inquiry as your second enabler. A lot of games you'll only get 1 enabler in your starting hand. What if you cast inquiry and you discard your second land? What if your first land doesn't produce green? now you can't dredge into dakmor salvage into loam to keep your land drops coming. What if you grow a pair and roll the dice with 2 bloodghasts and a land in your hand with some other junk and discard the land and none of the bloodghasts?
For the most part this deck wants most of it's cards in the gy, but there are a lot of cards that you have to keep in your hand or be able to sequence. Burning inquiry can seriously hinder those plans. If you're playing burning inquiry for ANY reason, it's the fact that it can really mess your opponent up a lot worse than you. Just be ok with the fact that you're going to lose a game or 2 to bad inquiry beats over the course of a tournament. Personally I'm not ok with that and I'm pretty sure anyone who wants to play a competitive tournament with at least 5 rounds isn't ok with it either.
Anyway, in other news I really like the protection that greater gargadon provides against stuff like anger of the gods and path to exile and such. I don't really like the gargadon/bridge plan going into an open field though (bridge is really bad in the aggressive matchups in my experience) So I'm running 3 in the SB with another bridge to bring in against stuff like jund and control decks:
4 insolent neonate
4 golgari grave troll
4 stinkweed imp
4 prized amalgam
4 narcomoeba
1 haunted dead
1 scourge devil
1 vengeful pharaoh
3 life from the loam
4 faithless looting
2 conflagrate
4 shriekhorn
1 bridge from below
4 mana confluence
4 gemstone cavern
4 copperline gorge
2 mountain
3 dakmor salvage
1 ghost quarter
3 ancient grudge
1 ray of revelation
1 memory's journey
2 gnaw to the bone
3 greater gargadon
3 lightning axe
1 bridge from below
1 bojuka bog
I also dropped a vengeful pharaoh for a ghost quarter main. Not really sure how I'm going to like that but I'm trying it right now. It's really good against tron and even the mirror oddly enough. It's also really good against suicide zoo and a slew of other decks with really heavy color requirments. Even against burn you can keep them off of atarka's command or boros charm.
Modern:
Twinning End
Commander:
Mayael the Anema
this is how some games are going to go, but GR tron is pretty consistent at assembling tron at least by turn 4. Wurmcoil, Ugin, and ulamog are all decently good against us. Stuff like oblivion stone and karn doesn't do much.
doesn't tron play 4 relics? post-board that seems pretty tough to beat if they see a few of them.
Modern:
Twinning End
Commander:
Mayael the Anema